United States
Read/download 'The Occupied Wall Street Journal'
[Issue #2 NOW available. For more on Occupy Wall Street, click HERE.]
October 4, 2011 -- Occupy Wall Street Media -- Occupy Wall Street (#OccupyWallStreet) is the beginning of a whole new kind of democracy: a bottom-up people's democracy led by the 99%. It is a bold vision for the future that is beginning to inspire the nation. However, to pull it off, we're going to need a robust people's media unbeholden to corporate money. If we want people's democracy then we've got to build a people's media -- the two are inseparable.
Eyewitness reports: The 99% occupy Wall Street; The Battle of Brooklyn Bridge; Unionists join in
Photo courtesy of Flickr.com/AdrianKinloch.
[For more on Occupy Wall Street, click HERE.]
By Pham Binh, New York City
October 5, 2011 – First appeared at the Indypendent, posted at Links International Journal of Socialist Renewal/Green Left Weekly with the author's permission -- The entrapment and arrest of 700 peaceful Occupy Wall Street (OWS) activists on the Brooklyn Bridge has created a huge wave of support for their movement. The number of daytime occupants in Liberty Plaza doubled or tripled from 100 the week prior to 200-300 this past Monday and Tuesday (October 3 and 4).
These people are the core who maintain the occupation of the plaza, making it possible for several hundreds and sometimes thousands to hold rallies in the late afternoon and participate in the open-mic speakouts and general assembly meetings in the evening.
Martin Hart-Landsberg: Troubling economic trends for US workers
By Martin Hart-Landsberg
Lucy Parsons: 'More dangerous than a thousand rioters'
Lucy Parsons, 1930: "I have seen many movements come and go. I belonged to all of those movements. I was a delegate that organized the Industrial Workers of the World. I carried a card in the old Socialist Party. And now I am today connected with the Communists."
By Keith Rosenthal
Evolution not 'reinvention': Manning Marable's Malcolm X
Malcolm’s political evolution was influenced by his own experiences and his discussions with Fidel Castro an
Martin Hart-Landsberg: The troubled US economy means a shaky world economy
By Martin Hart-Landsberg
August 15, 2011 -- Reports from the Economic Front, posted at Links International Journal of Socialist Renewal with Martin Hart-Landsberg's permission -- The US economy is in trouble and that means trouble for the world economy. According to the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development’s Trade and Development Report, 2010, “Buoyant consumer demand in the United States was the main driver of global economic growth for many years in the run-up to the current global economic crisis.”
Before the crisis, US household consumption accounted for approximately 16 per cent of total global output, with imports comprising a significant share and playing a critical role in supporting growth in other countries. In fact, “as a result of global production sharing, United States consumer spending increas[ed] global economic activities in many indirect ways as well (e.g. business investments in countries such as Germany and Japan to produce machinery for export to China and its use there for the manufacture of exports to the United States)”.
United States: The deficit deal -- We got taken
By Martin Hart-Landsberg
August 2, 2011 -- Reports from the Economic Front, posted at Links International Journal of Socialist Renewal with Martin Hart-Landsberg's permission -- The US Congress has finally agreed on a deficit reduction plan that President Barack Obama supports.As a result, the debt ceiling is being lifted, which means that the Treasury can once again borrow to meet its financial obligations.
Avoiding a debt default is a good thing.However, the agreement is bad and even more importantly the debate itself has reinforced understandings of the US economy that are destructive of majority interests.
United States: Debt crisis -- the issue is the war machine, not welfare
Source: “Graphic: Who pays the taxes?" What Went Wrong: The Betrayal of the American Dream. February 7, 2011.
By Paul Kellogg
July 27, 2011 -- PolEconAnalysis, posted at Links International Journal of Socialist Renewal with the author's permission -- As July came to an end, the United States central government had come up
against its congressionally mandated debt ceiling. Without an agreement
to raise that debt ceiling – last set at US$14.3 trillion – the US
central government will be unable to borrow money to pay its bills. The
consequences could be extremely serious – soaring interest rates, a
collapse of the US dollar, not to speak of social security stipends,
pensions and salaries going unpaid.
Lenin and revolutionary organisation today: An exchange
Introduction
Anyone familiar with the socialist movement in the industrialized countries today must be struck by the huge gap between what’s needed — mass socialist parties with deep roots in the working class — and the reality — small groups of socialists with little influence. The following exchange contains a searching discussion of these issues between the noted Marxist scholar Paul Le Blanc and John Riddell.
The exchange opens with an article by Le Blanc and continues with an exchange between Riddell and Le Blanc. The discussion was first published in Socialist Voice in June 2008 and later appeared on John Riddell's website (with more comments).
About the authors
Paul Le Blanc, a former member of the U.S. Socialist Workers Party, has been a long-time anti-war, anti-racist, activist in Pittsburgh. He teaches History at La Roche College. He is author of Marx, Lenin, and the Revolutionary Experience (Routledge 2006).