Every month in Glasgow I put out a free paper called, The Anarchist Critic. You can down load the latest, issue 110 as a PDF HERE.
The Anarchist Critic Archives as PDFs:
Issue 98 Issue 96. Issue 95. Issue 94. Issue 93. Issue 92. Issue 91. Issue 90. Issue 89. Issue 88. Issue 87. Issue 86. Issue 85. Issue 84. Issue 83. Issue 82. Issue 81. Issue 80. Issue 79. Issue 78. Issue 77. Issue 76. Issue 75. Issue 74. Issue 73. Issue 72. Issue 71. Issue 70. Issue 69. Issue 68. Issue 67. Issue 66.
Isn’t about time we woke up to the fact that national governments are no more than the corporate world’s minders. They certainly don’t function for the benefit of all in society, they do the bidding of their corporate bosses. We now live in a corporate society where the corporations control everything and nothing will be done that might in any way hinder their progress to amass ever greater profits. We should always remember that a pool of unemployed helps to keep wages down, it is a bonus to the corporate world. You can lobby the millionaire cabal in the Westminster House of Hypocrisy and Corruption all you want about more jobs and all that crap but basically they don’t need you. The corporate world is not in the least patriotic, the Asian manufacturing is booming and the companies that are falling over themselves to join that bandwagon over there are all familiar names to the Western workers. In the past the booming West sent its affluent workers as tourists to the East, now it is in reverse, the affluent Asians are visiting the poorer West. The corporate world doesn’t much care which way it goes, as I said before, they are not in the least patriotic.
It is strange that the corporate world and anarchists should have one thing in common, we both want the end to national borders. We anarchist want to see the end of the state and its borders so that we as people can co-operate, function freely in federation with all other people to our mutual benefit. The corporate world wants an end to national borders but only for capital to move freely around the globe exploiting any pool of cheap labour it can find and all for the benefit of that little band of parasites, the shareholders.
The reality is, we don’t need them, we make and distribute everything in this world, we can do so in a much more efficient, equitable, just and sustainable manner if we eliminated the parasites and and got rid of their mantra, profit above all else. They on the other hand do need us to continue to be exploited, so as they can maintain their pampered parasitical existence.
The European Trade Union Confederation is staging a European Day of Action on 29 September next. It will be made up of a Euro-demonstration in Brussels and trade union actions in the various European countries. The European trade unions will be demonstrating against the austerity measures adopted recently by many European countries, and to demand recovery plans in favour of quality jobs and growth.
This is not enough, little pockets of demonstrators dotted around Europe will not have any effect on the powers that be. What is needed is an indefinite pan-European general strike. To call on the workers to politely form marches here and there asking the financial world not to hurt them too much is a retrograde step. We want to change the system, we don’t want more of the same. If we want that better world for all, we can’t simply ask for more of what we have just had. All the workers of this world have to do to change it for ever is just simply fold their arms. Stay at home, read a book, take the kids for a walk, go for a cycle, then organise your community and work place the way you want it to be, but don’t turn up to be employed by the parasites, occupy your work place.
This action by the European TUC should be expanded, it should be seen as the opportunity to grasp the moment and take control of our lives and free ourselves from the yoke of exploitation by the parasitical financial greed merchants and their state mouthpieces the politicians. We could take that step to start the creation of that better world based on mutual aid that sees to the needs of all our people and consign this system of greed and profit to the dustbin of history. We don’t want to beg for work, we don’t want to to say “Please don’t cut my social services, my health service or my kids education but do keep exploiting me.” We want to change the world and only we the workers will do that for the benefit of the workers.
He was another Christian fundamentalist war mongering nutter mouthpiece of the state so why allow him to bask in the illusion of popularity. He became a millionaire on the blood of others.
Protest Blair’s Book signing – Wed 8 September
Message from Edinburgh Stop the War Coalition
We’ve had a huge response from our members, supporters and the press to the protest we are organising outside Waterstone’s, Piccadilly on Wednesday 8 September, 12:30pm, when war criminal Tony Blair will be at a book-signing event to launch his memoirs.
A measure of how outraged people are by a bookshop hosting an event as if Blair is like any other author publicising a book, rather than indictable for war crimes. Within days, our e-lobby has seen 1000 users ask Waterstone’s to cancel the book-signing. You can find the e-lobby at http://bit.ly/93tbfF .
Please publicise this link as widely as you can, post it to your Facebook, website, Twitter, etc.
A letter asking Waterstone’s to reconsider giving Blair a platform was recently published in the Guardian signed by, among others, novelists Iain Banks and AL Kennedy, journalist John Pilger, composer Michael Nyman, former Guantanamo detainee Moazzem Begg, ex-soldier Ben Griffin and artist Tanya Tier.
We’ve turned this into a petition for use by local groups, which can be downloaded here: http://tinyurl.com/386xtzm
If anybody out there thinks that it is Clinton/Bush/Obama that is the problem, then perhaps this little list, which is in no way complete, might help to make the point that it is the system of state/corporate capitalism/imperialism, and not the figurehead at the top that is the real problem.
Excerpts courtesy of CIA timeline. by Steve Kangas
1953: Iran; CIA overthrows the democratically elected Mohammed Mossadegh in a military coup, after he threatened to nationalize British oil.
1954: Guatemala; CIA overthrows the democratically elected Jacob Arbenz in a military coup.
1957-1973: Laos; The CIA carries out approximately one coup per year trying to nullify Laos’ democratic elections.
1959: Haiti; The U.S. military helps “Papa Doc” Duvalier become dictator of Haiti. He creates his own private police force, the “Tonton Macoutes,” who terrorize the population with machetes.
Ecuador; The CIA-backed military forces the democratically elected President Jose Velasco to resign
Congo (Zaire); The CIA assassinates the democratically elected Patrice Lumumba
1963: Dominican Republic; The CIA overthrows the democratically elected Juan Bosch in a military coup
1964: Brazil; A CIA-backed military coup overthrows the democratically elected government of Joao Goulart. The junta that replaces it will, in the next two decades, become one of the most bloodthirsty in history.
1965: Indonesia; The CIA overthrows the democratically elected Sukarno with a military coup.
Congo (Zaire); A CIA-backed military coup installs Mobutu Sese Seko as dictator.
1967: Greece; A CIA-backed military coup overthrows the government two days before the elections.
Bolivia; A CIA-organized military operation captures legendary guerilla Che Guevara.
1969: Uruguay; The notorious CIA torturer Dan Mitrione arrives in Uruguay, a country torn with political strife. Whereas right-wing forces previously used torture only as a last resort, Mitrione convinces them to use it as a routine, widespread practice.
1973: Chile; The CIA overthrows and assassinates Salvador Allende. The CIA replaces Allende with General Augusto Pinochet, who will torture and murder thousands of his own countrymen in a crackdown on labor leaders and the political left.
1981: Iran/Contra Begins; The CIA begins selling arms to Iran at high prices, using the profits to arm the Contras fighting the Sandinista government in Nicaragua
1983: Honduras; The CIA gives Honduran military officers the Human Resource Exploitation Training Manual, which teaches how to torture people.
1989: Panama; The U.S. invades Panama to overthrow a dictator of its own making, General Manuel Noriega.
Like I said, this list is in no way complete, but there is enough there to surely convince you that changing the smiling face that sits on the throne of corporate capitalism isn’t going to make one bleeding bit of difference to the endless slaughter that goes on to protect the bank balances of the rich parasites that own the corporate world. It will require the destruction of corporate capitalism and the creating a system based on mutual aid and sustainability that will see to the needs of all our people, before we see an end to the slaughter for profits.
It is odd that people should accept the state even although history tells us that, despite its vociferous and strenuous propaganda to the contrary, the state is the longest running, most experienced, most skilled, most copious purveyors in that ancient and intricate art of terror, in the long and tortured history of man.
Ever since the first government was formed, terror has been an accepted weapon for keeping the people in line. Never for the benefit of the people in the line, but for those who wish to keep them there. The few rule the many and since it is against the interests of the many, the few need the weapon of terror to protect their little profitable cabal. It would therefore seem obvious that if we wish to free ourselves from the the ever present anticipation and results of terror, we have to first and foremost get rid of the greatest source of terror, the state, and its mouthpiece, government.
THE WAY OF SLAVES.
Politicians living a life of opulence
paid for by other men’s dreams,
add to the lexicon of humanity’s suffering
weaving their selfish grandiose schemes.
Abusing privileges, grasping at wealth
egos blown like a hot air balloon,
preaching our poverty will bring
prosperity for all———-soon.
We tighten our belt another notch
accepting a beggarly slice of the cake,
while they bask in a cherry orchard
surrounded by a fine wine lake.
Pouring words, grand posturing,
as they unveil their latest plan,
assuring they live in luxury
while we struggle as best we can.
Poverty’s the price for allowing
others to plan our days,
when will we finally grasp
this is the way of slaves.
August 19 is celebrated by Afghans as Afghan Independence Day and represents the signing by the Afghans and the British Imperialists of the Treaty of Rawalpindi on August 19 1919. The British Imperialists, after three bloody wars, gave gave up their imperialist dreams of occupying Afghanistan. On her recent visit to Afghanistan, Hilary Clinton, with unashamed hypocrisy and utter audacity, congratulated the Afghan people on their 91 years of independence. An independence that has seen almost 10 years bloody Soviet occupation followed by a further almost 10 years, and even more bloody, US/UK occupation that is still ongoing.
It appears that when the US invades and occupies a country that is freedom, but when any other country does likewise, it is tyranny. It is simply a matter of state logic, we are always righteous and for freedom, they are always tyrannical and repressive.
In the past it was workers blood that was shed on foreign soil killing workers at the behest of our imperial masters. Now it is workers killing workers on foreign soil at the behest of the corporate world, with the state giving it the stamp of legitimacy by supplying the cannon fodder. Never has it been for the benefit of the workers. In the past crowns got extra jewels and mansions were built on the blood of the spoils. Now oil and minerals, contracts and markets are added to the corporate portfolio. History surely tells us that this system of states is not for the benefit of the ordinary people.
Now that the well manicured millionaire twins are in full swing with their machetes, hacking at the living standards of the ordinary people of this country, all those who voted at the last election must ask themselves is this what they voted for? Did you know what you were voting for, was it really to see the millionaires club rip you off? Well, it is all your fault, you voted for them. Think of the number of elections we have had and all those wonderful manifestos and yet nothing has changed. The rich and powerful still hold all the aces, we get to carry their bags and we are supposed to be grateful.
Every adult should know by now that changing the smile at 10 Downing Street, doesn’t make our lives any easier. It is not the well coiffured grinning face that needs changing it is the system. This system of corporate capitalism owns you, it owns the best houses the best land, the factories and the supermarkets, the schools and the hospitals. They have you by the balls and they are squeezing harder now than ever before. Our destiny is now shaped by globalised financiers and multinational corporations, ask yourself, did you vote for them? The 23 millionaires in the cabinet are the action team of the corporate world, they are there to sort things out, to sew-up all the public assets into nice packages for their parasite friends in the millionaires club to gobble up, and to hell with the people. It is their world or it is our world, there can be no compromise.
The Millionaire twins’ plans to cut the housing budget will have devastating effect on a huge swath of ordinary people. According to certain estimates the cuts will put another than 500,000 people on to the housing waiting lists as well as costing over 300,000 jobs in the process. The National Housing Federation stated that ministers risk “shutting the door on an entire generation of low-income families” It will also result in the creation of ghettos where the poor will be corralled like cattle, while the rich live in their secured areas of opulence at the expense of those poor. This is only one aspect of the Cameron-Clegg “BIG SOCIETY”. As well as decent housing being exclusive to the rich, the health service will go the same way and an adequate education will be an expensive commodity that most will not be able to afford. All this to safeguard the bond markets and the millionaire parasites of the corporate world, the real friends of this government and its millionaire cabinet.
We accept these cuts at our peril, all that the working class have gained through struggle over the last century will be wiped out. It will be a return the poverty of the Victorian era where the deprivation in society was handled by charities and the rich parasites massage their egos by pretending to be philanthropists where they handed back a pittance of what they stole from the poor and expect respect and homage from those that they plundered.
KABUL CONFERENCE SHOWS THE WAR AT AN IMPASSE
The Kabul conference discussing the war in Afghanistan has only served to
demonstrate the impasse which the war has now reached. Even the US
administration has conceded that talks with the Taliban – so far resisted by
Obama – are going to happen. The recognition that the war is losing contradicts the statements, still reiterated by foreign secretary William Hague, that there is a gradual improvement in the situation in Afghanistan.
The much-touted date for withdrawal in 2014 shows the desperation of the Nato governments, faced with defeat in Afghanistan and growing unpopularity of the war domestically. The fact that they are talking about a withdrawal date reflects the growing costs of the war, in human life and in billions of dollars. The death rate of British soldiers now stands at similar levels to those of Russian soldiers just before their withdrawal 20 years ago. The death rate of Afghans has increased over the past year. The Afghan army, supposedly being trained to take over the war from the Nato forces, has a 25% desertion rate.
But the conference today answers nothing. Why is fighting continuing in Helmand and the south when a likely outcome of negotiations to end the war will be to hand over that area to the Taliban? How can western governments claim the war is about human rights when it backs a government ranking among the most corrupt in the world? Why are these same governments ignoring public opinion, which is for rapid withdrawal of troops and an end to the war?
The role of the British government in this war has been shameful, from John Reid’s claim four years ago that the troops might be able to leave Helmand without a shot being fired in anger, to Hague’s current increasingly desperate justifications for the war.
How many more people will die before the proposed withdrawal date? How many billions will be spent on an unjustifiable war while the welfare state is
slashed by the Coalition government. And which government minister will have to tell the families of the dead what exactly they were fighting for?
We are asking all our supporters to redouble their efforts campaigning to bring the troops home. Now is a moment when the movement can really make a difference. Our timetable for withdrawal starts now, with campaigning in every locality, involving military families, trade unions, school students and students, faith groups and anti war campaigners. We are aiming for a big national demonstration to coincide with the next Nato summit on November 20th saying it’s time to go –bring the troops home.
Please start spreading the word about the demonstration – leaflets will be
available on Monday and get in touch with your local group or check the website for local activities.
‘AFGHANISTAN: TIME TO GO’.
PUBLIC MEETING MONDAY 26TH JULY
7pm, Monday, 26th July
Conway Hall
25 Red Lion Square
London, WC1R 4RL
Joe Glenton, jailed for refusing to fight in Afghanistan, speaks out against
the war. With Caroline Lucas, Jeremy Corbyn and Mark Steel.
The war in Afghanistan is in crisis. The strategy is crumbling, with Obama’s
sacking of General McChrystal and an increasingly corrupt Karzai government. The violence is intensifying with No clear goals and even fewer results. Thousands of Afghan civilians are dying every year and very little rebuilding is being done. Despite the 77% of people being opposed to Britain’s involvement in Afghanistan, this government continues to send troops to kill and die in a war that is being lost.
web; http://stopwar.org.uk
twitter; http://twitter.com/STWuk
As Ossie the toff prattled on about his necessary and very fair cuts you probably noticed that there were no cuts announced for the Ministry of War’s budget. I call it by it proper name since all it ever seems to do is send our troops to kill and maim people in other countries. Countries I might add that have never attacked us. He could have saved us £45 billion by scrapping trident and not replacing the beast, but some how he feels the need for our country to have these illegal weapons of mass destruction skulking about deep in the Atlantic pointing at our enemies. Who are our enemies? We don’t know and if we did we couldn’t fire these weapons of mass destruction, for though we bought and paid for them, we can’t use them without America’s permission, and they are unlikely to grant that permission unless it is somebody they don’t like, so we would be doing them a favour and taking the blame. At a running cost of £5 billion a year, these weapons of mass destruction do however allow our ministers to prance about on the international stage with the label “Super Power” pinned to their chest. That must make them feel good!! Let’s try to imagine how that £5 billion a year works out in schools, hospitals, cheap homes and/or an excellent public transport system.
Though Ossie the toff didn’t cut our Ministry of War budget you would imagine that there was a wee bit wiggle room there, as, for the year 2009, the financial crash year, we managed to spend more on warfare than Russia. As a matter of fact we were the third largest spender on warfare on the planet, We were only beaten into third place by the mighty war machines of the USA and China.
Our democratic welfare state managed to spend for the year 2009 approximately £45.8 billion on war. How would that translate into health, education and pensions? Of course we have to think what would the state be without its war machine? How could it make those land grabs for the corporate world, how could it seize other people’s oil for the oil giants? Yes, we need that mighty war machine to protect and increase the assets of the corporate world, so you and I will just have to pay up, grin and bear it.
We could of course organise to change society so that it sees to the needs of all its people and works in peace and co-operation with all other ordinary people across the planet. A society where the need to protect the greedy profit seeking parasites is a distant memory from the dustbin of history.
300 British troops killed in Afghanistan, it is working out at 1 killed every other day, 300 British families devastated, all in the name of –WHAT–? This does not take into account the number of young people coming back from that imperial expedition with limbs missing and other horrific injuries, then there are those who come home mentally scarred and broken. The bulk of those killed and damaged in this imperial affair are from the working class, the class that has nothing to gain from this endless slaughter. When it comes to why we are there we get a myriad of answers from, making us safe here in the UK, to building a true democracy in Afghanistan, of course we haven’t even started to build a true democracy here in the UK.
Recently we have been getting little hints of what could be the true reason for our government sacrificing so many of our working class youth, (and they are young, the average age of UK deaths in Afghanistan is 22 and among the 300 deaths, 31 were teenagers) In some of the financial papers there has been talk of the mineral wealth of Afghanistan as being in the £3 trillion region. Now the Western corporate world is not going to let that fall into the hands of of any other power group. So they call on their minders, the Western states to get in there and lay claim to that wealth by setting up a compliant government. A government that will let the Western corporate greed machine rip, rape and plunder that unfortunate land to feed their ever hungry shareholders. We the working class of the world bleed and the corporate world gains.
The Edinburgh June 5 demo against the Israeli massacre had a remarkable turnout. It was good to see such a large crowd at such short notice. There were groups from all parts of Scotland proudly displaying their banners. Despite the problems that the ordinary people of this country face because of the governments economic policies, it is obvious that the people of Scotland have not lost their compassion when others are in need.
This brutal Israeli state activity even brought out the local canine activists who marched with the other protesters in solidarity with the people of Palestine.
It is obvious that the pressure must be kept up to bring the Israeli zionist policies to a halt. Of course that is only one step in the right direction, we must struggle to end the state system. This brutal massacre is only one display of state savagery, we could fill a library with the list of brutal events visited on the ordinary people of this world by state oppression. By far the greatest killers in this world are states, their brutality outstrips any other organisation. In our focus on this massacre let’s not forget it is the state system that is at the root of this violence.
ISRAELIS KILL TEN STORMING GAZA FLOTILLA
EMERGENCY DEMONSTRATION TODAY
MONDAY 31 MAY 2.00PM DOWNING STREET LONDON
SPREAD THE WORD
Yet another act of Israeli barbarism as its forces storm one of the seven ships on the international flotilla taking aid to Gaza, where Israel’s illegal siege is starving Palestinians of essential resources. At least ten activists on board have been killed by Israeli forces.
Please join the emergency demonstration today if you can. Publicise it as widely as possible.
See video of Israeli assault from Turkish television: http://bit.ly/aKExFf
For updates see: http://http://bit.ly/bg5gIu
CONTACT FOREIGN SECRETARY WILLIAM HAGUE & YOUR MP
PROTEST TO FOREIGN SECRETARY WILLIAM HAGUE:
EMAIL:http:// msu.correspondence@fco.gov.uk
AND/OR http://private.office@fco.gov.uk
AND MSU.PublicIn@fco.gov.uk
LETTER TO:
William Hague MP,
Foreign Secretary,
King Charles Street,
London, SW1A 2AH
CONTACT YOUR MP:
http://findyourmp.parliament.uk/ Ask him/her to contact Hague on your behalf
CONTACT DEPUTY PRIME MINISTER NICK CLEGG
EMAIL: cleggn@parliament.uk
LETTER TO: Nick Clegg MP, House of Commons, London, SW1A 0AA
It appears that General David Petraeus, Commander of US Central Command issued secret orders last September, allowing the Pentagon to engage in espionage and reconnaissance throughout the Middle East and the Horn of Africa without regular congressional oversight or prior approval from the White House. This encompasses friend and foe lumped into the one package. So, can America claim to be a democracy now that its Generals can conduct their own form of foreign policy. A policy that interferes in the internal affairs of its sovereign allies?
Of course those who are in anyway informed will be well aware that America has been for some considerable time, governed by a military/corporate plutocracy. It is an imperialist power that rides roughshod over friends and foe alike in its quest for control over the planets resources.
Every four years the American public are granted the privilege of voting to see which bunch of millionaires/billionaires and their cabal of Generals/oil barons will have the privileged seat of power. This will decide which of the corporate moguls will get the cream and which will have to play second fiddle. However, the American people, like those in the other developed capitalist countries, will always remain at the bottom of the heap and for some strange reason they will continue to applaud their parasitical masters.
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