A New Annual Record

About 100 people were missing in December and feared dead after two shipwrecks off Italy raised the total of deaths among migrants on the Mediterranean Sea in 2016 to 5000 - a new annual record, United Nations Agencies said on December 23. 

Deaths linked to Mediterranean crossings by migrants spiked in 2016. In 2015 more than one million crossed the sea, with 3771 deaths recorded. In 2016 about 360,000 people have crossed, most between Libya and Italy, but there have been far more deaths, probably due to overcrowding on unseaworthy vessels. 

As long as capitalism lasts folks will always flee from its more troubled spots, hoping to find a place where they can be exploited without a war raging around them. 

Steve and John.

A Two Edged Sword

Regular readers of this column may recall an item some while back about the claw on garbage collection trucks which can be operated by the driver making it unnecessary for a guy to lift and unload bins. At the time there were still a two man team on the truck.

 Recently, in Mississauga, Ontario, this writer noticed there was just one guy. Under capitalism progress is a two edged sword. 

Steve and John.

Drug Related Deaths

On January 18, on the CBC news, they provided the statistics of drug related deaths, recently in BC. 142 died in December and 914 in 2016, which is an 80 per cent increase from 2015. 

What a sick, empty, meaningless society we live in that would make anyone turn to and get hooked on narcotics. Its time to get rid of it. 

Steve and John.

Capital versus Humanity

A new danger is threatening the domination of the bourgeoisie – workers are resolutely adopting the path of international class organisation. The down-trodden, submissive slaves humbly bowing before the omnipotence of the modern Moloch of capital are, under the reviving influence of socialist ideas, lifting their heads and raising their voices in defence of their common class interests. The capitalists once could breathe freely when they still had under their power an inexhaustible supply of compliant workers, always ready obediently and selflessly to enrich by their labour the happy owners of the instruments of production. The employing class availed itself of the advantage offered by this state of affairs to set one half of the proletariat against the other, shattering any unity, compelling the newcomer migrant workers to appear as the menacing rivals, sapping the class solidarity of the workers. With malicious smugness it, the bosses fostered a more ignorant working class to thwart the struggle waged by the organised elements of the working class. But now the owners of capital and property do have something to worry about: new successes are being achieved in the organisation of the working class. Yesterday's silent slave is now a courageous fighter for the liberation of the working class.

The advance of scientific knowledge and the use of scientific method are of primary importance to man because, through enlightenment, they free him from the blind forces of nature, and through labour and struggle enable him to master his environment. Technological progress in recent times has extended man’s control over nature, to the point where it is possible to provide for all normal material needs. This is the economic base on which the good life for all citizens can be built. Such a life involves the creation, in the broadest sense of a cultured community — a community providing the maximum opportunity for the development of the potential of all its members.

Socialists hold a lofty view of human powers — mental, moral, and physical: a view of mankind changing itself and the environment through the exercise of those powers in collective labour. The promotion of culture involves the all-round development of the whole community, including the care of physical health and welfare, and preparation for working life, as well as the things of the mind and spirit, the sciences and arts. Socialists seek their synthesis in the production of complete humanity, the all-sided personality, for whom all life and experience form a unity. Marx was concerned with education for life, for useful people, not education for a leisured class, and he saw the need for maintaining the organic connection between labour and culture. Socialism sees all labour, physical and mental, as a unity, and sets out to end the distinction that exists between them in a class society, by seeking the end-product of the worker-intellectual. Socialist men and women are all-round persons, at home in physical labour, with technical skills, and a scientific understanding of nature and man’s place in it. A cultured life in socialist society includes physical welfare and an interest in the world of spirit and mind as reflected in the arts and sciences. Under capitalism, both worker and intellectual tend to be one-sided, partially developed. Socialism sets out to achieve a synthesis in personality, to produce people for whom both productive labour and intellectual life are requirements for satisfactory living. With socialism, the distinction between mental and physical labour, essentially a class distinction, will have disappeared. The collective, co-operative spirit of living is part of the lifeblood of a socialist society.

Profit Before The Environment.

Indian chiefs from Manitoba, Alberta and B.C. said, on January 11, that environmentalists everywhere were impressed by Justin Trudeau's comments at International talks in Paris, in late 2015. To quote activist Jane Fonda,''we all thought, what a cool guy, what a disappointment. He talked so beautifully of the need to meet the requirements of the climate treaty and to respect and hold to the treaties with indigenous people. Such a heroic stance he took there and yet he has betrayed every one of the things he committed to in Paris." Last year Trudeau approved plans to triple the capacity of the Trans Mountain Line between Edmonton and Burnaby, B.C. And approved plans to replace Endbridge's line between Edmonton and Superior, Wisconsin, but he pushed ahead with a national carbon price and rejected Endbridge's proposed Northern Gateway Pipeline. The compromise did not please Grand Chief Stewart Phillip of the Union of B.C, Indian Chiefs, ''I share the bitter disappointment. He failed to restructure the National Energy Board or environmental assessment hearings into major resource projects''. Fonda added,''There's going to be more poor people if the likes of your Prime Minister and our President-Elect have their way - a lot of poor sick people''.

If the capitalist class and governments which maintain the status-quo consider the extraction and transportation of certain raw materials to be profit yielding they will go ahead and to hell with the environment and all who live there, indigenous or not. Protests won't accomplish anything - Revolution will. 


Steve and John

Bias Is Not Necessary A Bad Thing

On December 18 the Toronto Star focused on insurance claims made against General Electric in Peterborough, Ontario. Over the last ten years more than half of the 660 occupational disease claims, including brain, bowl and lung cancer, have been denied. Workers at GE are exposed to high levels of cancer causing substances such as Trichloroethylene, Asbestos and Lead. When they try to prove their cases to Ontario's Workplace Safety and Insurance Board they are confronted with delay, bureaucracy, callousness and disappointment.

One can hardly expect a Board, created by a government which is there to protect the interests of the Capitalist Class, to be unbiased. This is not to say bias is necessarily a bad thing. Some bias in the direction of a society where the above situation could not exist would be welcomed. 

Steve and John.

WORLD SOCIALIST REVOLUTION

The Socialist Party has no interests other than those of the working class. Capitalism has shown more and more clearly its inability to serve the needs of the people.  Wars, poverty, hunger, recessions and unemployment have been the lot of the people. But the millionaires and the industrialists have made their fortunes out of the people’s sweat and blood. The capitalists have done exceptionally well; indeed, they have never been better off. Fellow-workers have paid for all this in low wages and worsening conditions while the employing class has conducted a ceaseless offensive against the workers. Collective bargaining has been turned into a farce. The failure of the Labour governments and the failure of reformism is not the failure of socialism. Concerned only to defend capitalism and profit, the political leaders openly betray workers' interests. Only by the establishment of Socialism can workers' problems be finally solved and people guaranteed a good life, lasting peace and steadily rising living standards. Socialism means an end to capitalist profit and exploitation, for it will deprive the capitalists of their ownership and control of the factories and workshops, mills and mines, and land, shipyards and transport, and ensure that production is organised for the use of the people and not for the profit of the tiny minority of capitalists. The capitalist class is not interested in production to benefit the peoples of the world or even their “own” people. They are interested only in profits. If the productive forces in the world were to be utilised for the purposes of construction, the entire planet could be transformed and the standards of living and level of culture raised to undreamed of heights. This is not possible under capitalism. Plenty under this system can only produce crises of over-production, slumps and unemployment, because of the basic necessity of the capitalist class to make profits. Economists openly forecast a new economic recession in the imminent future. This springs from the economic laws of the system, not the desires, good or bad, on the part of the capitalists.

Socialism means peace and an end to the danger of wars because in socialism there are no longer capitalists who want to conquer new markets, to capture raw materials and to exploit other people for cheap labour. Socialists have always taught that war was not a question of the wickedness of individuals but the result of the conflicts caused by private ownership and profit and the existence of separate national states. There is only one class which loses in war and that is the working class. Workers in America, in Russia, in China and in Britain, like the workers everywhere, have their class interests in common. End the system that leads to war. 

Socialism ends the gulf between poverty and plenty and frees the creative energies of the people for gigantic strides forward in economic, social and cultural advances. Socialism means an end to slumps and unemployment. Socialism means freedom for the people—freedom from poverty and insecurity, freedom for men, women and children to develop their capacities to the full, without fear or favour and the opening of new opportunities for the family and new respect for the individual. Socialism means the abolition of capitalism. The way forward lies through the united action of the working people. The power of the working people, uniting all sections who recognise the need for social change and participate in carrying it through create the conditions for the establishment of socialism. The ownership and control by the people of all the main productive and distributive resources of the country will provide the means necessary for the reorganisation and extension of all social services, and the direct participation of the people in administering them.

The Socialist Party is out to change the whole system throughout the whole world. We, socialists, refuse to join the reformists in leading the workers into the camp of capitalism. Only a socialist revolution can prevent the outbreak of more global wars and the relapse of humanity into barbarity. To this inspiring task, we summon the workers of city and country – all who are oppressed by capitalism. The myriad evils of capitalism will disappear only with the destruction of capitalism and the building of socialism. The struggle for socialism will be an arduous one but only by wresting the state power from the capitalists can we begin the task of building a new society made to serve a truly human civilisation. The only road is the socialist road. End capitalism that breeds war, suffering, and oppression. Forward, workers of the world, forward to the new world that awaits us. Use the ballot against capitalism. Vote for socialism.” Vote for the Socialist Party, the only party that keeps the revolutionary banner unfurled and engages in the unremitting struggle for a socialist world. 

The Thanks One Receives

On December 23, three Canadian soldiers said they had endured years of racist abuse, including slurs about Aboriginals and Blacks that were ignored by their superior officers. The three have filed a lawsuit against the military in Federal court in Halifax. They claim they were exposed to verbal taunts, racial epithets and insults to family members. A Black soldier claimed someone threw bananas at his wife. Their officers brushed aside their complaints and told them not to file any suits. 

If all this is true, it goes to show that even when one is prepared to fight to defend and advance the interests of the capitalist class he is still treated with contempt. If anything is contemptible it's the capitalist system. 

Steve and John.

A Typical Capitalist Situation

In Toronto, unionized city garbage collectors said they would fight Mayor John Torys efforts to outsource 200 of their jobs. Matt Figliano, Vice-President of CUPE local 416, which represents the affected workers, said they have an anti-privatization,''Kicked To The Curb'', lobbying campaign. Before Toronto amalgamated in 1997, Etobicoke outsourced its garbage. In 2012 the then Mayor, Rob Ford, convinced council to contract out the rest of the city's west half, which saved them $11 million a year. 

The city is in debt, therefore it wants to save money, but workers don't want to lose their jobs - a typical capitalist situation. Years ago when the economy was buoyant, a job in the government usually meant job security, which today no longer exists. 

Steve and John

It's Obvious Nothing Changes Under Capitalism

On December 16 Venezuela became a country without cash. The most widely used banknote, the 100 Bolivar, which had previously been worth 2 American cents, went out of circulation. Higher denomination bills which were meant to replace it had not arrived at the banks and no explanation was given. This meant people looking to buy groceries were out of luck as banks had run out of lower denomination bills like 20 and 50 Bolivar notes. There were no political protests as people scrambled to figure a way of fulfilling their needs in a country operating without money, but with a price tag on everything they would want. 

And this in a country that claims to be a Socialist one - how ridiculous can it get?

 It's shades of the runaway inflation in Germany in the early 20's, when workers were paid four times a day.

It's obvious nothing changes under Capitalism, so why don't we all work for its abolition?

 Steve and John

Eugene Debs' Demands

Water and Waste-water

The United Nations is to issue a call for the world to stop simply throwing sewage away, arguing that it is economically valuable and warning that fresh water is a finite resource.

More than 80 per cent of the world’s wastewater is currently discharged into the environment untreated, causing diseases that kill 842,000 people every year, including about 300,000 children under the age of five.

Blooms of algae, which grow rapidly in sewage-rich sea water, have also created vast ‘dead zones’ where most marine life cannot survive. And less fish in the sea means less food for humans at a time when the global population is climbing rapidly.

Change is on the horizon

The worker is the slave of the possessing class. She or he is sold in the market like a commodity whose price is subject to rise and fall like that of any other commodity. If there is an increased demand for workers, their price goes up; if there is a decreased demand, the price goes down; if the demand has so decreased that a certain number of workers find no buyer of their labour-power, as ‘surplus stock’, then they have to lie in reserve, and thus earning no livelihood, and suffer deprivation. A chattel slave is sold once and forever but the worker has to sell him or herself each and every day and hour. 

Capitalism signifies the supremacy of the markets and the capitalists who wield their social power through these markets and who rule the world to even a greater extent than ever before.  The social power of capital is enforced through the so-called rule of law, which exalts the sanctity of private property and negates the sanctity of human life. Workers don't just replace their wages; their unpaid labour is the source of all of the capitalists' profits, and also pays for economic activities that do not add to social wealth, such as advertising, security, finance, etc. In other words, the exploitation of living labour is fundamental to capitalism. The capitalist class uses all forms of division and disunity amongst working people in order to reap their profits and to bear down on the wages of all workers. As a result of this unmitigated war on the working class, wages have fallen, the “middle class” has shrunk, and job insecurity has become the norm.

Since hunger for cheap labour is the main force driving the global shift of production, it's no surprise this is manifested in a preference for the cheapest labour namely that of women (and children) in countries such as Bangladesh. In societies that had hitherto excluded women from life and labour outside the home, globalisation is conferring the status of wage-workers and bread-winners on young women and concentrating them in large numbers in factories which is now transforming their social status and self-image, never more so than when fighting street battles with baton-wielding police and company security-guards.  Many women who have previously been uninvolved in politics are suddenly becoming active. 

  Unions were established because workers quickly discovered that as isolated individuals they have no power when confronting their employers. Without a union, individual workers can be fired at will; their wages can be reduced; they can be forced to work unreasonable schedules; they can be denied benefits; the list is endless. But when workers unite and act collectively, the balance of power shifts. If workers decide to strike, for example, they can bring the employers to their knees, provided their picket lines are impregnable. This means that unions must reject the culture of capitalism that atomises people by forcing them to compete against one another. To operate effectively, unions need to embrace socialistic cooperative values where an injury to one is an injury to all, and everyone works for the common good.

What we are up against is the power of the plutocrats and their servile State-servants. They sow discontent and fear among the people, fear-mongering the people into believing that dangerous foreigners are preparing to invade. You teach them to passively accept whatever is told them by the corporate media or a government spokes-person. They endeavour to brainwash us into believing that everything the government does is for our own good and anyone who opposes the “benevolent” government is an enemy. They create a state of martial law, carried out militarised police officers. They polarise us so that we can never unite and stand in unity against the ruling class. Those who speak up are shouted down by propaganda lies and the rhetoric of politicians. We are coming to a crossroads. Either we join together now and attempt to gain political and economic freedom or all will be lost.  Resistance must also be accompanied by an alternative vision of a socialist, anti-capitalist society. Because the enemy, in the end, is not Trump, May or Merkel but capitalism, itself. 

When It Comes Down To Money

The province of Ontario ''officially'' gives $61 million a year in grants to help marginalized students in Toronto. A report released on January 12, by ''Social Planning Toronto'', claims that half of that money isn't being spent on them and is instead diverted to cover other expenses, as the cash strapped Toronto District School Board struggles to balance its budget. According to Sean Meagher, director of Social Planning Toronto,''This is the first time we've had absolutely rock solid numbers that no one can refute because they are the TDSB's own numbers''.

 So as always under capitalism it comes down to money, which is another good argument in favour of a society without any. 

Steve and John.

More Crapitalism

Canadians who want to meet Justin Trudeau during his road tour of town halls are being asked to register their personal details with Liberal M.P.s. To quote Conservative M.P. Candice Bergen,''Do not call it open town hall when its actually a Liberal rally. Its not at all the back-to-the-people tour the Prime Minister described.'' 

That's what I like about Crapitalism - its so open and democratic.

 Steve and John.

Need I Say More?

On Jan. 12 incoming secretary of state, Rex Tillerson, promised a hard-line stance towards Russia, which conflicted sharply with Obama's and Trump's approach. Tillerson, a former CEO with Exxon Mobil, called Russia a danger to the U.S. and said he would keep U.S. sanctions in place and consider new penalties related to Russian meddling in the election, (if they did). 

He criticized Obama's sanctions on Russia, which cost Exxon hundreds of Millions of dollars - need I say more?

 Steve and John.

Refugee (music video)

Socialism - Human Liberation

The aim of the Socialist Party is to replace world capitalist economy by a world socialism as mankind’s only way out from the inherent contradictions of the capitalist system which threaten to degrade or destroy the humanity. A socialist society will end the class division of society, i.e., simultaneously with the abolition of anarchy in production, it will abolish all forms of exploitation and oppression of man by man. By abolishing private ownership of the means of production and converting these means into social property, the global system of socialism will replace the elemental blind forces of the world market and competition by consciously organising production for the purpose of satisfying social needs. With the abolition of anarchy in production, devastating crises and still more devastating wars will disappear. Instead of a colossal waste of productive forces, there will be a planned use of all material resources and a painless and sustainable economic development of productive forces.

Society will no longer consist of antagonistic classes in conflict with each other but will present a united cooperative commonwealth of labour. For the first time in its history mankind will take its fate into its own hands. Instead of destroying innumerable human lives and incalculable wealth in struggles between classes and nations, mankind will devote all its energy to the development and strengthening of its own collective welfare and well-being. Work will cease to be toiling for the benefit of a class enemy.  The State, being the embodiment of class domination, will die out in so far as classes die out, and with it all measures of coercion. Capitalism distorts human individuality, subordinates men and women to the needs of the profit system sets them against each other. Socialism aims to develop their individuality by creating a society in which exploitation and poverty are ended, and the resources of science and technology used to reduce the time spent in monotonous and mechanical jobs to a minimum, and vastly increase the amount devoted to leisure and creative work.

 Socialism will arise as a result of the conscious creative activity of the many millions of working people. There exists no force in the whole world capable of holding back the advancing movement of society on the path to socialism. Capitalism has outlived its time and the future belongs to socialism. The Socialist Party wants only a society in which people’s needs are provided for by an abundance of goods and services. It seeks to create the conditions in which human beings will be able to realise their full potentialities and work together for the common good, instead of being divided by class, sex, race or creed. New relations, based on co-operation instead of domination and exploitation, will come into being. A flourishing socialist economy will be able to meet the social needs of the people and improve the quality of life for all. With socialism, the process of production is no longer a process of capital expansion, but only a labour process in which society only draws from nature the means of consumption which it needs. No longer are exchange values produced, but only articles for use. 

White Shite

A group of racists will try to march in Edinburgh next week to mark “Global White Pride Day”.

 Neo-Nazi propaganda was discovered at several bus stops in nearby Dunfermline. The material encouraged local people to "reject multiculturalism", while some posters bore the slogan: "We must secure the existence of our people and a future for white children."

Reflections about Trump

 Trump is obsessed by Islamic terror but has given no details how to deal with it. If he moves the U.S. Embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, the Palestinians will go ballistic, both figuratively and literally. Trump has made no secret he doesn't give a 'rat's behind' for the threat of global warming, which is increasing, becoming less of a threat than a reality. So we can't expect anything positive there. On the home front, Trump said he will reduce crime, but again, gave no clear indication how. He said he will reduce unemployment, but if he scraps free-trade, he will make it worse.

 Trump, like other presidents, has his advisors, but any advice from them will be within the framework of what they consider best for U.S. capitalism. The moot question, is, "To what extent do individuals make a difference?" A smarter guy than me, once said, "Men make history, but from the conditions to hand." Or, something to that effect. Put it this way - the tailor makes the suit, but, not the cloth. Our comrades in the U.K. are only too well aware of this. 

 During WWII, Britain's Interior Minister, Herbert Morrison, could have shut down the British party. They wouldn't have been able to do anything about it and no one would have protested. Morrison was a humane man, attempting to administrate an inhumane system. As a WWI conscientious objector, there was a certain empathy there, so he allowed the SP to propagate and attack both sides in the war. Though individuals make a difference concerning details, they make none concerning fundamentals, nor can they.

No one knows exactly what will happen under Donny baby, maybe he doesn't, but we do know what won't. There will be no change in the class basis of society. The capitalist class will continue to own the tools of production, while the working class continues to be exploited by them, (that is, those who still have jobs) with all the consequent misery this causes. Nor, would it have been different if Hillary had won. Trump's ranting "America First", is so much hot air to convince the American working class they have something in common with those who exploit them.

The time is long overdue for the working class to stop saying 'let's vote for this or that candidate.' How about making things a whole lot better? This can be done by "not" voting for individuals as such, but electing a majority of socialist deputies, with a mandate to make the tools of production the property of all. Then we could have done with war, poverty, unemployment, planned obsolescence, famine, preventable diseases, epidemics and destruction of the environment. Also, no one would think of electing goofball politicians, or even smart ones, who's sole intention is to keep us exploited. 

Steve and John