Democracy

Build Independent Committees Of Action For Political Struggle Against Macron

December 5, 2019 Anthony Torres, WSWS.org. Organize! Democracy, France, Worker Rights, Yellow Vests

France - Today’s strike against pension cuts in France will mark a major escalation of the class struggle. A year after the eruption of the “Yellow Vest” protests against social inequality, the government has only intensified the attacks on the working class. Now rail, transit, airline, hospital, energy and port workers, together with students and lawyers groups, will strike and march. The strike has the support of two-thirds of the public, polls show, including 74 percent of manual workers and 70 percent of public-sector workers. It is part of a vast international resurgence of the class struggle this year. In Chile, Bolivia, Hong Kong, Iraq, Lebanon, Sudan, Algeria and beyond, workers and youth are mobilizing in protests driven by opposition to obscene levels of social inequality.

What Is Happening In Spain?

December 3, 2019 By Vicente Navarro, Counterpunch.org Educate! Democracy, History, Ideology, Spain

The transition from dictatorship to democracy in Spain (1978) was carried out under conditions very favorable to the profoundly conservative forces that controlled the Spanish state and the majority of the media. The democratic forces (lead by the clandestine left wing parties) were institutionally weak. It is true that popular resistance against the dictatorship had been strong primarily among the working class, the base of these parties. Spain had the largest number of political strikes in Europe during the transition period (1975-1979)...

The End Of The Rule Of Law

November 29, 2019 Chris Hedges, Truthdig.com Educate! Democracy, Ideology

Bruce Fein, a former senior official in the Department of Justice and a constitutional scholar, has identified 12 impeachable offenses committed by Donald Trump. But, as he notes, many of these constitutional violations are not unique to the Trump administration. They have been normalized by Democratic and Republican administrations. These long-standing violations are, for this reason, ignored by Democratic Party leaders seeking to impeach the president.

The US Is Not ‘Losing’ Its Democracy, It’s Already Long Gone

November 24, 2019 Richard Enos, Collective Revolution. Educate! Democracy, Inequality, oligarchy

The notion that citizens of the United States don’t actually live in a democracy has been picking up steam for decades, with scars from economic, social and political decay inflicting themselves ever more deeply into our psyches as the years move on. You would think that, with the rise of science and technology, we would have been able to build a far more prosperous nation. Instead, we have seen a vast reduction in our standard of living, and are being forced to work longer and harder in increasingly menial and unfulfilling jobs across the board. We are ever more being subjected to the control-hungry vicissitudes of mega-corporations that are swallowing up American entrepreneurship and prosperous self-employment.

Direct Democracy And The Passion For Political Participation

November 22, 2019 Yavor Tarinski and Eve Olney, Roarmag.org Create! Books, Democracy, Ideology

Yavor Tarinski is an independent researcher and activist whose publications and talks center on the possibilities of direct democracy and commoning practices as an alternative to the current social imaginary. He is the author of Direct Democracy: Context, Society, Individuality (Durty Books Publishing House, 2019). He is a member of the editorial team of the Greek political journal Aftoleksi, bibliographer at Agora International and member of the administrative board of TRISE. In the past he has co-founded “Adelante” — the first social center in Bulgaria as well as the first Bulgarian Social Forum.

The Enemy Within

November 5, 2019 By Chris Hedges, Truthdig.com Educate! Democracy, Electoral Politics, Ideology

Our democracy is not in peril—we do not live in a democracy. The image of our democracy is in peril. The deep state—the generals, bankers, corporatists, lobbyists, intelligence chiefs, government bureaucrats and technocrats—is intent on salvaging the brand. It is hard to trumpet yourself as the world’s guardian of freedom and liberty with Donald Trump blathering on incoherently about himself, inciting racist violence, insulting our traditional allies along with the courts, the press and Congress, tweeting misspelled inanities and impulsively denouncing or sabotaging bipartisan domestic and foreign policy.

Campaign For Community Control Of Police Goes National

November 4, 2019 Margaret Flowers and Kevin Zeese, Clearing the FOG. Podcast Community Control, Democracy, Police abuse, Racism

From November 22 to 24, the National Alliance Against Racist and Political Repression, founded in 1973, will be relaunching itself in Chicago, IL. A major part of the conference will be focused on work to create community control of the police to end racist, violent and murderous police actions. We speak with Frank Chapman, who has been with the alliance from the start and who is involved in the work in Chicago to create a Civilian Police Accountability Council (CPAC). They have legislation in the city government. Chapman speaks about how they have made so much progress to this goal in Chicago, what potential it will unleash for transformative change and how it ties into the long struggle for black liberation and against fascism.

Rethinking U.S. Election Law

November 4, 2019 By Erica Frazier, Portside.org Create! Democracy, Electoral Politics

The United States has come to a political crossroads. Few Americans have favourable opinions of Congress. There is not a single third-party member of Congress, though there is widespread support for an alternative political group. Rampant gerrymandering means politicians choose their voters, and the Supreme Court has once again declined to intervene. Steven Mulroy’s book, Rethinking US Election Law: Unskewing the System, is an excellent response to what feels to many like a total impasse, exposing a number of structural problems as well as tangible, realistic proposals to address them.

First International Congress Of Communes, Social Movements And Popular Power

October 27, 2019 Orinoco Tribune. Create! Community Rights, Democracy, New Economy, Venezuela

Venezuela - “The communal councils serve more than 6 million 407 thousand 651 families representing more than 80% of the families of Venezuela that participate in urban, rural or indigenous communal council.” This was stated by the head of state and government, Nicolás Maduro, during the closing ceremony of the First International Congress of Communes, Social Movements and Popular Power. The Venezuelan President said that to date 3,173 Communes have been formed, organized and registered in Venezuela, “Commander Hugo Chavez left in 2012, in the Plan of the Homeland 2013-2019, to reach 3,000 Communes, but the goal is that in a moment all of Venezuela — for the development of the evolution of the last years, has 6 thousand, 8 thousand, 10 thousand Communes and the great majority live in Communes”.

Democracy Shouldn’t Be About Celebrating Military Overlords

October 25, 2019 William J. Astore, Truthout.org Educate! Democracy, Inter-Imperialist Rivalry, Militarization

When Americans think of militarism, they may imagine jackbooted soldiers goose-stepping through the streets as flag-waving crowds exult; or, like our president, they may think of enormous parades featuring troops and missiles and tanks, with warplanes soaring overhead. Or nationalist dictators wearing military uniforms encrusted with medals, ribbons, and badges like so many barnacles on a sinking ship of state. (Was Donald Trump only joking recently when he said he’d like to award himself a Medal of Honor?) And what they may also think is: that’s not us.

Supreme Court Of New York Stops Pacifica’s Attack On WBAI

October 8, 2019 Pacifica Radio in Exile, Popular Resistance. Resist! Democracy, Media, Pacifica Radio, Radio

Berkeley-In the morning, a crew of Pacifica Foundation board members led by brand new IED John Vernile, locked out the staff at WBAI-FM in New York and then fired them all, told the landlord to rent the space to someone else, and started piping in content from the West Coast over mid-Manhattan. In the night, the Supreme Court of New York told them to stop it and restored WBAI's facilities, equipment, studio space, employees and control over the airwaves. If this feels to you like a flashback, well there's a reason for that. Two decades ago, the Pacifica Foundation locked out employees at Berkeley's KPFA and started piping in content from Texas. At that time, the nonprofit's board was united in their desire to teach KPFA a lesson and extract the millions in license value. Not this time.

Hundreds Of Groups Oppose Corporate-Governance Agreement Between UN & World Economic Forum

September 29, 2019 Transnational Institute. Resist! Corporatization, Democracy, United Nations, World Economic Forum

The UN Secretary General and the World Economic Forum signed on June 13 a Strategic Partnership Agreement for the implementation of the 2030 agenda (SDG). More than 240 organisations signed the following letter demanding the end of the agreement and denouncing it for formalising the corporate capture of the UN and moving towards an increasingly privatized and less democratic global governance. We the undersigned call on you to terminate the recently signed United Nations-World Economic Forum strategic partnership agreement. We are very concerned that this WEF-UN partnership agreement will de-legitimize the United Nations and provide transnational corporations preferential and deferential access to the UN System. The UN system is already under a big threat from the US Government and those who question a democratic multilateral world.

Three Takeaways From The Historic D.C. Statehood Hearing

September 22, 2019 Amanda Michelle Gomez, Washington City Paper. Create! Congress, DC Statehood, Democracy, Washington DC

The House of Representatives held the first hearing on D.C. statehood since 1993. The point of the hearing was to jump-start the process to vote on (and likely pass) H.R. 51, which would make the District the 51st state. Dozens of statehood advocates were inside the hearing, including Barbara Mitchell who arrived at Capitol Hill around 7 a.m. and was one of the first in line. Fittingly, Delegate Eleanor Holmes Norton oversaw the statehood hearing because House Oversight Committee Chairman, Rep. Elijah Cummings (D-Md.), wasn’t able to make it. “Statehood would give D.C. residents equal democratic rights,” said Holmes Norton at the start of the hearing, adding that H.R.51 has 220 co-sponsors but none are Republicans.

The Climate Crisis Means The Wrong People Are Running The World

September 20, 2019 By Tamara Pearson, Commondreams.org Educate! Class Struggle, Climate Change, Democracy

A sophisticated greenwashing industry has been evolving over the last few decades to not just mask the environmental destruction of corporations while passing the blame on to consumers, but to also present the climate crisis as a neutral and natural disaster that is disconnected from a system of inequality. In fact, climate change is a crime being perpetrated against us. Intimately intertwined with resource plundering by Western transnationals against poor countries, and with economic injustice – the climate crisis demonstrates that those who are running the world should not be.

Opposition Sets Democracy On Fire In Bolivia

September 16, 2019 By Hugo Moldiz Mercado, Resumen English. Educate! Bolivia, Democracy, Elections, Violence

The fragmented and heterogeneous right-wing opposition bloc in Bolivia has found in its increasingly sharp and violent attack on democracy and the institutions of the Plurinational State its point of convergence for its open opposition to the continuity of the Process of Change and President Evo Morales. Two major events, apparently disconnected, have confirmed the scope of its general strategy: first the fires affecting the Chiquitania dry forest and the other the physical violence unleashed by youth detachments, quasi-paramilitary, against MAS militants in the eastern city of Santa Cruz and the burning of an official campaign headquarters in the subtropical southern part of the Yungas of La Paz. The calls for the government to decree a national disaster based on the events of Chiquitanía and the call for an indefinite strike starting October 10 so that the members of the Supreme Electoral Tribunal (TSE) resign are just the pretexts or apparent motives to set fire to Bolivian democracy.

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