Interview with Oct. 7 organizer.

War and Lenin in the 21st century, part 4

The Aug. 8 wildfires that devastated parts of Maui are the deadliest in the U.S. since the 1918 Cloquet fire in northern Minnesota. Some two weeks after the fires, the official death toll stands at 115, and authorities in Hawaii have released the names of 388 people still unaccounted for. Tens of thousands have evacuated. Over 3,000 acres burned in Lahaina and neighboring communities.

While most of the focus was on the general elections in Ecuador, a national referendum was held on oil exploitation in the Amazon.

This is the first part of a $1 billion weapons transfer directly from Pentagon stockpiles to Taiwan this year.

The U.S. export controls (the act of war) on computer chips aim to cripple China’s ability to produce or purchase high-end chips, which are crucial for the development of advanced technologies such as supercomputers and artificial intelligence (AI). Some call this a Silicon Curtain in the New Cold War against China.

The beginning of July saw the hottest days on record globally.

Melinda Butterfield: “As I sat in Miami, I was keenly aware that Gov. Ron DeSantis was preparing to sign several laws aimed at banning trans people from public life and getting the health care they need to live.” (DeSantis did sign these laws just a few days later, not by coincidence, on May 17 – the International Day Against Homophobia, Biphobia, and Transphobia.)

As smoke and smog choke the Northeast, Alberta’s Indigenous Nations face down apocalyptic wildfires and the provincial government’s “let-it-burn” climate policy.

According to the U.S. newspaper The Wall Street Journal, which had the “honor” of putting the lie into circulation, there is an agreement between Cuba and China, in military matters, for the installation of an alleged espionage base.

Pentagon strategists have been beefing up their military presence in Asia and building alliances in preparation for an all-out war against China.

Although it was widely believed that the U.S. continued to secretly deploy nuclear weapons in Korea, this move by the Biden administration is a blatant violation of the denuclearization treaty.

On April 26, the far-right-dominated Montana state legislature in Helena censured the state’s first elected trans representative, Zooey Zephyr, after silencing her for several days and threatening her with expulsion. 

The U.S. corporate-controlled media are concealing the climate crisis’s severity and breadth.

The Trans Day of Vengeance was a long-planned protest in Washington, D.C., scheduled for April 1. People were coming to D.C. from across the country to participate. It was called in response to the growing legal and extralegal violence against the transgender community, egged on by far-right politicians and corporate media.

March 23 was a national day of action, a general strike, organized by the labor unions in France. 

The White House released its budget request for 2024. For the Pentagon, there is $824 billion. Adding armaments for military operations in Ukraine takes that figure to more than $950 billion.

Silicon Valley Bank, the 16th largest in the U.S., was shut down on March 10 and put under the control of the California Department of Financial Protection and Innovation.

While the giant U.S. energy corporations and banks seek out every way to profit from the climate change emergency that they inflicted on the world, extreme weather events are becoming the new normal. 

A standing-room-only crowd packed St. Mary’s Episcopal Church in Harlem, New York, for a “speak out to stop racism, poverty and World War III.” The event honored Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s legacy on the weekend of the King Day holiday.