Burns Night

To some, Robert Burns was a political radical and thinker, a seditious revolutionary and a staunch republican. Research suggests that Burns was an active member of The Friends of the People, formed in 1792 and the first organisation in Scottish history to openly call for universal suffrage for all men, rich or poor. This early proto-democracy movement never really had mass support in Scotland, and was crushed by government forces by 1794. "Robert Bruce's March To Bannockburn", better known as "Scots Wha Hae", was written in response to the trial of the radical Thomas Muir. Thomas Muir sentenced to 14 years imprisonment and deportation to Botany Bay, amongst the charges he was indicted with was singing ‘Ca Ira’ in public, an unofficial anthem of the French Revolution. The last line of Scots Wha Hae is “Let us Do or Die!” - was the oath of the French revolutionaries.

Burns was an advocate of "make love not war" as penned in  "I Murder Hate".
"In wars at home I'll spend my blood-
Life-giving wars of Venus.
The deities that I adore
Are Social Peace and Plenty,
I’m better pleased to make one more
Than be the death of twenty.”

In ‘Address of Beelzebub’ Burns uses satire and has the poem’s narrator, Auld Nick, praising the landlord class encouraging them to actually brutalise their tenants even more than they have been doing.

“And they, be Damned, what right hae they
To meat or sleep or light of day
Far less to riches, power or freedom
But what your Lordships like tae gie them.”

"Man Was Made to Mourn - A Dirge" is a cheerless poem and yet another example of Robert Burn's loathing of the class differences between the workers and the land-owners. Burns once told his brother that "he could not well conceive a more mortifying picture of human life than a man seeking work."  Burns felt it was horrible that a "wight," a human being, needing to earn money and wanting to be useful to people, was able to work only by permission of somebody else -  somebody who could make profit from him! That humiliating and desperate "sentiment" came to life with "Man was Made to Mourn," It shows again his deep compassion for the man trying to find work in order to feed and house his family. Two lines raise it to the level of a modern proverb:
'Man's inhumanity to man
Makes countless thousands mourn!'
Throughout history, countless thousands continue to mourn as a result of pain, torture, and loss of life inflicted upon them or those near and dear to them--innocent men, women, and children.

A SOCIETY OF DESPAIR

Capitalism kills millions in its wars. It starves millions to death amidst plenty, but the awful feeling of helplessness and despair that it engenders in everyday life can only be guessed at by the following statistics. 'The number of people taking their own life in the UK rose "significantly" in 2011, latest figures from the Office for National Statistics have shown. Some 6,045 people killed themselves in 2011, an increase of 437 since 2010.' (BBC News, 22 January) RD

A REDUNDANT SOCIETY

Capitalism is a social system based on slumps and booms and no amount of political posturing by so-called statesmen will change that. 'The number of jobless people around the world rose by 4 million in 2012 to 197 million and is expected to grow further, the UN labour agency warns. In a report, the International Labour Organization (ILO) said the worst affected were youth: nearly 13% of the under 24s were unemployed. It said global unemployment was projected to rise 5.1 million this year and by a further 3 million in 2014.' (BBC News, 22 January) This immense waste of human endeavour is the norm for capitalism. Inside world socialism think of the abundance that these millions of producers could contribute to society. RD

Banking on charity? Don't !

Charities lost a protracted battle against the banks.

The trustees savings banks which operated prior to 1986 had a tradition of charitable giving. When TSB Group plc was floated in that year there were established several charitable foundations. The Deed of Covenant dated 10 September 1986 by which TSB Group plc ("the Company") bound and obliged itself at quarterly terms to pay to the reclaimer the greater of "(a) the amount equal to one quarter of one third of 0.1946 per cent of the pre-tax profits (after deducting pre-tax losses) ... or (b) the sum of £9,730".

Following the banking crisis of 2009 and the takeover of Halifax Bank of Scotland, Lloyds Banking Group tried to change the terms of its relationship with the foundation. It wanted to half its donation and put its own staff on the foundation’s board. The following high-profile dispute resulted in the bank and foundation formally breaking their links, which will come into effect after nine years notice.

The foundation should have received £3,543,433 but the bank interpreted the small-print of accountacy rules to mean they were required to only pay £38,920 and has had this upheld by the Supreme Court.

There is enough food

Almost one billion children will be trapped in poverty by hunger and malnutrition by 2025 unless action is taken, a new campaign has warned.

 Kathy Galloway, a spokeswoman for the campaign, said: "In a world where there is enough food for everyone, the fact that not everyone has enough to eat is nothing short of a scandal.

 Actor John Michie, is supporting the campaign. He said: "We need to solve the underlying issues which create global hunger once and for all. People are denied access to land that could produce food. Parents work tirelessly, but still can't afford to feed their children. It's unfair, it's unjust and the truth is it's totally preventable. If we get enough Scots behind this campaign we can make world leaders listen."

Did the politicians listen in 2005 when hundreds of thousands of charities churches and celebrities marched in Edinburgh to "make poverty history"? Did they listen when tens of thousands besieged Bush, Blair and the G-8 at Gleneagles?

Socialist Courier over the years has witnessed numerous campaigns and pleas from well-intentioned folk and organisations but they have always fallen short in identifying the real cause of poverty and  hunger - the capitalist system and because of that failure they mis-direct their policies and solutions to symptoms and not the root of the problem. They repeat red herrings and political baloney. Reformers have wait for crumbs to fall from the overflowing plates of world capital.

  IF a socialist world came about we would be able to stop people dying from hunger immediately and rapidly increase world food production to reach a point where every person on the planet would have free access to sufficient good quality food to maintain good health. It is not a utopian fantasy – but a practical, revolutionary proposition. Let’s campaign for the abolition of capitalism and not misdirect our energies in pleading to politicians.

Part time job - full time poverty

Citizens Advice Scotland warned that the number of people in part-time work is pushing many to the brink of poverty.

Norma Philpott, chief executive officer of Citizens Advice and Rights Fife, said: “We are increasingly seeing people who are struggling to make ends meet because they can’t find work with enough hours. The rise in the number of people coming to us for help accessing food banks and the proportion of people turning to payday loans shows that many people who can only find part time work are being pushed into poverty.”

Food for thought

The Toronto Star Business section (1/12/12) reported that US home
improvement giant, Lowes, has offered $1.8 billion to buy Quebec-based
Rona. The idea is that the industry is somewhat 'overbuilt' in Canada,
meaning that the big players got greedy and expanded ahead of the
demand. The "good" thing would be that the takeover would lead to a
store 'rationalization' meaning reduction of the number of stores.
Somewhere in all this jargon is the fact that a lot of people are going
to lose their jobs -- but that's the last consideration when
accumulation of wealth is at risk. John Ayers

THE POLLUTED SOCIETY

 

The leaking Japanese nuclear plant has led to badly polluted waters around Fukushima, and has led many to be wary of the fish catch in the area. 'A murasoi fish, caught close the the Fukushima nuclear plant in Japan, is over 2,500 times the legal safe radiation limit for seafood, the plant's operator Tokyo Electric has revealed. ....... The Japanese government has admitted that levels of contamination in the area are very high, but says that high levels of cesium were only detected in fish that are found nearest to the site of the disaster.' (Independent, 21 January) This reassuring statement by the Japanese government must put local minds to rest, but we wonder how many MPs will be having a murasoi fish supper tonight. RD

Depressed Scotland

The number of people in Scotland prescribed antidepressants has reached record levels, with more than one in seven people taking the drugs. There has been a steady rise in usage. There were 1.26 million drugs dispensed in 1993/94, increasing to 5.01 million in 2011/12.

The diagnostic criteria for depression as two weeks of low mood, irrespective of any change in the circumstances of the patient which might have left them feeling down. It even proposes that being low two weeks after bereavement should be considered depression.

Glasgow GP Des Spence argues treating depression like a medical condition is distracting attention from what really makes patients unhappy. "I think we use antidepressants too easily, for too long and that they are effective for few people (if at all)." Dr Spence's  concern about the widespread use of antidepressants is they leave the real reason for someone's poor mood unexplained. He said: "Improving society's wellbeing is not in the gift of medicine nor mere medication, and over-prescribing of antidepressants serves as distraction from a wider debate about why we are so unhappy as a society."

She-Town

Jeanie Spence (Jute and Flax workers, Dundee), Lamont (National Federation of Women Workers), Agnes Brown (National Federation of Women Workers), Mary McArthur (national leader and general secretary of the National Federation of Women Workers) and Rachel Devine (Jute and Flax Workers, Dundee).

 In 1900 Dundee was associated with one product: jute. Jute was the cheapest of fibres, but it was tough. As such it was the ideal packing material. Jute bagging and jute sacks were used to carry cotton from the American South, grain from the Great Plains and Argentina, coffee from the East Indies and Brazil, wool from Australia, sugar from the Caribbean and nitrates from Chile. Dundee was ‘Juteopolis’ – synonymous with its main industry. This association of place and product was not unusual. We still link Clydebank with ships, Sheffield with steel, Stoke-on-Trent with pottery. Throughout the late nineteenth century, over half of Dundee's workforce worked in the textile sector, which, from the 1860s on, was dominated by jute. Migrant workers arrived in Dundee in thousands. By the end of the 19th century, the city had quadrupled in size. Many of the immigrants were from Ireland, poor and Catholic. Many Catholic Irish immigrants faced discrimination and bigotry in Presbyterian Scotland. They were attacked from the pulpit and in the street. The Irish women working in the jute mills of Dundee were an exception – they were widely accepted.

Raw jute was produced in significant quantities in only one region of the world: the deltas of the Ganges and Brahmaputra rivers in Bengal in India. And for a short period – long finished by 1900 – Dundee and the surrounding district had a near monopoly on its manufacture. The Dundee jute industry was composed of many firms, most of them carrying out only one part of the process of buying, transporting, manufacturing and selling jute. Big profits were made in jute, but these were invested overseas rather than in the local economy. From the 1870s on, investment trusts launched by Dundee businessmen, channelled enormous sums into foreign investments and particularly into American railway, land and cattle companies. Dundee's ‘jute barons’ preferred to invest in American stocks rather than in developing new industries in Dundee. The result left Dundee dangerously dependent on the jute industry.

Food for though

How capitalism creates war. Japan is beginning to wake up to the fact
that China is a military as well as an economic power as the latter
flexes its muscle in SE Asia. Japan is retaliating by providing its
first military aid abroad since WWII, spending millions on training
troops in Cambodia and East Timor and providing the Philippine Coast
Guard with 10 new cutters worth $120 million. In other words, it is
building alliances against China for future confrontations that would be
called on in the event of military action. Too bad they can't put this
kind of forward thinking into scientific, medical, and educational
activities that would benefit mankind! John Ayers

THE ACQUISITIVE SOCIETY

Every Sunday priests will rebuke society for its greed and trot out the old slogan of "blessed are the poor" and lecture the gullible about the evils of materialism. During the week however the church is a little less noble. 'Behind a disguised offshore company structure, the church's international portfolio has been built up over the years, using cash originally handed over by Mussolini in return for papal recognition of the Italian fascist regime in 1929. Since then the international value of Mussolini's nest-egg has mounted until it now exceeds £500m. In 2006, at the height of the recent property bubble, the Vatican spent £15m of those funds to buy 30 St James's Square. Other UK properties are at 168 New Bond Street and in the city of Coventry.' (Guardian, 22 January) RD

Who put the swizz in Switzerland

Statistics say the Swiss are the richest people in the world, with net financial assets of nearly $148,000 per capita. That is a third more than the average for the next two wealthiest nations-Japan and the United States. But the ownership of that wealth, including stocks or physical assets such as land and housing, is much more unequally shared in the nation. 

The top 1 percent in Switzerland control more than a third of the nation’s wealth, which is slightly larger than the share owned by the richest 1 percent in the United States. Switzerland also has the highest density of millionaires in the West, with 9.5 percent of all households having $1 million or more, and the greatest number of ultra-rich families - 366 households worth more than $100 million. Ten percent of all the world’s billionaires live there. The number of super-wealthy foreigners lured to Switzerland has doubled in the last decade, to more than 5,000. Their taxes are based on the rental value of their property rather than their income or wealth, on the condition that they do not work in the country.

Swiss companies accounted for five of the top 10 best-paid chairmen in Europe in 2011. Nestle Chairman Peter Brabeck has accumulated a fortune of up to $215 million. Credit Suisse’s  CEO, Brady Dougan received $75 million stock windfall he received in 2009. The annual list of Switzerland’s wealthiest 300 people published by Bilanz names has Ikea founder Kamprad in first place, at $38 billion.

China's class struggle

More than 1,000 furious migrant workers besieged a factory in Shanghai and held 18 Japanese and Chinese managers against their will for more than a day, after the workers were subjected to unequal regulations. 400 police freed the managers.

The workers of Japanese electronic appliance maker Shanghai Shinmei Electric staged a strike and besieged the factory for two days following the introduction of a new factory policy calling for heavy fines, demerits or immediate termination for workers who made a mistake.

A worker wrote via a microblog about the desperate situation management allegedly put them in. "We earn less than 2,000 yuan a month, but we could be subjected to fines of 50 to 100 yuan for arriving late or spending more than two minutes in the toilet,"

 The National Bureau of Statistics last week revealed the country’s Gini coefficient – which measures income inequality. The official figure of 0.474 is a belated acknowledgment that China has a serious problem. On the Gini scale, 0 is perfect equality and 1 is total inequality – any rating above 0.4 is considered to be dangerous to social stability.

AN AMORAL SOCIETY

Capitalism is a competitive and complex social system, with major banks and investment companies speculating on which way the market trends will go. 'Goldman made about $400m (£251m) in 2012 from investing its clients' money in a range of "soft commodities", from wheat and maize to coffee and sugar, according to an analysis for The Independent by the World Development Movement (WDM). ..... Christine Haigh of the WDM said: "While nearly a billion people go hungry, Goldman Sachs bankers are feeding their own bonuses by betting on the price of food. Financial speculation is fuelling food price spikes and Goldman Sachs is the No 1 culprit."' (Independent, 20 January) M/s Haigh may condemn such speculation and speak in moral terms about world hunger, but capitalism is amoral and its only goal is profit. RD

A SICK SOCIETY

If you are a member of the owning class you can afford the best that society can provide. Along with the best food, clothing, housing, travel and education, you can also enjoy the best of medical treatment. If you happen to be a member of the working class you suffer a much different fate. 'Last night, Jeremy Hunt, the Health Secretary, said there is poor care "dotted" all over the NHS of the kind that was uncovered at Stafford Hospital. Between 400 and 1,200 more patients died than expected at the hospital due to poor care. Failures at the hospital included patients left in soiled bed sheets and lacking pain relief.' (Guardian, 21 January. RD

O Dear me, The Jute Mill

"O Dear me the World is ill-divided...Them that work the hardest, are aye the least provided"
 The Jute mill song is based on the experience of women workers in Dundee who would work up till they had their babies and then had to scrape a living from pitiful wages. It reflects on the deep inequality in society. It speaks to a great many people then and now on how working for a wage feels like degradation with little to show for it at the end of the day. The lyrics manage to convey the lack of time in the workers life. Wage labour swallows it up and divides it into blurry sections called work and rest. They are always on the clock.

Buying Scotland

Billionaire Danish fashion magnate, Anders Holch Povlsen, has become the second-largest private landowner in Britain with the purchase of the 20,000 acre Gaick estate in Inverness-shire.

 Povlsen already owns the Glenfeshie, Ben Loyal and Kinloch estates, has increased the 43-year-old's land portfolio in Scotland to around 150,000 acres. It is second only to that of the Buccleuch Estates, with an estimated 280,000 acres. He has been criticised in some quarters for mounting a "land grab" of Scotland to take advantage of farming subsidies.

Rob Gibson MSP, a member of the Scottish Government's Land Reform Review Group, told The Herald: "It will be interesting to see what plans this gentleman has in terms of biodiversity and the local community. Some estates are used as private kingdoms by their owners..."

Povlsen, whose family owns Bestseller, the Danish fashion company that last year had a turnover of £2bn, also has substantial farming interests in his home country and owns areas of forestry in Romania.

Drop in pay

The real value of average earnings of all employees resident in East Lothian has dropped by 13.3 per cent since April 2008, new research has revealed. 

The Scottish Borders, the drop was 20.3 per cent.

In Scotland as a whole a 9.5 per cent drop in the real value of earnings

Deprived Scotland

A boy born in the most deprived 10 per cent of Scotland would have a life expectancy of just 68. That is eight years younger than the national average, and 14 years below boys born in the least deprived parts of the country.

 Rates of mortality for heart disease are twice as high in deprived areas, at 100 per 100,000 under-75s, compared with the national average. Cancer mortality rates are 50 per cent higher in poorer areas, at 200 per 100,000.

The number of Scots aged under 25 who are out of work has doubled to 90,000 since 2008, the Joseph Rowntree Foundation said.

The report also highlighted the rise in part-time employment, from 70,000 in 2008, when the economic crisis hit, to 120,000 now.

The Scottish Government insisted Westminster benefit cuts were the biggest threat when it came to poverty and inequality. Julia Unwin, chief executive of the Joseph Rowntree Foundation, said: “The Scottish Government has powers to do a lot now. They don’t need to wait for constitutional change."

Food for thought

In the financial pages of the press it was recently announced that to
remain profitable Canadian Pacific Railway Ltd. Would cut 4 500 jobs by
2016. Citigroup Inc., recovering from the financial crisis stated that
it cutting 11 000 jobs worldwide to save $1.1 billion a year in
expenses. For a company to survive it must make a profit and sometimes
that involves firing people. These are the iron-clad laws of capitalist
economics that will never change under the profit system. Insecurity for
all workers is a by-product of it. John Ayers

The Freedom Illusion

Both unionism and nationalism ultimately represent class interests other than our own. A Scottish government will do what the markets demand and be as staunch defenders of capital as the UK government. We all may be Scots, but a few Scots will continue exploiting the majority of other Scots, thieving the labour power of the working people of Scotland. While devolution has brought some benefits, such as free prescriptions and university places, and perhaps full independence may offer a few more concessions, whether independence will make the lives of working class Scots better or worse is a question of the degrees of capitalism. People may vote for separation if they feel it will make them better off but surely we know that this would be one more capitalist class illusion.The Scottish working class is promised a share of North Sea Oil should they vote yes in 2014, but like all modern ruling class politicians, the SNP would fail to make good on any pledge to increase working class living standards. Achieving independence, (even a left-wing republic), is certainly a more “realistic” possibility than expecting socialism to be established but it won’t affect capitalism. Little will change.

An independent Scotland will not be a socialist Scotland, nor would it be on the path to such a thing no matter how much some leftists might argue otherwise. Those who pretend otherwise are simply sloganising and phrase-mongering in support of a "good" nationalism. Talk of Scots being free and ruling themselves is appealing rhetoric which masks the continuation of the class system: the working class will not become empowered but wealth and power will remain concentrated in the hands of a few. The decision-making power of the Scottish state itself will always be subject to the vagaries of the world market of the multinationals or the business strategies the City of London (remaining within the £) or the policies of the EU ("Independence in Europe" a la Greece, Ireland and Spain !!!).

A smaller nation state won’t lead to a smaller and more democracy and it won’t replace representative democracy with participatory democracy. To suggest otherwise is simply naïve.  "Russia could not produce the World Revolution," conceded Maclean, despite his nationalist fervour. "Neither can we in Gorbals, in Scotland, in Great Britain...” He also disparaged the campaign for reforms that appear popular among “progressives" nowadays “Taxation of land or capital, including the Capital Levy, is of no use to the workers.”

Our opposition to independence is based on a class opposition. An independent Scotland would not solve the problems facing the working class. Our task is not  the break-up of existing states but to build the unity of the workers across all borders to abolish nation states. The socialist real idea is to not create your own little national state but for the working people of the world to unite and throw off the shackles that chain them.

 "Man to Man, the world o'er, Shall brothers be" - Robert Burns

Food for thought

We are constantly told that 'if you've got what it takes and work hard
you can make a fortune'. One such person who seemed to personify that
attitude was John Letnik, a Hungarian immigrant who came to Canada with
nothing and eventually opened a restaurant called "Captain John's".It
was on a ship in the Toronto harbour. The City of Toronto shut it down
six months ago to make way for a planned park. Letnik refuses to move
and lives on the ship in squalor and vows to go down with it. He spends
his nights sleeping on the carpet and hopes to find a buyer so he can
pay back taxes of $568 000 and 'leave with dignity', a quality that is
in shorter supply than the water the City is promising to shut off. Like
reforms, financial success can be fleeting in a profit society. John Ayers

Fact of the Day

The world's richest 100 people earned enough last year to end extreme poverty for the planet's poorest people four times over, Oxfam said. report

 The net income last year of the 100 richest people was 240 billion US dollars (£150 billion) in its report.

Have cash can travel

The cost of train tickets increased by 3.9 per cent this month  but Scotrail boss Stephen Montgomery won't be too inconvienienced. His pay package rose from £279,000 in 2011 to £333,000 last year, a £54,000 rise, which includes bonuses, a car allowance and National Insurance contributions. The firm, which is owned by Aberdeen-based FirstGroup. His boss Tim O’Toole, head of FirstGroup, stands to pick up share awards of nearly £1m, on top of a basic salary £846,000.

PROFITS AND POLLUTION

Inside capitalism there is a mad scramble for profits and in that scramble human health or dignity has no place. A recent example is the air pollution in the Chinese capital of Beijing . 'Readings from both official and unofficial monitoring stations suggested that Saturday's pollution has soared past danger levels outlined by the World Health Organization. ..... Air is unhealthy above 100 microgrammes. ..... Official Beijing city readings on Saturday suggested pollution levels over 400. Unofficial reading from a monitor at the US embassy recorded 800. ..........Last year Chinese authorities warned the US embassy not to publish its data. But the embassy said the measurements were for the benefit of embassy personnel and were not citywide.' (BBC News, 12 January) Not only are the Chinese capitalists poisoning their own people they are telling others to keep quiet about it. Big bucks lead to big lies. RD

THE DIGNITY OF LABOUR?

 

Desperate for work many Mexicans come to the USA and Canada and work on the farms there. Concerned about migrants settling permanently the Canadian government has very strict rules to deal with this. Only married men are eligible for the Canadian program, preferably those with young children, and their families must remain in Mexico. Another incentive to return home: a cut of the migrants' wages is placed in a Canadian pension fund, receivable only if they return to Mexico. 'Once in Canada, the workers live like monks, sleeping in trailers or barracks, under contractual agreements that forbid them from drinking alcohol and having female visitors, or even socializing with other Mexican workers from different farms. Most of their time in Canada is limited to sleeping, eating and working long days that can stretch to 15 hours, without overtime pay.' (Washington Post, 5 January) RD

Scotching the myth of independence

Those who control the Scotch whisky industry are overwhelmingly based outside Scotland.

Diageo has more than 35% of the whisky market, and if it can secure control of India's United Distillers, including Whyte & Mackay, that will push up to 40%. Pernod Ricard in France, has around 20%. LVMH, with Glenmorangie, Remy Cointreau, which recently paid a  £58m for Bruichladdich distillery on Islay, and Japan's Suntory which has Morrison Bowmore, control another 20%.

Professor John Kay, the UK's most influential business economist writing in Scotland's Economic Future, claims a mere 2% of the global retail sales value of Scotch whisky ends up in Scottish pockets. The reason is that more than 80% of the whisky distilled in Scotland is foreign-owned and the majority of value of leading brands values is accumulated overseas.

"Value added from Scotch whisky is reported as around £3 billion – about 2.5% of Scottish GDP – but this figure reflects essentially arbitrary transfer prices and export valuations,” writes Professor Kay, “wages and salaries and purchases of goods and services used in whisky production amount to only about £400 million. To this should be added the returns to beneficial Scottish ownership of whisky-related assets. With retail sales of whisky around the world totalling perhaps £25bn, the Scottish economy appears to derive modest benefit from its most famous product."

The Scotch Whisky Association priorities are not interchangeable with Scotland's because membership is dominated by multinational giants who have no reason “to maximise Scotch for the benefit of Scotland.” Membership is dominated by multinational giants for whom whisky is one category among many, and which are answerable primarily to shareholders, mostly outside the UK. The SWA does represent 95% of the distilling capacity, with 80% of the SWA owned by just 5 companies, the largest of which also provides the Chairman.

Donnie Blair, a former head of strategic affairs for Diageo said  "The industry is neither Scottish nor a success," Blair does not trust multinationals, with more profitable spirits in their portfolios to maximize Scotch for the benefit of Scotland, and is unmoved by statistics about millions invested in new distilleries and other plant – £1bn in four years according to the SWA. "Investments in Scotland are always presented as some kind of favour or gift to the Scottish people," Blair says. "In fact they are a normal cost of doing business, designed to generate even greater profits from Scotch."

Scotland is being used as a production facility. Profits like the whisky, going overseas.

 Economic commentator Alf Young comments "It's extraordinary we're having this debate about independence, and we don't have a debate about the independence of our corporate base".

 In 2011 there were over 2,000 foreign owned companies in Scotland employing over 280,000 with a combined turnover of over £87 billion. Manufacturingaround 70% non-Scottish ownership and control: 10% rest of UK, 60% plus foreign owned.

How can Scotland become truly free? How can Scotland aspire to being a truly sovereign nation? Is Greece independent? Is Spain independent? They have their own elected Parliaments, representatives to the U. N. and other international bodies; but are also beholden to foreign banks from whom they have saddled themselves with billions of dollars of debt. Their financial and social policies is decided by the European Central Bank. All the ceremony of statehood; all the trappings and the pomp - all the form without the substance! The banking moguls understand it. The multi-nationals know it.

 Richard Leonard of the GMB union explains that “the commanding heights of the Scottish economy are externally owned and controlled”. More specifically, he points out that the ten biggest private-sector employers of GMB members in Scotland are all either UK-owned and controlled, quoted on the London Stock Exchange or highly dependent on the whole UK market.  The inevitable conclusion is that political independence will not alter the fact that strategic political, economic and corporate decisions will still be taken in London.

We can admire John MacLean's and James Connolly’s stand against the slaughter of World War One, but their nationalism we cannot accept. It would  be nice if struggles for national independance could magically result in a classless society, but that's, unfortunately, not the way societies progress. Scottish' capitalism is not only tied to the British capitalism but also to international capitalism. Any kind of Scottish state that didn't offer benefits to corporations would see capital flight and a serious drop in its economy -- the Scottish socialist economy is a myth. Nationalism just replaces one set of bosses with another, and also helps to divide the working class. As if an "independent" Scotland would be any less affected by the world slump or being sacked by a Scottish boss be more agreeable. Will a social revolution come about through consitutional moves towards independence?  No! All moves towards independence have entrenched the power of the Scottish elite. The SNP have been bank-rolled by millionaires like Tom Farmer and Brian Soutar.

National independence is a chimera.  Scottish independence is a distraction from building working class solidarity against capitalism.  Nationalism is, at best, a dead-end and, at worst, reactionary. The socialist objective is to liberate humanity, not liberate nations.

Food for thought

An article in the Toronto Star, December 1, focused on the destruction
of the 'beautiful, pristine Chequamegon-Nicolet National Forest" in
Wisconsin by Mexican drug traffickers who are using the land to "grow
millions of dollars worth of marijuana and leaving behind their garbage,
poached deer carcasses, fertilizer, and pesticides" Investigators say
that it's likely just the tip of the iceberg. The advantages to the
traffickers are, not having to cross a border and less likelihood of
detection on public lands. In a socialist society the need for
artificial stimulants would be low to nothing as the stress of daily
life in this society would virtually disappear, and the lack of money
and profit would end trafficking and those who work in that field would
be able to make a real contribution to society. John Ayers

law for the rich

Scotland's legal profession is still dominated by a privileged elite, according to the latest figures on admission to university law courses. Fewer that one in 12 entrants to law degrees at Scottish universities comes from a deprived background.

Food for thought

With perfect timing, UNICEF Canada released a brochure entitled,
"Survival Gifts -- Keep a Child Alive. Help a Child Thrive". It contains
a list of forty-five gifts one may contribute to in order for a child to
survive. Typical examples are anti-infection tablets $20, exercise books
$23, clean water kits $28, malnutrition relief bundle $30, child
survival kit $44. It's easy enough for anyone with any love for humanity
to contribute but to do so helps maintain the status quo that causes the
very problems we are being asked to solve and as long as no one
questions the status quo, children will continue to starve and die from
malnutrition and preventable diseases. The best thing anyone can do is
to work to remove the cause of all poverty, including child poverty. John Ayers

HAPPY FAMILIES?

A sure-fire election winner for aspiring politicians is to be seen as supporting families. Get photographed kissing babies or hugging mothers is a godsend at the polling booth, but the reality behind this schmaltz is far different. 'Soaring energy bills are forcing one in four mothers to turn off their heating in the depths of winter in order to afford food for their children. Fuel poverty is resulting in thousands of families resorting to wearing extra clothes and using blankets in their homes. More than half of families turn off the heating in their houses when the children are out, while 45 per cent of adults keep warm using blankets or duvets during the day, according to a survey. ..... A shocking 23 per cent of families are already having to choose between buying food or using heating, according to a survey by the Energy Bill Revolution campaign.' (Daily Mail, 6 January) Warm shows of affection by politicians wont heat up your kid's bedroom. RD

All Out or All for Socialism?

RMT general secretary Bob Crow, Unite leader Len McCluskey and civil servants’ union PCS general secretary Mark Serwotka have backed a general strike. TUC delegates voted last year to look into holding a general strike in 2013. POA assistant general secretary Glyn Travis, whose union pushed the motion, said he was “upbeat” about the discussions so far. It is clear though that those trade union officials are talking about a one-day token gesture,  a glorified day of protest, rather than a revolutionary challenge for power. Even if union executives were to set the wheels of a strike wave in motion, the rank and file would be woefully unprepared for it. The strike would be seen by many as simply another day’s pay lost. The government would have little to fear from a 24-hour stoppage and it would just be a matter of "business as usual" the next day.

The Chartists in Britain were the first raised the question of a general strike. They called it a National Holiday and the Holy Month. In the writings of James Connolly and Tom Mann it was syndicalism and industrial unionism that would express the power of the workers at the point of production and by the general strike take over society. It would also provide the framework for the future workers’ republic.

In the case of the preparations for a General Strike in the UK in the period 1919 – 1921 despite the detailed planning, several hundred local Councils of Action were formed, a National Council of Action formed by the executives of trade unions and organisations affiliated to the Labour Party was called to arrange a general strike. plus extensive support among workers, the trade union leadership of the day were able to sabotage the entire project. When the circumstances had changed and the previous preparations had disappeared, the 1926 General Strike was relatively easily defeated with long-lasting set-backs for working people. The Greeks and the Spanish  have had a number of general strikes recently. What has been accomplished and what are the lessons? Austerity has continued, if not intensified, despite those general strikes.

The very question of such a momentous stage in the struggle against capitalism, needs lengthy discussion and the clear presentation of the successes and failures such strikes have had. For if such an idea is not already being widely discussed and absorbed among the organised and unorganised workers it has little chance of occurring. Plus if it has not become widely accepted by the majority that such a step is possible and practical, its consequences could be self-defeating. People will not enter any industrial struggle unless they can envision what a victory would look like and hold a belief that an alternative policy is both feasible and available. An ill-prepared or poorly supported general strike could be an enormous self-inflicted defeat for the working class. Empty sloganeering gets us nowhere. If we are to build towards a general strike, we need to lay foundations in every workplace and every community and we need to ensure that no one is under any illusions that this will be an easy fight.

Importantly, it should be noted that 24 hour general strike would be evidence of the potential power and organisation of the working class and the level of organisation beforehand that would be required to make it a carrying it off a success would indicate a rise in political consciousness to independently organise.  But after 24 hours everyone would have to go back to work and the question would be "What now?" An indefinite general strike to challenge for political power in one form or another? Who really believes the  working class is currently in a position to issue such a challenge and prevail?

It is simply impossible to end capitalism by trade union militancy alone. Engels wrote to Laura Lafargue (Marx's daughter) "whenever we are in a position to try the universal strike, we shall be able to get what we want for the mere asking for it, without the roundabout way of the universal strike" As Luxemburg asserted: "In reality the mass strike does not produce the revolution, but the revolution produces the mass strike."
 Our aim is not a general strike but advancing the organisation, consciousness and power of the working class movement which will require an effective potent working class political party, built on solid foundations of the workers themselves, and confident of the success of the practical and achievable objective of socialism.

Food for thought

Recently, Andrew Weaver, a scientist at the University of Victoria, BC, said, We are losing control of our ability to get a handle on the global warming problem. "One wonders when we ever had that ability in capitalism's pell mell dash to make profits regardless of the consequences. In 2011, 38.2 billion tons of carbon dioxide were pumped into the air from burning fossil fuels such as coal and oil. That amounts to 2.4 million pounds per second, according to the journal,
"Nature Climate Change". Most carbon stays in the air for a century so it's unlikely that signatories to the Kyoto agreement can keep temperature increases to two degrees centigrade. John Ayers

DESPERATION IN SPAIN

In recent years Spain has been struggling with a dramatic economic crisis, leading to an unemployment rate of 25 per cent and massive evictions. 'Spain's housing market collapsed in 2008 after a housing bubble, hurting the economy and causing a homelessness epidemic. As a result, more than 50,000 delinquent Spanish homeowners were evicted in the first half of 2012 alone, and 1 million homes lie empty in Spain, according to Reuters.' (Huffington Post, 3 January) These evictions have led locksmiths in Pamplona refusing to carry out evictions. This move they think could essentially stop evictions in Pamplona because even if the police kick a family out of their home, the evicted can still get back in if no one has changed the locks. This desperate move is doomed to failure. The only solution to the problem is a new society of world socialism. RD

Against Nationalism

 Socialists assert the primacy of the working class struggle over all others. The working class has no allies among the capitalist of any country. The battle lines may not be clearly demarcated in this era of media sound bites and dis-information but there is no question that the real struggle is between capital and labour. That is the bottom line. It is time to return to basics. There are no common interests between workers and their exploiters, whatever flag is waved.

An independent Scotland would not be a socialist Scotland.  To think otherwise is to encourage the myth that there can be a Scottish road to socialism. In calling for a spoiled referendum paper in 2014 we are in no way shape or form endorsing unionism. We are arguing that the only way forward for workers in Scotland and across the world is through the fight for socialism.

For a "nation" to arise there had to come first the development of private property, of social classes, rulers and ruled, masters and subjects. First arose the State, the chief general system of control used by the master class against the subject classes. The State must have definite territorial boundaries. If there is no private property there can be no State; if there is no State, there can be no "nation." The State is not the product of the "nation," the "nation" is the product of the State.

States may be characterised according to the class relations that mark the system of production expressed by the State. Thus, there may be slave States, feudal States, capitalist States. The feudal States were run by a given clan of a tribe that had become differentiated into masters and serfs bound to the land owned by the ruling family. Feudal States, in their backward economic relations, were unable to be national States and could evolve so only when capitalism, with its markets, commerce, towns, money, written records, and corresponding development of the circulation and production of commodities, could unify the country. Capitalist States are under the control of business mainly merchants, or by industrialists, or by bankers all operating in the capitalist market.

Fundamentally, it is not decisive just what kind of government is actually established or who actually gives the orders - whether workers, peasants, land-owners, small shopkeepers, lawyers, war lords, or such - what is important is: Who rules whom? What class is basically the beneficiary of the State's rule; that is, who is the real boss? And that is the capitalist.

 We do not advocate nationalism but people in socialism have to, in the end, direct their own lives and administer the places where they live. But those will not be countries.

MIDDLE EAST POWDER KEG

Amidst all the carnage of the Middle East in recent years we were led to believe that noble ideas like democracy and freedom were at stake, but it seems something less noble was up for grabs. 'The Iraqi government is spending billions of dollars to restore the country's military power but analysts say arms purchases won't peak until 2020. And Baghdad, angry about the slow delivery of U.S. weapons systems, may well switch the emphasis of its procurement program to Russia, the Czech Republic and possibly even China, to speed up amassing firepower for its military forces.' (United Press International, 4 January) Billions of dollars of armaments is a lucrative market and you can be sure there will be fierce competition between nations to grab as much as possible without any concern about such things as democracy or freedom. RD

Food for thought

In David Baldacci's recent book, "The Innocent", one of the characters dies from cancer contracted in the first Gulf War. A former comrade-in-arms comments, "I'm telling you it's all the crap we breathed over there. Depleted uranium, toxic cocktails from the artillery blasts, fires burning all over the damned place, painting the sky black, burning crap we didn't know what the hell it was. And there we were just sucking it in." If this story mirrors real life, then it's no wonder so many who have seen active service return home physically and/or mentally sick. If the enemy doesn't get you, your own side will. John Ayers

End of a Dream

Workers living on state benefits are well aware, it is quite impossible to put a little by for a rainy day, for every day is forecast as a downpour, and trying to keep your head above water is a constant problem. And for those who are wholly dependent on benefits as their only source of income, their whole lifestyle is dictated by their resourcefulness in eking out their pittance from one day to the next. Yet the ConDem government is planning to make things worse.

Changes to a single universal benefit – bringing together income support, jobseeker’s allowance, employment support allowance, housing benefit, and child and working tax credits – follow the cuts in child benefit voted through at Westminster last week, aims at reducing the UK’s welfare benefits bill. The universal credit is an attempt to simplify the complex benefits system into one new single payment.

A report, by public policy expert Dr Jim McCormick, says the new universal credits system, to be introduced over the next two years, contains “serious design flaws” and will plunge far more Scots into poverty than expected. The Scottish Council of Voluntary Organisations (SCVO) warns one in four Scots will be living in poverty by the end of the decade if the coalition government forges ahead with “criminal welfare reforms”. SCVO chief executive Martin Sime said: “The UK government’s £2.5 billion cuts in benefits must be seen for what they are: an assault on families, communities and the economy of Scotland. These callous cuts masquerading as reform represent an active choice taken by the UK government, which is hurting the most disadvantaged people in Scotland.”
Universal credit is seen as an “all-or-nothing” reform, says McCormick, which means that getting payments wrong would leave people facing delays, errors or cuts to their only source of income. Women are at particular risk from the move to a single payment into households. John Dickie, head of Child Poverty Action Group in Scotland, said: “Time is running out for UK ministers to respond to the mounting evidence that any positive impact of the new universal credit is being fatally undermined by design flaws, underinvestment and a lack of advice and information support for the hundreds of thousands of families who will rely on the new ­benefit.”

A vision of a poverty-free capitalism was shared by many during the post-war years of steady economic growth. Some still cling to that forlorn hope. The need for an efficient system of ensuring that workers' very basic needs was one of the main motives behind the introduction of the welfare state. The return of world recessions has made the welfare state  more difficult to finance out of sustained economic growth at exactly the time the burdens of poverty and unemployment placed increasing demands on it. Demographic shifts (such as the rise in the elderly and single parents) also increased the welfare burden for governments. Hence recent years have seen cutbacks in welfare payments and services in most industrialised countries on a scale that would have been considered politically unacceptable by Tories much less Labour politicians years ago.

It is unlikely that welfare services can ever be restored to what they once were.  Capitalism runs on the profits made in the profit-seeking sector of the economy and most of the state’s income comes from these profits, either through taxation or through borrowing. The state is in this sense parasitic on the profit-seeking sector and which is presently in difficulty. The private sector's message to governments everywhere is that the proportion of national income commandeered by the state must be reduced if profits are to be restored to adequate levels. The hope of those on the Left to pay for expanding welfare services out of sustained economic growth is becoming increasingly remote. The welfare state of the future is likely to be only a shadow of what it once was.

It is another demonstration that the reforms promised by politicians in order to obtain votes, far from removing the problems that they claim to remedy, merely ameliorate them at best. The social problems that give rise to reforms—in welfare as in other spheres—are inherent to the capitalist system and can only be ended by ending capitalism. To fight the same old welfare reform battles over several decades is demoralising enough, but when previous reforms are put into reverse the case against the system is stronger than ever.

CHINESE CAPITALISM

It is always touching to see a father being generous to his daughter, but this takes a bit of beating. 'Bringing new meaning to the phrase 'happy couple,' Chinese businessman Wu Duanbiao gave his daughter and her husband a dowry worth nearly $150 million in celebration of their wedding on Sunday, according to the South China Morning Post.' (Shine from Yahoo!, 2 January) This generosity is all the more remarkable as China pretends to be a communist country! RD

a charity for the rich

Fettes College and St George’s School for Girls, both Edinburgh, and St Columba’s School in Kilmacolm, Renfrewshire, have failed the regulator’s charity test and been warned they must do more to help pupils from low-income families or lose their charitable status. As charities they are excused corporation tax and receive an 80 per cent discount on their rates. It also makes them eligible for specific loans and grants. They have been given 18 months to widen access.

Fettes, former prime minister Tony Blair’s old school, fees were “substantial and represent a restriction on accessing the majority of the benefit the charity provides”. Fettes charges £12,555 a year for primary pupils and £19,680 for those who are boarding. Fees for secondary pupils are £20,235 – £27,150 for boarders. Of the school of 706 only five received a full award, entitling them to 100% of the fees.

Socialist "Blueprint" - Part Two

The Buddha said: “Thousands of candles can be lit from a single candle, and the life of the candle will not be shortened. Happiness never decreases by being shared”

Introduction

It is the main job of socialists not to theorise about the exact workings of a future economy, but to educate people on the main principles that might underpin a future communist society in its lower and higher phases, and then give them the tools - in the form of socialist democracy - to do the work themselves. Unless we say more about the goal we are striving for, we relinquish the future to those who insist that all there is an eternity of capitalism. If you dont have an alternative to capitalism you are stuck with capitalism. It is all very well to criticise capitalism - thats easy! - but the really hard thing is to put forward a viable alternative to put in its place. Its only through speculatiing about alternative in more and more details that we can begin to put more flesh on the bare bones on the idea, that we can invest with more credibility. It is important not to confuse two quite different things: 1) A basic statement of the core features of a future communist/socialist society 2) Speculative commentrary about the finer details of life inside such a society. Free access socialism  is the shortest and most effective route to meeting human needs. It immediately cuts out all the kind of work that performs no socially useful fiunction whatsoever but only keeps capitalism ticking over. If anything , given current levels of productivity, We can even envisage there being a shortage of socially useful work for people to do in free access communism. It will be able to produce so much more with so much less

Free access socialism, or higher phase communism as Marx called it, is not some futuristic science fiction scenario but has existed as a potentiality within capitalism itself from at least since the beginning of the 20th century. It is not predicated on some "super-abundance" of wealth being made available to people but rather on the very real possibilty of being able to meet our basic needs.  We dont say free access communism (socialism) will be a world without scarcities. Free access communism is not based on the assumption that we stand on the threshold of some kind of comsumerist paradise in which we can all gratify our every whim. We refer to the very real possiblity of society being able to satisfy the basic needs of individuals today, to enable us all to have a decent life. The elimination of capitalism's massive strucutural waste is the prime source of productive potential; it will make huge amounts of resources available for socially useful production in a society in which the only considertation is meeting human needs, not selling commodities on a market with a view to profit. In higher communism there is no exchange. None whatsoever. Consequently there is no "bartering" of each other's abilities or needs. You freely give according to your abilities and you freely take according to your needs. Its as a simple as that.

Food for thought

The New York Times wrote (16/12/12) that Fire (specifically the recent Deadly Gap. The gap is that between those who order the making of the garments, in this case Walmart, Sears, and C&A, and those who do one in the Bangladesh garment factory that killed 112 workers) Exposes a the work. The coercive laws of competition that rule capitalist production will always drive companies to the lowest price, of course, but the companies must be well aware of the conditions in Third World factories otherwise they wouldn't be there at all. Just the normal operation of the profit system and another reason to get rid of it. John Ayers

Quote of the Day

 Are we all sadists?

"Everywhere I could reduce men into two classes both equally pitiable; in the one the rich who was the slave of his pleasures; in the other the unhappy victims of fortune; and I never found in the former the desire to be better or in the latter the possibility of becoming so, as though both classes were working for their common misery...; I saw the rich continually increasing the chains of the poor, while doubling his own luxury, while the poor, insulted and despised by the other, did not even receive the encouragement necessary to bear his burden. I demanded equality and was told it was utopian; but I soon saw those who denied its possibility were those who would lose by it..." - The Marquis de Sade.

The Thought for To-day

We live in a world in which wealth is distributed in a wildly unequal way. A tiny few have billions of dollars, while many more have nothing. Politics is nothing but a media show to keep the masses under control in order to keep them ignorant of what the real situation is. It is a charade to make the people  believe that there is real division and to believe that they have a choice. They have no real choice. Everything you see and hear on mainstream media is a facade. The news we get is orchestrated and censored by the powers that be. We end up voting not for whom we want, but for the lesser of two evils. We live in a dictatorship of the rich and powerful.

Still, the people are not blind. They may be diverted by the reality-tv culture that is forced upon them much like the Romans were diverted by the games in the Coliseum… the “Bread and Circuses” model of government. Most people are waiting for something to happen. We only need to wake up.

 Imagine if money were food. The wealthy man has silo after silo full of grain. Meanwhile, thousands of people are poor and starving. "I built up these vast stores of food over my career as a trader. Although I could never eat all of the food they hold, it gives me great personal satisfaction to gaze upon them and reflect on my own success. But don't worry," says the rich philanthropist, "upon my death, all of my food holdings will be distributed to the poor." The people cheer his generosity. The rich man lives fifty more years. Meantime, the poor starve to death each winter. In capitalism, having, holding, and hoarding great wealth carries no shame. Yet starving is starving is starving.

Food for thought

Ontario Tories will enact Right to Work legislation if elected in the next election a la tea party Republicans of USA. Senior Tory MPP, Christine Elliot, said that only then will new businesses pick Ontario to locate in because they will have the "flexibility" they need to get the job done without tangling with unionized workers (Toronto Star, 15/12/12). The Tories would rip up the Rand formula, in effect since 1946 that requires all union members to pay union dues, effectively eroding the financial basis of the unions. Workers, the attack on your pay and benefits, and bargaining rights is strengthening and it only shows the futility of reform if that reform can stand for 66 years and then be wiped out with a stroke of the pen. Putting capitalism in the waste bin is the only answer. John Ayers

A Socialist "Blueprint" - Part One

"When one talks to people about socialism or communism, one very frequently finds that they entirely agree with one regarding the substance of the matter and declare communism to be a very fine thing; “but”, they then say, “it is impossible ever to put such things into practice in real life” Engels

Introduction

“Yes, Socialism is an excellent thing, but, alas! it is Utopia!”

Human society is a particular case in universal evolution. Nothing is eternal and unchangeable. Everything is variable. Every given social form is entirely relative, entirely conditional. Classes and systems succeed each other and differ from each other. For centuries, people have imagined utopias where advances in technology and attitudes create freedom for all. Capitalism distorts the vision of a future society. We can only see a different system in terms of our present one. The first victim of education is imagination. From a very early age every worker is taught to be “practical”, “realistic” and stop “dreaming dreams”. And yet imagination is the very act of being human. Whatever other aspects make human beings different from other animals, the human capacity to imagine is one of the most striking. The stifling of imagination is essential if the owners are to retain their class monopoly of the planet. The great revolutionary act for the working class is to imagine an alternative to present day society. Fantasy is the first act of rebellion said Freud. Let us indulge ourselves here in that most human of all pursuits – let us imagine the future.

A very natural question arises: “If one can visualise a possible future society then one should be expected to tell something of what that society will be like”. And so one should and so one can, but only within certain limits and with many reservations. In making projections into the future one should realise that one is dealing with the realm of speculation. Where a definiteness of opinion can be allowed is in the realm of the actual: what is and what has been. With the future the best we can hope for is to observe trends in the present and the creation and development of potentials, etc. These can be projected as trends into the future scene which may grow to greater potentials and into actualities that may become definite powers, agencies and institutions. Science does not deal in certainties but in high probabilities. It does not depend on clairvoyance or astrological forecasts for its findings. Nor does it admit the determinists, who tell us that this shall be and that shall not be. Yet, notwithstanding what has been stated, one must allow that Science, in its ever restless search for greater knowledge, must permit itself flights of imagination, so to speak, for lacking these it would hardly venture on those essential journeys into the future. In much the same way a socialist speaks of “visualising a future social system”. Science does create for itself what are termed “working hypotheses”; that is to say, it presumes certain things to be so, and for the purpose of establishing a point of departure for definite scientific inquiry it takes its hypothesis as established fact. Of course it recognizes that this at best is speculation but proceeds to then gather data that may prove, or disprove, such hypothesis. In the same way we permit ourselves certain speculations and in so doing “we visualise a future society which will be organised for public good”. But we must never lose sight of the fact that these are speculations, but like the “working hypotheses” of the scientist can be considered valid to the extent that such speculations arise naturally out of our knowledge of the past and the present – and in the absence of any contrary body of facts. The question is thus put “How will production and distribution be carried on in this visualised possible future society?” Socialism is often described in negative terms: a society with no money, no classes, no government, no exploitation. But it is also possible to speak of socialism from a positive viewpoint, emphasising the features it will have, as opposed to those it will not. The future always looks strange when people's minds are imprisoned within the past, but the nearer we get to the next stage in social development the less strange the idea of production for need becomes. There are thousands of workers walking around with ideas in their minds which are close or identical to those advocated by socialists; as that number grows, and as they gather into the conscious political movement for socialism, the doubts of the critics grow fainter and more absurd and what once seemed unthinkable rises to the top of the agenda of history. “Have you not heard how it has gone with many a Cause before now: First, few men heed it; Next, most men condemn it; Lastly, all men ACCEPT it - and the Cause is Won". We must not suppose that socialism is therefore destined to remain a Utopia

Thought for Today

Human-beings are a community animal. Individuals are biologically unique while also only being psychologically complete when acting as an element of community and integrated into its functioning. Reason, logic and scientific understanding may be used in making arguments, but it is not argument that will ultimately prevail. It is repetition, recognition and acceptance. Humans can change the way in which they live. The whole community is responsible for its total economic product and its distribution. All members of the community must have a just equity share in the community’s economic product.

In the United States one family, the Walton family of Wal-Mart, owns more wealth than the bottom 40 percent of Americans.

Imagine a world where the population reaps the benefits for their work. Imagine a world run as a democracy, from the bottom up, not from the top down.

The times aren't a-changin

Under European copyright law, copyright lasts between 50 and 70 years, but only to recordings that have been released within 50 years of them being made.

Sony have released just one hundred  copies of a new Bob Dylans early music sub-titled“The Copyright Extension Collection, Vol 1”. Compromising 86 songs recorded between 1962 and 1963, the box set is spartan with plain packaging and few explanatory notes. According to Rolling Stone’s sources at Dylan’s record label Sony, the compilation was not “meant” for wider release. The release is an attempt to stop the tracks entering the public domain and being available for free download.

Food for thought

A movie made in 1949 might not be thought to be relevant today. However, "All the King's Men" was recently shown on the movie channel TCM. Based on Robert Penn Warren's novel that is a fictionalized treatment of Louisiana Governor Hugh Long's career, the movie shows clearly how the political machine corrupts even the most well-intentioned politicians. Long (Willy Stark in the story), brilliantly portrayed by Broderick Crawford, was elected in 1928 when Louisiana was one of America's most economically backward states. With his initial compassion for the 'poor folk', mostly dirt farmers, Long set about building roads and bridges to help the farmers get produce to market, schools, and hospitals. Gradually, taking his cue from his opponents, Long became a blatantly corrupt demagogue, which led to his assassination. Ironically, at the end, the dirt farmers were still as poor as they ever were, proving economic conditions never permanently improve for the worker in the capitalist mode of production. The movie proves the maxim that 'all power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely'. Let's have done with a system where individuals weald power over others. John Ayers

We Are All Jock Tamson's Bairns

"Tell people that patriotism is bad and most of them will laugh and say: ‘Yes, bad patriotism is bad, but my patriotism is good!’ " - Leo Tolstoy

INTRODUCTION

Some accuse THE SOCIALIST PARTY members in Scotland of being unpatriotic. We are in fact proud to be anti-patriotic. But just because we are not prepared to back the efforts of Scottish nationalists to break away from the United Kingdom does not mean that we are a Unionist party. We don’t support the Union. We just put up with it! Socialists are just as much opposed to British nationalism as we are to Scottish. Our rulers have decided to ask us our opinion on the matter. We should be flattered, but don’t be fooled. Constitutional reform is of no benefit or relevance to us. So we won’t be voting “yes” or “no”. We’ll be writing the words “WORLD SOCIALISM” across the referendum voting paper.  

The Socialist Party, part of the World Socialist Movement, argue that every nation state is by its very nature anti-working class. While we certainly sympathise with those oppressed and displaced on national grounds, we refuse to simply identify with the many "solutions" offered up by the liberals and leftists in support of the victims. The “nation” is a myth as there can be no community of interests between two classes in antagonism with one another, the non-owners in society and the owners (the workers and the capitalists). The state ultimately exists only to defend the property interests of the owning class at any given point in history – which is why modern states across the world send the police and army in to break strikes and otherwise seek to protect the interests of the capitalists andtheir businesses at every turn.

Fife poverty

MORE THAN one in eight families in West Fife are still living in poverty, according to new statistics. 

A report by Audit Scotland revealed that 13.9 per cent of the Dunfermline and West Fife health partnership area are living below the breadline.

 Life expectancies in Dunfermline and West Fife saw a slight increase to 75.5 years for men and 79.5 years for women but these are still well below the UK average of 78.1 and 82.1.

Food for thought

Yes, after a brief respite in socialism (declaring the arctic wealth as the property of the whole world!), China is definitely back in capitalism. Apparently, several new cities remain unoccupied like ghost towns. Everywhere building materials are piled high, unused. This, we are told (CBC News) is the result of an economic downturn, Developers have run out of money/credit to complete the job. This shows China is no different to any other country where capitalism prevails. Boom and bust are the normal order of the day. John Ayers

RECESSION? WHAT RECESSION?

We are at present living through an economic recession and we are told by the mass media that we all must share the hardships of these straitened times, but it seems that some are faring better than the rest of us. 'The richest people on the planet got richer in 2012, adding $241 billion to their collective net worth, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index, a daily ranking of the world's 100 wealthiest individuals. .... Amancio Ortega, the Spaniard who founded retailer Inditex SA, was the year's biggest gainer. The 76-year-old tycoon's fortune increased $22.2 billion to $57.5 billion, according to the index, as shares of Inditex, operator of the Zara clothing chain, rose 66.7 per cent.' (Chicago Tribune, 2 January) RD

Food for thought

An article in The Toronto Star highlighted the fact that with Afghanistan an entire country suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder. A Nation-wide survey revealed that forty-two per cent suffered from the problem and sixty-eight per cent exhibited signs of a major depression. In other words, most of the population is suffering from psychological injuries. This shows exactly what years of war will do to people - another good reason to abolish the cause of war -- the capitalist system. John Ayers

A football working class hero

Nicolaas Steelink

Organised sport was originally for the elite with its roots in the English public schools. But taking advantage of the free-time offered by the eight-hour day, workers began to democratize games like soccer and rugby. We enjoyed sport as passive spectators and as active participants. Who can blame someone for enjoying leisure on a day off?

Before long, major social democratic parties across Europe were using sporting clubs and festivals to construct working-class identity and promote solidarity. By 1928, German sports societies had more than two million members, most of whom were affiliated with the Social Democratic Party. These clubs offered escape and a sense of belonging to the masses. Thousands hiked and learned to swim, freeing themselves, however fleetingly, from the grinding indignity of wage slavery. In Austria, during the Red Vienna period (1918-1934), a new stadium was built to host a “Workers’ Olympiad,” which welcomed participants from across the world—a testament to the internationalist impulses of a confident and forward-looking movement. In Britain we had cycling and rambling associations. Another sports world seemed possible, one that needn't be sold as a commodity. But these days sport has become unlinked from the working class political movement, hi-jacked by the jingoistic nationalists, the profit-seeking media corporations and sponsors, not to mention the egotistical oligarchs seeking an identity through being club owners.

One can even imagine aspects of sports that most closely mirror the capitalist ethos taking on a different context in a better society. Competition is brutal and ruthless in capitalism, under which, in many parts of the world, winning and losing carry life or death consequences. But competition in a safe environment can be positive and rewarding. We can imagine the new ways in which work and play could intermingle in a future society governed by equality and abundance rather than exploitation and scarcity. The discipline and pride of a craftsman who hones a skill and the athlete who trains toward perfection will have a larger place in the world.

Nicolaas Steelink was inducted into the American Soccer Hall of Fame in 1971. He was instrumental in organising the Californian Soccer League in the 1950s. Nicolaas Steelink was Dutch and immigrated to the US in 1912 at the age of 22. It was through his contacts playing football that he got introduced to a variety of political activists including socialists, industrial unionists and anarchists. At the time Steelink was angered by the injustices that surrounded him in California. Poor working conditions, war propaganda and censorship that was luring young Americans to their death in the trenches of the Somme, corruption and unpunished lynchings, were among the issues that helped radicalise the young Steelink. He joined the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW) and wrote a weekly column for their paper the Industrial Worker.

Following the First World War a number of states passed repressive laws in response to a rising radicalism amongst a large section of the workers. In California the state passed the Criminal Syndicalism Act in 1920, and Steelink was subsequently one of the first of the 151 IWW members to be arrested under these new powers. He was sentenced to five years hard labour in the infamous San Quentin prison for being a member of the IWW. After two years Steelink gained parole and his strong sense of injustice had been reinforced by the experience. He dedicated the rest of his life to continue to fight authority and injustice and continued contributing regular articles to the Industrial Worker entitled “Musings of a Wobbly”, under the pen name Ennes Ellae. He never lost his love for football. It was through football that he found that he could help the underprivileged youth, giving them a sense of comradeship and self-pride. He coached his teams to play flowing, skillful football that expressed his ideas of individual freedom.

Working less - earning less

Professor David Bell, an economic expert, warned MSPs that soaring numbers of Scots have been forced into “under-employment”  and a seismic shift away from full-time to part-time work and the disappearance of overtime have created a culture in which Scots’ lack of work is forcing them to cut back on household spending. Prof Bell’s report to the economy committee revealed the extend of “disguised unemployment” and the new phenomenon of “in-work poverty”.

About half a million Scots are now feared to be either out of work or under-employed. The number of part-time workers, including those who are self-employed, has risen by 74,000 since 2008, alongside a dramatic fall in the hours worked by full-time staff. The under-employment rate stands at over 10 per cent among Scots, with the academic finding there is not enough demand for the labour they are willing to supply. “The ‘Great Recession’ has had an adverse impact on the Scottish labour market,” said the report.

The jobless rise has been less then expected, but there has been a sharp fall in the number of hours that Scots are now working overall. The report says: “Amongst the full-time employed, there has been a reduction in their number and in their average weekly hours, partly as a result of reduced overtime working. “In contrast, there has been an increase in part-time working, though little change in their average weekly hours. “There has also been a trend towards self-employment, particularly part-time self-employment, where weekly hours are extremely low.” Scots struggling in this situation will not show up in official unemployment statistics, because they remain in work.

Margaret Lynch, chief executive of Citizens Advice Scotland, said: “We know that thousands of Scots can’t get work at all, but far too many of those who are in work are struggling in low-paid, temporary and unsatisfying jobs which don’t meet either their aspirations or their bills." She added: “Many people who are under-employed have to top up their income by borrowing, and often turn to high-interest lenders like payday loans, which they can’t repay and which gets them into a spiral of crisis debt.”

Dr James McCormick, Scotland adviser to poverty charity the Joseph Rowntree Foundation, said “What we see now is a significant risk of what we would term ‘in-work poverty’. This is people who are working, they may be doing less then 20 hours a week, but even if they are on a decent hourly rate of pay, they may still find themselves below the poverty threshold, because they’re not working sufficient hours.” Low pay remains a “persistent problem”, Dr McCormick said, and the combination of factors leads to a situation of “disguised unemployment”.

Another report reveals that Scots workers spend £2,000 a year on job-related costs such as food, travel, childcare, equipment and clothes. The average British worker spends one pound from every eight of their disposable income on costs relating to their job.

Fact of the Day

Everybody in the world was a hunter-gatherer until the local origins of agriculture around 11,000 years ago, and nobody in the world lived under a state government until 5,400 years ago.

Food for thought

Approximately 870 million people in the world do not eat enough to be healthy. That means that one in every eight people on Earth goes to bed hungry each night.
Hunger is number one on the list of the world’s top 10 health risks. It kills more people every year than AIDS, malaria and tuberculosis combined. 
A third of all deaths in children under the age of five in developing countries are linked to undernutrition. It costs just US $0.25 per day to provide a child with all of the vitamins and nutrients he or she needs to grow up healthy.
By 2050, climate change and erratic weather patterns will have pushed another 24 million children into hunger. Almost half of these children will live in sub-Saharan Africa.

Hunger is solvable

Independence - No Solution

Alex Salmon's argument for independence is that devolution had failed to solve the problems facing people in Scotland and that an independent Scotland was the only framework within which these problems can be solved.

Of course devolution has failed. But that's because people's problems in Scotland were never caused by a lack of devolution in the first place. They were, and still are, caused by capitalism as the system of class ownership and production for profit. This is why independence is no solution either. As capitalism would continue in an independent Scotland, so would the problems. These problems are not caused by the form of government, and any government of an independent Scotland would still be compelled by the economic laws of capitalism to put profits before people, just as UK governments have been.

The SSP would then no doubt come along and say "independence has failed because capitalism has been kept" and that what is needed an "independent socialist Scotland" and that then the problems will be solved. But they won't be. First, because socialism cannot be established in one country (we are living in an interdependent world and capitalism is a world system) and, secondly, because what the SSP mean by "socialism" isn't real socialism but only a national state-capitalism.

The only framework within which these problems can be solved -- which don't just exist in Scotland but are basically the same in all the countries of the world -- is a world community without frontiers based on natural and industrial resources of the world being the common heritage of all humanity so allowing production directly for use instead of for profit. In other words, world socialism not narrow nationalism. That's the issue we will be raising in this referendum.

All that glitters is not gold

Gold Supplement made from pure gold leaf inside a coated gold capsule. Does ingesting gold have any health benefit?  Nope. Gold is a metal that is not used by the body and is toxic in high doses. So, in the end it is a $425.00 glittery shit.

From here

A happy new year?

A third of young people in Scotland feel down or depressed either always or often, a youth charity claimed. 

One in ten young people feels unable to cope with day-to-day life.

28 per cent of young people believe their prospects have been permanently damaged by the recession.

21 per cent feel they have no  future as a result of the economic crisis.

"Send them Back"

Professor Tom Devine, director of the Scottish Centre of Diaspora Studies at Edinburgh University, welcomed plans for a planned monument in Glasgow to commemerate the 100,000 who fled to the city to escape starvation in Ireland in the 1840s. But he warned that it must not be "founded on comforting myth and unproven beliefs".

Far from highlighting Glasgow's generosity, almost 50,000 immigrants were sent back to Ireland.