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Nepali Congress leader Pradip Giri, a noted socialist thinker, passed away on Saturday night.

He was 74.

He passed away at around 9:30pm, Dr Pankaj Barman, a senior consultant and medical oncologist at Nepal Mediciti Hospital who had been attending to Giri, told the Post. He was also battling a last-stage cancer. Pneumonia from which he had been suffering led to multi-organ failure.

Giri was admitted to Nepal Mediciti Hospital in Lalitpur last month after he returned from India after treatment for cancer.

Earlier on Saturday, a statement by his family said Giri underwent immunotherapy a week back to boost his immune system.

However, he has now developed massive pneumonia, which has further compromised his health, resulting in multiple organ failure, the statement read.

Giri, a longtime Congress leader, worked closely with the late BP Koirala. He was highly influenced by the socialist movement in India led by Jayprakash Narayan and Ram Manohar Lohiya.

He was known as a fearless leader, not afraid of criticising his own party and the leadership and never hesitating to offer opposing and unpopular views.

He was a two-time member of the Constituent Assembly, which drafted the Constitution of Nepal 2015.

He, however, refused to sign the document, saying the process was flawed and the constitution failed to address the concerns of various sections of the societyTharus, Madheshis and Janajatis.

He had his sympathy for those who were protesting against the constitution-writing process even as top leaders of his party rushed to finalise the document.

A seasoned orator, Giri was well-versed in Marxism, often putting some communists, who claim to follow Marxist ideology, to shame.

He won the 2017 parliamentary elections from Siraha-1.

Giri, who started his political career in the early 1960s from the Nepali Congress, was also known for his simplicity, candor and wide-ranging erudition.

He never held any position of benefit.

Leaders from across the political spectrum expressed their condolences, hailing Giri as a veteran thinker, philosopher, socialist, intellect and an epitome of a leader who showed how politicians should lead a simple life.

We lost one of the brightest, most intellectual and profound thinkers of contemporary politics, said Ghanshyam Bhusal, a CPN-UML leader. A towering figure of our age committed to socialism.

Giri had a good grasp of Marxism too and was widely regarded as an intellectual who could explain Marxism to ordinary minds.

His [Giris] socialist view was different from others because he grounded socialism and Marxism philosophies in the Nepali context. A rare breed indeed, Bhusal told the Post. He was a true Gandhain someone really inspired by Indian socialist leaders like Jayaprakash Narayan, Ram Manohar Lohia and the like.

A student of economics and philosophy, Giri led a simple life, according to politicians who have known him for long.

He repeatedly refused the ministerial posts offered to him.

Such a gifted orator he was that every time he spoke in Parliament, he held parliamentarians spellbound. He was one of the most sought-after politicians by television anchors.

He has written over a dozen books on economics, women, philosophy and Marxism.

Deep Kumar Upadhyay, a Congress leader who is a former Nepali ambassador to India and a longtime friend of Giris, said that an era of value-based politics has ended with Giris death.

When the incumbent Congress-led government offered to pay for his hospital charges, Giri refused, said one Nepali Congress leader, highlighting the value-based politics Giri believed in.

Before he was admitted to Nepal Mediciti Hospital, Giri was admitted to a hospital in Mumbai, India.

Despite being born in a rich family, he lived a very simple life, Upadhyay said. He was well-versed in Marxism, socialism, and social democracy. He could speak on literature to economics impromptu. A vastly knowledgeable person, he was highly regarded not only in Nepal but also India.

According to Upadhyay, Giri was one leader who always played the opposition role in the Congress, questioning the leadership and keeping them on their toes.

For a long time, Giri had built an image of an anti-Koirala leader in the Nepali Congress because of his rebellious political nature.

When the Congress split in 2002, Giri supported the Nepali Congress (Democratic) formed by Sher Bahadur Deuba.

Giri chose to remain with Deuba because both of them came from the Krishna Prasad Bhattarai camp, according to Congress leaders.

Those who knew Giri said that he had a very good understanding of world politics from the labour movement to how social democracy is functioning around the globe.

Giri was equally well-informed about the contemporary global trends, where the labour movement stands, and whether social democracy is functioning well or not, said Bhusal, the UML leader known for his interpretation of Marxism. The best thing about Giri is he looked at them and interpreted them from different angles. That kind of analytical brain we hardly find in Nepali politicians.

Despite being such a great thinker and an upright politician, Giri did have some flaws, leaders close to him say.

He understood the problems in Nepali politics and would not hesitate to explain them, but he did little to address those issues, according to leaders.

In multiple interviews, Giri would say that he chose not to become a minister because he wouldnt be able to solve the problems he was talking about.

Congress leader Bimalendra Nidhi is one of the persons who knew Giri since his student days.

He was one of the prominent leaders of our times. He never did politics of power and he often had views independent of the party line, Nidhi told the Post. He was not a leader of only the Congress but of the whole country. The country has lost a fine politician its an irreparable loss.

Nidhi said Giri was a true follower of Gandhi, Lohiya and BP Koirala.

But he wouldnt hesitate to criticise BP Koirala, Nidhi told the Post. Thats how he stood tall. He lived a life of conviction. The country today lost a leader who was simple, intelligent, honest, and knowledgeable.

According to the Nepali Congress, Giris last rites will be performed at Pashupati Aryaghat on Sunday.

Issuing a statement on Saturday night, Congress whip Min Bishwakarma said Giris body will be kept on the hospital premises from 9-11am for final tributes.

His body will then be kept at the Congress party office in Sanepa from 11:30am to 2pm, where the party leaders, cadres and general public can offer their final tributes.

His last rites will be performed at Aryaghat on Sunday evening, said Bishwakarma.

Congress President and Prime Minister Deuba said on Twitter that he was shocked by Giris demise.

I am shocked by the news of the death of my friend Pradeep Giriji, the leader of Nepali Congress and an ideological and socialist thinker of Nepali politics, Deuba tweeted. With his death, Nepal has lost a true and good leader. Wishing his soul eternal peace, I express my deepest condolences to the family.

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Pradip Giri, a socialist thinker and philosopher, dies at 74 - The Kathmandu Post

Brazils presidential elections, scheduled for October 2, are being held under extraordinary circumstances. Almost six decades after the US-backed coup that overthrew President Joo Goulart in 1964, the possibility of a new military dictatorship is being openly discussed within the Brazilian bourgeoisie.

The Brazilian Socialist Equality Group (GSI) calls on the working class to mobilize its social force independently against growing dictatorial threats, rejecting the pseudo-lefts demands for its subordination to capitalism and the bourgeois state.

The official opening of Brazils election campaign on August 16 has laid bare the fraudulent claims of fascistic President Jair Bolsonaros official opposition, led by the Workers Party (PT), that it is waging a struggle in defense of the social and democratic rights of the working class and against the strengthening of fascism in the country.

While the PT promotes the idea that Bolsonaro is politically isolated and weak, his demise is only a matter of time, Bolsonaro is engaged in frantic preparations for a coup, centered on relentless claims that the Electoral Court (TSE) is preparing to rig the vote in favor of the PT candidate, former President Lus Incio Lula da Silva.

As part of this strategy, Bolsonaro has directed the Defense Ministry to mobilize military resources to call into question the voting machines, setting up a parallel vote count that will essentially give the generals a justification not to recognize the candidate declared the winner by the Electoral Court.

The president has already converted the upcoming commemoration of Brazils Independence Day on September 7 into a massive rehearsal for his putsch. He has called his supporters to take to the streets one last time against the TSE, and has tried to arrange a massive military display involving all three branches to coincide with his arrival on Copacabana Beach in Rio de Janeiro, to address a fascistic mob.

A conversation leaked by the Metrpoles website has revealed how a section of the ruling class openly supports a Bolsonaro dictatorship. Shrugging off the oppositions warnings that such a regime would scare investors, Jos Koury, a real estate businessman, argued that, surely nobody will cut business with Brazil. As they keep them with several dictatorships around the world.

Bolsonaro remains fully supported in his conspiracy by the two largest parties in Congress, which failed to abandon him, as predicted by Lula, who tried without success to rekindle his old alliance with Bolsonaros chief-of-staff, Ciro Nogueira.

At the same time, the armed forces are preparing an unprecedented national mobilization on the pretext of threats of electoral violence. For the first time since 1985, battalions will be on standby to act throughout the country without being requested by the governors. While the president is certainly counting on episodes of organized violence on Election Day to open the way for emergency rule, these preparations underscore the threat of an independent intervention of military forces with the same goal.

In contrast to the advanced and explosive state of the political crisis in Brazil, the tone of the PT-led opposition campaign was set by the reading of the pro-capitalist Letters for Democracy on August 11 at the So Paulo Faculty of Law.

Endorsed and promoted by the PT, the trade unions, and its allied pseudo-left parties as a great leap forward in the fight against fascism, these cowardly letters fail to even mention Bolsonaro or his plot to overthrow democracy and establish a military dictatorship.

The first document, In defense of Democracy and Justice, was advanced by large business associations, led by the So Paulo Federation of Industries (FIESP) and by the Brazilian Federation of Banks (Febraban). The second, Letter to Brazilian Women and Men in Defense of the Rule of Law (Estado Democrtico de Direito)! was put forward individually by the barons of industry and financethe leaders of the families that own Ita bank and industrial empires such as Suzano, Votorantim, and Klabin. Signing both documents were not only former PT presidents Lula and Dilma Rousseff, but also the two largest trade union federations in the country, the CUT and Fora Sindical, as well as the National Union of Students (UNE).

The political orientation of these documents was spelled out by the former justice minister of the Fernando Henrique Cardoso administration, Jos Carlos Dias, who in the introduction of the first letter cited its unprecedented character in bringing together capital and labor in defense of democracy.

Such a remark says more than its author probably intended. The unprecedented character could be attributed to the fact that the same capitalist entities and personalities that supposedly defend democracy today supported the 1964 military coup, inaugurating a 21-year-long bloody regime that Bolsonaro celebrates and says should have killed ten times as many.

The 1964 coup was carried out ostensibly in defense of bourgeois democracy, understood by such representatives of the Brazilian bourgeoisie as the unconditional defense of private property and the right to profit.

It is also revealing that the letters declare that in todays Brazil there is no more room for authoritarian deviations. Dictatorship and torture belong to the past. They do not explain what allowed room for a dictatorship in 1964. Nor do they indicate what fundamental social and political transformations have occurred since then, and why, if Brazil's political reality no longer allows it, an authoritarian offensive is clearly underway.

The letters supportersfrom trade unionists to identity politics careerists and bankersemphasize that they have been signed not only by the cream of capitalist society, but also by thousands of police and military officers, and that the first to read them is a former president of the Military Supreme Court, representing the the top brass.

A coup, they insist, would be bad for business and opposed by foreign governments, above all by the US. And they acknowledge as their model another letter for democracy from 1977, sponsored by an undisguised fascist, Goffredo da Silva Telles Jnior, who spent his political life in the Integralist movement and supported the 1964 coup.

In other words, they insist that the bourgeoisie, the military, imperialism and even the Brazilian right wing are against a coup. The threat against democracy they are supposedly fighting, devoid of any real political or social basis, would come solely from President Bolsonaro and a handful of lunatic advisers.

The unity between the capitalists and their lackeys in the unions, the PT and its pseudo-left satellites is based upon the contention that everything is fine. The daily crises between the branches of government and the relentless declarations of generals in favor of Bolsonaro and in commemoration of the bloody military dictatorship of 1964-1985 are nothing but background noise.

The principal purpose of this political operation is to conceal from the Brazilian working class the state of terminal crisis of capitalism. On an international scale, this crisis has produced an unprecedented offensive on the living standards of the masses, motivated the malignant response of the worlds ruling classes to deadly pandemics and the climate crisis, and is driving humanity toward a Third World War. These phenomena are fundamentally incompatible with democratic forms of rule. They lie behind the rise of far-right and openly fascist forces in countries such as France, the United Kingdom, India, the Philippines and Germany, and motivated Trumps January 6 coup in the United States which serves as a model for Bolsonaro.

While Bolsonaros authoritarian offensive is aimed at crushing the resistance of the working class through a regime of open violence, the PT and its allies pursue the same goal through legal means, which include their efforts to chloroform the public about the dictatorial threats and their use of unions as an industrial police apparatus.

These operations by the rival factions of the Brazilian bourgeoisie are necessary because the working class is radically opposed to the current state of affairs. It has already begun its counter-offensive, with a powerful wave of strikes and mass demonstrations that is increasingly turning against the capitalist system on a global scale.

None of the objective driving forces behind the crisis of democracy in Brazil and worldwide are even mentioned in the letters for democracy. To raise the origins of the Brazilian political crisis would automatically expose the ostensible hopes of the letters promoters, including the reelection of Lula, as a huge deception.

The PT was founded 42 years ago by trade unionists and Pabloite renegades from the Fourth International who advocated a parliamentary path to a welfare state and even socialism in Brazil. The PTs reworking of the Stalinist two-stage theory of revolutionwhich, applied by the Brazilian Communist Party (PCB), had already paved the path to the 1964 military coupserved the purpose of diverting the Brazilian working class uprising that had fatally undermined the military dictatorship. The confidence they advocated in the democratic potential of the Brazilian bourgeois state has given rise, in less than three decades, to renewed threats of fascist dictatorship.

Now, highly discredited among the working masses, the PT and its pseudo-left promoters propose a repetition of that catastrophic path through a bankrupt bourgeois alliance to save Brazilian capitalism.

The adherence of major economic sectors to a declaration of opposition to Bolsonaros coup offensive expresses a division within the ruling class and the lack of confidence of certain sections in the viability of this dictatorial project. These same sections see the political soporifics offered by the PT as a necessary means of preparing such a radical change in the character of the regime.

But the dispute within the bourgeoisie is not settled. As behind the backs of the public the ruling elite openly discusses the possibility of either a violent takeover by Bolsonaro, or independent intervention by the military, there is a question none of the signatories of the letters for democracy can answer: if the tanks take to the streets, even if against Bolsonaro, who will send them back to the barracks?

In 1964, the Brazilian armed forces promised swift action and elections the following year, before staying in power for 21 years and executing, torturing, and exiling thousands.

Todays dictatorial conspiracies must be disarmed, and the working class is the only social force capable of doing so. Such a fight demands a complete political break with the PT, the unions and pseudo-left parties responsible for subordinating the working class to the national bourgeoisie and imperialism. The workers counteroffensive in defense of their social and democratic rights is inseparable from a struggle against capitalism itself, the cause of austerity, war and dictatorship. And it can only be carried out through a socialist and internationalist strategy.

The International Committee of the Fourth International (ICFI) is the world political party that consciously represents and advances the interests of the global working class upsurge, of which the Brazilian workers struggle is an integral part. The building of a section of the ICFI in Brazil, the Partido Socialista pela Igualdade (PSI), is the great task of the present. It will open a new and decisive stage in the long history of the revolutionary struggle of the Brazilian working class.

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Down with the conspiracies of Bolsonaro and the military! - WSWS

Citing the lack of abortion services in the community, several local groups involved in a campaign for abortion access are hosting a March, Rally, Rage for Abortion Access in Geneva on Friday.

The Geneva Womens Assembly and the regional branches of the Party for Socialism and Liberation said that while New York continues to portray itself as a safe haven for women seeking legal abortions, much of rural New York, including Geneva, lacks the services the state claims to provide.

The groups claim researchers committed to expanding abortion access have contacted all local health facilities to inquire about what abortion services they provide, and the resounding answer has been that there is no abortion access in Geneva. This includes Finger Lakes Health and Finger Lakes Medical Associates, the major local health providers which operate both Geneva General Hospital and the health services at Hobart and William Smith.

As I called from clinic to clinic, asking what abortion services are offered, I was continuously met with uncertainty, and was frequently referred to Planned Parenthood, which is already at capacity and will be for months to come, reported Abbey Brown. I am baffled at the amount of womens health clinics, hospitals, and general healthcare facilities that do not offer abortion in the Finger Lakes.

In a news release, organizers state Fridays event, March, Rally, Rage for Abortion Access in Geneva, is meant to draw attention to the fact that, in our community, legal does not mean accessible.

Were New Yorkers without access to the same care the rest of the state has, Abby Hellauer Geiger explained. FLH and FLMA have a duty to provide abortion services to anyone who wants one in and around Geneva.

The Geneva Womens Assembly and the regional branches of the Party for Socialism and Liberation, which are collaborating on this campaign for abortion access, encourage all who are outraged by this lack of essential services to come to Fridays march. It will begin at 6 p.m. in front of the Scandling Center on Hobart and William Smith Colleges campus and conclude at Geneva General Hospital.

Get the top stories on your radio 24/7 on Finger Lakes News Radio 96.3 and 1590, WAUB and 106.3 and 1240, WGVA, and on Finger Lakes Country, 96.1/96.9/101.9/1570 WFLR.

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Friday Rally to Draw Attention to Lack of Abortion Access in Geneva - Finger Lakes Daily News

By Pedro Pablo Morejon

HAVANA TIMES Ive had an idea stuck in my head for weeks now, ever since President Miguel Diaz-Canel from the only legal party in Cuba, the Communist Party said that we need to carry on defending socialism because change would make our lives worse and that despite hardship, we still have dignity My idea? To write about Socialisms positive contributions in my country.

As were living very dignified lives under the shadow of continuity, I start looking for something that would make me feel like everything isnt bleak and hopeless, that this dignity would help us somehow, that a bright future awaits us beyond the present.

I sit down in front of the computer, open a Word document and stay there, watching how the minutes pass by and the page is still blank, ideas arent coming or flowing like Id like them to.

Thats because the truth is I wanted to paint a Cuba that is becoming more and more unrealistic, but I dont know whether thats because there isnt anything to praise or because Ive been tainted by scorn for a system that has only brought us destruction.

The reality is were living amidst blackouts, shortages of food, medicine, drinking water, transport etc.; amid a mass exodus, disease, accidents, unnecessary deaths, lies, repression and a dark horizon. Amidst so much audacity its really hard to find something positive, because Im not writing fiction here, but reality.

Its also better I chop my hand off before I start writing about healthcare and education. With dengue, medicine shortages and the condition of our clinics, having good health is a blessing right now in Cuba.

What about schools, you ask? Indoctrination centers where university graduates cant find a solution to their professional uncertainties and economic needs.

I think real hard, trying to find a hidden corner in my mind, begging a brain cell to help me with pictures of progress, something to enlighten me and Eureka!

Yep, socialism in Cuba has contributed to humankind. I repeat, it has contributed.

We are a museum of a country. Every historian interested in studying real socialism, in its most well-known form Stalinism, finds an accurate laboratory in Cuba, an endless source of what was one of the worst, along with Fascism, two social systems in the 20th century.

We are the lighthouse that guides Latin America, but not because of our good examples, but to warn Bolivars nations of the perils and not to shipwreck their dreams.

Unfortunately, some countries have ignored the signals and then they crash and come tumbling down. Venezuela, for example.

In short, we are an example to the world, showing everything you shouldnt do if you want to build a prosperous society.

We are a country of need, the justification for criminal sciences where you must sacrifice one thing to save everything else.

We Cubans play this part.

This is socialisms contribution on the island, at least for the rest of the world.

Read more from Pedro Pablo Morejon here on Havana Times.

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Cuban Socialisms Contribution to the World - Havana Times

Emily Carver is Head of Media at the Institute of Economic Affairs.

The heavens may have finally opened but there is a foreboding sense that disaster is on the horizon.

Bad news keeps coming, yet we only have a vague idea of how the next Prime Minister will attempt to deal with the omini-crisis we face. Soaring energy bills, NHS waiting lists, repeated strike action, illegal immigration; the country feels in a state of limbo as the to-do list grows by the day.

Despite the deluge of apocalyptic headlines, many are unaware of just how tough its going to get (a recent survey showed 12 per cent of us think bills willdecreasethis winter, while most underestimate the scale of the rises heading our way). But many of us are already pinching pennies as the cost of basics keep rising.

One exception to the doom and gloom has been the resilience of our labour market, though the issue of shortages in key sectors remains. The latest data show a mixed bag, but no sign of recession (yet). The headline problem that median pay increases have failed to keep pace with accelerating inflation is of little surprise, although an increase in low-paid workers, for example in food and hospitality, is likely to have had a downward effect on the median pay data.

But with unemployment only very marginally up, and payroll employment at a record high, there is still hope that the economic downturn could at least be a job-rich recession.

However, the cost of lockdown is becoming more apparent by the day. Businesses are going to the wall in record numbers. During the pandemic, insolvencies were kept artificially low. But as government support tapered off, businesses that were clinging on for dear life have found rising costs the final nail in the coffin; in the second quarter of this year, insolvencies were 81 per cent higher than in the same period the previous year.

The question of how businesses are going to cope with rising outgoings remains unanswered. Despite the growing consensus that government must always have a solution, it may well be that there is very little ministers can do to alleviate the pain, and its likely that many of those who have not prepared, for example through energy efficiency measures or cost savings, will go bust.

The number of restaurants, for example, falling into insolvency has increased by more than 60 per cent in the past year and more up-to-date figures are likely to show the situation worsen. For hospitality, Sunaks endless schemes and handouts were for thousands of businesses simply putting off the inevitable.

Perhaps if the trade-offs had been articulated earlier, fewer people would have accepted the Governments authoritarian measures for so long. In any case, it was a dereliction of duty that both government and opposition failed to communicate what impact the pandemic and public health measures might have on the economy and our standard of living further down the line.

It was as if the Government could simply turn on the spending taps, throw us a life jacket, and everything would be near plain sailing. The only thing that mattered was keeping the virus at bay.

Many of us enjoyed near or full pay, while the state borrowed and printed money to keep our heads above water and keep businesses that otherwise would have gone to the wall alive. This gave a false sense of security. Many in salaried jobs even accrued savings as living expenses plummeted.

Much of that money will now have been well and truly spent. A large proportion of households have no savings at all.

Against this backdrop, the left is gaining support for its big-state solutions. Sir Keir Starmers economically illiterate policy to punish the oil and gas sector with further windfall taxes in order to freeze the energy cap will do nothing to deal with the fundamental issue: a lack of gas supply.

Nor will it be cost-free, as the Labour front bench seem to think it will be. Of course, no word is given to the impact of windfall taxes on investment, the very evident failure of the energy price cap as a policy, nor the way the Net Zero dogma of successive governments has left us woefully exposed to supply shocks.

But at least Starmer has a proposal (Labour would stop the energy price cap going up. This would save families 1,000 this winter), however overly simplistic it may be. And its a popular one. When the public is asked whether theyd like to maintain the current price cap, of course the vast majority say yes. Who would opt for higher energy bills?

But this is akin to asking people if they want any freebie. The difficulties lie in the terms and conditions.

With the current vacuum in government, its prime time for the Left to make gains, and they may well be doing so. Worryingly, public debate appears to be on their side, at least in the battle of ideas, and polling continues to show Labour in front on managing the economy.

After the Government succumbed to a windfall tax, the Conservatives lost their free market credentials. The Left has capitalised on this. Now, greedy corporations are to blame for inflation. Nationalisation of industry is the answer to rising prices.

And further redistribution of wealth is demanded, with little to no recognition of the considerable cost-of-living support already announced by the Government amounting to 1,200 for a working-age family on means-tested benefits, which will apparently be paid for by the windfall tax, but more so extra government borrowing.

Liz Truss, focusing on economic growth, has promised to reverse the rise in National Insurance and suspend the green levy on energy bills. Rishi Sunak, on top of his already announced support packages, has committed to removing the five per cent VAT on household energy bills. The accusation that this is mere tinkering at the edges is fair, and further immediate support in the form of higher benefits may well be needed.

But its on the next leader of our country to be honest about the challenges we face and the limits of government. Its on them to look beyond sticking plasters, to communicate a longer-term strategy that will lower the cost of living through supply-side reforms rather than increasing dependence on the state, and to have the courage to rethink our energy strategy that has for so long neglected security of supply while prioritising arbitrary climate targets.

It will only be by providing a strong and confident alternative to the left-wing narrative and restoring the party to its reputation of managing the economy well that the Conservatives stay the party of government.

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Emily Carver: The Left is gaining support for socialism, as the cost living crisis mounts, and the new Tory leader must fight back - ConservativeHome