Gamal Abdel Nasser and the Arab Socialist Union

Again we see in this Counterpunch article no mention of Nasser and the Nasser years:


http://www.counterpunch.org/2013/07/05/the-fall-of-morsi-and-the-neocolonial-project/

We encounter the same problem as we struggle for reforms here. Our history is obliterated and as a result people always seem to think we start from square one where there has been no progressive movement to build from.

In politics the progressives foundations of the past become very important, especially when it has been severe government repression which interrupted the movements.

Just as if millions of people in this country knew that it was the "People's Front" led by Communists who won the New Deal, built the powerful industrial unions and laid the foundation for the Civil Rights and anti-Vietnam War Movements we would be in a much stronger position today. And it is the same with Gamal Abdel Nasser and the Arab Socialist Union party in Egypt. Key here, is people are being denied the information they need to win to better their lives and change how we view the world.

There is no way it is coincidental all these articles exclude mention of a leader of such importance of Gamal Abdel Nasser, and this should be of concern to everyone because it means we aren't thinking things through based on a full knowledge of history... especially if one needs to use this history as a building block.

I dealt with the editorial staffs of the Duluth News Tribune, Pioneer Press and the Minneapolis Star Tribune here in Minnesota on this very same issue the last time around in Egypt after they refused to publish a letter to the editor I wrote asking why with everything being published about Egypt dating back to the building of the pyramids and the ancient dynasties of the kings and queens of Egypt we don't hear one single word, not a mention, about Gamal Abdel Nasser and the Arab Socialist Union party. I would point out that none of these papers have ever published one single letter to the editor I submitted since and the Editorial Page Editor of the Duluth News Tribune told me in writing he has banned my letters forever.

And what the heck did Gamal Abdel Nasser ever do to get his name banished from forever being heard again or published in a newspaper? He stood up to U.S. imperialism--- crime of all crimes. That he was a founder of the Arab Socialist union party didn't leave him in such good standing either--- at least the Guardian gives those years credit, if not Nasser, for being the only years Egyptians ever had democracy.

Alan L. Maki

Egypt: What about Gamal Abdel Nasser?

When capitalism can't... Wall Street won't... the working class can.

Why does this left wing Obama supporter find it so difficult to link the struggle for jobs with the struggle for peace since anyone with an ounce of common sense understands that without a peace dividend derived from ending militarism and these dirty wars from which the Wall Street merchants of death and destruction profit so handsomely as militarism and wars kill jobs just like they kill people that there will be no jobs without peace?

Also, note that this Obama supporter fails to mention that if the United States government was financing the creation of two very much needed universal social programs--- a National Public Health Care System and a National Public Child Care System providing the American people with free health care and free child care--- over 18-million jobs would be created for a fraction of what these wars are costing us while robbing us of the universal social programs the United Nation's Universal Declaration of Human Rights declares we are entitled to by birth.

This writer tries to pull the same crap the Democrats are doing: Trying to make us believe there is no connection between:

1. Militarism and wars and job loss and job creation;

2. There is no connection between people's needs and job creation.

Not one single word is mentioned by this writer about the need for legislation which would make it mandatory for the President and Congress to work together to attain and maintain full employment with real living wage jobs.

It is rather strange we find this "leader" of the Communist Party USA who slobbers over Obama articulating the Democratic Party line bringing forward a call for jobs without so much as mentioning the need to wage a full-fledged struggle for both National Public Health Care and National Public Child Care since these used to be part of the Communist Party USA's main anti-monopoly platform which viewed Wall Street as our primary enemy because these Wall Street parasites and their bribed politicians in both the Democratic and Republican parties advanced an imperialist agenda with its never-ending wars which were viewed as job killers just like these wars kill people.

Obviously, the reforms he suggests are needed. But, let's get real here. Such reforms will do very little to put people to work with the capitalist system collapsing on a world scale--- not a stagnating economy as the over-paid pundits would have us believe--- but, a collapsing capitalist economy where austerity measures are being shoved down our throats to pay for these dirty Wall Street imperialist wars killing our jobs just like they kill people.

The writer here hides his refusal to get specific about what it will take to get unemployed and under-employed workers to work with left wing rhetoric--- some true and some nothing but capitulation to the do-nothing Democrats. This certainly is no way to lead the working class in struggle by failing to explain the nature of imperialism which is the highest and most "advanced" stage of capitalism of which massive unemployment is but one major aspect of this rotten capitalist system which has become barbaric and cannibalistic.

i invite Mr. Barile to respond since he reads my postings religiously and has quite a lot to say to others about what I write but like a coward runs from an exchange of views.

We know "capitalism can't" but what it will take to get us on the road to socialism is another matter and Mr. Barile doesn't seem to want to talk about this because it means understanding that his favorite politician, Barack Obama, is part of the problem--- not part of the solution... going on five years and no jobs program. None.

Needless to say, only a complete fool would take Sam Webb's advice about anything as Pat Barile suggests in conclusion. Webb couldn't figure out how to get a flimsy brown paper bag off his own head.

Like I say; some good points have been made. But the important points are completely missed. Specifics required to get 25-million Americans to work at living wage jobs solving the most pressing problems of the American people is completely missed.

Anyways, here is what this Obama-lover wrote recently:

When capitalism can’t

by: Pat Barile
July 3 2013

Today science stands on the cusp of developing new productive methods and capacities that will increase many fold the quantity of surplus value [privately-owned profit]. Today, there are hundreds of millions of people around the world who are and remain permanently in the "reserve army of the unemployed." Twenty-two million of these unemployed workers are in the United States alone.

The new productive capacities stemming from the developing sciences not only will increase surplus value at blinding speeds but threaten the need for and existence of human beings in the production process to create that surplus value. The reserve army of the unemployed will grow with the same intensity, and will have to organize its struggle for survival within every country and jointly, around the world.

The responsibility for the world's unemployed rests on the shoulders of the capitalist system in each country and the government and laws under which they operate.

President Franklin Delano Roosevelt once said, "When capitalism cannot provide jobs for the unemployed, then the government(s) must act before it loses the power to do so."

Capitalism cannot provide jobs for the hundreds of millions of unemployed, nor does it have any interest in doing so. Capitalism is in business to make profits, not jobs. When it needs workers, it will hire them; when it no longer needs them, it will fire them. As the new production technologies develop and the rate of production is intensified, workers will be needed for shorter and shorter periods of time.

Although capitalism cannot provide jobs for everyone who is willing, ready and able to work, we must wring out every job possible. Under the new lightening speed commodity production, fundamental changes in the economy are necessary. The old rules and relations which produce mass unemployment have to be sharply amended or replaced. Governmental processes which have always been in the control of capitalism must be redirected to meet the new production situation.

It is time for the labor movement, the unemployed, African Americans, Latinos, economists, progressives, liberals, in short, the "99 percent", to enter into a dialogue; to probe what it will take to win permanent, ongoing job-creating programs. Everyone's ideas for solutions should be discussed.

In order to change direction, it is necessary to examine and challenge the fundamentals of capitalism and make changes as they become necessary, to ensure the implementation of such job creation programs.

For example, capitalist propaganda makes the claim that it is the superior economic system. Why then, does the number of permanently unemployed continue to mount like snowflakes in a blizzard; why is it necessary for the government to continue to pump trillions of dollars into the Wall Street banking system while ever greater numbers of the "47 percent" fall into poverty. Why is it necessary for government to suppress democratic participation (example, voter suppression).

Another example is the granting of patents. Patents that cover inventions which receive public financing should be granted on the condition that the production for use and profit shall be shared with the government, and that the production takes place in the United States.

The U.S. government's budget provides billions of dollars to universities, laboratories and private industry for research and development. How long can we tolerate these jobs being sent abroad?

A good jobs creation program must contain vast reconstruction and reclamation projects. It should lay the basis for the progressive shortening of the work day and work week with higher wages. It should provide for substantial leisure time for workers and public facilities for the enjoyment of that time.

There are countless ways to discuss and develop a "new people's normal." A good place to start is by read the speech given last February at the University of Georgia by Communist Party Chair Sam Webb, entitled, "Is full employment possible under capitalism?" Webb argues, "It's hard to see where the economic dynamism and jobs are going to come from without action by the federal government, and the restructuring of the economy on a scale that only a few in Washington are ready to embrace."

It is the people's movement that will change this so that we can move forward towards full employment and a more just society.

Time Magazing... Moral Mondays: Religious Progressives Protest North Carolina Policies

I would encourage this article be widely shared.

Link: http://swampland.time.com/2013/07/01/moral-mondays-religious-progressives-protest-north-carolina-policies/

State Governments

Moral Mondays: Religious Progressives Protest North Carolina Policies

Almost every Monday since late April, hundreds of protestors have gathered in Raleigh to oppose the state’s budget cuts to unemployment benefits, healthcare funding, education, and other social benefits.

By Elizabeth Dias @elizabethjdiasJuly 01, 2013

Gerry Broome / AP

Demonstrators and NAACP-led supporters are arrested during an act of civil disobedience opposing the Republican legislature's agenda congregate at Halifax Mall outside the House and Senate chambers during "Moral Monday" protests at the General Assembly in Raleigh, N.C., Monday, June 24, 2013.


Almost every Monday since late April, hundreds of protestors have gathered at the North Carolina General Assembly in Raleigh to oppose the state’s budget cuts to unemployment benefits, healthcare funding, education, and other social benefits. Today, July 1, the “Moral Mondays” protest may break records: Thousands of people are expected, as it is the first Monday since the U.S. Supreme Court overturned parts of the Voting Rights Act and the day that some of the most severe state cuts go into effect.


Nearly 600 people have been arrested for civil disobedience in the Moral Mondays protests since they started on April 29. Last week’s protest alone drew 3,000 people, and 120 people were arrested. The protestors range from ministers to a 60-year-old seventh-grade teacher to college students to a Duke University historian. Baptist churches host worship and prayer services before the protests begin, and regional Christian radio stations are starting to cover the protests.


Moral Monday protestors are liberal in bent, unhappy with the conservative policies their Republican-controlled legislature has enacted so far this year. A new law goes into effect Monday that pulls extended unemployment benefits from over 70,000 North Carolinians. The legislature opted out of the Affordable Care Act’s Medicaid expansion provision that would have covered an additional 500,000 people, and repealed the state’s earned income tax credit, which will now expire at the end of this year. It also appealed the Racial Justice Act, which allowed people on death row to argue that racial bias influenced their trial.


State Republican leaders have largely dismissed the Moral Mondays. Governor Pat McCrory waited five weeks before commenting about them, and then stated that he is not interested in meeting with the group, whom he called “outsiders” who were trying “to do to us what they did to Scott Walker in Wisconsin.” Republican State Senator Thom Goolsby dubbed the protests “Moron Mondays” in an op-ed for the Chatham Journal. He later said he was just joking. Police records indicate that 98% of people arrested are actually from North Carolina.


The man behind the Moral Mondays movement, Rev. William Barber II, president of the North Carolina NAACP and a Disciples of Christ minister, says he is undeterred.  The Moral Mondays are the result of seven years of progressive organizing for a new Southern ‘fusion politics’—a new multi-ethnic, multi-religious coalition with an anti-racist, anti-poverty agenda. Their goal, he continues, is “to directly attack the old divisions of the white southern strategy and what we believe were the shortcomings of the so-called Christian evangelical right that limits issues in the public square to things like prayer in school, abortion, and gender issues.”


His goals are bigger than just changing policies and looking toward the 2014 election. Barber believes the South is in the middle of what he calls the “third reconstruction.” Changing demographics in America, and state battles over voting rights laws, he claims, echo both the first reconstruction, which was voting rights for African Americans after the civil war, and the second reconstruction, which was the Civil Rights movement. A new southern strategy must, he says, be “rooted in the idea of the deep moral issues about faith, our constitution, anti-racism, anti-poverty, that can break open the solid south and put holes in it so that we expand the electorate, we expand the discourse, we destroy the myth that when you hurt entitlements you only hurt certain folk.”
Barber, 49, sees North Carolina as a necessary test case. Republicans won both houses of the General Assembly in 2010 for the first time in more than a century, and the state that swung from President Obama in 2008 to Mitt Romney in 2012. “[Republicans] believe if they can get away with this in a progressive, southern state, then it pours water on the aspirations of the rest of the southern states,” Barber says. Barber has a masters degree from Duke Divinity School and a doctorate in Public Policy and Pastoral Care from Drew University, and he worked on Jesse Jackson’s 1984 presidential campaign.


Local Catholic, Episcopal, Lutheran, Presbyterian, and United Methodist leaders issued a joint statement in early June supporting the Moral Mondays purpose, if not their means of civil disobedience. Their concern, the faith leaders explain, is “not an act of political partisanship”—instead “it is a matter of faith with respect to our understanding of the biblical teachings and imperatives to protect the poor, respect the stranger, care for widows and children and love our neighbors (Isaiah 10:1‐2, Hebrews 13:2, James 1:27, Matthew 22:39, Galatians 5:14).”

Elizabeth Dias @elizabethjdias

Elizabeth is a writer-reporter in TIME's Washington bureau. Follow her on Twitter @elizabethjdias

Read more: http://swampland.time.com/2013/07/01/moral-mondays-religious-progressives-protest-north-carolina-policies/#ixzz2Y05yz17k

North Carolina crowd roars back at governor: "Wrong! Wrong! Wrong!!"

by: Tim Wheeler

July 2 2013

tags: workers rights, coalitions, activism, solidarity, poverty, jobless benefits, Medicaid, voter supression

RALEIGH, N.C.----Nearly 5,000 protestors at a "Moral Monday" rally, July 1, roared disapproval of North Carolina governor Pat McCrory's decision to terminate federal jobless benefits for 70,000 unemployed workers in the Tarheel State that same morning.
The Rev. William Barber, President of the North Carolina NAACP, main sponsor of the protests, accused McCrory of a "bald-faced lie" in claiming that accepting federal funds to extend unemployment compensation would cost the state.
"Zero is the amount of dollars it would have cost this state," Barber thundered. "70,000 unemployed workers lost their benefits at 12:01 this morning. Now they have to worry how they are going to pay for their medicine, pay for food, pay the rent." 
An additional 100,000 jobless workers in the state will lose their unemployment benefits in the coming months even though North Carolina ranks 5^th in the nation in unemployment, he said.
Added Barber, "The hurt you are doing to unemployed people is wrong. The hurt you are doing to voters is wrong!" The crowd roared back, "Wrong! Wrong! Wrong!"
The rooftop porch of the nearby General Assembly building was packed with legislators and their aides listening to the rally speakers on a day of intermittent rain and flash flood warnings. As the rally began, the sun burst through.
Barber also blasted McCrory for rejecting Medicaid funding under Obamacare, stripping 500,000 low-income people in North Carolina of their only health coverage.
Barber recalled that Republican leaders described the Voting Rights Act as a "headache" even as they pushed through voter ID requirements that civil rights advocates term "a poll tax by another name."
Barber listed the martyrs who died to win the right to vote, from Medgar Evers to the Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr. "Too much Blood has been lost, too many tears," he said. "If you think you have a headache now, just try to take away our voting rights. We're going to fight them because they are wrong. We're going to register everybody, get them to the polls like never before."
The crowd chanted, "Not one step back."
Rabbi Judy Schindler of Temple Beth El in Charlotte reminded the crowd that 600,000 poor children in North Carolina will be hurt by the cutbacks. She hailed the movement of many religious faiths, of all races and genders that is fighting back.
Javan Richardson, a 9^th grader from Rocky Mount, recited lines from the Gospel according to Matthew, "For I was hungry and you gave me nothing to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me nothing to drink, I was a stranger and you did not invite me in...." The crowd cheered.
Yara Allen, a leader of the Rocky Mount NAACP, pointed at the General Assembly building. "If there is no justice in our house, there should be no peace in that house over there. We will take this to the polls in the next election." Six hundred people have been arrested in civil disobedience protests since the Moral Monday actions began.
Later, Allen told the World "I've been coming to these rallies since they began and it has just grown bigger each week. We've been out in the rain, when tornadoes were forecast. Today they predicted flash floods. Nothing will stop us. We're here to stay.
She added, "We have become a family over the weeks. We are united across party lines, racial lines, religious lines. We are not going to be diverted by their divide-and-conquer tactics."
At this Monday's action, there were union members in their caps and jackets with placards upholding union organizing rights---Communications Workers of America (CWA), Service Employees (SEIU), Electrical Workers (UE). Many physicians who denounced cutbacks in Medicaid wore their white hospital smocks with stethoscopes around their necks. Teachers in the crowd held signs protesting the drive by to privatize public schools in the state. And many in the crowd were campaigning against "fracking" and demanding safe energy and clean air and water.
Harvey Smith told the World he has been unable to find steady work since he moved to North Carolina 23 years ago. He and his wife survive on his unemployment compensation. "After that runs out, I'll have to take early retirement and live on Social Security," he said.
The governor also reduced the maximum of those still receiving benefits from $535 per week to $350 a week. He slashed the amount workers are allowed to earn on part time jobs from $156 per week to $70 per week. He reduced the duration of benefits from 26 weeks to as little as 12 weeks.
Smith pointed out that North Carolina's Budget Director is the notorious Art Pope, owner of hundreds of variety stores in the region, a billionaire who also serves on the board of directors of Koch Industries. McCrory and Pope inflict maximum suffering on the poor while showering giveaways on their wealthy cronies, Smith charged.
Duke University historian, Dr. Timothy Tyson, scorned Republicans who think the people's movement is a "sinking ship." Said Tyson, "They are wrong. The ship that is sinking is the creaky old ship of white supremacy." The new ship of multiracial unity "is bound for glory. Get on board," he said. "There's room for many a more."
Photo: Tim Wheeler, Peoplesworld.org

-- 

Alan L. Maki

Director of Organizing,

Midwest Casino Workers Organizing Council

58891 County Road 13

Warroad, Minnesota 56763

Phone: 218-386-2432

Cell: 651-587-5541

Primary E-mail: amaki000@centurytel.net

E-mail: alan.maki1951mn@gmail.com

Blog: http://thepodunkblog.blogspot.com/

Let the bullets fly: War is a great business

http://www.phillyburbs.com/news/local/courier_times_news/opinion/oped/let-the-bullets-fly-war-is-a-great-business/article_96f67504-7b23-58f0-b593-110d5826cd71.html

Let the bullets fly: War is a great business

By Mike Krauss

Bucks County Courier Times

Defense contractors and Wall Street banks have been among the biggest winners in the nearly 12 years the United States has been at war in Afghanistan, Iraq, Pakistan, Yemen, Somalia, Libya and now Syria. Maybe the only winners.

And it seems the “Freedom Loving” peoples we support are not actually all that Freedom Loving; more like “Being-in-Control Loving.” All the American people and our armed forces have to show for the enormous sacrifice of blood and treasure is a tangle of vengeful ethnic, tribal and religious homicide and no really dependable allies.

We didn’t even get the oil in Iraq. China did. But maybe we’ll have a shot at the “rare earth” minerals that the Defense Department has mapped in Afghanistan. Or at least the Wall Street banks will get to launder the money from the opium trade.

The losers are more easily identified: the American dead and wounded and an estimated 220,000 men, women and children dead and several times that wounded , the overwhelming majority of whom were innocent of any aggression and posed no threat to the security of the United States. [Note: Counts of dead and wounded are contested. I selected the lower range of counts by the Non Governmental Organizations (NGOs) that I consider most trustworthy. U.S government counts are a widely disparaged undercount.]

Civilians continue to die under drone strikes and rules of engagement that label anybody, anywhere near one of our targets as an “enemy combatant,” to justify the deaths.

Great way to win hearts and minds.

The president has recently wrung his hands over these tactics and shared with the American people how troubled he is by the tough decisions he makes. But there is no indication that he will not go right on doing as he has.

So get ready, Syria, for help from the Freedom Loving U.S. administration and Congress. It is being carefully orchestrated. Sen. John McCain — who apparently never met a war he didn’t like — is leading the charge in the Congress, doing as he did in the run up to Libya, posing for photo ops with the Freedom Loving “rebels,” who included at least one known Al-Qaeda operative.

McCain’s valor and patriotism are beyond question. His judgment is not. You remember Al-Qaeda? Terrorists. The enemy.

But apparently not when they are on our side for the moment, as they were when the U.S. wanted to push the Soviets out of Afghanistan and we armed and trained them.

The politics of never ending war makes strange bedfellows.

The president seemed to be resisting the war drums. But this is the Obama hallmark, seeming to be doing one thing while actually doing another.

It is known American forces are on the ground in Syria: CIA and Special Forces. But in the recent White House announcement that the U.S. will be sending “direct military aid” to the Freedom Loving Syrians, the wording does not mention “troops.”

In fact, the statement offered almost no description of or limit to what that aid might be. There is suspicion that the White House is waiting for the right pretext to send in the troops; like maybe the day after our formerly evil but now allies in Syria tell us about some terrible things the Syrian “regime” is doing to innocent civilians.

We are told the Syrian government used a chemical weapon, and crossed a “red line.” Maybe they did. I have no idea anymore what information from our government can be trusted.

But other nations also have red lines. After the U.S. announcement, Iran announced it was sending 4,000 troops to support the Syrian government. Great.

War is a tough business. Supplying and financing war, on the other hand, is a great business and there is an army of patriotic lobbyists ready to man the barricades in Congress against the ruthless advocates of peace.

Let the bullets fly!

--
Circulated by:

Alan L. Maki

Director of Organizing,

Midwest Casino Workers Organizing Council

58891 County Road 13

Warroad, Minnesota 56763

Phone: 218-386-2432

Cell: 651-587-5541

Primary E-mail: amaki000@centurytel.net

E-mail: alan.maki1951mn@gmail.com

Blog: http://thepodunkblog.blogspot.com/

Sometimes I feel like I'm caught in a huge web.

It's only a few people who profit from the existing state of affairs. For most people, the "status quo" means being trapped in a massive web and to them it seems like a hopeless task attempting to break free; but as people begin to seek out solutions to their predicament together they become empowered to take action together. It isn't as easy as it seems it would be to free ourselves from this web that has us trapped, but it isn't that difficult either once people are in motion and more and more people figure out what it takes--- united action--- to escape the clutches of these parasites waiting to suck the last drop of blood from us.

Kieth Ellison a friend and ally of labor? Don't make me puke.

https://www.facebook.com/events/1376723425876972/?fref=ts

The Trans-Pacific Partnership is the largest free trade agreement the US has ever attempted to negotiate. So called "free trade agreements" have been nothing more than one more tool by which corporations manipulate government to deregulate themselves and consolidate their power. Fortunately, we have a very strong ally in Congress in Rep. Keith Ellison. Unfortunately, very few people are even aware that TPP negotiations are expected to come to a head THIS YEAR. Help Keith get the word out by joining us for this public forum to learn what the TPP is, what it will do, and how we can fight back! Keith will be joined by Josh Wise of the MN Fair Trade Coalition, Jim Harkness of the Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy, and Richard K Ryan of the International Association of Machinists.
-------------------------------------

I like the way Democrats said Ford Rangers would never be imported back into this country after they allowed the St. Paul Ford Twin Cities Assembly Plant to be shut down after tax-payers subsidized the operation to the hilt only to learn they were subsidizing Ford building a state of the art plant in Thailand to produce the Ford Ranger and the Democrats and the UAW and the USW and Sierra Club along with the St. Paul Green Party tried to hide the fact Ford had built a new Ranger Plant in Thailand. Now along comes the Ford Motor Company as one of the major pushers to get Thailand included in the Trans-Pacific Partnership.

Two-thousand good paying union jobs and a fully integrated workforce that took years of fighting the racist Ford management to achieve--- all flushed down the sewer into the Mississippi River because Democrats refused to support any efforts to save the plant and hydro dam as an industrial unit.

Where will two-thousand good paying union jobs ever come from in a state where the MN DFL has a super-majority and they leave the state's minimum wage at $6.25 an hour while refusing to enforce Affirmative Action on billion-dollar public works projects?

Come on Keith Ellison tell us about all those good jobs Democrats are going to bring to Minnesota.

This is obviously nothing but one more act under the big-top put on by a clown whose only intent is to continue hoodwinking people just like Obama has done--- with your unwavering support.

Now, like a circus clown, you are putting on a show to distract us from the next act which is--- war in Syria.

In case you missed the struggle to save the St. Paul Ford Twin Cities Assembly Plant like Keith Ellison and these other Democrats did; check this out:

http://capitalistglobalization.blogspot.com/

Working people don't have a "strong ally" in Kieth Ellison for anything. If we did, 44,000 Minnesotans wouldn't be working in the Indiana Gaming Industry's loud, noisy, smoke-filled casinos at poverty wages and without any rights under state or federal labor laws while a bunch of rich white mobsters who own the slot machines run off with all the profits leaving Native American Indians drowning in poverty-causing debt... and two-thousand Ford workers would still have their jobs and workers would be protected from lockouts and scabbing and we would have a real living Minimum Wage and "At-Will Employment" would be a thing of the past and we wouldn't have a billion-dollar Viking Stadium and a billion-dollar bridge over the St. Croix River being built without the enforcement of Affirmative Action at a time when racist unemployment and its accompanying poverty is sky high.

"Obama will understand protests against his visit."

"Obama will understand protests against his visit," says South African President Jacob Zuma.

But, the real question is:

Will the American people understand that these protests are anti-imperialist protests taking place because Obama is the major proponent of Wall Street's imperialist agenda?

Here is how one publication has pitched this story but how many people in the United States will ever see what is transpiring in South Africa reported in this straightforward manner:

COMING from one of the oldest democratic states, US President Barack Obama will not be surprised to see protests in South Africa against his visit, President Jacob Zuma said on Monday, defending the right of dissenting voices within the country’s diverse political spectrum, including his party’s alliance partners.

Some trade unions, political parties and civil society bodies on Sunday condemned Mr Obama’s upcoming visit to South Africa in a joint statement.

The organisations said: "We categorically make it known that the visit of the US president to South Africa is an unwelcome visit that will be protested, picketed and resisted by all justice and peace-loving peoples of this country."

The statement was issued by the National Unions of Metalworkers of South Africa, the South African Communist Party, the Young Communist League of South Africa, the South African Students’ Congress, the Muslim Students’ Association, the National Education, Health and Allied Workers’ Union, the Congress of South African Trade Unions, the Friends of Cuba Society, Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions against Israel in South Africa, and the World Federation of Trade Unions.

"Friendship with South Africa must be based on values of justice, freedom and equality, and these the US has offended, undermined and ridiculed through its actions in the global front," they said.

Mr Zuma was addressing the South African National Editors’ Forum as president of the African National Congress in a series of monthly briefings organised by the party. He said that although it was unfortunate to welcome a guest in this manner, peaceful protests were allowed and were a legitimate way, in a democracy, to express people’s different views.

Will we hear about these protests against Obama in South Africa from our mainstream media?

COSATU Calls on All Workers to Actively Participate in the Coming Protests Against US President Barack Obama`s Visit to South Africa

 

Congress of South African Trade Unions

June 20, 2013

 

COSATU joins the millions of people and workers the world over, particularly on the African continent and in South Africa, who are outraged at the horrifying record of US foreign policy in the world. We are particularly disappointed by the Obama administration`s record in continuing the appalling US foreign policy performance as per the following indicators, amongst others;

 

• The militarisation of international relations for the multinational companies and their profit-seeking classes in the US, as evidently manifested in the role of the US in world affairs. For instance, just before the April 14 Presidential elections in Venezuela, RT News reported on a Wikileaks Cable from 2006 in which, in the words of RT, then "ambassador to Venezuela, William Brownfield, outlines a comprehensive plan to infiltrate and destabilize former President Hugo Chavez` government," including through programs of the USAID and its Office of Transition Initiatives (OTI). On May Day, Bolivian President Evo Morales informed the U.S. Embassy in Bolivia that he wanted USAID to leave Bolivia because he (quite reasonably) suspected USAID of trying to subvert his own government as well.
• Linda J. Bilmes and Michael D. Intriligator, ask in a recent paper, "How many wars is the US fighting today?" they then proceed to answer the question by saying that, "today US military operations are involved in scores of countries across all the five continents. The US military is the world`s largest landlord, with massive military facilities in nations around the world, and with a significant presence in Bahrain, Djibouti,Turkey, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Iraq, Afghanistan, Kosovo, and Kyrgyzstan, in addition to long-established bases in Germany, Japan, South Korea, Italy, and the UK. Some of these are vast, such as the Al Udeid Air Force Base in Qatar, the forward headquarters of the United States Central Command, which has recently been expanded to accommodate up to 10,000 troops and 120 aircraft".
• It must also be further noted that, there are Special Operations forces in different countries, which are largely responsible for the destabilisation of various countries and communities. Jeremy Scahill in Dirty Wars: The World is a Battlefield, writes, "By mid-2010, the Obama administration had increased the presence of Special Operations forces from 60 countries to 74 countries". The world is literally a battlefield with conflicts being waged by the US (or with the "help" of the US). And, no country is off-limits to US military forces.
• US Africa Command (AFRICOM) is said to be involved in direct or indirect military-to-military relationships with 54 African countries.

 

The devastating result of all these is that we see the intensification of;

 

• The Brutal occupation of Palestine by the Israeli apartheid state, with the full support of the US and the EU, together with their Middle East puppet regimes
• The Continued jailing of the 5 (now 4) Cuban heroes in US jails for their role in fighting terrorism against the Cuban people
• The Continued existence of the Guantanamo Bay prison, which has been condemned by various international bodies, including Amnesty International and Nobel laureates as very inhumane and in contravention of international law
• The ruthless and savage looting of our natural resources by US and other multinational companies in close collaboration with corrupt elites in various countries
• The US support for oppressive regimes that benefit US narrow interests
• US aggressive opposition to climate justice and ways to end global warming and destruction of our environment, in pursuit of narrow profit interests
• US policies that perpetuate unequal and exploitative trade relations and underdevelopment in Africa and the rest of the developing world
• US policies of nuclear proliferation and arming of space to the detriment of peace, justice, democracy and human rights.

 

In this regard, COSATU fully supports and actively participate in the growing global and national movement for peace, justice, human rights, environmental justice and the right to development for all.

 

We call on all workers, communities and activists, particularly working with our alliance partners, the SACP and the ANC, as well as the various progressive civil society formations, to join the announced activities throughout the country, to demand an end to US warmongering and for a new foreign policy based on respect for human dignity and justice for the people of the world, including the people of the US itself.

 

The world-wide struggle against imperialism must be intensified and the people of Africa must lead the struggle to reclaim their natural resources and rise against oppressive dictators of various kinds that undermine their developmental and democratic aspirations for a better world. This means building progressive and popular working class alternatives to the crisis and failures of capitalism and dictatorship.

 

A new and just world is not only possible, but necessary NOW!

 

 

 

Coalition Group Plans Anti-Obama Demonstrations

 

    Cosatu backs `NObama' coalition's protests plan

 

By Karl Gernetzky

Business Day (South Africa)

June 24, 2013   

 

Successive US presidents have presided over increasing militarisation of the country's foreign policy, and mass protests over US President Barack Obama's state visit this week will seek to "persuade and influence" the South African government to challenge how the US acts in the global community.

 

This is according to a coalition of groups planning mass protests against Mr Obama's state visit, part of a three-country African tour that includes Senegal and Tanzania.

 

Speaking in Johannesburg on Sunday, Congress of South African Trade Unions (Cosatu) Gauteng chairman Phutas Tseki said "progressive forces" in South Africa would unite to reject the "unwelcome visit".

 

"Friendship with South Africa must be based on valued justice, freedom and equality and these the US has offended, undermined and ridiculed through its actions in the global front," said Mr Tseki.

 

The group, which also includes, among others, the South African Communist Party, student organisations, Friends of Cuba Society and Boycott, Disinvestment and Sanctions against Israel, has planned a "national day of action" on Friday, when Mr Obama lands in South Africa.

 

They will march from the Union Buildings to the US embassy in Pretoria. Other protests are planned for Friday outside the University of Johannesburg, and in Lenasia.

 

The group has cited, among other things, US economic sanctions on Cuba, failure by the US to act on climate change and the continued existence of the Guantanamo Bay prison. The group on Sunday demanded the disbanding of the US's African Command, which has about 5,000 personnel mostly based at its German headquarters and in Djibouti in the Horn of Africa.

 

This is Mr Obama's second trip to sub-Saharan Africa having visited Ghana during his first term.

 

In a transcript of a briefing given on the visit last Friday, US deputy national security adviser Ben Rhodes said trade and investment as well as democracy and democratic institution building would be part of the agenda.

 

He said the trip "ultimately disproves the notion that we are somehow securitising the relationship with Africa" as the focus was on "broader agenda and the fundamental interconnection between democracy, development and security".

 

Deputy International Relations and Co-operation Minister Ebrahim Ebrahim said the strength of South Africa's political and economic relations with the US spoke of the importance of the visit, adding that in terms of the protests South Africa is a "democratic country and anyone who wants to protest for whatever reason can do so".

 

The visit was likely to focus on regional issues and continental issues, such as stimulating trade and investment, he said.

 

The Democratic Alliance has called on International Relations and Co-operation Minister Maite Nkoana-Mashabane to distance herself and the government from Cosatu's planned anti-Obama demonstrations, saying that the protests were "cheap political point scoring" and "an embarrassment".

 

The Muslim Lawyers Association had requested the National Prosecuting Authority issue an arrest warrant for Mr Obama, based on the use of drones for targeted killings, however this had been turned down and indication had also been given than an investigation would not be initiated during Mr Obama's visit.

 

 

Campaign to Protest USA Foreign Policy during the State Visit of President Barak Obama

 

South African Communist Party (SACP)

June 19, 2013

 

 

 

We as South Africans in the form of the South African Communist Party (SACP), the Young Communist League of South Africa (YCL), the South African Students Congress (SASCO), the Muslim Students Association(MSA), the National Education, Health and Allied Workers Union (NEHAWU), the Congress of South African Trade Unions (COSATU), Friend of Cuba Society (FOCUS), Boycott, Divestment and Sanctionsagainst Israel in South Africa (BDS South African), and the World Federation of Trade Unions (WFTU), declare our utmost rejection of visit of the United States of America President, Barak Obama to our country.

 

Our rejection is based the USA`s arrogant, selfish and oppressive foreignpolicies, treatment of workers and international trade relations that are rooted in war mongering, neo-liberal super-exploitation, colonial racism and the disregard and destruction of the environment, thus making the realisation of a just and peaceful world impossible.

 

The coming of President Barak Obama to South Africa is the first ever since he was elected head of state. The USA under his leadership has escalated its assault on human rights, militarisation of international relations and continuing galloping of world resources at the absolute expense of the environment and oppressed peoples of the world.

 

The USA is deeply implicated in the oppression of the people of Western Sahara, the only remaining colonised country on the African continent,colonised by Morocco. And to this day, the release of the Cuban Five and a continuing baseless embargo against the country and peoples of Cuba still seems unmovable issues of commitment for the USA. The call for therelease of the Cuban Five has been an important international campaignsupported even by Nobel Prize winners who released a document calling on their freedom; Zhores Alferov (Nobel Prize for Physics, 2000), Desmond Tutu (Nobel Peace Prize, 1984), Nadine Gordimer (Nobel Prize in Literature, 1991), Rigoberta Menchú (Nobel Peace Prize, 1992), Adolfo Pérez Esquivel (Nobel Peace Prize, 1980), Wole Soyinka (Nobel Prize in Literature, 1986), José Saramago (Nobel Prize in Literature, 1996), Günter Grass (Nobel Prize in Literature, 1999).

 

The criminal occupation of Palestine by the Apartheid State of Israel, as awell-known fact in our country, has only been made possible by the USA`s financial and political support for the Racist Israeli regime. This is expressed in the main, through both its open support and military donations that come to billions of dollars every year - with USA aid to Israel being more than that of Africa, Latin America and Asia combined.

 

In addition, the USA has for years been singlehandedly blocking any progress and is totally divorced and isolated from the consensus of the international community. In fact, the USA is the most frequent user of the UN veto: it has used its veto power over 40 times to defend Apartheid Israel. As South Africans, we painfully recall how the US used its veto power to defend Apartheid South Africa, particularly from UN resolutions imposing economic and military sanctions. The USA, under Regan and others, suported Apartheid South Africa and was on the wrong side of history. Why does the USA not learn from its history, and be on the right side of history this time?

 

Finally, the United States` policies on the environment, specifically the fact that it is one of the largest contributors to global warming, yet to this day continues to refuse the observing and singing of the Kyoto protocol, is simply unacceptable.

 

Progressive forces in South Africa have consistently been raising theseissues and many others regarding the role of the USA in the global community. We categorically make it known, that the visit of the USA President to South Africa is an unwelcomed visit that will be protested, picketed and resisted by all justice and peace-loving peoples of this country. Friendship with South Africa must be based on values of justice, freedom and equality and these the USA has offended, undermined and ridiculed through its actions in the global front.

 

The following issues will be highlighted in upcmoing protests of PresidentBarak Obama:

 

1. The championing and maintenance, by the USA, in the militarisation of international relations and co-operation. It is a well-known fact that the USA approaches conflicts in the world through inciting, encouraging as well and championing war, primarily driven by its business interests often masqueraded in the language of defence of human rights. The militarisation of international relations is in the main exemplified by institutions like Africom, NATO, and the continuing double standards around nuclear disarmament that the USA preaches when it comes to countries in the South, whilst continuing to collaborate with on nuclearweapones with Israel.

 

2. The continued greed in the guzzling of world resources by the USA epitomised by its encouragement and support of its multinational companies that have no regard for the environment, human rights,progressive labour laws etc.

 

3. The USA`s active support and defence of colonial and oppressive regimes. This is the one aspect of USA foreign policy that most exposes its hypocritical character where regimes that support its interest are never opposed; instead they are not only supported but maintained through amongst other things, the USA war machinery. Chief amongst these is Israel, which continues to serve as the USA`s frontline state in the Middle-East whilst suppressing and maintaining its racist apartheid policies on Palestinian people. Another example, is the USA`s support to Morrocco, that is oppressiing and colonialally occuppying Western Sahara, and increasingly the support of oppressive regimes like the onein Colombia.

 

4. The USA`s role maintaining the underdevelopment of the African continent and its imperialistinc trade realtions with African countries.

 

5. The unjustifiable bloacke on Cuba and unfair imprisonment of the Cuban 5.

 

6. The United States of America is the single largest contributor to global warming which is condemning the world into catastrophic environmental disasters.

 

Key Programs

 

Members of the public are invited to participate in a National Day of Actionon the 28th of June, with a primary event taking place in the form of a protestmarch from Union Building to the United States of America Embassy in Pretoria: Date: 28 June, 2013, Friday - 10h00