SACP second largest party in SA - Central Committee, Malesela Maleka, 28 November 2010

http://www.politicsweb.co.za/politicsweb/view/politicsweb/en/page71654?oid=213220&sn=Detail&pid=71616

 
Statement issued by the SACP Augmented Central Committee, November 28 2010



The annual augmented Central Committee of the SACP took place in Randburg from the 26 -28 November. The augmented CC is, as the name suggests, an expanded CC that includes representation from the SACP's districts, the Young Communist League's provincial structures, and from institutions that the Party has jointly established - among them the Chris Hani Institute and the Financial Sector Charter Campaign. The annual augmented CC enables the SACP to collectively review the past year and to prepare for the next.

In reviewing 2010 the CC highlighted a number of key positive developments.

The ANC NGC

In the first place, the CC saluted the achievements of the ANC's October National General Council. We particularly welcomed the robust but disciplined manner in which the overwhelming majority of ANC branch delegates affirmed the key themes advanced by ANC President Cde Jacob Zuma in his opening and closing addresses to the NGC.

We believe there is now a clear determination on the part of the ANC and its membership to re-assert the historic values, discipline and strategic perspectives of the ANC and the movement it leads. In affirming these positions, the NGC raised exactly the same issues that the SACP's December 2009 Special National Congress firmly placed on the national agenda.

Collectively we need to address the dangers of a reckless demagogic populism. We need to guard against factional power plays within our movement, based on narrow self-enrichment agendas. And we need to condemn disgraceful displays of conspicuous consumption, not least those that degrade women.

Continued membership growth and Party activism

The CC also welcomed the growing influence, activism and membership of the SACP and Young Communist League. The SACP's membership has grown by a further 20,000 members this year, bringing our total membership to 114,600 - confirming the SACP as the second largest political party in South Africa (after the ANC) in terms of active paid-up membership. Among the highlights of SACP work during 2010 has been the convening of ongoing political education workshops, many of them convened jointly with COSATU affiliates, countrywide and at all levels from the local level up.

The YCL - a vanguard youth formation

The YCL has also emerged ever more firmly as a vanguard youth formation, bringing a militant but disciplined coherence into a sector that is now often characterised by volatile, anarchic tendencies. Among the highlights of the YCL's year was its convening of a Jobs for Youth Summit that drew in participation from over 50 formations, and included youth from the ANCYL, SASCO, COSAS, faith-based formations, and also, notably and encouragingly, from the DA, FF+ and IFP formations.

The crisis of youth unemployment is a matter that needs to be taken up by all South Africans. The CC urged the YCL to take forward its constructive work in this critical youth sector, and wished it well for its National Conference in Mafeking in mid-December.

The SACP - taking joint and collective responsibility for governance

The growing influence of the SACP has also been marked by the increasing appointment of communist cadres (in their own right as ANC cadres, of course) into key positions within government, in the national, provincial and local spheres.

While the SACP does not measure its successes in narrow head-count terms, and while we are committed to the principle of deployments being based, above all, on capacity, commitment and a proven track-record, we are nonetheless heartened by deployment developments over the past year.

The SACP has never conceived of itself as a non-governmental organisation. In the current reality of SA, the SACP, together with its Alliance partners, is committed to building popular and working class power both outside of and WITHIN the state.

In line with this commitment to take joint and collective responsibility for governance, the CC strongly re-affirmed decisions taken by the Party in regard to the deployment of its leadership (including its general secretary) nationally, provincially and locally. The CC also once more reaffirmed the Party's commitment to building leadership collectives, and avoiding all attempts to reduce the question of leadership to individual personalities.

The New Growth Path

A key achievement of 2010 has been government's consolidation and public release of a New Growth Path perspective. Minister for Economic Development, Cde Ebrahim Patel, presented government's NGP document to the CC.  The CC warmly welcomed the major paradigm shift represented by the NGP and government's earlier announcement of the Industrial Policy Action Programme 2 (IPAP2).

While we should certainly debate the detail of both IPAP and the NGP, this time around we must not allow detail to distract us from consolidating and defending the absolutely critical policy and programmatic shift that these policies now begin to represent. In essence this shift is characterised by the following key features:

    * An agreement that we have to radically transform the systemic features of our present productive economy;
    * The key objective is not to achieve an arbitrary GDP growth target (for example, 6%  or 7%), but job creation and greater equality;
    * These outcomes can only be achieved through active state intervention in the economy - through, amongst other things, planning, state-led investment, and the consolidation of a strong, strategically-mandated SOE and DFI sector. This will require the consolidation of a new state-owned bank, and generally a strategically-disciplined, democratic state capable of driving a state-led but people-driven transformation process.
    * The imperative of aligning macro-economic policies with our industrial policy and other productive economy objectives.
    * The imperative of state-led coordination of and between critical sectors of society - e.g., the productive economy, education and skills training, infrastructure development and environmental sustainability.
    * As much as possible, our redistributive interventions, including BBBEE, must also contribute coherently to the progressive transformation of the productive economy - for example, land redistribution can no longer simply be guided by principles of civil rights and historical redress (as important as these might be).
    * The achievement of a new growth path will not be possible without also addressing the way in which SA has historically been located within the global capitalist system as a semi-peripheral primary commodity exporter and regional sub-imperial power - "a (capitalist) gateway to Africa". The achievement of a NGP in SA will depend critically on our ability to play a progressive role in the reconstruction and development of our region. It will also depend on our ability to manoeuvre strategically within the context of major structural shifts within the global reality, not least through deepening anti-imperialist South-South relations.

These, we believe, are the fundamental core features of a new growth path. It is important to recognise that government has deliberately called it a "path" and not a "plan" - it is a strategic direction that we need now to move along, learning and adapting as we proceed.

Nothing is written in stone, other than the imperative of no longer delaying decisive action. Above all, we must not now turn government's NGP into a debating forum. We need, from within and beyond government to begin, together, to actively and decisively take major steps to place our economy onto a new job-creating and more egalitarian path. We cannot wait any longer.

Global capitalism - a crisis that is not going away

2010 has underlined the correctness of what the SACP has been consistently saying - the global capitalist crisis that began in 2008 is deep-seated, structural in character and it will be long-lasting. Everywhere imperialist forces, private banks, and western governments are seeking to displace their crisis onto the backs of workers, the poor, and middle-class strata.

Neo-liberalism's anti-protectionist, free market presumptions lie in tatters as national capital interests scramble to save their own profits and life-styles. The US has cynically declared a currency war on the world with its so-called quantitative easing QE2 initiative - pushing an extra $600billion into circulation - that will further appreciate currencies like the Rand, threatening our own efforts to reverse de-industrialisation.

In the course of 2010, the epicentre of the crisis has also shifted to the Euro-zone. The danger of toppling dominoes impelled by creditor-driven sovereign defaults is very real. The crisis in the Euro-zone is seeing drastic and aggressive moves by centrist governments to roll back popular gains.

In the face of these developments, everywhere there is working class and popular resistance. Day by day, the objective grounds for developing a very broad anti-imperialist front are developing.

Next weekend, the SACP will be convening the 12th International Meeting of Communist and Workers' Parties. Over 80 parties from all over the world have confirmed their participation. The meeting will focus on the global capitalist crisis and on the imperative of communists taking an active role internationally in turning the multitude of defensive struggles in every part of the world into an offensive struggle to roll back capitalism itself - it is a system that from every perspective, including being able to guarantee environmental sustainability, or decent work for all, or food security, increasingly demonstrates its threat to human civilisation itself.

Sixteen days of activism against violence against women and children

The SACP is actively engaged in the present "Sixteen Days of Activism". We are a society in which patriarchy continues to be a deeply-entrenched challenge. Too often regressive male behaviour hides behind of cloak of "culture". The SACP and the YCL are actively campaigning against reactionary customs like ukuthwala.

The SACP, together with its allies, will be embarking on a campaign for the establishment of more shelters for the victims of gender violence. We encourage communities to continue speaking out against gender violence. While reports indicate that we are beginning to stabilise the number of new HIV infections, there is a need to intensify the HIV Counselling and Testing campaign with active community support.

The CC also received a report from the Minister of Police, cde Nathi Mthethwa. He briefed the CC on government's strategic plans to combat crime and corruption. The CC engaged with the input, welcomed the progress made so far, and noted that it is the working class and poor in our country who are the principal victims of crime and corruption. Combating these evils is not just a matter for government, and the SACP once more commits to helping to strengthen the role of communities and the labour movement in this regard.

The SACP's programme of action for 2011

The CC discussed and approved the SACP 2011 programme of action. The key pillars of this programme include:

Revitalising the broad-based campaign for the transformation of the financial sector. After a period of stale-mate, recently, important progress has been made in the NEDLAC financial sector charter process thanks to a greater dynamism from the side of government. The SACP will be calling for a new Financial Sector Summit in 2011 convened by NEDLAC.

The Party will be resuscitating the broad front Financial Sector Charter Campaign structures as well as convening public forums and seminars. Notwithstanding some progress with, for instance, extending banking services to everyone, gains made are constantly threatened by the profit-maximising interests of the private banks.

There are, for instance, indications that at least some of the banks are planning to walk away from the Mzansi Account which achieved a remarkable 6 million new accounts within the space of a few years. Critical challenges in our struggle to transform the financial sector include the establishment of a state-run bank, cooperative financing, and the challenge of providing loans to working-class families for housing and for higher education fees for their children.

Local government elections - the SACP will be participating integrally in the ANC-led election campaign, including in the development of the manifesto, and consolidation of local election structures. The CC received an input on the forthcoming campaign from ANC NWC member, cde Jessie Duarte.

Deepening our work with the progressive trade union movement - including taking up the challenges of a consolidating an effective social wage for the working class especially in relation to housing, public transport, and the National Health Insurance, and linking these to COSATU's living wage campaign. The SACP will also be expanding its joint political schools with COSATU affiliates.

In the course of 2011, the SACP will continue to engage actively with its internationalist work, including ongoing solidarity efforts with Swaziland, Cuba, Western Sahara and Palestine. We will also convene on International Women's Day (8 March) a continent-wide African Women's Conference.

The CP of China and its strategic dialogues with PASOK and the Socialist International, From: Communist Party of Greece, Monday, 22 November 2010

http://inter.kke.gr


Comment of the Newspaper «Rizospastis”-Organ of the CC of the KKE (19/12/2010)

It is well-known that the KKE has come to the conclusion that capitalist relations are developing in China today, with the peculiarity that this is happening under the political leadership of the governing party which bears the title “communist”.

The consequences of this development are well-known: the elevation of China to the top of the countries with the fastest rates of capitalist development and the largest number of billionaires, the abolition of important workers’ gains, such as free health care and education, which the workers have to now pay for, and the existence of millions of unemployed and low-paid workers.

It was not by accident, then, that Liu Jieyi, Deputy Director of the International Department of the CPC Central Committee, in his meeting (16/11) with G. Papandreou, Greek Prime minister and President of PASOK and the Socialist International stated that ” The relationship between PASOK and the Communist Party of China is exceptional and we have every intention of working more closely together, in order to promote our inter-party relations and through inter-party dialogue to reinforce the exceptional strategic cooperation between our two countries, especially now as we face many challenges”. Liu Jieyi did not forget to congratulate G. Papandreou on the “excellent election results”. It could not be otherwise, as the political representatives of the monopolies (such as COSCO), regardless of their packaging, (“socialist” in Greece or “communist” in China), understand their common class interests.

The anti-people choices of the PASOK government are saluted and supported by Chinese officials, as long as they are combined with the opening of the road for the Chinese monopolies.

But as we learned from Liu Jieyi, the “love” of the CPC is not only reserved for “socialist” PASOK but for the whole Socialist International. As he himself said: “We are of the opinion that the continuation of coordination and the exchange of views are important, as is the strategic dialogue between the Socialist International and the Communist Party of China. We have every intention of continuing this dialogue further, because as we discovered in the meetings over the last two days, there are many points of agreement between the Socialist International and the political orientation of the Communist Party of China.”

We should remember that this “International” supported the wars of the USA and NATO, and is a political pillar of support for the exploitative capitalist system in Europe and the entire world.

After all this, one may well wonder that maybe the CP China is getting ready to abandon its last “fig-leaf”-its title?

VI Congress of the Cuban Communist Party: Towards a Future of Socialism, By Hilda Pupo S. / hildita@ahora.cu / Monday, 15 November 2010

http://www.ahora.cu/english/sections/opinion/3163-vi-congress-of-the-cuban-communist-party-towards-a-future-of-socialism.html


The announcement of the holding of the Sixth Congress of the Cuban Communist Party in April, brings an implicit truth: we approach the development of a defining event for the future of Cuba and its Revolution.

There is talk of strengthening brotherhood and changes to the current circumstances, but it is good to clarify, not to raise hopes in those who wish us ill, that those changes are only within the current model of socialism in the country.
Following the first modifications in recent years, the hostile press started asking about their slow pace and their alleged superficiality. Raul said that he had been elected president to defend socialism, not to destroy it.

It is certain that only under a political system like ours, we will be able to face the difficulties and plan our course without losing the essence of Cuba's humanitarian work; therefore the economy, the central theme of the event, will be discussed further in the search for better use of forces or more planning, but not the imperative of the market where the naked capitalist trend of supply and demand prevails.

It will analyze the defense of equal rights and opportunities for all citizens, other than to egalitarianism in the mechanisms of distribution and redistribution of income, because we cannot keep thinking about the general merits for the grace of wanting to be fairer. The work must be paid for quantity and quality and this will set the difference.

If the draft Guidelines for the economic and social policy of the country will be available to the entire population, which can emit criteria with a view to consideration and approval by Congress, it is due to the permanent respect for democracy. "Revolutionaries, the direction and the majority of the people are our most important strategic weapon, which has allowed us to get here and continue the future development of socialism," said Raul.

The discussion of his speech at the celebration of July 26th in Camagüey, is the best background for the deliberations that will begin now, and which call for reflection children of knowledge, not romantic and unworkable criteria.

With the meeting of the Communist Vanguard the economic model, now immersed in the adjustments to the reorganization of work that aims to deflate the templates in the search for higher yields, will be updated. Enhancing self-employment is part of these new mechanisms.

The greatest wealth in this definition of future is the people's participation.

On the resignation of Gordon Campbell Statement by the Communist Party of British Columbia, Young Communist League - BC Blog,

The three terms of the Campbell Liberals have been characterized by implementing the lowest taxes for the wealthy and corporations in North America at the expense of the standard of living, wages and social programs of BC residents. His forced resignation is a compliment to a tenacious and awakened electorate who has had enough.


 http://yclbc-lowermainland.blogspot.com/2010/11/statement-by-communist-party-of-british.html

 In his devotion to corporate welfare Gordon Campbell kept the minimum wage at the lowest level in Canada while presiding over an economy where the top ten CEO’s collectively in 2009 earned $70 million dollars. Upon the imbalanced scales of extreme wealth and extreme poverty Gordon Campbell’s weight was always on the side of extreme wealth.

For seven years British Columbia has had the worst child poverty in Canada. After nine years of tuition fee increases BC takes in more from tuition fees than it does from corporate taxation. The massive privatization of Healthcare services, with parallel cutbacks in quality and accessibility, has channeled hundreds of millions of taxpayer dollars into corporate bank accounts while rolling back healthcare wages 15% and then freezing them at that level.

The Campbell Liberals repeatedly broke election promises that had value to the public and steadfastly adhered to every policy that gave away public resources to private business. They have brought almost every school board in BC into funding crisis that has put 200 schools on the closure list so far. They broke their promise not to privatize BC Rail and in the corrupted bidding process implicated cabinet ministers in a scandal currently hidden behind two scapegoats and a plea bargain that hides the extent and involvement of elected officials in betrayal and corruption.

The Campbell Liberals have gutted the Environmental Assessment Act and created Cabinet powers that overrule municipal by-laws and autonomy to the point that municipalities can only govern if they don’t interfere with corporate interests. They cut the transfer of gambling profits to Charities and the Arts from 33% to 10%. They made massive funding cuts to Women’s Shelters, closed down homeless hostels and cut and slashed their way through almost every social or special needs program in the province.

For Gordon Campbell to whine about a vindictive public and the strain on his family after ruining so many lives is typical of the arrogance and contempt he and his government have exercised. The NDP MLA’s and Party Leader who stroke him on his way out with platitudes about “years of public service” should tell the truth and expose the years of “corporate service” if they don’t want to appear as members of the same club.

Gordon Campbell was not brought down by the parliamentary opposition; he was not brought down by a caucus revolt. He was brought down by massive public rejection of the Liberal Government’s record of lies broken promises and deceit that made it impossible for him to continue. The HST debacle and the transfer of $1.6 billion from the public to the private purse has become the catalyst, the glue of all the diverse forces screaming betrayal. The historic pending referendum is evidence of the public rage.

Gordon Campbell is going, he should be gone and his entire caucus that supported him doggedly should leave with him.

Had Enough? Written by Zoltan Zigedy, in Marxism-Leninism Today, October 6, 2010

Frustration with the Obama Administration has reached a new level with only 45% of US citizens polled approving of the job that the Administration is doing and 39% voicing approval of the Administration's policies on the economy (see Wall Street Journal/NBC telephone polls, 9-7-10). The overall mood is pessimistic: 65% of those polled believe that the US is in a period of decline; 59% of the polled population thinks that the country will be the same or worse in five years.

http://mltoday.com/en/subject-areas/commentary/had-enough-957-2.html

Only 30% of poll participants believe that the country is headed in the right direction. This is a negative assessment not seen since the tail end of the Bush Administration.

In a normal election cycle – the give-and-take of the two Parties – this would signal enthusiasm for the party out of power: the Republican Party. However, among Republicans, only 30% have a positive view of their own party, the lowest number recorded since before 1990.

These numbers express a smoldering anger about where we have arrived since the 2008 election and where we are heading.

The only major new force on the political scene reflecting this angry mood is the Tea Party phenomenon — a faux populist movement backed by extreme-right money and fueled by the ultra-right media.

Facing an interim election in November, all of the healthy forces in US political life are scrambling to establish a posture towards these elections. Bitterness, backbiting, and confusion abound. The Internet is abuzz with the anger of scorned liberals who feel betrayed by two years of at best, ineffectual, at worst, malign Administration leadership.

As the Administration positions itself for the coming months, it reflects this mood by jettisoning three of its leading economic lights: Peter Orszag, Christina Romer and Lawrence Summers. The exit of Rahm Emanuel, Obama's chief of staff, has passed the rumor level and is now a fact, as is likely the departure of many other prominent members of the Administration. Despite their fealty to the corporate financial sector, Obama has suggested that he is seeking economic advisors that are more comfortable communicating with the corporate world.

Some in liberal circles cling to lingering hopes that the "real" Obama will soon be revealed. With all the enthusiasm of a revival meeting, they are awaiting a political rapture – a fulfillment of the "change" and "hope" themes of the election campaign. But my angry local letter carrier sees it differently. She says that people mistook "hope" for "dope," a succinct declaration of her own frustrations.

Indeed, all signs point to a reshuffling of the Administration in an even more conciliatory-to-the-right, pro-business direction. As the Wall Street Journal reports, "Part of the president's task will be to 'reset' relations with the business community, not only to ease working in a divided Washington but also to smooth his path to re-election" (9-23-10). There is little room in this scenario for the revelation of a progressive, pro-working-class agenda. The WSJ cites senior White House officials as saying, "the president could concentrate on finding common ground on deficit reduction, education and immigration while guarding his achievements, from health care to student lending to financial regulation."

The Political Crisis
All polls agree that approval ratings for the President have sunk substantially since his inauguration. And approval ratings for Congress hover at an embarrassing low level, a level that has been maintained since a time deep into the Bush Administration. Polls also show that both Parties are generally unpopular. Whether one bought the Obama message or not, it should have been apparent that his Administration was meant to change the national mood of dissatisfaction and the international scorn brought on by the previous Administration. They have failed in that task. And the political crisis continues.

The distance between the legislative actions of elected officials and the needs and desires of the electorate has never been greater. And the Obama Administration suffers inordinately from this distance because they promised so much in the presidential campaign. This distance was shown most recently with the issue of allowing the Bush tax cuts for the wealthy to expire. Initially, Obama and the Democratic leadership proposed maintaining the cuts for all but the very wealthy, a move that would have brought a measure of fairness to tax policy and generated $700 billion over 10 years in extra Federal revenue.

The Republicans mounted a hysterical and demagogic campaign based on the inflammatory charge of tax increases. When opinion polls showed that the tax increases for the rich were popular (mid-September, CBS/New York Times - 53-38%), especially in key "battleground" states, the Republicans backed down. But, immediately, 31 Democratic Representatives voiced their public opposition to taxing the rich. Consequently any decision on the Bush tax cuts will be deferred until after the November elections. Every signal points to Congress maintaining the Bush tax policies for another two years.

Why is there such distance between popular issues and legislative action?

Many pundits employ vague, cloudy concepts like "gridlock" or blame a new-found intransigence or incivility. But the truth is simpler, but deeper: Elected officials are, for the most part, owned by monopoly capital. To a very great extent, the course of political success is greased with money and the opportunity to forge a successful and long political career is dependent upon corporate friendliness. Of course this is not new, but it has reached a new level of prevalence, demonstrating strikingly that the state – its structures and personnel – is dominated by and serves the interests of monopoly capital; that is, our reigning socio-economic system is state-monopoly capital.

Thus, there is no exit, without some radical surgery, from the political crisis that grips the US.

Moreover, the results of the November elections – regardless of the outcome - will have no dramatic impact on our profound political crisis. This does not mean, however, that there is nothing to be gained in the election. There are independent candidates – Greens, for example – who could open cracks in the corrupted two-party system. There are also some independent-minded Democrats who could, though only with a strong prod from progressive constituents, mount a meaningful challenge to the ossified, corporate-coddling Party leadership. And there would be advantages, advantages with a shrinking relevance, to maintaining a balance of forces favoring the Democrats. However, the ever-growing distance between the Democrats and the needs of the populace dampens any enthusiasm for fighting for this advantage.

Therefore, there is a deep and deadly contradiction embedded in the two-party system, a contradiction that will only be overcome with the emergence of independent movements unwaveringly committed to principled, progressive politics.

Going forward, we can expect the Obama Administration to focus on the 2012 Presidential election. The Obama team will maneuver rightward, leaving many of the now-distant campaign promises like the Employee Free Choice Act or immigration reform in its wake. The hints referenced above signal an aloof presidency, above the fray, though ever sensitive to the needs of the corporations and their generous campaign contributions. Like Bill Clinton, Obama will seek a presidential posture dissociated from any ideological position, but portraying civility, bi-partisanship, likeability and managerial competence – a posture appealing to the non-ideological center thought to be crucial for re-election.

Needed: A Break from the Past
Undoubtedly, these observations may not come as news for many, especially many of the 65% of those polled who think the US is in decline. The widespread mood is anger and disappointment. But little will come from moods if no useful conclusions are drawn, if patterns remain unseen, if events are misunderstood. Far too many see the political crisis in terms of flawed personalities, individual values or ideological caricatures.

The long-term trend of wealth and income inequality; the ever-growing concentration of power and influence in the hands or corporations, especially the financial sector; the growth of political corruption and the role of money and media in electoral politics; the ascension of the callous, anti-social culture of individualism assailing "entitlements" or common benefits; the repeated aggressive military missions to deny any barriers to international capital — all these phenomena interact and decisively cause the deepening political crisis. These are not moments of bad judgment, occasionally flawed policies, or aberrations. They are features of the logic of capitalism, a capitalism that brought on an equally profound and closely related economic crisis.

Not everyone yet makes these connections, but they ignore them at great peril. While there is a widespread sense that we are at a decisive moment, there is an unfounded faith that the old solutions will suffice. Some pine for an imaginary time of social harmony and cultural unity while conveniently ignoring those left out of their idyllic fantasy – a world without immigrants, embracing segregation and racism, and willfully ignorant of the crude exploitation of labor. Others embrace liberal values associated with an imaginary kinder, gentler capitalism, but turn away from the reality that the profit-hungry modern corporation stands firmly and powerfully against this dream.

Politics will become real only when we face the truth that the modern monopoly capitalist corporation stands as the adversary to all but the very rich. That understanding will lead to the further understanding that only a broad anti-monopoly strategy will solve the crises of our economy and our politics.

It's a curious, but telling, fact that political discourse has shifted from the extreme-right-imposed cultural battlefield of abortion, gays, and guns dominating the last decade to the issues of the economy and the role of the state. The Right has entered this new battlefield under the banner of fiscal austerity and hostility to government. Led by tea-bagger foot soldiers, they rail against government spending, regulation, and social programs. If they succeed in selling this line to voters, they will bring pain and devastation not only to working people, but also to the whole economy and social fabric.

Sadly, the Democratic Party leadership has shown little or no interest in engaging the right on this battlefield. They concede that government spending should be restrained, regulation should be minimal and non-antagonistic to business interests, and social programs must be trimmed. It is left for Democratic-friendly labor leaders and party loyalists to defend this blatant coincidence of political outlook. They must excuse this conjunction of Democratic views with Republican ideology as a tactical retreat or they must argue that Democrats will inflict the pain of austerity more compassionately. Neither excuse is credible with angry, frustrated voters who continue to thirst for effective change.

This is the great tragedy of the November elections. Indeed, there is much at stake, but the Democrats refuse to fight a credible battle, a battle that would require at least a modest rebuff to their corporate masters. As things stand, the election will turn on how much fear of a return to Republican leadership can be generated rather than what the Democrats would accomplish with a victory.

Last week's giant rally in Washington, DC only underlines these contradictions. Committed people came in droves to express both an outrage at where we are heading and a determination to join others in changing course. Hopes were high that leaders would energize the causes that inspire people to action, such as fair labor legislation, employment opportunities, peace, immigration reform, racial equality, help for the poor and disadvantaged, and mortgage and other debt relief. While speakers readily chronicled the evils produced by a system of inequality and injustice, they were hesitant to speak its name: capitalism. Instead, most urged those who came on buses, trains, planes, and cars to work for the election of Democrats in November.

This constant cycle of placing all the hopes for a better future in the hands of corporate-owned Democrats must be broken. This is not a call for those fearful of a Republican victory in November to sit on the sidelines or boycott the elections, but, rather, for them to further commit to establishing independent voices, voices that will demand that all elected officials choose between corporate fealty and the causes of the people.

For too long, many progressive and left leaders have posed supporting the Democratic Party against any initiative that might upset or provoke Democratic leaders. They narrowly and rigidly limit political action to the electoral campaign and reject any challenge to Democratic Party leadership as heretical and divisive. Such an approach has led us into the current political crisis and offers no way out. This false tactical finesse smothered the anti-war movement and tolerated the evisceration of health care reform, the expansion of imperialist aggression, the coddling of the financial sector, and the criminal neglect of the unemployed, the underemployed and the poor. It is time to reject it and move on.

There is no easy escape from our political crisis. But it begins by building movements outside of and often apart from the ineffective Democratic Party.

Which Way the CPUSA ?: A Response to C.J. Atkins “Living in an Era of Change” by: Emile Schepers, Political Affairs, November 8 2010

Blogger's Note:
SOURCE: http://www.politicalaffairs.net/response-to-c-j-atkins-living-in-an-era-of-change/
Emile Schepers writes in RESPONSE TO C.J. Atkin's article calling for dropping the Name of The Party:http://www.politicalaffairs.net/living-in-an-era-of-change/ and John Case's Reply to Atkins which goes beyond dropping the party-name to changing policy as well: http://www.politicalaffairs.net/reply-to-living-in-an-era-of-change-by-c-j-atkins/

This response is to C.J. Atkins' article and also by articles by John Case and commentaries related to these articles.

Although I take issue with some of the formulations, I am glad that this is being brought into the open for discussion. Some might say we should not be doing this, because no proposal to change the Party's name was brought to our May convention as a resolution, let alone passed, so we should wait to raise the issue for pre convention discussion before our next convention, three and a half years from now.

However, I think this policy should be changed. The world changes too fast for us to freeze all our Party-wide discussion for four years, defrost it for 6 months before our convention, and then freeze it again. So I would be very much in favor of having an ongoing discussion in our media and collectives on these questions of ideology, strategy and tactics. Only everybody should be invited to participate on an equal basis.

To the matter at hand:

Although I agree that, as Shakespeare said “a rose by another name would smell as sweet”, I do not think the logic of changing the “Communist” and “Party” names is well thought out in these contributions. 

We have to understand that while some may react negatively to the name, others react positively. This is the case with the hundreds of people who have been applying for party membership over the internet recently. These are mostly people who specifically went looking for the phrase “Communist Party” on the internet, found our websites, liked what they read and sent in an e-mailed application. We have received such a number of such applications that we have to work overtime to catch up with them all.  If we cut ourselves off from our fighting history by inventing some sort of bland new name for ourselves, such people would never even know where to look for us. Among more non-party people than you would imagine, our Party has a deep reservoir of prestige. I have even found this with some people in the Democratic Party. People who have any political education at all understand who we are on the basis of our history. For people who do not have a political education on that subject, it is our responsibility to provide it, which we will not achieve by hiding our light under a bushel.

And I think that people who are not bothered by the “communist” and “party” labels are better recruits for us qualitatively, than people who are – that is, unless we think it is a good plan to recruit anti-communists into the Communist Party (but they wouldn't join anyway).

I also have a fundamental problem with lowering our flag or donning some sort of camouflage as a response to the poison of anti-communism, instead of fighting it. Though the methods of people like Stalin and Mao were deplorable, and huge mistakes were made in other socialist countries also, to simply denounce the entire communist experience in the USSR and beyond to me is repugnant. What about Fidel, Che, Ho Chi Minh, Gramsci, Lenin and Mariátegui? Are we going to repudiate such figures too, because they are foreign, old, or (horrors) dead?

I think that our duty is to educate the US people about the real history of the communist movement worldwide and in our country. We should not cover up the crimes of Stalin or any of the other mistakes that were made, but neither should we make ideological concessions to our enemies. (Atkins mentions Ceausescu of Rumania as a bad figure from the communist past; do we not remember that Ceausescu was a pampered U.S. ally within the Eastern European bloc?)

I am sure the comrades who are writing in this vein do not intend to inject “red white and blue” USA nationalism into our Party, by implying that we have nothing to learn from “old” or “foreign” figures in the communist movement. But it is wrong anyway, and foments a nationalistic attitude. The United States has specific historically determined characteristics, around which we have to build our strategy and tactics (e.g., vis a vis the Democrats), but we are not better than other peoples and other communist parties, or different to the point that we have nothing to learn from them.  Study of the works of Gramsci, Che Guevara and Mariátegui would be very salutary for our members and friends – not to mention Marx and Engels themselves, who both were foreigners who became old and are now dead.

Thank goodness nobody takes the attitude that we can't learn from those two old, dead Europeans!

Yes, it's true that from time to time communist parties in other countries have used names other than “communist”. Sometimes that has worked out well for them, as for the AKEL of Cyprus. On other occasions, the results have not been as good, probably not because of the name change per se but because of other tendencies linked to the name change.

During the 1940s, this was the trend in some places. In the United States, we had the episode when Earl Browder was our General Secretary. The change of the name to “Communist Political Association” (note that “Communist” stayed in there, but “Party” was jettisoned) was associated with rightward, liquidationist trends than nearly put an end to us.  Riding herd on the Latin American parties, which had been put under our Party's tutelage by the COMINTERN, in some cases involved Browder and his colleagues pressuring for name changes, in other for dissolution of the existing communist parties. In the case of Cuba the name was changed to People's Socialist Party; in that of Mexico there was an effort to dissolve the Communist Party, which was resisted. This was all based on the idea that the Democratic Party would move the United States, and thus the world, in the direction of socialism. But the both major US political parties moved sharply to the right after World War II, and the Latin American parties who had followed our lead, or at any rate the COMINTERN's, in these things had to reorganize themselves completely to deal with new imperialist assaults in the region. The upshot for us was the ouster of Browder, the reconstruction of the Communist Party USA, and then repression during the McCarthy period.

And if anyone imagines that McCarthy and the House Committee on Un-American Activities would not have had success in going after us if we had been working under another name, they are quite wrong. Disguising our identity would not have worked, and would only have reinforced the idea that we were trying to hide behind false fronts. In fact, it probably would have been better if we had been working more openly under our own name; the failure to do that played into the anti-communists efforts to portray us as a secret conspiracy. Nor would changing our name have stopped the losses that we incurred after the Khrushchev revelations about Stalin, or the John Gates episode.

Again after the fall of the USSR and the Eastern European socialist bloc, some communist parties underwent a similar process which eventually destroyed them. And I have not seen the country in which the presence of a communist party would be bad, or which would be better off without one.

Based on 23 years of Party experience, I have a different idea as to why we do not grow quickly enough to make up for losses caused by the decease of our old, cherished comrades who established such a glorious record in past decades.

In the clubs I have been in, at one point as a club chair, I have never seen a systematic approach to strategizing which mass movements and organizations we should link up to. It has very often been left up to individual comrades, with some choosing not to get involved in mass struggles at all. There has been a willingness to do electoral work for the Democrats at election time, but that is only every couple of years. Things are said about this at the national and district level, but I fear it is not taken up by some clubs in any kind of organized way.

Worse, I have seen a lack of a systematic approach to recruitment. There is a struggle to get comrades to write down and turn in names and contact information on prospects, and in assigning people to go and talk to such people, inviting them to open club meetings. People who want to join the Party are supposed to find us somehow, while we try to disguise ourselves to make it harder! Speaking of sectarianism, this is a good example of how it harms us.

And I am not sure everybody is sold on the merits of using the Internet. I am on many list serves (Cuba solidarity, international affairs, civil liberties, immigrants' rights and peace) in which very important discussions take place, potentially giving a forum for our Party to put forth its views and announce its activities, not to mention urging people to read our online press. But very few of our comrades take advantage of this forum, as far as I can see. This is in spite of all the urging by our national leadership to get with the new developments in electronic communications. There is no reason why every single article in our press can't be posted on one mass movement list serve or other.

If we want the party to grow and increase its influence, we should do more check up on these things, and not cut ourselves off from our historic legacy and the reservoir of respect and prestige it has given us. 

The potential for growth is huge. [blogger's emphasis]

UN body accuses US of rights abuses, al jazeera, 05 Nov 2010

http://fwd4.me/mKU

American officials face barrage of criticism from Human Rights Council over Guantanamo and torture allegations.


Obama has missed his self-imposed deadline to close Guantanamo within a year of taking office  [EPA] 

The United States has for the first time faced the United Nations Human Rights Council over accusations of human rights violations.

Council members in Geneva, Switzerland, levelled a barrage of criticisms at the US administration on Friday, calling for the closure of the Guantanamo Bay prison and for investigations into alleged torture by US troops abroad.

The council's first review of the US human rights record was part of a gradual examination of the performance of all 192 UN members over a four-year period.

Iran's delegation accused the US of violating human rights though covert CIA operations "carried out on pretext of combating terrorism".

European countries said Washington should ban the death penalty. Mexico urged it to halt racial profiling and the use of lethal force in controlling illegal migration over its border.

Indonesia, the world's most populous Muslim nation, called on Washington to better promote religious tolerance.

'Grossly violating rights'

Commenting on the council's criticisms, Antonio Ginatta of the New York-based group Human Rights Watch said: "US officials were often reduced to restating current practices that grossly violate human rights, like the death penalty, poor prison conditions and sentencing youth offenders to life without parole."

Amnesty International said that the US must also hold accountable those responsible for torture.

"These recommendations must be at the heart of rebuilding the United States' human rights record," it said in a statement.



The US vigorously defended its human rights record, with Harold Koh, a US state department legal adviser, telling the UN council: "Let there be no doubt, the United States does not torture and it will not torture."

He said: "Between Iraq, Afghanistan and Guantanamo we have conducted hundreds of investigations regarding detainee abuse allegations and those have led to hundreds of disciplinary actions."

The Guantanamo Bay prison, maintained by the US in Cuba and which currently holds 174 detainees, has been highly controversial.

Barack Obama, the US president, had pledged to close the facility within a year of taking office, but missed that deadline.

Earlier, Koh responded to countries who bemoaned the failure to close the prison, saying that "the president cannot close Guantanamo alone".

He said any such move would require help from Congress, the US courts and foreign allies willing to take in released inmates.

US criticised

The US has come under renewed pressure over human rights with the revelation that George Bush, the former US president, personally authorised the waterboarding of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the alleged 9/11 mastermind.

According to The New York Times, which obtained an advance copy of the ex-president's book Decision Points, Bush responded "damn right" when the CIA sought permission to use waterboarding.

The practice of waterboarding, a form of simulated drowning, has been described as torture and Obama outlawed it shortly after coming into office.

Al Jazeera's Kristen Saloomey, reporting from the UN headquarters, said there was a "real attempt" to distance the Obama administration from practices used under Bush.

"This will probably not satisfy the critics however, in particular in the arena of drone attacks and these new allegations of torture which came out through WikiLeaks recently, where it is alleged that the US turned a blind eye to abuses by Iraqi forces," she said.

'Rogue regimes'

Bush had shunned the UN Human Rights Council, saying it did not need to be scolded by countries such as Syria and Cuba whose own records on human rights were poor.

Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, the Republican Representative who is set to chair the House Foreign Affairs Committee when a new US Congress convenes in January, echoed those views on Friday.

She said that the 47-member Human Rights Council was "dominated by rogue regimes".

"Serial human rights abusers like Cuba, Iran, North Korea, and Venezuela all hijacked the platform to attack the US for imaginary violations," she said.

"The US should walk out of this rogues' gallery and seek to build alternative forums that will actually focus on abuses and deny membership to abusers."

But Michael Posner, the US assistant secretary of state for democracy and human rights, told a news briefing after the council debate that the US got "a fair hearing".

"This is part of an ongoing process to engage with the Council and the UN," he said.

The council will issue its recommendations on Tuesday and the US delegation will indicate which of them are acceptable before reporting back in March when a final report is adopted.
Source:
Al Jazeera and agencies

Progressive Canadians must challenge JNF's charitable status Yves Engler, The Electronic Intifada, 1 November 2010

http://electronicintifada.net/v2/article11601.shtml



Last month, Greg Selinger, the New Democratic Party (NDP) Premier of the Province of Manitoba, and two of his ministers visited Israel. Among other things, the official delegation strengthened the longtime "progressive" government's ties to the Jewish National Fund (JNF). The trip was a sad spectacle that should embarrass every Canadian who opposes racism. Indeed, J.S. Woodsworth, the Winnipeg-based founder of Canada's social democratic party, must be turning in his grave.

The province and JNF signed an accord to jointly develop two bird conservation sites while Manitoba water stewardship Minister Christine Melnick spoke at the opening ceremony for a park built in Jaffa by the JNF, Tel Aviv Foundation and Manitoba-Israel Shared Values Roundtable. During the trip Mel Lazerek, a regional JNF president, was also appointed Manitoba's special representative to Israel for Economic and Community Relations.

Manitoba's ties to this openly racist institution are shocking, but also part of a decades-old pro-Israel policy of the NDP that must be challenged by real progressives.

Shutting out Palestinian citizens of Israel, JNF lands can only be leased by Jews. A 1998 United Nations Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights found that the JNF systematically discriminated against Palestinians in Israel. According to the UN report, JNF lands are "chartered to benefit Jews exclusively," which has led to an "institutionalized form of discrimination." In 2005, Israel's high court came to similar conclusions. It found that the JNF, which owns 13 percent of the country's land and has significant influence over most of the rest, systematically excluded Palestinian citizens from leasing its property.

JNF Canada officials are relatively open about the racist character of the organization. In May 2002, Mark Mendelson, JNF Canada's executive-director for Eastern Canada, explained that "We are trustees between world Jewry and the land of Israel." This sentiment was echoed by JNF Canada's head Frank A. Wilson in July 2009. Wilson stated that the "JNF are the caretakers of the Land of Israel on behalf of its owners, who are the Jewish people everywhere around the world."

Established in 1910, JNF Canada is one of the most important Israel-focused charities registered in Canada. It raises about $10 million annually in tax-deductible donations. Despite projecting itself as "an environmentally friendly organization concerned with ecology and sustainable development," it is a linchpin of Zionist colonialism.

The Canadian branch of the JNF has been directly complicit in Palestinian dispossession. At the end of the 1920s, a JNF representative came to Canada to raise $1 million for the lands of Wadi al-Hawarith (or Hefer Plain). A 30,000 dunam (roughly 7,500 acres) stretch of coastal territory located about half way between Haifa and Tel Aviv, the land was home to a Bedouin community of 1,000 to 1,200 persons. Without consulting the Palestinians living on the land, in 1928 the JNF acquired legal title to Wadi al-Hawarith from an absentee landlord in France.

For four years the tenants of Wadi al-Hawarith resisted British attempts to evict them. In All That Remains historian Walid Khalidi explains that "The insistence of the people of Wadi al-Hawarith to remain on their land came from their conviction that the land belonged to them by virtue of their having lived on it for 350 years. For them, ownership of the land was an abstraction that at most signified the landlords' right to a share of the crop."

The conflict at Wadi al-Hawarith became a lightning rod for the growing Palestinian nationalist movement. In 1933 a general strike was organized in Nablus to support the tenants of Wadi al-Hawarith. Palestinians, especially those without title to their lands, resented the European influx into their homeland.

After the June 1967 War, JNF Canada raised $15 million to build Canada Park on illegally occupied land. Three peaceful villages (Beit Nuba, Imwas and Yalu) were demolished to make way for the park.

Despite repeated attempts, the 5,000 expelled Palestinians were not allowed to return home. A 1986 UN Special Committee reported to the Secretary-General that it considers it "a matter of deep concern that these villagers have persistently been denied the right to return to their land on which Canada Park has been built by the JNF Canada and where the Israeli authorities are reportedly planning to plant a forest instead of allowing the reconstruction of the destroyed villages" (UN Report A/41/680, 20 October 1986).

The JNF Canada, which launched a $7 million campaign to refurbish the park in 2007, replaced most traces of Palestinian history with signs devoted to Canadian donors such as the Metropolitan Toronto Police Department, the City of Ottawa and former Ontario premier Bill Davis. Inaugurated by former Canadian Prime Minister John Diefenbaker in 1975, the Diefenbaker Parkway bisects the park.

In the early 1980s JNF Canada helped finance an Israeli government campaign to "Judaize" the Galilee, the largely Arab northern region of Israel. "The government is building Jewish settlements on our land, surrounding us and turning our villages into ghettos," Khateeb Raja, mayor of Deir Hanna, a Palestinian-Israeli town in the Galilee, told The Globe and Mail in 1981. Ishi Mimon told the paper that he planned to move his family to the newly settled "Galil Canada" area because "the Galilee should have a Jewish majority" (John Goddard, "14 settlements financed Canada's stake in the Galilee," The Globe and Mail, 27 June 1981).

JNF Canada's representative in Israel, Akiva Einis, described the political objective of Galil Canada stating that "The government decided to stop the wholesale plunder (by Israeli Arabs) of state lands [conquered in the 1947/48 war]. ... The settlements are all on mountain tops and look out over large areas of land. If an Arab squatter takes a plow onto land that is not his, the settlers lodge a complaint with the police."

JNF Canada spent tens of millions of dollars ($35 million was the total fundraising target) on 14 Jewish settlements in Galil Canada. In the contested valley of Lotem a stone wall and monument was erected, reported the Globe, with "hundreds of small plaques etched with names and home towns of Canadians who have contributed money to the Galilee settlements." Most of the donors to Galil Canada were Jewish, "but a Pentecostal congregation in Vancouver, the Glad Tidings Temple, has given $1-million."

Tawfiz Daggash, Deir Hanna's deputy mayor, denounced Canadian financial support for the settlements. "I want to say to the people of Canada that every dollar they contribute [to JNF] is helping the Israeli government in its attempt to destroy the Arab people here."

The JNF has long been supported by key figures in the Canadian political elite. Former Prime Ministers John Diefenbaker, Lester Pearson and Brian Mulroney have all spoken at JNF events and leading politicians continue to endorse the organization. In addition to this political support, the JNF is a registered charity, which means that up to a third of its budget effectively comes from public coffers. Yet Canada is supposed to outlaw institutional racism.

In 2007, Lebanese-Canadian Ronald Saba filed a detailed complaint concerning the JNF's charitable status with the Canadian Human Rights Commission. The claim was leveled at the "Government of Canada for violating the Canadian Human Rights Act and Canada Revenue Agency Policy Statement CPS-021 by subsidizing racial discrimination through granting and maintaining charitable status for the Jewish National Fund."

Considering the group's political connections, it's not surprising that Canadian officials refused to address Saba's complaint or follow-up ones (all the documents can be found at Montreal Planet Magazine). With the government's failure to address Saba's legitimate complaint, it is now time to launch a political campaign to push the Canada Revenue Agency to revoke the JNF's charitable status.

Victory won't be easy but the educational work involved in such an endeavor will be invaluable. With quasi-state status in Israel, the JNF is at the heart of Israeli apartheid and drawing attention to this institution is a way to discuss the racism intrinsic to Zionism.

Real progressives in Canada have never shied away from difficult, but important tasks such as fighting racism wherever it raises its ugly head.

Yves Engler is the author of Canada and Israel: Building Apartheid and The Black Book of Canadian Foreign Policy. For more information visit yvesengler.com.

Any hope I had in the ballot box bringing change in Afghanistan is gone | Malalai Joya, the Guardian,Tuesday 2 November 2010

Tomorrow there is an election in the US, and it is now two years since Barack Obama was elected president. His surge of troops has brought only a surge of violence, and his expansion of the war into Pakistan has claimed many innocent lives. Obama promised "hope" and "change", but Afghans have seen only change for the worse. Here he is now seen as a "second Bush".

One year ago Hamid Karzai was declared re-elected as president of Afghanistan, ending an election that had no legitimacy in the eyes of ordinary Afghans. The presidential election last year was a fraud, with ballot stuffing, vote buying and massive corruption reported by the world's media. Even if the independent election commission had not cancelled the planned run-off between Karzai and his main challenger, Abdullah Abdullah, it would have represented only a choice of the "same donkey with a new saddle". People had no incentive to participate as they knew that both main candidates would bring nothing positive for Afghan people.

      Karzai had lost his popularity way before the 2009 election. This was due to the ever increasing corruption of the government, the never-ending crimes of the many fundamentalists and warlords in his regime, and the financial scandals and corruption of his brothers. In Kandahar people even started calling Ahmed Wali Karzai the "little Bush", after the hated US president.

      The vast majority of Afghans have lost all hope in Karzai. For us his words and actions have no value, and that includes his latest "peace negotiations" and other measures. Including killers like Mullah Omar and Gulbuddin Hekmatyar in the government is not about negotiating for peace, but completing the decades-old circle of warlordism and fundamentalism.

      It's important to say that these so-called elections haven't damaged Afghanistan as much as the US and its Nato allies have, with their bombing and occupation. Wikileaks has exposed some of the truth about the civilian toll of this war against the Afghan and Iraqi peoples. Afghans hold the US and Nato, and their puppet Karzai, responsible for these war crimes. They claim to fight terrorism, but in fact they are the biggest terrorists in the eyes of our people because of their crimes and brutalities.

      Unfortunately the Afghan people are not yet strong enough to drive out the US, overthrow the mafia government of Karzai and bring an end to the crimes of the Taliban and other fundamentalists. Our history proves that this resistance to occupation will continue until we have won our freedom. Until both the US and the fundamentalists – of both the Northern Alliance and Taliban brands – are driven out of power in Afghanistan, we cannot see a bright future. It is now more than five years since I was elected to the Afghan parliament. My experience of this "democratic process" was to see my microphone cut off, and to be threatened with death by other MPs – many of whom teamed up to remove me illegally from my seat. My case alone is enough to prove that women's rights in Afghanistan have not truly been safeguarded – our situation was just invoked to justify the war.

      In fact, it's important to remember another document that Wikileaks exposed earlier this year: a CIA paper assessing western public opinion on the war that recommended using "testimonials by Afghan women" expressing fear about a Taliban takeover in the event of Nato pulling out. A Time cover story featuring the disfigured Bibi Aisha was a clear example of using the plight of women as war propaganda. The headline – "What happens if we leave Afghanistan" – could have, or should have, been "What happens while we are in Afghanistan", because crimes of mutilation, rape and murder against women are commonplace today.

      Many warlords and commanders aligned with Nato and Karzai carry out their sexist, misogynist crimes with impunity. Time could, for example, have done a cover story condemning the law signed by Karzai in 2009 that legalised crimes against Shia women, or about the shocking levels of women committing suicide by self-immolation.

      We had another so-called parliamentary election in September, but I chose not to run. Any hope I had for using the ballot box to achieve change in Afghanistan is gone. Like last year's presidential vote, September's election was full of the buying and selling of votes – one province, Paktika, reported a turnout of 626%. This sort of thing is the reason elections in Afghanistan long ago became a bad joke.

      Tomorrow there is an election in the US, and it is now two years since Barack Obama was elected president. His surge of troops has brought only a surge of violence, and his expansion of the war into Pakistan has claimed many innocent lives. Obama promised "hope" and "change", but Afghans have seen only change for the worse. Here he is now seen as a "second Bush".

      The only change that can make us hopeful about the future is the strengthening and expansion of a national anti-fundamentalist and democracy-loving movement. Such a movement can be built only by Afghans. And while we want the world's support and solidarity, we neither need nor want Nato's occupying forces.