The people who filled streets across the country on October 18 were those described above—many new to activism, urgently motivated by the authoritarianism rapidly descending on U.S. society.
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Trump’s leap into irrationalism?
Beyond a handful of commitments, mostly revolving around ways to boost his own power and to line his pockets, Trump is completely mercurial. Perhaps this is part of his projection of a “strongman” image, but it can also produce a situation where, among his minions, “the knives are out for everyone,” as Trump biographer Michael Wolff said.
Recognizing a Palestinian state doesn’t mean a free Palestine
Governments that truly wish to support the Palestinian cause must begin by recognizing the Palestinian people’s right to self-determination — before recognizing a hypothetical state, and without designating the Ramallah PA, which is rejected by most Palestinians, as the model for the state they call for.
Trump uses Charlie Kirk’s murder as an excuse to crack down further on free speech
Developments since Kirk’s death should clarify some points amid the noise and social media vitriol. They have exposed the lie that conservatives and the far right are somehow champions of “free speech” against a censorious left “cancel culture.” When billionaires like X’s Elon Musk and Fox’s Rupert Murdoch own massive communications platforms from which they spread conservative and far-right ideology into the body politic, it’s hard to take the claim seriously. With few exceptions, the right’s pretensions to “free speech” were always phony and mostly raised when others used their free speech to criticize the right’s bigotry.
US economy: Stagflation now more than a whiff
The basic problem is that a lack of demand is not the constraining factor in American manufacturing; it’s the workforce. The number of workers who are able and willing to work on a factory floor is shrinking. Almost 400,000 manufacturing jobs are currently unfilled, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
The fascists and the challenge ahead
On Saturday, September 13, well over 100,000 “Unite the Kingdom” anti-migrant protesters marched in London—vastly outnumbering (and surrounding) the counter-protest, which drew just 15,000. Here we reprint two articles from Counterfire, based in London, analyzing the urgent need for the left to mobilize and organize against the far-right.
The trouble with Trump’s tariffs
Trump has been ideologically committed to tariffs and an autarchic or nationalist view of the U.S.’s role in the world economy for decades. In recent decades, economic nationalism has been rising across the entire U.S. ruling class, as administrations of both major capitalist parties seek to compete with China and to prod the European Union to increase its military spending.
Palestine, Sudan, and the global North’s indifference
Overall, the “phase classification” data indicates that the entire population of the Gaza Strip and nearly half of Sudan’s population are suffering from food insecurity, requiring urgent action to prevent their condition from worsening.
The “parliamentary cretinism” of the Democrats’ opposition to Trump
It’s clear that the left and the labor and social movements are in a very precarious state today, and debates about how to fight back against Trumpian authoritarianism will be crucial. But elections and the courts won’t save us…
Pakistan: A gathering of suffering, that is my land!
From the very beginning, nature itself has been among the victims of the capital, alongside oppressed humanity. Driven by the logic of the market and the lust for profit, capitalism has treated nature not as a living entity bound to humanity by countless inseparable ties, but merely as a source of raw material and a dumping ground for industrial waste.
Bringing in the National Guard: Trump’s war on migrants (Part II)
It is not just the number of immigration detentions and deportations that is alarming migrant communities across the country; it is also the gestapo tactics used by the badge-less thugs who refuse to identify themselves as they beat and kidnap their targets.
The genocidal partnership of Israel and the United States
Unimpeded, a daily process continues to exterminate more and more of the 2.1 million Palestinian people who remain in Gaza – bombing and shooting civilians while blocking all but a pittance of the food and medicine needed to sustain life.
How are Trump’s tariffs affecting the U.S. economy?
Job openings are down, and employment growth is confined to a small number of sectors. The average of about 130,000 jobs added per month in the first half of a year is the weakest since 2010, when the U.S. was beginning its long ascent from the depths of the Great Recession.
Israel’s aid concessions merely offer Gazans survival on a leash
While the resumption of aid was touted as a lifeline, its scope remains grossly insufficient. According to the UN, Gaza needs 600-800 trucks of aid daily to meet basic needs. But yesterday, the first day of the new system, only 73 trucks entered the Strip along with three airdrops whose total payload was equivalent to only two additional trucks.
Famine expert: Israel’s starvation of Gaza most ‘minutely designed and controlled’ since WWII
Overall, at least 59,029 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli forces in Gaza since October 2023, most of them women and children, according to the Gaza Health Ministry. More than 142,000 others have been wounded, and at least 14,000 more are missing and presumed dead and buried beneath the rubble of hundreds of thousands of bombed buildings.
