Today's Topics:
1. [Maquiné-RS] COISA PRETA*: (Black Thing) Resumed
Mbyá-Guarani - Report of the Meeting of Supporters By ANA (ca,
pt) [machine translation] (a-infos-en@ainfos.ca)
2. wsm.ie: Common Threads #1 - Domination, Capitalism, and
Economic Crises. (a-infos-en@ainfos.ca)
3. wsm.ie: UDL fail to even show when Belfast anti-fascists
take their protest site (a-infos-en@ainfos.ca)
4. black rose fed: RE: THOSE MISSILES (a-infos-en@ainfos.ca)
5. wsm.ie: 5 Reasons to March against the Water Charges
Tomorrow - Saturday April 8th (a-infos-en@ainfos.ca)
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Message: 1
After three days and nights meeting and talking among themselves, the Mbyá-Guarani of
Maquiné called for a meeting of the people and organizations that support the Guarani
Retreat. This meeting took place on Sunday, April 2 , in the new Mbyá-Guarani village of
Maquiné (still unnamed), in the area formerly used by FEPAGRO - State Foundation for
Agricultural Research, extinct by the governor's austerity policies Of the South]José Ivo
Sartori. ---- " No one is without nobody." - Cacique André dos Mbyá-Guarani de Maquiné.
---- The caciques André of Maquiné and Cirilo of Lomba do Pinheiro and representative of
the Guarani of all Rio Grande do Sul, showed great joy and hope for the construction of
this new village in a land so rich and fertile. Unlike the land usually demarcated by the
State - unproductive, taken by monocultures of soybean and eucalyptus, unsuitable for the
traditional way of life of the Guarani - the land resumed for the construction of the new
village is covered with native forest, fruit trees and springs of Crystal clear drinking
water. They made clear the intention to resist and fight for the land, regardless of what
the white man and his institutions decide.
After brief speeches by the two chiefs, a space was opened for supporters and supporters
to present themselves. Representatives and members of Nascimento Maquiné (ANAMA),
Association of Studies and Projects with Indigenous and Minority Peoples (AEPIM), Friends
of the Earth Brazil, Jornal Já, several professors and students of the anthropology and
geography courses of UFRGS, Of the Root Movement, faithful of a (unidentified) church, as
well as several anarchists and Maquiné dwellers who support the Guarani revival.
" We do not have to climb stairs to have power, to speak. In our culture any little child
has that power. "- Cacique Cirilo
There were some interventions that informed the progress of legal proceedings. On the
injunction that asks for the "reintegration of possession," which would remove the land
from the indigenous people and return them to the state: a judge of the lower court should
appear on Tuesday, April 04. Even if the judge orders the reintegration of possession, it
should not be immediate, since the Military Brigade can not interfere with the indigenous
peoples without the presence of FUNAI and the Federal Police. The supporters of the
Mbyá-Guarani who are following the legal issue have shown some optimism.
Another relevant information is that an anthropologist from FUNAI would attend the village
on Monday, April 3, to start collecting data on the resumption.
" Why not give us a good land to raise chicken, to plant sweet potatoes, so we do not
depend on the state? It is a form that the state creates to dominate us. "- Cacique Cirilo
After the conversations on the morning shift, a lunch was served. In the afternoon the
chiefs resumed the conversation, asking the members of the Root Movement to explain what
this movement is. Then followed a mini-party rally for about 20 minutes, explaining their
concepts and their aspirations. The speech was so seductive that the Cacique Cyril
himself, in the end, said that since the Guarani are receiving support from the Root he
did not see why they too could not support the movement. It was not clear if the Cacique
understood that he is dealing with a political party, which is in the process of
collecting signatures for its regularization to run for office in the government.
Then he talked about raising funds to hold two meetings of the Guarani people that they
consider very important to strengthen the recovery. Apparently, the Root had been
responsible for this campaign, publicizing bank accounts for supporters to make these
donations. It seems that they have not even come close to the amount needed - meanwhile no
values were mentioned, how much is needed, nor how much was collected. Party militants
then talked about running a bill to get money through the Lutheran Church. At that moment,
Cacique Andre demonstrated his frustration, explaining that he does not understand why
white does so much project and project and never does things in fact.
" The bureaucracies exist so that we can not do anything." - Cacique Cirilo
Apparently, what the Guarani need to hold the meetings are many taquaras to build the roof
of 20 houses, transport to these taquaras and for the guarani of other villages can meet
and feed to the meeting.
" The juruá (white man) loves to hold a meeting. It's meeting all the time. I can not
stand any more meeting. I'll be white enough to meet you in a little while. "- Cacique Cirilo
Conclusions
The Mbyá-Guarani demonstrate an autonomist view, compatible with anarchist values (as you
can see from the caciques citations throughout this text). They are receiving a lot of
support in the legal area and even with food donations. However, it seems that in some
respects the support for recovery is trapped in the bureaucracies of the institutions that
support them.
Although anarchists and other autonomous supporters have played an important role in
solidarity with the Guarani Retomada, with audiovisual production, transportation, and
organization of independent donation campaigns, we are left with the impression that they
are somewhat neglected by the institutions, of which We do not perceive any effort with
the sharing of information and creation of a wide network of communication and
articulation for the supporters of the Resumed. For example, it was mentioned that in case
of "reintegration of ownership" by the State, that all of them went to the village to show
their solidarity with the Guarani, but it was not talked about how the communication will
be made for the diffusion of this information so that a number Significant number of
supporters can actually attend the village. When we asked about the existence of some
channel of communication between the supporters, the institutions were reticent and evasive.
We also fear that with the presence of political parties, the Mbyá-Guarani can be used and
influenced to support these causes, which are sold to them with the sweetest words.
For these two reasons - the lack of an autonomous network of support and solidarity for
the Guarani Retomation, which makes many supporters not know how to help and join, and the
presence of political parties - we think a more articulate and organized anarchist
participation is important. We feel that a truly autonomous network is capable of
spreading the needs of the Village and engaging more people to join in solidarity and
defense to this recovery. We invite you to contact us by e-mail (coisapreta@bastardi.net)
to build this joint.
" No one orders the Guarani. He who knows how to live and where to live. We're free to go
wherever we want. The whites do not understand this. "- Cacique André
* Thing Black is an anarchist collective. But more than that, we are a group of friends
and friends with desires, longings and dreams in common that join forces so that these
ideas are not only in our imagination.
Source: https://coisapreta.noblogs.org/report-of-recipients-of-the-retomada-guarani-02042017/
------------------------------
Message: 2
The history of capitalism has been a history domination; of landowners' domination over
tenants, of bosses' domination over workers, of economically robust countries' domination
over developing economies. of bloody labour struggles, social struggles, and of many
crises, which have the most devastating effect on the working class, those furthest away
from the levers of power and influence. As the framework of capitalism has developed, its
systems have expanded in complexity, but paradoxically also in fragility. ---- As Marx
discussed, crises which litter capitalism's history were often the result of
contradictions in the internal logic of capitalism. The crash of 2008 and the ensuing
economic meltdown was such a crisis. ---- The crash of 2008 was a moment of immense
significance in the history of capitalism.[1]Over the course of a few months $40 trillion
worth of equity (around 18% of global GDP) had evaporated.
In the US alone $14 trillion of household wealth disappeared, along with 700,000 jobs a
month. GDP growth ground to a halt as the global economy plunged into the depths of the
great recession, unparalleled by anything since the crash of 1929.
As the stock markets in New York, London, Paris, Frankfurt, Moscow, Beijing and Tokyo all
recorded record losses, the giant banks, hedge funds and insurance corporations of the
financial industry gradually revealed their exposure and the likelihood of their imminent
collapse.
By way of response, US and EU government officials, comprising mainly of staunch
neoliberals (‘free-market' ideologues who proudly touted rhetoric of minimal government
interference in the market place) went on a tax-funded spending spree of mass
nationalisations and bank guarantees, unprecedented in recent history.
While these points provide a glimpse of the systemic collapse that was capitalism hitting
the self-destruct button in 2008, they fail to fully capture the scale, complexities, or
significance of the event, or of the aftermath in which we remain.
This article briefly outlines the immediate causes of the 2008 Financial Crisis - the
trigger of the Global Economic Crisis, which still very much plagues the global economy today.
Of more interest however, we look at how the conditions which precipitated the financial
and economic crises were the result of the engineering of imbalanced geopolitical economic
systems, designed and implemented by the United States and its international institutions,
for the purpose of geopolitical hegemony and effective domination of the capitalist world.
The Financial Crisis in Brief
Speculators may do no harm as bubbles on a steady stream of enterprise. But the position
is serious when enterprise becomes a bubble on a whirlpool of speculation. When capital
development becomes a by-product of the activities of a casino, the job is likely to be
ill-done.
- John Maynard Keynes, 1936.
Since the 1970s the political response to downturns in economic growth has been a simple
one. Money. By reducing interest rates, Central Banks can reduce the ‘cost' for businesses
(investors) of acquiring capital, in effect pouring money into the beleaguered market. The
increased liquidity causes an upsurge in confidence, hence demand, and the recessionary
feedback of falling demand = falling output/redundancies = falling demand can be happily
avoided.
Overuse of this policy however creates an abundance of money, flowing around the markets
looking for the most profitable investment, which often (usually) is in speculative
finance - an enterprise which produces nothing, except profit.
In the early 2000s in response to the economic shocks following 9/11 and the bursting of
the dotcom bubble (a speculative bubble which inflated the shares of internet based
companies), the US federal reserve held interest rates at a ground level 1%.
The result was an abundance of cash which predatory banks put to use in the fuelling of
major bubbles in the US mortgage and credit markets. In Ireland and peripheral Europe,
swathes of cheap money (a result of currency union) flowing from central Europe in search
of higher returns similarly fuelled bubbles in credit and real estate.
In the US what was developed was called the ‘subprime mortgage market'. Loans were given
to ‘subprime borrowers' - people on low incomes who had poor creditworthiness, often with
no collateral. False assurances and propaganda from the banks convinced people of the
wisdom of taking out mortgages to buy houses they couldn't afford at artificially inflated
prices.
One might fairly ask, what lender would possibly find it advantageous to give money to
somebody with poor credit, to buy an inflated asset which will probably have collapsed in
value by the time the borrower fails to repay?
This is where the magic of financial ingenuity, and financial deregulation allow predatory
capitalism to enter full flight in its departure from reason and self-preservation. In the
early 2000s, after rounds of financial deregulation under Clinton, bright minds in finance
were busy developing new economic models, and financial instruments which would allow them
to eliminate risk from the system of money lending; or so they believed.
They created financial instruments called ‘Collateralised Debt Obligations' - CDOs -
tradable debt assets made up of snippets of loans from a variety of borrowers, with
varying credit-worthiness. In a traditional loan, the value of the debt (asset) created is
directly commensurate to the borrower's ability to repay.
However given that CDOs were made up of many loans from many borrowers, the belief was
that if one person defaulted on their debt, this would not affect another person's ability
to repay. In effect the buyer of a CDO hedged their risk, and could expect close to full
repayment along with receiving the usurious interest rates chargeable only to the most
underprivileged and vulnerable people in society.
What took place was the mass creation of CDOs across the financial industry, supposedly
riskless assets which were extremely lucrative. Of course in reality the CDOs were
comprised substantially of subprime mortgages, and hence were extremely high risk.
Yet due to the fact that the regulatory agencies are in essence employees of the financial
industry, and that people actually believed that risk could be engineered away, CDOs were
given the highest possible credit rating, AAA - treated as indistinguishable in risk from
US Treasury Bills, or indeed cash. As a result, banks and hedge funds around the world
began stuffing their coffers with these lucrative CDOs, introducing massive risk and
vulnerability into the financial system.
When the residential property bubble inevitably burst, the financial crisis began to
unfold. Once a few people began defaulting on their mortgages, economic slowdown turned it
into an avalanche.
The value of a given CDO became indeterminable. Banks were forced to reveal that much (in
some cases all) of the reserves that underpinned the solvency of their business were in
the form of CDOs which were now in effect worthless. One by one they were forced to reveal
their exposure, organise their own buyouts and/or go to their respective governments to
receive bailouts.
Panic set in to the financial sector, and banks ceased lending to one another, for fear
that they would be lending to a moribund business. This credit crunch had the effect of
bringing the woes of the financial sphere into the real economy, which came to a grinding
halt.
Actual productive businesses, which relied on short-term credit, were left bereft of
liquidity and were forced to close. Falling demand inspired dread and fear of what was to
come, and investment dried up, thus beginning the shutdown of the productive economy - the
great recession.
The Broader Context
While the Financial Crisis of 2008 was devastating in its effect on wages and employment,
and exacerbated by the equally destructive government policies of austerity pursued across
Europe, it does not explain the current global economic stagnation, high debt and high
inequality which pervades. More fundamentally, the financial crisis was a consequence of
shifts in the geopolitical economic system of international trade and credit flows; the
rules of which were laid down by the United States. The current economic no-man's-land is
the result of a discontinuity in this system of surplus production and absorption (current
global capitalism) which has broken down.
Of Surpluses and Deficits
Areas of high economic activity are areas that produce excess economic value - marketable
goods or services (surplus). Economic activity tends to be geographically focused in
certain locations - Dublin in Ireland, New York or Silicon Valley in the US, the Rhine
Industrial Zone in Europe.
These areas produce more goods (or goods of higher market value) than their inhabitants
can consume, they are therefore producing surplus. By exporting this surplus to less
economically active regions, they attract the profit and capital necessary to keep their
industries burgeoning, generally keeping high employment and higher living standards.
While surplus areas, or economic centres, are more developed and affluent and are
therefore more politically powerful than their deficit counterparts - the source of their
wealth and power comes from the demand for the goods they produce coming from deficit
areas. This means the strength of the surplus generating economic centres is directly
contingent on the demand (economic health) of the peripheral deficit areas.
Thus we can view operating economies as circuits between regions of excess production
exporting to regions of excess demand. Under market economics, we must consider, each
transfer of economic goods from a surplus area to a deficit must be matched by a transfer
of money of equal value in the opposite direction.
As a result what develops is a pattern of trade wherein goods flow from the centres to the
peripheries and money flows from the peripheries to the centres. The effect of this
natural imbalance between more and less productive regions is a build-up of debt on the
part of the deficit region (a trade deficit). This grants the surplus area economic and
political leverage over the deficit area due to its effective indebtedness.
This economic relationship lies at the heart of geopolitics, hegemony, and imperialism -
however, crucially - is by its nature one sided and therefore unsustainable i.e. if a
deficit region remains indebted to a surplus region indefinitely (as is usually the case),
it cannot continue buying the productive wares being produced in the surplus region
without some form of redistribution.
This creates an interesting yet deadly dynamic, which in effect is the cause of the
undoing of the current economic system. As a surplus area you by definition are more
powerful than less prosperous deficit areas; their dependence on the economic goods you
produce grants you immediate political leverage.
However ultimately the source of your power is the deficit area's demand for your goods,
without which your economy fades. Therefore you are in a fixed state of unequal
interdependence, which if you abuse - by disallowing the redistribution of wealth from the
surplus region to the deficit, outside of a market transaction (allowing the trade deficit
to grow indefinitely), you choke off the demand of the deficit region, destroying the
system whole.
In the aftermath of World War II, the United States found itself in a position of major
geopolitical advantage. Having emerged from the war as the only creditor nation (excepting
Switzerland), its major industrial rivals of Germany, Japan, Britain, and the USSR were
all either occupied or devastated by fighting.
The Great Depression which had mired US industry in a state of low profit, low production
and high unemployment in the decade previous, had been defeated by massive state
investment. It was in this context that the ‘New Dealers' (US politicians and planners
associated with Keynesian economics and the presidency of Franklin D. Roosevelt) set about
planning and rebuilding the global economy, placing itself at the centre, in a position of
unchallengeable dominance.
In July of 1944, 730 international delegates from the capitalist industrialised world met
in the small town of Bretton Woods, New Hampshire. The order of the day was to develop a
global monetary order and the necessary institutions that would support it. Two of the
three institutions which were formed still occupy preeminent roles in the current economic
system - the International Monetary Fund, and the World Bank. The third was the Bretton
Woods fixed exchange currency system. Under this system countries agreed to peg their
currencies at a fixed exchange rate to the dollar, the dollar was pegged to gold -
convertible at $35 per ounce.
The reason this fixed exchange rate principle is important is because of the relationship
between surplus and deficit regions discussed earlier. If two countries develop a one way
transfer of economic goods (from surplus to deficit), the flow can be combatted by a
devaluation in the deficit region's currency.
From the perspective of consumers in the deficit region, the devaluation will cause the
price of imports from the surplus region to increase, making domestically produced wares
more attractive. Concomitantly consumers in the surplus area will perceive a price fall in
goods produced in the deficit region, stemming or perhaps reversing the flow of trade.
Under Bretton Woods, currency devaluation was expressly prohibited, setting in stone the
relationship of one way flows of wealth, wherein deficit countries would be dependent on
the benevolence on the US for economic survival.
The second and arguably more ingenious part of the US Bretton Woods plan was the decision
to invest heavily in the infrastructure of its defeated enemies, Germany and Japan. The
idea was to create friendly, subservient capitalist surplus areas, which would use the
export markets of Europe and China to develop themselves as junior hegemons (incidentally
containing the communist USSR).
As a result the US insisted on the formation of the European Coal and Steel Community (the
precursor to the EU) and the introduction of free trade within Europe. After Mao's Marxist
revolution in China, referred to as ‘the loss of China' in US policy planning circles, the
US began military ventures in Southeast Asia in part to protect Japanese export markets
from communist influence.
The plan was remarkably successful. The decades that followed are often referred to as
‘the golden era of American capitalism.' The US and global economies boomed as the system
of US generated surpluses, sold to Germany and Japan strengthened the US industrial
manufacturing base. Equally the exports of Germany and Japan found respective markets.
As the German and Japanese economies continued to grow however, and as their industrial
sophistication and output began to rival and trump that of the US, America's status as
primary surplus producer nation waned. American dominance over the global economic system
seemed to be drawing to a close.
Phase two of American Hegemony.
By the mid to late 1960s the US found itself overextended militarily in the Vietnam war
which was costing hundreds of billions of dollars (both through US state spending, and
resulting damage to American business output). Domestically, ethnic, gender and class
tensions were simmering as an entire generation of young Americans began to see their
country for the first time through clearer eyes - as a business governed imperialist.
The military adventurism had caused a steady decline in real wages, and an increase in
general prices - as well as hitting profit levels significantly. The political concession
to the significant protest and resistance movements that had developed was Lyndon
Johnson's ‘Great Society' program - a hefty social investment aimed at the rejuvenation of
real wages and a reduction in inequality.
The cost of funding these two expenses (Vietnam War and the ‘Great Society') would however
have to be placed on the balance books of a declining superpower. The trade flows of US
manufacturing to Europe and Asia which had fortified American industry in the decades
previous had weakened significantly, reducing its trade surplus to a deficit.
By 1971 the US's liabilities stood at $70 billion, while its gold reserves (under Bretton
Woods the dollar theoretically transferrable into gold - giving the currency its value)
were only $12 billion. In short the economic position of the US was weakening
significantly as the government printed money to fund its programs.
This caused serious tensions internationally; because of the Bretton Woods stipulation
that other currencies must remain at a fixed exchange rate to the dollar, US inflation was
by default exported to all Bretton Woods countries, who were forced to print more money in
order to maintain parity with the devaluing dollar. Even by the end of the 60s it was
becoming ever clearer that the Bretton Woods system of fixed exchange rates and
gold-dollar convertibility could not be sustained given the changing international
economic environment.
Like all power centres, the US looked for ways of maintaining its economic dominance in
the face of declining power. By exploiting its ‘exorbitant privilege' - the international
dependence on the US dollar of which it had sole custody, Nixon and his appointed
economist Paul Vockler devised and implemented what was to be the new international
economic order.
On August 15th 1971, Richard Nixon abandoned the Bretton Woods currency regime, devaluing
the dollar, sending the price of gold and other commodities skyrocketing. The effect of
this was to reconstitute American hegemony over the international economic organisation,
but this time instead of being a producer surplus nation as it had been after world war
two, it would establish dominance by being a net consumer, on which surplus producing
countries such as Germany, Japan and China would depend to keep demand for their output,
in effect holding the surplus producing countries hostage.
By abusing its position as global currency reserve, the US could and would maintain
massive trade and fiscal deficits without being punished with a flight from the dollar.
This monumental switch in the flow of capital meant that US consumer needs would now be
met by imports bought with debt.
Not surprisingly coincided with the planned degradation of the American labour movement,
disempowered by the sharp decline in American manufacturing, and the rise of finance and
financialisation as a major component of the economy.
With labour defeated, neoliberals in the halls of politics and behind the desks of
government and economics departments waged an ideological and class war on the working
class, as well as against developing countries who failed to comply with neoliberal
doctrine. The elite have been set free to dominate capitalist society, writing trade deals
such as TTIP, C51 and the TPP to enshrine their power - deregulating and wreaking havoc on
global finance, with effects on the environment barely an afterthought.
What happens in a system of floating exchange rates (like the one which replaced Bretton
Woods) when a country maintains consistent trade deficits? Consider this: one only holds
the Singapore dollar if one is interested in buying goods or services originating in
Singapore. Demand for the Singapore Dollar (its value) is therefore tied directly to
industry and economic activity within Singapore.
If large trade deficits develop between Singapore and other nations, investors fearing a
devaluation may exchange to a safer currency, causing a drop in demand, hence depreciation
in the value of the Singaporean Dollar. In a floating currency system therefore, market
shock absorbers therefore come into play to stem trade imbalances.
Crucially however, the special status of the US Dollar as global reserve currency (it is
the currency in which commodities such as oil are priced, and it is used for international
trades not involving the US) means that it's value is not just tied to economic activity
in the US but to the global economy and global commodity prices. As a convenient offset of
this trate, its means is that the US has the capacity to run both enormous trade and
fiscal deficits - massive trade deficits in perpetuity. This was exactly the plan when
Nixon chose to abandon the Bretton Woods system.
Stable instability?
What the US created, both in the reconstruction of global capitalism in the aftermath of
WWII, and through the dissolution of the Bretton Woods agreement, were patterns of
international trade which would flow on aggregate in one direction. In both instances this
move focused power and geopolitical leverage into the hands of Washington planners and US
corporations, as was their intention.
By default however it also created a system which was imbalanced, and therefore
unsustainable. What happened in 2008 was the US losing its ability to recycle the
surpluses of Europe and China through creating debt on Wall Street.
The amassed surplus wealth, which could not be redistributed to deficit regions outside of
the market was recycled in the form of lending - debt creation. The bubbles that grew on
the back of this money, helped by financial deregulation grew so large, and inhabited such
a large part of the economy, that when they burst the entire system nearly came tumbling down.
The high debt, lack of demand, and obscene levels of inequality which now plague the
system as a consequence of these events, also inhibit any potential recovery. It is
therefore apt to expect further economic crises in the near future, given the system
remains fundamentally unchanged. For now it is running on steroids - massive injections of
liquidity and more debt.
An Anarchist Perspective
While a thorough exploration of capitalism and imperialism is necessary in uncovering much
of what we see and despise in our current society, the degree to which the nuances and
problems of these systems relate to anarchist theorising is limited.
Because a libertarian socialist, or anarchist society would oppose structures of control
and coercion, such as unregulated finance, privately ran business and corporations or
state structures, the anarchist perspective (as opposed to a ‘left-capitalist' or social
democratic perspective) can only provide a fundamental critique of these systems on
philosophical grounds.
Still points which are central to anarchist political theory resonate boldly with many
aspects of the story just told. Considering the self-destruction of the financial sector:
finance is an industry dominated by a small number of privately controlled, hierarchical
institutions - corporations. The sole purpose of the corporation is to funnel wealth
either produced by its workers, or from society into the hands of its owners.
The creation of lucrative bad debt was the logical consequence of pursuit of profit. The
ability of banks, private institutions to create and allocate debt bestows on them
stupendous power in society, which is used often against the common good in pursuit of profit.
Internationally, the economic trade flow imbalance could easily have been managed (as was
suggested by John M Keynes during the Bretton Woods sumit) through Surplus Recycling
Mechanisms and through creating an international reserve currency, which he named the
Bancour. This would have democratised to a large degree the running of the economic world
order, as opposed to leaving it controlled by the superpower of the day.
Nation states however, existing as concentrations of power will by default seek to
dominate and control, leaving the common good or even sustainability as a mere
afterthought. In the story of the last century, the abuse of the macroeconomic system to
develop political leverage for individual countries, is the primary cause of its demise.
Much of this argument, is made more elegantly in the work of Yanis Varoufakis, Joesph
Haveli, and Nicholas Theocarakis. The curious reader should refer to "The Global Minotaur:
America Europe and the Future of the Global Economy", and for a more technical exposition
"Modern Political Economics". For an insightful analysis of the flaws in mainstream
economic thinking, and of the post Bretton Woods America, one should refer to James
Galbraith's "The Predator State."
[1]For the purpose of this essay, I will refer to the phenomenon of state backed
quasi-market structures and corporate monopoly over production which presently prevails,
as capitalism. This is far removed from the conception of ‘pure capitalism', which is more
impressive as an exercise in calculus than as a proposal for a feasible, sustainable or
just system.
http://www.wsm.ie/c/domination-capitalism-economic-crises
------------------------------
Message: 3
This video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qg8JlyRZe_s shows some scenes from the
successful Belfast Anti-Fascist demo that took place Saturday April 1st ---- About 200
anti-fascists gathered to show the supposedly 30 or so supporters of the Ulster Defence
League that while neither they nor their views are welcome here refugees certainly are.
---- In reality, the illustrious UDL 30 had no organised or visible attendance, with
merely a couple of their brave warriors skulking around the edges, clearly humiliated by
the overwhelming presence of anti-fascists. ---- Derry Antifascists who travelled to
Belfast for the protest later reported on their page ---- "Antifascists from across the
North gathered in Belfast city centre earlier today in what was a clear visible show of
strength to counter any attempt by members of the tiny fascist group Ulster Defence League
(UDL) from holding a public protest in order to threaten or spread their lies and hate on
the streets.
From to outset as antifascists assembled in Writers Square in central Belfast by the
international antifascist monument, a monument dedicated to the local brigadistas of the
international brigades. There was also a highly visible PSNI presence who informed those
gathered that the event itself was an illegal demonstration and warning several activists
about having their faces covered in a public place. At the assembly point as more people
gathered it was decided to break up in order for activists make there way to another
agreed point before making there way to Belfast City Hall. As this happened many people
along the way again were being harassed by the PSNI and notified about walking together in
numbers as well as for wearing items that covered or obscured their identity.
Members of different left, republican and trade union groups were represented from Workers
Solidarity Movement to the Industrial Workers of the World including several non-aligned
anarchists, socialists and antifascists from across the North.
One activist said "When you hear of random racist attacks happening on our streets on an
almost daily occurrence as well as attacks witnessed on just yesterday on the streets of
London, when a young Kurdish asylum seeker was almost beaten to death by a mob people have
to say, "this has to stop here and now!"
Another young activist interrupted adding: "We can't allow any group, whether they're the
UDL or whatever they want to call themselves to even attempt to moblise here.
"History shows us all too cleary how we should deal with Nazis or fascist scum wherever
they raise their fucking heads or when they come up for air, if it's here in Belfast,
Derry or Dublin we'll be there!"
As antifascists made their way through the busy city centre streets through crowds of
Saturday afternoon shoppers under tight PSNI observation another activist commented, "Many
of us come from or acknowledge that we have a strong tradition of militant antifascism in
Ireland and it's appropriate for us to start today's events by assembling at the Spanish
Civil War monument. It's even better that more and more younger activists acknowledge this
also and are answering the call to organise".
At Belfast city hall there was no sign of the planned UDL rally against immigrants and
refugees, instead around 200 antifascist activists chanted slogans in between the beats
intervals of Samba drumming as a hand full of bemused union flag protests looked on.
Several finger pointing incidents, flag waving and one muppet wearing an 'anti commie'
t-shirt was all that developed. At times there were a few jossels and angry out bursts as
the PSNI kept a clear barrier between those outside City Hall but one thing was certain,
the proposed UDL gathering was a none starter.
In a statement issued by Belfast Antifascists afterwards a spokesperson said "Antifascists
from all over Belfast and Derry in representation of citizens of this island in opposition
of the regressive and fascist ideology of the Ulster Defence League and their associated
counterparts in the 'flegster' element.
"Despite the apparent fear and abscence of the UDL who in fact called for a protest in the
firstplace, Antifascists sought to take action and demonstrate even the very fact that a
hateful islamophobic protest was even dared to be called.
"Fascists should never have the right to an agenda, make them afraid, keep them off our
streets and communities. If you have any information regarding antifascists activity in
your area , please do not hesitate to make contact with us please.
"Immigrants, people of colour and the working class, will always be and forever more be
the priority of our political actions. Humanity comes first before borders".
The sunshine faded and the skies opened with torrents of heavy rain and hailstones, the
union flag protesters blinked first and packed up amidst cheers, jeers and applauding
onlookers."
Photos: From Derry anti-fascist FB album
http://www.wsm.ie/c/udl-belfast-anti-fascists-take-protest-site
------------------------------
Message: 4
Last night the U.S. military launched nearly 5 dozen cruise missiles at Syria from U.S.
Navy ships in the eastern Mediterranean Sea. This was a U.S. response to chemical attacks
against civilians allegedly ordered by Bashar al-Assad. The Democrats and Republicans are
united in their support for U.S. imperialism. Hours before the attack Hillary Clinton
"came out of the woods" to say that the U.S. should conduct air strikes against targets in
Syria. Today stocks in Raytheon and Lockheed Martin, war profiteers who make hellfire
missiles, have been rising. The war profiteering companies U.S. officials euphemistically
call the "defense industry" are full of alchemists who know the right mixtures to turn
blood, horror, displacement, and human misery into profits. It is difficult to formulate
an adequate response, beyond our general stance against imperialism and militarism, when
there is so little information to go on beyond U.S. State Department statements and
corporate media reporting based on those statements. However the following are some short
initial thoughts from Black Rose - Central Illinois. This is not a definitive position
paper or anything so official, but simply an initial reaction.
Re: those missiles:
1. The source of the chemical attack is still contested.
2. There's something called the International Criminal Court for war crimes and crimes
against humanity (in which tribunals of US officials are overdue).
3. The United States continues to support extremist militias in Syria and Saudi Arabia's
decimation of Yemen.
4. Remember that the U.S. war on Iraq produced ISIS.
5. Trump's decision is an extension of a legacy of atrocious U.S. foreign policy in that
region that continued under Obama (for example, ‘surgical' drones) who received the Nobel
Peace prize. Over the course of both of Obama's terms as President, the U.S. dropped
thousands of bombs on the people of Syria. We must see last night as a problem of U.S.
imperialism and not merely a problem of any one specific president be it a Democrat or a
Republican.
6. Wars are invariably never meant to secure the lives of women and children. They
reinforce a global patriarchy and solidify borders.
7. Refugee populations are increasing and being refused elementary conditions of
existence, while missiles get launched in the name of people suffering.
8. Before you know it, CNN politics will be debating Trump's nomination for Nobel Prize.
9. The launching of these missiles also can't be seen disconnected from the interests of
resource extraction industries in their relentless pillaging of indigenous lands around
the planet.
Our commitment is not to Bashar al-Assad's murderous regime, Putin's murderous Regime,
Trump's murderous regime, or any state. The state is terror everywhere. Our commitment is
to the people who, like us, resist state violence and work to organize just, egalitarian,
free societies. We fight for the abolition of state borders and for the free movement of
people. It is the cruelest hypocrisy for U.S. President Trump and his ideological friends
in Europe to close borders and shut doors to Syrian refugees, cutting off all options of
escape, only to then launch missiles at them. Smash fortress Europe and smash fortress
USA. We work toward a world without states, without imperialism, without capitalism.
http://blackrosefed.org/re-those-missiles/
------------------------------
Message: 5
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sTo53DZJcfw ---- ONE - Because Fine Gael are kicking back
and won't scrap the charges and metering. We'll force them. ---- TWO - To remind everyone
that people power, direct action and mass protest, was decisive in this campaign and not
lobbying in the Dáil (and definitely not Fianna Fáil!) ---- THREE - Because since Fianna
Fáil and the Greens first put water charges into their programme for government in 2009,
the wealth of Ireland's richest 300 hoarders has more than doubled from under €50Bn to
€100Bn today. ---- FOUR - Because TD Alan Kelly (former Minister of Water Charges) just
said ‘people want to pay for water'. Yes, he actually said this in 2017. ---- FIVE - To
have a clear victory, to defeat the charges and the privatisation plan once and for all,
to lift our spirits and spur on us to keep fighting for Justice.
And there are a lot more reasons than that.
Gathering at Heuston & Connolly stations 2pm, marching to Dame Street. Anarchist Bloc
assembling at Connolly Station (2pm).
You've likely heard that the Oireachtas committee has gone even further, and removed
reference to ‘excessive water usage' and metering new houses, and that Minister for Water
Charges and Homelessness Simon Coveney is much incensed about this development, making it
clear that he won't comply.
This underlines what we've already said, that the government will have to be forced to
enact our will. When struggling for justice - or conquest and fame in their case - you
will always get as much as you can take. In this case, it will be incredibly embarrassing
for the architects and jackals of the Irish Water plan to lose after 3 long years. And not
just lose, but lose to a great swarm of nobodies (that's us) who aren't supposed to be
interfering. That pretty disastrously undermines the legitimacy of the state and its
managers and their (supposed) moral authority to rule.
What kind of precedent does it set, that governments have tried to pass laws taking money
from us, establishing an entire new company, and people just decided that we didn't agree
and stopped them? And not just that because this plan extends far beyond our shores,
wrapped up in the global neoliberal scheme to grab natural resources for private owners
and extract wealth from the working class to be distributed among the ruling class and
their banking system.
The fact that ‘ordinary' people have shut down this grand scheme with the full force of
money and media and law against us sets a very dangerous precedent for those who stand in
the way of universal freedom. It makes you think we can probably do anything if we set our
minds to it.
On Saturday 8th April we will be taking to the streets of Dublin once more in what may
well be the final massive march against the water charges. Although it looks like victory
on abolishing the charge is near it's important not to lose sight of the need for an
ongoing campaign demanding amnesty for all those facing prosecution for their role in the
struggle.
Saturday's march is organised by Right to Water, the trade union backed coalition that
involves some of the local water charges groups around the country and the left political
parties. The intention as with many previous demonstrations is for people to gather at
Connolly & Heuston trains stations for two massive marches that will converge to rally on
Dame St. The anarchist bloc will be meeting up at Connolly station at 14.00, join us there.
Right to Water have been somewhat inactive since the announcement last year that water
charges were suspended pending a report by a committee of politicians. With that report
now due to be agreed Tuesday it was important that a mass demonstration be staged to
underline that the charges were defeated by people power and not by lobbying and
negotiation in the Dail. 70% of the charges were not being paid, a mass boycott at that
scale would be next to impossible to defeat. All the more so in in the context of the 100s
of direct actions by neighborhoods all over the country in fighting the charges over the
last years demonstrating a widespread resistance not under the control of any one group.
One significant problem with the decentralised nature of the resistance and the attempts
by various parties and individuals to control it despite that has been a fair amount of
mutual suspicion and hostility. While this hasn't much impact on the big mobilisations,
people come regardless of who is organising them, it is having a major impact on activists
who face prosecution. It should be the case that any and all facing prosecution for water
charge resistance are supported by all activists regardless of the differences that exist.
That is the nature of real solidarity, solidarity is never built around only supporting
your own particular sub-group in a struggle while turning a blind eye to others. If there
are serious criminal consequences for any activists arising from our struggle that will
have a chilling effect on all future struggles, all the more so if it appears they were
not fully supported.
It's uncertain what the total number will be like on Saturday, it's unlikely that the
demonstration will be as large as those at the peak of the struggle. The ongoing national
strike by Bus Eireann workers will make it more difficult for individuals not in Dublin to
take part so this may have some impact. But it was always the case that the fight against
the water charge was one aspect of the fight against the neoliberal restructuring of the
Irish economy that escalated with the financial crisis. The fight of the Bus Eireann
strikers against race to the bottom wage and conditions cuts is also very much our fight.
http://www.wsm.ie/c/reasons-march-against-water-charges-april8th2017
------------------------------
Geen opmerkingen:
Een reactie posten