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The coup in Honduras highlights once again that even mild reforms within the capitalist system cannot be tolerated by the local oligarchies in Latin America and their imperialist masters. But Venezuela teaches that if the masses mobilise reaction can be stopped. Now is the time to mobilise the full force of the Honduran workers and poor.
On Wednesday, May 27th, a small but diverse group of labor and community organizers, concerned citizens, union workers and retirees gathered at the Center for Theology and Social Analysis in St. Louis, MO to meet Laura Kurre, one of the organizers of the new National United Healthcare Workers union (NUHW) in California.
What we are witnessing in Iran is a full-blown popular revolution. However, in order to set its stamp on the movement, the working class must participate in the front line. The movement will stand or fall to the degree that the working class is able to lead it.
The stormy street demonstrations in Iran are continuing and gathering strength. Anti-government protesters held another big rally in central Tehran today (Wednesday), which, to judge from photographs we have just received, has dwarfed even the massive demonstrations of the last few days. It defied renewed calls from Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, the Supreme Leader, to keep off the streets. Faced with vast protests, the ruling regime in Tehran is being pulled in opposite directions.
The Iranian masses have recently begun moving in an attempt to transform their conditions and throw off the chains of the fundamentalist regime in what can only be described as the first stages of the Iranian Revolution. Given the importance of these events, we have produced a new leaflet from Socialist Appeal to present a brief Marxist analysis of the situation. You can download it here.
The Workers’ International League held its first National Marxist School over the weekend of June 13th and 14th. As part of the School, a public event was organized jointly with Hands Off Venezuela, to discuss the 50th Anniversary of the Cuban Revolution and the lessons for Latin America. Over 60 people attended the event, which was held at the United Labor Centre in Minneapolis, and nearly $100 in donations were raised to help develop the Hands Off Venezuela campaign. The event featured two main speakers, Jorge Martín, International Secretary of the Hands Off Venezuela Campaign and regular presenter at the Havana Book Fair in Cuba, and August Nimtz, a professor at the University of Minnesota and member of the Minnesota Cuba Committee. The discussion was facilitated by Sonia Arevalo of the MN FMLN rank and file committee “Combatiente Anonimo.”
All the objective conditions for revolution as outlined by Lenin have matured in Iran. The events of the past few days mark the beginning of the Iranian revolution, which will unfold over a whole period. This is due to the lack of a mass revolutionary party capable of leading the masses today. But the conditions to build such a force have also matured. Workers and youth in Iran will be looking for the genuine ideas of revolutionary socialism, of Marxism.
Despite what Obama calls a “glimmer of hope,” the economic crisis continues to unfold and reduce living standards everywhere. Vice-President, Joe Biden, told CNN recently that we can expect to see increased unemployment every month for the rest of the year, and the unemployment rate could be over 10 percent by Christmas (the unemployment rate is currently at 8.5 percent). This is bad enough news for working people in general, but how do things fare for Black Americans. Has Obama been the “change” that so many hoped for?
In December, Obama presented a handful of measures he planned to carry out once in office. Among these was the expansion of the AmeriCorps program. In April, the $5.7 billion expansion was approved. Over the next eight years, the AmeriCorps program will grow to include 225,000 participants annually, up from the current average of 75,000.
Volunteers in the program work in teams assigned to various projects focused on the environment, education, public safety, “unmet needs,” disaster relief, etc. This is all well and good, but the program is nowhere near being a true “mass program of public works,” nor is it a grass roots movement of any kind.
April 15th was “Taxed Enough Already” Day for thousands of right-wingers, ultra-rightwingers, and assorted confused radicals across the United States. Images of Ayn Rand book covers on poster boards and people dressed up like the “founding fathers” flooded the media, particularly outlets such the Fox News Network.
In this letter, Kevin Nance analyzes the development of class consciousness across the Americas, including the United States. The author of the letter goes on to show the problems of leadership and the need for a mass party of labor.
The Communist is the official newspaper of the party of the Revolutionary Communists of America. It is different from any other publication you’ll find in the US today. Behind this newspaper, there’s a vast network of communist activity from coast to coast. It is a tool for organizing in the streets, at protests and strikes, for building communist cells in our neighborhoods, workplaces, and campuses.
The RCA is on a mission to carry Bolshevism into the political arena of a country that’s ripe for it. Yes, we’re Bolsheviks living in the digital age, and we also use social media and our podcast to spread the communist program. But we’re not the kind of internet leftists who stay inside and “do politics” online. That’s why we need something we can carry with us into the streets and put into people’s hands. The physical paper is an instrument for building a real-life organization—a genuine Communist Party of fighters.