In the 3-month period encompassing August, September and October, 107 FARC guerrilla attacks took place. That is over one attack per day. During that period, the Colombian military suffered 131 killed and 358 wounded, for a total of 489 casualties. The military suffered over 1 killed and 4 wounded per day, or almost 6 casualties a day. Pretty good for a guerrilla army on the verge of defeat.
489 casualties, and not one word on any of it from the US corporate media. No wonder Americans think the guerrilla is near defeat.
20 businesses were attacked in various cities and towns,including Bogotá, for refusal to pay revolutionary taxes. 2 helicopters were shot down and 6 more were hit by guerrilla fire.
Apparently these figures are for the Eastern Bloc of the guerrilla alone, but a Spanish speaker may want to look that over, because my Spanish is not that great.
Make no mistake about it, the FARC is undergoing some hard times. But only six years ago, they were said to be on the verge of taking over the country. This army has been around for 43 years and they have been on the verge of defeat for real many times. They recovered every time. It is probably not possible to defeat the FARC militarily.
Red Resistencia is an interesting FARC website, with very regular and well-done communiques from the "defeated" guerrillas. ANNCOL, the New Colombian News Agency, is frankly nothing more than the news agency of the FARC, but it is very well done, with many new stories filed every day. I can't understand how a defeated guerrilla army does such a great job of keeping up these websites.
ANNCOL-Brasil (in Portuguese) is the support network of the "defeated guerrillas" in Brazil, where they have long had a large support base, especially with members of the PT ruling party (though probably not the Lulaistas - the supporters of the moderating Presidency of Lula).
The website of the Colombian Communist Party, and its famous newspaper, Voz. FARC has always been nothing more than the armed wing of this party. The PCC site is also very well-done. The nicely-done website of the "defeated" FARC Eastern Bloc.
The FARC is deeply allied with both the Cuban regime and with Chavez' government in Venezuela (Yes, the propaganda is true.). As far as how deep that alliance goes, I have no idea. Apporea is a leftwing, pro-Chavez site out of Venezuela.
The FARC is also allied with the FSLN Sandinista party (and presumably the Sandinista government) of Nicaragua (Yes, this is true too.). The website of Chavez' Telesur TV out of Venezuela, designed to provide a progressive alternative to the rightwing Latin American media. Mundial is a leftwing radio station out of Venezuela, also run by the Venezuelan government - this is their website, with lots of text on it.
All of the above is in Spanish only.
Showing posts with label Nicaragua. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Nicaragua. Show all posts
Sunday, November 23, 2008
Friday, August 29, 2008
Multiculturalism and Socialism: The Odd Couple
The latest death toll figures from Hurricane Katrina can be seen on this website here. The famous Russian neo-Nazi video is on this blog here.
Updated September 2:
In the comments section, Scott, who is a White nationalist, discusses the disconnect between multiculturalism and socialism or social democracy.
Yes, we do allow White nationalists, even anti-Black ones, on the board, but every time a cute Black woman shows up on the board, we force them to kiss her. On the lips. On penalty of banning. None have left yet. Brown sugar, how come you taste so good?
Scott says:
Scott is right. Does the UK count as a multicultural country? If it does, it's growing a nasty White racist - fascist party of reaction to the diversity in the BNP.
Does Venezuela count? If Venezuela counts, I would say that Venezuela is a country riven with violence, tension and class war. There seems to be a racial angle, but in the upper class and upper middle class, it's really more about class than race. Nevertheless, it's clear that the oligarchy is much more light-skinned than the Underclass that supports Chavez.
Is multicultural Russia a social democracy? Maybe so, but it's riven from one end to the other with horrible racism.
Do Communist states like China and Cuba count? Maybe so, but those countries, probably due to the class warfare (in the case of both) and combined class/race warfare (in the case of Cuba) inherent in their societies, needed full, bloody Communist revolutions to institute any kind of socialist system.
Vietnam and Laos are multiethnic countries, but the Lao and the Vietnamese are the overwhelming majority. They also needed Communist revolutions to put in socialism.
I would say Sri Lanka. They have a pretty good social democracy there, and the ruling party is a member of the Socialist International. There's also a horribly vicious civil war going on, because that "socialist" party in power has never done much to help the Tamils.
Socialist parties in Chile, Argentina and Brazil haven't been able to get much done. In Chile and Argentina the problem is probably much more class than race. In Brazil, surely it's both race and class together. The socialists in Ecuador and Bolivia are trying to get something done, but Bolivia is riven with a horrific class/race division and it's almost civil war there.
I don't think that the socialist parties in Nicaragua and Guatemala will be able to get much done. Both nations had Leftist revolutions for decades, in the case of Nicaragua followed by a revolutionary government and more civil war, this time counterrevolutionary. Nicaragua was always more about class than race, but the oligarchy is light-skinned. In Guatemala, the situation is very much about both class and race riven together.
One thing becomes clear in this analysis.
The only way to peacefully vote in a socialist or social democratic government is to have a relatively homogeneous society. Typically a White society. As diversity and multiculturalism increases, even in White European countries, White racist/fascist groups rise up for various reasons and racial violence against minorities becomes common.
In multiethnic or deeply class-riven nations (Note how often the two are conflated!), socialism, social democracy or movements towards them is typically accompanied by either outright civil war, de facto civil war, tremendous open class war in terms of coups, attempted coups, lockout strikes, riots, imperialist interventions, class-based separatist movements, and much violence.
In other places, socialist governments are not able to get much done due to deep class and race-based conflicts and the threat of violence from dominant ethnics and/or classes.
In other places, long civil wars eventually installed Communist regimes in multiethnic countries and ethnic conflict subsided or stopped. Short of installing a Communist regime, multiethnic countries moving towards socialism are likely to experience a lot of internal violence and chaos.
If diversity is so bad for socialism, why do socialists in the West keep pushing it?
Good question.
Note: Readers should carefully read the Commenting Rules before commenting to avoid having their comments edited or deleted and to avoid being banned from the site.
Updated September 2:
In the comments section, Scott, who is a White nationalist, discusses the disconnect between multiculturalism and socialism or social democracy.
Yes, we do allow White nationalists, even anti-Black ones, on the board, but every time a cute Black woman shows up on the board, we force them to kiss her. On the lips. On penalty of banning. None have left yet. Brown sugar, how come you taste so good?
Scott says:
Look at the countries that have the highest index of egalitarianism in the West: Iceland, Norway, Sweden (used to have more). The inhabitants are all pretty closely related to one another. I'll spot my sibling $100 cash.I respond:
It's basically the same thing but in a less dramatic way in such countries, but when other nationalities come in because of the aforementioned ethnostates' welfare system, as seek to take advantage of it, the whole system gets messed up. Find me an ethnically diverse country with a social democracy.
Scott is right. Does the UK count as a multicultural country? If it does, it's growing a nasty White racist - fascist party of reaction to the diversity in the BNP.
Does Venezuela count? If Venezuela counts, I would say that Venezuela is a country riven with violence, tension and class war. There seems to be a racial angle, but in the upper class and upper middle class, it's really more about class than race. Nevertheless, it's clear that the oligarchy is much more light-skinned than the Underclass that supports Chavez.
Is multicultural Russia a social democracy? Maybe so, but it's riven from one end to the other with horrible racism.
Do Communist states like China and Cuba count? Maybe so, but those countries, probably due to the class warfare (in the case of both) and combined class/race warfare (in the case of Cuba) inherent in their societies, needed full, bloody Communist revolutions to institute any kind of socialist system.
Vietnam and Laos are multiethnic countries, but the Lao and the Vietnamese are the overwhelming majority. They also needed Communist revolutions to put in socialism.
I would say Sri Lanka. They have a pretty good social democracy there, and the ruling party is a member of the Socialist International. There's also a horribly vicious civil war going on, because that "socialist" party in power has never done much to help the Tamils.
Socialist parties in Chile, Argentina and Brazil haven't been able to get much done. In Chile and Argentina the problem is probably much more class than race. In Brazil, surely it's both race and class together. The socialists in Ecuador and Bolivia are trying to get something done, but Bolivia is riven with a horrific class/race division and it's almost civil war there.
I don't think that the socialist parties in Nicaragua and Guatemala will be able to get much done. Both nations had Leftist revolutions for decades, in the case of Nicaragua followed by a revolutionary government and more civil war, this time counterrevolutionary. Nicaragua was always more about class than race, but the oligarchy is light-skinned. In Guatemala, the situation is very much about both class and race riven together.
One thing becomes clear in this analysis.
The only way to peacefully vote in a socialist or social democratic government is to have a relatively homogeneous society. Typically a White society. As diversity and multiculturalism increases, even in White European countries, White racist/fascist groups rise up for various reasons and racial violence against minorities becomes common.
In multiethnic or deeply class-riven nations (Note how often the two are conflated!), socialism, social democracy or movements towards them is typically accompanied by either outright civil war, de facto civil war, tremendous open class war in terms of coups, attempted coups, lockout strikes, riots, imperialist interventions, class-based separatist movements, and much violence.
In other places, socialist governments are not able to get much done due to deep class and race-based conflicts and the threat of violence from dominant ethnics and/or classes.
In other places, long civil wars eventually installed Communist regimes in multiethnic countries and ethnic conflict subsided or stopped. Short of installing a Communist regime, multiethnic countries moving towards socialism are likely to experience a lot of internal violence and chaos.
If diversity is so bad for socialism, why do socialists in the West keep pushing it?
Good question.
Note: Readers should carefully read the Commenting Rules before commenting to avoid having their comments edited or deleted and to avoid being banned from the site.
Saturday, July 26, 2008
Do Capitalists Support Pubic Health and Education?
In a response to my post, The Paradox of Capitalist Regulation, brilliant British commenter huy suggests that capitalists nowadays are enlightened enough to see that public health and education are needed for the workforce. I argue otherwise below.
Huy:
If you look at the 3rd World, the capitalist classes there do not want public education and they certainly do not want state health care. Even here in the US, the capitalist class has waged all-out war on public education and national health care through the Republican Party, although the Democratic Party also now seems to oppose national health care.
In parts of the world where national health care has been put in, the capitalists and their rightwing parties quickly wage ideological warfare to get rid of it.
Europe is an unusual case, probably due to circumstances discussed in my earlier post, For Justice, A River of Blood.
Europe was a very rightwing place in the 1930's. WW2 completely destroyed most of the European Right, defeated all rightwing governments, killed, wounded or imprisoned many of the rightwingers themselves, destroyed or made illegal their organizations and dissolved much of their wealth and power, and more importantly, humiliated them and completely discredited rightwing ideology.
As a consequence, the Right was in disarray for decades after WW2 in Europe, and they have not yet regained their power. After the war, there was a Cold War threat from the USSR and from Left groups all over the rest of Europe.
In order to co-opt the Soviet model and the West European Left, the ruling classes in Europe cut deals with workers, consumers and society in which a Social Contract was erected in the form of a socialism called variously the social market or social democracy. Due to the decimation and discrediting of the European Right, even European elites and media bought into social democratic ideology.
Hence we see in France large Leftwing papers like Liberation, huge Euro-Communist parties getting 10-30% of the vote and even ruling states in Italy. A Gramscian cultural hegemony was constructed by the Left in post-war Europe, such that the media and culture itself promoted social democracy as the normal way for a society to operate.
Elites in Scandinavia formed collegial relations with Communist and Leftist states and Leftist guerrillas on the basis that they were all socialists. For instance, Scandinavian governments had friendly relations with Sandinista Nicaragua, Cuba and Vietnam, along with the FMLN and FARC guerrillas in El Salvador and Colombia.
Scandinavian governments gave generous aid to the Third World, often in pro-people forms with no capitalist or reactionary strings attached. This had the effect of taking the wind out of the sails of West European Communists. In a relatively just social democratic society, most saw little need for revolution.
In Europe, even the capitalists have gone along with national health care, although in the UK they have been whittling away at it since Thatcher. European executives love their free national health care and paid six week vacations.
However, in much of the rest of the world, capitalists have rolled back national health and education. In China, national health care is apparently gone as a right. In Russia, too, it scarcely exists anymore, while education has been decimated along with educated persons and professions.
In some of East European states like Bulgaria, health care has been devastated. The first thing the hero of both US parties, Nicaraguan President Violeta Chamorro, did when the Sandinistas were voted out was to get rid of free public education and free national health care.
In Canada right now, the rightwing party and the business class have declared war on the national health care system (an ongoing project for a good 15 years or so now), but it is popular, so they have to tread lightly.
If the business classes in the US supported public education and national health care, we would not have a decades-long war against both of them waged by the party of business, the Republican Party, and supported by the business class in its entirety. It is true that some more enlightened US capitalists (especially big businesses) do support public education and even national health care, but they are an exception.
In this sense, the US small business class is even more reactionary than US big businesses. The US small business class supported Ross Perot and Ron Paul and are often far to the Right of the corporate guys.
This rightwing populism can and does lead to fascism. Small business and the petit bourgeois were the army behind fascism in Nazi Germany and have led many far-right movements in the US too.
The petit bourgeois resents the plutocratic elites for screwing them, but on the other hand also resents the working classes for being unionized and making good money via union wages. They feel oppressed by both groups.
Also, many petit bourgeois did not go to college, so they resent those white collar workers (seen as intellectuals and professionals) who got degrees and the resulting higher-paying jobs.
The petit bourgeois work in offices, banks and stores as clerks, tellers, low-ranking managers, etc. This class sector is often equated with something like the lower middle class. They often have no class consciousness at all, which is why they are often fodder for the Far Right.
What you are advocating above, huy, is not the free market at all, since the free market advocates getting rid of most to all government spending and regulation. Instead, you are advocating for socialism in one of its many forms. This form being the social market or social democracy.
I am a strong supporter of social democracy along the lines of the European model. The social market is a regulated capitalism with many government programs as a safety net and considerable government involvement in and even ownership of parts of the economy. In Sweden, 93% of the economy is private, but almost everyone, including managers and office workers, is unionized.
Government involvement in the economy takes the form of industry guidance as a corporatist element. Ownership of aspects of the economy takes the form of ownership of large industries like aircraft and ship building, national airlines, vehicle manufacturing, national rail, etc. It's worked quite well.
Keep in mind that capitalists are loath to invest in industries like ship building in which it may take 100 years to make your first profit. These industries need to be state-run for a long time.
Further, passenger rail is almost never profitable for the private sector, so they just don't run passenger trains. Since it operates at a loss as its nature, it must be run by the state.
This is what is so sick about the endless demands on Amtrak to make a profit - it is almost impossible for Amtrak to make a profit, because large passenger rail networks almost never do. In order to profit, they would have to charge so much money that they would hardly get any passengers.
In the same way, city buses never run at a profit either, hence we never see the private sector running passenger buses inside cities. Do you see any private rail lines running passenger rail in any areas of the US? Of course not.
Why? Because it's not profitable. Passenger rail must be run by the state for it to exist at all. Demands for Amtrak to run a profit are perverse, dishonest and wrong. How many Americans think Amtrak needs to run a profit? Of those with an opinion, possibly most. This is what rightwing propaganda will do to you.
Note: Readers should carefully read the Commenting Rules before commenting to avoid having their comments edited or deleted and to avoid being banned from the site.
Huy:
I would say that history has taught capitalism that free education and law and order run by the state is essential for capitalism to work, as without those things capitalism fails.I respond:
It looks like capitalism is learning across the globe that free and equal health provided by the state is also essential for capitalism to run (from a free market economic point of view).
Socialism wants national health and education for the benefit of the people, while capitalism wants national health and education for the benefit of the market and growth of the economy, An economy with higher-skilled, more versatile workers who are in good health is a more productive one.
I consider myself vey leftwing and technocratic, and I'm deeply in favour of the free market, but only if the state provides good free education and health for all, minimum wage, poverty benefits, unemployment benefits and the chance for adults to get apprenticeships and qualifications for free when ever they need to or want to (within reason) so as to allow the lower-skilled workers to keep up with the fast pace of the free market and all the job cuts and creations that come with it.
The free market is humanity's best hope for destroying poverty, but only if it is galvanized by the state properly, whereby social mobility and equal opportunity and social justice and lack of social deprivation is followed through. This makes both moral and economic sense.
If you look at the 3rd World, the capitalist classes there do not want public education and they certainly do not want state health care. Even here in the US, the capitalist class has waged all-out war on public education and national health care through the Republican Party, although the Democratic Party also now seems to oppose national health care.
In parts of the world where national health care has been put in, the capitalists and their rightwing parties quickly wage ideological warfare to get rid of it.
Europe is an unusual case, probably due to circumstances discussed in my earlier post, For Justice, A River of Blood.
Europe was a very rightwing place in the 1930's. WW2 completely destroyed most of the European Right, defeated all rightwing governments, killed, wounded or imprisoned many of the rightwingers themselves, destroyed or made illegal their organizations and dissolved much of their wealth and power, and more importantly, humiliated them and completely discredited rightwing ideology.
As a consequence, the Right was in disarray for decades after WW2 in Europe, and they have not yet regained their power. After the war, there was a Cold War threat from the USSR and from Left groups all over the rest of Europe.
In order to co-opt the Soviet model and the West European Left, the ruling classes in Europe cut deals with workers, consumers and society in which a Social Contract was erected in the form of a socialism called variously the social market or social democracy. Due to the decimation and discrediting of the European Right, even European elites and media bought into social democratic ideology.
Hence we see in France large Leftwing papers like Liberation, huge Euro-Communist parties getting 10-30% of the vote and even ruling states in Italy. A Gramscian cultural hegemony was constructed by the Left in post-war Europe, such that the media and culture itself promoted social democracy as the normal way for a society to operate.
Elites in Scandinavia formed collegial relations with Communist and Leftist states and Leftist guerrillas on the basis that they were all socialists. For instance, Scandinavian governments had friendly relations with Sandinista Nicaragua, Cuba and Vietnam, along with the FMLN and FARC guerrillas in El Salvador and Colombia.
Scandinavian governments gave generous aid to the Third World, often in pro-people forms with no capitalist or reactionary strings attached. This had the effect of taking the wind out of the sails of West European Communists. In a relatively just social democratic society, most saw little need for revolution.
In Europe, even the capitalists have gone along with national health care, although in the UK they have been whittling away at it since Thatcher. European executives love their free national health care and paid six week vacations.
However, in much of the rest of the world, capitalists have rolled back national health and education. In China, national health care is apparently gone as a right. In Russia, too, it scarcely exists anymore, while education has been decimated along with educated persons and professions.
In some of East European states like Bulgaria, health care has been devastated. The first thing the hero of both US parties, Nicaraguan President Violeta Chamorro, did when the Sandinistas were voted out was to get rid of free public education and free national health care.
In Canada right now, the rightwing party and the business class have declared war on the national health care system (an ongoing project for a good 15 years or so now), but it is popular, so they have to tread lightly.
If the business classes in the US supported public education and national health care, we would not have a decades-long war against both of them waged by the party of business, the Republican Party, and supported by the business class in its entirety. It is true that some more enlightened US capitalists (especially big businesses) do support public education and even national health care, but they are an exception.
In this sense, the US small business class is even more reactionary than US big businesses. The US small business class supported Ross Perot and Ron Paul and are often far to the Right of the corporate guys.
This rightwing populism can and does lead to fascism. Small business and the petit bourgeois were the army behind fascism in Nazi Germany and have led many far-right movements in the US too.
The petit bourgeois resents the plutocratic elites for screwing them, but on the other hand also resents the working classes for being unionized and making good money via union wages. They feel oppressed by both groups.
Also, many petit bourgeois did not go to college, so they resent those white collar workers (seen as intellectuals and professionals) who got degrees and the resulting higher-paying jobs.
The petit bourgeois work in offices, banks and stores as clerks, tellers, low-ranking managers, etc. This class sector is often equated with something like the lower middle class. They often have no class consciousness at all, which is why they are often fodder for the Far Right.
What you are advocating above, huy, is not the free market at all, since the free market advocates getting rid of most to all government spending and regulation. Instead, you are advocating for socialism in one of its many forms. This form being the social market or social democracy.
I am a strong supporter of social democracy along the lines of the European model. The social market is a regulated capitalism with many government programs as a safety net and considerable government involvement in and even ownership of parts of the economy. In Sweden, 93% of the economy is private, but almost everyone, including managers and office workers, is unionized.
Government involvement in the economy takes the form of industry guidance as a corporatist element. Ownership of aspects of the economy takes the form of ownership of large industries like aircraft and ship building, national airlines, vehicle manufacturing, national rail, etc. It's worked quite well.
Keep in mind that capitalists are loath to invest in industries like ship building in which it may take 100 years to make your first profit. These industries need to be state-run for a long time.
Further, passenger rail is almost never profitable for the private sector, so they just don't run passenger trains. Since it operates at a loss as its nature, it must be run by the state.
This is what is so sick about the endless demands on Amtrak to make a profit - it is almost impossible for Amtrak to make a profit, because large passenger rail networks almost never do. In order to profit, they would have to charge so much money that they would hardly get any passengers.
In the same way, city buses never run at a profit either, hence we never see the private sector running passenger buses inside cities. Do you see any private rail lines running passenger rail in any areas of the US? Of course not.
Why? Because it's not profitable. Passenger rail must be run by the state for it to exist at all. Demands for Amtrak to run a profit are perverse, dishonest and wrong. How many Americans think Amtrak needs to run a profit? Of those with an opinion, possibly most. This is what rightwing propaganda will do to you.
Note: Readers should carefully read the Commenting Rules before commenting to avoid having their comments edited or deleted and to avoid being banned from the site.
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