Left

How Immigrants Built The American Left—And Can Build It Again

February 25, 2017 Nelson Lichtenstein, www.dissentmagazine.org Create! Immigration, Left

By Nelson Lichtenstein for Dissent - Last Thursday’s “Day Without Immigrants” work stoppages, which closed hundreds of restaurants, grocery stores, garages, retail shops, and other businesses, offered a taste of the capacity for militant action wielded by immigrant America. Led in many cities by Latino activists calling for a “huelga general,” the February 16 coast-to-coast walkouts augur well for an even larger set of strikes and demonstrations, including a March 8 “Day Without a Woman” and quite possibly a May Day general strike, already endorsed by one of the Service Employees International Union’s biggest and most active California locals. This year’s May Day mobilization looks to replicate or even exceed the stupendous success of the original May 1, 2006 “Day without Immigrants,” which shut down agribusiness fields, poultry processing plants, warehouses, and the ports of Los Angeles, Long Beach, and Newark.

The Unions Betraying The Left

February 8, 2017 Erik Loomis, www.newrepublic.com Educate! Left, Unions

By Erik Loomis for New Republic - Days after the inauguration, the leaders of several building trade unions met with President Donald Trump at the White House, outraging those on the left who want organized labor to lead the resistance to the president’s anti-worker policies. The building trades cited Trump’s call for infrastructure investment and their warm personal relationship with him as reasons to be optimistic about his presidency. As reported in The New York Times, Sean McGarvey, president of North America’s Building Trade Unions, stated, “We have a common bond with the president. We come from the same industry. He understands the value of driving development, moving people to the middle class.”

As Democrats Press For War, Left Must Demand Peace And Social Transformation

January 13, 2017 Glen Ford, www.blackagendareport.com Strategize! Democrats, Left, Wars and Militarism

By Glen Ford for Black Agenda Report - As is ordained by law, at the end of the week much of President Obama’s legacy will become Donald Trump’s powers, including the power to detain Americans indefinitely (forever) without trial or charge, an authority the First Black President secured from Congress in 2011. Obama’s wars become Trump’s wars, which, if Trump follows Obama’s example -- and if he succumbs to the furious pressures of leading Democrats, old line Republicans and an openly aggressive and “politicized” national security establishment -- will be expanded and multiplied. The most imminent threats to human survival under a Trump presidency flow...

Time For Real Left To Double Down On Single Payer Medicare For All

November 22, 2016 Bruce A. Dixon, www.blackagendareport.com Strategize! Left, Medicare, Single payer health care

By Bruce A. Dixon for Black Agenda Report - Under President Obama, Democrats threw away their mandate to fight for health care for. Instead they let insurance companies concoct Obamacare, sketchy policies, skimpy coverage, high deductibles and co-pays for half the uninsured and empty promises for the other half. A Gallup Poll confirms that 58% of Americans want to see Obamacare replaced with a single payer system to guarantee health care, not health insurance for everybody.

The Secret History Of Leftist Board Games

October 22, 2016 Brian Van Slyke, www.truth-out.org Create! History, Left

By Brian Van Slyke for Truth Out - Think board games are "just games"? Think again. There's a little known but vibrant history of leftist board games that stand in opposition to the endless number of other games about war, conquest and profiteering. (Which, admittedly, I grew up playing and loving.) And though some might scoff at the idea, ultimately, we can't keep politics out of gaming, and in fact, we shouldn't try. Just like fiction and other works of art, games are a reflection of our beliefs, fears, values, hopes and dreams.

Social Democracy And Radical Left: Why We Continue To Build Left Unity

October 21, 2016 Kate Hudson, www.defenddemocracy.press Strategize! Democracy, Jeremy Corbyn, Left, Radicals

By Kate Hudson for Defend Democracy Press - Jeremy Corbyn’s re-election to the leadership of the Labour Party on an increased vote is a significant victory for the left in the Labour Party and for progressive politics in Britain. It is a victory that everyone on the left celebrates. It demonstrates the strength of support that exists for changing the politics of the Labour Party: for shifting the balance of power within our society, away from the political and economic elites towards the majority, to empower and enfranchise the working class and communities hardest hit by the long run attacks upon the welfare state.

The Left Never Recovered From Fall Of Soviet Union — Yet There Is Hope

October 10, 2016 Yanis Varoufakis, www.newstatesman.com Create! History, Left, Soviet Union

By Yanis Varoufakis for New Stateman - The left has been in disarray since 1991 – it never fully recovered from the collapse of the Soviet Union, despite widespread opposition to Stalinism and authoritarianism. In the past two decades, we have witnessed a major spasm of global capitalism that has triggered a long deflationary period across the United States and Europe. Just as the Great Depression did in the 1930s, this has created a breeding ground for xenophobia, racism and scapegoating.

Europe’s Left After Brexit

September 17, 2016 Yanis Varoufakis, www.yanisvaroufakis.eu Strategize! Brexit, Democracy, Europe, Left

By Yanis Varoufakis for Yanis Varoufakis - In the space of thirteen months two referenda shook up not only the European Union but also Europe’s Left: the Greek OXI in July 2015 and Brexit in June 2016. Exasperated by the EU’s mixture of authoritarianism and economic failure, a segment of Europe’s Left is now calling for a “break with the EU”,[2] a stance that has come to be associated with the term Lexit.[3] DiEM25, the transnational Democracy in Europe Movement, rejects the Lexit logic and offers an alternative Progressive Agenda for Europe.

The Radicalism Of Black Lives Matter

August 21, 2016 Martha Biondi, www.inthesetimes.com Organize! Activism, Black Lives Matter (BLM), Left, Racism

By Martha Biondi for In These Times. Three years have passed since the July 2013 acquittal of George Zimmerman in the killing of Trayvon Martin prompted Oakland, Calif., organizer Alicia Garza to write an anguished Facebook post ending with the words “Black lives matter”—words that would channel an outpouring of outrage on social media. A year later, the police killing of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Mo., ignited a local rebellion of Black citizenry, and a social movement took shape. That the Ferguson Police Department left Brown’s fatally wounded body on the street for hours encapsulates the disregard for Black suffering that continues to drive protest nationwide. Already, the Black Lives Matter (BLM) movement and the violence it exposes feel like a fixture of our media and social landscape, the images jarring and unrelenting

A New Left In Poland?

August 21, 2016 Lorenzo Marsili, www.euralter.com Strategize! Democracy, European Union (EU), Left, Poland, Political Parties

Interview with Marcelina Zawisza and Maciej Konieczny by Lorenzo Marsili in European Alternatives. “We are not the old Left. It is more than clear if you look at our faces, our age, the way we speak and our new way of making politics”. In ultra-conservative Poland, something is moving. We meet some of the founders of Razem (“Together”) a new political party emerging from social movements and strongly inspired by the experience of Podemos in Spain. We discuss their project and the Polish scenario: from the surprising social policies of the current authoritarian government to the liberal opposition defending freedom of information but forgetting about inequalities. And the meaning of launching a new party from the bottom-up today.

How Media Destroys Black Lives Matter: “Anchor Left, Pivot Right”

July 15, 2016 Staff, www.writetoright.blogspot.com Educate! #BlackLivesMatter, Black Lives Matter (BLM), Left

By Staff of Write to Right - As a college professor who teaches her students to decipher information, I have found it increasingly difficult to guide my students through current rhetoric, current texts, whether they be in the form of books, articles, films, documentaries, or performances. What I've come to understand is that, in the guise of complexity, insidious messages are couched within the framework of sensible logic and liberalism or even the idea of "revolution."

The Spanish Left’s Anti-Inequality Plan

June 28, 2016 Oscar Reyes, www.inequality.org Create! Left, Spain

By Oscar Reyes for Inequality - After weaker than expected results in Sunday’s election, Pablo Iglesias, leader of the Spanish Podemos Party, vowed to continue to push the young party’s ambitious anti-inequality and anti-austerity platform. Podemos and other smaller leftist parties in the coalition “Unidos Podemos” had been widely expected to come in second in the June 26 vote. Instead, in the aftermath of the UK’s destabilizing Brexit vote, the upstart party placed third after the two that have taken turns governing the country for four decades – the right-wing Popular Party (PP) and the center-left Socialist Workers Party (PSOE).

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