A
calendar for the year 2008, dedicated to the struggles of the
international working class for peace and socialism.
Featuring
notable dates, short biographical sketches, plus poetry, speeches, and
writings by
Che Guevara, Clara Zetkin, Norman Bethune, James Connolly, Emiliano
Zapata, Nikos Beloyannis, Dolores Ibarruri, V.I. Lenin, Pablo Neruda,
Gladys Marin, Tim Buck, Nazim Hikmet, Ho Chi Minh, and Salvador Allende.
Available for $10
plus $2 postage from People's Voice, 133 Herkimer St., Unit 502,
Hamilton, ON, L8P 2H3.
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|
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| Theoretical and Discussion Bulletin of the
Communist Party of Canada |
People's
Voice deadlines:
FEBRUARY 1-15
Thursday, January 24, 2008
FEBRUARY 16-29
Thursday, February 7
Send submissions
to PV
Editorial
Office,
706 Clark Drive, Vancouver,
V5L 3J1, pvoice@telus.net
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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!
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Canadian economy
heading into crisis
(The
following article is from
the January 16-31,
2008
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.
This analysis of
some recent trends
in the Canadian economy is from the main political report adopted by
the Dec. 8-9 meeting of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of
Canada, presented by CPC leader Miguel Figueroa.
First, let us turn to the current
state of the Canadian economy which, according to Finance Minister Jim
Flaherty and most Bay Street analysts and sycophants, is humming along
just fine. Indeed, a superficial reading of key economic indicators
appears to sustain such a conclusion. Official unemployment remains at
a relatively "low" 5.9%; inflation stands at 2.4%; and the value of
exports continues to grow, driven primarily by high energy and other
commodity prices (precious metals, agricultural products, etc.). What
is conveniently overlooked in these rosy assessments however is that
according to the composite index of 10 leading indicators, the economy
is slowing at a significant, if not a precipitous, pace. The index has
been falling every month since the beginning of the year, and the
annual index now is lower than at any time since 2001.
Most notable
is the deepening
crisis in the manufacturing sector, which has shed almost 300,000
full-time jobs since 2002, mostly in Quebec and Ontario. Between
November 2002 and February 2007, the proportion of the workforce
employed in manufacturing declined from 18.6% to 14.4% in Quebec, from
18.2% to 14.8% in Ontario, and from 9.4% to 8.8% in the rest of Canada.
Job losses are now spreading beyond the auto, steel, appliance and
textile industries into other sectors such as forestry, where the
downturn in the U.S. housing market combined with the impact of
tariffs, the high Canadian dollar and high energy prices, has resulted
in a slew of lay-offs and shutdowns throwing tens of thousands of
workers unto the unemployment rolls in Quebec, Ontario and B.C.
While
employment in other
sectors has mostly made up for jobs lost in manufacturing, most of the
jobs created in recent months have been low-wage, part-time, and/or
self-employed positions and other types of precarious employment as
opposed to full-time higher-wage jobs. The percentage of new employees
working in temporary jobs practically doubled in recent times (from 11%
to 21%).
The Bank of
Canada's high
interest rate policy and related fiscal policies of the Harper
government, intended to maintain low inflation and attract foreign
investment capital to Canada, are largely responsible for the
appreciation of the value of the loonie vis-a-vis the U.S. dollar. The
soaring Canadian dollar, in turn, has contributed to the current
manufacturing crisis, a sector heavily dependent on exports to the U.S.
market.
But the root
causes of this
crisis Go well beyond interest or exchange rates; they are based in
changes in the international division of labour brought about by the
frenzied dispersion of capital around the world in search of low-wage,
high yield investment opportunities. That increased mobility of capital
has been facilitated by the imposition of neoliberal "globalization"
policies by U.S. imperialism and the international financial
institutions it largely controls (the IMF, World Bank, World Trade
Organization, etc.) - policies which have actively been supported in
Canada by both Conservative and Liberal governments alike, and driven
by the monopoly capitalist interests they serve.
While
workers in all capitalist
countries stand exposed to these impacts, the specificities of the
Canadian economy, characterized by exorbitantly high levels of foreign
corporate ownership, make it particularly vulnerable. That is why any
genuine attempt to reverse de-industrialization must be based on a
comprehensive program to restore Canadian political and economic
sovereignty, including steps to extricate our country from trade pacts
and agreements, such as NAFTA and the Security and Prosperity
Partnership agreement, designed to serve the interests of finance
capital rather than the Canadian people. And it must include policies
that challenge corporate domination of the economic, political,
cultural and social life of our country, and expand the public sector.
Two other
quick notes on the
economy... The first relates to the fact that the rosy economic reports
conceal the extent of the concentration of wealth and the growing class
disparities within Canada. Soaring profits for the corporations and the
rich have come at the expense of the further immiseration of the bulk
of the working class. A recent study entitled "The Rich and the Rest of
Us: The Changing Face of Canada's Growing Gap" by the Canadian Centre
for Policy Alternatives (CCPA) reports that in 2004, the richest 10% of
families earned 82 times more than the poorest 10% - almost triple the
ratio of 1976, when they earned 31 times more. The CCPA report also
notes that with respect to work time, all but the richest 10% of
families are working more weeks and hours in the paid workforce (200
hours more on average since 1996) yet only the richest 10% saw a
significant increase in their earnings - 30%.
The most
vulnerable Canadians,
those forced to survive on social assistance, have fared the worst. The
National Council on Welfare recently reported that all welfare incomes
in Canada - affecting the lives of 1.7 million Canadians, half of whom
are children - have declined in the last decade, dropping further below
the poverty line. And last week, the United Way released its "Losing
Ground" study showing that incomes in Toronto, Canada's largest city,
have fallen significantly over the past 15 years, especially for
single-parent families and among new immigrant workers, reflecting the
increasing racialization of poverty, particularly in the main urban
centres.
These and
similar reports
confirm the reality experienced by working class Canadians every day -
that we are working harder and making our bosses richer, while we are
getting poorer ourselves.
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Does income gap make the rich nervous?
(The
following article is from
the January 16-31,
2008
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
It's not often that Canada's most
prestigious corporate newspaper expresses concerns about "the
phenomenon of extreme concentration of income among the `superstars'
and their like". But this was the theme of a commentary by Peter J.
Nicholson in the Jan. 5 Globe and Mail.
Nicholson
certainly comes with a
blue chip resume. Now the president of the Council of Canadian
Academies (essentially a taxpayer-funded body to advise governments),
Nicholson was a top gun at the Bank of Nova Scotia and BCE Inc., and
then worked as a special advisor for the Organization for Economic
Cooperation and Development before landing his current gig.
From this
lofty perch, Nicholson
has discovered that "Statistics Canada reported recently that the
earned income of the `average' Canadian - the so-called median income -
was the same in 2004 as in 1982.... Yet during that same time the
Canadian economy grew, in real per capita terms, by more than half. But
only the very well-paid - those above the 90th percentile of the income
distribution - saw any significant increase in earned income; and the
higher up the earnings ladder, the greater the growth."
Canada's
experience follows a
pattern similar to the United States - three postwar decades during
which the growth of labour incomes roughly paralleled those of the
upper crust. That changed in the mid-1970s, and the gap between "the
rich and the rest of us" has widened steadily ever since.
None of this
is surprising to
anyone who pays attention. But the figures quoted by Nicholson are
still startling. For example, the average earnings of the highest 1 per
cent of the U.S. income pyramid rose 160% between 1975 and 2005, while
the income of the top one-tenth of 1 per cent soared 350%, in real
terms, from $800,000 in 1975 to $3.6 million by 2005.
Nicholson's
article comes
complete with a graph showing the shares of total income taken by "top
earners" from 1920 through 2000 in Canada and the U.S. While the shares
of the top 1 per cent are "back to where they were in the Roaring
Twenties", he notes, "the share of the merely very well-paid - say,
those between the 90th and 95th percentiles of income - waned sharply
in the 1930s and '40s, but, unlike the top 1 per cent, their share of
the pie has increased only very little in the U.S. and not at all in
Canada."
A Marxist
analysis of these
figures would conclude that there is no big mystery here. The
underlying laws of the capitalist economy are at work, including the
concentration of wealth in fewer hands, and rising rates of
exploitation of North American workers. This trend includes the growing
immiseration of the most poverty-stricken members of the working class,
such as the homeless, many of whom have jobs which pay too little to
afford MONTHLY rent.
But for
Peter Nicholson, "these
figures challenge the central faith that has guided economic policy in
the U.S., Canada and other market economies for more than half a
century: the assumption that economic growth can be harnessed for the
benefit of all citizens, not just the rich."
Not knowing
Nicholson
personally, we can only wonder whether he actually believes this hokum.
After all, astrologers can pump out horoscopes without actually
believing that the alignments of the stars and planets affect the daily
fortunes of human beings.
Nicholson
would be better off to
sit down with some veteran labour activists to discuss the real
"general faith" guiding economic policies. He might be surprised to
find that economic growth is invariably harnessed by governments and
big business for the short and long-term benefits of the capitalist
class - the "top earners" whose contribution to society consists of
their ownership of the corporations which dominate the economy.
It is true
that governments are
sometimes forced to adjust policies in response to militant pressures
from a mobilized and powerful working class. That's what happened
during the post-war period, when unions and people's movements led by
Communists and other radicals dealt powerful blows against the bosses,
winning the right to organize, shorter work weeks, higher pay, and a
range of progressive social reforms. The ideological weapons of
anti-Communism and capitalist consumerism later weakened this drive for
working class gains, allowing the ruling class to go back on the
offensive over the past thirty years. Every federal government over
these decades has worked hand in glove with big capital, not "to
benefit all the people," but to find ways to increase profits at the
expense of working people.
To his
credit, Nicholson does
consider factors such as the shift towards highly progressive income
taxes during wartime and afterwards, and the neo-conservative movement
that later began to gut what he calls "the excesses of the welfare
state." (Only somebody who has never lived on welfare could write such
a line!)
His
conclusion is that the
neo-cons "may have created a social and political environment more
tolerant of winner-take-all behaviour," resulting in skyrocketing
compensation for CEOs. He blames "the new transparency" which puts
"pressure on boards to match or exceed the pay of executives in
competitor companies", and the media for helping to create the
"celebrity CEO." (And just who owns the mass media?)
Nicholson
wonders why the
extreme concentrations of income has not produced more outrage. Here
his explanations are hilarious: perhaps the extremely rich are so few
that the rest of us never meet them to become jealous of their wealth!
(Hello! The print and electronic media tell us more than we want to
know about the resource-guzzling "lifestyles" of these billionaires.)
Or maybe the falling prices of cellphones and flat-screen TVs make us
feel equal to the rich. (Credit card statements have a way of taking
the shine off that rosy glow.)
The finale
is Nicholson's
warning to his fellow members of the Canadian elite: "appearances are
finally starting to fade as the U.S. economy softens, the real estate
bubble deflates and the presidential campaign gets into full swing. So
expect to hear a lot more about divvying up the income pie south of the
border. Canadians - who are experiencing the same trends but just a
step behind - should definitely start paying attention."
Here the
truth emerges.
Capitalism is heading into serious crisis. Working class outrage is
beginning to build. When it explodes, to paraphrase Karl Marx, the
ruling classes will tremble. Peter Nicholson is apparently among those
who advocate mild reforms to soften the blow. Somehow, I doubt that the
George Bushes and Stephen Harpers are listening. Hang on for an
exciting ride!
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Figueroa tour to urge
unity against Harper Tories
(The
following article is from
the January 16-31,
2008
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
Communist Party of Canada leader
Miguel Figueroa will be on the road in eight provinces over the next
two months, bringing the party's message of unity to defeat the
Tory/corporate attack on working people. The tour will include media
outreach and several public events, as well as meetings with CPC clubs
and members across the country.
Although the
federal political
situation remains in turmoil, an election is widely expected sometime
during 2008. As Figueroa noted at the December Central Committee
meeting of the CPC, the party's general characterization of the
minority Harper Conservative government as utterly reactionary and
anti-democratic "continues to hold true."
Harper and
his inner circle of
advisors have been "looking for the right moment to force an election
in order to secure enough seats to gain a majority in Parliament,"
noted Figueroa. These forces thought that they "had all the stars in
proper alignment when the federal by-elections in Québec on
September
17 handed the Liberals a humiliating defeat, provoking a crisis over
Stéphane Dion's leadership. With their standing in opinion polls
edging
toward 40%, and the Opposition benches in disarray, the Tories tried
unsuccessfully to provoke an election by manoeuvring to have their
October 16 Throne Speech defeated in an non-confidence vote. Although
carefully crafted to include some populist plums like tax breaks for
`middle class' Canadians, the Throne Speech set forth a dangerously
reactionary program."
On closer
examination, the
Throne Speech revealed the far-right Tory agenda - extending Canada's
role in the US/NATO occupation of Afghanistan, wide-ranging attacks on
civil and democratic rights, refusal to achieve real reductions of
greenhouse gas emissions, and steps to eliminate any federal role in
social programs. In short, Harper's goal is to militarise the Canadian
state, and to remove "social redistribution" functions achieved through
generations of working class struggles.
But since
October, the political
momentum has started to swing back to the opposition parties. The
corruption affair involving Karlheinz Schreiber and Brian Mulroney, the
shameful role played by the Harper government at the Bali climate
change summit, rising poverty and manufacturing job losses, and the
Tories' defeat in the Ontario provincial elections, have all helped to
put the Harper Conservatives back on the defensive.
"These
developments improve the
prospects for defeating the Tories at the polls in 2008," says
Figueroa. His tour will aim to help strengthen the popular struggles
against the war in Afghanistan and the drive towards integration with
US imperialism, and the movements to preserve Medicare, public
education, pensions and other vital social services.
"Jobs,
peace, democracy,
equality - these are the real issues facing the Canadian working class
today," says Figueroa. "The primary arena for all these struggles will
continue to be in the workplaces, and in the streets and communities of
this country - in other words in the arena of extra-parliamentary
struggle. The trade union movement is always pivotal in this regard,
because of workers' decisive place in the production process and the
creation of value. Labour can and must play in drawing all of the
thread of people's resistance together into a united fightback, a
movement which can drive the Harper Tories out of office and open the
door to a wider struggle for progressive change."
Figueroa's
tour begins in
Toronto on Jan. 17 with a 7 pm forum at the Greek Hall (290 Danforth
Ave.), followed by Ottawa (Jan. 28), Winnipeg (Jan. 30-31, call
204-586-7824 for details of public forum), Saskatoon (Feb. 1), Alberta
(Feb. 2-4), Kelowna, BC (Wed., Feb. 6, call 250-860-6108 for details of
public forum), Vancouver (Thursday, Feb. 7, public forum 7:30 pm at the
Centre for Socialist Education, 706 Clark Drive), Montreal (Feb. 9-10),
Nova Scotia (Feb. 15-17), and Newfoundland (Feb. 18-19). Other Ontario
events will take place in late February and early March.
For more information on the tour, call
the central office of the Communist Party, 416-469-2446.
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Growing calls for
Vancouver election unity
(The
following article is from
the January 16-31,
2008
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 Vancouver Bureau
With the November 2008 civic election
in Vancouver looming nearer, there are rising demands for unity at the
polls to defeat Mayor Sam Sullivan's right-wing NPA.
The latest
call was issued by
the Coalition of Progressive Electors, the labour-left municipal party
which has led the struggle for civic reform in Vancouver since the late
1960s. Speaking to a crowd of reporters at City Hall on Jan. 8, COPE
councillor David Cadman and COPE Executive members Ellen Woodsworth and
Rachel Marcuse urged all opposition parties and progressive groups to
unite behind a single mayoral candidate and a common campaign.
"COPE has
been actively working
for such a common campaign for some time," said Woodsworth, stressing
that this will require agreement on a single candidate against
Sullivan, a single list of candidates for City Council, Park Board, and
Board of Education, and a common platform on the crucial issues of
homelessness, transportation, environmental sustainability, safe
neighbourhoods, and democratic leadership.
"Vancouver
faces unprecedented
levels of homelessness, labour relations remain poisoned by the most
bitter strike in the city's history, jammed busses continue to by-pass
riders who have to cough up for another fare hike, and taxes for
ordinary homeowners continue to increase, while Sam Sullivan and the
NPA do nothing," said Cadman. "Despite promises that taxpayers would
not be on the hook for the 2010 Olympics, the NPA are pouring tax
dollars into the Games while community centre programs for seniors and
youth are facing cutbacks."
Rachel
Marcuse urged Vision
Vancouver members to support unity as that group prepared for its Jan.
14 annual meeting. "We call for a common campaign to defeat Sam
Sullivan and the NPA," said Marcuse, "and we make this call
specifically to Vision supporters. The damage being done to Vancouver
by the NPA requires that we move beyond partisan politics."
Despite the
history of disputes
between the two groups, the unity message was heard at the Vision AGM,
where members voted to give their executive the authority to decide on
the numbers of candidates for different positions. That effectively
opens the door for talks on joint slates with COPE and other groups.
Days
earlier, the Vancouver
Public Education Project, a recently-formed group of prominent
advocates for public schools, issued an "Open Letter to Prospective
School Board Candidates," also urging electoral unity.
In full page
ads published in
the Georgia Straight and Vancouver Courier, the Project warned that
"Vancouver's public schools continue to be eroded by provincial
underfunding, a narrow and flawed `accountability' agenda, and an
absence of leadership at the school board level. Where once the VSB
took leadership in recognizing the needs of its diverse student
population by being an outspoken voice for adequate provincial funding,
and by developing a model of public engagement in budget and policy
formation, in recent years it has lapsed into reacting to events and/or
apologizing for provincial assaults instead of standing up for students
with a proactive strategy for defending and rebuilding public
education."
Implicitly
criticizing the
NPA-dominated Board elected in 2005, the Open Letter stated that "A
majority of our current trustees have publicly stated that it is
educationally appropriate for thousands of students to learn in
overcrowded classes. They have voted to reduce supports for vulnerable
students, despite significantly increased enrolment of students with
special needs. This impacts all classrooms and reduces the individual
attention that all students need to achieve their potential.
"Quality
public education in
Vancouver cannot withstand this continued lack of vision, failure to
advocate and loss of transparency. In the past three years, we've seen
record numbers of school-aged children in Vancouver choosing
alternatives to public schools. This decreased enrolment reflects an
erosion of public confidence and is having a devastating impact on our
schools as it further reduces funding and leads to possible school
closures and further reductions to educational services to students."
Calling for
"elected trustees
who can effectively advocate for that funding, not trustees who cut
services to students," the Public Education Project said it "has come
together to engage all advocates of a strong public education system to
reverse the current direction... We want to see candidates committed to
a broad, comprehensive vision of public education, working together in
a united effort to stand up for our schools and our students."
The group
called on "progressive
trustee candidates who are considering running in the 2008 Board of
Education election and who share our commitment to restoring confidence
in Vancouver's Public Schools to run under a common slate with a common
platform and participate in a common campaign."
The Open
Letter was signed by
thirteen well-known education activists, including former trustees
Adrienne Montani and Jane Bouey, key figures in the 2002-2005 COPE
School Board majority. Others include Patti Bacchus, a former director
of BC Society for Public Education and coordinator of Vancouver Parents
for Successful Inclusion; Bill Bargeman, past president of Vancouver
Secondary Teachers Association; Julianne Doctor, the current Chair of
Vancouver's District Parent Advisory Council and Kelly Read, another
district PAC member; longtime public education advocate Catherine
Evans; Glen Hansman, President of the Vancouver Elementary School
Teachers Association; Barbara Laird, a 15-year member of the VSB's
Special Education Advisory Committee; Helesia Luke and Dawn Steele,
founding leaders of the Vancouver Save our Schools campaign; Allison
McDonald, chair of King George Secondary School PAC; and Kathy Whittam,
a founding Director of the Charter for Public Education Network.
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CUPE warns Toronto
residents may lose programs
(The
following article is from
the January 16-31,
2008
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.
A
sharp debate has broken out in
Toronto over proposals to increase fees for recreation services. We
print here some excerpts of an analysis of this development by CUPE
Toronto District Council.
The proposal by Toronto Parks,
Forestry and Recreation to increase recreation fees in order to
increase access to recreation is misleadingly called, Everyone Gets to
Play. In fact the report, released on January 7, will severely limit
recreation opportunities for poor and working families, the majority of
whom are from racialized communities.
Currently,
Parks, Forestry and
Recreation operates 21 Priority Centres and has a subsidy called
Welcome Policy which is accessible for all families who are below the
low income cut-off. Free programs are run across the City in all
recreation centres and there is a 30% cost recovery rates for
recreation programs.
Under the
new plan, Priority
Centres will be eliminated by 2011. Currently there are 40,000
registered participants taking part in free recreation programs at
priority centres, which are in the poorest neighbourhoods across the
City. There have been 500,000 visits to priority centres for recreation
programs over the past year. There are approximately 50,000 children
and youth and 26,000 adults on social assistance. The latest United Way
report on poverty, Losing Ground, says that 30% of families in Toronto
are living in poverty. The Colour of Poverty Campaign
(www.colourofpoverty.ca) highlights the increasing and persistent
poverty among newcomers, and in particular racialized people.
Priority
centres are true
examples of universal accessibility where people, regardless of their
socio-economic background can participate in recreation and cultural
activities. This should be expanded, not eliminated. Statistics in the
PFR report show that people who participate in priority centres are not
only from the poorest communities. Any movement away from the
ghettoization of racialized and poor communities should be encouraged,
not eliminated.
Introducing
fee programs at
priority centres starting in 2009 and then increasing those fees yearly
for three years, will result in fewer residents living in poor
communities participating in recreation programs. Poor residents will
chose to feed their families and pay their rent before they pay for
recreation programs, even though it has been proven that an investment
in recreation programs saves millions of dollars in social assistance,
policing and the justice system...
Increasing
fees to 34% cost
recovery in 2008 with a goal of 54% cost recovery rates by end of the 7
year implementation period, will have an impact on working families who
have been taking the brunt of the loss of manufacturing jobs in the
city. Stable good paying jobs are declining and contingent, part-time
and lower paid jobs are replacing them. As the rich get richer, and the
poor, poorer, we should not be limiting their access to recreation
programs.
If the
Welcome Policy is capped
at 15,000 users, how will those 40,000 who take part in priority
centres and will now have to apply for subsidy be accommodated? What
about the 50,000 children and youth on social assistance? Currently
there is no cap on the cost of recreation programs accessed under the
welcome policy. Under the proposed plan, there will be an annual
subsidy of $360 for children and youth and $150 for adults and seniors.
Currently, a child who registers for the After School Recreation Care
program qualifies for three free months and is also eligible for an
Aquatic program per season and a Camp. ARC alone costs $100 per month.
In the new system, this child will only receive ARC and will not be
able to participate in swimming lessons nor summer camp programs.
Free
programs are going to be
offered under the new plan, including swim to survive, learn to skate
and youth leadership programs. The swim to survive program is
important, but it will not take the place of swim lessons, which will
be severely limited for poorer families. What about those children and
youth who are talented swimmers or skaters? Not only will they never
know if they could go on in either of these sports, they will not be
able to get one of these higher paid instructional jobs with the city
if they are not qualified in either sport. Youth from poor families
will be streamed into generic and lower paid program or camp leader
positions.
There are
many basic programs
for children and youth that should be offered free of charge. In fact,
the Mayor's election platform called for free programs for children and
youth in the priority neighbourhoods. Certainly free programs should
include preschool programs that help prepare children for school and in
many cases offer screening and identification of children with special
needs years before they enter the school system. What about skill-based
programs in instructional sports and arts? Are there not as many
talented dancers, artists and musicians in poorer neighbourhoods or do
they only supply great basketball players who then can seldom make it
beyond their school teams.
The
community must mobilize to
fight the recommendations in Everyone Gets to Play.... We urge all
locals, CUPE members and our community allies to get involved in the
fight for accessible and affordable recreation for everyone.
Expand and
reinvest in priority
centres! Expand number of welcome policy participants! Expand the range
of free programs for children and youth across the City!
(For more information on this urgent
issue, visit http://www.torontocouncil.ca)
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Behind the Laibar
Singh case - Editorial
(The
following article is from
the January 16-31,
2008
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, Jan. 16-31, 2008
Efforts to whip up demands
for the deportation of Laibar Singh have unfortunately met with some
success, despite his broad support from the South Asian community and
many labour and progressive groups. One reason is that the corporate
media and the Canadian state's immigration bureaucracy have hidden the
facts of this case from the public (for details, readers can visit
http://supportlaibar.blogspot.com on the Web).
It is
crucial to grasp the wider
context around this issue. This is not simply a debate around one
individual - it is an attempt to redefine Canada's immigration and
refugee policies in a fundamentally anti-human direction.
For many
years, Canadian
immigration policies have been designed to attract wealthy
entrepreneurs who will not become a so-called "burden on society." But
since the corporate ruling class also needs to maximise extraction of
profits from low-paid labour, it resorts to "temporary foreign worker"
programs, bringing in groups of workers who must later return to their
country of origin. The result is a separate caste of workers within the
Canadian economy, a sub-group with extremely limited rights. For the
capitalist class, this policy has the benefit of pitting Canadian
workers against immigrants, at the expense of both groups. This policy
takes on increasingly ominous overtones as the US and its allies use
their military might to seize oil and other resources around the world.
The racialization and demonization of immigrant communities within
Canada is a necessary part of the drive for imperialist war on the
global scale.
The push to
deport Laibar Singh
is not an attack against one man. It is part of a deadly racist
campaign against all workers of colour in Canada, which must be
resisted by the entire labour movement and all progressive and
democratic forces.
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Harper's paltry handout
- Editorial
(The
following article is from
the January 16-31,
2008
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, Jan. 16-31, 2008
Stephen Harper's "aid program for
ailing industries" is a political gimmick, not a serious effort to
address the crisis in Canada's manufacturing sector and the loss of
hundreds of thousands of jobs. If Harper was concerned about job losses
in single-industry towns, he would act now, instead of tying this $1
billion fund to the upcoming federal budget and spreading the handout
over three years. Ottawa's multi-billion budget surplus should be used
immediately to tackle this crisis, rather than waiting for several more
months.
In fact,
these federal surpluses
have been taken directly from the working class of Canada over the past
generation. Successive Tory and Liberal governments have made it
increasingly difficult for laid-off workers to collect unemployment
insurance, to the point where less than 40% are eligible for the
scaled-back benefits. The resulting surplus of more than $50 billion in
the EI Fund has been transferred into general government revenues to
provide huge tax cuts to the rich, while social programs are slashed.
Consider the
forestry industry,
which laid off 6,559 workers during the first nine months of 2007, from
54 mill closures. This industry, which directly employs over 300,000
people, has been devastated by the collapse of the U.S. housing market
and the rising Canadian dollar. The softwood lumber sellout has already
taken $1.5 billion out of communities dependent on this industry,
costing 10,000 jobs. One billion dollars will not come near the losses
suffered by forestry workers.
Instead,
Canada needs policies
for people's needs: an end to "continental integration" under U.S.
domination; urgent measures to protect and build goods-producing
industries, the cornerstones of our economic base; and legislation to
block plant closures and mass layoffs.
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Égale Canada
launches student survey
(The
following article is from
the January 16-31,
2008
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.
On
December 10, Égale Canada launched
a student survey to look at homophobia and transphobia in Canadian
schools. The survey targets students in grades 8 through 12 and aims to
document the realities of life at school for straight, lesbian, gay,
bisexual, transgender, Two Spirit, intersex, queer, and questioning
(LGBTTIQ) students, who are more likely than their peers to be
threatened with weapons, to drop out of school because of harassment,
or to be forced to leave home because of conflicts with parents.
Information from the survey, the first of its kind in Canada, will
provide educators and policy makers with information to help make
schools safer and more respectful places.
Égale
is working with School
Boards, Gay Straight Alliances, agencies and service providers to
expand access by youth across the country to the survey, which is
available online at http://www.climatesurvey.ca.
British
Columbia educator and
Chair of Égale
Canada's Education Committee, Noble Kelly, explains that
the survey "will give us the statistics necessary to help develop the
kinds of supports kids need while coming to terms with who they are."
The survey
asks questions about
sexual orientation and gender identity, language at school, bullying,
the curriculum and teacher and staff support. Straight students are
asked about their openness to queer students.
"Homophobia
and transphobia are
very major problems in schools but we don't see any real action," said Égale
Canada executive director Helen Kennedy at the survey launch on
Dec 10. "Our children are being bullied in the hallways, our children
are being bullied in the playground, our children are being bullied on
the internet."
Three school
boards have agreed
to work with Égale on
the survey: Victoria, BC; Thunder Bay, Ontario;
and one in Nova Scotia. In those schools, the survey will be addressed
in some classes. Participation is voluntary and results will go
directly and anonymously to Égale.
Students in other school districts
can fill out the survey online.
The Toronto
District School
Board (TDSB) has released the results of a survey showing that eight
percent of its students identify as gay, lesbian, bisexual, not sure,
questioning or "other" - which includes trans, queer and two-spirited.
But the TDSB survey, although theoretically anonymous, required
students to sign their student numbers, compromising voluntary
participation.
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Cuban Five case breaking
the media blackout
(The
following article is from
the January 16-31,
2008
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
I can think of few legal cases today
that better capture the central hypocrisy in American imperialism's
policy and, at the very same moment, call out for the energy and
passion of youth activists to champion the truth, than the historic
case of the Cuban Five.
Most People's Voice readers are
familiar with their struggle for justice by now. For those who do not
know about the Cuban Five - if you do one thing after reading this
article, then visit the site http://www.freethefive.org
which will tell you
their story.
This year,
2008, will mark the
tenth anniversary of the Cuban Five's unjust imprisonment in the jails
of the United States, and the tenth anniversary of the international
campaign for the freedom of these political prisoners.
This past
year saw many
important actions in solidarity with the Five, bringing together around
this noble cause peoples across the world. In the spring, the Cubans
organized an international conference and launched a youth campaign for
the Five. In the summer, demonstrations were held outside US embassies
and consulates from Mexico to Australia, protesting that country's
brazen and contradictory refusal to extradite a real terrorist to
justice - CIA-trained Luis Posada Carriles - while not allowing a fair
trial for the Five, who actually were fighting terrorism.
In the fall,
an international
conference was convened in Canada, around the theme of "Breaking the
Silence" in the mass media and in people's consciousness. Delegates
came from across Canada, including Quebec. Many people - perhaps the
most important group - travelled from the US.
Now it seems
as if this general
direction of work is paying off. The New York Times ran an article on
the Five for the first time in the fall. CNN aired a 13-minute segment,
while a Reuters story on the Five was picked up by almost one hundred
US daily newspapers. In Britain, the BBC carried an interview with one
of the prisoners, also a first.
These are
very positive signs
showing that through sustained public pressure, the thunder of justice
and truth can overcome seemingly enormous obstacles. The solidarity
movement is heading into the New Year with a real momentum. As I write,
all friends of the Five are awaiting the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals
and a three-judge panel decision. Actions to push forward the demand
for the Five's liberty are being called at federal buildings and public
places across the United States, and in Canada.
Earlier
tonight, I attended one
of these demonstrations in the winter cold outside the US consulate in
Montreal. The protest was organized by the Table de concentration de
solidarité Québec-Cuba and the Comité Fabio Di Celmo pour les 5.
People
everywhere have good
reason to vocally object to the imprisonment of the Five, for their
treatment is intolerable. Every second those men spend behind bars,
denied proper access to even their mothers, wives, and children, is
undeserved. Every second is a vile and futile attempt to affront their
homeland, socialist Cuba, and the values of democracy, human dignity,
and an alternative to capitalism that this courageous island represents.
In Montreal,
opposition to the
continued US-sponsored terrorism directed against the Cuban people and
their revolution hits close to home as well. This is the wonderfully
internationalist city that Fabio Di Celmo, a native of Italy, decided
to adopt. Fabio was a Montreal resident when he was killed by a
terrorist bomb that exploded in the lobby of the Copacabana hotel in
Havana City. The bomb deliberately targeted tourists, in an attempt to
disrupt the island's revenue-generating tourism sector.
That was
September 1997. Exactly
one year later the Cuban Five were arrested for investigating the kind
of terrorist groups (counter-revolutionaries, in fact) who killed Fabio.
Today,
Fabio's father and
brother are outspoken in the cause of the Five. I have heard the
brother speak publicly. He is a sincere and genuine man who wishes this
madness directed against Cuba to end. I think Fabio's story is a
warning to Canadians, that we must not allow the Harper government to
abandon Canada's official policy of good relations with Cuba.
Back in
Montreal, "we call them
heroes," says Marianne, a student activist who brought me out to the
protest. Now my cold toes are warming up as we talk in a nearby
restaurant. "The Five are heroes because they came to the US to fight
terrorism, and now they are in jail for being terrorists."
"They are
separated from their
families almost every day, yet still they fight," her friend Evelyn
adds, pointing to the fact that for almost a decade these men could
have sold out and denounced the Cuban government.
I am
personally convinced that
if the Five were to denounce Castro, then - Flash! Beautiful mansions
would be instantly found for them in Florida or California, so much
nicer than their hard prison cells (and sometimes complete isolation,
which one of the Five was subjected to for many days just before
Christmas).
Yet Ramon
Labanino (one life
sentence), Antonio Guerrero (one life sentence), Fernando Gonzalez
(nineteen years), Rene Gonzalez (fifteen years) and Gerardo Hernandez
(two life sentences), remain resolute.
That is why,
for 2008,
progressive people all across the world have renewed their commitments
to win the Cuban Five's release, staying on alert for emergency
demonstrations. I think that I can speak for all the Young Communist
League when I say that we join with those who champion this demand -
with the firm belief that through our combined efforts we will expose
the truth, and see their freedom soon.
- Johan Boyden is the General Secretary
of the Young Communist League of Canada.
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FMLN mayor
assassinated in El Salvador
(The
following article is from
the January 16-31,
2008
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 New Year has just started and
already there has been a political assassination in El Salvador. It is
believed the killing is part of a systematic campaign of political
intimidation on the part of ARENA, the right-wing, pro Bush, neoliberal
party that has governed the country for years.
Wilber
Moises Funes, 33, the
mayor of the eastern Salvadoran town of Alegria, was shot and killed on
Jan. 9 by unknown assailants while riding in a vehicle in the company
of a municipal employee. The country's youngest mayor took office in
May 2006 and was a member of the left-wing FMLN, El Salvador's main
opposition party.
An FMLN
spokesperson, congress
member Sigfrido Reyes, told the media that Funes was travelling with
municipal employee Zulma Rivera when attackers intercepted them and
opened fire. Funes and Rivera, who was in charge of contracts and
purchasing, were apparently heading to a site to supervise the
construction of a sports facility.
The mayor
was taken with serious
injuries to the hospital in the nearby city of Santiago de Maria, where
he succumbed to his wounds, while Rivera died at the site of the
attack. Reyes said that Funes had received death threats since taking
office and that his father had been the victim of another attack in
April 2006.
"We demand
an immediate,
exhaustive, professional investigation to determine who was responsible
for this terrible crime against the mayor, a young man with an
enterprising vision," Reyes said.
Observers of
the situation in El
Salvador predict the campaign will escalate as the next presidential
elections get closer. The FMLN is urging solidarity activists to write
letters denouncing this crime and demanding an immediate investigation
and prosecution of the culprits.
Letters can be sent to:
Dr. Agustin Garcia Calderon,
Presidente de La Corte Suprema de Justicia, Centro de Gobierno, San
Salvador, El Salvador, email conchita_lopez@csj.gob.sv
Felix Garrid Safie, Fiscal
General de la Republica, Colonia San Francisco, Calle Los Abetos # 85,
San Salvador, El Salvador, email fgsafie@fgr.gob.sv.
Presidente Elias Antonio Saca,
Presidente de la Republica de El Salvador, Casa Presidencial, San
Salvador, El Salvador (Secretaria de Comunicaciones de la Presidencia
de la Republica).
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CPC opposes Laibar
Singh deportation
(The
following article is from
the January 16-31,
2008
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
Jan. 11, 2008 meeting of the
Central Executive Committee of the Communist Party of Canada adopted
the following statement opposing the deportation of Laibar Singh:
"The Communist Party of Canada, which
has a long and proud history of opposition to this country's racist and
anti-democratic immigration and refugee policies, gives full support to
the struggle to allow Laibar Singh to remain in Canada. Mr. Singh is
severely disabled and paralyzed; he should be given ministerial
discretion to stay on humanitarian and compassionate grounds, as has
been done with others in similar situations in the past. We also note
that there is strong community support to urge the federal government
to take this step, despite attempts to whip up an anti-immigrant
backlash demanding immediate deportation. Finally, we condemn the
demand to remove the historic right of sanctuary for places of worship,
a right which has many times been used to help victims of persecution
build new lives in this country. The struggle to defend Laibar Singh is
an important part of the wider struggle for the rights of all
immigrants and refugees to live in dignity and as equals in Canadian
society."
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Police
brutality against Mapuche protests in Chile
(The
following article is from
the January 16-31,
2008
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.
Condensed from reports on the website
http://www.mapuche-nation.org.
A peaceful protest by the Mapuche met
a bloody end on January 3 when police opened fire into the crowd,
killing 22-year-old university student Matias Catrileo Quezada. The
young Mapuche man was shot in the back while retreating, when Chilean
police began firing indiscriminately into the crowd with machine guns.
Among the protestors were elderly civilians and children, but nobody
else was killed.
For years
the Chilean judicial
system has refused to return the indigenous land illegally taken by the
estate Santa Margarita, owned by Jorge Luchsinger, in the district of
Vilcun. The local Mapuche protested by moving onto their land to
attract the attention of the authorities. The police responded by
shooting into the crowd, which immediately dispersed and ran for cover.
Matias' body
was handed to the
local Catholic Church, who appointed Bishop Sixto Parzinger to arrange
an independent autopsy, and mediate with the authorities. This murder
has caused immediate outrage among both the Mapuche communities and
non-Mapuche throughout the ancestral territory of the Mapuche, and the
capital of Chile, Santiago.
The ensuing
civil outcry has
been met with yet more protestors being injured and detained, including
Matias Catrileo's mother, Monica Quezada, his sister, and various other
members of his family. On January 9, in Temuco, Monica Quezada was
arrested along with 16 other protestors during a march condemning the
murder of her son.
The tension
between the Mapuche
people and the Chilean authorities has been growing since last October
10, when six Mapuche political prisoners went on hunger strike. The
prisoners originally agreed to stop their protest upon the intervention
of Bishop Camilo Vial, who organised a mediation between the Mapuche
and the government in an effort to clarify the conditions concerning
their imprisonment, including why the authorities had decided to use
the Anti-Terrorism Law, a relic from the time of the Pinochet
dictatorship that only last year the President had promised never again
to use upon the Mapuche. The government agreed to this mediation, and
on December 17 the negotiations were supposed to start.
With this
agreement, all but one
of the prisoners, Patricia Troncoso, stopped their hunger strike.
Patricia decided she would wait until the talks began. She is now being
kept alive by a saline drip. According to a Jan. 7 medical report,
Patricia has lost 26.2% of her original weight, is suffering from
cramps, slowed heart rate, respiratory difficulties, and a very weak
pulse. She is disorientated, and drifting in and out of consciousness.
The prognosis shows that even if she were to stop her hunger strike
now, she would never fully recover.
The present
outrage felt by the
Mapuche communities has been expressed through many public protests.
These demonstrations have been aggressively broken up by the military
police, who use water cannons to disperse the crowds, beating and
arresting countless Mapuche and supporters, including children. The
result is that the tension is continuing to escalate.
For further
information, visit the Mapuche International Link website at http://www.mapuche-nation.org.
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Benazir
Bhutto killed: Pakistan's travails continue
(The
following article is from
the January 16-31,
2008
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 B. Prasant, PV
correspondent in India
My
earliest recall of Benazir Bhutto
was in 1973 when she came to India accompanying her father, Pakistan's
prime minister, Zulifikar Ali Bhutto. She appeared to me to be haughty,
selectively aloof, over-protective of her father, and she showed signs
of dominating formal and informal tete-a-tetes that the Prime Minister
had with the Indian media. Some of her remarks have stayed with me.
She spoke arrogantly of
"Pakistan's destiny" being linked up with the Bhutto family, and was
always willing to hold forth on the parallels between US-style
westernization and "modernisation." She uttered not a single word on
the state of (or the lack of) democracy in her country even when her
father was in office, having won a popular mandate. Nor had she
anything to say on questions put to her on the condition of the
purdaansheen (head-scarved) women of her country, or about the women's
emancipation of which she always appeared overenthusiastic when in
Oxford.
Her political idiom was of the
US variety, and even at that young age (she was turning twenty, I
recall), she was watchful not to tread on the shoes of the military
elite who actually ruled Pakistan, allowing Bhutto senior to enjoy a
populist flirtation with democracy. She would certainly not say
anything about the spreading US hegemony over the sub-continent,
repeated prodding from the media notwithstanding.
Her father was becoming a tyrant
on his own, accosting and embarrassing the military elite. After his
hanging in 1979, Benazir and her mother were sent packing to the
Rawalpindi jail for some months. Following this, she went in for
elections, certainly not operating away from the larger machinations of
the junta, who regarded her as a convenient "democratic face" to
present before the patrons in the capitalist west, chiefly the United
States, as they did her father before he became politically redundant.
The lack of spontaneous popular
protest against her father's execution, other than burning of a few
vehicles and fiery speeches in areas dominated by the Pakistan People's
Party (founded by Zulifikar Ali Bhutto in 1967), was a clear indication
about the generalised apathy of the mass of the people of Pakistan, and
of the ruling classes to a prime minister being hanged with minimum
formalities of trial proceedings. A similar scenario followed Benazir
Bhutto's brutal death.
Strong disillusionment with
vicious military rule and the extremes of poverty made the people elect
Benazir Bhutto in hope of a change for the better. She became the prime
minister of Pakistan twice, with a gap of a few years in between,
during the beginning of which period she had been dismissed, and then
recalled, only to be dismissed again when she started to make noises
about family rule. The years were 1988, 1993, and 1996.
By this time, she had started to
accumulate an enormous amount of wealth, mostly through illegal and
semi-legal deals, enriching herself, her husband Asif Ali Zardari
(known as "Mr. ten per cent" for the cuts he would take for doling out
government contracts), and her brothers. Swiss bank accounts in the
family's name bulged to bursting.
Her two brothers met with
mysterious ends. Both cases of murder were squarely led at the doors of
Benazir Bhutto and her husband by the wives of the brothers, and by
other members of the Bhutto family. Criminal cases - wide-ranging and
strongly evidenced - were brought against her, and then mysteriously
dropped when a high-powered team of US officials made a covert visit to
Pakistan. She went abroad leaving behind her husband, the poor fall
guy, locked up in jail for close to eight years.
Benazir Bhutto started to plan
her return to Pakistan politics, activating her networks and getting
support from the US ruling classes, who had started to apprehend that
General Pervez Musharraf was getting able enough to defy US
imperialism's diktats about what to do with the economy, how do deal
with India, and less importantly whom to kill and whom to elevate in
the political hierarchy of Pakistan. The US minders brought into play
two other "democratic dummies," the much-accused former prime minister
Nawaz Sharif, and the cricketer-playboy Imran Khan, both bitter rivals
of Benazir Bhutto and both linked with the ruling elite in Pakistan,
especially in the armed forces.
Her return was entirely opposed
by Musharraf, the general-turned-president-in-civvies with strong
connections to the shadowy Pakistan branch of al-Qaeda. Musharraf
virtually guided the Pathan tribal section of the Taliban in the
country, cornering and exterminating in incremental doses, the Baluch,
the Sindhi, and the Yusufjhai varieties of the same terrorist sect. His
initial talks with Benazir Bhutto, Nawaz Sharif, and Imran Khan alarmed
the latter two enough to make public noises about the developing
closeness of Benazir to the now-civilian general.
What went wrong suddenly in the
weeks prior to the assassination is too recent for even preliminary
political investigation. It is widely assumed by the Communists and the
Left in Pakistan, who mostly keep silent in concern for their own
security, that the Benazir-Musharraf celebratory was rudely interrupted
by a clear signal from the US that they preferred Benazir Bhutto, the
acceptable soft face of Pakistan to the extreme hard-line of the former
general.
Having managed to get the US
nominee killed, clearing the field for his election as a civilian
president, Pervez Musharraf has presented the US with a fait accompli,
which cannot be ignored or pushed aside. The US statement that the
elections should go ahead if everything continues to be normal is a
triumph for the military elite. Benazir Bhutto's tragedy lay in the
fact that she chose to walk into a playing field that she did not
control, and paid the price. The travails of Pakistan, a country
fatally dominated by feudal remnants, tribal loyalties, venture
capitalism, and militarism, go on uninterrupted.
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WHAT'S
LEFT
(The
following article is from
the January 16-31,
2008
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
Pan-Canadian
Day of Action in Support of US War Resisters - rally Sat., Jan.
26, 1 pm, Public Library, 300 W. Georgia; see page 5 for more
info, or
visit www.resisters.ca.
Vancouver,
BC
My Name Is Rachel
Corrie - co-produced by
neworldtheatre and Teesri Duniya
Theatre, based
on the writing of Rachel Corrie, 7 & 9:30
pm, Jan. 25-Feb.
3, Havana Restaurant, 1212 Commercial Dr.,
for tickets 604-231-7535.
Rally in Support of
the Mapuche People - Fri., Jan. 25, 12 noon, Chilean
Consulate, 1185
West Georgia (at Bute). Called by LaSurda Latin
American Collective,
lasurda@resist.ca.
Bolivia: The Struggle for the New Constitution - two short films &
presentation, Friday, Jan. 25, 7 pm, Rhizome
Cafe, 317
E. Broadway, presented by Canada Bolivia
Solidarity Committee
and Cafe Rebelde.
Communist Party
Leader Miguel Figueroa - public forum on the political &
economic situation in Canada today, 7:30
pm, Thur.,
Feb. 7, Centre for Socialist Education, 706 Clark Drive, for info call BC
Committee CPC,
604-254-9836.
StopWar.ca
coalition - next meeting Wed., Feb. 13,
5:30 pm,
Maritime Labour Centre, 1880 Triumph St. See http://www.stopwar.ca
for updates.
WINNIPEG,
MN
Young Communist
League-UW campus club - meets every 2nd Wednesday, 5:30 pm,
U of W
buffeteria (4th floor top of escalators). Next
meetings Jan. 23 & Feb. 6. E-mail
us at ycl_manitoba@ycl-ljc.ca
YCL movie nights on
U of W campus - to get on the notice list for time, room,
and films, just
e-mail us at yclmovienight@hotmail.com.
EDMONTON,
AB
TORONTO,
ON
Pan-Canadian
Day of Action in Support of US War Resisters - rally Sat., Jan.
26, 1
pm, Bloor St. United Church, 300 Bloor St. W, for more info visit
www.resisters.ca
or call 416.598.1222.
Jose Marti Dinner
and Dance - Sat. Feb. 2, 300 Bloor
St. W. (1
block from St. George Subway), dinner 7 pm,
cultural event
8:45, dance with band “Sol De Cuba,” 9:15 and
10:30 pm,
advance paid ticket $25 ($30 at door), $10 for
dance only
starting at 9:15 pm. To reserve tickets, mail
cheque to CCFA
Toronto, PO Box 730 Stn. F, Toronto M4Y
2N6. For info,
Canadian-Cuban Friendship Association, 905-951-8499, or Elizabeth
Hill, 416-654-7105.
Norman Bethune Day
celebration - Sat., March 1, 290 Danforth Ave, media
sponsor People’s
Voice. Tickets $5, door prize one-week
all-inclusive trip for two to Cuba.
Info: 416-469-2446.
MONTREAL,
QC
Vigil against
occupation of Palestine - Fridays, noon to 1 pm, at Israeli
Consulate, corner of Peel and Rene Levesque. For info: Palestinians And
Jews United, 961-3928.
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People's
Voice deadlines:
FEBRUARY 1-15
Thursday, January 24, 2008
FEBRUARY 16-29
Thursday, February 7
Send submissions
to PV
Editorial
Office,
706 Clark Drive, Vancouver,
V5L 3J1, pvoice@telus.net
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