Winter Soldier 2008

Against the Current

Published bimonthly since 1986, AGAINST THE CURRENT is a Solidarity-sponsored analytical journal for the broad revolutionary left. The March/April issue features the Educational Crisis in California and the Unfolding Fightback with articles by students and workers in the University of California system. For International Women's Day there are reviews on gender, sexuality and liberation by Catherine Sameh, Chloe Tribich and Kate Flynn. Other articles include Malik Miah on Obama Forgets the Black Community, Michael Steven Smith on Lost Liberties in the Age of Obama and Kim Moody on the Crisis and Potential in Labor's Wars and coverage on Honduras and Gaza.
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International Viewpoint is the monthly English-language magazine of the Fourth International. IV is a window to radical alternatives world-wide, carrying reports, analysis and debates from all corners of the globe. Correspondents in over 50 countries report on popular struggles, and the debates that are shaping the left of tomorrow.

Put a Socialist in the Senate!

Dan La Botz, a 64-year old Cincinnati school teacher, has filed petitions with the Ohio Secretary of State to become the candidate of the Socialist Party for the U.S. Senate. La Botz, who needed 500 signatures to get on the Socialist Party primary ballot, filed petitions with approximately 1,200 signatures on Thursday, Feb. 18. La Botz, a long time labor and social movement activist, is the candidate of the Socialist Party of Ohio which is the state organization of the Socialist Party USA.

Buttons to Build the Movement

Order these eye-catching buttons to spread the demand for social and economic justice. If you don't have paypal, email us!

Reads Bail out People, not Wall Street!. Around the edge, these 2 1/8" buttons read "Free Health Care," "Defend Public Services," "Living Wage Jobs," "Free Higher Education," "Troops Home Now," "Rebuild the Gulf Coast," and "Affordable Housing."

Bright orange 1 1/2" buttons boldly demand: "Bring the Troops Home Now!" Wear one everywhere to start a conversation about why US occupation can never be a force for liberation, and people's needs should come before the massive military budget.

Produced during the massive immigrant rights demonstrations of 2006, these 2 1/8" buttons read, in Spanish and English: ¡exigimos Paz, Legalización, y Trabajos para Todos! we demand Peace, Legalization, and Jobs for All!

Videos from Solidarity's Educational Conference

November 14-15 in New York City, Solidarity held a successful conference featuring engaging talks on a number of topics. Click here to view these videos from "Their Crisis, Our Movements"

- Crisis of Capitalism, Challenge to the Movements (David McNally, New Socialist Group)
- The New Imperialism and The Global Fightback (Vivek Chibber, Christy Thornton, Jonah McCallister-Erickson)
- The State of Resistance in Communities & the Workplace (Normahiram Perez, Steve Downs, Penelope Duggan)
- Race and National Liberation Under Obama (Glen Ford, Lalit Clarkston)

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Second Annual Convention of Labor Campaign for Single Payer, March 5-7, 2010
by Milton posted on 03/13/10
Trail of Dreams, bound for DC, passes through Georgia
by Tim S posted on 03/12/10
Chicago immigrant youth are Undocumented and Unafraid
by Isaac posted on 03/11/10
Women's Day March in San Antonio Says “Ya Basta” to Abusive Treatment of Workers
by Chris posted on 03/10/10
Tres resolutivos del Congreso Mundial de la IV internacional sobre México
by International Viewpoint posted on 03/9/10
Disability and socialism
by Chloe posted on 03/9/10
Pakistan: Women workers march in Lahore to observe International Women Day
by International Viewpoint posted on 03/8/10
Salt of the Earth, Classic of Feminist Cinema [Full Video]
by Isaac posted on 03/8/10
Solidarity with Haiti!
by International Viewpoint posted on 03/7/10
How many gender problems can you count?
by Chloe posted on 03/7/10

One Year of Obama and the Democrats’ Debacle

Last fall, in the discussion that produced our analysis of “Obama After 200 Days,” we said it would be premature to speak of a “crisis” for the administration. A year after the euphoric 2009 inauguration, it no longer looks premature. People who looked to Obama and the Democrats for leadership are bitterly disappointed, and a very peculiar brand of rightwing politics has seized the initiative.
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Regroupment & Refoundation of a U.S. Left

As part of the preparation for our 2008 Convention, members of SOLIDARITY have begun a political document describing some perspectives for socialist renewal in the twenty-first century. We welcome responses to this initial draft of the document. Some of the themes here have also been developed in Solidarity's Founding Statement and our 1997 pamphlet, “Socialist Organization Today.”

— Introduction
— Social Movements over the Last Two Decades
— Regroupment, Refounding and the Arc of Resistance
— Refounding a New Left: Next Generations & Their Experiences
— The Tasks and Possibilities of a U.S. Refounded Left
— Refounding the Left: Taking Our Past Into Our Future

New Pamphlet: Hell on Wheels

New from Solidarity! Long time transit worker activist Steve Downs has written a pamphlet charting the twenty year story of New Directions, a rank and file caucus in New York City's transit union that he helped build and develop - including the challenges of keeping the rank and file democracy movement alive after New Directions won control of the local.

Read an interview on Zmag.org
Read a review and order your copy today!

From Abortion Rights to Reproductive Justice

New from Solidarity's Feminist Commission, this leaflet responds to the right wing attack on reproductive freedom and argues that the movement must go beyond "pro-choice" to true reproductive justice. This socialist and anti-racist feminist agenda would take up issues such as access to health and child care, forced sterilization, and the division of "productive" and "reproductive" labor.
Download the pamphlet...

— Nate Franco and Dianne Feeley

MORE THAN 250 veterans and military families gathered from March 13-15 outside Washington, DC for the Iraq Veterans Against the War (IVAW) Winter Soldier Investigation: Iraq and Afghanistan. Videos of their testimony on their experiences are posted at www.IVAW.org.

The weekend was directly patterned on the example of the 1971 testimonies organized by Vietnam Veterans Against the War on the horrors and atrocities they had witnessed and perpetrated in that holocaust, calling the event “Winter Soldier” after Thomas Paine’s call for patriotic service during the Revolutionary War.

In a panel with Barry Romo (a VVAW founder), David Cortwright (author of Soldiers in Revolt) and Tod Ensign (Director of Citizen Soldier), the weekend began by making the case that as with Vietnam, ending today’s wars requires an antiwar movement within the military. Resisters Jeff Englehart and Garett Reppenhagen described how they created the blog “Fight to Survive” while in Iraq, writing about their experiences and what they thought was wrong.

Englehart was told to cease and desist, but did not. Back home, he joined Iraq Veterans Against the War and has found it to be the best therapy he could find. Reppenhagen noted that many veterans are career soldiers, which makes antiwar organizing difficult in the military: Though they oppose the war, they want to remain in the military for the benefits. Reppenhagen says soldiers can speak out without getting in trouble, and IVAW stands ready to help them learn how.

In a panel on gender and sexuality in the military, women and men noted the frequent harassment and demands for sex, as well as rape — all of which go undocumented, and about which any who speak out are coerced into silence. One female soldier was raped in a shower while the camp was being attacked.

Margaret Stevens, former Army National Guard soldier, noted that the issues of gender and sexuality are woven throughout war and imperialism, including the rape of Iraqi women. She also discussed the pressures women face to trade sex with superiors for promotions, as well as tensions created by pregnancy of soldiers.

Other panels discussed the crises in Veterans Affairs, the global context of the “war on terror,” the use of racism to dehumanize the enemy, the costs of war at home and abroad, and the breakdown of the U.S. military.

In testimony about the rules of engagement, Jon Turner, formerly of Kilo Company, 3rd Battalion, 8th Marines, recounted the mistakes that he made, that everybody in Iraq made. “On April 18, 2006, I had my first confirmed kill. This man was innocent.”

“I called him ‘the fat man.’ He was walking back to his house, and I shot him in front of his friend and his father. The first round didn’t kill him…he started screaming and looked right into my eyes…So I took another shot and took him out. He was then carried away by the rest of his family…We were all congratulated after we had our first kills, and that happened to have been mine. My company commander personally congratulated me…the same individual who had stated that whoever gets their first kill by stabling them to death will get a four-day pass when we return from Iraq.”

Turner concluded his testimony by saying, “I am sorry for the things that I did. I am no longer the monster that I once was.” (Full transcript can be found at www.democracynow.org, March 17 broadcast. “Democracy Now” was among the handful of media outlets to cover the hearings.)

My Lai Anniversary

The final day of Winter Soldier Investigation, March 16, marked the 40th anniversary of the infamous My Lai massacre, when U.S. troops entered a Vietnamese village and murdered hundreds of men, women and children, young and old, raping some of the women and bayoneting elderly men.

It is up to us in the antiwar movement to publicize the Winter Soldier investigation, especially to those on the street who don’t even know what IVAW is, and to those young men and women in this country who are on the verge of walking up to that recruiter and signing on the dotted line.

ATC 134, May-June 2008