There is something in the air. You can feel it in something as simple as the amount of honking as people drive by picket lines. This was certainly the mood last summer. But this momentum needs new fresh events and struggles to sustain itself.
Analysis
Teamsters über alles?
With the Teamsters and O’Brien coming under heavy criticism, a siege mentality has gripped the union with pressure on well-known Teamster activists to demonstrate loyalty to O’Brien.
From Taliban to BJP: The far right and religious fundamentalism in South Asia
The roots of religious fundamentalism with all its forms, formations and faces in South Asia should be looked for in the historic evolution of these societies under colonialism, imperialism and subsequently the independent rule of a lackey bourgeoisie. With the uneven and combined pattern of development, the noxious amalgamation of impoverishment, religious prejudices and superstitions of the foregone times, partial modernity, socio-cultural remnants of feudalism and tribalism, finance capital and black money has only complicated the evolution of these countries.
Continuing the discussion on Teamster politics
It matters whether a particular union leadership is encouraging or blocking a particular struggle. Socialists are therefore not indifferent to different trends in the union leadership and pay careful attention to them in order to chart their possible impact on our fundamental task, the battle with the employers.
What we learned from the DNC
A commitment to arming Israel and to providing it impunity to violate international law is a bipartisan pillar of U.S. foreign policy. On that score, Harris is and will be no different from her predecessors. But many ordinary Democrats and activists—including many on the marches outside the convention center—will be encouraged to believe otherwise.
Workers and the Biden/Harris economy
It’s common for people to think about the price of eggs or gasoline when they think about inflation. But aside from prices for commodities like these, which do fluctuate with “supply and demand,” there are the long-term price increases of commodities and services that are essential to everyday life.
“Killer Kamala, sending bombs, killing children and their moms.”
The reality is that there is no evidence, no serious reason, to believe that Kamala Harris will have a better or different approach to Palestine than Joe Biden. Fortunately, large sections of the movement understand this very clearly.
The political bankruptcy of lesser-evil scare tactics: “It’s democracy vs. fascism!”
Throughout US history, the only way democratic rights have been expanded is through mass struggle—from the Civil War to the labor upsurge of the 1930s; from the Civil Rights movement to the fight for marriage equality—and it’s the only way they can be won today.
What makes the Democrats different from, but the same as, the Republicans?
The Republicans are the right-wing party akin to the Liberals or the Nationals, and the Democrats are the “center-left” party like the Labor Party. While this is a quick way of sorting out the two main parties in the US bipartisan system, it doesn’t adequately account for what is unique about the Democrats in the taxonomy of political parties across the democratic world.
In the face of a dubious electoral result and the popular mobilization for respect of the real vote
We are with the people in the streets to defend their vote. We are on the side of their democratic demands. But at the same time, we mark distance with the political leaderships that are trying to manipulate them or use them as “cannon fodder.”
On the murder of children and the return of genocide to banality
The latest figures available from UNICEF (the United Nations Children’s Fund) indicate that the number of children killed in the Gaza Strip has now exceeded 14,000, in addition to the number of missing, wounded, forever disabled, and orphans, which is many times that number.
The (undemocratic) Democratic Party machine lurches toward the election
Harris’ rhetoric has tended to be more progressive than Biden’s, but Biden’s policies are very likely to be Harris’ policies in a future presidency because Harris has never strayed far from them—whatever language she has used.
Violence has been the backdrop of the entire arc of US history
The country was built on the violence of chattel slavery, the extermination of the native population, and wars of conquest. It fought a bloody civil war that killed the equivalent of seven million people, in today’s population.
Labour Party wins UK election amid a crisis for British capitalism
The people of Britain wanted to oust the Tories at any cost. In this regard, they cast a vote of hatred and disgust against the Tories rather than a vote of hope and optimism for Labour. The situation is the inevitable result of Tory policies over the last 14 years, which have desperately worsened the conditions of toiling Britons.
Statement on second round of France’s snap election
The far right has been pushed back by popular mobilization—now we must implement the program of the New Popular Front!
