besieged tegucigalpa one day after the 4th of July, a poem by andrew taylor, who is a son of The Americas

where o where
is the brave
the new United
states of the americas?

Sing the evening birds
in Tegucigalpa

cry the workers
of Honduras

shout the women militants

say the officious apprentices and clerks

whisper the old men in corners...

thousands, thousands
marched to greet
the one
they’d elected
people’s president
Zelaya !Zelaya !
Viva Zelaya ! !

thousands, thousands
marched towards Toncontin airport
with a gallant desire

but
cut down
by
the
passionless bullets
triggered by experts,

became blood-baptized fountains,
became the holy martyr-comrades
for the redemption of new Honduras

Zelaya !Zelaya !
Viva Zelaya ! !

O where o where
Is the audacious new brave
president of the United
states of Hope
of Change !?

(hear the world, hear history, it is shouting out...)

and
floating above besieged tegucigalpa

so also sing
the new white robed martyrs
the ecstatic, unconsoled angels
of beseiged tegucigalpa

recently shot dead
hit in the head
by gangster Junta gunfire
from inside the airport
as the people rocked a security fence

the report says
where hope is dying
in tegucigalpa

Malaysian socialists: `Unite to turn workers’ frustration into a political struggle for socialism’

By M. Saraswathy

[M. Saraswathy is deputy chairperson of the Socialist Party of Malaysia. She was a featured guest at the World at a Crossroads conference, organised by the Democratic Socialist Perspective and Resistance, and held in Sydney, Australia, April 10-12, 2009. Below is M. Saraswathy's speech to the final session of the conference: ``World at a Crossroads -- Fighting for our future''.]

Cuba si! Yankee no! Uh! Ah! Chavez no se va!

Red salute from Malaysia to all friends and comrades!

The Socialist Party of Malaysia thanks the Democratic Socialist Persective, Socialist Alliance and Resistance for inviting us to this valuable World at a Crossroads conference.

One of the most widely known truths today is that capitalism is in deep crisis of its own making . The endless search for greater and greater profits with complete disregard for people and the planet has inevitably resulted in crises which capitalism itself cannot solve.

The clock cannot be turned back on global warming, which has resulted in major changes to temperature and natural phenomena, and which poses a serious threat to future life on Earth.

Capitalism has also created a crisis of resources. The resources of the world are being exhausted and depleted by unplanned production and wasteful exploitation. Peak oil production has been reached and we face the prospect of a world that is short of energy resources.

Currently we are all in the midst of a worldwide economic recession that is entirely created by the capitalist system. Thanks to global capitalism no country in the world is spared. Workers are losing jobs in millions; there is widespread homelessness and misery. The recession has created and is going to create massive poverty. World poverty figures are going to skyrocket.

Of course, the capitalist-run media mourns not the huge suffering of the people but the bankruptcy of financial institutions, the drop in the billions owned by the billionaires, and the billions being pumped in by capitalist governments to save the capitalist system.

The constant warning is that this is going to be the worst economic crisis in 80 years, and even worse than the depression of the 1930s. For us socialists this means a long period of suffering and deprivation for the people, brought about by the ruthless profits-first and greed-driven system.

Hope

But this very bleak period also is a period of great hope, having created the objective conditions necessary for ending capitalism .Widespread unemployment and poverty also means widespread disenchantment and anger. We have the opportunity to create awareness among workers by exposing the capitalist system as a system that rides on the super-exploitation and repression of workers. We have the opportunity now to create awareness about the socialist system. We have the opportunity to empower workers. I think we are all agreed that the objective conditions are ready for a change. But are we ready to use this opportunity to fight for a socialist future?

I would like to propose some actions we should take in order to be able to respond to the crisis of capitalism.

1. Sink our differences

One of the biggest obstacles in the way to a concerted fight against capitalism is factionalism among the left. Many groups seem to be more concerned about the correctness of their ideology and position rather the onslaught of capitalism and how the left will need a joint response to it. There is a need to unite on our similarities as socialists, oppressed by an inhuman system in which the majority remains oppressed, and commit ourselves to struggle for socialism with the working class. There is a need for continuous dialogue over our differences as we work together. There is an urgent need for us to think of the challenges and kind of socialism in the 21st century and how to arrive at it. And to realise that capitalism is still strong and will come back after the recession only because the socialists wasted their opportunity. Human history and the working class will never forgive us if we continue divide ourselves!

2. Venezuela and Latin America

We need to look at Venezuela and Latin America. Non-socialists are achieving what socialists have failed to achieve in decades. Socialism is being introduced in ways never imagined before. What lessons can we learn from Latin America which we can apply in the struggle in our own countries?

3. We have to work

We have to go the ground level and agitate, as Che said. Engage with the working class in struggle, empower them. Gain the democratic space to enhance our struggles. We have to write pamphlets for workers to understand and discuss – to create awareness and urge them into action. We have to harness the anger and frustration of the workers and make people aware that humankind is not doomed to suffer under the capitalism system forever. Socialism doesn't drop from the sky!

As Rosa Luxemburg said, the choice facing humankind is socialism or barbarism. There will be great anger and dissatisfaction with the existing economic system. Our role is to turn this frustration into a political struggle for a socialist society.

Long live socialism!

Working class of the world unite !

Hidup perjuangan! Hidup sosialisma!

Barack Obama: Taking up where Teddy Roosevelt left off?

http://theragblog. blogspot. com/2009/ 04/steve- weissman- obamas-big- stick.html


By Steve Weissman / The Rag Blog / April 17, 2009

In less than hundred days in office, President Barack Obama has already demonstrated his desire to speak softly to all comers, friend or foe, while his proposed military budget shows a determination to carry America’s big stick into far-off trouble spots that most of us don’t know how to spell.


“Speak softly and carry a big stick,” President Theodore Roosevelt proclaimed just over a hundred years ago. Unabashedly committed to make America an imperial power, the energetic Roosevelt looked to a strong Navy to enforce the Monroe’s Doctrine’s hold over Latin America and to project the country’s growing power into the far corners of the world.

In less than hundred days in office, President Barack Obama has already demonstrated his desire to speak softly to all comers, friend or foe, while his proposed military budget shows a determination to carry America’s big stick into far-off trouble spots that most of us don’t know how to spell. The budget numbers and choice of weapon systems tell the story. Obama turns out be far more globally ambitious than either his supporters or detractors expected, and far more eager for Washington to remain the world’s policeman, ready, willing, and able to intervene militarily in what the Pentagon calls counter-insurgency and Teddy Roosevelt would have called colonial wars.

As Secretary of Defense Robert Gates put it, the Pentagon would retain a hedge against other risks, but the primary goal was to prepare to “fight the wars we are in today and the scenarios we are most likely to face in the years to come.”

Up to now, the raw numbers have drawn the most attention, much of it scurrilous or silly. Republican hawks condemn Obama for “gutting the military budget.” Anti-war bloggers defend him for proposing the most military spending in years, an estimated $534 billion or some 4% higher than George W. Bush’s last budget. And, it takes the right-wing libertarians at the Cato Institute to point out that the total military spending – including the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and other incidentals – amounts to more than $750 billion. According to CATO researcher Benjamin H. Friedman, “That is more than six times what China spends, 10 times what Russia spends and 70 times what Iran, North Korea and Syria spend combined.”

Obama’s choice of which arms to keep – and which to cut – further highlights his global ambitions. He has forced the Pentagon to cut down on overly exquisite and under-performing weapons systems, especially those intended primarily to combat technologically sophisticated opponents, such as Russia and China. The cuts would halt or scale back the F-22 fighter jet, the missile shield in Poland and the Czech Republic that the Kremlin opposes, non-workable armored vehicles for the Army’s Future Combat Systems, a new communication satellite, the C-17 transport plane, a new generation of stealth destroyers, and new helicopters to rescue downed pilots and for President Obama himself.

In place of these, Obama is boosting proposed expenditures for more boots on the ground and more plentiful, more modular, lower-tech, and somewhat lower-cost arms that make military intervention in colonial wars faster, cheaper, and – he hopes – more effective. Among the keepers:


* Littoral Combat Ships – smaller, high-speed, multi-purpose surface vessels that can operate in shallow water close to shore. The Pentagon will use them to move troops and equipment onto a beach, support Special Forces in commando raids, collect intelligence, perform surveillance and reconnaissance, sweep mines, hunt submarines, and fight pirates.
* F-35 joint-strike fighter planes – high-speed, multi-purpose single-engine jet fighters optimized for air-to-ground rather than air-to-air combat. The Air Force, Navy, and Marine Corps will use as many as 2,443 F-35’s to provide close air support, tactical bombing, and air defense. Allied nations will also use them.
* Unmanned Aerial Vehicles – remotely piloted drones to fly over targeted areas to collect intelligence and fire rockets. The Pentagon and CIA are already using them in Afghanistan and Pakistan, often killing civilians and provoking a militant reaction.


These are the weapons systems Obama wants to help Washington police the world. Whether he gets them, and whether he gets rid of those arms that do little to serve that task, remain to be seen. Each of the wasteful weapons systems has a powerful constituency, including the companies that make them, all the sub-contractors, the unions, the communities in which all of the work is done, and the senators and representatives who feed at the military trough. But, win or lose, Obama’s first military budget reveals his global goals and the technocratic rationality with which he is pursuing them. Teddy Roosevelt would be proud.

[Steve Weissman is a contributor to The Rag Blog. A veteran of the Berkeley Free Speech Movement and the New Left monthly Ramparts, Steve Weissman lived for many years in London, working as a magazine writer and television producer. He now lives and works in France.]

"Raisin in the Sun", poem by Langston Hughes

What happens to a dream deferred?

Does it dry up
like a raisin in the sun?


Or fester like a sore--
And then run?

Does it stink like rotten meat?
Or crust and sugar over--
like a syrupy sweet?

Maybe it just sags
like a heavy load.

Or does it explode?

A Good-bye Kiss to the Blockade?

http://www.politicalaffairs.net/
A Good-bye Kiss to the Blockade?

By Manuel E. Yepe

Original source: CubaNews

“The embargo on Cuba has been in place for almost 50 years. Although it may have been an appropriate policy response to the Cuban Revolution in the milieu of the Cold War, the reality of the 21st century calls for its abolishment.”

That assertion is made in article by Colonel Glenn Alex Crowther entitled “Kiss the Embargo Goodbye,” published in the [February 2009] monthly newsletter of the Strategic Studies Institute (SSI) of the US Army War College, a branch of the US government’s Defense Department.

“It is time to kiss the embargo goodbye, while maintaining an unyielding stance that democracy is the only acceptable form of government in the Western Hemisphere,” the article states, thereby reasserting a supposed US right, recognized by no one else, to determine what form of government its neighbors should have.

According to Colonel Crowther’s interpretation of the history of Cuba: “On January 1, 1959, in the wake of several notable victories by insurgents, the dictator Batista fled Cuba for exile. His government, isolated from both the Cuban people and the US Government because of its repressive policies, collapsed. Fidel arrived in Havana on January 9, 1959. He and his comrades took power in the face of a total government vacuum.”

Crowther states that “the United States initially responded in a conciliatory manner; however, mutual antipathy prevented rapprochement. The United States responded with support for the Bay of Pigs invasion in 1961. Cuba then allowed the Soviet Union to place nuclear missiles in Cuba. Fidel also initiated a policy of exporting revolution to the rest of the Western Hemisphere and a few countries in Africa. His Argentine lieutenant, Ernest ‘Che’ Guevara, promised ‘one, two, one hundred [sic] Vietnams.’”

Later, according to Crowther, the triumph of the Sandinistas against the dictator Somoza was the only confirmation of the Cuban theory of guerrilla foco, which, nonetheless failed in Nicaragua because the US intervened to defeat the revolutionaries, and it continued to intervene throughout Latin America against all “fidelista-inspired revolutions.”

In this context, “it was not surprising that the United States sought to punish the Cuban regime. Among other responses, the United States declared a commercial, economic and financial embargo on Cuba on February 7, 1962.” The immediate justification “was the expropriation of properties owned by US corporations and citizens; however the long-term goal was to destabilize Cuba and hopefully cause regime change.”

The author asserts that because of the support that the Soviet Union gave to Cuba, the blockade could not overthrow the revolution, but it did succeed in doing great damage to the Cubans and preventing them from providing “even more support to world-wide revolutions.” During the Cold War, one of the tactics used by the United States to wear down the USSR was to force it to provide aid to Cuba, and that motive for the embargo has lessened with the end of the Cold War.

In Crowther’s opinion, “the only reasons for supporting the embargo” are: (1) to force Cuba to reform and (2) to accede to the demands of the Cuban community in Miami. They were the ones who argued in favor of the 1992 Torricelli Law (the Cuban Democracy Act) and the 1996 Helms-Burton Act (Cuban Liberty and Democracy Solidarity Act), aimed at bolstering the blockade.

The first reason, the need to keep up the pressure to force Cuba to reform, has “manifestly failed,” writes Crowther. “Not only did the embargo fail,” the article states, “but it is not in step with our policy towards other communist regimes who were our opponents during the Cold War,” citing the examples of China, Vietnam, and the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea.

The second reason, the desire of Miami Cubans to maintain the embargo, “has slowly gone the way of the Cold War,” Crowther writes, and notes that the positions of the Cuban diaspora regarding ties with their country of origin have become more variegated.

He adds, as if this were a great discovery, that the blockade increases the Cuban people’s mobilization against US intervention in their internal affairs, although he justifies this with the old lies that portray the Cuban defensive actions as the “tyranny” of “the Castro regime.”

Lifting the blockade, he states, would project the US before the international community as “magnanimous and inclusive. Maintaining it makes us look petty and vindictive to the rest of the world.”

The article’s author, a Research Professor of National Security Studies at the US Army’s Strategic Studies Institute, argues that “we cannot convince anyone that Cuba is a threat to the United States, nor can we make the case internationally that more of the same will have a positive impact. Lifting the blockade would signal that we are ready to try something different” to achieve change.

Crowther assumes that as soon as the blockade is lifted the market for US goods and services will open up, and he dreams of a bourgeoisified and consumerist society that will covet US appliances and gadgets when the blockade ends, as happened “in Iraq in 2003.”

It is outrageous that there are those who call for lifting the blockade, not because for a half century it has been an unjustifiable crime committed against the Cuban people, but rather because it has been ineffective in achieving the foul aims that gave rise to it.

--A CubaNews translation by Will Reissner. Edited by Walter Lippmann.

A partial Biog of Works in Soviet Studies

J. Arch Getty and Roberta T. Manning editors, Stalinist Terror: New Perspectives, Cambridge University Press, 1993. [Getty & Manning]


David King, The Commissar Vanishes: The Falsification of Photographs and Art in Stalin's Russia, Metropolitan Books, 1997 [King].
Some excellent photos of N.I. Ezhov, as well as the Greatest Genius of All Times and Peoples, and the "enemies of the people" they eliminated together.

V.A. Kovalev, Dva Stalinskix Narkoma ("Two Stalinist Commissars"), Izdatel'skaya Gruppa "Progress," Moscow, 1995. [Kovalev]
A dual biography of OGPU-NKVD chiefs Genrikh Grigor'evich Yagoda (1934-36) and N.I. Ezhov (1936-38)

Roy Medvedev, Let History Judge: The Origins and Consequences of Stalinism (Revised and expanded edition edited and translated by George Shriver), Columbia University Press, New York, 1989; pp. 358-361. [Medvedev]


Vadim Zakharovich Rogovin; 1937: Stalin's Year of Terror; Mehring Books Inc., 25900 Greenfield Road, Oak Park MI 48237; 1998. [Rogovin]
(A Trotskyite, Rogovin takes the unusual view that there really was an effective Trotskyite opposition in 1936-38, and that, by Stalinist standards, the 1936-38 purge was needed to maintain Stalinist control.)

Arkadij Vaksberg, Carica Dokazatel'stv: Vyshinskij i ego Zhertvy, AO«Kniga i Biznes», Moskva, 1992; paper, 350 pp plus 16 pp. of photos.

which is also available in English translation:
Arkady Vaksberg, Stalin's Prosecutor: The Life of Andrei Vyshinsky (translated by Jan Butler), Grove Weidenfield, New York, 1991.