February 15, 2012
By Adaner Usmani
AS 2011 CLOSED, the mainstream press was awash with ominous, dark assessments of the state of the relationship between the United States and Pakistan. After a cross-border NATO air strike in November resulted in the deaths of 24 Pakistani soldiers, Pakistan responded forcefully, closing the Af-Pak border to NATO traffic, expelling the U.S. military from an air base inside Pakistan,(1) and boycotting the International Conference on Afghanistan in Bonn, which had been tasked with outlining the...
January 30, 2012
The ATC Editors
THE QUESTION ISN’T whether the magnificent “Occupy” movement will continue after police action and the onset of winter have largely emptied the encampments. The righteous rage that made the movement possible, and the enormous social and economic crisis that made it necessary, are not going away anytime soon. Quite the contrary — capitalism’s inherent contradictions, made worse by economic policies in Europe and the United States that seem calculated to maximize the...
January 3, 2012
By David Finkel
IT TOOK ABOUT twenty minutes after the last official U.S. combat troops crossed the border from Iraq into Kuwait for the Potemkin village of “Iraqi stability and democracy” carefully constructed by the American occupation to fall apart. The regime of prime minister Nouri al-Maliki has brought a terrorism indictment against the vice-president Tariq al-Hashimi, who promptly headed north to autonomous Iraqi Kurdistan where the central government’s hand doesn’t reach. Purges of university...
November 4, 2011
by Dan La Botz
And some of the Pharisees among the multitude said unto him, Master, rebuke thy disciples. And he answered and said unto them, I tell you that, if these should hold their peace, the stones would immediately cry out.—Luke 19:39-40
Tahrir Square in Cairo, Egypt
Where does the tremendous power of the occupation of city spaces, particularly the square, come from? The occupation of Tahrir Square in Cairo brought down the Mubarak dictatorship, theindignados in assembly in the plazas shook the...
November 1, 2011
by Bay Area Solidarity
Occupy Oakland is calling for no work and no school on November 2 as part of the general strike. We are asking that all workers go on strike, call in sick, take a vacation day or simply walk off the job with their co-workers. We are also asking that all students walk out of school and join workers and community members in downtown Oakland. All banks and large corporations must close down for the day or demonstrators will march on them…
October 5, 2011
Solidarity Political Committee
Occupy Wall Street is just about the best thing that’s happened to America since the economic crisis first broke. Occupation is spreading. We’re standing up and fighting back. And we’re showing that another way of living together is possible.
We’re a movement of the underdogs. We embrace the unemployed, the homeless, the ex-offenders, the down-and-out and the downtrodden. We welcome those who are discriminated against, those who are outcast. That’s what democracy is all about. And...
September 26, 2011
David McNally
While I was cursing the inane mainstream commentary on the global economy recently, I was reminded of a pivotal scene in the 1976 movie, All the President’s Men. As two young reporters investigate the burglary of Democratic Party offices in the Watergate Hotel, a disgruntled, high-ranking FBI agent, code-named Deep Throat, advises, “Follow the money. Always follow the money.”
They did. And, in the process, the real-life journalists, Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein, blew the lid off one of...
“This fight to end the death penalty is not won or lost through me but through our strength to move forward and save every innocent person in captivity around the globe. We need to dismantle this Unjust system city by city, state by state and country by country.” -Troy Davis
The hypocrisy of the United States was on full display late Wednesday night, "International Peace Day," as the Supreme Court ruled that Georgia should proceed with the execution of Troy Davis. His body was strapped to a...
BREAKING: The scheduled 7pm execution of Troy Davis has been temporarily delayed by the United States Supreme Court while they decide whether to rule on his case. The streaming video feed at Democracy Now! has constant updates live from the maximum security prison in Jackson, Georgia. Call the United States Supreme Court at (202) 479-3000 and urge them to rule in Troy's favor. There are reports of a spontaneous demonstration at the Supreme Court building in Washington, DC.
On Tuesday Morning,...
by Isaac Steiner
On September 21, the state of Georgia intends to kill a 43-year old man named Troy Davis who has spent nearly half his life on death row. This is the fourth time Davis has faced the executioner's needle. A powerful international movement, fueled by the lack of evidence linking Davis to the 1989 murder he's accused of—and by simple opposition to the barbaric death penalty—has pushed back the state's previous attempts.
Troy Davis with his mother in 2002Now that same movement...
by Ricardo Levins Morales
The Madison worker uprising shook up the US political landscape. State governments that were peacefully going about their business forcing workers and communities to pay for upper class gluttony are facing resistance on a scale they had not imagined. Instead of letting their fellow workers be picked off and destroyed sector by sector, a wide swath of the working public rose in support of Wisconsin teachers and state workers. This, in turn, has given new juice to efforts...
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2011 Solidarity Summer School
Summer School Themes:
Anti-Racism, Communities of Color and the Crisis
Capitalism: Fundamentals, Current Phase and Resistance
From 20th Century Socialism to 21st Century Socialism
Public Sector Fightback
Socialist-Feminist Politics and Analysis
Have we officially entered an "age of austerity"—and if so, what is our exit strategy? As...
IS THERE ANY ruling class in history that would sit by as its country went bankrupt, not by necessity but to serve the ideological agenda of a political fringe? It seems incredible, yet at face value it seems that this perspective is looming on August 2 – and not to just any country but to the world superpower, the United States of America.
Legislation to raise the U.S. debt ceiling is usually a routine procedure whose necessity is well understood. The Republicans’ position is to hold this...
May 4, 2011
David Finkel, for the Political Committee of Solidarity
“U-S-A! U-S-A!” The celebrations – in gatherings in front of the White House, at Ground Zero and around the country as the news spread of the U.S. assassination of Osama bin Laden – are understandable, after a decade in which the mass murderer OBL was portrayed as the incarnation of all things evil. The popular euphoria will fade quickly. The triumphal comment by the President of the United States – “The U.S. has shown it can do whatever it wants to do”...
April 4, 2011
Solidarity National Committee
For socialists and for antiwar forces, the events in Libya have presented — and continue to present — agonizing political and ethical choices. It is entirely logical and inevitable that thoughtful activists find themselves in disagreement among each other, and indeed in internal conflict within themselves, over questions raised by the Libyan popular uprising and by the military intervention of the western powers. Recognizing the difficulties of the situation is the essential first...
by Stephanie Luce
I spent the last few days in Madison, returning to the city where I lived for many years in the 90s. I hadn’t been back there in almost 10 years, and I wasn’t sure what to expect.
The major event was the rally on Saturday, March 12. This started off with a tractor-cade around the Capitol Square at 10 am. Dozens of tractors came from around the state in protest of Governor Walker’s proposed cuts and attacks on democracy. The streets were lined all the way around the square...
By Santiago Alba Rico & Alma Allende
Rebelion, March 3rd 2011
We have the impression that a great worldwide liberation process may be aborted by the unappeasable ferocity of Gaddafi, U.S. interventionism, and a lack of foresight in Latin America.
We might describe the situation like this: in a part of the world linked once again to strong internal solidarities and from which only lethargy or fanaticism was expected, a wave of popular uprisings have arisen which have threatened to topple the...
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—David Finkel
January 27, 2011 -- The revolt spreading from Tunisia to Algeria, Egypt, Yemen and beyond inspires both hope and fear. Hope, because so many tens of millions of people are taking to the streets at the risk of beating, torture and death to liberate themselves and their country. But also fear, because of the chilling reality that for every democratic victory -- such as we’ve witnessed so far in Tunisia, or the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989 or the political revolution that ended...
by David Finkel
AFTER THE INITIAL horror, the responses to the massacre in Tucson have settled into the usual political dialogue-of-the deaf, and like most such discourse these days it is pretty much useless all around.
THE SOCIAL SECURITY “reform” proposal by Erskine Bowles and Alan Simpson, in advance of the December release of the “bipartisan” deficit reduction commission appointed by president Obama, is only the preview of a coming series of savage attacks on programs that working people in the United States have counted on for decades. These assaults in the name of “budget discipline” will dominate the legislative agenda for the next Congress, and for dozens of state legislatures as they face...
NOVEMBER 3, THE DAY AFTER -- Several points stand out from the long-predicted results of the midterm election. The Democrats, of course, took a big hammering -- and quite frankly, they deserved it. If it weren’t for the gift of a few whacked-out Tea Party candidates in critical races, they’d have lost the Senate too.
A line of voters file into New York City polling station
By Dan La Botz
Socialist Party candidate for the U.S. Senate from Ohio
DanLaBotz.com
The following essay represents a distillation of my basic stump speech over the past nine months of the campaign. Visit my YouTube page to watch me giving speeches very much like this one around Ohio - or follow my campaign on Facebook.
In recent weeks, millions of French workers and students have gone on strike and participated in massive demonstrations against proposed changes to the country's pension system. President Nicolas Sarkozy wishes to push through a change to that would raise the retirement age from 60 to 62. This attempt has become a social clash over which class will pay for the ongoing economic crisis: the rich elite, or the working majority.
The union leadership, tied to the Socialist Party and its perspective...
by the Solidarity Political Committee
Update: List of Protest Actions at FBI Offices
On Friday, September 24, the FBI used search and seizure warrants to raid the homes of several antiwar and socialist activists in Minneapolis and Chicago. Subpoenas were delivered to activists in other states. The charges related to supposed "material aid to terrorist organizations." In this case, the activists appear to have been targetted because of their active support for organizations in Colombia and...
—by Isaac Steiner
From Manhattan to Murfreesboro, Tennessee, the right wing’s efforts to demonize Muslim people has turned mosques and Islamic cultural centers into political battlegrounds. All progressive people have a responsibility to stand against the spread of this hatred, and we support all of the mobilizations that have been organized in defense of religious freedom and the Muslim community.
The impact of this was made painfully clear on August 30th when a cabdriver, Ahmed Sharif, was...
ARIZONA’S VERSION OF ethnic cleansing, SB 1070, came into force on Thursday, July 29, minus those provisions halted by a federal court injunction – notably the requirement that police check the immigration status of anyone suspected of being “illegal.” The ruling by federal judge Susan Bolton is heading for appeals that will almost certainly wind up in U.S. Supreme Court. That body has recently distinguished itself by upholding the “personhood” rights of corporations, but not those...
President Obama and the Congressional Democrats have been stern in their condemnations of BP. Yet their responses to the greatest environmental catastrophe in U.S. history show the Democratic Party’s unwillingness to challenge not only the logic of private profitability, but also the short-term prerogatives of corporate interests.
The President’s June 15 Oval Office address met a wide array of critics. Some questioned his lack of specificity, others the tardiness of his response. But Obama...
by the Socialist Project in Canada
The massive police presence in Toronto over this week has been officially justified on the basis of protecting the leaders of the G8 and G20 countries meeting in Huntsville and Toronto. We were told that the creation of the fenced-in fortress, the massive mobilization of police (estimates ranging from 10-20,000) from across Canada, and even the passing of a secret law on policing (by the executive of the Ontario government without reference to the Legislative...
This week, Solidarity members will join thousands of other activists and organizers at the second United States Social Forum in Detroit, June 22-26. The USSF will combine educational and organizing workshops, protest, People's Movement Assemblies and cultural events, all focused on connecting and advancing the struggles of working and oppressed people, and against war and ecological destruction.
The 2007 USSF in Atlanta succeeded in bringing together new networks dedicated to everything from...
The Israeli Navy’s murderous assault on the Gaza Freedom Flotilla has been described as a bungled and botched operation and a diplomatic disaster for Israel. It is all of that, but more important, it is a crime against the law of the sea in the context of a larger crime against humanity – the siege of Gaza.
Statement for March 21 [Español abajo]
View our previous front page, They're President Obama's Wars Now, here
Is this what people voted for? Bring all the troops home now!
The voters in november 2008 spoke loud and clear: They rejected the disastrous wars of George W. Bush, the lies, the torture, the horrible waste of lives and resources. President Barack Obama, on his first day in office, promised that the Guantanamo prison would close within a year. “Gitmo” was created by the Bush-Cheney regime, on U.S.-occupied Cuban territory, to make sure the torture and military “trials” there would be...
—David Finkel
Delivered to the Solidarity National Committee in February 2010
Dan La Botz, Cincinnati School Teacher, Socialist Party Candidate for U.S. Senate.
by Enku Ide
The 7.0 earthquake that razed much of the Haitian capital on January 13 has led to a uniquely devastating humanitarian crisis.
— Wesley Strong
While President Obama unveiled his plan to escalate troop levels in Afghanistan last week, anti-war activists were finishing the organization of protests for the following
A Statement by the Solidarity Political Committee
Statement adopted by the Left Unity Commission of Solidarity (November 2009)
— Ron Lare
AUTO WORKERS WERE supposedly whipped, tamed and back in their cages. But “No”! The beast has raised its head again.
— David Finkel
For the Solidarity Political Committee
— Jonah McAllister-Erickson
Activist with the Thomas Merton Center (writing in a personal capacity)
Afghanistan:
The Case for Out Now
Read the new statement by the Solidarity Political Committee on the case for immediate withdrawal from Afghanistan, issued on the day the occupation entered its ninth year.
Check back in the upcoming days for reports on the October 17 mobilizations on the Solidarity Webzine. For more information about Solidarity's perspectives and work in the anti-war movement,...
—David Finkel
Delivered to the Solidarity National Committee in Sept. 2009
- by Dan La Botz, June 28
THE UNFOLDING EVENTS in the Iranian crisis remind us, on the one hand, of the magnificent democratic mobilizations in Iran’s own history, and globally over the past century and in our own time
This December in Copenhagen, the United Nations Climate Conference will determine the international agreement on climate change to succeed the expiring Kyoto Protocol.
In their essay “Reimagining Socialism,”
New! scroll down for videos from a recent forum on Gaza at NYU...
Stand with the people of Gaza!
MILLIONS OF AMERICANS see the election of Barack Obama as a referendum on white supremacy and today we join in their celebration.
[To download and print a 4-page foldable leaflet, click here. Some printers have difficulty with the file.
by Charlie Post
IS THE BANKING crisis the end of capitalism as we know it?
Download a .pdf of the document
Lawyers’ leadership on the road from resistance to reconciliation
By: Farooq Tariq
We started our Long March from Lahore around 6pm on 12 June 2008. Four vehicles were carrying around 100 Labour Party Pakistan activists. The destination was Islamabad, where leaders of the lawyers’ movement announced a picket of parliament. This was to put pressure on the Pakistan Peoples Party government to fulfill their promise to restore the country’s top judges.
Statement by Cynthia McKinney, Power to the People Candidate for U.S. President, on the nomination of Barack Obama as the Democratic Party's Presidential Candidate in 2008
(statement issued June 9, 2008)
Solidarity congratulates the Cynthia McKinney "Power to the People" presidential campaign on winning the Green Party endorsement.
Motion from Solidarity National Committee
(Passed 5/17/08)
Solidarity endorses the Cynthia McKinney campaign in the Green Party as the most viable option for an independent political alternative in the 2008 presidential election. We make this choice in the context of the following considerations:
by Marc Johnson
Media reports have neglected the most important source of aid to victims of cyclone Nargis - spontaneous donations from their fellow citizens.
With the Burmese regime continuing to deny the true extent of the catastrophe, and army factions vying to appropriate as much of the aid as possible, food, clothing and money gifts from private Burmese citizens probably represents over 80% of the aid actually received by victims of the cyclone, which killed over 30,000 people when it hit...
Nakba Day, 15 May, means "Day of the Catastrophe" and marks the beginning of the Palestinian exodus following Israel's creation in 1948. Solidarity salutes the brave struggle of the Palestinian people with these reflections:
Why We March On May Day
(Op-Ed for L.A. Daily News)
By: Nativo V. Lopez, National President, Mexican American Political Association (MAPA)
The immigrant vote will increase to unstoppable heights in four short years across California's political landscape, a veritable big-foot electorate, according to a recently released study commissioned by the Grantmakers Concerned With Immigrants and Refugees. Fully one-third of California voters by 2012 will be comprised of immigrant voters - naturalized...
Watch it online here!
Last month, March 13-16, hundreds of soldiers gathered in DC to disclose the realities of U.S. war policy in a public investigation called Winter Soldier: Iraq and Afghanistan. Veterans and civilian survivors of both conflicts gave public testimony and shared the eyewitness stories that have been censored from the American public about the true human cost of these occupations. The Iraq Veterans Against the War (IVAW) are turning a page, and writing a new chapter in the...
Farooq Sulehria is a prominent radical journalist and leading member of the Labour Party Pakistan.
Liaqat Bagh: On February 18, as the night set in, the lush green garden in Pakistan's northern town of Rawalpindi was witnessing a very different scene. Unlike the December 27 bloody Benazir tragedy staged on its gates, this scene featured a crowd of several thousand cheering and chanting. Waving Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) flags, chanting “Jeay Bhutto” (“Long live Bhutto”) youth embraced...
January 25, 2008
About 3:00 am on Wednesday morning Jan. 23, well-coordinated explosions demolished the iron wall built by Israel to seal the southern border between the Gaza Strip and Egypt (the Philadelphi axis). Tens of thousands of Palestinians streamed across the border and entered the Egyptian side of the town of Rafah, which had been bisected by the wall, in search of food, gasoline, and other basic commodities which have been in short supply for many months in Gaza. The first wave of...
January 23, 2008
Jeff HalperThe people of Palestine have done it again, taking their own fate in their hands after being let down by their own "moderate" political leadership and, indeed, the entire international community in their struggle for freedom. Early this morning they simply blew up the wall separating Gaza from Egypt, breaking a siege imposed on them by an Arab government in collaboration with Israel.
THE UNAUTHORIZED OPENING of Gaza’s border with Egypt may be known to later historians as the beginning of the Third Intifada of the Palestinian people. That remains to be seen. What should be clear to everyone -- with the Egyptian border now re-closing and with the Israeli assassinations of resistance leaders back in full operation – is that Gaza under closure and blockade is an open wound on the body of the “international community,” and the deliberate starvation of its people by the...
Boris KagarlitskyThe strike at the Ford factory in Vsevolozhsk, located right outside St. Petersburg, ended on Dec. 14. It was the longest and most intense standoff in post-Soviet times. The strike began on Nov. 20 and continued for three weeks. According to union activists, the plant's conveyors came to a full stop. Then management threw together one shift mainly composed of office workers and, toward the end of the strike, a second shift to keep the assembly line running. But the quality...
The following contributions reflect a partial cross-section of the rich and complex discussion taking place in the Venezuelan and international left just before and immediately after the narrow defeat of the Constitutional referendum. Undoubtedly the discussion will continue among all of us who view the social process in Venezuela as a beacon of hope in the resistance to savage neoliberalism and U.S. imperial domination.
Earlier this month, we featured coverage of events in Pakistan after President Musharaff declared martial law. As events have heated up again following the assassination of Pakistan People's Party leader Benazir Bhutto, be sure to look at our International Spotlight on Pakistan page. We also have a section on the Venezuelan referendum.
The United Auto Workers (UAW) four-year contracts with General Motors, Chrysler and Ford contain cuts that mark the end of high-paying jobs in the U.S. auto...
On November 3, Pervez Musharraf, the president of Pakistan, declared a state of emergency and suspended the constitution in the face of protests against his attempted re-election while remaining army chief. Musharraf came to power following a 1999 military coup d'etat and since 2001 has been a key U.S. ally in the region. These recent actions lay bare the hypocrisy of the supposed democratic aims of the "War On Terror." Below, British socialist Tariq Ali reflects on the meaning of the state of...
Bush, Democrats and the War that Won’t End:
OUT OF IRAQ – NOW!
Download a copy of this statement in .pdf format
In November 2006 the U.S. electorate repudiated the Bush regime’s war in Iraq and put the Democrats in control of Congress, with a clear mandate to bring this disastrous imperial adventure to an end. A year later it is clear that Congress under the Democratic leadership could – but won’t – end the war. It’s even becoming apparent that the leading Democratic presidential...
August 25, 2007, Newark, New Jersey
by César Rosado
The sweltering, above 95-degree heat did not deter the about 1,000-1,500 people that congregated today at Lincoln Park, in Newark, New Jersey, for the “People’s March for Peace, Equality, Jobs and Justice.” The march commemorated the 44th anniversary of Martin Luther King, Jr.’s March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom, the 40th anniversary of the Newark Rebellion, and the second anniversary of Hurricane Katrina.
Solidarity held a 3-day conference on "Socialism and Environmental Justice" in New York City, July 20-22. Joel Kovel, author of this article, and other socialist, labor and environmental justice activists presented on topics ranging from the Uneasy Alliance of Labor and Environmental Justice to Feminism, Reproduction and the Environment. Some of the resources gathered by the summer school committee, grouped under several themes and questions, are available at the bottom of the page.
The optimism...
The second annual May Day mobilizations for immigrant rights brought an outpouring of 100,000 people into the streets of Chicago; tens of thousands in Los Angeles, where peaceful marchers with their families, as well as journalists, were met with a police riot at MacArthur Park; five thousand or more in Detroit; and thousands or tens of thousands in many other cities.
— Charlie Post
What follows is not a definitive analysis of the 2006 elections. Instead, I want to spark a discussion on several questions:
Why did the Democrats win a majority of the House and Senate?
THE CRISIS IN the Middle East deepens as the Bush regime twists in the wind, offering non-solutions that even the establishment media openly question. The new Democratic majority in Congress has neither unity nor a coherent alternative. Republicans lost the November 2006 midterm election for one overwhelming reason-the U.S. population's repudiation of the war in Iraq and the leadership that produced this disaster. Now both pro-war parties share responsibility for continuing a war that the...
--from Solidarity’s Anti-War Working Group
With the recent leak of the National Intelligence Estimate, the Bush administration’s own intelligence agencies have confirmed what the anti-war movement has been saying since 2003—the US invasion and occupation of Iraq have not promoted peace and democracy either in Iraq or around the world. Even on its own terms, the US war has been a failure-- providing a fertile environment for the growth of terrorism around the world. (Mark Mazzetti,
Spy...
Artwork: Megan Finn
August 29th marks the one-year anniversary of Hurricane Katrina's destructive landfall in New Orleans. For five endless days the nation watched while 100,000 people, trapped by the floodwaters, struggled to survive. "They just left us here to die" remarked one woman in the Superdome. Her words captured the sentiment of many survivors -- that those too poor, too old, or too Black were just abandoned by the government.
Rarely have the savage inequalities of race and class in...
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