Click HERE
for official results.
[September 28, 2010 -- According to the United Socialist Party (PSUV) and opposition sources the PSUV and its allies, the Communist Party of Venezuela and Peoples' Electoral Movement (MEP) have won 98 seats, while the parties in the MUD opposition
alliance won 65 seats, the pro-oppositom PPT 2 seats and 2 seats went to Indigenous
independents. However, official results still give 95 to the PSUV and 62 to the opposition.]* * *
By Gonzalo Gomez, Caracas
Cuba: The drive for efficiency within socialism
Cuba's president, Raul Castro.
[For more analysis and discussion on the economic changes in Cuba, click HERE.]
By Helen Yaffe
Accordingly, the individual producer receives back from society – after deductions have been made – exactly what he gives to it -- Karl Marx, 1875
Wages today are clearly insufficient to satisfy all needs and have thus ceased to play a role in ensuring the socialist principle that each should contribute according to their capacity and receive according to their work…the Party and government have been studying these and other complex and difficult problems in depth, problems which must be addressed comprehensibly and through a differentiated approach in each concrete case. -- Raul Castro, 2007
[We have] the dream of everyone being able to live on their salary or on their adequate pension… -- Fidel Castro, 2005
Basque Country: Armed struggle ends, mass struggle continues
Basque trade unionists protest against the capitalist crisis.
By Jack Ferguson
September 8, 2010 -- Scottish Socialist Youth -- On September 5, 2010, the Basque armed group Euskadi Ta Azkatasuna (Basque Homeland and Freedom, ETA), which has fought an armed struggle for Basque freedom for decades, released a video declaring that several months ago it had decided to stop armed actions, and announced a ceasefire.
In its statement, ETA said:
Against the Current – On September 24, the FBI conducted raided the homes of antiwar and left activists
in Minneapolis, Chicago, Michigan and North Carolina.
Venezuela criticises `market totalitarianism' at UN Millennium Development Goal summit
By Tamara Pearson, Merida
Venezuela: Opposition and media lies about lack of democracy exposed
September 23, 2010 -- Venezuela Solidarity Campaign (UK) -- Venezuelans vote on Sunday, September 26, for the South American country's 165-seat National Assembly – its national parliament. This is the 16th national election or referenda since Hugo Chávez was first elected president in 1998.
Venezuela’s last election, on February 15, 2009, was a referendum to remove presidential term limits. This was endorsed by 54% of the electorate. Sunday’s election is the first to take place against the backdrop of the world recession, which has been hit Venezuela hard, as it has in many other countries.
`A force which is truly for good' -- John Coltrane and the jazz revolution
The John Coltrane Quartet (John Coltrane, McCoy Tyner, Jimmy Garrison, Elvin Jones) on the 1963 TV program, Jazz Casual, playing "Alabama", written by C
Sweden: Far-right election gains met with spontaneous mass protests
On September 20, 2010 -- the day after the Swedish general election -- 10,000 people in Stockholm protested against the far-right Swedish Democrats party.
By Johann Sommansson
September 23, 2010 -- The counting of votes in the September 19 Swedish parliamentary elections sent out shock waves. The far right made its parliamentary debut, and for the first time in modern Swedish political history an incumbent non-Social Democrats government has been able to win a national election. As such, the process of dismantling the Swedish welfare state is set to continue unabated.
Pakistan: ‘Cancel the debt to help flood victims’
March to demand debt cancellation, Lahore, September 19, 2010
September 18, 2010 -- Green Left Weekly -- Ammar Ali Jan is a 23-year-old activist in Pakistan who visited Australia earlier this year to speak at the Resistance national conference. He is an organiser of the Progressive Youth Front (PYF), which campaigns for democracy and against corruption. He spoke to Melanie Barnes from Resistance about what’s been happening in Pakistan, especially the devastating impact of the recent floods.
* * *
Thailand: What the September 19 mass Red Shirt rallies mean for Thai politics
Bangkok, September 19, 2010.