April 2, 2008 — The Department of Justice under the Bush administration continues to manipulate the legal system to keep Dr. Sami Al-Arian imprisoned indefinitely. Sami Al-Arian, a computer engineering professor from Tampa, Florida, was arrested on charges of supporting a designated terrorist organization in 2003. Al-Arian proclaimed his innocence and maintained the charges […]
Geography Archives: Americas
South America, Central America, United States & Canada
Nicaragua: A Sharp Left Turn
MRZine must be commended for its recent publication of Mike Friedman’s interview with Nicaragua’s Comandante Mónica Baltodano. It is especially welcome because there has been a dearth of information and analysis about Nicaragua in the English-language world ever since the 1990 electoral defeat of the revolution. That in some ways is puzzling because the actions […]
Bobby Hutton and Martin Luther King, Jr. — Forty Years On
April 4, 1968 was the day when Martin Luther King, Jr. was killed in Memphis, Tennessee. He had been working with the Memphis sanitation workers in their struggle for better working conditions and a union. The night before his assassination, he gave his speech that ended with the words “But I want you to know […]
Obama, Clinton, and McCain Won’t Save the American Economy
The US media and party election machines have once again transformed the run-up to the US elections into a melodrama. Across the country, party candidates have been swaggering across stages, surrounded by stars and stripes and CNN logos, to spew out the latest piece of propaganda that the spin doctors have managed to conjure up. […]
Ask Ms. Liberty: Advice for the War-Torn
Although it’s been over five years since the United States invaded Iraq, a few non-patriots among us refuse to understand or endorse our wartime zeitgeist. I have, therefore, persuaded our noble, statuesque Icon of America to gas up her torch and shed some light on a few selfish queries posed by our huddled, recalcitrant masses. […]
Conflict in Ohio: More to Come?
The Taft-Hartley mandatory Labor Board election is a steel trap. It extinguishes the Constitutional right of free association for most workers most of the time. It has effectively ended self-organization and the formation of new unions. Tinkering with Board election procedures in an effort to revive the labor movement is exactly the wrong course […]
Argentina: Workers and the “Agrarian Strike”: The CGT against the Oligarchy and Its Proxies’ Destabilization
Thirty-two years, one month, and ten days ago — on 16 February 1976 to be exact — bankers, industrialists, the Sociedad Rural, and other leading organizations of rural sectors initiated a strike in support of a coup d’état (known as the Bosses’ Apegé Lockout), anticipating the military revolt of 24 March, all with the […]
US Labor in Trouble and Transition: A Review
Is there anyone with a deeper knowledge of the contemporary American labor movement than Kim Moody? He not only seems familiar with the strategies and outcomes of practically every strike and organizing drive of the last twenty years. He also appears to know the status of each union local, large and small, as well as […]
“European Universalism Is Used to Justify Imperialism”: An Interview with Immanuel Wallerstein
Sociologist and historian at Yale University, Immanuel Wallerstein has described the globalization of capitalism, and today he criticizes Western “universalist” justifications of expansionism. In your book European Universalism, you revisit the 16th-century debate between Las Casas and Sepulveda on the American Indians. In what respect does this debate seem to you particularly relevant to […]
How to Counter the Danger of War at This Sensitive Moment
Unfortunately, influential American and Israeli opponents of Iran have been successful: using negative propaganda of the sort that claims that Iran has an intention to cause a nuclear holocaust and that a Third World War and “Islamic fascism” must be prevented, and tying the disaster of Iraq to Iran’s interference, they have turned Iran into […]
The Coming War on Venezuela: Eva Golinger’s Bush vs Chavez
More than a year ago, I attended the official book release for the Venezuelan edition of Eva Golinger‘s Bush Versus Chávez, published by Monte Avila, and the book had previously been printed in Cuba by Editorial José Martí. I recount this to make the following point: long before the publication of Bush Versus Chávez in […]
U.S. Labor and Gaza
Al-Awda NY and NYCLAW
New York City Labor Against the War joins the Congress of South Africa Trade Unions in denouncing Israel’s recent massacres in Gaza, the victims of which include at least 130 Palestinians — half of them civilians, including dozens of women and children — since February 27.
Unpleasant Anniversaries
March is a cruel month in the recent history of the Middle East. This year is the fifth anniversary of the death of Rachel Corrie who was crushed to death by an Israeli soldier driving an armored Caterpillar D9 bulldozer on March 16, 2003 as she attempted to stop the gigantic vehicle from destroying the […]
The March 20, 2008 US Declaration of War on Iran
March 20, 2008, destined to be another day of infamy. On this date the US officially declared war on Iran. But it’s not going to be the kind of war many have been expecting. No, there was no dramatic televised announcement by President George W. Bush from the White House oval office. In fact […]
Market Terrorism
The intimate partnership between mainstream economics and right-wing ideology has long trumpeted the wonderful efficiency of markets. In these partners’ fantasy, markets are truly wondrous coordination mechanisms that perfectly match the supply of goods and services to what buyers demand. All this happens, they say with immense self-satisfaction, without the intervention of any government or […]
Chronology of the 4th Generation War against Venezuela
The US Government is waging war on Venezuela — not your typical, traditional war, but a modern, asymmetric — 4th Generation War – against President Chávez and the Bolivarian Revolution. Below is a presentation I created regarding the pattern and escalation of US Government aggression against Venezuela, with clear quotes and cites as evidence to […]
Beware an Attack on Iran
Is the Bush administration ramping up for an attack on Iran? The signs seem to point in that direction. On March 11, Navy Adm. William Fallon, commander of the U.S. forces in the Middle East, retired early because of differences with Washington on Iran policy. And now, Dick Cheney’s current Middle East tour may be […]
When Henry Kissinger Opines
When Henry Kissinger opines in an op-ed in the Washington Post, it behooves us all to pay attention. There is a message there. Kissinger has always presented himself as the supreme “realist” proponent on U.S. imperial policy. But he has also always taken care not to distance himself too far from the conservative political Establishment. […]
Barack Obama’s Speech on Race: New Challenges for Him, the Democrats, and Us
Barack Obama’s speech on race, the greatest speech by a major American political figure in decades, elevates the discussion of race in America to a new level. What makes this speech so powerful is not only what he said, but also what it requires us to ask and what it demands that we reply. With […]
The Economic Crisis, the American Working Class, and the Left: The Situation Today and the Situation in 1930
The world appears to be on the verge of an economic crisis and, if it turns out to be as serious as some think, one that could rival or exceed the great panics of the late nineteenth century and the decade-long Great Depression. The crisis began with unscrupulous mortgage lending on an enormous scale, leading […]
