Martin Wolf described it as “a bloodbath.” The Financial Times editorial called it a “chilling read.” Britain’s budget is one of austerity, the likes of which has not been seen in generations. A 25 per cent cut in public spending; a quarter of a million or more public sector jobs to be slashed. It […]
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Monthly Review Magazine
Climate Crisis: A Symptom of the Development Model of the World Capitalist System
Speech to the Panel on Structural Causes of Climate Change, World Peoples’ Conference on Climate Change and the Rights of Mother Earth, Cochabamba, Bolivia, April 20, 2010 Good afternoon, compañero presidente Evo Morales, thank you for this initiative, for this invitation, and for your hospitality. Thanks to the people of Bolivia and the people […]
Honduras: One Year after the Coup, Washington Continues to Fight against Democracy
At dawn one year ago, on June 28, soldiers invaded the home of Honduran President Mel Zelaya and flew him to Costa Rica. It was a frightening throwback to the days when military men, backed by a local oligarchy and often the United States, could overturn the results of democratic elections. It would also turn […]
India: The Oil Price Hike
What on earth are they thinking? In the midst of an almost unprecedented and continuous increase in the price of necessities, which is increasingly translating into generalised inflation, the UPA government has chosen to “free” the price of petroleum products, to bring them in line with international prices. What this translates into is a significant […]
Expelling Palestinians from Jerusalem: The Case of Four Hamas Politicians
Israeli human-rights groups and Mahmoud Abbas, the president of the Palestinian Authority, have condemned a decision by Israel to expel four Palestinian politicians from East Jerusalem by the end of this week. The Israeli government revoked their residency rights in Jerusalem a few weeks ago, after claiming they were “in breach of trust” for belonging […]
Exploitation and Exclusion: The International Struggle
Everyone who knows Hari knows that his life has been one of struggle against imperialism and in support of the right of the oppressed to struggle for a decent life. His theme, indeed, might be that of the Communist Manifesto‘s assertion that ‘the free development of each is the condition for the free development of […]
Mortgage Applications Index at Lowest Level since 1997
The Case-Shiller 20-City index rose by 0.8 percent in April, the first increase since last September. Prices rose in 18 of the 20 cities, with only New York and Miami reporting price declines. The biggest increases were in Washington, DC, where prices rose by 2.4 percent, San Francisco, with a 2.2 percent increase, and Dallas, […]
Coup Leaders
Eneko Las Heras, born in Caracas in 1963, is a cartoonist based in Spain. This cartoon was published on his blog . . . Y sin embargo se mueve on 1 July 2009. Honduran President Manuel Zelaya Rosales was overthrown by the US-backed military coup of 28 June 2009. “During the six months of the […]
Lieberman’s “Peace” Plan: Strip Palestinians of Citizenship
Avigdor Lieberman, Israel’s far-right foreign minister, set out last week what he called a “blueprint for a resolution to the conflict” with the Palestinians that demands most of the country’s large Palestinian minority be stripped of citizenship and relocated outside Israel’s future borders. Warning Israel faced growing diplomatic pressure for a full withdrawal to the […]
Unions Representing Workers in Canada, Mexico, and U.S. Explore Merger
The merger would create an international union of one million metal workers and miners. The United Steelworkers (USW), which represents 850,000 workers in Canada, the Caribbean, and the United States, and the National Union of Miners and Metal Workers (SNTMMSRM), known as the Mineros, which represents 180,000 workers in Mexico, have announced plans to explore […]
Peace Negotiations
The only kind of Israeli-Palestinian peace negotiations that Obama promotes: one that doesn’t fly, shackled as it is in the ball and chain of settlements. Fahd Bahady is a Syrian cartoonist. This cartoon was first published in his blog on 2 May 2010; it is reproduced here for non-profit educational purposes. The text above is […]
Washington Elite Still Don’t Get Latin America — Will They Ever?
In the film Guantanamera, the last by renowned Cuban director Tomás Gutierrez Alea, the Yoruba creation myth is presented as a metaphor for the difficulties of bringing about change. In this myth, humans were at first immortal, but the result was that the old suffocated the young, and so death had to be created. Here […]
Robert Samuelson: Economics Is Hard
That seems to be the main point of Robert Samuelson’s column today. It might be a bit easier with a bit more careful thought. For example, Samuelson tells readers that the debt burdens of major countries are rapidly approaching “financial and psychological limits” that prevent further fiscal stimulus. He then cites the 92 percent debt […]
What US Soldiers Say about Afghanistan: We’re Fucking Losing This Thing
“But we’re fucking losing this thing.” — Staff Sergeant Kennith Hicks This video was released by Brave New Films on 26 June 2010. See, also, Michael Hastings, “The Runaway General” (Rolling Stone, 22 June 2010). | Print
Saudi King Abdullah to Meet President Obama: Iran, Iraq, and Palestine on the Agenda
Saudi Arabia’s King Abdullah will come to Washington for a meeting with President Obama on Tuesday; there is little doubt that Iran will be a high-priority topic for discussion between the two leaders. Notwithstanding the extraordinary importance of the U.S.-Saudi relationship, it is striking how relatively few meetings there are between American presidents and Saudi […]
The Excess of the Left in Iran
Maziar Behrooz. Rebels with a Cause: The Failure of the Left in Iran. I.B. Tauris, 2000. The role of the left in the Iranian Revolution is complicated, what Frederic Jameson and Slavoj Žižek would call the ‘vanishing mediator’ of the event. The fact that at their peak Iranian Marxists commanded the loyalty of millions, and […]
Iran Vote Shows China’s Western Drift
This month, the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) passed a resolution to tighten sanctions on Iran, imposing a ban on arms sales and expanding a freeze on assets of the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps in response to the country’s uranium-enrichment activities, which Tehran says are for peaceful purposes but other countries contend are driven […]
Caesarism
Caesarism. Caesar, Napoleon I, Napoleon III, Cromwell, etc. Compile a catalog of historical events which have culminated in a great “heroic” personality. It may be said that caesarism is an expression of a situation in which the forces in struggle are balanced in a catastrophic way, that is, balanced in a way that continuation […]
The Real Meaning of Thermidor
Nevertheless, today we can and must admit that the analogy of Thermidor served to becloud rather than to clarify the question. Thermidor in 1794 produced a shift of power from certain groups in the Convention to other groups, from one section of the victorious “people” to other strata. Was Thermidor counterrevolutionary? The answer to […]
British Columbia’s Fossil Fuel Superpower Ambitions
The province of Alberta is well known as a climate-destroying behemoth. The tar sands developments in the north of that province are the single largest source of greenhouse gas emissions on the planet. Less well known are the ambitions of its neighbouring province, British Columbia. It shares similar fossil fuel reserves and ambitions as Alberta. […]
