National Farmworkers Awareness Week

This week is National Farmworkers Awareness Week (March 28 to April 3). The purpose of this week is about more than just the history of the farmers and their struggles. It is also about meeting these fair demands from thousands of farmworkers.

-Decent and healthy living and working conditions for farmworkers
-An end to unfair treatment under the law
-Fairly harvested food
-Fair pay for farmworkers

Working on a farm is the third most dangerous job in the United States. Sadly, those who grow our food are denied many of the rights and protections that other workers get. These include overtime pay, unemployment insurance, and protection when joining a union. They are excluded from American fair labor standards.

Many farmers today, in the US and around the world, are treated like modern-day slaves.

"If you've ever bought a tomato from a supermarket during the winter, you've benefited from slave labor in Florida," said Megan Greenwell, an activist who fights poverty.

A 2008 Federal case coming out of Fort Myers, Florida proves this. Five Immokalee field bosses pleaded guilty to keeping Hispanic farmworkers as slaves (literally).

The 17-count indictment stated that for two years, bosses Cesar Navarette and Geovanni Navarette kept more than a dozen workers in boxes, shacks and trucks on their property. The workers were chained, beaten and forced to work on farms in North Carolina, South Carolina and Florida. The indictment shows that the men were forced to pay rent of $20 a week to sleep in a locked furniture van. They were forced to urinate and defecate in a corner of the vehicle.

The Coalition of Immokalee Workers conducted and investigation into this case and six other cases, which resulted in the liberation of over 1,000 field workers.

"I think most Americans would find it hard to believe that people in our country are pleading guilty to slavery charges... but that is what is going on in the tomato fields of Florida," said Senator Bernie Sanders (I-Vt). "While slavery is, of course, the most extreme situation in the tomato fields, the truth is that the average worker there is being ruthlessly exploited. Tomato pickers perform backbreaking work, make very low wages, have no benefits and virtually no labor protections."

What's In the Healthcare Reform Bill?

The following was taken from Revcom.us. Although The Partisan doesn't agree with certain points that were made, we still find this article to be useful.

When Barack Obama ran for president, he declared that health care "should be a right for every American." A modest proposal one might think—something that other advanced capitalist countries like Canada, most of Europe and Japan promise.

The reforms will make it possible for parents, starting three months from now, to buy insurance for children and themselves with "pre-existing conditions" through subsidization of a high-risk insurance program, and then will kick in further in four years. As filmmaker Michael Moore put it, "you can rack up another, you know, probably 20,000 to 40,000 deaths in the meantime from people who otherwise would have received help had we truly gotten rid of the pre-existing condition thing for all citizens." Eventually, the bill would extend medical insurance to 32 million currently uninsured Americans over 10 years, through requiring nearly everyone to purchase insurance through private exchanges.

But the overall situation for health care in the U.S. will remain a horror. There are no restrictions on insurance companies raising prices. Half of all personal bankruptcies will still be caused by an inability to pay astronomical medical bills.

Click here to read the entire article on its original website.

Healthcare Mandate Idea Was Created by Right-wing

The Miami Herald has reported that the Florida Attorney General's lawsuit against the new national healthcare bill is focused on a provision that conservatives and big businesses, including insurance businesses, have advocated for a long time.

The lawsuit concentrates on the provision that all Americans are required to have health care by 2014 or else they will face penalties. This concept, called the "individual mandate," was originally thought up by a conservative economist in the 1980's. This idea was embraced by the insurance industry and became a core part of the health care bill.

Mark V. Pauly, a capitalist economist at the University of Pennsylvania, said that he invented the idea for the administration of George Bush Sr. Although his proposal only required coverage for catastrophic events.

Linda Quick of the South Florida Hospital and Healthcare Association mentioned to the Miami Herald that Republican John McCain supported this conservative version of universal healthcare during a speech against the so-called "Hillarycare."

In 2006, Mitt Romney, the Republican governor of Massachusetts, crafted a gigantic healthcare reform that required all citizens to have healthcare.

"Some of my libertarian friends balk at what looks like an individual mandate," Romney wrote in The Wall Street Journal in 2006. "But remember, someone has to pay for the healthcare that must, by law, be provided: Either the individual pays or the taxpayers pay. A free ride on government is not libertarian."

Tommy Thompson, secretary of Health and Human Services under the George W. Bush regime, aimed to use the idea as well.

"Just like people are required to have car insurance, they could be required to have health insurance," said Thompson.

When asked about the lawsuits being carried out by attorney generals nationwide, Mark Pauly had very little to say. He said that people could just pay a fine instead of getting insurance, which he was OK with.

Is the new healthcare bill "Obamacare" or "Conserva-care"?? I can't see the difference. What is needed is a rapidly expanding health care and medical industry that is democratically controlled by the masses, regardless of how much money they have. This will make medicine and care more abundant and more efficient. Only a socialist state is able to carry out this task!

A Letter from a Reader

The following is an email ("letter") from a new Partisan reader. Remember, feel free to send in your letters by using the "Contact Us" option to your left.

Dear editor and readers,

My name is Jeff. I live in Macon, Georgia (the state not the country). I want to share my story with you, if I may.

I was raised as a conservative by my devoutly Methodist parents. I would go to church every Sunday and Wednesday, and my ol' preacher-man would talk about how the atheists and the "commies" were trying to take over the USA. Tryin to burn down all of the churches, make us read Mein Kampf (of all the crazy accusations), and make whites politically inferior to "them damn [n-word] and Mexicans." This was at the peak of the Cold War, mind you.

My parents would say similar things, only with less zeal than our reverend. Although mom and dad were not Republican Party members, they often voted for the GOP and other right-wing parties (if they felt it was worth it). If I even tried to think for myself, or ask silly political questions that kids ask, and my parents didn't like the question, they'd woop me with a belt and tell me not to talk like a "damn Rusky." Of course, I thought it was for my own good. I was just a youngin', I didn't know better. I'm sure we have all been there and done that.

Anyway, I clung to these right-wing views that were forced on me as a child. And when I first heard about Barack Obama, back when he was doing that campaign against Hillary Clinton, I was shocked to say the least. I was even more shocked when I learned what my usual news sources, which were Fox News, my local church newspaper, and other, more right-wing sources, had to say about Obama. Needless to say, I believed every single word they told me. I believed them when they accused Obama of being a foreign Muslim out to spread Jihad against the US. I believed them when they said he was a "dirty communist pig," and most of all I believed them when they said we has going to do bad things to white people.

I was closely watching the elections that November night, and the second I saw that John McCain had declared himself defeated, I was in a state of panic. First came doubt, though. Then I started to panic like someone who just found out they were going to Hell. I rushed into my son's bedroom and woke him up. "Son, son, wake up," I said. "Obama just won the election. I don't know if I should let you go to school tomorrow because of this. I'm afraid for your life. Now that HE is in office, chances are good they're gonna turn this country into a communist-Muslim-atheist police state. They are going to burn down our church, make your mom and sister wear those black sheets over their heads like Arab women do, redistribute our money, our stuff, your toys!" At this moment we hugged each other and began to cry, but it wasn't over then. "I hope that Nazi Obama doesn't kick us out of our house so that black people and Mexicans can move in," I said. We cried for about twenty minutes after that. "Our freedom!!!" I sobbed miserably. I didn't even realize that it is a contradiction to call someone a "Muslim-atheist."

After a few months of that dirty Obama being in office, curiousity got the best of me. I wanted to know what the other news-media sources were saying about him. I wanted to know how bad they had gotten with their praise for "Dear Leader Obama Jong-il." I didn't know what to expect when I first tuned into CNN, MSNBC, and so on. I was surprised that hammers and sickles weren't on the screen. But I was exposed to this other point of view, this "liberal" (if you will) view point. And I thought, "Well, this ain't so bad." Eventually, I wanted to see what regular people like you and me were saying. So I looked at some blogs on the internet, the Partisan being one of them.

After having read these blogs for a while, I realized how misguided I had been. I realized that Obama is just a Democrat. He isn't a "dirty red swine" nor is he an Islamic fundamentalist. Once I began reading this here blog, I realized, for the first time in my life, that there are left-wingers who absolutely hate Democrats. That you can criticize Obama from the left, that all lefties ain't one in the same. I learned that not everyone is either a "faggot liberal" or a "good ol' boy." I learned that there are radicals out there, and that moderate is more than just an adjective.

After examining all of these different media sources, I realized how wrong I was. I realized why those basket-cases on the far right are attacking Obama, and why the far left is attacking Obama for more intelligent reasons. I also learned that you can never, ever, under any circumstances, trust Republican and Democrat media.

I am unsure as to where I stand on the political spectrum at this time. I might give up this madness they call politics. And who could blame me? Thank you, "commies", for putting the Republicans and Democrats to shame.

Sincerely,
Jeff C.

Political Tricks & Intimidation at the RT-D Healthcare Public Square

The following article was taken from the website of the Richmond, VA branch of the Green Party. Although The Partisan doesn't agree with some of the things the Greens advocate, we find this piece here to be quite revealing and worth reading. Click here to go to the original post on the Green Party blog.

“Congressmen Scott and Congressman Cantor, I believe in following the money. The monetary source for the medical industry, the Pentagon and other institutions that control the US government is the Federal Reserve Bank which lends out trillions of dollars without disclosing where the loans go or what the collateral is. I have two questions for the both of you. How do you respond to people like me who claim you are bought and paid for by the moneyed interests that control our government like the medical industry and the Pentagon? And how are the American people supposed to trust a central bank that behaves like a ponzi scheme? “ I planned to ask these questions to the Congressmen at the The Times-Dispatch Health Care Public Square. I didn’t. But not because I arrived late. I was waiting in line at 4:40AM, over an hour before the next person showed up. I was given a piece of paper with the #1 on it. I then followed all the guidelines for people wanting to ask questions given by the organizers which was to sit near the microphone at the front of the room. I was closer to the microphone than anyone else. So what happened to the “first come, first serve” rule that was advertised by the Times-Dispatch?

After I had taken a seat, Dana Millbank of the Washington Post interviewed me because I was the first person to the event. We then discussed the questions that I was going to ask Scott and Cantor. Some minutes later an announcement was made that anyone who wanted to ask a question needed to form a line in the hallway which was in the back of the room. This is significant because those who arrived early, had the first numbers on their arrival order and had followed all instructions to that point, were in the front of the room near the microphone.

I got out to the hall as quickly as possible, but of course, because I had followed the previous instructions, I was no longer first…I was seventeenth. This change in plans rewarded the latecomers. When I asked a RT-D staff member about the change and shuffling the order, she replied that this is the way we are doing this now. I responded that this did not answer my question.

When the event began, I was hoping many people would get a chance to talk to the congressmen. However, it was clear that in order for those who arrived early and followed instructions to speak, the forum would have to last an additional two hours. This was in part because the RT-D did not enforce their own rule of a two minutes limit for each questioner. Some questioners had 15 min at the microphone. This was a shame too, because most of the people who arrived early had insightful questions whereas the latecomers seemed not to even know their facts.

When it was clear I would not get a chance to speak, I began telling an RT-D official sitting directly to my left that I thought it was unfair that I and others who arrived early did not get a chance to speak. He paused and then replied with an extended “Shhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!”, which was much louder than my question to him. I told him that I did not appreciate his response and I wanted to discuss the flipping of the script afterwards. I did not see him again. However, after the event, I did approach the moderator, Tom. I explained that I and others who had arrived earliest and followed instructions given by the RT-D organizers had been shafted. He responded by saying “I am sorry you have a legitimate complaint.”

I then noticed several Richmond Police and other security closing in on me. I turned and asked the policemen sneaking up on my right hand side “What’s going on?” The policeman on my left side said “Are you ready to leave?” I responded by asking again, “What was going on?” During this time I was neither loud nor disruptive. I was then ordered to follow the police out of the room. Before the event, RT-D security had confiscated my bike pump which I had been traveling with since I had a slow leak in my bicycle tube. I requested my pump back and the officers refused to give it to me until we got outside. Were these men with guns, most of whom were much larger than I, afraid of an unarmed citizen? As I was being removed, I asked the police if I needed to call a lawyer, where they were taking me and also why I was being removed. The police refused to answer all questions. When we were officially off RT-D property, I was told the organizers of the event wanted me removed because they did not like something I said earlier. Since I was not allowed to speak, I can’t imagine what that could be. Perhaps they were referring to my vocal criticism of Congressmen Scott, Cantor and the RT-D.

Are we going to continue to accept these undemocratic intimidation tactics from our government, the media, and the police whose duty it is to uphold the Constitution?

Chris Dorsey

An Interesting Project At VCU

The Partisan isn't affiliated with any school, student group, or political party. However, it does support national and social liberation struggles worldwide. So I, the editor, want to share with my readers an interesting website that one of my friends is running. The website is done as part of an ongoing documentation and education project by the Virginia Commonwealth University Students for Social Action (SSA).

What the VCU SSA is doing here is basically just collecting news articles and essays about ongoing revolutions from around the world. It covers Nepal, India, the Philippines, Colombia, and Palestine. The aim of spreading this news among the VCU community, as well as throughout Richmond, is to raise awareness about important global events and what role the US is playing in them.

The project also covers news about important state political events that go on at Virginia Commonwealth University, such as the anti-discrimination rallies that took place.

So if you attend VCU, or simply live in Richmond, and have an interest in the world, then you should visit the SSA project to learn about the struggles of the masses.

The website is: http://lalsalamvcu.blogspot.com/

The VCU SSA also does a lot of work agitating against the state and university budget cuts carried out and supported by the VA governor, VCU President Michael Rao, and the Board of Visitors. There are links to the SSA Facebook page on the website above.

If you are interested in helping/joining the SSA, then just leave a comment on one of the news articles on the website linked to above, or leave one on the SSA Facebook page.

Chechen "Black Widows" Bomb Moscow

Two women carried out a suicide bomb attack on the Moscow metro early this morning. The attack, which took place at two subway stations, killed at least 38 people. Over 100 people were injured.

The two women accused of carrying out the suicide bombing are believed to belong to the Black Widows. The Black Widows are a Chechen separatist organization composed of women who have lost relatives, usually husbands and brothers, in the conflict with Russia.

“The terrorist acts were carried out by two female terrorist bombers,” said Moscow’s mayor, Yuri M. Luzhkov. “They happened at a time when there would be the maximum number of victims.”

Vladimir Putin has vowed that the terrorists will be "destroyed."

"As far as possible we will try to avoid civilian targets, but for me there are no civilians in Russia," Doku Umarov, the separatist leader, said in an interview in July. "Why? Because a genocide of our people is being carried out with their tacit consent."

“If Russians think that the war is happening only on television, far from the Caucasus, and it will not touch them, then we are going to show them that this war will return to their homes,” Umarov said in February.

Jonathan Eyal of London's Royal United Services Institute said the killings were a challenge to Putin's authority. "This is a direct affront to Vladimir Putin, whose entire rise to power was built on his pledge to crush the enemies of Russia ... It's an affront to his muscular image," he told Reuters.

Chechen separatist attacks have been quite common for Russia in its recent, post-Soviet history. If the Chechens want to be independent so badly, then why not just let them be independent? Chechnya is a very small and underdeveloped region. There is no way they could ever be a major offensive military threat to Russia.

Things were never perfect in the Soviet Union, but the Chechen-Russian conflict seemed to be less intense back in those days, at least when times weren't tough for everyone (like during WWII). I would like to prove this by showing this passage from a New York Times article:

The older Chechen fighters like Mr. Basayev occasionally refer to a common Soviet past when communicating with Russians. Maksim Shevchenko, a Russian journalist who interviewed him frequently during the first war, recalled one such appeal by Mr. Basayev, who wears the long beard of Islamic radicals."He switched off the tape recorder and he said, `You think I was always this bearded fighter with a machine gun?' " recalled Mr. Shevchenko, who at the time was writing for the daily Nezavisimaya Gazeta. " `I also sang the song, "My address is not a home or street; my address is the Soviet Union." Those were very good times.' " (“With Few Bonds to Russia, Young Chechens Join Militants.” NYT November 19, 2002.)

Bring back a new and improved Soviet socialism, give Chechnya more autonomy if it can't be freed entirely, and all of these racial and ethnic conflicts will disappear. Why? Because Marxism provides for equality. The aim of socialism is equality. Inequality in all of its various and ugly forms is what causes ethnic, racial, religious, and class conflicts.

Turning Schools into Prisons in the Name of "Safety"

The following article was taken from Revcom.us

Welcome to the youth wing of the New York City prison system, also known as the NYC system of public schools.

In 1998, the NYPD was given authority to ensure "safety" in the city's public schools. What "safety" has meant in reality is the harassment, brutalization, and criminalization of a generation of youth. Today, more than 5,000 civilian NYPD employees, called "school safety officers" (SSOs), and nearly 200 armed NYPD cops patrol the city's schools. SSOs wear NYPD uniforms and can stop, frisk, interrogate, and arrest students. A federal lawsuit filed in January 2010 by the New York Civil Liberties Union (NYCLU) documents numerous incidents of students being handcuffed, arrested, and physically assaulted for minor misbehavior or for nothing at all.

The New York Times' Bob Herbert has also documented some of these incidents ("Cops vs. Kids," NYT, 3/6/10):

In March 2008, a sixth-grade girl and boy at a Bronx middle school drew a line on each other's desk with an erasable marker. SSOs seized the two, handcuffed them, an armed cop interrogated them, and the kids were then hauled away to the local precinct.

In fall 2008, an SSO at a Queens high school kicked in the door of a stall in the boys' bathroom. The student in the stall, who had done nothing wrong, was hit in the head by the door and injured. The boy's family sued the city, and a $55,000 settlement was reached.

In January 2008, a kindergarten pupil was acting up. An SSO handcuffed the boy, who was then taken to a hospital psychiatric ward. As Herbert remarks: "A 5-year-old!"

In filing its lawsuit, the NYCLU noted that "The aggressive policing in the city's schools contributes to the school-to-the-prison pipeline, a disturbing national trend wherein students are funneled out of the public schools and into the juvenile and criminal justice systems. These children tend to be disproportionately Black and Latino..."

Herbert pointed out that "This poisonous police behavior is an extension into the schools of the humiliating treatment cops have long been doling out to youngsters—especially those who are black and Latino—in the city's streets." ("Poisonous Police Behavior," NYT, 6/2/07)

Young women in these schools are frequently harassed and groped by the police. A March 2007 NYCLU report ("Criminalizing the Classroom: The Over-Policing of New York City Schools," nyclu.org) surveyed women students who said officers touched them in ways that made them feel uncomfortable. Women whose underwire bras set off metal detectors, which now exist in most of the city's schools, were forced to raise their shirts or unzip their pants, supposedly to prove they weren't concealing weapons or cell phones.

The creativity, energy, initiative, and rebelliousness of the youth that this current system crushes could be fully appreciated and unleashed—under a whole different system, a socialist society.

Tea Party Violence and How to Counter It

A gas line was recently found to be severed at the home of Bo Perriello, the older brother of U.S. Rep. Tom Perriello (D-Ivy). This came just a day after two Virginia Tea Party activists, one being Danville Tea Party leader Nigel Coleman, posted Bo Perriello's address online and encouraged health care reform opponents to “drop by” and “express their thanks.” Coleman added, “I ain’t holding back no more.”

The Tea Party originally thought they were posting Tom Perriello's address, not Bo's. When they discovered they had posted the wrong address online, Coleman said, "Oh well, collateral damage.”

Coleman's actions have been compared to those of neo-Nazis, who like to post the addresses and pictures of Jews, socialists, and general anti-fascists on the internet so that other Nazis can physically attack them.

Last Friday Mike Vanderboegh, a former Alabama militia leader, encouraged opponents of health care reform to vandalize Democratic Party buildings around the country.

“[I]f you wish to send a message that [House Speaker Nancy] Pelosi and her party cannot fail to hear, break their windows,” the former militia leader wrote. “Break them NOW. Break them and run to break again. Break them under cover of night. Break them in broad daylight. Break them and await arrest in willful, principled civil disobedience. Break them with rocks. Break them with slingshots. Break them with baseball bats. But BREAK them.”

“If it takes a few bricks and broken windows for people to understand how close we are to widespread violence in this country then the bricks in the windows will have been worth it,” Vanderboegh said.

Windows have been smashed at Democratic Party headquarters in Monroe County, N.Y., and Sedgwick County, Kansas. Another brick was thrown at the New York headquarters with a note attached that said, “Extremism in defense of liberty is no vice."

Tea Party members also spat on an African-American Congressman and yelled racist and homophobic slurs at Democrats.

Health care "reform" can be easily overturned if a Republican president is elected during the next Presidential election. Unfortunately, the opponents of this crappy, middle of the road reform are acting like impatient children and don't want to wait for the next election. They would rather start a genocidal civil war in the US that is on par with the "La Violencia" era in Colombia all over a piecemeal reworking of the health care system. Sending a strong message to the Democrats is one thing, but starting chaos over something petty like Obama's health care "reform" is just crazy.

If these right-wing extremists want to act like fascist bullies, then they should be treated like fascist bullies. The left should prepare to defend itself, especially those on the far left who support a socialist model of health care (as opposed to the Democrat model) and the redistribution of wealth. This is because socialists of all types will end up bearing the brunt of the right-wing attack if their fascist tactics get even more out of hand.

The Partisan has a few ideas for the self-defense of the left against the impending semi-war that the far right wants to carry out.

1. Form united fronts with friendly groups in order to achieve the best possible political representation and ability to monitor right-wing extremist activity.

2. Start collective self-defense training programs. Weapons (including firearms) training should be carried out only when the conditions call for it and not before. Organized self-defense squads should be formed to go along with this.

3. Use the defense squads to protect centers of left-wing political activity and protesters. They should also patrol the streets in order to stop any potential right-wing attacks that might occur after a threat or attack order has been issued by the right.

4. Try to establish a legal defense fund in case an ally is unjustly arrested and/or brutalized by right-wing police.

5. Attempt to shut down major right-wing activities that promote speakers and groups that promote right-wing extremist violence (as opposed to legal actions on their part). Methods can include legal activity, but the arena of struggle shouldn't be limited. Leftists should, for example, also try non-lethal sabotage techniques. Or try to get to the right-wing meeting place first and block people from entering (or leaving). Remember, if these people get too many opportunities to spew their propaganda, then that could lead to the creation of too many enemies to combat.

If The Partisan's idea isn't to your liking, then try to open up a discussion among left-wing groups in your area on how to effectively prevent right-wing extremism. Then put the best of those new ideas into practice.

Please remember that it is right-wingers who are forming most of the militias in the US. It is right-wingers who are going on shooting sprees against those they disagree with. It is right-wingers who try to bomb abortion clinics and shoot doctors. If the left continues to turn the other cheek and doesn't build up a strong resistance movement in the US, then it's demise will only approach faster.

Unemployment over twenty percent among young veterans

According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, about 22 percent of Gulf War II veterans 18 to 24 years old and younger are unemployed. This is 5 percent higher than unemployment in the civilian population.

Veterans liken looking for work to being stuck on a desert island. Many joined the military out of high school, and their deployment is usually not considered “sufficient job training or experience.”

Employers are reluctant to hire a new worker who may have to leave to redeploy at any time. Many veterans return with physical or mental health problems that make it difficult to find work.

Justin Wilcox, a 30-year-old Iraq veteran, told the Associated Press: “[I]t's been a real hard time for me. Because when I do get a job, it's not a real high paying job. . .”

These statistics highlight the priorities of imperialism. Young people are used as cannon fodder, and once they return to civilian life, they are deemed worthless.

Taken from: http://www.pslweb.org/site/News2?page=NewsArticle&id=13859&news_iv_ctrl=1261

Arundhati Roy: Walking with the Comrades

Last month, quietly, unannounced, Arundhati Roy decided to visit the forbidding and forbidden precincts of Central India’s Dandakaranya Forests, home to a melange of tribespeople many of whom have taken up arms to protect their people against state-backed marauders and exploiters. She recorded in considerable detail the first face-to-face journalistic “encounter” with armed Maoist guerrillas, their families and comrades, for which she combed the forests for weeks at personal risk. This essay was published on Friday in Delhi’s Outlook magazine. Arundhati Roy made the pictures in this 20,000 word essay available exclusively to Dawn.

The following was first posted on Dawn.com. The Partisan urges all readers to give it close attention and wide circulation. Roy's essay can be read at the link below:

http://kasamaproject.org/2010/03/21/walking-with-the-comrades/

Peace to the street, war on the palace.

Here is a nice article by Jed Brandt. He lives in Nepal and is witnessing the Nepali revolution first hand. http://socialistwebzine.blogspot.com/2010/03/war-on-palace-letter-from-revolutionary.html

Democratic Centralism

The following is the text to the YouTube video called "Democratic Centralism" by RedNickD.

It has come to my attention that a lot of people don’t know what democratic centralism is, and that these people like to go around spreading lies and false assumptions about democratic centralism. So I have found some material here that will help you understand exactly what democratic centralism is and how it works. So, let’s take a look at some Bolshevik quotes about democratic centralism, and some Maoism too. Please take the time to read these quotes for yourself.

Centralism in Society

“Far from precluding local self-government, with autonomy for regions having special economic and social conditions, a distinct national composition of the population, and so forth, democratic centralism necessarily demands both.” - Lenin, Critical Remarks on the National Question

“Truly democratic centralism requires that the manifold paths, forms, and methods by which local creativity and spirit of initiative attain general goals have a sufficiently unhindered development.” - Lenin

“… [we] must provide for wide regional autonomy (not for Poland alone, of course, but for all the regions of Russia) and fully democratic local self-government, and the boundaries of the self-governing and autonomous regions must he determined by the local inhabitants themselves on the basis of their economic and social conditions, national make-up of the population, etc.” - Russian Marxist Programme.

“The organs of state must practice democratic centralism, they must rely on the masses and their personnel must serve the people.” - Mao Zedong, On the Correct Handling of Contradictions Among the People.

Now I will give a brief summary of the Maoist Mass Line idea, which many believe stems from democratic centralism. The communists learn from the experiences of the non-Party workers; the Party distills the best aspects of the workers' views and forms a new line; the communists then go out to win the non-Party workers to support this new, more left line and get them to join the party.

Centralism in the Party

Lenin’s idea of democratic centralism is as follows.

-Make local organizations the principal units of the Party

-All higher Party bodies must be elected and subject to recall if necessary

- Autonomy of the various Party Organizations

- Ideological debate between different types of Marxists

- Party Congress supervises the Central Committee and can dissolve it

“The principle of democratic centralism and autonomy for local Party organizations implies universal and full freedom to criticize, so long as this does not disturb the unity of a definite action…” -Lenin, Freedom to Criticize and Unity of Action

This quote means that members have the right to criticize the Party as long as it does not serve to ruin the plans of the Party which have already been decided on (definite actions) democratically. Even if one member disagrees with a decision, they are expected to uphold the decision externally while working from within to convince other members that they are wrong. This method of organization is based on the assumption that eventually the majority of the members of a group, presented with conflicting views, will be able to arrive at the best possible decision.

Here is an example. If the Party decides to run in elections, and a branch tells people to boycott the elections, this could harm the Party. This goes against a definite action. However, if a branch supports boycotting elections and argues for such during the decision making process, then that is acceptable. Constructive criticism of the Party’s plan after the elections is also important and can be done.

The Party must be united in carrying out its plans in order to achieve success. It will be hard to tell if an idea works if the Party is not united in putting the idea into practice.

Here is an argument in favor of democratic centralism that I believe can be true a lot of the time, but of course not all of the time. Organizations without democratic centralism, whether they lean towards anarchism or something else, have trouble being truly democratic because they lead to the formation of informal cliques that translate into power for those more experienced or more connected people - and powerlessness for other members. However, it is also possible for cliques to arise under democratic centralism as well, as we have seen in the past.

Democratic centralism also helps to limit infiltration within the party. For example, the Black Panther Party only loosely enforced centralism. This allowed them to be easily infiltrated by government spies. State spies had no problem discovering which BPP members disagreed with which others. They used this knowledge to play one off the other, by sending forged messages to people, and by agitating with those not entirely satisfied with a policy or rule. Rather than fostering healthy debate, the lack of centralism served to stifle it, allowing dishonest elements into powerful roles within their party.

Sources:
“On Democratic Centralism” PLP article
“Democratic Centralism” MIM Notes article
http://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1913/crnq/6.htm
http://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1906/rucong/viii.htm
http://www.marxists.org/archive/lenin/works/1906/may/20c.htm
http://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/mao/works/red-book/quotes.htm
http://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/mao/selected-works/volume-8/mswv8_64.htm

Bolton cops have blood on their hands

This paragraph was taken from Lenin's Tomb.

After the EDL rally and UAF counter-protest, during which riot police relentlessly attacked non-violent antifascists, while allowing EDL activists considerable space to roam through the streets and in and out of pubs, it emerges that EDL supporters attacked and stabbed a man. The EDL had been aggressively harassing pub goers, and jumped on a man who asked them to leave. His friend intervened, and he was beaten up and stabbed. The police are quoted as saying: "We need to identify these men and lock them up so they cannot hurt anyone else." But it was the police who gave them the opportunity to go out looking for violence, knowing exactly what kind of people they were defending. It was the police who beat and set dogs on antifascists to ensure that the EDL could have this outing. It was the police who struck an 89 year old antifascist and veteran of WWII. And it was the police who fed smears to the media to justify this conduct. They behaved this way despite the overwhelming opposition of the local community, the council, local businesses, even the bloody cabbies who were leafleting against the EDL. They did this despite the fact that the EDL have a known propensity for attacking innocent people when they are given the chance to, and despite the fact that the antifascists were engaged in a legal, non-violent protest. Lesson one for anti-fascists, then: don't depend on the police to contain the racists and fascists.

March 20th Anti-war Protest in Washington DC

Thousands of enraged protesters took to the streets of Washington DC on Saturday the 20th of March to demand an end to US and Israeli wars worldwide, but mainly the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Some mainstream media reports put the number of protesters as high as ten thousand. The Partisan was on the scene and believes that ten thousand is accurate. Thousands more protested the wars in other cities around the United States.

There were several speakers giving short lectures at a pre-march rally. The speakers included Cindy Sheehan, Ralph Nader, members from Black is Back, Project Censored representatives, the Raging Grannies, and many others.

The march went passed the White House and then returned to it. Thousands of people held up anti-war signs from the ANSWER Coalition and the Party for Socialism and Liberation. Groups participating in the marching protest included US Labor Against the War, Iraq Veterans Against the War, Party for Socialism and Liberation, Revolutionary Communist Party, Socialist Party USA, 9/11 Truthers, Ron Paul supporters, the Virginia Anti-War Network, groups from the 4th International, US Marxist-Leninist Organization, RAAN, Students for a Democratic Society, and many others.

Chants of "No justice, no peace, US out of the Middle East," "Not my president, not my war," "US imperialist, number one terrorist," and "Hey hey, USA, how many kids did you kill today," could be heard.

Cindy Sheehan and seven other activists were arrested for placing fake coffins draped with flags outside of the White House.

Anti-war events have been happening in DC for several days now, and will likely continue for several more.

What saddens the author of this article is that the mainstream media has, so far, failed to mention that most of the protesters were communists of some sort. Anyone who was at the march will tell you that there were thousands upon thousands of people holding up anti-war signs that were obviously from the Party for Socialism and Liberation (a Marxist-Leninist group). It seems that the mainstream media fears Marxism and its growing presence throughout the world and is biased in favor of capitalism.

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On a somewhat related note, click here to read an article about censorship and whitewashing in the American media.

US 'used plague bomb' in Korea War

It is a crime the US has always denied - dropping germ bombs on North Korea. But in 1952 the bubonic plague, never known before in North Korea, broke out across the country. It claimed at the time that the United States was to blame. But the allegations were brushed aside as propaganda. Sixty years later however, new evidence has emerged that bioweapons may indeed have been used. Think twice before you dismiss something as "communist propaganda" next time.

Police State: The Militarization of the Police Force in the USA

Here is a nice video about how the American police force, from Florida to Wisconsin to California, is being militarized. It seems the police are being given military-grade weapons and tanks. Could this be a sign that the US is being turned into a police state? Watch the video and decide for yourself.

A Response to the Socialist Worker

The following is a response to the Socialist Worker article titled "Who made China's revolution?" dated October 12, 2009.

A lot of the things said in this article are accurate and quite correct. Unfortunately, there are some things that aren't correct. I disagree with some of the things the article says about Stalin, but not all of them. However, I don't intend to discuss Josef Stalin in this response. I will instead be correcting the erroneous views on Maoism that the Socialist Worker has propagated in the article.

Although I may have misunderstood the article in this regard, it seems to me that the article is trying to blame Maoism for China's turn to capitalism. Maoism did not turn China capitalist, it tried to do the opposite, but after Mao died Deng Xiaoping and his henchmen came to power and opened their arms to foreign capitalists and began to dismantle the "Iron Rice Bowl" (The IRB guaranteed the Chinese people jobs and benefits). The actions of Deng and the "capitalist roaders" were not Maoist at all, those actions were pure revisionism and treachery. Trotskyists will be quick to assume that the hijacking of China means Maoism doesn't work, but I must remind them of the fact that they believe Stalin hijacked the Soviet Union. So it seems we're even.

Due to the betrayal of the Chinese peasantry and workers, the international communist movement is now working on theories to prevent such a thing from happening again. Some advocate more criticism from below, others advocate a system with multiple proletarian and peasant parties.

The article also condemns the CPC-KMT (GMD) alliance. Although this alliance had its down side, the SW author seems to forget the fact that the KMT was quite left-wing at one point, but the rightists eventually carried out a coup of the KMT which caused many communists within the group to leave. The alliance was not such a bad idea, especially since many Chinese people demanded it, it just did not work out in the end due to the coup. The SW article also blames Stalin for encouraging the alliance and supporting the KMT. Indeed Stalin made this mistake, but he eventually made a self-criticism and admitted he was wrong.

Here is an excerpt from the SW article that I feel needs to be addressed more directly:

"This pattern highlights some of the defining features of Maoism: its orientation to the peasant class, its nationalism and its dependence on military power to gain political power. While the peasantry has a long revolutionary history, there is nothing inherently socialistic about it, as peasants' main concern is farming their own land. And while it is true that political power can grow out of the barrel of a gun, to paraphrase Mao, guns alone cannot bring about socialism."

While I agree that guns alone cannot bring about much of anything, the statements made in this paragraph show that the SW author knows absolutely nothing about Maoism. As a Maoist myself, I will give you a little MLM 101 lesson by breaking down this incorrect paragraph.

"This pattern highlights some of the defining features of Maoism: its orientation to the peasant class, its nationalism and its dependence on military power to gain political power."

First of all, Maoism advocates a strong worker-peasant alliance. Second of all, Maoism is not entirely dependent on the People's Army to gain power. In Nepal, for example, the UCPN (Maoist) has been working within the electoral system.

“The communist party and the revolutionary forces of every country must ready both hands, one for winning victory peacefully, one for taking power with violence. Neither may be dispensed with.” - Mao Zedong

The author also seems to be condemning anti-imperialist nationalism. I certainly hope this person doesn't consider his individual school of thought to be coming from Marxism-Leninism. Both Marx and Lenin supported anti-imperialist nationalism.

When it came to British imperialism in Ireland, Marx sided with the oppressed nation, Ireland.

“Hence it is the task of the International everywhere to put the conflict between England and Ireland in the foreground, and everywhere to side openly with Ireland.” -Karl Marx

Marx also supported the national movement of the Poles and the Hungarians in his day.

“…emphasis must necessarily be laid on their advocating freedom for the oppressed countries to secede and their fighting for it. Without this there can be no internationalism.” -V. I. Lenin, "The Discussion on Self-Determination Summed Up"

Here is another point from the article that must be addressed:

"While the peasantry has a long revolutionary history, there is nothing inherently socialistic about it..."

According to F. Engels, this statement is incorrect. Helping the peasants is one of the duties of communists everywhere.

"We . . . are decidedly on the side of the small peasant; we shall do everything at all permissible to make his lot more bearable, to facilitate his transition to the co-operative should he decide to do so, and even to make it possible for him to remain on his small holding for a protracted length of time to think the matter over, should he still be unable to bring himself to this decision. We do this not only because we consider the small peasant who does his own work as virtually belonging to us, but also in the direct interest of the Party. The greater the number of peasants whom we can save from being actually hurled down into the proletariat, whom we can win to our side while they are still peasants, the more quickly and easily the social transformation will be accomplished. It will serve us naught to wait with this transformation until capitalist production has developed everywhere to its utmost consequences, until the last small handicraftsman and the last small peasant have fallen victim to capitalist large-scale production. The material sacrifice to be made for this purpose in the interest of the peasants and to be defrayed out of public funds can, from the point of view of capitalist economy, be viewed only as money thrown away, but it is nevertheless an excellent investment because it will effect a perhaps tenfold saving in the cost of the social reorganization in general. In this sense we can, therefore, afford to deal very liberally with the peasants." - Engels

The SW author also seems to makes the mistake of boiling Maoist theory down into nothing more than "people's consciousness change things, not economic conditions." (He didn't say that verbatim, but it was implied though.) This is a blatant misunderstanding of Maoism. Does he honestly think the CPC intended to industrialize China with their minds alone? Mao's book "On New Democracy" has large sections dedicated to economics and politics, not just philosophy. I also recommend the SW author go to the Marx2Mao.com and read "A Critique of Soviet Economics" by Mao Zedong. He should also read "Maoist Economics and the Revolutionary Road to Communism: The Shanghai Textbook" before he talks about Maoist theories on change, economic conditions, and politics. There is nothing revisionist in those books!

One last thing. The SW author states that he thinks the Chinese Revolution basically neglected the workers, or that workers didn't play a big enough role in it. To him, I share this quote from Mao.

"The first step or stage in our revolution is definitely not, and cannot be, the establishment of a capitalist society under the dictatorship of the Chinese bourgeoisie, but will result in the establishment of a new-democratic society under the joint dictatorship of all the revolutionary classes of China headed by the Chinese proletariat." Mao Zedong, "On New Democracy"

I will also point out this quote from the SW article, which seems to contradict the SW author's point which I am addressing.

"[The Chinese Communist Party] became an organization concentrated on the coastal cities, and overwhelmingly working class. It achieved this size by leading strikes in Shanghai and Hong Kong against foreign companies after British and French troops had shot and killed demonstrators. In those few years the CPC helped to organize 20 percent of the 15 million workers in China into trade unions."

The Socialist Worker, whether it realizes it or not, is helping the imperialist bourgeoisie by claiming that socialist revolution is an exclusive club in which only industrialized nations can take part. This claim meets the imperialists halfway by indirectly discouraging attempts at socialism in oppressed countries, and also opening the door for more capitalist-oriented nationalist revolutions that will, by their bourgeois nature, end up doing business with the imperialists in many exploitative ways after taking power.

Sources:
"China Since 1945" by Stewart Ross
“Ireland and the Irish Question” by Marx and Engels
"On New Democracy" by Mao Zedong
"Red Star Over China" by Edgar Snow
"The Foundations of Leninism" by J.V. Stalin
http://www.isreview.org/issues/13/marxism_nationalism_part1.shtml

Is God a Dictator?

Right-wingers and religious people in Europe and North America often like to complain about dictators. They are always going on about their "freedom." Unsurprisingly, many of them are Christians. Like any good religious person, they overlook the fact that their God is an autocratic tyrant who is worse than any dictator in history!

I know a lot of you religious and conservative people aren't smart enough to know what autocracy is, so let me define it for you. While I'm at it, I'll define monarch too.

Autocrat: a cruel and oppressive dictator
Monarchy: an autocracy governed by a monarch who usually inherits the authority

Think about it. Do you remember electing any god? What kind of democracy has a leader who will punish you for not believing in him or agreeing with him? Some will argue that God should be in power because he "created life." Did you ask to be alive? No you didn't, this cruel life on Earth was forced on you.

Jesus Christ is termed "King of Kings" in the Bible, particularly in the Book of Revelation, 17:14 and 19:16. Jesus says in the Book of Matthew, verse 28:18, that all authority on earth has been given to him. We can tell from this that Christ, the embodiment of God, is certainly far from being a constitutional monarch, let alone a democratic ruler. He is an absolute monarch, one of the oldest forms of autocratic oppressors.

The hallmark of almost all undemocratic forms of government is cruel and unusual punishment. In case you were unaware, cruel and unusual punishment is prohibited by the US Constitution. Oddly enough, American conservatives support cruel and unusual punishment when their dictator in the sky does it.

Revelation 14:11 “[referring to those who worship the beast] the smoke of their torment goes up forever and ever and they have no rest day and night.”

Matthew 13:41 "The Son of Man will send his angels, and they will gather from his kingdom everything that causes sin as well as all lawbreakers. And throw them into the fiery furnace, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth."

Isaiah 66:24 "And as they go out, they will see the dead bodies of those who have rebelled against me. For the worms that devour them will never die, and the fire that burns them will never go out. All who pass by will view them with utter horror."

According to the Bible quotes above, if you break God's insane laws you will burn, have your teeth broken, and have other unspeakable things done to you in Hell for all eternity. Seriously imagine how bad it must feel to be burning inside of a lake of fire for all eternity! That is a million times worse than any of the torments dished out by human dictators (which include water-boarding, rape, beatings, starvation, electrocution, and forced labor). On top of all that misery, you will have absolutely no rest! Even Hitler let the Jews sleep in the Concentration Camps! We can safely conclude from this that God is worse than Hitler!

While I'm at it, here is another thing to think about. Does anyone really deserve to be tortured day and night for all eternity? God's punishments don't fit the crimes. If you lived a life of sin, shouldn't you get a simple lifetime of punishment instead of an eternity? It is frowned upon when judges sentence people to death for stealing, so why is it acceptable for a "Holy" judge to torture someone forever and ever even though they only broke a few laws in one short lifetime?

Psalm 9:17 "The wicked shall be turned into hell, and all the nations that forget God."

Many dictators, Hitler for example, liked to conquer nations that refused to obey their imperialist wishes. The Christian god does a lot worse than this. Instead of doing normal oppression, he will torture the entire nation for all eternity in Hell. This is worse than anything Hitler or the Roman emperors could ever dream of doing.

1 Sam. 15:3 " [God said to his followers] Now go and attack Amalek and utterly destroy all they have and do not spare them. Kill both man and women, infant and nursing child, ox and sheep, camel and donkey." (See also: Deut.2:30-35, 7:1-2, 7:16; Josh.6:21; 1 Sam.6:19; Jer.13:14)

This is reminiscent of the things the Nazis did to the Slavs. The Nazis destroyed the Slavic infrastructure and indiscriminately murdered civilians in the most brutal ways. This lead to the death of between 3.5 to 6 million Slavic civilians. What I'm trying to say here is that if God exists, which he doesn't, then he is the inventor of genocide, the original Nazi.

1 Corinthians 11:3 "But I would have you know, that the head of every man is Christ; and the head of the woman [is] the man; and the head of Christ [is] God."

1 Corinthians 14:34 "Let your women keep silence in the churches: for it is not permitted unto them to speak; but [they are commanded] to be under obedience, as also saith the law."

Genesis 3:16 "Unto the woman he said, I will greatly multiply thy sorrow and thy conception; in sorrow thou shalt bring forth children; and thy desire [shall be] to thy husband, and he shall rule over thee."

There are many sexist passages in the Bible like the ones quoted above. The third one discusses how God punished all women for something that only one woman, Eve, did. How is this "just and fair?"

In Genesis 9:24-27, God's friend Noah placed a curse on the descendants of Ham, who are believed to be of African descent. These verses also encourage slavery. So not only has God allied himself with a racist, he is also pro-slavery.

In conclusion, the God of the Bible is a merciless, tyrannical, genocidal, racist, slave-driving, sexist, quasi-Nazi, and I think that is an understatement. If you wouldn't support a human tyrant doing any of these things, then why would you turn a blind eye to the tyrant in your religious books?

Despite my criticisms of his ideology, I believe the Anarchist Mikhail Bakunin had it right when he said, "Even if God really existed, it would be necessary to abolish him."

Now, here is something you might find interesting. It is an essay by Frederick Engels, the co-founder of Marxism, which debunks the Book of Revelations. Click here to read it.

Toyota Bosses Ignore Safety Concerns

Six Toyota manufacturing employees are now claiming that they wrote a memo to the company executives in 2006 regarding the employees' concerns about vehicle safety issues.

"We are concerned about the processes which are essential for producing safe cars, but that ultimately may be ignored, with production continued in the name of competition," the memo from the concerned workers stated.

In the five years leading up to the 2006 memo, Toyota recalled over 5 million cars worldwide. This lead to many people within the company to become concerned, especially since Toyota had cut overhead while increasing output at the same time.

The Toyota executives simply ignored the memo and the concerns of their workers.

"They completely ignored us," said 62-year-old assembly line worker Tadao Wakatsuki. "That's the Toyota way."

"We used to test every one of our cars for safety and quality," Watasuki, founder of the All Toyota Labor Union, said to the press. "Now we do maybe 60%. The old 100% is a thing of the past."

The Union founder also had this to say:

"Our responsibility as a labor union was to point out these problems that Toyota should have known about. People were overworked; some were committing suicide... Of course, Toyota did nothing, but looking back we see how important this was. We just told them what we saw."

If capitalism and competition are so great at making products of good quality, then why is Toyota intentionally lowering its quality? If capitalism treats workers so well, then why are there reports of Toyota workers committing suicide? I think it is fair to say that the capitalists have lied to us.

Karl Marx said that competition only makes it harder for a company to make a profit from selling its products. So they must cut back on costs (usually labor and quality costs) in order to increase profit by saving money. Toyota is cutting back on safety testing and its relationship with its workers in its drive for greater profits. This will only result in Toyota's destruction, unless they are bailed out by their friends in some government (who will use taxpayers' money, unfortunately).

Obama Assimilated

Is Obama really a socialist? Or is he closer to John McCain and George Bush than you think? Is his health care plan really single payer? Check out this brief and entertaining video about Obama and maybe decide for yourself.

Why Maoism Works

Examples of working socialism

Under Mao their were favorable growth rates in the Chinese economy, and even the CIA acknowledged this. In less than four years, Maoist policies had turned small, private farms into cooperatives. This increased agricultural production. Then the People’s Communes were formed, and they more than doubled the food grain output. Poor and lower-middle peasants were big fans of these communes.

Industry became less lopsided and grew to meet the needs of Chinese national and military construction. Agriculture was mechanized rapidly also. By 1973, 90% of the counties in China had repair shops for agricultural machinery. Electricity consumption and tractor use increased. Land plowed by machines increased by 70 percent.

Chinese technology excelled and precision tools were built in China without outside help. China became the first country in the world to successfully synthesize insulin and build a working double internal water-cooling turbogenerator. China’s communications, transportation, commerce, banking, finance, cultural, and educational endeavors rapidly advanced. The cultural and educational level of the Chinese people increased too.

The Taching (Daqing) oil field, once an empty field of nothing, was set up in about three years. They didn’t have much equipment when doing it, but they established a first-class oil field. Construction on the oil field began in 1959. Under Mao, China was pretty much self-sufficient in oil products since 1963.

The Chinese currency was stabilized and more and more countries began to use it as a means of calculating prices in international accounting.

New values and ways of thinking and attitudes were forged. The Cultural Revolution changed the masses world outlook to a more united and socialist one. This crushes the old bourgeois lie of how people are naturally greedy.

Here is an unorthodox example (that has nothing to do with China). Canutillo was destroyed by the fighting going on in Mexico, then Pancho Villa took over Canutillo. He applied a collective system of work, and the town was repaired in less than three years. Three years was quick for back then. Canutillo became economically productive and self-sufficient in every respect. It had also acquired many conveniences that were modern at the time.

How Maoism Works and Leads to Communism

Workers and peasants democratically elect managers, and managers can be recalled by the workers. Managers also take part in labor. Government cadres take part in labor as well. This helps restrict bureaucracy, dogmatism, and bourgeois right. It also helps resolve worker-manager contradictions and helps eradicate the difference between mental and manual labor. Maoism also encourages criticism of bureaucrats and capitalist roaders in the Communist Party. An example is Mao Zedong’s “Bombard the Headquarters” comment and the big-character posters.

Strong, centralized leadership in economic planning must be combined with local initiatives. The central leadership must consult the local ones, and it must take into account local conditions. That is how it will come up with plans. The individual enterprises will have decentralized management, and will use state funds, based on what they need to do, to produce according to the state’s plan. Expectancies must not be set too high. Reasonable plans can often, but not always, be over-fulfilled. This will arouse the enthusiasm of the masses. The masses must discuss the lines of the plan, and mass movements must be launched.

“…trusts and factories have been founded on a self-supporting basis precisely in order that they themselves should be responsible…for their enterprises working without a deficit.” - Lenin

Private, small scale means of production (especially farms) are turned into cooperatives, then into communes. This will increase production. Due to the elimination of competition, enterprises better cooperate with each other. This better concentrates resources and manpower. It increases production, finishes projects and developments quicker, and can overcome weaknesses in the national economy. Through Marxist emulation in production, the ever increasing needs of the people are met and the level of technology is raised. Of course, the people could also request new technology be developed for whatever purposes.

Workers for agriculture are very important. The right number of agricultural workers must be secured before anything else. This is because agriculture produces a lot of food and raw materials for heavy and light industry. Maoism aims to mechanize agriculture in order to produce more and free up workers for other work, mainly expanding the other means of production. The mechanization of agriculture helps to eliminate the difference between urban and rural.

Industry must be distributed rationally in every area and the poorer areas better funded. To develop heavy industry, emphasis is put on expanding agriculture and light industry. Light industry and agriculture provide funds and markets for heavy industry and help make the development of heavy industry more stable. Light industry and agriculture also improve the livelihood of the people.

The state will regulate prices in money relations between agriculture and industry in order to restrict bourgeois right. The positive side of the law of value is used to set prices rationally and make plans based on actual conditions. The state must also improve production methods, lower production costs, and implement economic accounting. Democratic methods will be used to solve financial matters.

The production of value will be subordinate to the production of use value. This further restricts bourgeois right.

Unlike in capitalism, overproduction isn’t a problem because the consumption of the masses doesn’t go down. It steadily increases as national construction expands. This is because the socialist system creates jobs, to put it plainly. Production in the socialist state enterprise is not subject to fluctuations according to the level of prices and magnitude of profit. This is because the national plan decides how much to produce, and production plans are based on the growing needs of the people and state. Any losses are made up by planned subsidies. Only the amount of paper money needed for circulation will be printed.

Sources:

Maoist Economics and the Revolutionary Road to Communism: The Shanghai Textbook edited by Raymond Lotta

http://ojinaga.com/pinon/index2.html

Review of The Private Life of Chairman Mao

A lot of the author's memoirs are nothing more than recycling of widely available information. Li’s memoirs are not based on his personal diaries as he claims, because he burned his own diaries during the Cultural Revolution.

It was the publisher of this book, Random House, that wanted to add all the bullshit about Mao’s sex life. They did this in order to sell more copies, and they didn’t care if what they said was historically inaccurate. An Open Letter was published in the Asian American Times and Straits Review in Taiwan. The signatories of the letter pointed out discrepancies between the English and Chinese version of this book. A statement against this book was signed by 150 people who worked with Mao.

Li claimed to be Mao’s physician since 1954. He presented no evidence to back this up. However, there is evidence that he was Mao’s physician since 1957. So he lied to his readers! Li also claims that he attended CCP Politburo meetings with Mao. This is also a lie. Li wasn’t authorized to attend such meetings. It was against the party rules.

People who worked with Mao and earned his trust all have some personal item from Mao. Li, however, does not! Li claims it was Deng who fought against Mao’s personality cult. In reality, Mao warned against personality cults, and Mao always rejected the term “Mao Zedong Thought”. Instead, he simply called it “Mao Zedong’s Instructions” or “Work by Mao”.

Li claims that Mao was a womanizer and slept with women under a big quilt, but he is lying. Mao didn’t use quilts when he moved to Beijing. When Li came face to face with a Chinese audience, he had to admit that he never caught Mao in bed with a woman he wasn’t married to.

The author claims that Mao wanted to shut down the clinics for top-ranking party members because he wanted to topple Liu Shaoqi, who had lung disease. In reality, Mao closed down the facilities after Liu’s lung disease was cured. Li says that Mao sent anyone he disliked to a gulag. This isn’t true. Mao simply sent people to the countryside to learn from the peasants and understand the average citizen's way of life.

Sources (books):
The Battle for China's Past: Mao and the Cultural Revolution by Mobo Gao
The Private Life of Chairman Mao by Li Zhi-Sui

Review of Mao the Unknown Story

James Heartfield has heavily attacked and criticized Mao the Unknown Story. Steve Tsang, an anti-Mao Oxford University historian calls the book a “distortion of history”. A Taiwanese publisher was contracted to publish the Chinese version of Mao The Unknown Story, but they decided not to when they realized the authors couldn’t back up their claims.

Chang and Halliday had the funds to interview anyone they wished for their book. Many of this book’s interviewees are irrelevant. For example, what would Lech Walesa or a Hungarian Prime Minister know about Mao Zedong? Most of the time Chang and Halliday don’t cite sources, and when they do it is only to demonize Mao. They often use quotations and sources out of context. They have done this with Gong Chu, a speech made by Mao, and a witness of the Luding Bridge battle. The authors fail to cite references properly and don’t say which source they used to make a claim. The authors commonly give a source for pieces of irrelevant information, and then make a substantial claim but don’t give a source. Jung Chang has a linguistics doctorate, but in this book she doesn’t properly convert the Chinese names into English spelling.

They make claims that are just plain stupid as well. They claimed that Mao drank plenty of milk each day, consumed a kilo of beef stew each day along with a whole chicken. Any idiot can tell that this is not humanly possible. Most human beings, including Mao, can’t eat that much. They also claim that the KMT let the communists escape on the Long March. Any historian can tell you that this isn’t true. When the authors were asked which source supported their idiotic claim, they were unable to answer because they were lying. Jung Chang also refused to give convincing replies to Jin Xiaoding’s 17 questions about this book. The authors claim to have interviewed the last surviving eyewitness of the battle at Luding Bridge. They claim the person said there was no battle there. When an investigation was done, reports confirmed that a battle took place and that Chang and Halliday were lying.

Chang and Halliday claim that 700,000 people died in Ruijin before the reds had complete control of mainland China. To back this claim up, they cite two sources for a population drop. Just because a population drops doesn’t mean people were killed by communists. Their sources fail to specify how many people left the area and how many people were killed by the KMT.

Chang and Halliday claim that Mao didn’t walk during the Long March, but was carried. They use Zhang Guotao’s memoirs as a reference. However, his memoirs were written after he left the communists and joined the Nationalists. So these memoirs are biased and most likely untruthful. Even Zhang himself claims Mao wasn’t carried all of the time.

Chang claims her home province was hit with famine. In her books Wild Swans and Mao: The Unknown Story, Chang fails to provide any eyewitness accounts of starvation in her home province. Halliday originally condemned the Japanese invasion of Manchuria and China, but now he agrees with Jung Chang that it was justified as a result of a Mao-Stalin conspiracy. Halliday is a walking contradiction whose politics have changed due to emotions, not logic.

They also claim to have interviewed Mao’s English teacher. When the teacher was contacted, she said she didn’t give them an interview.

Chang and Halliday say Mao was reckless with agriculture. In reality, Mao always urged caution in grain production and told people not to boast or to lie about false achievements in the production. During the Great Leap Forward, Mao warned the people to be cautious.

When scholars talk about death tolls for the Great Leap Forward, they are not sure how many actually died and how many weren’t even born yet. Their stats are based on inaccurate methods. Most of them don’t take into account the serious natural disasters that took place during that period. All GLF death toll estimates are inaccurate. Chang and Halliday, however, pick the highest estimates they can find.

Sources (books):
The Battle for China's Past: Mao and the Cultural Revolution by Mobo Gao
Mao the Unknown Story by Chang and Halliday

The Era of Mao

Modern Chinese scholars often claim to represent the Chinese people as a whole, but they really don’t. How the Chinese view the Mao era is often, but not always, dependant on the individual’s class. The Chinese scholars, being in the elite, naturally view it pretty negatively.

Mao and his comrades in the CCP are often accused of violence against people who disagreed with them. However, there was no official policy for violence. In 1966, the CCP approved a decree for the whole of China. It said that no school, mine, factory, administration, or any other unit could set up a makeshift court to persecute anyone. The official policy was “engage in struggle with words, not with physical attacks”. This was recorded in an official Cultural Revolution document called “The 16 Articles”. Mao is often accused of setting up the Red Guards. There were Red Guards, but there was no such singular group called the Red Guards.

It’s also claimed that official policy was to destroy traditional objects. Despite efforts by post-Mao Chinese authorities to denounce the Cultural Revolution, no evidence has been put forward to prove that physical destruction was officially sanctioned. The official policy was to protect cultural relics from destruction. In 1967, the CCP central committee issued a document called “Several Suggestions for the Protection of Cultural Relics and Books During the Cultural Revolution”. The number of archeological discoveries was high during this period, and preservation of the discoveries were effective. Mao also promoted the use of traditional Chinese medicine. It should also be pointed out that tension between conservation and destruction of traditions has existed in China for thousands of years.

It is often said that Chinese Red Guard were responsible for the destruction in Tibet. However, only a limited number of ethnic Chinese Red Guards reached Tibet. Most of the destruction was done by Rebels of Tibetan ethnic origin. Tibetan authorities often used the PLA to restrain such radical actions.

Many lower-class Tibetans responded to Mao in a positive way because he changed their lives with a revolutionary land reform and emancipation of slaves. They liked Mao because he respected the Dalai Lama, and had good political relations with him from 1950-59.

China is often accused of imperialism for taking control of Tibet, but we must differentiate between, for example, British Imperialism in India and Chinese “imperialism” in Tibet. First of all, there were areas of Tibet that were already part of Chinese provinces before the communist take over. Many Tibetans and Chinese lived in those areas for a long time. No major state recognized Tibet as independent during that time either. The Tibetan population has grown since it became part of China. Whether or not Tibet should be independent now, in the 21st Century, is a whole other story.

Under Mao, inflation was brought under control, the currency stabilized, and there was redistribution of large estates. Between 1950-60 the number of teachers in China rose from ½ million to 2½ million. The number of elementary school pupils rose to 100 million. The first 8 years of Mao saw more industrial output, development of roads, and development of railroads.

China’s economy was disrupted in 1967-8, but through the rest of the 1960’s and 70’s, it grew consistently. It had positive growth in agriculture and industry. The Cultural Revolution period had a rapid growth of rural industry. The US government acknowledged this in 1978. The average life expectancy for the Chinese rose from 35 years in 1949 to 63 in 1975. Mao set up the barefoot doctors, and set up better healthcare for the rural Chinese.

There was a lot of official, semi-official, and underground activity during those years. More than 10,000 different newspapers and pamphlets were published during the Cultural Revolution. Mao even read some of these publications. However, Western academics always use so called “Red Guard” publications to asses the Cultural Revolution.

During the Cultural Revolution years of 1972 to75, China had 4 national fine arts exhibitions with over 2,000 works selected from over 12,000 works of art recommended from all over China. The exhibits attracted 7.8 million people. Such a large audience was never seen before the Cultural Revolution. The number of cinemas, cultural clubs, public libraries, and museums increased between the years of 1965 and 1976.

During the Great Leap Forward, the idea of backyard furnaces was proposed. Mao was skeptical of them. They weren’t Mao’s idea, but rather Bo Yibo and Liu Shaoqi’s idea. It was Bo who said that China could catch up to the UK in two years. Mao didn’t say any of that and was always skeptical. He always wanted them to be cautious. Mao told the media to tone down publicity about unrealistic production targets. Deng Xiaoping said himself and other leaders were to blame for the GLF disasters, and Mao wasn’t entirely at fault. Deng was in charge of implementing the GLF policies and worked as a middle man between Mao and the local leaders who put the policies into practice. Deng and others are mainly at fault for the GLF disasters, not Mao.

Sources (books):
"The Battle for China's Past: Mao and the Cultural Revolution" by Mobo Gao
"China Since 1945" by Stewart Ross

Capitalist Competition and Socialist Emulation

Holy egomaniacal, capitalist arguments Nick!
To the RedMobile!

OK, so Capitalists say that technology can’t be advanced without competition and profit motive, which are two of the things capitalism is all about. A few examples of things that weren’t invented through competition and profit motive include the spear, woodblock printing, gunpowder, and the AK-47. In 1971, during the Cultural Revolution, the Chinese developed a special extraction method to isolate artemisinin. Those are only a few examples. Those things might sound old to you and I, but they were new advancements when they were first developed.

Let’s also not forget the open source movement for software. Open source has outperformed commercial, for-profit software in terms of server-software and has strongly challenged Microsoft in the realm of consumer software. A report by the Standish Group says that adoption of open source has caused a drop in the revenue of the for-profit software industry by about $60 billion per year!

Marx said that a capitalist gains from competition “more difficult conditions for the profitable employment of his capital.” So it’s not much they gain. Marxists tend to favor emulation over competition. Industrial emulation focuses on making a better product, not a profit. It is more significant in the development of productive forces.

In a talk with Stalin, Colonel Robins of the USA once said of Soviet emulation, “I have already sensed this in your factories where I have seen that socialist emulation has resulted in the creation of a new kind of ardour, a new sort of ambition that money could never buy, because the workers expect to get for their work something better and greater than money can procure.”

Another argument states that in a Marxist society, people could democratically request that new things be developed when needed. Through the examples I have listed earlier, technological advances don’t necessarily have to be democratically requested nor developed through competition.

Sources:
“The Battle for China’s Past: Mao and the Cultural Revolution” by Mobo Gao
http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1847/wage-labour/ch09.htm
http://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/stalin/works/1933/05/13.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gunpowder
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spear
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Woodblock_printing
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open_source_software

KOE salutes the demonstrations

The following is a statement from the Communist Organization of Greece (KOE).



(5/3/2010)

The Communist Organization of Greece (KOE) salutes the combative mass demonstrations that took place yesterday afternoon and today morning all over the country against the new measures adopted by the government of PASOK. These demonstrations must become the starting point of a great uprising of all the workers and of the whole people, obliging the government to pay dearly its effort to impose the barbaric measures imposed by Brussels. Today the Greek people, demonstrating in their dozens of thousands with such an impressive and militant way, send a clear message to the government: The new anti-people measures will go, or this government will go!

The Communist Organization of Greece condemns the coward attack of the special police forces against Manolis Glezos, the 87 years old Hero of our National Resistance against the Nazi Occupation, outside the entrance of the Parliament, which resulted to his injury and hospitalization in Intensive Care Unit. Seven decades after his legendary and symbolic blow against the Nazi Occupation (*), Manolis Glezos is aggressed by the political servants of Brussels and Berlin!

The Communist Organization of Greece also condemns the unprecedented attack of the special police forces against the Parliamentary Group of SYRIZA (Coalition of Radical Left) while the MPs were coming out of the Parliament with their own banner in order to meet the demonstrators. The out of limits behavior of the police forces corresponds very well to the equally out of limits economic and social suffocation imposed on the country by the government of PASOK.

The Communist Organization of Greece denounces the provocation set up in common by the parliamentary speaker of PASOK Christos Papoutsis and by Adonis Georgiadis, MP of the extreme right-wing party LAOS, who targeted KOE and SYRIZA as responsible for the attack of demonstrators against Yiannis Panagopoulos (president of the General Confederation of Labor). This orchestrated attack against KOE and SYRIZA proves that the extreme right-wing LAOS supports the government of PASOK both in the Parliament (**) and in provocations.

It is very well known to all that KOE has a radically different political line than the one followed by the leadership of the General Confederation of Labor – especially today that the workers become the subjects of the wildest attack ever perpetrated by the ruling classes and their governments. But it is also equally very well known that KOE puts in practice this political line as the Left always did: massively and politically, in the working places and in society.

It is shameful that, the very day that PASOK and LAOS bury in the Parliament the conquests of a whole century, the same parties, these shameless representatives and puppets of Brussels, hasten to cover their huge responsibilities with such cheap tricks and provocations against KOE.

The Communist Organization of Greece calls to even bigger and more combative mobilizations. Today we gave a battle, but the struggle continues. Everyone to the streets, until the government’s measures will be cancelled and until the EU Stability Pact will be abolished!

Athens, 5 March 2010

Communist Organization of Greece



(*) On May 30, 1941, Manolis Glezos and Apostolos Santas climbed on the Acropolis and tore down the Nazi Swastika, which had been there since April 27, 1941, when the Nazi forces had entered Athens. That was the first resistance act that took place in Greece, and probably among the very first ones in Europe. He passed 16 years in prisons and in exile, persecuted by the reactionary post-war regimes of Greece.

(**) The new measures were approved today in the Parliament, under a “special urgent procedure” that lasted a few hours, with the votes of the MPs of PASOK (government party) and LAOS (extreme right-wing party).

Schools Are Bullying Youth

A high school in Lower Merion County, Pennsylvania is now under investigation by the FBI due to the fact that one of its policies was an outright violation of students' civil rights. The school used webcams built into school-issued laptops to spy on students. One student, Blake Robbins, was arrested and falsely accused of using and intending to sell pills.

According to Robbins' attorney, Mark Haltzman, "She [the school's vice principal] called him into the office and told him, basically, 'I've been watching what was on the Web cam and saw what was in your hands. I've been reading what you've been typing, and I'm afraid you are involved in drugs and trying to sell pills.'"

In reality, the vice principal was telling lies and Robbins didn't have pills, only Mike and Ike candies. Robbins' parents have sued over this issue.

This is far from being an isolated incident. This blatant oppression of youth has been happening almost every day for some time now. For example, last year the US Supreme Court ruled in favor of Savana Redding. Redding, now an adult, was strip searched at school (basically molested) when she was only thirteen years old. She had been searched because school officials feared that she was in possession of prescription ibuprofen (oh horrors!).

Last month 12-year-old Alexa Gonzalez was arrested and hauled off to a New York (Queens) jail for writing on her desk. All she wrote was, "I love my friends Abby and Faith," and "Lex was here. 2/1/10."

"I started crying, like, a lot," Alexa told the Daily News. "I made two little doodles. It could be easily erased. To put handcuffs on me is unnecessary."

Alexa was assigned 8 hours of community service, a book report, and an essay on what she had learned. All over simply writing on a desk. Her suspension was lifted, but she missed three days of school. She spent those days in agony, vomiting!

In Montgomery Country, Maryland, a 13-year-old student at Roberto Clemente Middle School was taken out of his class room by police officers because he refused to recite the pledge of allegiance. He acted like a mature person by simply sitting in silence for two days in a row when the pledge to the flag was roboticly repeated by the other students. This was a clear violation of his civil rights, and the ACLU has taken up his case.

The shit-headed scumbags who run Roberto Clemente Middle School ignorantly refused to admit they violated the students' Constitutional rights. Instead, they say the student owes an apology to his obviously fascist teacher for "defiance."

Although a spokesperson for the school did have this to say.

"The policy is very, very clearly stated," the spokesperson said. "Our teachers are expected to know the students' rights and responsibilities....A mistake has been made, and it will be rectified."

The spokesperson admitted that the rights of the student, as stated by Maryland law, were violated.

13-year-old Chelsea Fraser was arrested for writing "okay" on her desk at a middle school in Dyker Heights, Brooklyn.

"Here we have rapists, murderers, and you're taking a 13-year-old kid? Wasting valuable manpower to arrest a child who wrote on a desk?" said Fraser's mother.

Let us not forget the ongoing reports of police using tasers on unarmed minors.

"We are arresting them at younger and younger ages [in cases] that used to be covered with a trip to the principal's office, not sending children to jail," said Emma Jordan-Simpson, executive director of the Children's Defense Fund.

According to a report by the NYCLU:

"At the same time that the number of police personnel in the schools has increased to a whopping 5,200 agents, the ability of educators to oversee school safety and student discipline has decreased. Principals complain that they are unable to control the conduct of School Safety Agents and are limited in their ability to strike the right balance between school security and a supportive educational environment."

Manuel Criollo, a Los Angeles-based organizer with the Strategy Center "No to Pre-Prison" Campaign told AlterNet.

"Reliance on law enforcement opens the door to criminalize student behavior," he said. "Therefore, issues such as fighting, truancy, and tardiness become crimes -- and of course students of color are more vulnerable to targeting and profiling."

Of course, the right-wingers oppose the expansion of government. They fear big government. They even bring up police states as a reason to distrust the government, yet they turn a blind eye to policies that turn schools into mini-police/prison states. This just shows their hypocrisy and bigotry towards minors. The liberals are just as bad, but they are more sneaky about their oppression of youth. From these facts, it is clear that the only way to go is radical. If youth rights groups could become just a little stronger, and if students would take-over (occupy) a few schools around the country, maybe then the oppressive teachers, police, and government bureaucrats would realize that youth are people too.

Mao Zedong once said that the young aren't our inferiors. His followers in the Red Guards even did much work in liberating children from oppressive schools. For example, they called for students to criticize their teachers. So, I feel that for school kids, as the old Maoist motto goes...

IT IS RIGHT TO REBEL!

Ayn Rand Was a Big Admirer of Serial Killers

With the election of the deceiving bourgeois named Obama, right-wingers have invoked the works of Ayn Rand in order to advance their agenda. But there are some things you didn't know about Rand. For example, Ayn Rand found early inspiration in 1920's murderer William Hickman. Here is a good article on AlterNet about this right-wing "hero" (click here).

Anti-Hate Rally at VCU

Richmond, VA, USA - Hundreds (possibly over four-hundred) of Virginia Commonwealth University students and local activists gathered for an anti-hate rally in the VCU student commons plaza on Tuesday.

The rally was planned as a response to a protest tour of Richmond by the hate-mongering, homophobic, and anti-Semitic Westboro Baptist Church. The purpose of the rally was to promote tolerance and love of other people regardless of race, sex, religion or lack thereof, and sexual orientation.

The speakers and planners of the anti-hate rally included Rev. Jeanne Pupke of the First Unitarian Universalist Church, Jonathan Zur of the Virginia Center for Inclusive Communities, VCU professor Renee Hill, and Jonathan Bridge of the Jewish fraternity of Alpha Epsilon Pi.

Several gay rights activists, communists, atheists and spiritual liberals took part in the rally. Both the rainbow flag and the communist flag were flown by anti-hate demonstrators. Others held signs saying "love is our resistance," "God hates morons," and "God hates Fred Phelps." There was even a man in a walrus suit.

The Westboro Baptist Church's tour of Richmond included the Virginia Holocaust Museum, Hermitage High School, and local Jewish community centers. Hermitage High School recently suffered the tragic suicide of one of its students. Needless to say, that school is going through tough times right now, but the Westboro Baptist Church protested there anyway. This shows tremendous indecency and a lack of morals on the part of the hate-mongers.

On an unrelated note, if you are interested in activist things at VCU then check out this blog: lalsalamvcu.blogspot.com

US Quickly Finds Reason to Delay Troops Withdrawal from Iraq

Protests in Iraq have recently turned into new outbursts of violence due to the fact that the Iraqi government has refused to register hundreds of candidates as deputies of the head legislative body.

Both Sunnis who welcomed, and Sunnis who opposed, the US invasion of Iraq in 2003 have expressed their disgust and disappointment over the actions of the election committee.

This new wave of violence is now providing the US occupation forces with an excuse to delay the withdrawal of their soldiers from Iraq. Obama originally planned to pull troops out of Iraq by September, but General Odierno is now arguing against that.

Analysts believe that a continued American military presence will further enrage the Iraqi people.

“The American presence is a disaster. We rebelled against the US occupation in 2004 and 2008. There is no help from America except for missiles that kill the Iraqis. There is no help from the Iraqi government either. Nothing from Iran, nothing from the UN, nothing from anybody,” Abu Mustafa, one of the Shiites of Baghdad, who welcomed US invasion of Iraq in 2003 said.

“We hoped in 2003 that they would help develop Iraq for the Iraqis. The things that started happening were all made against the people of Iraq, and we rebelled against it. I can say the same about the Iraqi government, which was forced to serve America, not the people of Iraq,” Mustafa said.

Meanwhile, the Iraqi puppet regime is trying to win support from the masses by reinstating 20,000 military officers who served in the Iraqi army under Hussein.

From the sentiments of Abu Mustafa and the Iraqi people, it is clear that committing undemocratic actions with the election committee, reinstating the monsters who made up Saddam's army, and continuing the imperialist occupation of Iraq is certainly not going to bring peace and stability to the country. The rulers of Iraq and the US are far from stupid, they know the bad results that will happen from their actions. The thing is, they don't care. They are apathetic to the needs of the people. Only Maoist people's war, not petty-terrorism, can save the Iraqi people.