Catalan politics has seemed for a long time like a contest of figure skating on ice in slow motion. The actors are moving very slowly, offering their best smiles to accompany their better pirouettes. First, the date and the question. Afterwards, the long preparation of the consultation. Then, the signing of the decree calling the 9N vote. After this, the agonizing debate on the call for elections. And so on.
“Neither the 13th nor the 15th represent us”
16 March 2015, byOn Friday 13 March and Sunday 15 March, Brazil saw two mass mobilizations across the country. Over a million people took to the streets. The first was called by the governing Workers’ Party (PT) and its supporters to counter the second, organized by a number of right-wing forces seeking to take advantage of governmental disarray and call for the removal of President Dilma Rousseff. The crisis in government has been caused by a vast and still unfolding corruption scandal involving the state-controlled oil company, Petrobras, and most of the mainstream political parties – especially the PT and its coalition allies – coupled with a sharp downturn in the economy and austerity measures, which are turning Brazil’s “emerging economy” into what some are calling a “submerging economy”. The following editorial by Insurgencia was published two days before the pro-government demonstrations.
Frank Fried (1927-2015)
15 March 2015Frank Fried, among the most remarkable U.S. revolutionary socialists in the second half of the 20th century, passed away in Alameda, CA on January 13, 2015 at the age of 87. He is survived by his wife of 27 years, the novelist Alice Wilson-Fried.
Year-end Snap Election and Political Situation
14 March 2015, byAs expected, the general election of December 14, 2014 gave an absolute majority of the seats again to the ruling coalition of Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) and Komei Party. LDP got 291 seats and Komei Party got 35 seats out of the total of 475 seats. The biggest opposition, Democratic Party (DP) got only 73 seats.
“What we want to socialize is the possibility that we are all happy”
14 March 2015, byWhen the results of the internal elections in Podemos were announced in mid-February Miguel Urban had lost in Madrid by only 5 per cent (49.88% against 44.44%) to the candidate of Pablo Iglesias, Luis Alegre. However as first alternate on the list of European deputies he has now taken a seat in Brussels following the resignation of Teresa Rodriguez, also of Anticapitalistas, who won the election in Andalucia to be Podemos candidate for the regional elections on 22nd of March and thus resigned to devote herself to that campaign.
The vote, in these elections, on “open lists”, and thus for individuals not only for one list, thus allowed 16 members of the Urbán list to be elected, alongside 18 for the winning list, to sit in the Citizens’ Council of the Madrid region. The individual with the highest number of votes was in fact not the candidate of Iglesias but a member of the Urbán list, the actor San Juan!
Priests fill the political void on the left
14 March 2015, byWith the left by and large failing to provide political leadership in the critical political situation that has developed in Mexico following the kidnapping of 43 students in Iguala, Guerrero and the “white house” scandal surrounding President Enrique Peña Nieto, Catholic priests have been attempting to fill the void. Several Catholic priests—Padre Gregorio (Goyo) López, Padre Alejandro Solalinde Guerra, and Archbishop Raúl Vera most prominent among them—have in different ways been playing the role of spokespersons for the oppressed. These priests have been speaking out against government corruption and the politicians’ links to the drug cartels, defending local armed self-defense organizations, demanding an investigation into the role of the Mexican Army, and even calling for a constituent assembly to refound the country on a new and more democratic basis.
Jobs, Ecology, and Survival
13 March 2015, byThis article is based on the paper given by the author at Historical Materialism 2014 in London as part of a stream on Ecology.
Women Under the Gun, 2015
12 March 2015, byIn the United States, as elsewhere, a woman’s body is not her own. The evidence of the video-gone-viral of a woman walking in New York City, capturing the remarks that men felt they had the right to make as she passed, is a case in point. College campuses are also a hunting ground for sexual predators, as women come forward to disclose various forms of date rape.
Pushing Back Civil Rights
11 March 2015, by“If, in 2014, we’re still making ‘white savior movies’ then it’s just lazy and unfortunate. We’ve grown up as a country and cinema should be able to reflect what’s true. And what’s true is that black people are the center of their own lives and should tell their own stories from their own perspectives.” — Ava DuVernay speaking to the Boston Globe (January 3, 2015) in response to criticism of her treatment of President Johnson in her film, Selma.
“In spite of Obama’s debt to the civil-rights movement, the ideal of American exceptionalism is only as valid as the standing of people who have just as often been seen as exceptions to America.” — Jelani Cobb in his column for the New Yorker (January 26, 2015), “A president and a King.”
Something That Might Be Called Neocon:" Hillary Clinton & Corporate Feminism
10 March 2015, byAssuming Hillary Clinton runs for president in 2016, much of her popular support will be based on her image as an advocate of women’s rights. During her 2008 candidacy, the National Organization of Women (NOW) endorsed Clinton based on her “long history of support for women’s empowerment.” A group of 250 academics and activists calling themselves “Feminists for Clinton” praised her “powerful, inspiring advocacy of the human rights of women” and her “enormous contributions” as a policymaker. Since then, NOW and other mainstream women’s organizations have been eagerly anticipating her 2016 candidacy. Clinton and supporters have recently stepped up efforts to portray her as a champion of both women’s and LGBT rights.