Close Election Sends Argentina to Second Round

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By Diego Gonzalez, Julia Muriel Dominzain

For the first time in Argentine history there will be a run-off election for President. The ruling party candidate Daniel Scioli and the opposition leader Mauricio Macri will face off on Nov. 22 after receiving 36.8% and 34.3%, respectively in the Oct. 25 first round.

The results surprised the candidates, the voters, the military, and the bureaucrats, and discredited the pollsters. And if the tight race was unexpected, the victory of the Macrista candidate in Buenos Aires Province was a bombshell. María Eugenia Vidal will be the next governor of the country’s most heavily populated region, with some 37% of the electorate. For the first time in 28 years, the province will now be governed by someone who does not belong to the Justicialista Party.

Debate has flared in a country that, until Sunday evening, assumed that Scioli would win, and that it was just a question of when–whether in the first or second round. The big issue, at this point, involves the 21% who voted for the third-place candidate, Sergio Massa, also a Peronist and former government official, and now a staunch member of the opposition who insists on the need for “change.”

Candidates Responses

Sunday night in Scioli headquarters the news of the discouraging numbers arrived like an unwelcome visitor. Supporters were singing with their heads bowed, looking at their mobile phones. The stage was empty, the remixed cumbia blared at an intolerable volume and was superimposed on the sound of the bass drums and the sporadic efforts of the organizations to sing a complete song.

At about 10 p.m., much earlier than anticipated, the candidate stepped out onto the stage at Luna Park and gave a speech that confirmed that the campaign was continuing: “There are at play two very different visions of Argentina’s present and future. Our priorities are the humble people, the workers, and our middle class. To those who voted in favor of a different proposal, I appeal especially to you, because for an Argentine there is nothing like another Argentine, and I believe, like Perón, that united we will all triumph.”

Near midnight the Minister of Justice Julio Alak announced the first official numbers. At that moment, with 60% of the votes counted, Macri led Scioli by almost two points. Although in the course of the evening the numbers flipped, the effect was immediate: the headquarters emptied out as if someone had pulled the fire alarm.

In the press room, the stress reached peak levels. Within a few minutes, on the mythical premises where Perón and Evita met in 1944, all warmth was drained.

“Now we go back to eating polenta and drinking bad wine,” one man shouted. Meanwhile, at Costa Salguero, the Cambiemos (Let’s Change) Party started the frenzy that went on for days. Balloons, dance steps, emotional speeches, generic words: “Let’s change,” “for change,” “to change.”

Macri’s Republican Proposal (PRO) is a young party of right-leaning business interests that was spawned by conservative thinktanks after the crisis of 2001 and grew in strength in the city of Buenos Aires. This is the first time it has gotten involved in elections.

Its campaign centers around the idea of “change.” In the Let’s Change Party, the PRO joined ranks with the Radical Civic Union and diverse Peronist sectors. The party proposed a new aesthetics, and presented itself as “the new”.

But by mid-2015 it made a discursive swerve and began to say it would guarantee continuation of many of the Kirchner measures it had previously opposed–universal Allocation per Child (unemployment insurance) and refraining from re-privatizing Aerolíneas Argentinas. It even erected a monument for Juan Domingo Perón.

Perhaps the biggest news has been that the new governor, Vidal, a technical staffer formed at the Catholic University of Argentina, won in the province over Cristina Fernández de Kirchner’s current Chief of Staff, Aníbal Fernandez. In Buenos Aires there will be no run-off; the 39.4% that Vidal won sufficed to beat Fernández’s 35.1%.

A more detailed analysis of the region reveals that votes for Julián Domínguez, who competed against Fernandez in the Front for Victory (FPV) primaries, did not transfer completely to the other ruling-party candidate.  There were also those who split their ballots and voted for Scioli as President and Vidal as Governor. Let’s Change won such key voting districts as La Plata, Mar del Plata, Quilmes, and Tres de Febrero, among others. Vidal not only won, but also helped Macri better position himself for the run-off.

On Aug. 9t in Buenos Aires, it poured rain and there were many who could not get out to vote.  Last Sunday’s election produced two million additional votes. With a participation of more than 80% of the total number of registered voters, almost all the candidates received more votes than before. Nonetheless, Macri managed to reduce the lead of 8.5% that Scioli, the current Governor of the Buenos Aires Province, had over him in the primaries to only 2.5 points. From one election to the other, Macri drew an additional 1,600,000 votes, Sergio Massa 600,000, and Scioli only 280,000.

Although all the candidates increased their votes, the distance between the three leading forces, instead of lengthening, grew smaller. The FPV could not maintain its 38.7% and fell by 2 points. Let’s Change grew almost 5 points (from 30.12% to 34.4%) and the Massa’s Reformist Front (Frente Renovador) held steady (from 20.57% to 21.3%).

Real Power

There weren’t just elections for president and vice-president on Oct. 25; the country also voted for 11 new governors, 43 Mercosur parliamentarians, 24 senators, and 130 seats in the House of Representatives were elected.

In the House of Representatives, the FPV Party lost 24 seats to Let’s Change. The ruling party will still be the largest minority (107 representatives), as compared to Macrismo’s 93. Neither, by itself, can manage an absolute majority. The Massa bloc, which had a great election in the Buenos Aires Province in 2013, will hold 31 seats. The FPV was able to maintain a majority in the Senate with a noteworthy total of 45 seats; Let’s Change garnered 15, and Massa’s group has veto power.

What is left to contest in the November 22 elections are the 8,000,000 votes distributed among the 22.3% who voted for Massa, the Trotskyist left that supported Nicolás del Caño (3.2%), Margarita Stolbizer (2.5%) of the Progressives, and the ex-governor of San Luis, the also Peronist Adolfo Rodríguez Saá (1.6%).

The left has already initiated a blank-vote campaign. Rodríguez Saá is holding his tongue for now. Stolbizer is talking about change, and Massa has already said he does not want Scioli to win.

No one owns the votes, but everything indicates that, despite the ruling party’s technical victory in the first round, it will be hard for them to expand. While the PRO is wearing a victory halo despite coming in second, for now the news for Scioli’s supporters is grim.

 

COUNTERVIEW: Monolithic, flattened view of India’s history “not supported” by sources, or by any serious historical inquiry

What the present regime seems to be promoting is a legislated account of the past, glorifying a homogenized and inflexible ‘Hindu’ tradition

Source: COUNTERVIEW: Monolithic, flattened view of India’s history “not supported” by sources, or by any serious historical inquiry

Communist Refoundation and unitary subject of the left: the document approved by the CPN

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Final political document of the National Political Committee of 7/8 November 2015 

The National Political Committee reiterated the need to continue on the path of revival of political activity of the Italian  Communist Refoundation Party and the construction of a left and anti-neoliberal alternative to the Democratic Party and the government Renzi.
The revival and strengthening of the party, from recovery pride and sense of belonging to the Communist Refoundation and the role it has played and plays “towards obstinate and contrary”, has nothing to conservative nor bureaucratic but stems from the awareness that there is more need than ever of the contribution of Communists and Communists to oppose global capitalism, the growth of inequality, the emptying of the social gains and democratic, the spread of wars, xenophobia, racism.
The major difficulties encountered in recent years there have folded, and in recent months we have registered positive signs of vitality and recovery. This tell us about the extraordinary result of the campaign of 2 per thousand combined to the excellent result of the Feasts of Liberation, and in particular of the national one, which are a strong encouragement to generalize in all areas and at all levels the commitment to revival of the party in terms of organization, processing, training and social roots.
The National Political Committee calls on all party structures maximum effort and maximum mobilization in the campaign ” The money is there “, with ‘ target of making socially and politically perceived the PRC on that content and those buzzwords. It is a long-term campaign, which does not end in a few weeks, or it comes to making recognizable our political proposal, at least as it was the 35-hour, on the social level.
We must be clear that the party reveals that the crisis , whose dramatic effects visited upon the working classes, it is not given by scarcity, but it is a crisis of excess production capacity, to an unprecedented concentration of wealth and power in a few hands. Explain that “The money is there” means counter the hegemony of the causes of the crisis that has been imposed as common sense and dominant narrative, and at the same time concrete proposals that speak to the condition of our social subjects of reference. Exit from the policies of austerity and sacrifice is possible, but only by challenging the neo-liberal policies pursued by the EU and Italian governments.
The building, of a political and social that make us recognizable and identifiable as participation and ‘internità movements and struggles, he must go hand in hand with continued revival also organization of our party. In recent months, in implementation of the last Conference Organization, we have taken the first steps forward since the establishment of the office organization that has taken a systematic reorganization and verification in connection with the regional and provincial party following objectives defined in the document “We share” approved by management last September. We are aware that many still are the steps to building a party with the tasks and the project of Communist Refoundation.
There are, today, the conditions to relaunch also on the accession to the party and the membership: this year has been achieved the goal of distributing 20,000 cards paid by the local structures, and on the occasion of this National Political Committee we started the distribution of cards in 2016. The goal is to close on 31 December membership in 2015 by starting immediately and with maximum momentum to the membership in 2016 with the determination to achieve a turnaround and the increase in subscribers.
Rifondazione Comunista should continue and strengthen its efforts in conflict and social struggles, and through the presence concrete and through social practices mutual grown in recent years in different territories. Our intuitions about the “social party” came today in widespread awareness of the left and represent a heritage which must be generalized and raised.
Another crucial aspect of our policy is the construction of a left and anti-neoliberal alternative to the Democratic Party to be able to answer the question alive, although fragmented, unity and effective opposition to the neoliberal policies of austerity, one question that comes to most people who continue to feel the left, but mostly from the working classes and working classes that are subject too long of a systematic attack.
The document ” We have, we launch the challenge “ , which calls for a national assembly in January 15-16-17 open, is an important step in the direction of the allegations made ​​by the Communist Refoundation in these years, often in solitude: the forces of the left parties to move it from the document sharing exhaustion and failure of the season of the center. Our proposal to build a political unit and the plural left highly independent and alternative to the Democratic Party is beginning to become a reality. We reiterate, as we are concerned, that this plant lives regardless of the electoral law and its changes. For us, the left is an alternative to the Democratic Party because it does not agree with the policies. Do not feel like orphans of a center that produced the renzismo as the terminal phase of a long genetic mutation.
The document “We are, we launch the challenge” to be considered, therefore, as a starting point. Communist Refoundation is committed to the development of such a path in the direction of the full involvement of stakeholders and social forces, of areas as large as possible of movements and societies that daily struggle and build alternative experiences, participation and inclusiveness; the placement of the plural subject that we intend to build within the Gue and the European Left; characterization of a strong alternative to the Democratic Party. If we are aware of the articulation of positions and different sensitivities present, we are also aware of how much our political coordinates are potentially majoritarian left. The commitment of the whole party in the unification process is essential to determine a positive development and a character of radical alternative. We are convinced that this process should take a broad and popular characterization, which aims to rebuild a web of social practices that are settled in the territory after the suburbs, also to prevent the right-wing populism, reconstructions and practices that do not stop and do not act only in institutional places.
The left is reconstructed primarily on the streets, in the neighborhoods, in the workplace and everyday life.
In this sense the continuity and consistency with the policy conference of Perugia, with regard to strengthening and revitalization PRC together with the aim of building a broader left, subsidiary and alternative to the Democratic Party continues to be the compass of our political initiative.
We believe in this important transition directly involve members and party members on the outcome of our work and – in light of what happened – propose to continue, according to the coordinates choices to Congress, asking for a review of the mandate he received at the conference. In the congress of Perugia we put at the center of the knot of recognized democracy and members, stressing that our objective was to engage the body of the party in the relevant passages and not only in the conference schedule. Therefore, we propose aconsultation of members and members of the PRC .
The National Political Committee then called to express themselves in the consultation on the following text:
“Our goal is to place at the center, in continuity and in implementation of the policy established at the Congress of Perugia, the way of strengthening and revitalization of the Communist Refoundation Party and the building through a unified process, participatory and democratic, the new party of the left in Italy. This process which will see the first positive stage in the notice of the meeting of 15/17 January 2016 convened on the basis of the document “We are, we launch the challenge” should be aimed at building a unified entity and the plural of the anti-liberal left, clearly alternative to pd and placed in Europe as part of the GUE and the European Left ”
The consultation will take place in the period December 1 to 19 through the organization and holding of active local members and the members of the single circle or circles convened jointly. Federations are responsible for ensuring that all facilities are activated. You have the right to vote who has the card 2015. Using the appropriate forms provided by national sponsors – indicated by Federations – record the vote (for, against, abstentions), and blatant show of hands, and will make a report overall outcome.

Unripe
Flamini
Mainardi
Rinaldi

Document approved with 53 votes in favor. The document with the petitioner Azzolini has obtained 20 and what he had as first signatory Bellotti 3. Abstentions 4.

 

Three reasons for the fall of oil and its global impact

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Venezuela is leading a global campaign among producing countries to raise and support the prices of crude oil at $ 80 or so. What are the causes of his fall ?. Here we explain.

Since 2004, crude oil prices have been volatile, with a downward trend. Venezuela is leading a global campaign to gather wills between the members of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) and other world producers, to try to raise it and maintain it.

Know the main causes that destabilize the global oil market:

Western interest

Since 2002, major oil producers have experienced sabotage, invasions and military offensives by US and its allies.

.- Oil strike in Venezuela from 2002-2003 promoted by the United States after the failed coup of April of that year.

.- US invasion of Iraq in 2003, under the excuse of the alleged existence of weapons of mass destruction.

.- Sabotage the flow of oil in Nigeria.

.- Sanctions and threats against Iran by the governments of George Bush and Barack Obama.

.- Overthrow and murder of Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi. NATO bombing and financing mercenary groups that dismembered Libya, which before the war was one of the largest oil producers in Africa.

.- Western support for terrorist groups in Syria with the aim to overthrow President Bashar al-Assad.

All these factors had a negative impact on the oil market, which initially undertook a rally after having remained for 16 years below $ 30 a barrel until 2002.

After invading Iraq in 2003, the Bush administration threatened to countries that did not follow their guidelines to be the next targets.

Not yielding to his pretensions, Washington sought to intimidate the producers (especially in the Middle East and the Persian Gulf) with carrier visits, maneuvers, contramaniobras, weapons deployment, military exercises, support for terrorist groups in Syria, Iraq and other area countries.

Why the Gulf? Because in that area much of the world’s oil (No. 1 producer with 10.3 million barrels per day Saudi Arabia) occurs. Most oil exports pass through the Straits of Hormuz, the only exit to the oceans.

Fracking

Since 2014, the president of Venezuela, Nicolas Maduro , has warned about the method used by the United States for the production of oil, called “fracking”.

Maduro has reported that US oil flooded the world market with the aim of lowering oil prices, and destabilize the economies of the exporting countries, especially Venezuela and Russia.

“(Obama) recognizes the economic war against Russia, here we have it, we can read now, I read yesterday; recognizes war oil prices for the first time it recognizes the strategic line that is under development and it is behind it. Moreover, he says more seriously, to take effect this year, next year and the other, 2015 and 2016, oil war, war of prices, “the Venezuelan president in December 2014.

The so-called “fracking” is a technique for extracting oil and gas from underground. We proceed to fracture the rock hundreds of meters deep injecting between the cracks, water and other chemicals at high pressure.

See also →  The fracking unbalanced the world oil market

The technique has served the United States to raise its oil production and at the same time to make them cheaper in the international market. This method poses serious health risks for the contamination of groundwater with the liquid mixture introduced underground during the process, in addition to affecting the global seismicity.

The Fact: The US is the largest oil consumer in the world with 18.2 million barrels per day (2014).

Speculation

The oil market speculation is a factor that affects the price volatility.

The Secretary General of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) , Abdullah al-Badri said the current state of the oil market does not justify the collapse in oil prices.

“We want to know the real reasons that led to such a fall in prices,” he said in Dubai on December 14.

Al Badri said that the production ceiling of OPEC “has not changed in the last 10 years (remaining) in about 30 million barrels” per day.

“Supply and demand were up -ligera- does not explain this drop 50 percent” since June 2014. If this continues, “speculation contributes greatly” to the collapse in prices, he added.

International impact

According to the American economist Jack Rasmus, there are at least three major potential impacts on global economic instability, following deflation of oil prices.

1- rapid appreciation of the US dollar, and the corresponding relative decline of the currencies of several emerging market economies (EME) – particularly those dependent on commodity exports, especially those for oil exports represent a significant percentage of total exports.

There is a long, documented historical relationship between the fall of oil prices and rising dollar.

2- Contribution to the general deflation in Europe and Japan economies are already in recession.

Despite the billions of dollars of liquidity injections by central banks, price levels still have been reduced to zero or less. Deflation oil added a deflationary drift significantly in Europe in general and in Japan.

This in turn is likely to lead to even more liquidity injections by central banks in the form of more quantitative easing (QE), further fueling the stock markets and bond asset bubbles.

3- The decrease in financial assets linked to oil could increase the trend to global financial instability.

Oil deflation can lead to widespread bankruptcies and defaults for various non-financial companies, which in turn precipitate financial instability events in banks linked to these companies.

The collapse of financial assets associated with oil may also have a “chain effect” later in other forms of financial assets and financial instability spreading to other credit markets.

Venezuelan proposal

President Maduro has insisted on a proposal for members and non-members of OPEC, which consists of two points:

1- Apply a mechanism of progressive cuts in oil production, in order to control prices.

2- Establish a first floor in oil prices at $ 70 and a ceiling of 100.

“A Very Big Mistake”: Joseph Stiglitz Slams Obama for Pushing the TPP | Democracy Now!

As Congress debates the Trans-Pacific Partnership, we speak to Nobel Prize-winning economist Joseph Stiglitz about the trade deal. “The irony is that the president came out and said, ‘This is about who makes the trade rules—China or the United States?'” Stiglitz said. “But I think the big issue is, this is about who makes the rules of trade—the American people, our democratic process, or the corporations? And who they’re made for, which is, for the corporations or for all of us?”

Source: “A Very Big Mistake”: Joseph Stiglitz Slams Obama for Pushing the TPP | Democracy Now!

Big protests during Greek general strike shows workers’ willingness to fight austerity

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by Panos Garganas in Athens


Many workers joined protests during a general strike in Greece

Many workers joined protests during a general strike in Greece (Pic: Workers Solidarity)


The general strike in Greece today, Thursday, was a bigger success than anyone expected. No boats, no trains and no planes moved. In Athens the Metro stopped all day, as did buses in the morning and evening.

On the strike demonstration there were groups of workers—bank staff for example—who haven’t had an organised contingent since 2011. It was the biggest strike demonstration since the huge strikes that brought down the government of technocrats in 2012.

Before the official rally, a march organised by the Communist Party stretched for around a kilometre. So did a feeder march from the Archaeological Museum with a big presence of the anti-capitalist left front Antarsya. The official rally in front of parliament was huge.

This was bigger than, or at least comparable to, the rally for the No vote in July’s referendum when left wing prime minister Alexis Tsipras spoke.

The message was clear. People may have voted for Tsipras’ party Syriza in the election. But that doesn’t mean they accept what his government does. He may have electoral control, but he can’t control people’s reaction to austerity.

By the eve of the strike Syriza was even pressured to announce its own token support. Their line was that the strike would strengthen their hand in negotiations with the “Troika” of Greece’s institutional creditors.

Striking workers on the march in Athens

Striking workers on the march in Athens


But the government has already given into the Troika on the issues at stake. It’s implementing pension cuts, and more cuts are coming.

Parliament has already voted to increase the retirement age to 67. And existing pensioners will have their payments cut because they retired younger than that.

That’s before the main bill on pensions has even reached parliament. Government documents released the day before the strike revealed that pensions will be cut by ending the link to final salaries.

Blackmail

The pressure is on for unions to call another general strike on the day that bill reaches parliament. The Troika is using its support for bailed out Greek banks to blackmail the government into bringing it forward to this month or next at the latest.

A number of other disputes are developing with more strikes expected in shipping, local government and hospitals.

And a demonstration to mark the anniversary of the 1974 Polytechnic uprising against Greece’s military dictatorship is expected to be very big. Teachers and students, angry at underfunding and understaffing in education, are likely to turn out in large numbers.

The right has tried to use the refugee crisis to attack Syriza, but they haven’t succeeded. Instead the government is under pressure from the left.

A debate is opening up about the alternatives.

When right wing governments implemented austerity, people could hope for a left government to replace them and end austerity. Now that prospect is gone, some argued that people would be disappointed and the strikes would flop. That has not been the case.

Others—in the Communist Party and the Popular Unity split from Syriza—argue that we must now go for a “real” left government. But the prospect of that happening is very remote. In electoral terms both are far too small.

People went out on strike and demonstrated despite this. They can see that workers’ own action can force the government to make a U-turn and stop implementing austerity