“Springtime for America (Again)” When Ronald Reagan ran for re-election for president in 1984, he declared that it was “springtime for America”. He should have said it was “springtime for Corporate America.” Under his administration and those that followed, Corporate America and the world wide capitalist class increased its domination of the world, seemingly without an equivalent resistance from the working class, especially from the US working class. While this has started to change in recent years, the movement in the US has been lagging far behind.

Now that is starting to change.

To read more, see attached article

A new phase in capitalism’s global economic crisis appears to be opening up. As is usual, this crisis has first hit the financial sector of capitalism. First, it was in the privately-owned banks and other financial institutions. Now the contagion has spread to public treasuries. The sovereign debt crisis in Dubai was the first warning. Now it is Greece.

Read more: See attachment

In the last week or so, the US media has focused on the assault on Marjah, in Helmand Province, Afghanistan. They have emphasized how very careful the troops are to avoid killing "civilians." When the US troops assaulted Fallujah, Iraq in 2004, they simply declared war against the entire population. That was ignored by mainstream media, of course. What is the meaning behind this new emphasis? See attached document.

I don't know how many have been following the scandal of the murder of a Hamas leader while he was in Qatar. Evidently this was carried out by Mossad agents. Nothing new there, but the scandal comes in in the fact that they entered Qatar on false passports - passports of British and Irish citizens, from those countries. The original names were the same, but the photos and biomeric information was changed. Thus, evidently Israel changed the passports of citizens from those two countries. (Whether or not is was done wioth the individuals' permission is an open question.) In the world of diplomacy, this would cause an uproar had any other nation done this. The British and Irish regimes have tried to brush it off, but they cannot. The great British journalist Robert Fisk has a good interview on al jazeera on this. You can see it here: http://english.aljazeera.net/news/middleeast/2010/02/2010219104320606581.html

If you can't get there by clicking on the link, then you can copy it and paste it to your browser.

Iran is not the Former Soviet Union

Gerald Seib is the Washington bureau chief for the Wall St. Journal. As such, he is one of the foremost political analysts for American finance capital. In the Feb. 12 edition of the paper, he has an article entitled “Iran Revolution’s End Will be Heard Around the World.” In it, he explains that although the regime seems to have consolidated itself for the time being, it cannot maintain itself indefinitely since it is based on repression.

He explains how the 1979 seizure of power by the Muslim clerical establishment had global consequences. These included US capitalism’s support for Saddam Hussein, increased influence by the reactionary Muslim clerical establishment in Saudi Arabia, the rise of Hezbollah, and the general spread of Islamic fundamentalism throughout the Islamic populations of the world.

So far, so good.

He seems to believe that the eventual collapse of the Iranian regime will mean the reversal of these developments and, by implication, the increased power of US capitalism.

The conviction of Dr. Aafia Siddiqui on Feb. 3 of this year for attempted murder raised widespread outrage in Pakistan, Siddiqui’s home country. Born in Karachi in 1972 and educated at MIT in the US, Aafia Siddiqui is not a likely candidate for being caught up in this web of terrorism counter terrorism.

Siddiqui was married through an arranged marriage while in the US and subsequently became quite active in a Muslim mosque in her area. By 2002, with her marriage on the rocks, she moved back to Karachi, although she made several return visits to the US. The purpose of these visits is under dispute. In March of 2003, the FBI issued an alert for her and within a few weeks Siddiqui disappeared from the streets of Karachi. Although the Pakistan Minister of the Interior stated that she had been turned over to US authorities, the US denies ever having held her until 2008.

to read more, click on file attachment

Socialists and all fighters for the working class should record the passing last week of Howard Zinn. He was 88 years old. My mother taught at Spelman College for one or two years while Zinn taught there. She always used to talk about how much he was beloved by his students, both for the intellectual stimulation he offered as well as for his kindly attitude. Of course, Zinn will be best remembered for his "A People's History of the United States", and rightly so. This book is an absolute classic as far as a serious history of this country. Zinn was not a Marxist, in fact, he was something of a liberal, but a decent and courageous one as far as possible. "People's History" does not provide a clear analysis of the class forces at work in the United States, but it is a brilliant expose of the real history, of the bloodthirstiness of the US capitalist class and of the resistance to it on the part of many sectors of society, from the native Americans to workers (including slaves) to youth. If the purpose of life is to leave the Earth a slightly better place for our presence here, this one book accomplished that for Zinn, quite aside from his other contributions.

Wages, Prices and Profits

(Note: This title is borrowed from Karl Marx, who wrote a brilliant piece of this same title. Likewise for much of the content. I don’t think old Karl would mind. As the postal worker told the poet in the film “Il Postino”: “Poems don’t belong to those who write them; they belong to those who need them.” The same is true for ideas in general.)

Many mainstream economists are predicting that if the economy picks up, there will be increased inflation. In fact, the signs are already present. For instance, the World Food Price index from March-December, 2009 shows prices up by 23%. Corn prices from September – January were up 24% and Oil per barrel from September – January was up 20%. Overall, in the US, the Consumer Price Index (CPI) is now at 2% (i.e. a 2% inflation rate) vs. -2% in the middle of last year. (It should be noted that these figures underestimate inflation by about 3%. In the 1990s, under Bill Clinton, they changed the way the CPI is figured, resulting in reducing it by about this amount. The figures for this can be seen at www.shadowstats.com.)