Archive | September, 2018

Ignorance is not a crime. And neither is non-vaccination, for now.

This marvelous work of history is a must read for anyone trying to understand the dynamics of slavery in the United States in the pre-Civil War period. Walter Johnson locates slavery as playing a central part in the development of a particularly racialised and oppressive capitalism in the slave states.

The search for explanations of our current political climate, especially the rise of nationalists like Marine LePen in France, Narendra Modi in India, and our own president in the United States, has led pundits to return to the concept of “authoritarian” tendencies as a psychological phenomenon.

A history of the left in the Labour Party highlights the need for a strong extra-parliamentary movement, argues Chris Nineham.

In Syria, the battle for the province of Idlib has begun. Over the course of the past few years, the remnants of the hardened fighters have retreated to this region on the Syria-Turkish border, where they have been under the overall command of an al-Qaeda inspired group.

U.S. establishment liberals are using their opposition to Trump’s military threats as a cover to back economic sanctions currently wrecking the Venezuelan economy, argues Professor Steve Ellner.

Strikes continue to be an effective way for teachers to improve their living and working (and by extension student learning) conditions. And, polls show that a strong majority of parents continue to support them. Popular support for teacher strikes remains strong The education pollster PDK recently asked adults what they thought about teacher salaries and […]

The phrase “a threat to the world” has a hyperlink to an earlier Tharoor piece (3/1/18), which includes the claim, “As many as 4 million Venezuelans—more than 10 percent of the population—have already left the country, according to the Brookings Institution,”

Although a truth of science is not equivalent to the consensus of scientists, neither historically nor now, there are times when scientific facts (or truths) are of such compelling importance that a near consensus of scientific practitioners ought to be regarded as fact. Yes, when I began smoking cigarettes at age fifteen there was something […]

Sagar Abraham-Gonsalves writes about his clawing helplessness as his father, Vernon Gonsalves, was arrested on Tuesday in the Bhima-Koregaon case.

Within days of starting the war, Saudi Arabia imposed a total land, air and sea blockade, along with targeting vital agriculture and food supply infrastructure that sustains life for the 29 million Yemenis—all of which constitute war crimes under international law.

This lack of distinction explains the decline in women’s workforce participation rates. The decline reflects a shift from paid to unpaid work.

The Bharatiya Janata Party-led government and the Hindutvavadi “nationalist” movement’s demonic drive for cultural orthodoxy seems to know no bounds. What is alarming is the former’s support for and complicity in the acts of the latter, as also the Indian state’s control of its “necessary” enemies through the use of state terror, with the category “urban Naxals” singled out in the latest of such drives (in June and August 2018) that otherwise routinely target Muslims, militant oppressed nationalities, and “Maoists.”

Marxists have long understood that the workplace is the primary strategic site of class struggle, and that class struggle is essential for cohering a radicalized working-class majority with the capacity and will to overthrow capitalism in favor of socialism. At the same time, Marxists recognize our moral responsibility to oppose—and the strategic necessity to fight—all forms of exploitation and oppression.

In a September 8 post to the Jacobin  website, Eric Dirnbach announced that “U.S. workers are striking again.”

“The Resistance” is steering so much of the left into a hard-right turn — including even Pacifica’s KPFA Radio-Berkeley.

VA’s Jeanette Charles reviews Maroon Comix, a book that tells the tales of maroons’ fight for freedom and self-determination and their legacy for today’s struggles.

Corporate media just can’t stop cluelessly digging their own grave.

Writer-Activist condemns recent arrests of activists. She says ” I Am a Part of Society, I’m Not a Part of the State”

On 3 September, a four-day legal challenge to the UK’s sovereignty over the Chagos Islands began in the International Court of Justice (ICJ). The islands are part of an archipelago located in the British Indian Ocean Territory (BIOT), and home to U.S. airbase Diego Garcia.