Archive | Commentary

  Since the 1990s, at least 40 million farmers in China have lost their land. This process is being driven by what the article below calls the “bureaucratic-commercial interest group.” Local bureaucrats need to have a “good record” if they are to advance in their careers. A “good record” implies rapid GDP growth from industry, […]

For years, U.S. political and economic leaders saw themselves in mortal combat with communist nations for the allegiance of peoples at home and abroad. The pressure of being in competition with an alternative economic system set limits on how thoroughly Western leaders dared to mistreat their own working populations. Indeed, during the Cold War, pains […]

  Good morning. President Hargrove, leaders, and members of the Canadian Auto Workers, I wish to thank you very much for inviting me to speak with you today. This is a great honor and I have been looking forward to this opportunity. If all goes according to some plans, by the end of July, the […]

At noon on a beautiful June day in suburban Minneapolis, eighty-five women and men streamed out of the U.S. West corporate “campus” building, each one carrying a pink, lime green, or lemon yellow square. Each square bore a single letter in black paint. Laughing, they lined up in a particular order, spelling out “D-O-W-N-S-I-Z-I-N-G A-T  […]

It’s fashionable on the Left to look down one’s nose at the world of sports. To do so, according to Dave Zirin, would be to miss a chance at both inspiration and solidarity. Zirin’s new book, What’s My Name, Fool! Sports and Resistance in the United States creates a much-needed bridge between the political and […]

Every now and then I see a slogan that’s credited to Ben Cohen, of Ben and Jerry’s ice cream: “If it’s not fun, why do it?” It seems like the worst part of the sixties in seven words — the mindless hedonism and self-involvement that made the counter-culture such fertile terrain for commodification. We serious […]

The battle over labor’s future is heading toward a showdown at the AFL-CIO Convention, beginning Monday July 25th in Chicago. But the confrontation pitting a team of insurgent unions led by the Service Employees International Union against the AFL-CIO establishment is shaping up to be organizationally bloody, but spiritually bloodless. We’re fighting for the heart […]

[John Mage’s Note: A version of the following article appeared in German in the weekly Freitag on July 8, 2005. On July 21, the German president agreed to the call for new elections in the fall. The latest polls indicate that support for the new Left Party continues to rise and is now at twelve […]

“Hello, Garci. . . . Will I win by one million votes?” is ringing on cellphones throughout the Philippines.  It is the taped voice of President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo talking with commissioner of elections Virgilio Garcillano, nicknamed “Garci” in May 2004 before the election results were announced.  Arroyo did, in fact, win by a million […]

Freedom of the press, like freedom of speech, is sacred to most of us, limited as it is in a capitalist society in which the press is free only if you own one.  Today, Judith Miller of the New York Times is considered a martyr for freedom of the press. The emblematic defense of reporters’ […]

I am hereby presenting my note of dissent on the wrong charges and wrong actions, which are against the interest of the Party and the revolution, against Com.Laldhwaj, Com.Rahul (Alternate PBM) and Com.Ashok (PBM) by the recently concluded meeting of the politbureau of our glorious Party, I request you to register this formally in the records of the Party and circulate it throughout the Party rank and file in a proper manner

We have released this communiqué to clarify our views about the concerns raised from different quarters about our party’s internal life and some of the questions of its policies since some time

Party central Headquarters all of a sudden received a letter of serious nature from comrade Laldhoj, the standing committee member of politburo, in a very sensitive moment when the entire rank of our great and glorious party was going to implement the first historic plan of counter offensive against enemy according to the decisions taken up by the last Central Committee meeting. Party centre would like to clarify the entire party rank on the nature and the questions put forward in it as follows.

The basic questions on which the top leadership of our great and glorious Party, the CPN (Maoist), have had a debate and relative agreement but recurring dispute in one form or other for a long time, can be categorised as (i). ideological/philosophical questions (ii). politico-military questions (iii). organisational questions, and (iv) cultural questions. It is imperative to have a wide inner-Party debate on these questions and arrive at correct revolutionary conclusions

Speaking from Cuba, where she was granted asylum after escaping from a US prison in 1979, Assata Shakur, the alleged “Bandit Queen” of the now defunct Black Liberation Army, announced today that she would hand over one million “HANDS OFF ASSATA” t-shirts to the person or persons who successfully apprehend US Secretary of Defense Donald […]

Solo, Frente a luces ajenas Oye otras voces calladas, distantes: Este puente te lleva al olvido, Te cambia de nombre. Ya nada será tuyo Escucha el sonido del tren que se aleja, El viento que roza la tarde. Ya nada será tuyo Y cuando vuelvas Traerás en las uñas, en el tacto, en tu aliento, […]

Vigilantism along the U.S.-Mexico border, which dates back to the U.S. conquest of Mexico, refuses to die.  The latest vigilante group, the Minuteman Civil Defense Corps, claims 15,000 volunteers willing to patrol the border in Texas, New Mexico, Arizona, and California.  During April, the group staged a border watch in southern Arizona to stop illegal […]

Journalism professor, columnist and author Walt Brasch began writing his essential new book, America’s Unpatriotic Acts, shortly after Congress passed the USA PATRIOT Act. “By exposure of what the federal government has done to our Constitutional rights during the past four years,” he explains, “I hope the people will fully understand that the claims by […]

This past winter we heard reports of a heated dispute within the leadership of the Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist), the guiding party of the revolutionary struggle in Nepal. The old regime in Nepal, a brutal military dictatorship under King Gyanendra Shah, on February 1st, 2005, carried out a coup against the remnants of legality within that part of the country it still controlled—the central valley of Nepal (containing the capital Kathmandu), and the area immediately surrounding the army’s fortified bases elsewhere, primarily in district towns. The rest of the country has been liberated, and is self-governing under revolutionary leadership, with the CPN(M) playing the leading role. But Nepal’s limited communication links with the rest of the world are concentrated in Kathmandu, and the royal military government was able to sever all links not under its control at the time of the February 1st coup. Under these circumstances it was not possible to determine the trustworthiness of the various reports of the dispute with the CPN(M) leadership

[The following is a speech delivered by Jerry Tucker on March 12, 2005 at the conference on “Work and Social Movements in the United States” at University of Paris – Sorbonne (March 10-12, 2005). Tucker will report daily on the AFL-CIO 2005 convention in Chicago on July 25-28. — Ed.] There is today a rare […]