Venezuela: counter-revolutionary provocations ignite revolutionary ferment

10 Thursday Dec 2015

Posted by raomk in Current Affairs, INTERNATIONAL NEWS, Left politics

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Bolivarian, Chavez, counter-revolution, Venezuela

Written by Jorge MartínThursday, 10 December 2015

With 53% of the votes the Venezuelan opposition has managed to secure 112 seats in the National Assembly. This gives them a sweeping two third majority and wide ranging powers. Drunk with victory and seething with revenge, they have started to announce plans to reverse every single one of the gains of the Bolivarian revolution. This has provoked ferment amongst the revolutionary rank and file, which at the same time is directing part of their anger at bureaucrats and reformists within its own ranks.

The final results of the December 6 National Assembly elections in Venezuela have now been announced. The opposition MUD received 7.7 million votes (53%) for the Bolivarian parties 5.6 million (40%). Due to the way the Venezuelan electoral system works this has guaranteed the opposition a two thirds majority in the new parliament where they have 109 deputies as well as 3 indigenous representation deputies which also went to the opposition.

On the night of the election the representatives of the reactionary opposition started to announce the measures they would implement. These included the rollback of all the key laws passed by the Bolivarian movement in power. The different bosses organisations (Fedecamaras, Consecomercio, Fedenaga), feeling that they were now back in the saddle, demanded the repeal or “reform” of the Law on Fair Prices, the Labour Law (in order “to make it more business friendly”) and the Health and Safety at Work law. The landowners demanded the repeal of the Land Law (passed by Chavez in 2001) and the devolution of all expropriated latifundia. An opposition deputy for Carabobo announced they would privatise all expropriated factories. The opposition mayor of Baruta stated that they would privatise the Caracas water supply company Hidrocapital, as well as the electricity company Corpoelec.

Ramos Allup, the leader of one of the traditional parties of the oligarchy (AD), set the tone by attacking the National Assembly TV, threatening its very existence, and announcing a constitutional coup against the president. “This government will not finish its term” were his words. He also announced a freeze on the level of pensions and a freeze on the number of pensioners. Furthermore, the opposition has already announced a purge of all the state institutions, including the National Electoral Council, the Supreme Court of Justice, etc. The ruling class feels confident and are going onto the offensive to recover all the levers of state power they had lost control of over the last 10 or 15 years.

To add insult to injury, the executive secretary of the opposition MUD, Chuo Torrealba, threatened to remove Chavez’s remains from the Cuartel de la Montaña in the 23 de Enero parish.

All of this has provoked great uneasiness amongst the Bolivarian masses who at the same time are discussing the reasons for the defeat. It is clear that even a layer of people who voted for the opposition are now opening their eyes to what the rule of the right wing will really entail.

Even within the opposition itself there are serious splits about the way forward, particularly between the “moderate” wing, represented by Capriles, and the “insurrectionary” wing, represented at the moment by people like Ramos Allup and Chuo Torrealba. Behind Allup and Torrealba stand Maria Corina Machado and Leopoldo Lopez. In a typical fashion they are already at each others’ throats fighting for the loot.

After the initial shock of the defeat, Bolivarian activists in the neighbourhoods and in the workplaces have started to react. Comrades report that there are meetings being organised everywhere, in a semi-spontaneous fashion, to discuss the reasons for the defeat but also to organise the resistance against the counter-revolutionary assault.

A comrade who works for Movilnet, the cellular telephony operator owned by state-owned CANTV (renationalised by Chavez in 2007), reports that there is great ferment amongst the workers. They fear (for good reason) political reprisals and even privatisation. They are getting organised and have established a skeleton of workers’ committees in each department of the company. “There is a very militant mood. The people are mobilising and getting organised at a very high level. There are meetings taking place in the streets and in the workplaces. In Movilnet yesterday we set up 14 cells which will became the organised structure of the workers”. Similar meetings are taking place in government institutions, ministries and state-owned companies.

Workers at the National Assembly TV started to mobilise against the threats of the opposition and received solidarity from workers at other state-owned media outlets (Vive, AlbaCiudad, VTV, etc) who also fear a political vendetta. President Maduro took the step of handing over the broadcasting licence to the workers themselves, so that the National Assembly TV will now be under workers’ management and out of bounds for the new National Assembly majority. In the same vein, president Maduro has announced the transfer of ownership of the Cuartel de la Montaña to a Foundation, “so that it belongs to the people and can’t be touched”. These measures have been welcomed by activists, though some are saying that had similar measures been taken before, then they wouldn’t have been defeated!

Workers at nationalised paper factory Invepal, the first company to be expropriated by Chavez back in 2004, have already rejected any threats of privatisation and announced they will defend themselves.

On Wednesday the 9th of December, the social movements in Caracas called for an open meeting outside the National Assembly that they described as a Parliament in the Streets. Hundreds of activists representing many organisations attended the meeting and took turns to speak to analyse the reasons for the defeat and what to do next. (Picture gallery)

Comrades from Lucha de Clases, the Venezuelan section of the IMT, report the general thread running through all these interventions were: “1) the masses are not to blame for the defeat, 2) corruption and lack of efficiency of the government and institutions is to blame, 3) they are asking that Maduro should sit down to discuss with the rank and file, not with the right wing nor the capitalists, 4) there’s talk of expropriation and nationalisation and 5) heads of ministers and vice-ministers should roll”

Another comrade made some very interesting observations about the mood of those present at the Caracas assembly: “It is worth noting that this mobilisation was not organised by the bureaucracy, no free food or drinks were handed out, no one was expecting to be given a Canaima tablet, this is the real chavismo, the rank and file one, sick and tired of reformism, bureaucracy and corruption. We demanded the deepening of the revolution. As more and more people kept coming, we recognised our strength and the mood become one of joy. Carmona’s and the IMF’s dogs should be aware that the people will be in the streets defending its rights and conquests. The mood is increasingly revolutionary, the youth is fighting for a space within the party.” (Picture gallery)

The assembly then marched all the way to the presidential Miraflores Palace. When they arrived, soldiers guarding the Palacio Blanco (opposite Miraflores) came out of the fences and greeted them. They also listened attentively to the speeches. Some of the soldiers went to the roof of the palace and greeted the assembly by waving a huge Venezuelan flag. This was a very significant gesture as everyone present was aware that it repeated what had happened after the defeat of the coup in April 2002. It was a powerful symbol of the unity between the revolutionary people and the ranks of the Bolivarian army. (Picture gallery)

It is worth noting that the anger of the masses was not only directed at ministers and vice-ministers. There was also criticism of the recall PSUV congress which has been called for December the 10th and 11th. Speakers pointed out that, in fact, the delegates, which are those of the previous congress, should all resign as they too are responsible for the defeat. Let us remember that a large part of that congress was made up of local mayors, regional governors, etc. Those at the assembly questioned the fact that the congress was going to take place at the Alba Hotel. “Why are they not meeting in the streets, with us, with the PSUV rank and file members” said one of the participants in the assembly.

Not only are these people are out of touch with the mood of the masses but, as a matter of fact, their program is completely utopian. The reactionary MUD wants no compromise. What they want, as they have made clear, is to roll back all the conquests of the revolution. As a matter of fact, it is precisely this policy of appeals to the “good will” of the ruling class which led to the electoral defeat.

If, as it seems, the counter-revolution goes on an all out offensive against the conquests of the Bolivarian movement, then there will be a counter-reaction.

The main tasks of the revolutionary movement should now be:

1) To make a sharp balance sheet of the reasons for the defeat. The masses of the people are not to blame. Bureaucracy, corruption and reformism are responsible.

2) The revolutionary movement should re-arm itself with a clear revolutionary program of expropriating the oligarchy and planning of the economy under the democratic control of working people in order to solve the pressing economic difficulties facing the masses.

3) All conquests of the revolution should be defended at all levels.

The Venezuelan revolutionary masses have not yet said the last word.

Courtesy :marxist.com

THE BLACK BOOK OF CAPITALISM

06 Sunday Dec 2015

Posted by raomk in History, INTERNATIONAL NEWS, Left politics

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Anti communist, CAPITALISM, Goebbels, Propaganda

Anti communists are always branding communists as genocides and misleading the peoples with false propaganda. They believe in Goebbels, the facts are not true, But who is really genocides, look into …..

THE BLACK BOOK OF CAPITALISM

By Daniel Gilbert

Most Americans today think that communism has been one of the most genocidal ideologies in human history. Many are misinformed by anti-communist propaganda stating that we have killed over 100 million people when in fact this is not true remotely. I will save that for another time today we are here to discuss the deaths caused by capitalism.

In India when the English colonized India in the 19 century they tried to make it as profitable as possible this included making the Indian farmers switch from food production to cotton production this lead to a massive famine that killed 30 million people in India.

While in America we were undergoing one of the best examples of ethnic cleansing to date. The forced removal of the Native Americans from their homelands resulted in over 14 million people dying and the rest forced to live on reservations. All this done because a need for raw resources, required more land. All those keeping track at home this brings the count to 44 million dead and we haven’t even got into the 20th century.

An examination of imperial Russia shows that because of a lack of modernization and greedy hoarding done by capitalist and nobles lead to routine famine called the “hungry years” leading to countless deaths and starvation. This continued until the 1920-1930 through which the collectivization of agriculture by Soviet Union lead to less deaths and ended widespread starvation. When China was under the Qing dynasty, British merchants illegally sold opium. A 3 year long war resulted which ended in China’s defeat. This left hundreds of thousands dead the results of the war lead to Te Tai Ping rebellion. A famine later happened due to the countless fighting, corruption and bad weather again this death toll is incalculable.

The exploitation of the African people who due to the domination of foreign governments where second-class citizens in their own country. When African nations finally became independent from imperialist rule the Europeans left Africa in a “cookie cutter” state. Meaning that nations where drawn out on a map without consideration of the local ethnicity. Which lead to many civil wars including the famous one in Rwanda where 800,000 lost their lives due to imperialist favoritism. The international world did nothing to stop this atrocity.

In Yugoslavia with lack of care from the international world the government collapsed due to pressure put on them by the World Bank and the IMF lead to war within the country. Now this article leaves out many things that also happened under capitalist rule that is because it is nearly impossible to figure out the total death toll if you may know any more events please feel free to comment.

From Peoples World

A Chavista victory in Venezuela will be “fraud” to the opposition

06 Sunday Dec 2015

Posted by raomk in Current Affairs, INTERNATIONAL NEWS, Left politics

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democracy, elections, Latin America, Venezuela

by: ERIC A. GORDON

CARACAS, Venezuela – By the time you read this – presumably on Monday, Dec. 7 – the results of Venezuela’s nationwide elections for its National Assembly will likely be known to the world.

But as I write, two days before this decisive vote, let me share some thoughts about the process – and about the prognosis.

I have made this trip to Caracas – and later in the week to other sites in Venezuela – with a group of North American activists and writers concerned about learning the truth of what is happening in this country. These elections, two years after Nicolas Maduro very narrowly won the presidency as successor to the late Hugo Chavez, will determine if the Bolivarian process that Chavez initiated in 1998 will be given the chance to advance. If the right-wing opposition – widely reported to be favored and financed by the U.S. and other capitalist powers – wins on Sunday, Dec. 6, progress could be stopped in its tracks with dire consequences for the vast majority of the Venezuelan people.

In the weeks before leaving the U.S. to come here, everything I read in the U.S. corporate media pointed to a loss for the Chavista movement. Venezuelans, these reports assured, had become tired of the shortages of basic goods and staples in the stores, frustrated with everyday violence, outraged by sky-high inflation that makes nonsense of any efforts at price stabilization, and confused by the privately-owned media that pours out a constant blast of criticism of the government’s supposed incompetence.

Frankly, I arrived expecting in a few days to witness “the beginning of the end,” that moment on Dec. 6 when a majority of Venezuelans would decide to put a halt to the whole Bolivarian experiment, make a lame duck of President Maduro, and perhaps prepare the ground for his impeachment, and throw their fates to the waiting opposition.

Now, after a few days here, I am not at all convinced this will happen. If indeed the Chavistas win, which many people we have met so far are sure will be the case, count on the opposition to immediately start yelling “Fraud!” to whoever will listen. The mass media and politicians in the imperialist countries will readily come to the opposition’s defense, for they already “know” all about the origins of the crisis in Chavez’ utopian scheme to tilt his country away from dependency on the U.S., and to lead the rest of Latin America toward a self-sufficiency that is free – what a crazy concept! – from U.S.-dominated Western Hemispheric trade alliances and investment loans.

The justification for “humanitarian” intervention – to save Venezuela from its “corrupt elections” and bring the country back into the capitalist fold – has already been carefully established. After all, did not our own President Barack Obama, just a few months ago, declare Venezuela to be an immediate and extraordinary threat to the vital security of the United States and place certain Venezuelan officials on persona non grata status? Although other Latin American nations forced him to retract this statement, the anti-Chavista fever can easily be stoked up again.

The problem is that Venezuela’s electoral process has been analyzed and studied by numerous world bodies and private NGOs, such as the Carter Center, and found to be among the fairest, most democratic, and most fastidiously enforced on the planet. Hugo Chavez was no dictator: He was voted in by enthusiastic majorities time after time. That is what’s so galling to the banksters and loan sharks who have dictated U.S. policy in the hemisphere for so many decades and who now fear the jig may be up.

Our little group of nine met for three hours, on our first full day in the country, with officials of the CNE – Consejo Nacional Electoral, or National Elections Commission – in their busy offices just days before the momentous vote. CNE staff, including the rectora principal, the director Tania D’amelio Cardiet, patiently answered every question we posed. They appeared eager to have their work reliably reported in our media.

In the first place, the CNE directors are appointed to overlapping seven-year terms by the National Assembly. It is autonomous from the government, and only accountable to the specific, detailed electoral law of the land. Venezuela has a plethora of political parties, some running together as a Chavista unity slate with the same candidates (think “fusion parties” in the U.S.), others going it alone. The Chavista slate includes the large socialist PSUV (Maduro’s party) as well as the PCV, the Communist Party of Venezuela. Each of the 23 states in the country, plus the Distrito Capital (Caracas), has its own concatenation of parties, each state entitled to the number of National Assembly members according to its population.

The total number of National Assembly members is 167, of whom 113 are voted in on the strength of their own names, 51 elected from party lists according to the popularity of those parties in the overall voting, and 3 seats designated for Indigenous peoples.

At the time Hugo Chavez was first elected in 1998, some 28 percent of eligible voters were not registered. Now only 3 percent are unregistered. In presidential elections 80 percent of the approximately 19.5 million voters in the country vote; for National Assembly elections the turnout is over 70 percent. Even in elections for much lower offices the turnout is around 60 percent.

Demographically, 51 percent of voters are women, and almost 4 million are young voters 18-30). Women enter their “senior” years in Venezuela at age 55, with the right to start receiving a pension, and men at age 60. Some of us “seniors” in our study group qualify to ride the modern, efficient Metro system in Caracas for free.

Once voters arrive at one of the 14,515 polling sites around the country, where qualified officials run 40,601 separate precinct tables, they identify themselves with their national ID card, place their thumb into a machine which reads their fingerprint, thus confirming who they are, and enter the voting booth where they have up to 6 minutes to cast their electronic ballot (most people take under a minute). When they finish, they receive a printout of their vote to confirm their choices, and they deposit this slip into the ballot box. At the end of the day the electronic vote and the paper ballots should match exactly. Witnesses from the participating parties are entitled to observe this entire process to certify its veracity.

Not entirely as a parenthetical note, readers should know that presumably voters going to the polls are completely sober: There is no liquor legally sold throughout the country for three days, from 6 p.m. Friday through Sunday – not even to us innocent visiting non-nationals!

Immediately after the votes are recorded and reported, an automatic audit takes place of 53.3 percent of all the precincts, randomly chosen from around the country, to spot any conceivable irregularities. Within a few weeks a 100 percent audit takes place. All parties in the elections have signed on to these carefully thought-out and elegantly devised mechanisms, regarded – to repeat myself – as among the most democratic in the world.

Later in the day, we attended the huge public rally officially closing the electoral campaign, where Maduro spoke and revved up his thousands of supporters in the capital, a flock of colorful flags and banners proudly whipping in the breeze, the red-shirted crowds gaily chanting, singing and cheering. Their infectious joy helped to persuade me that this election is very much up for grabs. A Chavista win is hardly out of the question!

Whatever the result on Dec. 6, whether a victory for the Bolivarian Revolution or for its opposition, you can be assured that there was no question of fraud. If you hear that claim, don’t believe it, and start asking serious questions of anyone making it. It ain’t so.

From Peoples World

The returns of Marx

05 Saturday Dec 2015

Posted by raomk in INTERNATIONAL NEWS, Left politics, Opinion

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communist, Marx, MARXIST, MARXIST CRITICISM

Aldo Tortorella from the latest issue of the journal MARXIST CRITICISM we publish the introduction returns of Marx, organized by Fondazione Luigi Longo and Marxist criticism in Alexandria, on 22-24 October 2015..

A return, almost a fashion, Marx was widely spoken after the start of the Great Depression opened in 2008 by the bankruptcy of the Lehman Brothers bankruptcy and the risk of other very large US banks – then saved with public money, reflecting a mechanism , said conventionally liberal, specializing in privatize profits and socialize losses. Printing and dissemination of the texts of Marx multiplied worldwide, manifested new movements inspired directly or indirectly to a critique of the financial capital, found vast echo research Piketty, non-Marxist, the capital in the XXI century and its concentration in the same way and in the same hands as ever, a topic of interest Marxian.

More recently, the confirmation of a return was made from an unusual source but sensitive to the spirit of the times as the world of the visual arts, with a dedication to Marx of the Venice Biennale this year, including a public reading and systematic Text of the Capital . The greater part of our ineffable daily press has treated the subject almost as a kind of strangeness of the Nigerian curator, who – Okwi Enwezor – is, in fact, one of the most important American intellectuals of matter, distinguished university professor and creator of the most great art exhibitions in the world. The text of his presentation of the biennial, inspired by the reading of Walter Benjamin’s Angelus Novus of Klee, realizes with painstaking meticulousness of the origin and meaning of the reference to Marx: “Capital – writes – is the great tragedy of our time . Today looms more than any other element in every sphere of life … ‘, determining whether “the state of affairs” is the way to watch them.

The Capital of Marx since its release – he adds – has involved not only politicians, economists, philosophers, but artists and the exhibition in Venice, then promises to perceive – says – “the aura, the effects, the consequences and spectra of the capital. ” That the program is successful or not is and will be, of course, the subject of discussion, but it is well proven the validity of a return to those who first put under scrutiny, in fact, the foundation of the contemporary world and it has envisioned the consequences.

After 89

The last burial officer, who seemed the final one, was filed at the end of the Soviet Union. Many funeral orations were spoken by publicists and thinkers of various kinds. Among the political parties of the traditional left of ancient origin terzinternazionalista, but also in the socialist parties, and among many of the intellectuals who were, or were supposed to close them there was a race to deny any relationship with Marx.In Italy, as you know, it takes place the transformation of the Communist Party, party planning but inspired by Marxian reworking of Gramsci. In the German social rethinking of the program of Bad Godesberg – namely the total repudiation of Marxism – begun in the years of Brandt, and continued by Oskar Lafontaine, will close with the “new center” of Schroeder. England Blair will do away with the article of the statute it provides that aims to overcome the capitalist property.

Here, nell’aneddotica of that hasty transformation is also a place for our magazine Marxist Critique , redeemed at the price of a penny, and so saved dall’autodafé collective, and made reborn to a new life. The task that we inscribed in the head, and that has a time even in today’s conference, was to “rethink the left” – the theme, as seen in each other daily, never exhausted.

Then it seemed to some of us, in addition to other considerations, supremely unfair that he considered himself the old Marx as head even last of the tragic fates of the Soviet system came to collapse or errors that the Italian Communists could have done.

An injustice because there had been among the staunchest critics of the Soviet model so many excellent scholars of Marx (including several Italian), all Marxists persecuted by Stalinism, as well as politicians who claimed to be inspired by him (including, albeit belatedly, the top leaders of the Communist Party). But also a mistake because we felt that his thought – and the attempt to use it critically as already suggested the name of the magazine – was essential precisely in order to a radical renewal of ideas and political practices of the left.A renewal is essential, but to qualify for both the change in the global economic and political reality with the global victory of the capitalist model and for the transformations in production systems, in lives and in human relations induced by scientific discoveries and the technological revolution of the century .

In the twentieth century

The story of unwise burials and recurring return alive Marx would, I believe, a search distinct from those on many Marxists, whose history began even during the lifetime of Marx, and the subject of a vast bibliography, is largely summarized by us, at least until the beginning of the eighties of the last century, a collective work conceived and edited by Einaudi Hobsbawm and others. The study of death certificates of Marx’s thought, that accompany the moments of greatest success of the various experiences economic, social and political the capital structure, there would seem to me less important than that of his subsequent resurrection to major crises or disasters of wars.

If at the beginning, at the time of the triumphant bourgeoisie and colonialism ruling, the slating of the economic and social development of Marx, moved by optimism scientist and industrialist, they belonged to a theoretical discussion on the law of value, sull’impoverimento absolute, on ‘outcome of the cyclical crises, after the October Revolution the removal or convictions Marxian analysis were associated largely aversion to the Soviet state nascent. But as well as the outbreak of World War I had done justice to at least some of the more reckless criticisms – like those that assumed a relative ease in overcoming cyclical downturns without contemplating the risk of recourse to war – and had created the revolutionary struggles of the post-war period, the same way the crisis of ’29 brought with it a revival of the analysis Marx and a thorough critique to economic liberalism.

Then, as you know, the ruling classes and the imperial ruling classes were faced with the crisis with the analysis of Keynes and Roosevelt’s reforms in the capital market, while in continental Europe most of the national bourgeoisies were promoting Nazism and fascism and while worldwide Soviet forced collectivization campaign and the repression of dissenting generated the terrible tragedies that you know. He came here to a new time of anti-Marxism combined with the anti-Soviet, with the appreciation of the successes in the West in the internal policies of the Nazis and fascists – and the abandonment of the Spanish republic to Franco – until the new and frightening world war the international anti-fascist alliance again tipped the scale of values and pushed to new interest in Marx a part of the intelligentsia and the new generations matured during the conflict and the resistance.

It was still, however, an interest in which the image of Marx mingled with that of the country of the Battle of Stalingrad and the red flag on the Reichstadt, the country in which, albeit with terrible tragedies, for the first time it had come experimenting the abolition of private ownership of the means of production and exchange.A mixture that was underpinned by new revolutions in the giant China and Cuba in the small. Even the great youth rebellion of ’68 dall’antiautoritarismo move, having the background Vietnam Ho Min did not give us to draw on past revolutions, albeit sometimes, but not always, watching the dissenters persecuted more than the winners.

Equally and not, for as long as the Cold War the anti-Marxist polemic flourished and developed having the background the same image overlay: there was talk of Marx, but it was thought – or were referred – Stalin, Mao, Castro .

The success of the idea promoted by Isaiah Berlin purely negative freedom (ie as total rejection of any interference from the public other than safety of life and property) has the background, in fact, the unacceptability of a model of absolute statism and denial of freedom, as well as the idea, propagated by Thatcher, that the company is purely abstract notion as the only concrete thing are the individuals it targets the very notion of the welfare state, seen almost as an antechamber to the Soviet model of collectivism.

In fact, that overlap, although almost fatal, was essentially arbitrary. In the days of November 1917 a young Italian socialist of great talent, which will be one of the founders of the Communist Party, had written and realized that the October Revolution – which he like millions of people around the world appeared enthusiastic – it was, in Actually, its a revolution against the Capital of Karl Marx. Gramsci differed, in that well-known article on ‘ Avanti , a Marx “tainted by positivism and naturalism” by Marx heir, as he says, “the idealistic thought Italian and German. ‘ The first would be the author of the idea that comes before the capitalist bourgeoisie, its maturity and its crisis, and only at the end of the socialist transformation – and against this Marx, in fact, occurred the October Revolution. In contrast, according to the Marx ‘that never dies, “he taught, according to the young Gramsci, that” the greatest factor of history “is not given the” economic facts brutes “but the relations between human beings,” the society of men “who” develop a collective will, “which” shapes the objective reality that lives, moves, acquires the character of matter telluric boiling, which can be channeled where the will like “2. The times are not required, therefore, and the maturation of consciousness and revolutionary will of the exploited, very long in normal times, could have acceleration due to special reasons – in this case the World War. Unfortunately, the absolute voluntarism that inspired that article born on the wave of emotion and one that did not belong to the old Marx, was not enough and in fact, as we shall see, he could turn against itself.

And, in fact, Gramsci, then, long worked in the notebooks of the jail on that famous passage of the Preface to the Critique of Political Economy of ’59 – omitted in a text written for the party school of 1925, as recalled Fabio Frosini3 – in Marx speaks of the conditions for which you run out of old social formations and the new born, a song that he translates: “No social order ever perishes before they have developed all the productive forces for which it is still not enough, and new, higher relations of production have not taken place before the material conditions of existence of the latter have been hatched in the womb of the old society. Therefore mankind always sets itself only such tasks as it can solve; (If you observe more accurately, you will always find that the task itself arises only where the material conditions for its resolution exist or at least are in the process of their becoming) “4. Gramsci interpret this passage from stripping can read deterministic, but he tried his acuity of thought seeing the substance that is a criticism of the fantasies that, at the same time, defines the actual terrain of the political struggle and ideal, and does not eliminate the role of subjectivity policies. Marx had so little to do with the Soviet model that the Vulgate became known as “Marxism-Leninism” which was added, then, the suffix “Stalinism”, in order to establish a sort of canon immutable. Which, as should be obvious, it was not only distant but opposed to every form of critical thinking – in which Marx also is recognized as a major.

However that mixture and culturally undue overlap was practically inevitable given the origin of the promoters of the ideal of a socialist revolution, and this explains the presumption dell’affossamento definitive Marx following the collapse of the Soviet Union, its dismemberment, the transformation of Russia into a country of capitalism more or less wild. The launch of China in a similar direction, despite the red flag, completed the work. He even spoke of the end of history, in the sense that the winning model would have no alternative. It was a form of self-deception of the winners. The basic reasons that had driven the search for Marx had failed, despite the technological abyss separating us from him. For this is the new return, but if you do not remember the previous one can not understand the difference.

Well dug, old mole!

Today, there is no illusion that somewhere on earth was found the formula of the new world, or that no longer considered inevitable march towards socialism is already embodied in a social formation. Capitalism has shown its ability to huge quantitative development and adaptation, as Marx had predicted, and founded on the desire (ie the individual) and choice (ie free will).

Social ownership of the means of production and exchange, the time and place in which it was attempted, became state property and property in this bureaucratic, and bureaucrats into capitalists robbery. If someone levasse, the call for unity of the proletariat, already rejected in the trenches of World War I, would sound foreign to the reality of a world in which, despite a number of workers than ever, the work must continue to decrease, competition downward it is already deadly fragmentation multiplies misery overflows and generates plenty of recruits for promoters of wars. That is, in short, that this time the return to Marx does not presume to be based on data acquired or easy hopes, and can not have the quality of mature disenchantment.

Born, also, this return by the rapid depletion of the promises implied in the birth of a world unified under the sign of financial capital.

The Cold War ended with the victory of one of the contenders did not open the way to permanent peace and a linear progress. Instead, it returned to the confrontation between the powers and the multiplicity of wars appears to be a world war creeping, potentially explosive. The supposed self-regulating capacity of the market has failed. The idea of infinite development has come up against the physical limits of the planet and threatens the very conditions of life. They do not change, and in many cases increase, the gap between rich and poor and, in each country, between the very rich and the great mass of others. Traveling between the stars but too many people continue to die of hunger, and it seems to be disproportionate welcome those who run away from war and poverty. The pontiff of the Catholic Church had to explain that when he speaks in defense of the poor and against the immoderate gains it does because it is communist but because it is inspired by the Gospel. He had to reinterpret Scripture to explain that the man was not donated the land and the animals that live there to ruin the one and torturing others at will but to protect them.

One would think, with the greatest respect, ‘Well dug, old mole “. In truth, Hamlet says, “Well said, old mole” to the spectrum of the father at the time warned the ground: it was, of course, the voice of the past buried and ignored who returns to tell what he knows, and go in peace. As for Marx, who in the 18th Brumaire he quoted from memory, the mole digging well, as you know, is the image of the revolution which operates under the radar. For us, perhaps, the word spectrum underground is just to Marx now freed from the burden of something that did not belong and also helps those who are distant or hostile. A voice, too, heard so much better after the work of interpretation. For us, but not only for us, it should first reading that did Gramsci who taught to understand, among other things, the mutual influence between the base material, economic, society and all the phenomena called superstructure in lexicon of tradition.

And they have also helped all the jobs that have enabled it to overcome the anachronisms and place it in its time and in its culture, highlighting, for example, the difficulty of this individual to look not only socially determined or the failure to understand the influence patriarchal order in the determination of the male as unacceptable absolute value. A thought does not stay indefinitely because this is no time, but because, in the narrow limits of time, culture and life of its author, opens a new window to look at reality. Now no one, more innocent, drink the hemlock to comply with the law of the city, rather than the more guilty the more frolic. But no one can dispute that the poor Socrates is one of the first inventors of ethics, including the public.

And so it is for Marx. Considering it a kind of Bible, you use it, of course, against himself, perhaps unlikely to endorse or pernicious doctrines of others, as indeed happened (and happens). Seen within its limits and its shortcomings studied for many years, including in this meeting will be discussed, he returns the actuality of who, in fact, found in the capital and along the explosive force, as has been said, the drama of our time, and he teaches about the building of human reality from the ground, trying to see it for what it is and not for what we imagine it to be.

Upload ethics

Can return, so, the author moved by a powerful but misunderstood ethics office that breaks the hypocrisy of the beautiful souls smug virtue of their real or alleged but unable to look at the origins of the evils to deprecate words. The school of thought of Kantian origin who emphasized, at the beginning of the past century, this side of Marx was submerged by those who believed the author of an exact science, then returned to the subject constantly. Its scientific analysis, like every other, is conditioned by the level of knowledge at that time and therefore can be reached continuously partly denial partly correct, but, being the object to which it refers to the social relations – and thus ultimately between people – he would never even born had it not been moved by indignation and a passion. The outrage over the fate of the last and penultimate manufacturers of objects indispensable to life and a good life, a passion for the freedom of each and all. Relations between Marx and Spinoza, a scholar of the passions, now fill a library. The work changes, changes the system of education or employment of consciences, the dominated may ignore or even to be so happy to be so, but without that anger and that passion genuinely experienced, you can not do political action, let alone one called left.

Can return, today, the author who studied this thinking of the future, perhaps in the belief, as certain look, a certain history in the mouth, but said he did not want to do and never did the pastry chef of the future, the ‘ author of an open-ended but not so much because it thus: and so Marx said he was not a Marxist, knowing that their critical method would also cover his work. This is not groped do not know which new orthodoxy, but to read it without distorting lenses to be helped to understand the origin of this distressing problem. And also to be led to a deeper self-criticism.

This world is in danger and forged dominated by capital everywhere and winning first flowering of civilization in places that can not be said to be inspired by Christianity, not only that but also the other Protestant majority here, although raised in the little loyalty or ignorance of the Gospel, as we are now told authoritatively. This is Western civilization today questioned. And the onslaught of fundamentalism losers can not be answered, otherwise the catastrophe, with the fundamentalism of winning. This world is super armed is now closing grimly, as last tried even Switzerland, instead of looking at himself and seek to correct their distortions considering them because of those of others. The tendency to use inordinate force becomes greater, with the attendant risks.

It should react to what is called the left. But having thrown away Marx did not help and, in fact, has been a powerful incentive to slip into the arms of neoliberalism successful and unsuccessful, so the distinction between left and right has become increasingly blurred. It is obvious that not just Marx, but without continuing a rigorous analysis, as was his, the economic and social model in which we live will continue to miss the contribution that the left could give to solve the growing problems of the present. I think that, with open eyes, Marx may be more useful than ever to stimulate research and, also, political action.

2) A. Gramsci, The revolution against the “Capital”, in Id., The future city from 1917 to 1918 , edited by S. Caprioglio, Turin, Einaudi, 1982, p. 514.

3) See. F. Frosini, Preface of ’59 , in G. Liguori, Voza P. (eds), Dictionary Gramscian 1926-1937, Rome, Carocci, 2009, p. 661.

4) A. Gramsci, Appendix. Excerpts from the Notebooks of translation, in Id., Prison Notebooks , edited by V. Gerratana, Rome, Einaudi, 1975, p. 2359.

పెట్టుబడిదారుల ఊహకందని పోర్చుగల్‌ వామపక్ష ఐక్యత

02 Wednesday Dec 2015

Posted by raomk in Current Affairs, INTERNATIONAL NEWS, Left politics

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financial times, portugal left.

ఎం కోటేశ్వరరావు

జనం నాడిని పసిగట్టటంలో దోపిడీ వర్గం ఎప్పుడూ ముందుంటుందని అనేక దేశాల పరిణామాలు వెల్లడించాయి.ఎందుకంటే తమ లాభాలతో పాటు వాటికి ముప్పు ఎటువైపు నుంచి వస్తుందాని కూడా అవి నిరంతరం చూస్తుంటాయి. గత వారంలో ఐరోపాలోని పోర్చుగల్‌లో వామపక్ష కూటమి అధికారానికి వస్తుందని ఐరోపా కార్పొరేట్లు వూహించలేదని ఆ పరిణామాలపై తాజాగా ఫైనాన్సియల్‌ టైమ్స్‌ పత్రిక వ్యాఖ్యాత రాసిన విశ్లేషణ వెల్లడిస్తోంది. దానిలోని ముఖ్యాంశాల సారాంశం ఇలా వుంది.’ నాలుగు దశాబ్దాలుగా ఎడమొహం పెడమొహంగా వున్న వుదారవాద సోషలిస్టులు, రాజీపడని కమ్యూనిస్టులు ఏకతాటిపైకి వచ్చేందుకు అంగీకరించటం వారికి తీవ్రవాద వామపక్షం తోడు కావటం పోర్చుగల్‌ వర్తమాన తరానికి అతిపెద్ద పెద్ద రాజకీయ విప్లవం.వారి మధ్య ఆటంకాలు తొలగిపోవటానికి కారణం పొదుపు చర్యలను(జనంపై మోపుతున్న భారాలకు కార్పొరేట్లు పెట్టిన ముద్దు పేరు) అధిగమించటానికి గతంలో ఎన్నడూ జరగని ఒప్పందం కుదరటమే.

సోవియట్‌ కమ్యూనిజం మరియు స్వేచ్ఛామార్కెట్‌ ప్రజాస్వామ్యం మధ్య అత్యంత బలమైన చిహ్నంగా వున్న బెర్లిన్‌ గోడ పతనమైన పాతిక సంవత్సరాల తరువాత తమ మధ్య కుదిరిన సంబంధం బెర్లిన్‌ గోడలో కూల్చిన చివరి ఇటుకవంటిదని నూతన కూటమికి సంధానకర్తగా వున్న సోషలిస్టు పార్టీ నాయకుడు ఆంటోనియో కోస్టా వ్యాఖ్యానించాడు. మాజీ శతృవుల మధ్య ఆశ్చర్యకరంగా వుద్రిక్తత సడలటానికి అక్టోబరు నాలుగున జరిగిన దేశ సార్వత్రిక ఎన్నికల ఫలితాలే కారణం. మధ్యేవాద మితవాద ఫార్వర్డ్‌ పోర్చుగల్‌ (మున్ముందుకే పోర్చుగల్‌) కూటమి గత ఎన్నికల కంటే ఏడులక్షల ఓట్లు, 230 స్దానాలున్న పార్లమెంట్‌లో 25 సీట్లు పొగొట్టుకొని అతి పెద్ద పక్షంగా అవతరించింది.

కొన్ని విధానపరమైన రాయితీలను పొంది అందుకు బదులుగా మధ్యేవాద మితవాద మైనారిటీ ప్రభుత్వం స్ధిరంగా వుండేందుకు మద్దతు ఇవ్వాలని మితవాద అధ్యక్షుడు అనిబల్‌ కావాక్‌ సిల్వా కోస్టాను కోరాడు. కానీ సోషలిస్టు పార్టీ నాయకుడు అందుకు సిద్దం చేసిన స్క్రిప్ట్‌ను చించివేయటమేగాక పొదుపు వ్యతిరేక కూటమి ఏర్పాటు చేసి దేశాన్ని మరియు మిగతా ఐరోపా మొత్తాన్ని ఆశ్చర్య పరిచారు. ఈ ఎత్తుగడను ఎన్నికలలో ఓటర్ల ముందు సూచించలేదు. నూతన ఒప్పందాన్ని పార్లమెంటులో పొగుడుతూ ఒక ఆంక్ష తొలగి పోయింది, ఒక గోడ కూలిపోయింది, ఒ దుర్భ్రమను అధిగమించాము అన్నాడు.ఒక నాడు వేర్వేరుగా వున్న వామపక్షాలు ఎన్నికలలో మెజారిటీ సీట్లు సాధించాక అక్టోబరు 30న అధికారాన్ని స్వీకరించిన పాసోస్‌ కోహో ప్రభుత్వాన్ని పదకొండు రోజులకే కూల్చివేయటానికి ఐక్యమయ్యాయి.

మితవాద మైనారిటీ ప్రభుత్వాన్ని కాపాడేందుకు అధ్యక్షుడు అడ్డదారిలో విప్‌ను ధిక్కరించాల్సిందిగా సోషలిస్టు పార్టీ సభ్యులను కోరాడు. నలభై ఒక్క సంవత్సరాల దేశ ప్రజాస్వామ్య చరిత్రలో అత్యంత తక్కువ రోజులు అధికారంలో వున్న సర్కార్‌గా పాసోస్‌ ప్రభుత్వం చరిత్రకెక్కింది. వామపక్ష కూటమి ప్రభుత్వాన్ని ఏర్పరచటం కేవలం అధికార దాహంగా పోసోస్‌ వర్ణించాడు. 1974లో నియంత పాలనను కూలదోసిన తరువాత పోర్చుగీసు సోవియట్‌ అనుకూల కమ్యూనిస్టుల చేతిలోకి పోకుండా చూసేందుకు సోషలిస్టు నాయకుడు మరియో సోరెస్‌ కమ్యూనిస్టులకు వ్యతిరేకంగా పశ్చిమదేశాల ఒడిలోకి చేర్చేందుకు ప్రయత్నించాడు.1977లో ఐరోపా యూనియన్‌లో సభ్యత్వం కోసం దరఖాస్తు చేయటం దానిలో భాగమే అని సోరెస్‌ చెప్పాడు.

స్పెయిన్‌, ఫ్రాన్స్‌, ఇటలీలోని తోటి కమ్యూనిస్టుపార్టీల మాదిరిగాక సోవియట హయాం మారిపోయిన తరువాత కూడా పోర్చుగీసు కమ్యూనిస్టుపార్టీ మార్క్సిస్టు-లెనినిస్టు వైఖరికి గట్టిగా నిలబడింది. అనేక స్ధానిక ప్రభుత్వాలకు అది ఎన్నికైంది.జాతీయ ఎన్నికలలో 8.3శాతం ఓట్లు తెచ్చుకుంది. గ్రీసు సిరిజా, స్పెయిన్‌ పొడేమాస్‌కు ముందే 1999లో ప్రజలను ఆకర్షించే నినాదాలతో పోర్చుగల్‌లో వామపక్ష కూటమి ఏర్పడింది. అంతకు ముందుతో పోల్చితే తాజా ఎన్నికలలో తన ఓట్లను రెట్టింపు చేసుకొని 10.2శాతానికి పెంచుకొని పార్లమెంట్‌లో మూడవ పెద్ద పక్షంగా అవతరించింది. వామపక్ష కూటమి ప్రభుత్వ ప్రధానిగా బాధ్యతలు స్వీకరించిన కోస్టా ఐక్యవామపక్షం 50.8శాతం ఓట్లు సంపాదించిందని భాష్యం చెప్పారు. పొదుపు చర్యలకు వ్యతిరేకంగా మార్పును కోరుకున్న ఓటర్లని అన్నారు. అత్యంత దుర్మార్గమైన నయా వుదారవాద విధానాల కోసం పాసోస్‌ మధ్యేవాద మితవాద సోషల్‌ డెమోక్రటిక్‌ మూలాలను వదులు కున్నారని కోస్టా విమర్శించారు.వామపక్ష ఐక్యతకు తాము కుదుర్చుకున్న చారిత్రాత్మక ఒప్పందంతో ఐరోపా యూనియన్‌లో పోర్చుగల్‌ సభ్యత్వానికి ముప్పు లేకుండానే దేశం పొదుపు పేజీని తిప్పేట్లు చేస్తామని కోస్టా అన్నారు.అయితే కమ్యూనిస్టులతో ఒప్పందాన్ని కుదుర్చుకోవటాన్ని వ్యతిరేకిస్తున్న ఆయన వ్యతిరేకులు కోస్టా ఎన్నికలలో ఓడిపోయిన తరువాత కుదుర్చుకున్న అవకాశ వాద ఒప్పందంగా, రాజకీయంగా అక్రమ ప్రభుత్వంగా వర్ణిస్తున్నారు. అనూహ్యంగా కోస్టా వామపక్షాలతో ఒప్పందం కుదుర్చుకోవటంతో సోషలిస్టు పార్టీలో విభేదాలకు కారణమైంది. చీలిక తప్పదనిపిస్తోందని కోస్టా వ్యతిరేకి ఫ్రాన్సిస్‌కో ఆసిస్‌ వ్యాఖ్యానించాడు. వామపక్షాలతో ఒప్పందం పైకి కనిపిస్తున్నది చాలా తక్కువ అంతర్గతంగా వున్నది ముఖ్యం,అది మామూలుగా పెద్ద వినాశనానికి దారితీస్తుంది అని వ్యాఖ్యానించాడు.’

ఫైనాన్సియల్‌ టైమ్స్‌ పత్రిక చేసిన ఈ వ్యాఖ్యానం ఐరోపా పెట్టుబడిదారుల అంతరంగాన్ని, పోర్చుగల్‌లో ఆశాభంగాన్ని వెల్లడిస్తున్నది. గ్రీసు సిరిజా అనుభవం తరువాత పోర్చుగీసు సోషలిస్టులు పాఠం నేర్చుకుంటారా? లేక వారి మాదిరి వత్తిళ్లకు లొంగి ఏదో ఒక పేరుతో భారాలు మోపుతారా అన్నది చూడాల్సి వుంది.

దక్షిణాఫ్రికా కమ్యూనిస్టులపై మీడియా దాడి

02 Wednesday Dec 2015

Posted by raomk in Current Affairs, INTERNATIONAL NEWS, Left politics

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Berni sanders, Mao letter, Media, SACP

ఎం కోటేశ్వరరావు

శతృవు దాడి చేస్తున్నాడంటే కమ్యూనిస్టులు తమ కర్తవ్యాన్ని నిర్వరిస్తున్నట్లే భావించాలి. కార్మికవర్గంతో మంచిగా వుండే వారు పెట్టుబడిదారులు నిజమైన పెట్టుబడిదారులు కానట్లే పెట్టుబడిదారీ వర్గం పట్ల మెత్తగా వుండే కమ్యూనిస్టులను కూడా అనుమానించాల్సిందే. కమ్యూనిస్టులు భాగస్వాములుగా వున్న దక్షిణాఫ్రికా ప్రభుత్వం అనుసరించే కొన్ని విధానాలపై విమర్శలు వున్నాయి. అక్కడి ఆఫ్రికన్‌ నేషనల్‌ కాంగ్రెస్‌, కార్మిక సంఘాల సమాఖ్య, దక్షిణాఫ్రికా కమ్యూనిస్టుపార్టీలు ఎన్నికలలో వుమ్మడిగానే పోటీ చేస్తాయి. గత రెండు దశాబ్దాలుగా వాటి మధ్య ఐక్యతను దెబ్బతీయాలని జాతీయంగా, అంతర్జాతీయంగా ఎన్నో కుట్రలు జరుగుతున్నాయి. వాటిలో భాగంగా ఒకదాని మీద మరొకదానిని రెచ్చగొట్టటం, ఆయా సంస్ధలలోనే అంతర్గతంగా కలహాలను రాజేయటం, ఆఫ్రికన్ల మధ్య చిచ్చురేపటం వంటి ఎన్నో చేస్తున్నారు. అయినా ఆ కూటమి మధ్య ఐక్యత కొనసాగటం వర్తమాన పరిస్ధితుల్లో ఒక విశేషం, విజయమూను.

కమ్యూనిస్టుపార్టీ ప్రస్తుతం మీడియాలో రావాల్సిన మార్పుల గురించి ప్రచారం చేస్తున్నది .ప్రపంచంలో పెద్ద ఇంటర్నెట్‌ కంపెనీలలో ఏడవ స్దానంలో వున్న దక్షిణాఫ్రికా నాస్సర్‌ కంపెనీ మీడియా 24 ద్వారా కమ్యూనిస్టు వ్యతిరేక ప్రచారంలో ముందున్నది. గతంలో ఈ సంస్ధ జాత్యహంకార శక్తుల మద్దతుదారుగా వుండి ప్రస్తుతం ప్రభుత్వ ముఖ్యంగా కమ్యూనిస్టు వ్యతిరేక ప్రచారంలో మునిగి వుంది. కమ్యూనిస్టు పార్టీ ప్రధాన కార్యదర్శి బ్లేడ్‌ జిమాండే తదితర అగ్రనేతల ప్రతిష్టను దిగజార్చేందుకు పూనుకుందని యువ కమ్యూనిస్టు లీగ్‌ తాజాగా ఒక ప్రకటనలో పేర్కొన్నది. నాస్పర్‌ తన పత్రికలు, టీవీ, డిజిటల్‌ మీడియాకు 2017 వరకు కమ్యూనిస్టు వ్యతిరేక ప్రచారానికి ఒక కార్యక్రమాన్ని కూడా రూపొందించింది.దేశాన్ని తిరిగి వెనక్కు తీసుకొని వెళ్లటాన్ని అనుమతించేది లేదని, ఆధారంలేని అభూత కల్పనలను అడ్డుకొనేందుకు అన్ని రకాల చర్యలూ తీసుకుంటామని యువ కమ్యూనిస్టు లీగ్‌ హెచ్చరించింది. నాస్పర్‌ మీడియా సంస్ధలు, ప్రతిపక్ష శ్వేతజాతి డెమోక్రటిక్‌ అలయన్స్‌ పార్టీ కుమ్మక్కై తప్పుడు వార్తలను వండి వార్చటం వాటిని పార్లమెంట్‌లో, వెలుపలా ప్రస్తావించి జనం మెదళ్లను లుషితం చేసేందుకు పూనుకున్నారు.మీడియా కుట్రలు, తప్పుడు ప్రచారం గురించి కమ్యూనిస్టు పార్టీ నిర్వహిస్తున్న రెడ్‌ అక్టోబర్‌ ప్రచారానికి యువ కమ్యూనిస్టు లీగ్‌ పూర్తి మద్దతును ప్రకటించింది.

కమ్యూనిస్టు బూచిని చూసి బెదరని శాండర్స్‌

అమెరికాలో కమ్యూనిస్టు అంటే ఎయిడ్స్‌ వచ్చిన వారి మాదిరి చూసే రోజులు ఒకప్పుడు వుండేవి, ఇప్పుడు కూడా వ్యతిరేకతను రెచ్చగొట్టటం, భయపెట్టటంలో తక్కువేమీ లేదు. అయితే ప్రచ్చన్న యుద్ధంలో తామే విజయం సాధించామని, సోషలిజం, కమ్యూనిజాలను ఓడించామని పాతికేళ్ల క్రితం అమెరికన్లు ప్రకటించారు. శకునం చెప్పిన బల్లి కుడితిలో పడిందని సోషలిస్టు ఆర్ధిక వ్యవస్దలు పని చేయవని చెప్పిన పెట్టుబడిదారీ వ్యవస్దలే గతంలో వచ్చిన వాటి కంటే తీవ్ర సంక్షోభంలో కూరుకుపోయిన విషయం తెలిసిందే.ఈ పూర్వరంగంలో అమెరికాలో తాము కమ్యూనిస్టులమే అని బహిరంగంగా చెప్పుకొనే వారు పెరిగారు. కష్మా సావంత్‌ అనే భారతీయ సంతతికి చెందిన మహిళ సియాటిల్‌ నగరంలో తాను కమ్యూనిస్టును అని చెప్పి మరీ నగర పాలక సంస్ధ ఎన్నికలలో 2013లో విజయం సాధించింది, మరోసారి ఇటీవల రెండోసారి ఎన్నికయ్యారు. వచ్చే ఏడాది జరగనున్న అధ్యక్ష ఎన్నికలలో డెమోక్రటిక్‌ పార్టీ అభ్యర్ధిగా బెర్నీశాండర్స్‌ అనే ఎంపీ మాజీ మంత్రి హిల్లరీ క్లింటన్‌తో పోటీ పడుతున్నారు.ఆయన ఒక కమ్యూనిస్టు అని ముద్రవేసి వ్యతిరేకతను రెచ్చగొట్టే యత్నం జరుగుతోంది.అందుకు మీడియా తన వంతు పాత్రను పోషిస్తోంది. తాను సోషలిస్టునని శాండర్స్‌ ప్రకటించుకున్నాడు. మూడు దశాబ్దాల క్రితం నికరాగువా అధ్యక్షుడిగా ఎన్నికైన డేనియల్‌ ఓర్టేగాను కమ్యూనిస్టుగా పేర్కొన్న మీడియాను ప్రశ్నిస్తూ బర్లింగ్టన్‌ మేయర్‌గా వున్న శాండర్స్‌ మాట్లాడిన దానిని గతవారంలో ఒకరు యూట్యూబ్‌ నుంచి వెలికి తీసి జనానికి అందుబాటులోకి తెచ్చారు. దానిలో అసలు కమ్యూనిస్టు అంటే ఏమిటి అని విలేకర్లకు ప్రశ్న సంధిస్తూ ప్రారంభించారు. ఓర్టేగా బహిరంగంగా తాను మార్క్సిస్టు అని చెప్పనపుడు ఆయనకు మీడియా ఆ ముద్ర వేయటం ఎందుకన్న శాండర్స్‌ ప్రశ్న. వుదాహరణకు రోనాల్డ్‌ రీగన్‌ అమెరికా ఫాసిస్టు అధ్యక్షుడు అని ముద్ర వేస్తే ఏమౌతుంది అంటూ రీగన్‌ తనను ఫాసిస్టు అనుకోడు అందువలన ఎవరికైనా ఒక ముద్రవేసేటపుడు వారు తమను తాము ఏమనుకుంటున్నదీ పరిగణనలోకి తీసుకోవాలని శాండర్స్‌ చెప్పాడు. వుత్తర, దక్షిణ అమెరికా దేశాలలో కమ్యూనిస్టు వ్యతిరేకతను తీవ్రంగా రెచ్చగొట్టిన పూర్వరంగంలో ఓర్టేగాతో సహా అనేక మంది కమ్యూనిస్టులు వేరే పేర్లతో వుద్యమాలు నడిపారు. మన దేశ చరిత్రను చూసినట్లయితే స్వాతంత్య్ర వుద్యమ కాలంలో నిర్బంధకాండను తప్పించుకొనేందుకు కమ్యూనిస్టులు కాంగ్రెస్‌ సోషలిస్టు పార్టీ, పెజెంట్స్‌ అండ్‌ వర్కర్‌ పార్టీల పేరుతో పని చేసిన విషయాన్ని ఇక్కడ గుర్తుకు తెచ్చుకోవాలి.ఇటీవలి కాలంలో డెమోక్రటిక్‌ పార్టీలోని అనేక మంది ఆ పార్టీలో వుంటూనే వామపక్ష వాదులుగా స్వతంత్ర కార్యాచరణకు పూనుకుంటున్నారు. దానిలో భాగంగానే కొన్ని చోట్ల కార్మికుల తరఫున ప్రత్యేక వేదికల పేరుతో ఎన్నికలలో కూడా పోటీ చేస్తున్నారు. డెమోక్రటిక్‌ పార్టీలోని కార్మిక వ్యతిరేక శక్తులను బలపరిచేది లేదని బహిరంగంగా ప్రకటిస్తున్నార. ఈ పూర్వరంగంలో బెర్నీ శాండర్స్‌పై గత కొద్ది సంవత్సరాలుగా మీడియా, ఆయన ప్రత్యర్ధులు కమ్యూనిస్టు ముద్రవేసి వెనక్కు నెట్టాలని చూస్తున్నారు. ఆయన నిజమైన వామపక్షవాది కాదు అని కొంతమంది వామపక్షవాదులు భావిస్తున్నమాట వాస్తవం. అమెరికా రాజకీయాలలో తాను వామపక్ష వాదిని అని చెప్పుకొంటే జరిగేదేమిటో, అధికారానికి దగ్గరకావాలంటే చేయాల్సిందేమిటో తెలియనంతటి అమాయకుడు కాదు శాండర్స్‌.అయినా డెమోక్రటిక్‌, రిపబ్లిక్‌ పార్టీల విధానాలకు భిన్నంగా కొన్ని అంశాలపై తన అభిప్రాయాలు వెల్లడించటం ఆహ్వానించదగిన పరిణామమే. శాండర్స్‌ అధికార డెమోక్రటిక్‌ పార్టీ ఎంపీ తప్ప కమ్యూనిస్టు సభ్యుడు కాదు. అందువలన పక్కా కమ్యూనిస్టులా వుండాలని ఆశించటం, ఆ దృష్టితో చూడటం వాస్తవ దృక్పధం కాజాలదు. సోషలిస్టు అగ్ని ఆరిపోకుండా, పెరగటానికి ఎవరు ఎన్ని చితుకులు వేసినా ఆహ్వానించాల్సిందే.

అట్లీకి మావో రాసిన లేఖ వేలం

1937లో నాటి బ్రిటన్‌ ప్రధాని క్లెమెంట్‌ అట్లీకి చైనా కమ్యూనిస్టు నేత మావో జెడాంగ్‌ 1937 నవంబరు ఒకటిన రాసిన లేఖను బ్రిటన్‌లో వేలం వేయబోతున్నారు. ఆ ప్రఖ్యాత లేఖ ధర లక్ష పౌండ్లకుపైగా పలుకుతుందని అంచనా. జపాన్‌ సామ్రాజ్యవాదులను ఎదుర్కొనేందుకు సాయం చేయవలసిందిగా ఏనాన్‌లోని కమ్యూనిస్టు పార్టీ ప్రధాన కార్యాలయం నుంచి మావో రాసిన లేఖ అది. జపాన్‌ను ఎదుర్కొనేందుకు చైనాకు చేయదగిన సాయానికి మద్దతు ఇవ్వాలని అట్లీని మావో కోరారు. బ్రిటన్‌ పౌరులకు చైనాలో జపాన్‌ దురాక్రమణ వాస్తవం గురించి తెలుసునని, చైనా పౌరులకు వారు మద్దతుగా ముందుకు వస్తారని, చివరకు జపాన్‌ నుంచి తమ కంటే తక్కువగాని ముప్పును తామూ ఎదుర్కొనే ప్రమాదాన్ని తప్పించేందుకు వీలుగా తమ ప్రభుత్వం ఒక విధానాన్ని అనుసరించే విధంగా వారు వత్తిడి తెస్తారని మావో తన లేఖలో పేర్కొన్నారు.

ఈ లేఖను లండన్‌లోని సౌత్‌ బేలో డిసెంబరు 15న వేలానికి వుంచుతారు. లక్ష నుంచి లక్షా 50వేల పౌండ్ల వరకు అమ్ముడు పోవచ్చని అంచనా వేస్తున్నారు. ప్రపంచ మార్కెట్‌లో మావో సంతకంతో కూడిన పత్రాలలో ఇది రెండవది. అంతర్జాతీయ దౌత్యంలో భాగంగా అధికారానికి రాక ముందే మావోప్రారంభ చర్యలలో ఇదొకటి.ఆయన సంతకంతో కూడిన లేఖ కావటం కూడా ప్రాధాన్యత సంతరించుకుంది.

Portugal: the Left Takes Charge

01 Tuesday Dec 2015

Posted by raomk in Current Affairs, INTERNATIONAL NEWS, Left politics

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Antonio Costa. After several weeks of political brinkmanship, Portugal’s rightwing president, Anibal Cavaco Silva, finally backed off from his refusal to appoint the leader of a victorious left coa…

Source: Portugal: the Left Takes Charge

LOK SABHA ADJOURNED REPEATEDLY OVER CPI-M MEMBER’S REMARKS

30 Monday Nov 2015

Posted by raomk in BJP, CPI(M), Current Affairs, Left politics, NATIONAL NEWS

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CPI(M), Intolerance, LOK SABHA

Parliament House of India

New Delhi, 30 Nov 2015: The Lok Sabha witnessed repeated adjournments on Monday as differences between some members of opposition and the treasury benches erupted when a CPI-M member attributed some remarks to Home Minister Rajnath Singh.Mohammad Salim of the Communist Party of India-Marxist(CPI-M), who initiated a discussion in the Lok Sabha on the issue of intolerance, cited the home minister as having made the remarks to a magazine. Ruling National Democratic Alliance members contested this strongly.While denying having ever made such remarks, Home Minister Rajnath Singh said he was deeply hurt by the claim.

“I am (have) never been so much hurt in my parliamentary life. If a home minister makes such comments, he has no right to be on his post,” Rajnath Singh said, adding that members of the house and people from the minority community know that he cannot make such remarks.Lok Sabha Speaker Sumitra Mahajan said Salim’s remarks pertaining to the magazine report on the minister would not go on record and she would examine the issue.”I will give my ruling,” she said.

Minister of State for Parliamentary Affairs Rajiv Pratap Rudy said the member should withdraw the comments till their authenticity was ascertained.Rudy said it would be difficult for members on the treasury benches to sit in the house after allegations “which are dangerous for the country”.Biju Janata Dal member Bhartruhari Mahtab said a member has to give prior notice before levelling allegations against another member.

Saugata Roy of the Trinamool Congress, however, said there was no denial from the minister after the publication of the report in the magazine.Salim later said his intention was not to hurt the minister and he had done the job of intelligence agencies by telling the minister about the publication of comments attributed to him.

Rudy, however, insisted that Salim should withdraw his words.As the standoff continued, the speaker adjourned the house for an hour.After the house reassembled, Rudy again insisted on the CPI-M member withdrawing his remarks till the authenticity was proven.

Salim, however, said he would not withdraw his remarks. “This is also intolerance. This is ridiculous,” he said.Salim said he cited the magazine after questions were put to him about his remarks.As the standoff persisted, Deputy Speaker M. Thambidurai briefly adjourned the house.When the house reassembled after its second adjournment of the day, Congress member M. Veerapa Moily said that since both Salim and Rajnath Singh had spoken, the matter should be put to rest.But the stalemate persisted and the house was adjourned till 3.15 p.m. and then again till 4 p.m..

When the house met at 3.15 pm, Salim said he was going by the rules and remarked he would have been happy if Rajnath Singh had become prime minister instead of Narendra Modi.Parliamentary Affairs Minister M. Venkaiah Naidu objected to his remarks and said such comments can also be made about CPI-M general secretary Sitaram Yechury.(IANS)

Sitaram Yechury’s Speech in Parliament on November 27, 2015

30 Monday Nov 2015

Posted by raomk in CPI(M), Current Affairs, Left politics, NATIONAL NEWS

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Ambedkar, Constitution, Parliament, SITARAM YECHURY

DISCUSSION ON COMMITMENT TO INDIA’S CONSTITUTION AS PART OF 125TH BIRTH ANNIVERSARY CELEBRATION OF DR. B.R. AMBEDKAR Contd..

SHRI ARUN JAITLEY (CONTD.): So, if Dr. Ambedkar had today stood up and proposed this provision, how would this House have reacted? ..[In Hindi]

SHRI SITARAM YECHURY: These are Directive Principles. You know as much as I know. These are Directive Principles. Do not stretch that argument to such a level.

MR. CHAIRMAN: Let the hon. Speaker continue.

SHRI ARUN JAITLEY: We will go beyond Directive Principles now…[In Hindi] “The State shall endeavour to organise agriculture and animal husbandry on modern and scientific lines and shall, in particular, take steps for preserving and improving the breeds, and prohibiting the slaughter, of cows and calves and other milch and draught cattle.” So if Dr. Ambedkar had proposed Article 44 and Article 48 today, how many of you would have accepted it, as Shri Sitaram Yechury says, even as a Directive Principle? …[In Hindi]

SHRI SITARAM YECHURY: .[In Hindi] Dr. Ambedkar gave primacy to equality, life, liberty and dignity, the Fundamental Rights.

SHRI SITARAM YECHURY: Mr. Jaitley, if you don’t mind, I wish to make a point. You see, you have quoted article 44. You just go to article 43A. It says, ‘…by suitable legislation…to secure the participation of workers in the management of undertakings,…’ Has that been done? Look at article 45. It says, ‘The State shall endeavour to provide early childhood care and education…’ Has that been done? Then, go to article 46. It talks about promotion of educational and economic interests of SCs, STs and other weaker sections…(Interruptions)…But, you choose one article 44 and another article 48…(Interruptions)…What about providing special care? What about providing all these?

MR. CHAIRMAN: Sitaramji, please, do it when your turn comes. …(Interruptions)…

SHRI SITARAM YECHURY: So, don’t pick and choose. That is what I am saying…(Interruptions)…

SHRI ARUN JAITLEY: I think, I am glad that my friend Sitaram’s best argument is that we must have equality in the matter of not following the law, because one provision has not been followed the other should not be followed.

SHRI SITARAM YECHURY: Sir, I am saying you should follow the entire law…(Interruptions)…No, you are not following the entire law. …(Interruptions)…

MR. CHAIRMAN: I would request all the concerned to allow the discussion…(Interruptions)…

SHRI SITARAM YECHURY: Why are you picking and choosing, Sir? That is my point…(Interruptions)…

SHRI SITARAM YECHURY (WEST BENGAL): Sir, thank you for giving me this opportunity. ..[In Hindi] So, what we wanted was enactments of all the legislations on the basis of which we can carry forward the vision of social justice that Dr. Ambedkar stood for. Now, instead, we have a situation where the Government has come forward saying that we reaffirm our faith in the Constitution. Where is the question of reaffirming? You are here, I am here, and all of us are here on an oath on this Constitution. What is this drama of reaffirming? If the Constitution is not there, then, you won’t be here. The Government of the day must know, the Leader of the House — he is not here now — should know that they are there only because we affirm this Constitution. What is this question of now saying, “We will reaffirm”? And what is this Constitution Day, Sir?….

Go through the history. On 26th of November this Constitution was signed by the President of the Constituent Assembly. It was voted upon and the draft was adopted and in the draft you have said explicitly ‘that on the26th of January India shall be a Republic in 1950 when this draft will turn into a Constitution and we shall enact.’ Can this Government answer? I want our esteemed lawyer, the Leader of the House, to tell us what law governed India from 26th of November, 1949 to 26th of January, 1950? Was it this Constitution? Is it known, Sir? The law that governed India during those two months after you adopted this Constitution was India Independence Act, 1947 moved by the British Prime Minister Attlee in the House of Commons in London. What is this Constitution then? You were under the British law for these two months. You adopted and enacted this Constitution on the 26th of January. Now, what is this new thing that you are finding now 65 years later on the Constitution Foundation Day? You please explain to me, Sir. You are sitting on the Chair. Maybe, you have greater knowledge, but you please explain to me that when Dr. Ambedkar himself says that on 26th of January we are enacting this Constitution and we shall be a Republic, what is this 26th November? Yes, that day the Constituent Assembly adopted this draft, but that was not the Indian Constitution yet. That was not the law of our land yet. It became the law of the land on the 26th of January, 1950. Lawyers are talking like this, Sir, on the Constitution Foundation day! You want some day or the other to find yourself so that you can celebrate one more event. The Constituent Assembly met again on the 24th and 25th of January, 1950. The Jana Gana Mana as the National Anthem was adopted on the 24th of January and on the 24th and 25th all Members of the Constituent Assembly signed this Constitution and on the 26th of November only 15 out of the 395 clauses in our Constitution came into operation. Sir, 26th of January, 1950 was when the entire Constitution came into operation. So, what is this new item that we have, Sir? …(Interruptions)… You may call it item song or whatever. It is a new item now in the Indian Constitution. A senior leader of the ruling party has described our Prime Minister, charitable or uncharitable, I don’t know, it is up to their party to decide, he called him an excellent event manager. One event after another, London and after that Malaysia, after that Asia and after that Constitution Day and from tomorrow it will be Paris. They showed us an old film in my youth, “Paris ke range shyam”. That will be the event from tomorrow.

SHRI ANAND SHARMA: It cannot be in the name of a film.

SHRI SITARAM YECHURY: I don’t know. So, what is this event to event to event? What are we observing, Sir? I am sorry, but I think the entire, what in Hindi we call, garima of this House, of the Parliament is being undermined by these sorts of flippant events that are coming in. Yes, for 26th of November we have the highest respect for Dr. Ambedkar and for everybody else. Does this Government today know that Constituent Assembly began its work on a Resolution moved by Shri Jawaharlal Nehru called the ‘Objectives Resolution’? Does this Government know that out of the eleven sittings of the Constituent Assembly six of the sittings were devoted to the ‘Objectives Resolution’ and not to this draft? A majority of the discussions in the Constituent Assembly was on the objectives put forward by Shri Jawaharlal Nehru. Sir, that is our history. Yes, the victor always scripts the history.

SITARAM YECHURY (CONTD.): But, here, the victor is also trying to change the past history! Now, this is the history we have inherited. Like the hon. Leader of the House, I was also born after Independence. I think, many of us are born after Independence. And, for all of us, this is inherited history; this is our legacy. You cannot now tamper with that history and tell us a new history! Now, why this Constitution Day? I can only come to the conclusion that this is an attempt to try and worm their way into the national movement when they had no role to play at all. This is the way they want to worm themselves into the national movement and how they want to worm themselves I want to know.

How this order is given? Sir, it is a Gazette Notification saying that ‘it has been decided to celebrate 26th day of November every year as the Constitution Day.’ It is a Gazette Notification. If you want I will place it on the Table of the House. It is a notification in the Indian Gazette, dated 19th November. It is issued by the Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment. Does the Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment decide a national day to be observed every year?

AN HON. MEMBER: The hon. Minister is here.

SHRI SITARAM YECHURY: Yes, I have noticed that hon. Minister is coming in here. Hon. HRD Minister was a good fried of mine before she became a Minister. After that she does not have time and she has got very onerous responsibilities. But, I just want to know how the Gazette Notification comes on 19th and the HRD Ministry issues a circular to schools on 10th of November saying ‘observe 26th November as the Constitution Day.’ This is a Gazette issued on 19th. What is happening, Sir. Items in Indian politics. That is the only thing I can say — events. You have event management. You want to worm into the national movement when you had no role. Here, I wish to put it on record the fact that often we have heard and we will hear also, I am sure, in the course of this discussion, the role of Communists, etc., in the Freedom Struggle. That is an old charge…
(Interruptions)…

SHRI SITARAM YECHURY: Sir, please don’t deduct the time of these interruptions from my time and start pressing the bell. Please don’t do that. The British Bombay Home Department, in 1942, during the Quit India Movement observed, “The Sangh has scrupulously kept itself within the law and in particular has refrained from taking part in the disturbances that broke out in August, 1942.” ..(Interruptions).. This is the record of the British Government. Now, Tarunji made a charge against the Communists. .[In Hindi].

“After large scale strikes in mills in Kanpur, Jamshedpur and Ahmedabad, a despatch from Delhi dated September 5, 1942, to the Secretary of State, in London, reported about the Communist Party of India: ‘the behaviour of many of CPI members proves what has always been clear, namely, that it is composed of anti-British revolutionaries.'”

This is the President of India telling this in the Central Hall of Indian Parliament.
(Interruptions)
…[In Hindi]. He read out Article 44 of the Constitution, Sir, which deals with it. I have the copy of the Constitution and this is the copy that belongs to the Chamber. So you cannot accuse me of any personal or fudged copy.
MR. DEPUTY CHAIRMAN: Do you think there are different copies of Constitution?

SHRI SITARAM YECHURY: No, no. Sir. They may accuse me. They may accuse me, so I am reading out only from the Chamber’s copy. Even that is challenged. So you don’t argue for authentication; it is marked as Chamber’s Copy. It says, ‘the State shall endeavour to secure for the citizens a uniform civil code.’ It was quoted. It was also quoted on the question of organisation of agricultural and animal husbandry. I pointed out then that these are Directive Principles of State Policy, which are not justifiable and enforceable, and these Directive Principles also have other things, Sir, which are not quoted. What do they say? They say, ‘the State shall promote with special care the educational and economic interests of the weaker sections of the people.’ What did Babasaheb Ambedkar say? The same thing; that is Article 46. Article 47 says, ‘the State shall regard the raising of the level of nutrition and the standard of living.’ Isn’t it a shame that today, the largest number of children malnutritioned are in India? Isn’t it a shame that majority of the stunted children in the world are from India, today? This is the Constitutional Directive, Article 47. What has been done? You only pick and choose what you want to do and that is where the suspicion comes as to what is your actual motive. Here in the section on Fundamental Duties that are supposed to be enforceable — you please look at your copy in your hand, Sir — Article 51A says, ‘it shall be the duty of every citizen of India.’ If you read Article 51A (f), it says, ‘to value and preserve the rich heritage of our composite culture.’ Is it the composite culture that we are preserving, Sir? I will come to that again. What does 51A(h) say? It says, ‘to develop the scientific temper, humanism and the spirit of inquiry and reform.’ Sir, if we hear that Lord Ganesha was the creation of plastic surgery or Karna in the Mahabharata was the creation of stent technology and test tube babies, is that scientific temper? And it comes from no less than hon. Prime Minister. What is happening? What are you implementing? What are you wanting to implement and what not? You are only reviving the hardcore Hindutva agenda. Cow protection, you are wanting to revive. Then the entire question of equality of all citizens to liberty in life. He has quoted Article 30. He is not here, unfortunately, so I cannot request him also. He has quoted this Article 30 — you can also help me, Sir, in finding that Clause — and said that these are contradicted by Articles 29 and 30. Article 15 says, ‘the State shall not discriminate against any citizen on grounds of religion, race, caste, sex, place of birth or any of them.’ This is Article 15, Fundamental Rights.

SHRI SITARAM YECHURY (CONTD.): He says, “Articles 29 and 30 are in contradiction”. Sir, any lawyer would know, any right always comes with what is called reasonable restrictions. I hope, Mr. Parasaran is here; there is no right which does not come without reasonable restrictions. The reasonable restrictions through Article 15 have been detailed in Articles of the Constitution, 29 and 20, where the rights of the minorities to their religion are given. Minorities here meaning not only religious but also linguistic minorities. So, it is said, “This is a contradiction. Don’t we want to remove it?” What would Dr. Ambedkar say today if you were talking about this contradiction, about this Constitution? He would say precisely the same thing that the duties of a citizen would be the spread of tolerance, and not the spread of any one particular intolerant point of view. And that is the bone of contention today, Sir. I read in the media that hon. Home Minister saying that secularism is the word that was injected into the Constitution, and, therefore, that is the cause of all problems. He has also referred to, I believe, poor old Aamir Khan; our actor is getting lampooned. He said, “Ambedkar did not leave the country. But he stayed here and struggled”. And that is what Aamir Khan also said, Sir. He did not say that he is leaving. I am glad he is staying and struggling, and then you accuse them saying that Left is sponsoring all that. Thank you for putting all those people with us. Our tribe is increasing. That is what you are doing. …(Interruptions)… But remember, Ambedkar did not leave the country. He was a patriot. But, Ambedkar renounced Hinduism and embraced Buddhism. You remember that. You remember that, and why was that? That is where the intolerance issue comes in. Sir, these are matters again of history. You cannot erase it, and if you want the question of intolerance, take the same speech of Dr. Ambedkar of 25th November, which the hon. Leader of the House was quoting. This is the same speech, and what does Dr. Ambekar say? He was talking about ‘history will repeat itself’. “Will we lose our Independence again…”, hon. Leader of the House quoted that. After that, he did not quote the rest of it. What does it say? I am quoting from that Speech of Dr. Ambedkar. “Will history repeat itself”? That is, will we lose our Independence once again? “Will Indians place the country above their creed or will they place creed above the country, I did not know”. As the Leader of the House said, if Dr. Ambedkar was here today, what would he say? He would not pose this question. He will say, “Indians are being forced to place their creed above the country”. And that is the intolerance that is happening in the country today. Then, what did Dr. Ambedkar say? “But this much is certain — this is the speech, Sir, which was quoted in the morning — if the parties place creed above country, our Independence will be put in jeopardy a second time — after all the instances he gave, which were quoted by the leader — will be put in a jeopardy a second time and probably be lost forever. This eventuality we must all resolutely guard against. We must be determined to defend our Independence with the last drop of our blood”.

Today, when I stand up against this intolerance, I am doing exactly what Dr. Ambedkar asked us to do. Anybody who wants to say what Dr. Ambedkar said must be done, we will do exactly what Dr. Ambedkar asked us to do, i.e., raise ourselves against this sort of intolerance. This is the same Ambedkar in the same speech.

Then, we heard the question of social justice. The essential point of Dr. Ambedkar is missed out. I have quoted this a number of times in this august House, but I can’t stop myself from quoting this again.

SHRI SITARAM YECHURY (CONTD.): Now, I quote it in the full. It says, “On 26th of January, 1950” – please note once again, it is the Constitution Day, the Republic Day – “we are going to enter into a life of contradictions. In politics, we will give equality and in social and economic life, we will have inequality. In politics, we will be recognizing the principle of ‘one man one vote’, ‘one vote one value’. In our social and economic life, we shall, by reason of our social and economic structures, continue to deny the principle of ‘one man one value’.” That is the contradiction. Then, he continues to say, “If we continue to deny it for long, we will do so only by putting our political democracy in peril. We must remove this contradiction at the earliest. Or else, those who suffer from this inequality will blow up the structure of political democracy that this Assembly has so labouriously built”. This is Dr. Ambedkar in the same speech. What is the situation today? A hundred multi-billionaires in our country, whose asset value is close to one-half of my country’s GDP. And, according to the latest census, ninety per cent of the households in my country, today, have an income of less than Rs. 10,000, a month. Is this contradiction being resolved or are you only accentuating it further? Are we discussing issues of how we should reduce the gap in this contradiction? Instead, every foreign trip, we find a new concession to foreign capital. Fifteen new areas have been opened up to the FDI. Free Trade Agreements are ruining our domestic cultivation of commercial crops! The agrarian distress is growing. Farmers are committing suicides. Your industrial production index, as per this Government’s own statistics, this month has shown a drop from about six per cent plus to about three per cent. Manufacturing has dropped to 2.4 per cent from over 6 per cent. Industrial production is declining. Agrarian distress is deepening. …[In Hindi]

Where are we on the social justice vision of Dr. Ambedkar? I have mentioned about the atrocities on SCs and STS and about reservation. On the question of growing inequalities, the condition of our people is deteriorating. What is this contradiction? You see the reality. Are we paying homage to Dr. Ambedkar? Is this the way Modern India is actually fulfilling the vision of social justice. Forget about the political parties. Forget to which party belong, to which party you belong. As an Indian, when you are talking about these things, are we being honest to ourselves? Are we doing justice to Dr. Ambedkar and all of that generation – Nehru, Gandhi, Abul Kalam Azad, Sardar Patel – that gave us Independence and this Constitution? What had they exhorted all of us to do? Are we doing it? And, you say, “I reaffirm my faith in the Constitution.” Without reaffirming that faith, you won’t be here. What is this reaffirming of faith? Come to the federalism. What did Dr. Ambedkar say on federalism?

MR. DEPUTY CHAIRMAN: Please try to conclude.

SHRI SITARAM YECHURY: Yes, Sir. But how can I conclude federalism and intolerance and all that? …(Interruptions)… You are asking to conclude what the Government is doing.

SHRI SITARAM YECHURY (CONTD.): In a federal structure, on CentreState relations, what did Dr. Ambedkar say? He said that the Centre and the States are coequal in this matter. Sir, I am reading from the same speech. “It is difficult to see how such a Constitution can be called centralism. That is, the basic principle of fedearlism is that the legislative and executive authority is partitioned between the Centre and the States, not by any law to be made by the Centre but by the Constitution itself.” That is the essence of this Constitution. Is the principle of federalism followed, Sir? You are talking about the misuse of Article 356. That is only one part of it. We, the Kerala Government, were the first victim of Article 356, way back in the 1950s. I don’t know how many of you were there. Second time, we were victim in 1960s; twice, we were victim in Bengal, in 1967 and 1969. …(Interruptions)..

SHRI T.K. RANGARAJAN: Mr. Antony is here. He was the hero.

SHRI SITARAM YECHURY: Hon. Antony is here. He was a hero of one of the… (Interruptions).. But, Sir, all that apart, what is fedearalism? Not merely equality, that independent respect of the States, are we granting it today? Then, you talked of judiciary. Let me tell you, what Dr. Ambedkar said about judiciary is very, very interesting. I am quoting from the same speech, ” Courts may modify, they cannot replace”, please note, “Courts may modify, they cannot replace, they can revise earlier interpretations as new arguments, new points of view are presented. They can shift the dividing line in marginal cases, but there are barriers they cannot pass, definite assignments of power they cannot reallocate. They can give a broadening construction of existing powers, but they cannot assign to one authority powers explicitly granted to another.” The separation and the complementarity of the Executive, the Judiciary and the Legislature are hallmarks of our Constitution. Now, this is as far as your Judiciary is concerned. But what worries me about is you are paying homage to Dr. Ambedkar. Remember, Sir, from 1946 to 1950, what was the condition of the world? Millions of people were under colonial subjugation. When these countries became independent, what we did in India was, actually, a revolutionary step then. We granted universal adult suffrage, which nobody else of these countries granted. …(Interruptions).. Europe did not grant and not even the United States of America. President Obama came here. All of us were very excited in the Central Hall, both sides. Everybody was saying, wah wah, President Obama came here, and, then, he wrote in the Golden Book — there is no gold in that book — of our Parliament, “Greetings from the world’s oldest democracy to the world’s largest.” This was his message. Yes, this was the message he gave. I had to point it out later that evening at the President’s banquet. I said, “Sir, I think, this is a wrong definition that you are the world’s oldest democracy.” He said, “Why’? I said, “Sir, you got the right to vote, that is, American-Africans, universally in the United States of America in 1962, one year after you were born. The universality of adult franchise in the United States of America came only in 1962; in India, we gave it in 1950.” Whether you are a dalit, you are a landlord, whether you are a Muslim, whether you are a Hindu, we gave it in 1950. And, today, Sir, what is happening? In Haryana, 86 per cent of the people will be kept out of their right to vote and right to contest elections because of various conditions. The State Government has said that unless you fulfil these conditions, you cannot contest or you cannot vote.

SHRI SITARAM YECHURY (CONTD.): In Rajasthan, you put conditions whereby more than half the people are excluded from the universal suffrage. In Gujarat, you have said, ‘unless you have a toilet, a pucca toilet, in your house, you cannot vote or contest in local elections’. All these three States have got a BJP State Government. You come here to pay homage to Dr. Ambedkar and the one important thing that has been done by the Indian Constitution on universal adult suffrage, you deny it to people in the States which have a State Government that is led by the BJP. …(Time-bell)…

Sir, I know you will press the bell. But the point is that you please consider all these things. The Ruling Benches are empty. I don’t know who will convey, what and to whom when the reply comes on Monday.

MR. DEPUTY CHAIRMAN: The Ministers are there. …(Interruptions)… They will do it. …(Interruptions)…

SHRI SITARAM YECHURY: Sir, I sympathize with my friend, Shri Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi. How much burden can he carry, Sir? How much can he go and report upstairs saying that this is all that has been said and you please answer that? And, even the officers have deserted the officials’ block. So, I don’t know if anybody is taking note of all this. We understand many of these things. They ignore us normally. …(Interruptions)…

AN HON. MEMBER: This shows their commitment.

SHRI SITARAM YECHURY: But, Sir, since you are pressing the bell, let me come down to my final points. The Leader of the House made an interesting and a very interesting reference to the Third Reich and Germany. Wonderful, Sir. We are happy, and I must pay my gratitude to the Leader of the House for having reminded me of the Third Reich and Germany and the dangers of authoritarianism. Sir, in 1939, when the debate in the country was going on as to what should be the character of Independent India, there was a book, which was not thought that it would be very important but a book which had a very, very important implication for Indian politics and India’s future, and that was a book called ‘We, or our Nationhood Defined’ by Madhav Sadashiv Golwalkar. He is called the RSS Guru. And, since the Leader of the House mentioned the Third Reich, I only want to quote from that book about the Third Reich. That book is, ‘We, or Our Nationhood Defined’. Who is ‘we’? In Hindi ‘Swaraj.’ ..[In Hindi] That is the entire import of that book..he talked saying that ‘only Hindus and Hindus alone are inhabitants of this country’. And, then, what does he say about the Third Reich? I am quoting, “To keep up the purity of the Race and its culture, Germany shocked the world by purging the country of the semitic Races, the Jews”. I will take a break here, Sir, for a moment. You please draw the parallels in India — who is that instead of the Jews and who is that for the Race and the culture and its purity. I continue with the quote. “Race pride at its highest has been …” …(Interruptions)…

SHRI V.P. SINGH BADNORE: Sir, which book is he referring to? …(Interruptions)…

MR. DEPUTY CHAIRMAN: From which book are you quoting? …(Interruptions)…

SHRI ANAND SHARMA: He is quoting from scriptures of your party. …(Interruptions)…

MR. DEPUTY CHAIRMAN: You say from which book you are quoting. …(Interruptions)…
SHRI SITARAM YECHURY: Sir, my good friend, Mr. V.P. Singh Badnore, may not be so much in tune with the RSS as he is a BJP M.P. But let me tell him that the name of the book is: ‘We, or Our Nationhood Defined’. I am quoting from page no. 35. This book was published in 1939 by Bharat Prakashan, republished by Bharat Prakashan, Second Edition, again in 1944. That is the authenticity. That book must be available in library if it is not already removed. I mean, they have this habit also of removing all these books. But otherwise, this book should be in the Parliament library. Otherwise, I will help you. I will give you a copy.
SHRI SITARAM YECHURY (contd.): Now, it is in this book, on page 35. I repeat that quote; it says, “To keep up the purity of the race and its culture, Germany shocked the world by purging the country of the semetic races, the Jews. Race pride at its highest has been manifested here. Germany has also shown how well nigh impossible it is for races and cultures having differences going to the root to be assimilated into one united whole. A good lesson for us..” Please understand this.

SHRI V. P. SINGH BADNORE: We cannot do that. That is why! What is that commentary?…(Interruptions)… We cannot do it. What is wrong in it? …(Interruptions)…
SHRI TAPAN KUMAR SEN: He is not saying anything wrong. Why are you getting agitated? …(Interruptions)…

SHRI V. P. SINGH BADNORE: We cannot do that. That is why he has said so. What is wrong in that?…(Interruptions)…

SHRI TAPAN KUMAR SEN: He is not saying anything wrong, Mr. V.P. Singh. …(Interruptions)…

SHRI SITARAM YECHURY: Sir, let me complete. …(Interruptions)… Sir, let me complete. ..(Interruptions)…

SHRI V. P. SINGH BADNORE: We cannot do that. That is why he has said…(Interruptions)… What is wrong with that? …(Interruptions)… What is he trying to do? …(Interruptions)….

MR. DEPUTY CHAIRMAN: Please, you would get a chance. You may reply to that; you would get your chance….(Interruptions)…. You can reply to that. You would get your chance. You say that he is misinterpreting. When you get your chance, you may correct it. …(interruptions)…

SHRI SITARAM YECHURY: I am quoting verbatim. And if you want, shall I re-quote the whole thing?
MR. DEPUTY CHAIRMAN: No, no; there is no need for that. It is all on record. …(Interruptions)….
SHRI SITARAM YECHURY: Have you followed so far?

MR. DEPUTY CHAIRMAN: Yes, yes. Now, you need to conclude also. There is no time. …(Interruptions)…

SHRI SITARAM YECHURY: Sir, let me conclude with just one sentence – “A good lesson for us in Hindustan to learn and profit by.” This is about the Third Reich that the hon. Leader of the House was reminding us about.

SHRI V. P. SINGH BADNORE: We thought this is wrong. That is why we…(Interruptions)

MR. DEPUTY CHAIRMAN: Now, please conclude. …(Interruptions)…
SHRI SITARAM YECHURY: This is exactly what this Hindu Rashtra is all about, Sir. That is why, if you want to pay homage and our shraddhanjali to Dr. Ambedkar, please remember what he said in the speech finally. I would like to quote to you what he said about creed: “Without equality, you cannot have liberty. Without fraternity, you cannot have equality and liberty. Without equality and fraternity – fraternity means sadbhavna – …you cannot have liberty.” If you are celebrating India’s freedom and its liberty, equality and fraternity are the two things on which there can be no compromise. And that is precisely what is being compromised in this furtherance of the atmosphere of intolerance.
Sir, finally, let me end by quoting Dr. Rajendra Prasad. When he was about to put his signatures on this draft, the future President of India, quoted these lines. He was not yet the President of India; he became the President of India only on the 26th of January and, then, it was said that the Governor General, Dr. Rajagopalachari, cannot administer an oath to our President because the Governor General is an appointee of the British. So, the Chief Justice was called, in this Central Hall, and he administered the oath. After that Dr. Rajendra Prasad administers the oath for an interim Government, adopts this Constitution, administers the oath and directs that under this new Constitution, fresh elections be held after delimitation is completed. That election was held in 1952. And today, we hear, Sir, that Sardar Patel was being denied from being India’s first Prime Minister. Unfortunately, poor Sardar died in 1950; the first election was in 1952. .(Interruptions). Is that understood, Sir? Now, if there is some magic and some tantra through which like Lord Ganesha somebody who is dead and gone can be brought back alive, unfortunately, to be the Prime Minister, I can understand! That apart, what did Dr. Rajendra Prasad say? I am quoting this and ending, Sir. Dr. Rajendra Prasad, in his address, hailing that we adopted this Constitution, says, “After all, a Constitution, like a machine, is a lifeless thing.”

SHRI SITARAM YECHURY (CONTD.): “…It acquires life because of the men who control it and operate it. India needs today nothing more than a set of honest men who will have the interest of the country before them.” I am sure when Dr. Rajendra Prasad and Dr. Ambedkar talked about ‘men’, they included the ‘women’ also. So, please don’t take offence; I am sure, at that time, women were also part of it. “There is a fissiparous tendency arising out of various elements in our life”, said Dr. Rajendra Prasad on November 26, 1949. He said, “We have communal differences, caste differences, language differences, provincial differences and so forth. It requires men of strong character, men of vision, men who will not sacrifice the interests of the country at large for the sake of smaller groups and areas and who will rise over the prejudices which are born out of these differences. We can only hope that the country will throw up such men in abundance.” Is that the case? I rest my case by asking you the question. What are we seeing today? Have we produced such men in abundance? If not, I think it is time to correct the notion. If you want to do actual reaffirmation to our Constitution and pay our homage to Dr. Ambedkar, …(Interruptions)…

MR. DEPUTY CHAIRMAN: Okay.
SHRI SITARAM YECHURY: Please don’t okay me here, Sir, you will also be a part of it. All of us will have to sincerely pay homage to this, and that is what we need to do. Thank you, very much for giving me time. (Ends)

Argentina tango right

30 Monday Nov 2015

Posted by raomk in Current Affairs, INTERNATIONAL NEWS, Left politics

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Argentina, Right

Marco Consolo – http://marcoconsolo.altervista.org/ –

Celebrates the right of Argentina and the continental. With a difference of less than 3% and a narrow margin of 700,000 votes, the ballot wins its candidate, Mauricio Macri, the “Argentine Berlusconi”, who beat Daniel Scioli, the candidate of the Frente para la Victoria who somehow represented the continuism (51.6% to Macri, Scioli to 48.3%, 22% abstention). The settlement of Macri is scheduled for Dec. 10. It ‘the first time since 1998, when Hugo Chavez won the elections in Venezuela, that the ballot box to the right riconsegnano the government of a country that was looking for an alternative.

Decisive factor in the victory was the vote of Peronism conservative, that the first round had voted for Sergio Massa’s reach third. Sniffed the air, Massa had asked for a sign of “change”, implicitly guaranteeing its support “critical” to the right of Macri who managed to add up the votes of an important part of the conservative electorate Peronism. Massa today provides the elect in the different provinces and its votes in Parliament.
In the result has also played support for the right to be part of “social democrats” Unión Cívica Radical, past and barrel with his right from the first round .

The reasons for the defeat

A defeat expected with multiple causes. First, the erosion of consensus after 12 years of uninterrupted management with several errors, a high inflation that eroded the purchasing power of wages, some high-profile cases of corruption, the difficulty in responding to attacks by international powers, the need to the face of internal contradictions, its a process of transformation, a style of self-government.

The decisive factor was the ongoing offensive of the mass media (international and Argentine) against the government and against the Anti-monopoly on the media, with the group Clarin in the front row. The government failed to dismantle the “narrative” of “media latifundia”, which took for granted a win Macri (with a distance of less than 16 points), convincing the most conservative sectors that the “game was over.” Later, the political right will return the favor in the media: the Law on Media will be another of the objectives of the conservative restoration.
It certainly working against the government the international crisis, whose impact on Latin American economies has meant, among ‘ another, having to review the implementation of social plans and redistributive.

Important chapter is the new “middle class”, who voted for change (as in Brazil) despite the obvious improvement of their living conditions and purchasing power. It ‘a fact that is repeated in several countries of the continent and that should give pause. In the Argentine case, in recent decades the behavior of the middle class has fluctuated between radical positions and periods reactionaries, even pro-coup. But more generally, the lesson of the polls is not just pull out of poverty amp sectors of the population for electoral support. The new middle class has embraced the social achievements, highlighted by increased consumption capacity. Do not you think you can really go back, because recent years have convinced him of the irreversibility of processes. Not only. In many cases, the new middle class claims for itself the resources allocated to pro-poor in a “war between the ex-poor and still poor.”

Last but not least , the candidate of the outgoing government, Daniel Scioli, governor for a short while in the Province of Buenos Aires, disliked by the more militant sectors of “Kirchnerism” for its management and its moderate constraints passed by former President Carlos Menem . A candidate with little charisma, whose image is closer to the Peronism of the past years, that the “Kirchnerism” the twenty-first century. And Cristina Fernandez preferred to keep a safe distance dall’agone election. But in these 12 years, both Nestor, Cristina that have failed to make room for any successor, can represent a credible and successful. A choice which has weighed various sectors who have decided to vote in white, despite Scioli has recovered about 3 million votes from the first round.
And that’s the worst predictions of the vigil have come true without surprises. The sensational performance of Macri in the first round, had alerted the militants “kirchneristi” who led a generous campaign door to door, of which Argentina had no recent memories. But it was not enough. The 12-year rule “Kirchner” (Before Nestor Kirchner and Cristina Fernandez after his death) were not enough to consolidate an organized social base that would guarantee the continuity of the social transformations of Argentina.

The modern face of the right

In line with the suggestions of the spin doctors of the marketing election, Macri reinvented itself. He did everything possible to alienate itself from the image of the right of “dinosaurs coup” of the past, the “gravedigger” of social achievements, presenting a sign of strength captivating name “Cambiemos” . During the campaign he had to recognize some positive transformations of the government of Cristina Fernandez, coming to claim to “believe in the role of a strong state.” But true to the motto of veltroni “but also …”, during the election campaign promised state and market, and multinational homeland. A devaluation of the currency, the elimination of state subsidies to transport electricity, gas, and a cut in social programs generalized in favor of the poor. In other words, the view of the future is that of a fall in the purchasing power of wages.

And a few hours after the election results, it promised that the economy will be led by a group of “6 technicians”, stressing the need to deal with the “Fondos Buitre”, to recover the “competitiveness required” for the country’s economy .
gloating the “financial markets” and especially the “vulture funds”, which, thanks to a US judge complacent, they put a heavy burden on their stratospheric profits to buy at bargain prices of external debt and that they never wanted to accept the proposed restructuring of government debt.

In danger are also policies in defense of Human Rights, one of the flags of the government, with hundreds of trials of military and civilian leaders of the genocide of the dictatorship and which today organize their revenge.

Macri complex for the parliamentary framework, which has no majority either in the House, nor the Senate (the latter in the hands of “Kirchnerism”). But it controls many of the most important provinces, including that of Buenos Aires, the largest in the country, the former Peronist stronghold which concentrates almost 40% of voters, conquered in the first round just to Daniel Scioli.

Peronism in dispute

There is no doubt that the election result opens the dispute over control and representation of the Justicialista Party, the Peronist party, historic tank in electoral terms, of power, cronyism and consensus.
In the runoff, the real surprise was the vote Cordoba, in the hands of the Peronist governor José Manuel de la Sota, who guaranteed to Macri almost 70% of the votes in the province, making a lot of difference in the final result.
The two figures emerging today seem so those of Sergio Massa (real balance of power) and that of Jose Manuel De la Sota. Both states support “critical” to the government of Macri and counting on several MPs. It is not to be discarded that some deputy elected with Massa may swell the ranks of “macrismo.”
As is known, in the past the complex phenomenon Peronist had the ability to hold together conflicting options and grinding each other (by the radical left of the “Montoneros” , until the death squads of the “Triple A”) and the figure of Juan Domingo Peron and Evita has represented the historical glue. Nestor Kircher first and then with Cristina Fernandez, in the Peronism was born a sort of “third way”, with the attempt to build the wing “Kirchner” with mass organizations, especially among young people.
The main unknown concerns precisely those organizations, grown in the 12-year rule. The sectors most militants had twisted my mouth on the candidacy of Scioli, and until the last maintained a critical position. It will be to see if they can withstand the impact of displacement from positions of power guaranteed by the umbrella of the government, “Kirchner”. And if the trade union movement, strongly divided, unable to regain its leading role autonomous from the government.

The international framework

The result will have an impact on the political landscape of Latin America in the last 15 years characterized by the presence of progressive and leftist governments, which had bet on unity and regional integration, the United States moving away from the orbit.
Although pragmatically says it will continue to do business with China, Macri confirmed its wish to reconnect the United States (and Israel, with an eye to the important Jewish community of the country) to the International Monetary Fund, and his beloved friends such as former Colombian President Alvaro Uribe, ( who described him as “a hope for all Latin Americans … who need brilliant leaders”), the Partido Popular of Spain Rajoy, and the Venezuelan opposition, at his side during the election campaign.
The new President has reiterated that he will ask the withdrawal of Venezuela from Mercosur, accused of failing to respect the so-called “Democratic Clause” to “abuses against opponents and freedom of expression.” A clause inspired by the one in force in the Organization of American States (OAS).
The clause provides for the possibility of sanctions as the total or partial closure of land borders, suspension or limitation of trade, air traffic and shipping, communications, administration of energy and services.
The frontal attack on Venezuela has come in recent days by the same OAS that “Che” Guevara defined as “Ministry of Colonies” of the United States. The current Secretary General, the Uruguayan Luis Almagro, a few days ago attacked heavily Venezuelan electoral authorities, provoking public distancing former President “Pepe” Mujica.
The right-wing Latin American (and the US) now they aim to expand to the maximum “the domino effect” across the continent, starting from the upcoming elections in Venezuela on December 6, and then stick to the bottom of the government of Dilma Rousseff in Brazil. And as others. Mala tempora currunt for transformation processes in Latin America. There is little discussion of the past neo-liberal, with old answers to new questions. Young people have not known nor dictatorship, nor the long neo-liberal night. Today, the key lies in the future, which promises to be turbulent.

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