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As the Russian governments criminal war in Ukraine continues, socialists in the US have forcefully condemned the invasion while focusing most of our energy on opposing the potentially catastrophic escalation in tensions between Russia and the United States. This in turn has resurrected a common accusation from the post-9/11 years that in taking such a strong antiwar stance, the Left isnt being true to our own values.

After all, the criticism goes, were supposed to be internationalists. But if were willing to abandon the Ukrainian people by criticizing the US government coming to their aid or, in earlier versions of this accusation, if we oppose the military liberation of Iraqis or Afghans arent we showing ourselves to be not internationalists but isolationists?

Absolutely not. Opposition to war and the militarism of our own government has always been at the heart of what leftists mean by internationalism.

The International Workingmens Association, later known as the First International, was founded in 1864 to bring together the worlds left-wing parties and trade unions. Primarily led by Karl Marx, it also included a significant faction around the anarchist Mikhail Bakunin.

While the two factions had fundamental disagreements, they agreed on issues of war and peace. Both took it for granted that workers in every country should oppose the wars declared by capitalist governments but fought by the working class. And both found inspiration in the 1871 Paris Commune, a brief revolutionary experiment that flowered at the end of the Franco-Prussian War when workers and disenchanted soldiers took over the municipal government in Paris and instituted radical policies like reopening abandoned factories under workers control.

The song most associated with left-wing internationalism, The Internationale, was written by a French Communard, Eugne Pottier. His anthem has been translated into every language and sung around the world by socialists, communists, and anarchists ever since. Heres the direct English translation of some of the original French lyrics:

Let the armies go on strike / Guns in the air, and break ranks / If these cannibals insist / On making heroes of us / Soon they will know our bullets / Are for our own generals

Shortly after the Commune was crushed the French and Prussian governments united to destroy this experiment in working-class power, massacring vast numbers of Communards in the process the International Workingmens Association collapsed amid factional strife between Marxists and anarchists. About a decade and a half later, though, the mass socialist parties that were springing up around the world came together to form the Socialist International the Second International. In the decades leading up to World War I, the congresses of the Second International repeatedly passed resolutions promising that if their respective governments tried to go to war with one another, the socialist parties in each country would instigate general strikes to stop their respective war machines from churning.

When war actually came, some member parties like the Socialist Party of America and the Bolsheviks in Russia stuck by their word. Many conscripted European soldiers also continued to wonder if they might have more in common with each other than with the officers on the front or the bosses at home.

The Christmas Truce of December 1914, in which some soldiers on both sides defied the higher-ups to celebrate the holiday together, was one early manifestation of this impulse. In 1917 and 1918, the Bolsheviks came to power in Russia (on the slogan Land, Peace, Bread) and the kaiser was brought down in Germany (when a mutiny in the Navy stopped an attempted last stand to stave off German defeat). In the United States, the most famous expression of this anti-militarist sentiment was the fiery 1918 speech that socialist leader Eugene V. Debs gave in Canton, Ohio. The master class, Debs proclaimed, has always declared the wars; the subject class has always fought the battles.

Unfortunately, though, most of the social democratic parties in Europe got caught up in the patriotic fervor instead of staying true to their earlier commitments. In Germany, for example, socialist parliamentarians voted for war credits and enthused about a war of liberation that could witness the tsars prisons thrown open by soldiers marching under the German flag.

In the early days of the war, those who held fast to their principles and rejected the war met in neutral Switzerland for the 1915 Zimmerwald Conference. These were the socialist movements hard-core internationalists. The conference presaged the formation of the Third International the Communist International, or Comintern after the Russian Revolution.

In its own very different way, the Comintern would eventually fail in its mission of promoting global working-class solidarity against the bosses and generals in every country. When the Bolsheviks first took power, they assumed that either the revolution would spread to the West or it would be crushed in Russia. Neither happened, and eventually the Soviet Union emerged as an important global power in its own right and the Comintern became an arm of its foreign policy.

But the core ideas of working-class internationalism animating all three Internationals continue to guide many on the Left.

At its core, socialism is about empowering the working class and not just the part of it that lives in the United States. Wars are one of the most extreme ways imaginable that ordinary people can be disempowered. Politicians declare the wars, their capitalist friends make a killing manufacturing the guns and bombs, and working-class people on both sides are literally killed.

Vladimir Putin and his oligarch friends, for example, are in no more physical danger than Dick Cheney and his friends at Halliburton were during the war in Iraq. Its working-class Russian soldiers and Ukrainian civilians who are doing the dying now and who will continue to die in even greater numbers if people like Hillary Clinton get their openly expressed wish and Ukraine becomes an Afghanistan-style quagmire for Putin.

In Debss Canton antiwar speech, he praised those few German socialists who had the courage to stand by their antiwar convictions and spoke of the thousands of socialists who have languished in the jails of Germany because of their heroic warfare upon the despotic ruling class of that country. He took it for granted that solidarity with them and opposition to the war that was being waged by his government against theirs went hand in hand the same approach taken by Jacobin writers who express love and solidarity for the brave antiwar protestors in Russia while also opposing calls for deeper or more direct US involvement in the conflict.

Thoughtful people can disagree on some of the particulars. New York magazines Eric Levitz, for example, argues that sending some level of military aid to Ukraine isnt an imperial intervention so much as a means of enabling Ukrainians to fight on their own behalf, and that without such military aid to the Ukrainian government, the Russian government has little incentive to get serious about peace negotiations.

Others, like my Jacobin colleagues Branko Marcetic and Daniel Bessner, have argued that the Joe Biden administration has consistently displayed a disinterest in pursuing a negotiated settlement instead of inflicting maximum military pain on Russia, and that there are far greater possible downsides to flooding the country with weapons than NATO-friendly progressives are willing to grant ranging from making the war longer and bloodier to Osama bin Ladenstyle blowback resulting from US arms winding up in the hands of far-right forces like the Azov Battalion.

They also point out that if were serious about winding down the military-industrial complex and no longer having the United States in the business of keeping the world supplied with deadly weapons, we have to start opposing arms transfers in particular cases even when there may be real trade-offs and that in any case, given the long history of unintended consequences from Western military interventions, the best things we can do for Ukrainians are to focus on humanitarian aid, promote peace negotiations, and admit refugees. Whats happening right now may be an arms dealers dream, but there are a great many ways it could be a nightmare for everyone else.

Other issues are vastly easier calls for anyone with an anti-militarist bone in their body. A no-fly zone, for example, would be the height of insanity. It wouldnt lead to World War III. The American military entering a war zone with the announced intention of shooting down Russian planes would be World War III. The only remaining question would be whether it would stay conventional or confirm Albert Einsteins prediction that, whatever weapons World War III is fought with, World War IV will be fought with sticks and stones.

That scenario is thankfully quite unlikely although heading off even a 1 percent chance of the end of human civilization should surely be at the top of any remotely sane list of priorities. Such a war would bring far more suffering to the segment of society that started it than any previous war, but all wars, conventional or nuclear, bring devastation to people at the bottom. Even in a global thermonuclear conflict, if there are any escapes to be had, either to mineshafts ( la Dr Strangelove) or spaceships ( la Dont Look Up), theyll only be available to the wealthiest and best connected. As with all previous wars, the rest of us would be fucked.

The lack of a mass socialist movement in the United States and similar societies has meant that what previous generations of leftists understood as internationalism often feels like a half-garbled memory. But before throwing around the term, we should remember its history ranging from Eugne Pottier writing about armies going on strike and workers around the world singing that song in their own languages to Eugene V. Debs going to prison for declaring his solidarity with the German working class by opposing sending the US working class to kill them.

Its a term that has always meant opposition to both foreign tyrannies and allegedly anti-tyrannical wars that never seem to play out like their cheerleaders predict. Its what the Industrial Workers of the World were singing about in one of my favorite lyrics in the IWW songbook:

Well, Ive been agitatin now for fifty years or more / for jobs or for equality and always against war

You want to talk about the tradition of socialist internationalism? Thats the tradition.

Accept no substitutes.

See original here:
No, Left-Wing Opponents of War Aren't Isolationists - Jacobin magazine

Dear Zoomers,

You were raised to believe that you could change the world. You were told by older generations that you would fix the problems they created: climate change, wars, gun violence, inequality, racism, sexism, homophobia. No one can say you didnt try.

Growing up, you saw the racist murders of Trayvon Martin in 2012 and Michael Brown in 2014, sparking protests across the country. Though you were only children when it happened, some of you took to the streets. And you watched in horror when, after months of protest, their murderers walked free.

Six years later, during the COVID-19 pandemic, over four hundred fifty major protests kicked off around the country in response to the police murder of George Floyd. With an estimated 15 to 25 million participants, the 2020 Black Lives Matter uprising was the largest protest movement in American history.

Yet the Democrats nominated two champions of mass incarceration and neoliberal austerity for their presidential ticket, while congressional Democrats just kneeled symbolically. Two of the countrys largest protest movements, six years apart, called attention to the same problem on which no progress seemed to have been made.

In between these bookends, you took part in other important movements. Bernie Sanderss presidential campaigns introduced a new generation to democratic socialism but were crushed by the Democratic establishment. National walkouts during March for Our Lives called to end mass shootings and gun violence, the 2019 Climate Strike shouted for climate action around the world. And still, you were ignored by the politicians and the capitalists who funded them.

All this has made many of you cynical. You might feel that all hope is gone, that climate disaster is coming for us all, and nothing we can do will save us. You dont want to be jaded, but you cant help it.

Its an understandable feeling. But were here to tell you that its wrong. Thats because the world is changing in our favor and you have a crucial role to play in pushing that change further.

These movements failure to win their demands is not for lack of effort. Economic and political elites are incredibly powerful, and to beat them, we need to build power of our own. Right now, the labor movement is showing us how its done.

When hundreds of thousands of teachers went on strike in states like West Virginia and Arizona starting in 2018, we saw what can happen when ordinary people fight back with the power of organized labor they win. Many of you walked out with your teachers, fighting for the public education that you deserve. Not only did your teachers win higher wages, better funding, and more respect. They also reintroduced the idea of the strike and the union to American society.

Now your generation is at the forefront of another breakthrough. Against all odds, exploited and mistreated workers in Staten Island, New York won the first ever union election at Amazon. These eight thousand warehouse workers, many of them young and pissed off just like you, beat a multimillion-dollar anti-union campaign by one of the most powerful companies in world history.

Meanwhile, workers at two hundred Starbucks locations have announced their goal of unionizing with Starbucks Workers United (SWU), winning at eighteen stores so far. SWU is beating one of the biggest restaurant chains in the world, with over 9,000 locations in the US. And theyre proving its possible to organize the food service sector, where almost 10 million people worked by 2020 but few are unionized.

These two companies set standards for key parts of the economy. If workers win unions, better wages, and better working conditions at Starbucks and Amazon, they will advance the cause of the whole working class and inspire millions of workers at other companies to organize, too.

Young people are at the heart of recent Starbucks and Amazon wins. An Amazon Labor Union (ALU) leader told Jacobin that the average age of ALU organizers was twenty-six. Another leader proclaimed, The youth made a statement. Laila Dalton, a union activist recently fired for organizing her Arizona Starbucks, is only nineteen.

At both Starbucks and Amazon, workers your age are leading the charge to revitalize the labor movement and change history.

You might not have planned to become a labor activist, or become an activist at all. But a revitalized labor movement will be central to winning much more than just better wages and conditions and you (yes, you) can play a key role in those wins.

Unions are central in the fights against sexism, homophobia, racism, war, and climate disaster. This is because society doesnt function if workers stop working.

The labor movement at its best has been central to fighting racism, on and off the job. Women have always organized at work to fight sexual harrassment. Unions have substantially reduced wage inequality between black and white workers, and between men and women.

We need strong unions to win better public schools, tuition-free college, student debt forgiveness, and universal health care and childcare all of which would dramatically reduce racial and gender inequality.

Massive labor struggles won the New Deal in the 1930s. Without the leverage of a strong labor movement now, climate activists will have to rely on the goodwill of politicians and their billionaire donors two groups whose interests directly clash with a real climate solution. Only an organized working class can save us from climate disaster.

Today you are protesting police violence, climate disaster, war, homophobic and transphobic laws, and abortion bans across the country. Progressive candidates, many of them young activists like you, are challenging business as usual. These movements are incredibly important, and have inspired workers at Amazon, Starbucks, and elsewhere to organize at work.

There is now an opening for you to join those workplace fights and rebuild union power.

The world often doesnt change bit by bit. Long periods of quiet submission by average people are followed by earthquakes revolts and revolutions by people who just a few years or even weeks earlier seemed resigned to accept their oppression forever.

Whenever this transformation has happened in modern history, young people like you have played central roles.

This was true of the Civil Rights Movement that ended Jim Crow segregation, and the movements in both the United States and Vietnam that stopped the Vietnam War. It is also true of the upsurge that built the modern labor movement in the 1930s.

In the roaring 1920s, capitalism was ascendant, and the labor movement was weaker than ever. Even once the Great Depression struck in 1929, throwing a quarter of US workers out of work, resistance was muted. Companies crushed union after union. As labor historian Irving Bernstein writes in The Lean Years, Workers on the way down were in no mood to improve, far less to reorganize, society.

But in 1934, their mood changed a lot. Three massive strikes in 1934 shook the working class from its cynicism.

First, in Toledo, Ohio, where workers at the Auto-Lite car parts company sick of dangerous conditions, low wages, and job insecurity went on strike for union recognition, supported by thousands of unemployed workers organized by a socialist organization, the American Workers Party.

On Wednesday, May 23, in front of a pro-union crowd of ten thousand, police arrested strike leaders and beat an elderly man. The crowd exploded. With their bare fists and rocks, writes Art Preis in Labors Giant Step, the workers fought a six-day pitched battle with the National Guard. Toledo strikers won the sympathy of the community, with forty thousand people rallying in the city center and forcing the withdrawal of troops. The company gave up. Auto-Lite workers won a union and a raise.

At almost the same time, massive showdowns kicked off between striking workers and company-friendly police in Minneapolis, led by truck drivers, and in San Francisco, by longshore workers. Yet again, workers showed their power.

The most important things these strikes won was not higher wages or union recognition, but a new consciousness among American workers. By the end of the decade, millions of workers carried out their own strikes and joined unions.

Terrified of the emboldened workers and the growing popularity of radical ideas, elites knew that workers were now in the mood to reorganize society. As one Congressperson fretted in 1934, You have seen strikes in Toledo, you have seen Minneapolis, you have seen San Francisco . . . but . . . you have not yet seen the gates of hell opened, and that is what is going to happen from now on. Politicians, desperate to avoid more unrest, promoted the progressive legislation of the New Deal to try to placate workers.

Many of the young people on the front lines were children of immigrants who believed in the American Dream. Instead, they faced the nightmare of American capitalism: poverty wages and dangerous conditions for workers, misery and homelessness for millions of unemployed. These young workers refused to accept the status quo, and they changed the world. You can, too.

There are many ways you can join this fight. If you have a job that you know needs a union now, you can build one. Established unions and organizations like the Emergency Workplace Organizing Committee (EWOC) can help you figure out how to do that.

You can get a job at Amazon or Starbucks and organize with your coworkers, where recent victories will likely inspire them to join the movement. Or you can get a job in a sector that is already unionized, like public education, health care, public transit, or construction, or work at important unionized companies like UPS.

Young radicals today can help to transform the labor movement from the bottom up put the movement back in the labor movement, as the labor organization Labor Notes slogan goes by getting a job and organizing at work. This rank-and-file strategy was key to the upsurge in the 1930s, and something socialists are pursuing again today. You can meet and learn from thousands of other labor activists at the Labor Notes conference this summer.

From the auto workers of the 1930s to Starbucks and Amazon workers today, young people like you have shown they have the power to shake the earth. So we ask you: Are you ready to rebuild the labor movement and make history?

Read the rest here:
Dear Gen Z: Now Is the Time to Join the Labor Movement and Change the World - Jacobin magazine

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KILLER FEESWhen will our provincial politicians understand it is not the actual price per kilowatt of energy, or the price per kilojoule of natural gas that is killing consumers? It is all the add on fees like administration levies and distribution fees; (plus) more that makes gas and electricity so expensive for every homeowner. Then there is GST and carbon tax, or tax on a tax, to make things worse. The UCP will enact a rebate, next winter, should the prices go over a pre-determined price. Again, the base price is not the root of the problem. If gas and electricity was free and consumers had to just pay for all the add ons, heating and lighting a home would still be very pricey. And then there is idiot Justin Trudeau. He only believes the CT is only found at the gas pumps when filling, or on the natural gas bill. He clearly does not understand how the CT can be found and is attached onto every item associated with everyday life. Why? Because Trudeau has not paid for anything out of his own pocket since 2015. And before that is questionable as well. Canadian taxpayers are filling his pantry and fridge, as well as heating and lighting Rideau Cottage. So Trudeau is completely unaware and oblivious to what is going on within Canada. This can be said for a lot of issues, but inflation and cost of living do not exist within the Trudeau household.ROLLY KLAEPATZ(This inflation is making it harder for every Canadian living from paycheque to paycheque, and even worse for those deeper in need.)

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AN HONEST DOLLARS.I. Petersen makes a good point. If we want an effective economic system, we need to ensure that it incentivizes good behaviour. If the tax code is set up to encourage laziness by rewarding people who accrue passive income through capital gains, instead of rewarding people who have to work a full week to earn the same income, then it is punishing people who have to work for a living. Its not a lot of effort to invest in a solid index fund that gives good returns, you simply put your money in and you get free money as return on interest for doing literally nothing. This system also creates income inequality because the amount of passive income one gets is proportional to their wealth. People become more wealthy by being wealthy, in a vicious cycle. Meanwhile, a single worker is only able to work for 16 waking hours a day, and their paycheque then gets eaten up by the rising cost of living combined with stagnant wages. Maybe we should adjust capital gains tax to be as high as income taxes, so that the economy supports people who contribute instead of wealthy freeloaders.KEVIN WEBSTER(But it wont go anywhere insinuating people are wealthy freeloaders.)

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SOCIALISM FAILSRe: ITS ABOUT CARING, letter, April 10. Thats all fine and dandy, but reality paints a different picture. In fact, communist socialism as defined by Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels has never prevailed over the ages. The United Socialist Soviet Republic, or U.S.S.R., is the classic example. When it imploded under Mikhail Gorbachev in 1991 the United States of America under Ronald Reagan celebrated the largest victory of the 20th century for capitalism, by winning the Cold War. It was the ultimate showdown between communism and capitalism a.k.a. the free market economy. Socialist communism will never prevail in the long run, as it requires totalitarian dictatorships where their own people are fighting this political system from within, and economic ambitions and personal incentives no longer exist. It is quite possible that the present Russian socialist communism under Vladimir Putin may fail again, as he has too many opponents within his Russia. North Korea, Venezuela and even China will eventually fail because of their socialist communist ambitions.CASPAR PFENNINGER(Just say no to socialism.)

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BAD MOVE, WILLJust a comment from an old story now. The academy suspends Will Smith for 10 years and his reputation takes a big dive. He not only embarrasses himself as well as his family but pretty much any of his homies for slapping Chris Rock with a girly man slap and not even get a stagger or head shake from the comedian, who is quite smaller than Smith. Chris Rock showed a great deal of self control and class by brushing off the incident with great professional behaviour and in doing so made Will Smith a real small man in the eyes of Hollywood, but more importantly his friends who may chicken at his slap on Mr. Rock, that will do more damage to his ego than any suspension from Hollywood ever will.KEN UHREN(He really hurt his brand with that behaviour.)

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DITCH THE FLUORIDESo Ottawa is going to spend billions on a national dental-care program, specifically aimed at low- and medium-income Canadians. The program is supposed to be up and running by the end of the year for children under 12, by the end of next year for those under 18, seniors and those with disabilities, and fully implemented by 2025. So why is Calgary still moving forward on a multi-million dollar fluoridation program aimed at low- and middle-income residents, when the federal program is supposed to cover everyones needs from cradle to grave? Is this what they call a two-tier health care? Spend millions promising to eradicate cavities at a local level, but just in case that doesnt work out, spend billions more nationally to make sure local failures dont become national failures. Just another example of fiscally responsible local leadership and why your taxes keep climbing.PAUL BAUMBERG(One is purely preventative so you dont need the other so much, no?)

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GO AWAY, GREENIESReally? Groovy Steve Guilbeault, the Green Jesus of Montreal? Quite the promotion for an attention desperate roof-stomper looking to scare the wits out of Colleen Klein. As usual, the save the world pose was just that. No resemblance to the Yeshua I know who was emphatically not about crucifying His neighbours. As long as Greenpeace is ruling the country, Jason Nixons civil disobedience within Confederation action-plan has great merit. In fact, its my kinda war. Where do I sign up? Nobody asked for these tree-humping bozos to shove their religion down our throats. In fact, if were so cranked about getting rid of the premier that got us through a uniquely-terrible situation with at least a few freedoms intact, why arent we getting behind Jason Nixon? Forget the bottom-feeders and swine in the pines.GUY PLECASH(OK.)

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SORRY CHARESTSo, Jean Charest says that Pierre Poilievre should resign from the Conservative leadership race. He said Pierre supported the truck convoy, so he is not fit to run. Well, I dont know what show Charest was watching because I saw it differently. Pierre supported the democratic freedom of peaceful assembly. There wasnt any violence in the Ottawa protest. It might have caused disruption but there wasnt any violence. Secondly, wasnt it nice to have someone take the time to go down to the people and see what was happening? Charest should look in his closet. Was he not working for Huawei while our two Michaels were incarcerated in China? Now that looks more of a reason for Charest to resign. Maybe he could simply come up with some unique ideas to boost his popularity rather than hooking on to a very controversial subject. Hes also got that university student protest in Quebec that doesnt look too good on him. So, Ill stand by Pierre and his values. Hes standing by his objectives and values and giving the Canadian people some hope for a better future! We dont need a liberal at the head of the Conservative party. Its time for a change and Jean Charest is not the answer!DIANE BEILNER(Is Canada excited for yesterdays man? Likely not.)

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CARBON NIGHTMARERegarding Brian Lilleys article about how Justin Trudeau is a climate hypocrite, it is actually much worse than indicated in the article. In the article, an online carbon calculator is used to determine Trudeaus flying carbon footprint. The online carbon calculators are based on commercial airliners flying at around 95% capacity. Thus for example, if a Boeing 737 MAX were flying from Ottawa to Calgary with 95 passengers (assuming maximum passenger load of 100) the carbon calculator would provide a good value of the carbon emissions of each passenger on that flight. But if the plane was only carrying 30 passengers, then the carbon emissions for each passenger would be about triple and this is generally not reflected in online carbon calculators. Since Trudeau doesnt fly commercially, but instead on government jets, and rarely with 100 people on a plane, Trudeaus carbon footprint is much worse than noted in Brian Lilleys article. The fact that Trudeau is such a blatant climate hypocrite has been previously discussed by engineers in August of 2021. Trudeau truly is the Prince of Privilege in all things that he does, while ordinary Canadians must suffer his follies.S. ALLAN SHELLEY(Yep, a gem.)

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RIP VAN CHARESTAfter a 10-year hibernation from Canadian politics, this adept political opportunist has shockingly awoken from a deep sleep. Jean Charest has a checkered history in politics, including a forced resignation after attempting to interfere in the affairs of a Quebec Superior Court judge. He is also a political chameleon, morphing his political colours from a Progressive Conservative cabinet post to a lengthy stint as the provincial leader of the Liberal Party of Quebec. His appalling, unprovoked and unwarranted attack on Pierre Poilievre displays a wanton lack of moral fibre while satiating his voracious appetite for political stardom. Albertans should bear in mind that Jean was an early mover in the fledgling environmental movement years ago, while now professing loudly that he stands firmly on the side of Western Canadian interests. Jean, we did not ask for you, do not want or need you and politely, but firmly, ask that you return to the perpetual slumber from whence you came.DAVID HUGHES(Another career politician who thinks he knows whats best for Canadians.)

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Letters, April 17: 'The energy add-ons are putting us in the poorhouse' - Calgary Sun

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Liberals have broken all the rules of sensible taxation

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Had I been in charge of titling last weeks federal budget, it would have been called something like Circling the toilet bowl of socialism. Were not quite in the bowl yet, but with this budget, were circling it. The Liberals instead called their budget A Plan to Grow Our Economy and Make Life More Affordable, a far less accurate description, for their policies are exactly the opposite of what they should be if they really want to grow the economy. As a matter of basic economics, to encourage economic growth, taxes must be low, simple, predictable, and broadly applied, in order to minimize distortions and provide certainty. The Liberals have broken all the rules of sensible taxation by making taxes higher, more distortionary, more arbitrary, and less certain.

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Financial institutions are squarely in the governments crosshairs, and appallingly, the Liberals introduced a new tax with retroactive application by announcing that large financial institutions would have to pay a 15 per cent tax on income over $1 billion in the 2021 tax year. That is madness. Businesses and individuals plan for today, next year, and five and 10 years into the future. When retroactive taxes are in play, not only do people not know what tax rate they must pay next year, but they dont even know what tax rates apply to their income today, so that short-term planning, let along long-term planning, becomes impossible. Raising taxes is bad enough policy; by also creating an environment of policy uncertainty the Liberals do double damage.

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When it comes to taxes and uncertainty, the worst part of the budget is actually not the misnamed chapter on A Fair Tax System, but all the other sections of the document containing the new spending initiatives. Keep your eye on one thing and one thing only: how much government is spending, Milton Friedman wisely advised, because thats the true tax. If we dont pay for spending with the taxes in the current budget, we pay for it through future taxes or in the form of inflation. Keeping an eye on government spending is, like most everything Friedman said, excellent advice, but with this budget, taxpayers may instead want to look away.

Program spending this fiscal year, including net actuarial losses, is planned at $434.3 billion. This despite the Liberals saying in their fiscal update just four months ago that spending in 2022-23 would be $424.2 billion. Somehow the Liberals decided in the intervening period that spending was $10 billion per year too low a decision made undoubtedly with encouragement from the NDP. Note that the Liberals Budget 2019, itself far from fiscally responsibly, projected that by 2022-23 the government would be spending only $358.4 billion. That the government is spending $76 billion more than was planned just three years ago shows that the Liberals are abusing the pandemic, which has pretty well now ended, to dramatically and permanently increase government control.

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The most expensive chapter of the budget is surprise! the one on climate change and the environment. It includes $12.4 billion in new initiatives over the next five years, including $2.7 billion on zero-emission vehicle programs, $2.0 billion to expand the Low Carbon Economy Fund, $887 million on agricultural subsidies, and other big-dollar programs related to carbon capture, renewable energy, and various other things. Not included in that $12.4 billion figure are hundreds of millions of dollars in climate spending elsewhere in the budget, for such things as a green buildings strategy, low-interest loans for energy efficiency, and an Indigenous Climate Leadership Agenda.

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Much of the expense imposed on Canadians in the federal budget doesnt actually appear on the program expenses line for in addition to the Liberals spending other peoples money, they also create new rules and regulations about how people must spend their own money and otherwise conduct their private business affairs. Turning again to the climate chapter, the Liberals reaffirm their plan to ban sales of new light-duty vehicles with internal combustion engines by 2035, propose to force federally regulated institutions to report on climate-related financial risks, and announce that the governments Sustainable Finance Action Council will develop strategies to marshal private-sector capital to support the transition to net-zero emissions.

The budget is all bad, but the good news is that a market economy is remarkably robust. Even if the government gives it a severe taxation and regulatory beating, the economy will still grow just not as quickly as it should. So even with this budget of higher spending, more intrusive regulation, and more climate alarm, the Canadian economy is not quite in the toilet bowl of socialism yet. Were only circling it.

Matthew Lau is a Toronto writer.

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Matthew Lau: Circling the toilet bowl of socialism - Financial Post

The Socialist Equality Party (SEP) is standing candidates in the 2022 election to advance a socialist program of action for workers to fight for their class interests against the relentless assault on their basic social and democratic rights.

The source of this assault is the historic breakdown of the global capitalist system manifested in the unchecked spread of COVID-19, the growing danger of world war, the continual evisceration of social spending and wages, and the ravages of climate change.

The issue before the working class in Australia and internationally is the fight to end the capitalist profit system which dominates over and determines every aspect of the lives of working people.

Consequently, we are irreconcilably opposed to every other partythe Liberal-National Coalition, the Labor Party, the Greens, the United Australia Party and pseudo-left parties such as Socialist Alliance and the Victorian Socialistsas well as the array of so-called independent candidates who seek to curry favour with the major parties, all within the framework of the political establishment. All of them stand for the defence of the profit system.

This election takes place in conditions of mounting anger and frustration, with support for the Liberal-National Coalition and the Labor opposition at record lows. The campaign of diversionary point scoring, phony promises and invective has one aim: to divert attention from the real issues.

Whatever the shape of the next governmentCoalition, Labor or a minority government backed by various independentsit will make the working class pay for the huge budget deficits and spiralling government debt created by pouring billions into military spending and big-business pandemic support packages. In fact, Labor leader Anthony Albanese is signaling to the ruling class that Labor is the better party to take the country to war and impose austerity.

The Greens are again pledging a greener, kinder Australia with limited policies that they will quite happily ditch to enter a coalitionwith Labor or Liberalas they did in supporting the Gillard Labor government. The billionaire Clive Palmer is spending his millions on TV ads to present himself as a man of the people and get the jump on his rival right-wing populists Pauline Hanson and Jacqui Lambie.

A particularly pernicious role is played the pseudo-left parties. They function to corral the emerging anti-capitalist sentiment and combativeness of workers and young people back behind the very parties and organisations responsible for the crisisLabor, the Greens and the trade unions. Far from being socialist in any sense, they represent the interests of an upper middle-class layer steeped in the divisive and regressive politics of identity based on race and ethnicity, sexuality and gender.

None of these parties is addressing the real concerns and fears of working people or offering any solution to the excruciating daily difficulties facing millions struggling to make ends meet. There is a conspiracy by the media and political establishment not to discuss the major dangers facing humanity and the future of young people in particularthe pandemic, war climate change and the worsening social crisis.

The COVID pandemic is a devastating exposure of capitalism and the ruling classes around the world. Their governments have instituted the unscientific policy of herd immunity and let the deadly virus rip through the worlds population killing up to 20 million already and allowing the emergence of even more dangerous strains. It is a policy of wholesale murder that serves the needs of big business to drive workers back into the factories and workplaces to ensure the continued production of profits.

Australia is no exception. State and federal governments began the reckless lifting of the limited public health measures put in place at the start of the pandemic in December just as the highly infectious Omicron variant was taking hold. Infections, hospitalisations and deaths soared. Schools and workplaces have been turned into mass infection sites. Yet governments and the media insist that people have to live with the virus and act as if the pandemic is over.

Everyone knows it is a lie. Everyone knows at least one person who has been infected, and in some cases, someone who has died. Almost five million people have been infected in the past few months. More than 4,000 people have died of the virus so far this year, nearly double the figure in the first two years of the pandemic.

The responsibility for the catastrophe lies squarely with all parties. Coalition and Labor governments have conspired in the unconstitutional National Cabinet to lift necessary public health measures and unleash the virus. No one has stood up in any parliament to criticise or challenge the policy, let alone demand the prosecution of those responsible for criminal negligence.

The SEP and its sister parties of the International Committee of the Fourth International (ICFI) champion the scientifically based strategy to eliminate the virus. China has demonstrated that elimination is possible, but it cannot be achieved in one country. Internationally-coordinated public health measures are needed.

Workers have a growing sense of foreboding as they watch nuclear-armed powers go head-to-head in Ukraine. Many are distrustful of the daily deluge of propaganda demonising Russian President Vladimir Putin while portraying the right-wing Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky as the defender of freedom and democracy. We have seen it all beforein the US-led wars in the Balkans, Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria and Libya.

What is behind the US drive to war with Russia? In response to the global breakdown of capitalism, the ruling classes everywhere have only one solution: war against their rivals and class war against the working class.

The most acute expression of the crisis lies at the very heart of world imperialism in Washington. Confronting social and political turmoil at home, the Biden administration has brought forward longstanding plans to subordinate Russia and also China in order to arrest Americas historic decline. It has deliberately goaded Putin into a reactionary and reckless war, calculating it will create chaos in Moscow and facilitate the breakup and US domination of Russia. The chief responsibility for this war rests squarely with the US and its allies that are funneling mountains of arms into Ukraine.

At the same time, the US has not let up pressure, threats and provocations against China in which Australia is playing a central role. The Morrison government with Labors full support joined the AUKUS pact with the US and United Kingdom last September. The military are now acquiring nuclear-powered attack submarines and hypersonic missile. There is bipartisan support for a military budget of over $600 billion this decade. Who will pay this gargantuan sum? Inevitably it will be the working class.

The SEP and the ICFI oppose the Russian invasion of Ukraine, not from the standpoint of supporting the NATO puppet Zelensky, but because it is sowing divisions between Ukrainian and Russian workers. Only a unified anti-war movement of the international working class can halt this reckless plunge towards a nuclear catastrophe. Having sacrificed millions of lives to COVID, the US and its allies will not hesitate to kill many millions more in a nuclear conflagration to prosecute their interests.

An immense gulf exists between working people and the world inhabited by politicians, media personalities and trade union functionaries who rub shoulders with corporate executives and billionaires. They have no idea what it is like to face the excruciating choices between paying the rent or mortgage, seeing a doctor or putting food on the table.

There are literally two Australias. Last year the wealth of the richest 250 Australians increased by $50 billion, to a staggering $520 billion, while wages stagnated, unemployment became more uncertain and government pensions and benefits declined in real terms.

This situation will only get worse. Inflation is rising around the world, including in Australia, driven by the economic dislocation caused by the pandemic and now the Ukraine war. The answer of central banks backed by government is to lift interest rates hitting workers with a double whammyrising mortgage repayments and rent as well as rising prices for goods. Inflation here has already hit 3.5 percent, but for food and fuel is growing at more than 10 percent.

The contempt of governments, state and federal, for working people is epitomised by their response to the recent harrowing scenes of flooding in Lismore and other areas. Morrison visited Lismore, hid from angry residents and told the city that it was on its own: you cannot expect government help the victims of floods, bushfires and cyclonesit is too costly.

Extreme weather events such as flood and bushfires are becoming increasingly common. While the connection to individual events is complex, no one can doubt that climate change is the basic driver of new extremes in temperature and climatic instability, nor that greenhouse gases are chiefly responsible. Yet for decades, governments have fiddled with patently inadequate policies and market-based measures, while the planet has baked. Already scientists are warning that we are on the brink of irreversible changes that threaten the future of humanity.

None of the other parties, including the Greens, has a solution. Their policies are limited to what is possible within the framework of the profit system and the national state, and are therefore piecemeal, parochial and based on the market. But capitalism and its division of the world into rival nation states are the essential barrier to the only real solution: a scientifically-based and internationally coordinated plan to halt and reverse climate change.

The capitalist agenda of social inequality and war is incompatible with democratic forms of rule. Under various pretexts, Coalition and Labor have collaborated in undermining basic democratic rights and legal norms and erecting the scaffolding of a police state that will be used against the working class.

The attack on democratic rights is most nakedly expressed in the endless incarceration of WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange, an Australian citizen, for exposing the war crimes and diplomatic intrigues perpetrated by the US and its allies. The SEP will continue to take the fight for Assanges freedom into the working class, making it a central feature of our election campaign.

The entire repressive apparatus of the capitalist state, its security forces and battery of anti-democratic laws must be abolished, including the party deregistration legislation and the laws barring dual citizens from standing for parliament.

Decades of abject treachery and betrayal by the trade unions and the Labor Party have led to growing anger, frustration, and rebelliousness towards organisations that are a barrier to any struggle by workers for their class interests. New workers organisations, independent of unions and guided by a revolutionary perspective, are needed. As a unified fighting force that understands what must be done, the working class is more than capable of refashioning society globally from top to bottom to meet the needs of humanity. That is the essence of the fight for socialist internationalism that has terrified the ruling classes ever since it was first developed.

Our campaign is above all aimed at providing workers with the political weapons and organisational means to fight for their interests. After decades of its suppression by the union apparatus, the class struggle is re-emerging in Australia. Nurses and other health workers in New South Wales have shown the way forward, taking their first strike action in over a decade, while teachers, rail workers and a number of other key sections of the working class are engaged in industrial disputes over wages and intolerable working conditions.

These strikes are part of the first stirrings of an international movement that has already seen strikes and mass protests in Sri Lanka, India and Peru as well as through the Middle East and parts of Africa over surging prices for food and fuel and acute shortages. In North America and Europe, workers have increasingly taken strike action, in some cases in open defiance of the trade unions.

The SEP has initiated rank-and-file committees among teachers, university staff, postal workers and health workers, independent of the trade unions, to provide the basis to fight the onslaught on their jobs, wages and conditions. We encourage workers to form democratically elected rank-and-file committees in every factory and workplace and working-class suburb as the means to break out of the shackles of the trade unions and to advance their class demands.

Trade unions no longer defend even the most elementary needs of workers but function as the industrial police for governments and corporations to suppress workers. They rely on the draconian Fair Work legislation put in place by the last Labor government, and supported by the unions, to stand over and menace workers. The abolition of all anti-strike laws needs to be an elementary demand of all rank-and-file committees.

The unification of the working class is the essential means to halt the drive to war, eliminate COVID-19 or arrest climate change. To unify workers, all forms of racism and nationalism must be rejected, and the persecution of refugees and immigrants opposed. Workers must be able to live and work wherever they want with full citizenship rights.

We advance the following demands to meet the pressing needs of working people:

A hue and cry will immediately go out from the financial press, corporate CEOs and their political servants: This is unaffordable. But the working class, the source of all wealth in society, must decide what is affordable and what is not.

Nationalise the banks, finance houses and major corporations under the democratic control of the working class. Seize the colossal wealth of the billionaires. Place production and distribution under democratic workers control. Halt the squandering of billions on the military and weapons of war.

These demands inexorably lead to the issue of which class is to hold the reins of power. A workers government resting on organs created by the working class in its struggles has to be established to reorganise society along socialist lines as part of the fight for socialism internationally.

The SEP is not like other parties. Our ambition is not to establish as many of our members as possible in comfortable seats in parliament. We are based on the principles of socialist internationalism that animated the Russian Revolution and the creation of the first and only genuine workers state in history. We also stand on the lessons of the political fight waged by Leon Trotsky against the betrayal of the Russian Revolution by the Stalinist bureaucracy that usurped power from the working class. We are part of an international partythe ICFIthat alone defends and fights for the program and perspective that underpinned the Fourth International founded by Trotsky in 1938.

The SEP calls on workers to vote for our candidates to demonstrate their support for a socialist alternative. None of the issues confronting workers can be resolved through parliament. But if elected, our candidates will use parliament to expose the institution and the grubby manoeuvres of capitalist politicians, and to popularise our program to a broader audience of the working class.

We urge workers and youth to support our campaign in every way they can. But above all what is needed for the struggles ahead is revolutionary leadership. The history of the last century has demonstrated again and again that without a revolutionary party even the most sizeable and militant of movements of workers ends in defeat. We urge you to join and build the SEP as a mass revolutionary party of the workers.

Authorised by Cheryl Crisp for the Socialist Equality Party, Suite 906, 185 Elizabeth Street, Sydney, NSW, 2000.

Join the SEP campaign against anti-democratic electoral laws!

The working class must have a political voice, which the Australian ruling class is seeking to stifle with this legislation.

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A socialist program of action for the working class to oppose war and fight COVID-19 and austerity - WSWS