February 1-14, 2009
Volume 17 - Number 2
$1

Prolétaires de tous les pays, unissez-vous!
Otatoskewak ota kitaskinahk mamawestotan!
Workers of all lands, unite
Contents
Printer-friendly articles
Mobile-friendly articles

1) THE FEDERAL BUDGET: A "SMOKE AND MIRRORS SHAM"
2) BACK TO WORK LAW HITS YORK U TEACHERS
3) HOW CAN WE CHANGE THIS?
4) BC LIBERALS CHALLENGED BY FSA REVOLT
5) ISRAEL'S WAR CRIMES RECORD - Editorial
6) GAGGING IN BRITISH COLUMBIA - Editorial
7) HARPER HAS NO "MORAL AUTHORITY" TO HELP HUMAN RIGHTS MUSEUM
8) CANADA STUDENT LOAN DEBT HITS RECORD $13 BILLION
9) NOT ONE MORE ISRAELI MASSACRE IN GAZA!
10) LOCAL ELECTIONS IN CHILE RAISE HOPES FOR LEFT
11) FMLN TOPS EL SALVADOR VOTE
12) ISRAEL ACCUSED OF WHITE PHOSPHORUS ATTACKS
13) LEFT UNDER ATTACK IN SOUTH KOREA
14) VANCOUVER ELEMENTARY TEACHERS CONDEMN GAZA ATTACK
15) WHAT'S LEFT
 16) PODCAST OF PEOPLE'S VOICE ARTICLES
17) CLARTÉ (en français)
18) THE SPARK! (Theoretical and Discussion Bulletin of the Communist Party of Canada)
19) INTRODUCING MARXISM: A COMMUNIST PARTY STUDY COURSE
20) REBEL YOUTH

FEBRUARY 1-14, 2009 PV


The Spark!
Theoretical and Discussion Bulletin of the Communist Party of Canada

The Spark!

The latest issue of The Spark! theoretical journal, is now on sale for $5 at Communist Party offices (see p. 8) or People’s Co-op Books, 1391 Commercial Drive, Vancouver.

Articles include
  • “Introduction to a General Theory of Culture” (Barry Lord);
  • “Political & Economic Realities Behind Colombian Labour Relations” (Sacouman, Moore & Brittain); 
  • “Treaty Process & Indian Nationalism” (Ray Bobb);
  • “Lenin: Heritage of the Socialist Market Economy” (C.J. Atkins);
  • “Nature of the State Under Bush & Harper” (Stephen Von Sychowski);
  • plus reviews, editorials, and more.

People's Voice deadlines:
FEBRUARY 15-28
Thursday, February 5
MARCH 1-15
Thursday, February 19
 Send submissions to PV Editorial Office,
706 Clark Drive, Vancouver, V5L 3J1, pvoice@telus.net





People's Voice finds many "Global Class Struggle" reports at the "Labour Start" website, http://www.labourstart.org. We urge our readers to check it out!

*  *  *  *  *
People's Voice

Canadian Publications Mail Sales Product Agreement #205214
ISSN number 1198-8657
People's Voice is published by
New Labour Press Ltd
   PV Editorial Office
706 Clark Drive,
VANCOUVER, B.C. V5L 3J1
Phone:604-255-2041
Fax:604-254-9803
email:  pvoice@telus.net

Editor: Kimball Cariou
Editorial Board: Kimball Cariou, Miguel Figueroa,
Doug Meggison, Naomi Rankin, Liz Rowley, Jim Sacouman

* * * * * *
Letters
People's Voice welcomes your letters
on any subject covered in our pages.
We reserve the right to edit for length and clarity,
and to refuse to print letters which may be libellous
or which contain unnecessary personal attacks.
Send your views to:
"Letters to the Editor",
796 Clark Dr., Vancouver, BC V5L 3J1,
or pvoice@telus.net
People's Voice articles may be reprinted without permission,
provided the source is credited.

* * * * * *

The Communist Party of Canada, formed in 1921,
has a proud history of fighting for jobs, equality, peace,
Canadian independence, and socialism.
The CPC does much more than run candidates in elections.
We think the fight against big business and its parties
is a year-round job,
so our members are active across the country,
to build our party and to help strengthen people's movements
on a wide range of issues.

All our policies and leadership
are set democratically by our members.
To find out more about Canada's party of Socialism,
give us a call at the nearest CPC office.

* * * * * *
Central Committee CPC
290A Danforth Ave Toronto, Ont. M4K 1N6
Ph: (416) 469-2446
fax: (416) 469-4063 E-mail info@cpc-pcc.ca

Parti Communiste du Québec
3891, avenue Barclay, app. 5
Montréal (Québec
 H3S 1K9
E-mail: pueblo@sympatico.ca

B.C.Committee CPC
706 Clark Drive, Vancouver, V5L 3J1
Tel: (604) 254-9836
Fax: (604) 254-9803

Edmonton CPC
Box 68112, 70 Bonnie Doon P.O.
Edmonton, AB, T6C 4N6
Tel: (780) 465-7893
Fax: (780)463-0209

Calgary CPC
Unit #1 - 19 Radcliffe Close SE
Calgary  AB, T2A 6B2
Tel: (403) 248-6489

Saskatchewan CPC
mail@communist-party-sk.ca

Ottawa CPC
Tel: (613) 232-7108

Manitoba Committee
387 Selkirk Ave., Winnipeg, R2W 2M3
Tel/fax: (204) 586-7824

Ontario Ctee. CPC
290A Danforth Ave., Toronto, M4K 1N6
Tel: (416) 469-2446

Hamilton Ctee. CPC
265 Melvin Ave., Apt. 815
Hamilton, ON.
Tel: (905) 548-9586

Atlantic Region CPC
Box 70 Grand Pré, NS, B0P 1M0
Tel/fax: (902) 542-7981

http://www.communist-party.ca/

* * * * * *

News for People, Not for Profits!
Every issue of People's Voice
gives you the latest
on the fightback from coast to coast.
Whether it's the struggle for jobs or peace, resistance to social cuts,
solidarity with Cuba, or workers' struggles around the world,
we've got the news the corporate media won't print.
And we do more than that
- we report and analyze events
from a revolutionary perspective,
helping to build the movements for justice and equality,
and eventually for a socialist Canada.
Read the paper that fights for working people
- on every page, in every issue!

People's Voice
$25 for 1 year
$45 for 2 years
Low-income special rate: $12 for 1-year
Outside Canada $25 US or $35 Cdn for 1 year
Send to: People's Voice, 133 Herkimer St.., Unit 502, Hamilton, ON, L8P 2H3

REDS ON THE WEB
http://www.communist-party.ca
http://www.ycl-ljc.ca

(Contents)
(Home)



1) THE FEDERAL BUDGET: A "SMOKE AND MIRRORS SHAM"

(The following article is from the February 1-14, 2009, issue of People's Voice, Canada's leading communist newspaper. Articles can be reprinted free if the source is credited. Subscription rates in Canada: $25/year, or $12 low income rate; for U.S. readers - $25 US per year; other overseas readers - $25 US or $35 CDN per year. Send to: People's Voice, c/o PV Business Manager, 133 Herkimer St., Unit 502, Hamilton, ON, L8P 2H3.)

Commentary from the Central Executive Committee, Communist Party of Canada, Jan. 27, 2009

The political mindset has changed in Ottawa since last fall, but not nearly as much as most analysts of the Jan. 27 federal budget suggest. This is not surprising, since Finance Minister Jim Flaherty's "budget consultations" were conducted almost exclusively with big business and right-wing think tanks. As the global economic crisis deepens, this budget prioritizes bail-outs for the banks and other lenders, and tax hand-outs to business, while ignoring the urgent needs of workers and the unemployed - further proof that the Harper minority government remains a trusted tool of the ruling class and a bitter enemy of working people across Canada. More than ever, a massive struggle by the working class and other democratic forces is needed to drive the Tories out of office.

     Stephen Harper, Jim Flaherty and the Tory cabinet remain diehard advocates of neo-con ideology. The ruling Conservatives have been compelled by events to bring in a `stimulus package' which combined with falling government revenues will result in a $64 billion deficit for the next two years. But the far-right Tory agenda remains in place, thinly disguised by smoke and mirrors such as minor announcements of infrastructure spending, designed to maintain Harper's grip on power.

     The current crisis proves that reality trumps the abstractions of bourgeois economic theory. For more than two decades, all the major capitalist governments have a strategy of deregulation, privatization, social cuts, massive tax breaks for the rich and corporations and increased military spending, and have imposed these neoliberal policies on so-called `less developed' states. Surely, if this "Washington consensus" truly possessed the powers its acolytes claim, capitalism would have entered a higher realm of crisis-free expansion, with benefits flowing from the top of the pile down to the lowest sections of the working class.

     But suddenly - as predicted by more objective economists and by the Communist Party (see People's Voice, January 1-15, 2008) - the edifice has collapsed. Not only are neo-con policies unable to tame the inherent "boom-bust" cycle of capitalism, they actually make the crash far more severe when it does arrive. The huge profits and asset growth of recent years stand revealed as mere spectres, projected by financial manipulation, over-heated housing and real estate markets, and the "bubbles" of speculation and unprecedented debt.

     Even before last September, the real impact of neo-con policies in North America was evident to any careful observer. The gap between rich and poor has reached staggering levels, tens of millions of working people were swamped by huge debt loads, the manufacturing sector was devastated. Similar trends were witnessed in Europe. Now, as millions of jobs vanish, parties which preached the neo-con gospel are bending the knee to the formerly reviled tenets of Keynesianism.

     This shift does reflect a powerful consensus among voters that an economic boost is desperately needed. In virtually every major capitalist country, governments are adopting policies to avert complete collapse, spending trillions of dollars on infrastructure and bailouts. To some extent, this is simply playing catch-up after years of cutbacks to schools and hospitals, of neglecting everything from sewage systems to crumbling bridges. Governments which poured billions into military expansion while cutting tax rates - such as the Harper Tories (and the Liberals before them) - are now responding to public pressures by going into deficit to pay for some urgent priorities.

     But the devil lurks in the details. Sixty-four billion dollars over two years sounds like a lot, but Harper's "stimulus" is less than 1.5% of Canada's Gross Domestic Product, far below the 2.5% planned in the US, and well short of what will be required to `jump-start' the sputtering domestic economy. Over half of the Tory deficit is simply a shortfall of revenue projections caused by the economic downturn and Harper's $12 billion in tax cuts implemented last year.

     Not content with this cut to future government revenues, the Tories are accelerating their corporate tax reductions. Their "across-the-board" tax cuts are actually a shift towards a "flat tax" system, benefitting those in high-income brackets far more than low and lower-middle income earners.

     Despite the rhetoric, the real needs of working people are not addressed by this budget. Half of the $2 billion promised for social housing will go towards renovations, not new homes. This allocation is feeble compared to the amount budgeted for home sales/renovations, the bulk of which is really a hidden subsidy to the real estate and construction industry. Nor is there anything for those who do not own homes, or protection for families facing foreclosures.

     There is nothing in the budget for a Canada-wide child care program, to improve healthcare, or to reduce the debt burdens faced by post-secondary students. The budget also carries over some of the worst provisions of Flaherty's disastrous "economic statement" from last November, including the attack of pay equity rights for women, an imposed wage ceiling for federal workers and the sell-off of $2 billion in public assets to corporate interests.

     Far from assisting the unemployed, this budget continues the Tory war on the poor. The extension of EI benefits by five weeks is minimal, the waiting period remains in place, and access to miserly benefits (still pegged at only 55% of former earnings) remains limited to about one-third of the growing ranks of unemployed. The $2 billion for retraining jobless workers is a tiny fraction of the $54 billion stolen from the unemployed over the years through Liberal and Tory cuts to EI benefits. The federal minimum wage is unchanged, and the budget does nothing to protect and raise pensions, or to improve social assistance.

     The infrastructure spending is spread thinly across the country. Instead of a new financial deal for cities, the budget contains "poison pill" provisions compelling provinces and municipalities to cough up matching funds. As a result, many so-called "shovel-ready" projects will remain sidelined, since cash-starved local governments lack necessary taxation powers or sufficient support from higher levels of government.

     The budget does nothing to stem the loss of manufacturing and to protect industrial jobs - no plant closure legislation, nothing to make government financial support conditional on keeping plants open without lay-offs or wage cuts. Despite the enormous deficit, there are no cuts to the bloated military budget and the discredited and disastrous mission in Afghanistan.

     After all Harper's claims to be "listening" to the Canadian people and to understand the need for new policies, the Jan. 27 budget does nothing to tackle the very serious structural problems plaguing social and economic life in Canada: growing unemployment and homelessness, an ever-widening income gap, deindustrialisation, completely inadequate social programs, racist oppression of Aboriginal peoples, environmental destruction, the sell-out of Canadian sovereignty. In essence, the budget is simply a political effort to salvage the fortunes of the Conservative party.

     The Liberals under their new leader Michael Ignatieff have decided to support the budget, hoping to regain their position as the "favoured party" of big capital. This decision finishes the Liberal-NDP coalition which millions of working people had hoped would defeat the most reactionary, pro-business, militaristic, sell-out government in Canadian history.

     But as Canada faces the deepest economic crisis in generations, the labour and democratic movements cannot accept this outcome quietly. We urge an escalated struggle to unite the working class and its allies into mass actions to drive the Harper Tories out of office, and to win the pro-people policies so desperately needed at this crucial moment.

Printer- friendly article
(Contents)
(Home)


2) BACK TO WORK LAW HITS YORK U TEACHERS

(The following article is from the February 1-14, 2009, issue of People's Voice, Canada's leading communist newspaper. Articles can be reprinted free if the source is credited. Subscription rates in Canada: $25/year, or $12 low income rate; for U.S. readers - $25 US per year; other overseas readers - $25 US or $35 CDN per year. Send to: People's Voice, c/o PV Business Manager, 133 Herkimer St., Unit 502, Hamilton, ON, L8P 2H3.)

PV Ontario Bureau

Seven months after ordering striking TTC workers back to work, the Ontario Liberals introduced similar legislation on Jan. 25. This time the target is striking members of CUPE Local 3903, mostly contract teachers and workers at York University, fighting for job security in a workplace where all are obliged to re-apply for their jobs annually.

     Some have worked as long as 15 or 20 years at York, never knowing from one year to the next whether the University will rehire them, or to teach one course or five. Members of Local 3903 teach most of the courses at York, but their wages are a fraction of the university budget. Many of these low paid contract workers are also post-graduate students, facing high tuition fees.

     Because the conditions at York are similar for contract teachers at most Canadian universities, their struggle will set the stage for negotiations and settlements across the board. This is no doubt why York's right-wing administration has refused to negotiate, effectively locking out its employees, and waiting for provincial legislation.

     Ontario Communist Party leader Liz Rowley charges the government with collusion, since provincial under-funding of universities is at the root of the problem. "Ontario's universities receive the lowest funding of all ten provinces, and none of them are well-funded," she says. Furthermore, "binding arbitration which will follow the back to work order requires the arbitrator to take into account the employer's ability to pay in making an award. This will ensure that the workers will be the losers. That's not free collective bargaining. It's union-busting."

     While marching to Queen's Park after a Jan. 27 rally at the Ministry of Labour, strikers were attacked by Toronto police. Four were arrested and charged with assaulting police. Office workers in the towers overlooking University Avenue in downtown Toronto rushed out to tell media that they had seen the police attack the strikers, not the other way around. Video of the attacks was also given to union leaders and their lawyers. 

     CUPE Ontario President Sid Ryan said the union will challenging the back to work legislation. "There is no deadlock", he said, stating the union has been waiting to negotiate a collective agreement for 83 days, while the employer has refused to negotiate for weeks at a time. A forced vote on York's final offer was soundly rejected in mid-January, after which the employer flatly told the mediator they would refuse to meet the union for further negotiations.

     A successful challenge to the legislation would make it easier for unions like the Elementary Teachers and the Ontario Public Service Employees Union which are, or will be in difficult negotiations with the provincial government this year. 

     The Ontario NDP has opposed the back to work legislation, delaying passage of the Bill, extracting a promise from the Premier that he would pressure York President Shoukri to send York negotiators back to the bargaining table. 

     The Tories meanwhile are hysterical, attacking everyone for being "in bed" with the unions and casting themselves as protectors of 50,000 York students. 

     With the forces inside the Legislature so stacked against labour, the Communist Party is calling on the labour and democratic movements to gird for a major battle to defend basic labour and democratic rights.

     "It can't be fixed in the Legislature," said Rowley, "it will need the power of a mighty people's coalition to stop the economic and political bulldozer that's coming this way. Quality of life is about to be flattened across the province and across the country.  We need a coordinated fightback led by labour, and we need it now."

Printer- friendly article
(Contents)
(Home)


3) HOW CAN WE CHANGE THIS?

(The following article is from the February 1-14, 2009, issue of People's Voice, Canada's leading communist newspaper. Articles can be reprinted free if the source is credited. Subscription rates in Canada: $25/year, or $12 low income rate; for U.S. readers - $25 US per year; other overseas readers - $25 US or $35 CDN per year. Send to: People's Voice, c/o PV Business Manager, 133 Herkimer St., Unit 502, Hamilton, ON, L8P 2H3.)

By Johan Boyden, General Secretary, Young Communist League of Canada

Picture this. It is the first day of school for the new semester. As usual, the teacher has written on the board. The headlines are from newspaper: December unemployment highest in 16 years. EU: Deep recession, surging unemployment coming. Child poverty grows. Youth, women suffer in latest layoffs.

     The teacher turns to the class. What can we do to change this? she asks.

     Last November, the YCL was talking about the need to advance a bold "people's alternative agenda," trying to shield and block as much as possible as the Harper Conservatives renew the attack and use their response to the economic crisis as a pretext. At the time, I wrote an article in People's Voice partly about the positive potential of coalitions, and promised to present analysis about economic crisis, and its implications for youth and students.

     Of course, since then, we've seen remarkable openings and volatility in Parliament with the temporary eclipse of emperor Harper through a coalition, all prompted by their arrogant first attempt at a budget. Now, at the time of press deadline, we're all entering into budget-process round two, and Harper looks likely to win.

     I received an email from the finance minister a few weeks ago asking me for consultation on the budget process. Intrigued, not least about how some Jim Flaherty email-bot got my address, I followed the link. I was give a one-to-six grading options on six vague items and the option of adding 250 characters - yes, not words but characters, just like text-messages - to add with my humble opinion.

     Let's see if we can do something better in terms of a critique.

     Still, some people may ask: is capitalism capable of doing this job? That's another good question. The answer is clearly no. But where does that leave us? A general discussion about the merits of socialism?

     As far as I'm concerned, its case-closed on that debate - socialism is thousand times better. Speaking in his last televised address of 2008, Venezuelan president Hugo Chavez announced that capitalism is "the immoral art, science, and technology of development of capital." If want to use this definition is it any surprise that even Hustler magazine's publisher Larry Flynt headed to the US Congress earlier this January asking for a billion-dollar bail-out for the porn industry?

     Or were they asking for a stimulus package? (For those who care, YouTube search this phrase).

     But seriously, why do all the stimulus packages seem to sound like the familiar broken record where the rich guys make the problem and the little folk pay for the clean up? Lets flip this record. What would a peoples stimulus package look like? What would an economic recovery for youth and students start with?

     For the youth movement, in the YCL's view, such an alternative direction might draw from the Youth Charter that the broad and powerful Canadian Youth Congress proposed, following the On To Ottawa Trek of the Great Depression.

     This is no dusty idea. American youth and students are currently mobilizing around a "youth agenda" platform, as have youth students in Europe, and also in Africa. Whatever the case, in the end this resistance has to be shaped by today's conditions and the requirements for social advance for the all exploited people and oppressed nations of Canada.

     This is not the same as replacing the Conservatives with the Liberals, in short. It will require dynamic, broad, and visible opposition in the streets in the coming months.

     So it comes down to struggle.

     Where to start? What about the Canadian Federation of Students do with their four proposals for "a broader economic stimulus package." Those proposals are: an increase to the Canada Social Transfer for post-secondary education; more graduate student funding under the Canada Graduate Scholarships; greater financial support for Aboriginal students; and a boost in student summer jobs funding.

     Could a youth coalition be build around these issues, as well as the agenda for raising minimum wages that Canadian Labour Congress Youth are putting forward, and the idea of shifting money from war budgets, military recruitment and the dirty war in Afghanistan and back to the people that will be discussion of the upcoming student anti-war conference co-sponsored by the Canadian Peace Alliance? The Sierra youth coalition has also made the link between the environmental policies of the Harper Tories and the need for a new direction.

     The contribution of the Marxists and the left is not in wandering around among the people proclaiming 'we told you so,' (although a glance at some of the academic left press would make you think otherwise). The contribution bigger, it is to help propose a way forward.

     After all, we should never celebrate people's suffering. Crisis is a feature of capitalism. If there is an accompanied sustained working class offensive against the system, and progressive forces world-wide are able to grasp the moment and force through major change - that would be cause to celebrate.

Printer- friendly article
(Contents)
(Home)


4) BC LIBERALS CHALLENGED BY FSA REVOLT

(The following article is from the February 1-14, 2009, issue of People's Voice, Canada's leading communist newspaper. Articles can be reprinted free if the source is credited. Subscription rates in Canada: $25/year, or $12 low income rate; for U.S. readers - $25 US per year; other overseas readers - $25 US or $35 CDN per year. Send to: People's Voice, c/o PV Business Manager, 133 Herkimer St., Unit 502, Hamilton, ON, L8P 2H3.)
By Kimball Cariou

"Not everything that counts can be counted, and not everything that can be counted counts." - Albert Einstein

     These words by Einstein have a wide application, ranging from the student "testing" described below to the conduct of war. A January 2009 article in The Nation magazine, for example, describes a US military campaign in early 1968 to wipe out "enemy fighters" in heavily populated rural areas of the Mekong Delta. "Success" was to be quantified "accurately" by counting the number of dead National Liberation Front (so-called "Viet Cong") soldiers. Troops were ordered to count all those killed in the "free fire zones" as enemy combatants, not just those found with weapons. Months later, the percentage of NLF combatants among the 10,000-plus killed was found to be about the same as their presence among the overall population. In other words, far from a "scientific" analysis, the obsession with "hard numbers" had resulted in random slaughter.

     The consequences are less deadly, but public education supporters in British Columbia argue that a Fraser Institute program to "measure the success" of schools is equally bogus. As the May 12 provincial election nears, the Campbell Liberal government unexpectedly finds that "Foundation Skills Assessment" (FSA) testing has turned from a public relations asset into a political hot potato.

     Vancouver's new majority of Vision-COPE school trustees recently informed parents that they can keep students out of the controversial FSA tests conducted in grades 4, 7 and 10. It also voted to ask the Education Ministry "to take a leadership role in preventing the misuse of student achievement data such as the Foundations Skills Assessment". The move has opened the floodgates for other school boards to speak out against the FSA, which is widely seen as a tool to attack public education in the name of "accountability."

     The FSA struggle has been building up since the mid-1990s across British Columbia, with the sharpest debates in major urban centres. All public schools are required to do the testing, and private schools participate voluntarily. The theory is that FSA results accurately measure key student skills within each school, giving the province and school boards a better handle on where to direct limited resources.

     In fact, only the Fraser Institute uses the results for an annual "ranking" of all schools, widely published in CanWest Global newspapers. Early support for this initiative came from some parents looking for easy ways to research the effectiveness of their children's education. But the real outcome was to reinforce perceptions about "good" and "bad" schools.

     Private schools consistently topped the rankings, giving the impression that these are the "best" schools. Many families pulled their children out of local schools, spending thousands of dollars to enroll them in private academies. Similarly, schools in the wealthier west side of Vancouver invariably score higher than those in the lower-income east side, leading to an exodus of students westward when catchment area restrictions were eased.

     The problem is that the Fraser Institute report gives a warped picture. The FSA scores do not accurately measure student achievement or learning conditions. They do reflect class stratification; schools with a higher income population base tend to score higher marks in exams. This disparity is reinforced by other factors. For example, private schools have the luxury of selecting "better qualified" students, immediately creating an inherent bias in the FSA testing.

     There are also wide divergences in testing application. Private schools often "teach to the FSA," for example, in order to boost their rankings and attract more "customers." Principals in some public schools deliberately discourage less academically-advanced students from taking the test, as a way to artificially inflate the school's average. Other principals try to ensure maximum participation, which lowers the average score.

     As a result, the real achievements of local public schools are systematically ignored. Parents who know first-hand of the excellent teaching staff and positive learning atmosphere at their children's schools are deeply frustrated when the annual report gives a low score, scaring other families in the neighbourhood from enrolling their children.

     From the Fraser Institute perspective, none of this is a problem. The anti-union think tank seeks to privatize all public services, including education. The FSA encourages parents to enroll students in private schools, and undermines overall support for public education. It turns schools against each other, and pits families against teachers and their unions.

     Not surprisingly, the most consistent opponent of the FSA has been the BC Teachers' Federation, whose members face the heat every spring when the rankings are published. The BCTF has been campaigning for random testing, which would become simply one of many tools to measure overall achievement by school district.

     More recently, groups like the Vancouver District Parents Advisory Committee (DPAC) have taken a similar approach. Some lower-income schools in the city don't have PACs, so the DPAC position shows that growing numbers of parents understand that the rankings are deeply negative for the public school system.

     But it was the recent VSB decision which set off a political storm, including bitter editorial attacks against the trustees in the Vancouver Sun and National Post. Clearly, the right wing forces for which these media speak fear that the Fraser Institute agenda to privatize education is threatened by a broad revolt of teachers, parents and trustees.

     That revolt may be growing. The Maple Ridge-Pitt Meadows Board has asked the Education Ministry to reconsider how it administers the tests, and the Coquitlam Board said it will send a letter to parents "similar" that adopted by Vancouver trustees. The Sunshine Coast board had already passed a motion requesting the Ministry to withhold the identities of individual schools when releasing FSA data, as the Ministry of Health does with individual hospitals.

     Given the Campbell government's diehard support for the FSA, nothing is likely to change right away. But the campaign against the Fraser Institute agenda is gaining momentum, and could become a big issue in the election.

Printer- friendly article
(Contents)
(Home)


5) ISRAEL'S WAR CRIMES RECORD

(The following article is from the February 1-14, 2009, issue of People's Voice, Canada's leading communist newspaper. Articles can be reprinted free if the source is credited. Subscription rates in Canada: $25/year, or $12 low income rate; for U.S. readers - $25 US per year; other overseas readers - $25 US or $35 CDN per year. Send to: People's Voice, c/o PV Business Manager, 133 Herkimer St., Unit 502, Hamilton, ON, L8P 2H3.)

People's Voice Editorial

There is said to be "mounting fear in Israel" that its leaders could face war crimes charges over their invasion of Gaza. Even the country's chief law officer, Menachem Mazuz, has warned that Israel will soon face "a wave of international lawsuits".
     The post-World War Two Nuremburg Tribunal ruled that illegal aggression against other countries was one of the most serious Nazi war crimes. Certainly Israel's brutal attack ranks with the US war against Iraq as such an aggression.

     Richard Falk, the United Nations' special rapporteur on the occupied territories and a professor emeritus of international law at Princeton University, accuses Israel of gravely violating the laws of war during its three-week offensive, which killed more than 1,300 Gazans, most of them civilians, and wounded thousands more.

     "There is a well-grounded view that both the initial attacks on Gaza and the tactics being used by Israel are serious violations of the UN charter, the Geneva conventions, international law and international humanitarian law," Falk said during the final stages of fighting.

     Those tactics include the Israeli military's failure to distinguish between Palestinian civilians and combatants, its firing of white phosphorus shells in Gaza, despite the ban on this weapon in civilian areas (see page 9), and its use of a deadly experimental weapon - dense inert metal explosive, or Dime - that severs limbs and ruptures the internal organs of anyone close to the blast.

     Over 300 human rights organizations have prepared a 37-page dossier of evidence to present to the International Criminal Court in the Netherlands that tries war crimes. Supporters of Israel in Canada who loudly attack trade unions and other groups which criticize the Zionist regime would do well to read this dossier.

Printer- friendly article
(Contents)
(Home)


6) GAGGING IN BRITISH COLUMBIA

(The following article is from the February 1-14, 2009, issue of People's Voice, Canada's leading communist newspaper. Articles can be reprinted free if the source is credited. Subscription rates in Canada: $25/year, or $12 low income rate; for U.S. readers - $25 US per year; other overseas readers - $25 US or $35 CDN per year. Send to: People's Voice, c/o PV Business Manager, 133 Herkimer St., Unit 502, Hamilton, ON, L8P 2H3.)

People's Voice Editorial

Under the pretext of controlling "election advertising," British Columbia has launched one of the most far-reaching censorship laws in the world. Starting on Feb. 13, organizations or individuals who speak out on the issues and parties involved in the May 12 provincial election face the possibility of severe legal penalties. The labour movement has been fighting the law since the Campbell government introduced the legislation, and the matter is headed to court.

     But the law's full impact was not widely understood until the Vancouver-based Renters at Risk coalition received a letter from Elections BC last November. The letter warned that "Our review of the Renters at Risk campaign during the campaign periods of the Vancouver-Burrard and Vancouver-Fairview by-elections identified several instances of messaging that appeared to be election advertising."

     Election advertising is defined as anything that describes issues or legislation, associates them with politics and directly or indirectly takes a promotional or oppositional position, starting 60 days before the campaign officially begins, or during a byelection. Punishment for "unregistered groups" which violate the ban is a $10,000 fine, imprisonment for one year, or both. Advertisers, bloggers and anyone else who expresses a public opinion will have to register, post their names and phone numbers, disclose funding and meet spending limits of $3,000 per constituency and $150,000 province-wide.

     Everyone knows the law is aimed at the trade union movement, the main target of the Campbell government for eight years. It's properly termed a "gag law," violating the freedom of speech of all British Columbians, and it must be repealed.

Printer- friendly article
(Contents)
(Home)


7) HARPER HAS NO "MORAL AUTHORITY" TO HELP HUMAN RIGHTS MUSEUM

(The following article is from the February 1-14, 2009, issue of People's Voice, Canada's leading communist newspaper. Articles can be reprinted free if the source is credited. Subscription rates in Canada: $25/year, or $12 low income rate; for U.S. readers - $25 US per year; other overseas readers - $25 US or $35 CDN per year. Send to: People's Voice, c/o PV Business Manager, 133 Herkimer St., Unit 502, Hamilton, ON, L8P 2H3.)

The record of the Conservative Party made it unacceptable to include Prime Minister Stephen Harper in the recent sod-turning ceremony for the Canadian Human Rights Museum in Winnipeg, according to the Communist Party's Manitoba Committee.

     "This is a government that commits war crimes in Afghanistan and genocide against the Aboriginal peoples in Canada, prefers to let the unemployed working class rot during the economic crisis, attacks the equality of women and other discriminated groups, and violates or allows the violation of the most basic civil rights of citizens such as Omar Khadr, the four Canadians sent to torture in Syria, and Abousfian Abdelrazik, stranded in Sudan since 2003," said CP (Manitoba) leader Darrell Rankin.

     "It is a government that believes jobs, education, health, equality and peace are not human rights," continued Rankin. "It is a government that does not believe all nations have rights including peace and sovereignty. It is a government that does not believe citizenship should correspond with diplomatic support, no rendition and freedom from torture. It is a government that does not respect the United Nations Charter, the democratic legacy of the fight against fascism.

     "It is a government that attacks collective agreements and wages, privatizes property, destroys science and regulation, and kills the environment, the ill and consumers to make money for the corporations. It is a government that could not care less about the hungry, victims of the global food crisis, except when it has shipped some morsels to Haiti and Afghanistan which are now its provinces because it is the occupier.

     "It is a government that spends its time in secret talks with corporations about a new relationship with the U.S. and Mexico. It is a government that has done nothing to honour its promise of accountability, instead keeping its candidates away from public election meetings, muzzling cabinet ministers and making media sign a waiting list to ask questions.

     "It is a government that is more friendly with the abusers of power in the world than with the governments that are doing the most to protect and improve the rights of their citizens. It promotes friendship by signing free trade deals with the Colombian oligarchy, guilty of the state murder of countless Colombian citizens. It defends Israel's criminal and genocidal actions against the Palestinian people in Gaza...

     "It is a government that issues gag orders, drops voters from lists and fires directors to get its way with the Canadian Wheat Board, a sign of what kind of elections Canada would have if the Conservative Party ever gets a majority government.

     "It is a government that does not believe in or support child care. It is a government that honours only profit, the corporations, tax cuts for the wealthy and military spending...

     "The government of P.M. Stephen Harper should be a display in the museum of an example of a violator of human rights. The invitation to Harper to attend the sod turning ceremony is another sign that the organizers believe human rights belong in a museum, as a part of our past."

Printer- friendly article
(Contents)
(Home)


8) CANADA STUDENT LOAN DEBT HITS RECORD $13 BILLION

(The following article is from the February 1-14, 2009, issue of People's Voice, Canada's leading communist newspaper. Articles can be reprinted free if the source is credited. Subscription rates in Canada: $25/year, or $12 low income rate; for U.S. readers - $25 US per year; other overseas readers - $25 US or $35 CDN per year. Send to: People's Voice, c/o PV Business Manager, 133 Herkimer St., Unit 502, Hamilton, ON, L8P 2H3.)

Canada Student Loan debt has now surpassed a record $13,000,000,000, the Canadian Federation of Students announced on January 21. Across the country, CFS member locals have been holding a week of actions to highlight this crisis. In an open letter to Minister of Finance Jim Flaherty, the CFS demanded four actions to improve access to post-secondary education and reduce student debt: increasing the Canada Social Transfer for post-secondary education, increasing graduate student funding, greater financial support for Aboriginal students, and a boost in student summer jobs funding.

     People's Voice recently talked with Mikael Jensen about the tuition actions at Vancouver Island University (formerly Malaspina University College), who was just elected campaign coordinator for the CFS-BC. Jensen spoke to PV in his capacity of Director of external relations for the Vancouver Island Student's Union, CFS Local 61.

People's Voice: What message are you sending out this week?

Mikael Jensen: We're saying that student debt is far, far too high. Every year goes by and education is less and less accessible to students from middle and low income families. When you do graduate the average student debt load is over $25,000. Total student loans owed to the Government of Canada is increasing by $1.2 million a day - and this figure does not include provincial student loan debt or personal debt such as credit cards, lines of credits, bank loans, and family loans. As we all know private debt interest accumulates incredibly fast. So this hurts your career choices. As interest racks up, young workers must turn to the first good paying job they find after graduation, not to the career they've gone to school for.

PV: Talk about your event.

Jensen: Tomorrow we're having an event where Local 61 members can call the Prime Minister, demanding they do something about Canadian student debt. So we are putting on a soup kitchen, to draw our members in and educate. And there is a lot that can be done about student debt. Reducing tuition fees, for example, and shifting funds from education tax credits to up-front student grants - immediately.

     Harper's effigy will be there with his usual line: no soup for you, I gave all the soup to the auto CEOs and the banks. Something else we are highlighting is the preference that the government has had towards corporations and businesses [in loans]. The government just gave out multi-billion dollar bailouts, what about the students? Students are not able to declare bankruptcy on a student loan for seven years! What kind of Prime Minister is this? And previous governments under the Liberals have done nothing as well.

     So we are using student debt hitting $13 billion mark as a call for action. Recent polling indicates that 60% of Canadians would like to see zero tuition fees in Canada. So even more so, we have further proof that the Conservatives and the Liberals aren't listening to students. We're calling upon the fed government to act both in favour of what Canadians are asking for.

PV: How would you change student loans?

Jensen: Well, with student loans, the government presents education as if were a service, when it is really putting people into debt. And the government is making money on this debt, because they loan at a better rate than they give to students. Every dollar they loan out they make money on. So we are calling for a system of grants... Like I say, the public does also poll that they want the elimination of tuition. While elimination of tuition fees is the long term goal of the federation, we are realistic about that goal.

PV: What's the next step?

Jensen: Well, here at my local we are continuing, and I think provincially the CFS will be doing more work around Valentine's day and in March and April, leading up to the provincial election in May. Students are upset at what is going on. We are doing voter registration for the provincial election, talking about the issues, hoping to influence the policies and platforms of the parties that are running in the election.

PV: What about the provincial situation in BC?

Jensen: To me, Premier Campbell really comes out as a very bad guy - the Federal Government just transferred $110 million, with a capital M, for post-secondary education. And then just after receiving this, Mr. Campbell cut funding by $55 million. It is no secret that we have Olympic cost over runs. The money is not being spent where it should be.

     Something we have been calling for, similar to health care, is that Canada should have a post-secondary education act, so post-secondary education money transferred from the federal government to the province actually spent on just that - post-secondary education.

PV: How is this debt affecting students in Nanaimo?

Jensen: These problems with student debt just compound when you look at the very low minimum wage, and the high cost of living and the economy now. Everything is going up except for wages. If wages had gone up with tuition, would we see these debt levels? We need cheaper, affordable transit, and affordable housing. The province has $250 million to build affordable housing and it is not being done.

     This all makes life harder for students, who are broke or poor, especially while attending school. The effects are easy to see. People have to work tons of hours. Not being able to concentrate on studies as much as they should. The options students are given are actually clear: have a huge debt, be lucky enough to be from rich a family, or join the military.

Printer- friendly article
(Contents)
(Home)


9) NOT ONE MORE ISRAELI MASSACRE IN GAZA!

(The following article is from the February 1-14, 2009, issue of People's Voice, Canada's leading communist newspaper. Articles can be reprinted free if the source is credited. Subscription rates in Canada: $25/year, or $12 low income rate; for U.S. readers - $25 US per year; other overseas readers - $25 US or $35 CDN per year. Send to: People's Voice, c/o PV Business Manager, 133 Herkimer St., Unit 502, Hamilton, ON, L8P 2H3.)

By Darrell Rankin, Leader, Communist Party of Canada - Manitoba

The government of Israel's media blackout could not stop the world from seeing that it was massacring a largely defenceless population which offered no serious military resistance. Israel carried out the massacre brazenly, before the eyes of all who watched the news. Planned for many months, the carnage inflicted by Israel on the people of Gaza is one of its most horrible aggressions.

     Its purpose was to block humanity's aim to bring peaceful solutions to the area, a purpose made clear by the support Israel received from other imperialist governments. The one-sided statements and military trade from Harper, Bush and other imperialist leaders make it clear they support the agony Israel has imposed for many decades on the Palestinian people, in and out of exile. It is the future they offer to any people that resists their hegemony.

     The call for criminal prosecution of Israel's war leaders is loud, ranging from the 118 countries that comprise the Non-Aligned Movement to prominent jurists - hundreds of them. Israel bombed schools, hospitals, food depots, United Nations sanctuaries. It used phosphorus shells, DIME weapons and much of its modern military arsenal.

     Almost a year ago, Israel's deputy defence minister threatened a "shoah" in Gaza, a Hebrew word meaning calamity and often used to describe the Nazi holocaust. He warned the Palestinians "will bring upon themselves this destruction," as if the Israeli war machine had no choice.

     The minister dishonestly portrayed this supreme crime as legitimate, but the horrible truth is that Israel's leaders are making far more serious threats to the Palestinian people and neighbours such as Iran. In the short span of three weeks Israel's leaders killed or injured 6,780 people; the overwhelming majority civilian and about one-third children. The heavily televised terror of Israel's massacre wounded every feeling person on earth who support justice, Palestinian or not.

     Israel made no attempt to hide the massacre. It used the most monstrous and twisted lies, half truths that only the most hardened murderer could use. For example, was Israel's real aim to stop the comparatively puny rockets launched by Hamas - the occupied territories' elected government? No, the Israeli government planned the attack more than a year in advance.

     Even if we consider the rockets, Hamas used them to retaliate in a relatively modest way against deadly Israeli air attacks. Israel made these air attacks four months into a ceasefire which was honoured by Hamas even as Israel killed hundreds of people through its Draconian blockade of food and humanitarian aid - an act of war according to any jurist or human being. In Gaza half a million people are completely dependent on food aid and over half of all households eat less than one meal a day.

     Nothing can be explained if all one sees is rockets and Israel's accusation that Hamas is a terrorist group. The real starting point is Israel's illegal sixty-year occupation of Palestinian territories and the brutal repression it has inflicted all that time on the national liberation movement of the Palestinian people.

     The "war on terror" must end. Countries like Canada, the United States and Israel use this war to impose state-military terror on people who are struggling for their rights. It is the dishonest rationale for imperialism's wars of domination and plunder.

     Prime Minister Stephen Harper's government has cast criminal shame on Canada by aiding and abetting Israel's massacre. The two ministers of Manitoba's NDP government who attended Winnipeg's January 8 pro-war rally are no different than Harper.

     The Canadians, including many trade union leaders, the peace movement and left groups, who acted and spoke in solidarity with the Palestinian people in Gaza brought honour and truth to our country.

     The most important historical lesson about the massacre in Gaza is the sharp contrast between what imperialist countries like Canada, the United States and Israel offer humanity compared to the resounding chorus from the non-imperialist world, the world dominated by imperialism's giant corporations - the chorus for the national liberation of the Palestinian people, for an end to war, and for solving humanity's great problems.

     Will Israel use nuclear weapons in its next massacre? Or will world protests, combined with the resistance of the Palestinian people and Israeli peace activists, create the political and military isolation of Israel needed to liberate the Palestinian people and to achieve the balanced, verifiable disarmament that would allow all nations in the region to live in peace? War will not solve a single problem of humanity, but imperialist countries are using war to prolong their unsustainable hegemony over humanity.

     For decades the Palestinian Liberation Organization was labelled a terrorist group, allowing Israel to assassinate, torture and imprison its members. Israel must not continue to use the same excuse it used with the PLO to block talks with the Hamas government. Without justification, Israel is dividing those with whom it will talk from those who it will massacre. Divide and rule.

     It is time for Israel to end the aggression, talk to the elected government of the occupied territories and respect the full national rights of the Palestinian people in line with United Nations resolutions!

Printer- friendly article
(Contents)
(Home)


10) LOCAL ELECTIONS IN CHILE RAISE HOPES FOR LEFT

(The following article is from the February 1-14, 2009, issue of People's Voice, Canada's leading communist newspaper. Articles can be reprinted free if the source is credited. Subscription rates in Canada: $25/year, or $12 low income rate; for U.S. readers - $25 US per year; other overseas readers - $25 US or $35 CDN per year. Send to: People's Voice, c/o PV Business Manager, 133 Herkimer St., Unit 502, Hamilton, ON, L8P 2H3.)

By Alfonso Alvarez, translation by Ardis Harriman

At the end of October, municipal elections for mayors and city counsellors took place in cities and towns throughout Chile. The results showed growth in the vote for the Communist Party of Chile and for the left alliance in which the Communists participate, known as Junto Podemos Mas ("Together we can do more"). It is worth having a look at the importance of their success.

     Seven mayors and 80 counselors were elected from both these groupings with more than 500,000 votes cast. The Communist vote went up from previous elections; more counselors were elected along with four Communist mayors.

     According to Guillermo Teillier, President of the CP Chile, three more progressive mayors were elected because of the agreements between the various left political forces, and important gains were made in working class communities such as Pedro Aguirre Cerda.

     Socialist Party candidate Jorge Gajardo was elected in La Florida, one of Santiago's largest suburban areas. With the support of Communist Party voters, an independent candidate won in northern Illapel, and in the mining area of Lota, a candidate of the Humanist Party (which also takes part in the Junto Podemos Mas alliance) took Yumbel. Communist Hugo Gutierrez almost took the mayoralty in Santiago's downtown area of Estacion Central. The same occurred in the region of Los Vilos, in the north of the country.

     With this success, the Communist Party and the Junto Podemos Mas movement have created new conditions to demand the end of the exclusion that has plagued them at the national level, where the electoral rules mean the election of only Concertation and Alianza por Chile (right-wing) coalitions.

     Many mistakenly believe that the Communist Party has a vested interest in these elections, and that it will be looking for government positions. Teillier has clearly stated that the Party does not seek any special benefits or agreements. Its objective is simply to bring an end to a long period of exclusion from the political scene to which it and other leftist parties have been subjected. The Party must now increase the pressure on the right wing, which will no doubt continue to deny its support for political and electoral reforms. It will also be agitating for reforms to the rights of all Chileans, such as the right to vote for citizens living outside the country.

     An immediate task is to press for a Parliamentary agreement so the Party and the left can elect senators and deputies and thus change the balance of forces in the Congress. 

     Chile needs a new alternative, different from what is being supported by the Right, and from the Concertacion government, which continue to try to entrench the neoliberal model which has been proven a failure worldwide.

     The Communist Party is on a different path and is prepared to work with the Central Unica de Trabajadores (CUT) and other social groups, unions, left-leaning parties and organizations to forge a major agreement and push for measures that will mean more than just a change to the electoral system.

Printer- friendly article
(Contents)
(Home)


11) FMLN TOPS EL SALVADOR VOTE

(The following article is from the February 1-14, 2009, issue of People's Voice, Canada's leading communist newspaper. Articles can be reprinted free if the source is credited. Subscription rates in Canada: $25/year, or $12 low income rate; for U.S. readers - $25 US per year; other overseas readers - $25 US or $35 CDN per year. Send to: People's Voice, c/o PV Business Manager, 133 Herkimer St., Unit 502, Hamilton, ON, L8P 2H3.)

The Farabundo Marti National Liberation Front (FMLN) finished first in El Salvador's parliamentary elections on January 18, increasing chances that Mauricio Funes, the progressive movement's candidate, will win the presidential vote in March. Such an outcome would continue the recent pan-Latin American trend of election victories for left political forces.

     The FMLN received 42.6% of the votes on Jan. 18, taking 35 seats out of 84 in the Legislative Assembly. This is an increase of 2.9% in votes and three seats over the March 2006 parliamentary election. A total of 943,936 voters backed the FMLN, up from 624,635 three years ago. All these figures mark a high-water point in electoral success for the FMLN, which signed a peace accord with the country's US-backed government in 1992. The accord ended a lengthy civil war in which the military and right-wing forces carried out numerous massacres against peasants, labour movement, and opposition sectors.

     The latest parliamentary vote also marks a decline for the ruling right-wing ARENA party (Alianza Republicana Nacionalista). ARENA dropped from 39.4% of the vote in 2006 to 38.5% in this campaign, and fell to 32 seats from its former 34. The ARENA popular vote rose from 620,000 up to 854,166, reflecting a higher voter turnout this year.

     Smaller right-wing parties also saw a decline in their vote shares and seats, but did elect 17 deputies, leaving the FMLN in a minority in the Assembly. In municipal elections conducted at the same time, the FMLN made overall gains across the country, but lost control of the mayoralty of the capital, San Salvador.

Printer- friendly article
(Contents)
(Home)


12) ISRAEL ACCUSED OF WHITE PHOSPHORUS ATTACKS

(The following article is from the February 1-14, 2009, issue of People's Voice, Canada's leading communist newspaper. Articles can be reprinted free if the source is credited. Subscription rates in Canada: $25/year, or $12 low income rate; for U.S. readers - $25 US per year; other overseas readers - $25 US or $35 CDN per year. Send to: People's Voice, c/o PV Business Manager, 133 Herkimer St., Unit 502, Hamilton, ON, L8P 2H3.)

Special to PV

Credible reports are emerging that Israel's tactics in Gaza have included use of the incendiary weapon white phosphorus, which is banned in civilian areas under international conventions.

     One such report from Agence-France Presse concerns a January 5 Israeli bombardment of the outskirts of Beit Lahiya, in the northern part of the Gaza Strip. AFP reports that "Sabah Abu Halima and her family rushed to the top floor of their house, to shelter in a corridor without windows and escape any flying glass." Two weeks later, Chris Cobb-Smith, a British weapons expert, arrived to examine the home. He found a hole in a burnt-out ceiling, fragments of a shell, and a substance that bursts into flames at the slightest contact with oxygen.

     AFP quotes Cobb-Smith: "Here the white phosphorus comes through the roof, detonates as it hits the wall and distributes the pieces of white phosphorus within the house, and that's the explanation for the severe burning that you see around."

     Cobb-Smith was part of an Amnesty International delegation investigating the Israeli army's use of phosphorous bombs. These weapons are regulated by the 1980 Convention on Certain Conventional Weapons, specifically by Protocol III on Prohibitions or Restrictions on the Use of Incendiary Weapons, which bans them in civilian areas.

     In the Beit Lahiya attack, five civilians were killed and four wounded, including Sabah Abu Halima.

     "It hurts me terribly, my skin is burning. I don't sleep any more, neither day nor night," she told AFP in the burns unit of Gaza's Shifa hospital. Gaza hospitals have been inundated with victims of white phosphorus, which they don't know how to treat as the substance has never been used in the Gaza Strip.

     At Shifa hospital, survivors recounted how their wounds began smoking when they washed them or took off their bandages; white phosphorus remains active for a long time and continues to burn when you try to smother it. It explodes on contact with the air and is used by armies mainly to create a smokescreen or to mark targets for aerial bombardment.

     "There is absolutely no military, tactical reason for the use of white phosphorus in this environment," Cobb-Smith says. "I believe it's just being purely used as a weapon of terror to frighten, to intimidate people. Obviously it's going to cause physical harm as well because it can kill people and it can destroy property."

     Israel has now admitted that white phosphorus was deployed in its Gaza offensive, a report in The Times of London said on Jan. 25. When the Times reported the matter on January 5, it was strenuously denied by the Israeli army, which was finally forced to backtrack in the face of mounting evidence and international outcry.

     "Yes, phosphorus was used but not in any illegal manner," the Times quoted Israeli Foreign Ministry spokesman Yigal Palmor as saying. "Some practices could be illegal but we are going into that. The IDF (Israel Defence Forces) is holding an investigation concerning one specific incident."

     The Times said Palmor was thought to be referring to the firing of phosphorus shells at a UN school in Beit Lahiya on January 17. Pictures of this attack show Palestinian medics fleeing as blobs of burning phosphorus rain down on the compound.

     There are increasing calls for war crimes trials to be launched against Israel. While the International Court of Justice in The Hague cannot try Israel as it is not a signatory to the Geneva Convention, any country that is a signatory can prosecute individuals who took part in the Gaza operation as culpable of war crimes. The ICJ did rule several years ago that Israel's so-called "separation wall," which carves Palestinian West Bank territories into small pieces, is a violation of international law.

Printer- friendly article
(Contents)
(Home)


13) LEFT UNDER ATTACK IN SOUTH KOREA

(The following article is from the February 1-14, 2009, issue of People's Voice, Canada's leading communist newspaper. Articles can be reprinted free if the source is credited. Subscription rates in Canada: $25/year, or $12 low income rate; for U.S. readers - $25 US per year; other overseas readers - $25 US or $35 CDN per year. Send to: People's Voice, c/o PV Business Manager, 133 Herkimer St., Unit 502, Hamilton, ON, L8P 2H3.)

By Sean Burton

They say the Korean Demilitarized Zone (DMZ) is the last front of the Cold War, marking the division between the "Juche" socialist North, and the staunchly capitalist (and Americanized) South. Hundreds of thousands of soldiers lie on both sides of the border. But the Cold War was never just a military or economic confrontation. It was also a war of words and ideas. In the United States, such viciousness was manifested in "McCarthyism," named for Senator Joseph McCarthy, who spearheaded anti-communist and anti-progressive witch hunts that destroyed many lives and drummed up a fear of the Left.

     The war of words has never ended, not in the US, nor in South Korea, where many civic organizations are devoted to uprooting anything they perceive as "leftist". One such organization is the People's Coalition Against Antinational Education. "Antinational education"? With a phrase like that, one would assume Koreans were being forced to learn Japanese all over again. But no, it means education "tilted to the Left". Naturally, President Lee Myun Bak and his ministries are supportive of this definition.

     Under attack in particular are history textbooks accused of downplaying South Korea's economic "miracle" after the 1950-53 war, and focusing instead on the excesses of state leaders. By not presenting a "positive view of Korea's economy and democracy," the texts are said to "undermine" the country's values. The latter statement comes from South Korea's defense ministry - no surprise, since several South Korean presidents either owed their position to the military or were generals who seized power themselves.

     The books also place greater emphasis on the struggles of Koreans for national independence in the face of a perceived American occupation. For example, a page from one text apparently emphasises that it was the US flag that was raised in Seoul when the Japanese surrendered, and not the Korean taegukgi. The book also had no qualms about calling Syngman Rhee a dictator, or for that matter any number of his successors, like General Park Chung Hee. This is to the horror of the South Korean right, which balks at the notion that national division might not be due to the North Korean communists.

     Meanwhile, the People's Coalition has done something else to attack the Left, releasing the names of some five thousand members of a progressive union in Seoul, the Korean Teachers and Education Workers' Union. They claim that the "biases" of the members of this union undermine the entire education system. The Coalition has announced that it will soon release over 70,000 names from across the country, according to the Korea Herald. Union leaders had already gone to court in October when they were accused by the coalition of violating the national security law.

     As an educator, I am appalled by these events. The neat and tidy history demanded by the right wingers of South Korea is dangerous. It is a lie that "external factors" such as the United States had no impact on national division. It is a lie that Syngman Rhee or many later presidents were great fathers of democracy. People must know of the massacres of civilians during the war and during peacetime. They must know of the resistance to American occupation and to Syngman Rhee that toppled his government. No matter what kind of economic growth the South experienced under Park Chung Hee, he was a dictator, and assassinated.

     In response to the argument that "money's all that matters," these truths must be made widely known.

Printer- friendly article
(Contents)
(Home)


14) VANCOUVER ELEMENTARY TEACHERS CONDEMN GAZA ATTACK

(The following article is from the February 1-14, 2009, issue of People's Voice, Canada's leading communist newspaper. Articles can be reprinted free if the source is credited. Subscription rates in Canada: $25/year, or $12 low income rate; for U.S. readers - $25 US per year; other overseas readers - $25 US or $35 CDN per year. Send to: People's Voice, c/o PV Business Manager, 133 Herkimer St., Unit 502, Hamilton, ON, L8P 2H3.)

Resolution passed by the Vancouver Elementary School Teachers' Association (VESTA), a local of the British Columbia Teachers' Federation, to be debated at the upcoming BCTF annual general meeting March 14-17, 2009 in Vancouver:

"That the BCTF strongly condemns the recent Israeli bombardment and attacks on the defenseless people of Gaza. The targeting of UN facilities, schools, universities and medical centers, and the killing of hundreds of Palestinian civilians, is totally unacceptable.

     "And that the BCTF calls upon the Canadian government to support the international effort to achieve a long term ceasefire that recognizes the right of the Palestinian people of Gaza to a viable territory and independent international relations free from Israeli blockade and military intervention.

     "And finally that the BCTF support the call by Palestinian human rights organizations for the U.N. Security Council to call an emergency session and adopt concrete measures, including the imposition of sanctions, in order to ensure Israel's fulfillment of its obligations under international humanitarian law."

Printer- friendly article
(Contents)
(Home)


15) WHAT'S LEFT

(The following article is from the February 1-14, 2009, issue of People's Voice, Canada's leading communist newspaper. Articles can be reprinted free if the source is credited. Subscription rates in Canada: $25/year, or $12 low income rate; for U.S. readers - $25 US per year; other overseas readers - $25 US or $35 CDN per year. Send to: People's Voice, c/o PV Business Manager, 133 Herkimer St., Unit 502, Hamilton, ON, L8P 2H3.)
VANCOUVER, BC

Celebration of the lives of Rosaleen Ross and Bill Mozdir - 2 pm, Sunday, Feb. 15, Centre for  Socialist Education, 706 Clark Drive. Call BC Committee CPC for information, 604-254-9836.

Winners, Losers and the Olympic Industry - 6:30-8:30 pm, Tuesday, Feb. 10, at the Centre for Socialist Education, 706 Clark Drive. Panel forum on the costs of hosting the Olympics, with Helen Lenskyj, retired U of T professor, researcher and activist. Sponsored by Olympic  Resistance Network.

Women’s Memorial March, remembering murdered and missing women - starts 1 pm, Sat., Feb. 14, from Main and Hastings.

Valentine’s Day Fundraiser, sponsored by Latino Club CPC - 6 pm-midnight, Sat., Feb. 14,  Peretz Centre, 6184 Ash St. For tickets and information, contact BC Committee CPC,  604-254-9836.

Left Film Night - Sunday, Feb. 22, 7 pm, at the Centre for Socialist Education, 706 Clark Drive.  Featuring “North Country,” call 604-255-2041 for details.

Haiti Today - Sunday, March 1, 2 pm, journalist Kevin Pina speaks at SFU Harbour Center,  515 Hastings St. W., on the fifth anniversary of the overthrow of the Aristide government.  Organized by Haiti Solidarity BC, 604-338-2558.

TORONTO, ON

Publicly Funded Health Care and Its Preservation in Canada, presented by U of T Health Studies Program, with speaker Ralph Nader - 7 pm, Friday, Jan. 30, Convocation Hall, 31 Kings College Circle, advance tickets at Women’s Book Store 73 Harbord St., call 647-501-1954 for info.

A Hot Cuban Night, celebrate Jose Marti’s birthdate - Sat., Jan. 31, from 7 pm, dance to the  music of Pablo Terry and Sol de Cuba! Cover charge $15, delicious dinners from $10.99 or appetizers from $4.99, cash bar, at Cervejaria Downtown Bar & Grill, 842 College (just west of Ossington). Sponsored by Canadian-Cuban Friendship Assoc., call Sharon, 905-951-8499, or Liz Hill, 416-654-7105.

Norman Bethune Day celebration - Sat., Feb. 28, 290 Danforth Ave., tickets $5, door prize one  week all-inclusive trip for two to Cuba, for info call PV Ontario Bureau, 416-469-2446.

Printer- friendly article

(Contents)
(Home)