Important US political news high lights of 2018

By សតិវ​អតុ

It is  time, once again, for a year end political news round up. This is that time of year I write about the high lights of the last year.

In December Claudia Amaro, a leading activist and organizer in the Latino community of Wichita spoke to the Peace and Social Justice Center, for their Annual Dinner on the problem of immigration.

Amaro discussed many of the bad laws that have been passed over the years that have contributed to the immigration problems of today. She gave the example of NAFT (North American Free Trade Agreement).

“It created great hardships,” Amaro said.

Some other problems she added included that fact that US Corporations went to Mexico to avoid taxes and to dodge paying workers minimum wage. NAFTA undermined labor laws.

Amaro reminded people that it was Ronald Reagan who attacked the countries of El Salvador and Guatemala, as well as Honduras. That kind of interference has made life for some citizens of those countries almost unlivable. That is why they are coming her.

In November Trump ignored critics from both parties, Democrat and Republican, and announced that he was going to ignore all the crimes committed by Saudi Arabia and continue to sell arms to that country. Saudi Arabia is probably one of the worst foreign policies of the US. Both People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK) and Saudi Arabia have handed down political power from father to son, a monarchy type situation.

Every time some one has any kind of relationship to or with Kim Jong Un, the leader of DPRK , reporters are quick to point out that Kim is a “murderer.” He has a “horrible human rights record,” as any politician or celebrity will be reminded by mainstream reporters. But Saudi Arabia is no better. Saudi Arabia has about the same type of human rights abuses. People are executed all the time in that country. Our own CIA has figured out that Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman is a murderer and responsible for the murder of Journalist Jamal Khashoggi.

And yet Trump defied the nation’s intelligence agencies to declare his

unswerving loyalty to Saudi Arabia and its Crown Prince Salman. He made the ridiculous claim that “the killing of Journalist Jamal Khashoggi might never be known.”

This October some right-wing nut sent pipe bombs to Democrats and progressive politicians. What is not surprising is that Fox News tried to blame the Democrats and liberals for the attempted bombings.

This September we witnessed the spectacle of the Republican Party doing everything it could, often without a single shred of decency or fair play, to get their right-wing ideologue Brett Kavanaugh on the Supreme Court bench. Not only is this guy far-far-far to the right, he was also accused of attempted rape and other ill tempered actions towards women. The Republicans in the Senate ignored the accusations. Also Kavanaugh gave a speech defending himself that demonstrated him to be arrogant and hateful towards the Democratic Party.

In August, Narendra Modi's Fascist government began to arrest democratic activists. The Indian police force carried out a series of raids and arrests in Delhi, Haryana, Maharashtra and Telengana. Virasam Leader Varavara Rao, Civil Liberties activist Gautama Navlaka, journalist Kranti Tekula,  Advocate Sudha Bharadwaj. IPAL activist Arun Ferreira and Vernon Gonzalves were among those imprisoned. Those kinds of arrest indicate the possibility that anti-government activists and revolutionaries are making progress and Modi finds himself threatened by his opposition. Whether this is a sign that the Indian government is really going to fall or if it is just the over reaction from a fascist, the coming years will tell us if there is going to be any revolutionary changes. 

In July a large group of Wichitans protested and occupied the Immigration and Customs Enforcement, (ICE) center at 555 N. Woodlawn, About 90 people attended the rally, which began as a response to Trump's actions that led to separated families. 

All year long, the Trump administration was trying to bring down the government of President Nicolás Maduro. I wrote an article on this last June.

According to Nacla:

"It used to be generally frowned upon to openly call for military coups and U.S. intervention in Latin America. Not anymore. At least not when it comes to Venezuela, a country where—according to the prevailing narrative—a brutal dictator is starving the population and quashing all opposition.

Last August, President Trump casually mentioned a “military option” for Venezuela from his golf course in New Jersey, provoking an uproar in Latin America but barely a peep in Washington. Similarly, Rex Tillerson, then-Secretary of State, spoke favorably about a possible military ouster of Venezuelan president Nicolás Maduro."

I have been following the activities of Wichita's DSA Chapter all year. In May DSA held a camp out, which was attended by DSA members from nearby states, such as Nebraska and Kansas City, MO. I was very interested in a talk by Phil Brown, from Omaha, Nebraska, who gave an excellent speech on "Combating anti-communism." It was a relief to hear a DSA member explain the drawbacks and dangers of supporting some of the liberals and mainstream Democrats who campaign against communists who are involved in various progressive causes.

Every few years this country has a drug epidemic and that is followed by overreaction that can cause problems for a lot of people. During the 1980s we had a crack cocaine epidemic and that caused a lot of young black men and some women, to receive ridiculously long prison sentences for possession of small amounts of crack cocaine. Now we have the opioid epidemic. A lot of this is caused by a street version of a synthetic opioid known as fentanyl. It is a cheap easy to make drug that is 100 times stronger than heroin and is present in most of the opioid deaths that are fueling this campaign. The worst thing about this epidemic is that the press and politicians are focusing on doctors, claiming that over-prescribing pain medicine has caused this epidemic. The results is that people who need pain medicine are finding it hard to get. I have a friend who has two forms of cancer and he spent months looking for a doctor that would prescribe the pain medicine he needs. In April I wrote an article on this hype and hysteria; " The opioid epidemic is really a fentanyl epidemic—and we don’t need all the hype"

In March we had a March for Our Lives, in Wichita, and it was probably one of the largest marches I've seen in several years. It was run mostly by, and largely attended by high school students. A few thousand people Marched from Park Elementary School to the old Sedgwick County Courthouse. This coincided with students across the country who are sick and tired of seeing students shot down in their schools. They are tired of seeing all the politicians who consistently do nothing to pass laws that will deal with gun violence. Since the dominant party in this country is presently the Republican Party, they have seen a government of politicians who are determined to listen to the NRA (National Rifle Association), which opposes any kind of gun regulations at all. This generation is fed up with the NRA and all politicians (Mostly Republican) who are so in dept to them. A lot of these students are presently too young to vote. But that will change over the next few years. When these students come of age it could change the political landscape. We could see a real back lash against these pro-gun Republicans and some real problems for the NRA —who seriously deserve what they will get.
After more than six years of strangulation due to the tax cuts for the rich, by our past Governor Sam Brownback, we attained relief from Republican miss-management, in February. Our schools were underfunded. and every program designed to help the poor were slashed to the bone, so wealthy business owners could enjoy a massive tax break. The economy was in shambles before he went off to be an ambassador-at-large for international religious freedom around the world for our idiot and chief Trump.

Brownback admitted he was running an experiment in Kansas and that experiment has failed and failed miserably. He slashed taxes for wealthy businesses, and as most conservatives he tried to balance the budget on the backs of working people. Kansas's budget has for years resembled a wallet with a hole in it—every time the state's bookkeepers peek inside, they find less money than the government thought would be there. He took a lot of money out of our education system as if it had no value.

Last January I wrote about the problems of the US anti-war movement. That problem lies mostly in the hands of the Democratic Party which has largely ignored the peace movement. Since the election of Barack Obama to the presidency, the Democratic Party has been as hawkish on foreign policy as the Republicans. Today there is no mainstream party and very few persons that a peace advocate can vote for. I wrote an article called; " Code Pink has a morale problem: It’s called Democrats.:

The last few decades have been extremely conservative. That iron grip the Republicans have had on this nation and world are slowly starting to slip. But we have a long way to go to stop the tide of conservatism. This is a new year, so we can keep trying, both to stop the Republicans and to end capitalism and imperialism.

The Communist Party of the Philippines at 50 Years anniversary

From Democracy and Class Struggle.

Protracted People’s War is not universal and in some places—suicidal- Part 2

By សតិវ ​អតុ

This is a continuation of the article I wrote earlier called: "Protracted People’s War is not universal and in some places—suicidal."

While I built up the case against protracted people's war, I really didn't give an alternative to PPW. I'm not sure there is any one method of revolution we can go to. Here are a few ideas I believe we can consider—Number one, sabotage the economy and do it without using the kinds of violence that can justify the "Rosenberg" style punishment.

Just last week Britain's second-busiest airport had to be closed after drones forced it to shut its runway, sparking chaos and delaying thousands of Christmas travelers. According to ABC News:

"Planes were unable to depart after the drones were spotted, while a number of flights scheduled to land were diverted to other airports, Gatwick Airport said in a statement.

On Friday (local time) the airport said 700 planes were due to take off, although there would still be delays and cancellations.

To try and thwart those causing the disruption, the army and police snipers were called in to hunt down the drones, which flew near the airport every time it tried to reopen on Thursday."

Yes a troop of those toys people buy that can fly around the neighborhood were able to shut down an entire airport, creating genuine havoc. It created economic sabotage. It couldn't have cost that much money to stage this event. It wasn't done for political reasons, as far as I know, but look how effective it was. At times simple tactics may be able to attack the capitalist system and bring it to a standstill.

And that brings me to another form of revolutionary actions—"black block tactics. We don't have to use all of them. We don't need to destroy people's personal cars. Some proletariat people rely on their cars to get to work and to do other important chores. But attacking businesses using groups of people who will destroy economic property and then slip away could be a useful tactic.

Elections! Yes, as part of an overall strategy as long as using elections is not the ONLY strategy. We can not elect ourselves into power. That has never worked in the past and it won't work here today. But a campaign can be used to educate people and produce ideas necessary for staging a revolution. In no way am I suggesting that we abandon all revolutionary tactics and trade them in for running elections. The use of these campaigns is to educate people and not just to pretend we can just elect ourselves into office.

Another tactic we saw a few years ago was the Occupy Movement, which had serious drawbacks but such tactics maybe useful in combination with other tactics, from time to time.

These are just a few ideas. An organization can also have a militarist branch that uses black block tactics while another branch of the organization uses elections as just one of several tactics.

We have to be inventive and try new things. These are just a few ideas to be discussed.

Pix by Libcom.org.

Communist Party of the Philippines congratulates New People's Army for successful tactical offensives in answer to martial law

This is from Redspark:

1. The Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP) applauds the successful tactical offensives mounted by the New People’s Army (NPA) in Agusan del Sur, Samar, Sorsogon and elsewhere over the past two days. The NPA tactical offensives are resounding blows against the Duterte regime’s martial law rule in Mindanao and across the country.

2. The people celebrate the success of the NPA, in particular, the annihilation of an entire CAFGU detachment under the 3rd Special Forces Battalion and the seizure of 24 high powered firearms in Agusan del Sur. The people have long suffered from the crimes and abuses and perpetrated by these military and paramilitary forces.

3. All prisoners-of-war who who were captured after surrendering during the raid in Agusan del Sur are being treated leniently. They will be released soonest so long as the AFP relents in their offensive in order to pave the way for their orderly and safe release and give them the opportunity to be with their families this christmas. We urge third party facilitators to coordinate and cooperate with the local NPA command.

4. The tactical offensives of the NPA displays the superiority of the NPA in terms of support of the people and mastery in guerrilla warfare. It also manifests demoralization among the AFP and paramilitary forces who are being used as canon fodder in defense of a rotten system and corruption of their superiors. We urge all enemy foot soldiers to surrender to the NPA.

5. Just to set the records straight, the recent NPA offensives do not violate the CPP’s unilateral declaration of temporary ceasefire which shall take effect on December 24 to 26 and December 31 to January 1 next year to celebrate the CPP’s 50th anniversary and join the the people in their holiday traditions.

6. The Party calls on the NPA to mount more tactical offensives in the next few weeks and months to defeat Duterte’s all-out war and fascist attacks against the people’s democratic rights and livelihood.

Source: https://www.philippinerevolution.info/2018/12/20/cpp-congratulates-npa-for-successful-tactical-offensives-in-answer-to-martial-law/

‘Christmas Vacation’ provides a Marxist critique of capitalism—here’s how

From The Dialy Dot:

There’s a specter haunting National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation—the specter of communism.

Some of our most vaunted Christmas movies assail the very underpinnings of the consumerist machine churning furiously at the heart of this season of consumption for consumption’s sake. A Charlie Brown Christmas provides little more than a takedown of Christmas consumerism with a thin religious veil. A Christmas Carol, in all its cinematic iterations, gives a downright hostile perspective of the supremacy of capital, positing that a more equitable society can only be achieved through threat of life and limb against the monied class. It’s a Wonderful Life displays an ice-cold capitalist predator threatening the well being of working families, featuring George Bailey, the people’s hero.

But no holiday film confronts the vicious class struggle created and inflamed by the logic of capital better than Christmas Vacation, wherein the capitalist dream—the American dream—becomes skewered, mocked, and vilified amid cartoonish hijinks and Chevy Chase’s goofball one-liners. Watch Christmas Vacation through a critical lens and you’ll see that it’s not just a source of holiday lulz, but a Marxist critique of capitalism and class struggle in the United States.

Such a critique goes best with eggnog served in a moose head-shaped glass, naturally.

Clark Griswold: The pitiable chaser of the American dream—and all its hollow, materialistic promise. Griswold represents what’s known in Marxist literature as the petty bourgeoisie, a sort of in-between class that shares some interests with the lowly proletariat, but often aligns itself with the bourgeoises, or capitalist ruling class. Clark, an inventor working for a giant U.S. corporation, belongs to a class of small proprietors and handicrafts folks living more comfortably than the proletariat, but still far from the power and luxury of the bourgeois life. Clark’s allegiances, therefore, constantly divide. The internal struggle is at the source of much of the movie’s comedy, as Clark strives for what he believes to be a classic Christmastime—the one he experienced as a child in the 1950s. Almost everything he does is a strategic move to exit the petty bourgeoisie and join the rulers in their mansions and gated communities; cozying up to those above him on the class ladder, pandering to them, kissing their asses.

For the rest click here.

Holiday cartoons!

These cartoons feature the high lights of our holiday season, as well as presenting traditional Holiday villains. 

Small Town Titans- You're A Mean One, Mr. Grinch

Pix by mackaycartoons, drgrobsanimationreview.com, HuffPost.

Popular struggles unfold in Burkina Faso

The following is a story about a Communist Party active in Africa, this one in the country of Burkina Faso. There have been very few communist or Marxist parties active in Africa. They have almost completely disappeared. So this article is especially important. Africa once had many Marxist groups, so the end of them has been a major discouragement for most of us Marxists. Maybe things will now turn around. -សតិវ ​អតុ

From La victoria de los oprimidos y explotados:

Note V.O. The Voltaic Revolutionary Communist Party describes in the latest issue of the international magazine CIPOML the situation of high tension and social struggle in the Central African country, Burkina Faso. For your interest we reproduce below a fragment of the article: "! The popular struggles are taking place in our country! "In order to approach the reality of this country and its revolutionary struggle against imperialism and the oligarchy.

These struggles have shaken all the popular social classes, both in the cities and in the countryside: workers, semi-proletarians, peasants, urban petty bourgeoisie. Struggles that have taken various forms: sit-ins, strikes, mass demonstrations, barricades in the streets and roads, etc. The organization of these struggles has been from unions, associations and other coalitions to "Soviet" (workers' councils) initiatives in the field.

These struggles must be analyzed taking into account the following considerations:

Spirit of popular insurrection that remains alive in the minds of the popular masses. The combativeness, awareness and organizational reflection are increasingly developed from the experience of the popular insurrection of October 2014, and the victorious resistance against the counterrevolutionary coup of General Gilbert Diendere in September 2015 .

Awareness has gone beyond the framework of economic struggles. It has a political and anti-imperialist content that affirms and grows. The vindication of a true change is still valid because the insurrection was neutralized by the coup d'état of the Presidential Security Regiment, Lieutenant-Colonel Zida, supported by the bourgeois parties and organizations of civil society controlled by imperialism, specifically the French. Our people denounce the domination of our country by imperialism, particularly French. It demands national independence. Denounces the presence of foreign troops in our territory, as well as the currency, the CFA franc, as an instrument of economic domination. Our people fight for national sovereignty over the country's natural resources.

As during the Transition, our working class and the people do not trust this power of the MPP whose main leaders for thirty years were pillars of the repressive and looting power, from the National Council of the «Revolution» to the Fourth Republic of Blaise Campaoré passing through the Popular Front. They are the animators of a bourgeois state that defends the interests of imperialism, mainly French, and the neocolonial bourgeoisie. This is the reason why they have been unable to take action on any of the basic problems of insurrection. Its main objective is to liquidate the popular and revolutionary movement that is developing and that threatens the foundations of the neocolonial system in our country.

The revolutionary crisis deepens from day to day, it is politics. The power of the MPP and its allies has various conflicts, open or latent, among the main leaders of the MPP at the level of certain main parties of the Presidential Majority Alliance (UNIR / PS, PAREN, among others) The same happens in the opposition bourgeois reactionary coaligada within the CFEOP (head the political opposition), and with the shakes within the UPC (Union for Change) which is the main force. The CDP of the deceased regime overthrown by the popular insurrection, tries to rebuild itself in the middle of the struggles of influence between the different clans that compose it.

The Defense and Security forces are undermined by the crisis as evidenced by the multiple restructurings at the level of the commanders of the armed forces and the rupture between the troops and the top hierarchy. Protest movements are multiplying in the National Police with numerous financial scandals revealed in research reports, and by the growing discontent among agents for the degradation of their living and working conditions. The military and police expelled for their participation in the riots of 2011, as well as retired gendarmes also express their discontent.

In the economic field, the situation is catastrophic. The people are gripped by poverty and misery, aggravated by the endemic unemployment that occurs, above all, among young people. The economic machinery is going at a slow pace, the PNDES (National Economic and Social Development Program) is not the solution as the structural adjustment programs (PASD), the Strategic Tables of the Fight Against Poverty (CLSP) or the Strategy of Accelerated Growth and Durable Development (SCSDD), all programs based on the economic liberalism advocated by the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund (IMF).

Was Trump right?—to oppose our Middle East Imperialist policies?

From The Idiot Factor:

Trump’s latest declaration is that the US has defeated ISIS (Islamic State) and the US does not need to be in the Middle East. He is right. I don’t agree with him often, but the US is addicted to war and imperialism. The Republican Party, especially, is addicted to the idea that the US needs to be in charge of the entire world. They believe every decision foreign governments make needs to by approved by US leaders. And most Republicans can’t imagine a war they aren’t supporting.

It amazes me that his own party is tearing him up over his stand in Syria.

“We have defeated Isis in Syria,” Donald Trump tweeted on Wednesday, “my only reason for being there during the Trump presidency.”

Trump has taken some real heat from his own supporters for his latest declaration:

“It had to be uncomfortable morning viewing for Donald Trump again Thursday as Fox & Friends host Brian Kilmeade tore into the president for his shock announcement that he wants to withdraw all 2,000 U.S. troops from Syria—a move Kilmeade slammed as “totally irresponsible” and that would allow ISIS to re-establish its severely diminished power.”

I listened to NPR on the radio today and they can’t find anyone in the US government that agrees with Trump. That includes both Democrats and Republicans. I heard comments such as “shocked’ and “big mistake.”

But this is a country today where no one, Democrat nor Republicans, can imagine the US at peace. We are the world’s bully boys and we have to be fighting and killing those who don’t conform to the US standards.

I don’t care why Trump made this decision, it is the right one to make. The rest of the county’s government leaders need to get over it!

Pix by Wired.  

Prez. Trump is ridiculous and the US health care and political system is badly broken

From The Idiot Factor:

US President Donald Trump would be a funny man, deeply amusing, if he wasn’t such a destructive political force. He is truly despicable. One of the best examples of this is his policies on health care. One of the first things he did when, he took office, was to strip Obamacare (Affordable Care Act) and cost millions of people their health care.

He is still at it, determined to destroy health care for millions of people. He is determined and has worked diligently to destroy the one act to provide common people of medium and lower class workers to health care. The US is about the only industrialised country in the world that does not have any program to provide health care for its working poor.[1] For the last 50 years various presidents and politicians have tried to pass laws that would change that, but the various corporations that profit off of this country’s sick people have managed to destroy such attempts.

It was almost two weeks ago that aTexas judge ruled Obamacare to be unconstitutional, a move that could leave millions of Americans uninsured and without any health care. If that ruling stands, it could be a disaster for millions of Americans and yet Trump was crowing about it being a “great ruling for the country.”

 “It was a big, big victory by a highly respected judge, highly, highly respected in Texas,” President Trump said in response to a question from ABC News during a visit to Arlington Cemetery Saturday.

Just a few days ago, Jay Bookman, writing for The Atlanta Journal-Constitution gave a really accurate description of Trump:

“Whatever else it will say about him, history will see Donald Trump as a marker in time that divides what came before him from what will come after him. He is a ridiculous figure, especially as president, but the fact that he was elected anyway demonstrates the bankruptcy of that previous era and the repudiation of an approach to politics that had grown stale and unresponsive…..

…… Through incompetence, ignorance and no small degree of malevolence, Trump is hastening the destruction of that previous world. Alliances, networks and understandings that had stood for decades are falling apart, quickly, but the truth is that all that was fated by time to crumble anyway. Wiser leadership would attempt to manage that decline while building replacements, but for the moment that is not the leadership that we have given ourselves.”

Bookman doesn’t spell out the direction he thinks the Democrats should go, but he seems to be fairly accurate about Trump and his contributions to politics. Trump is ridiculous. What is really amazing is that anyone who does not have a lot of money would actually vote for him and continue to support his presidency. A lot of people who will lose their health care actually voted for him and many still support him. It almost seems to be an act of self loathing to support this man and his destruction of the working class. As Bookman points out, many people are seriously unhappy with the direction of this country and already feel they are being attacked by the mainstream political establishment. Trump represents working class people who are jumping from the frying pan into the fire. Trump talks about fixing this county’s health care system and yet the Republicans have done nothing but preventing any positive change for health care. We can expect more of the same.

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[1] For an example for some of this see; “Estes just wants insurance companies to profit off of the sick and dying.”

Protracted People’s War is not universal and in some places—suicidal

By សតិវ ​អតុ

In recent years a lot of leftist have written about protracted people’s war (PPW), a major emphasis of Marxist-Leninist-Maoist writers and theoreticians of today. PPW is a major theory and it is being used successfully in some third world countries, such as Philippines. Today the most successful use of PPW is in India.

But PPW is not possible in all countries. PPW has been promoted as a universal strategy for revolution by many organizations and writers. Chairman Gonzalo has written extensively on the use of PPW and many of his supporters have called PPW to be universal.

According to the Revolutionary Communist Party (RCP) of Canada, as an introduction to an article on this subject:

“A DISCUSSION ABOUT THE REVOLUTION IN IMPERIALIST COUNTRIES

Protracted people�s war is the only way to make revolution.”

And not everyone agrees with this statement. A lot of people disagree with this and they have written about it. That would include a group calling itself Mass Proletariat:

“Protracted People’s War (PPW) has been promoted as a universal strategy for revolution in recent years despite the fact that this directly contradicts Mao’s conclusions in his writing on revolutionary strategy. Mao emphasized PPW was possible in China because of the semi-feudal nature of Chinese society, and because of antagonistic divisions within the white regime which encircled the red base areas. Basic analysis shows that the strategy cannot be practically applied in the U.S. or other imperialist countries. Despite this, advocates for the universality of PPW claim that support for their thesis is a central principle of Maoism. In this document we refute these claims, and outline a revolutionary strategy based on an analysis of the concrete conditions of the U.S. state.”

Theorists have been developing PPW in recent years in contrast to the now outdated focoist theories utilized by Che Guevara. The big difference between these theories has been the emphasis on including the people in PPW. Maoists rely heavily on the support of people in areas where PPW is put in use. The problem in some countries is the reliance on military weapons and places to hide the revolutionaries. No matter how much PPW is developed and improved on, there are some places it just won’t work.

For a person living in the US it seems very obvious why PPW won’t work here. 

There are a number of reasons we don’t see any guerrilla organizations taking on the US Government with arms, here in the US. The two best examples of past Marxist insurrection, here in the US, were the Symbionese Liberation Army (SLA) and the Weather Underground. The Weather Underground aim was more for pressuring the government to end the Vietnam War than it was to overthrow and replace the US government.

The SLA was probably the best left-wing guerrilla group this country has ever had.[1] There have been a number of US guerrilla groups,[2] which our government always refers to as “terrorist groups.” The SLA eventually collapsed. Its leaders were all captured and jailed, bringing the group to an end. Since that time American leftists have avoided any kind of armed insurrection. For one thing the US government has made a special priority of being able to capture such groups. There are now vast networks of spies all across the country trying to break up and arrest military groups before they get started. The government used its experience breaking up such groups and the Whether Underground and the SLA as practice for any future groups. They are using all their tactics against Al-Qaeda and ISIS (supporters of the Islamic State) cells in the US today and they have been very successful. With the exception of 9/11 most of ISIS and Al-Qaeda attacks have been disrupted.

One example of their tricks is to plant a person in a dissident group and this person just happens to know someone who can deliver a truck full of explosives. The group of people buy the truck, which is actually full of fake explosives that won’t work. Then they are all arrested and charged with attempting to bomb various targets. After the fist few times this was done, people should have known better than to fall for that scam again. But it has worked to capture lots of Islamic people and groups. But it was also successfully used against three anarchists with the Occupy Cleveland movement who wanted to blow up a major bridge, which would have been a major traffic disruption. We can see what would happen if groups on the left tried such tactics. Many of them would be in jail.

Since the 1980s the US government has waged a so called “War Against Terrorism” which includes developing a massive network of spies, and the use of police and military tactics to watch nearly every dissident organization in this country. There is little privacy in this country and anyone who does anything suspicious can be assured that some government agency is spying on them.

The question of what we can do is not clear. We already know that using elections alone will not create a revolution. The Occupy movement from 2011 was an example of trying to use people power to change the system. That was not very effective. Keeping up a momentum just wasn’t possible. But that event did teach us some things about revolutionary tactics. One they we realize is just how much out government doesn’t care if “the whole world is watching.” Our government relies on brute force and cares nothing what those in other countries think. Maybe a combination of various different tactics might work. Red Guards - Los Angeles (NCP-LC) has claimed to be starting a PPW, but from what I read it may just mean using more militant tactics than launching an actual war with guns and bombs. The same thing may be said of Canada’s RCP. But right now, relying on a PPW, with real guns and bombs, is just not the answer.

Pix by MLM Mayhem!

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[1] Some other small groups in the US included the May 19th Communist Organization (M19CO) and the United Freedom Front. There have also been several Puerto Rican armed groups.

[2] See Brian Glick, “War At Home,” (South End Press, Boston), 1989. This book explains the covert action the FBI used against legal political groups of the 1960s and 1970s. While these “dirty tricks,” were exposed and denounced, it is likely such tactics would be used today against any political group that dissents against the US government today. Everyone on the left should have a copy of this book.

"Weird Al" Yankovic - Christmas At Ground Zero

DOWNLOAD MAGAZINE EL MAOÍSTA No. two

This is from Communist Party of Ecuador - Red Sun/
Partido Comunista de Ecuador - Sol Rojo. Just click on the picture.

US- Working In A White House Wonderland—RICHARD CROWSON

From The Idiot Factor:

I was driving along in my car and I heard this song on the radio, channel KMUW, 89.1, Wichita,  Kansas’ NPR station. I managed to find it on the internet, so here it is—a great little ditty to listen to for a good laugh. To actually hear this song, click here and look for the music play button.

The Lyrics:

 (A song, to the tune of Winter Wonderland)

Going away is John Kelly
He took a swift kick to the belly
You'd think it takes a real chump
To want to join up with Trump
Working in a White House Wonderland

In the meadow Trump can build a snowman
And offer him the job of Chief of Staff
But when Trump tries to hire him he’d say, “No, man!
I’d have to be insane! Don’t make me laugh!”

Later on, Trump will perspire
‘Cause there’s no one left to fire
Eating Big Macs with cheese
Among blood-red Christmas trees
Working in a White House Wonderland

Maybe there’s somebody who will do it
Work extra hard for pay that’s cut in half
If I were Trump I think I’d look into it
Hire an undocumented immigrant chief of staff!

Gone away are so many
It used to be that there were plenty
As Mueller tightens the knot
Nobody wants to get caught
Working in a White House Wonderland

US- Wichita, Kansas- Plight of immigrants explained by Claudia Amaro, at the Peace and Social Justice Center’s Annual Dinner

From The Idiot Factor:

US meddling in foreign countries, whose people now flock to the US, was discussed by Claudia Amaro, a leading activist and organizer in the Latino community of Wichita, who spoke to the Peace and Social Justice Center, for their Annual Dinner, last Friday.

Each year devoted supporters and members of the Peace and Social Justice Center gather for a dinner and speaker.

“It is too bad we have such a president” (as Donald Trump), said Amaro. “Immigration has always existed. It is as broken system that comes from years ago.”

Amaro discussed many of the bad laws that have been passed over the years that have contributed to the immigration problems of today.

She gave the example of NAFT (North American Free Trade Agreement).

“It created great hardships,” Amaro said.

She added that US Corporations went to Mexico to avoid taxes and to dodge paying workers minimum wage. The agreement undermined labor laws.

Amaro reminded people that it was Ronald Reagan who attacked the countries of El Salvador and Guatemala, as well as Honduras.

Honduras had a coup in 2009[1] to remove a progressive president, Manuel Zelaya. Amaro pointed out that the US has a history of using military coups to remove progressive leaders and replace them with military dictators.  Continuous, interference in Central America has helped to create the situation we have today. Violent gangs dominate day to day culture in much of Central America.

“People are determined to get a better life for their kids,” Amaro added. “There was a coup in Honduras and every country in the world has condemned it, accept the US.”

Amaro is a US citizen today, but she said that not all of her relatives are citizens.

“I moved to the US when I was 12 years old,” Amaro said. “I was born in Mexico, but my home is the US.”

While she has been a citizen most of her life, her husband was not and she had to help him gain his UScitizenship. She now helps other non-citizens to get their citizenship. She often deals with people who are in detention centers, where she said the conditions are terrible.

“People go through hell,” she said.

Amaro explained that people need to share the stories of these immigrants so that the common citizens of this country understand what life is like for these people.

She also said that voting is important.

“Some politicians just want my vote,” Amaro added.

She suggested people check out a politician’s history is on immigration. If their record is bad voters need to expose them for that.

Amaro explained that ICE (Immigration and Customs Enforcement) plays a destructive role in immigrant’s lives and this country has developed a culture of hate that needs to be countered.

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[1] The 2009 Honduran coup d'état, part of the 2009 Honduran constitutional crisis, occurred when the Honduran Army on June 28, 2009 followed orders from the Honduran Supreme Court to oust President Manuel Zelaya and send him into exile. Zelaya had attempted to schedule a non-binding poll on holding a referendum on convening a constituent assembly to rewrite the constitution. Zelaya refused to comply with court orders to cease, and the Honduran Supreme Court issued a secret warrant for his arrest dated 26 June. Two days later, Honduran soldiers stormed the president's house in the middle of the night and detained him, forestalling the poll. Instead of bringing him to trial, the army put him on a military aeroplane and flew him to Costa Rica. Later that day, after the reading of a resignation letter of disputed authenticity, the Honduran Congress voted to remove Zelaya from office, and appointed Speaker of Congress Roberto Micheletti, his constitutional successor, to replace him. -From Wikipedia.