Chilling Survey Reveals Majority of Americans Willing To Preemptively Nuke Other Nations

Click here to access article by Darius Shahtahmasebi from Anti-Media. 

What it [the research] ultimately shows is that Americans want to fight (and instigate) wars but no longer want to expend their own people commissioning such conflicts. Polls have also demonstrated that the majority of Americans approve of the use of drone warfare against suspected terrorists, another example of Americans approving of killing people without realistically endangering personnel.

Contrary to this conclusion arrived at by the author of this article, I believe that the research results show the power of the US ruling class to instill hatred of their enemies in the minds of ordinary Americans. I know from my own experience that the ongoing portrayal of the Japanese as beasts by US media enabled the American populace to accept the nuclear bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The same applies to Iran. (I was awakened to this discovery when a sibling expressed such hatred toward Iran and praised the virtues of Saudi Arabia.) 

Also one must factor in the ruling class's induced passivity and acceptance of authority into one's interpretation of the results. What the 1974 classic Milgram study demonstrated is that in a society taught to induce blind obedience to authority figures, people can be rather easily encouraged by authorities to apply apparently very painful electric shocks to others in conditions where they will suffer no adverse consequences themselves and will please authorities in their presence. Thus ruling classes can create conditions to induce ordinary people to commit horrific acts by teaching them to hate their enemies using all kinds of fake information and officially sanctioning such acts.

Americans, like the Germans and Japanese, are intrinsically no different than anyone else when allowances are made for their idiosyncratic experiences and their history of being untouched by the experience of war on their continent since the Civil War of 1860. What they do share with millions across the globe is living in nations that are ruled by self-serving ruling classes that are overwhelmingly capitalist. The system itself, fueled by the quest for profit and power, encourages war for access to cheap resources and labor. The solution, which this research and others like it supports, is not to denigrate Americans but to end the rule of tiny classes of people, and in today's world that means the end of capitalist rule and the creation of social systems that can support harmony among people and with nature.

Capitalism puts profits first, but an ecological society will serve humanity-- an Interview with Fred Magdoff (a "best post")

Click here to access this interview from Truthout.

What would a truly just, equal and ecologically sustainable future look like? Why would it require a change in our economic system, namely the end of capitalism? Fred Magdoff and Chris Williams answer(s) these questions in Creating an Ecological Society: Toward a Revolutionary Transformation. Suffused with radical hope, this book can be yours with a donation to Truthout!

Is a world possible based on equitable needs, empathy and sustainable economics? Two authors believe so -- and that it would require the end of capitalism: Fred Magdoff and Chris Williams, who co-wrote Creating an Ecological Society. In this Truthout interview, Magdoff -- a professor emeritus of plant and soil science at the University of Vermont -- shares his vision of how we could move toward such a world.

Magdoff's articles have been frequently published in the Monthly Review, a longtime socialist journal. He is a professor emeritus of plant and soil science at the University of Vermont and co-author of the new Monthly Review Press book Creating an Ecological Society: Toward a Revolutionary Transformation.
 
Fred Magdoff demonstrates in this interview that he is a very wise man as illustrated in this paragraph in a partial answer to the question "In summary, what would an ecological society look like to you?"

It will be critical to operate in ways that maintain an egalitarian and democratic society. Transparency and openness need to be maintained. There are a variety of methods to help make that happen, such as simple processes for recall of unsatisfactory persons in positions of authority and regular rotation of positions within economic units and within social structures, such as community, regional and multi-regional councils. Continuing efforts will take place in schools and society at large to encourage pro-social traits needed in a cooperative society -- cooperation, reciprocity, sharing, empathy, treating all people equally and fairly (no favoritism) -- and to work to minimize the expression of traits emphasized and rewarded by capitalism (especially, greed, selfishness and individualism) and to eliminate the deep scourges of racism, sexism and other forms of discrimination and oppression.

In the last lengthy sentence he poses what I believe to be a major hurdle to overcome by any revolutionary movement that attempts to replace capitalism with what is truly a social-system: individualism that is laced like fabric throughout the culture of capitalism. That is why I believe that any effective revolutionary movement must emphasize a pro-social prefigurative component (see mine here and here in my revolutionary proposal) in order to provide training and experience to create a totally new human being to preserve this new social system.

A Future Beyond Capitalism, Or No Future At All

Click here to access article by Jason Hickel and Martin Kirk from Fast Company. 

In February, college sophomore Trevor Hill stood up during a televised town hall meeting in New York and posed a simple question to Nancy Pelosi, the leader of the Democrats in the House of Representatives. He cited a study by Harvard University showing that 51% of Americans between the ages of 18 and 29 no longer support the system of capitalism....

And later:

It’s not only young voters who feel this way. A YouGov poll in 2015 found that 64% of Britons believe that capitalism is unfair, that it makes inequality worse. Even in the U.S., it’s as high as 55%. In Germany, a solid 77% are skeptical of capitalism. Meanwhile, a full three-quarters of people in major capitalist economies believe that big businesses are basically corrupt.

Why do people feel this way?

So You Want to Start a Resistance

Click here to access article by Tony Cartalucci from his blog Land Destroyer Report. 

I am posting this because its author is a well-respected critic of the existing power structure and all of its manifestations, but I find his arguments about resisting this status quo lacking in convincing political substance. I've often wondered what the ideology of his politics were, and this piece really lays them out. To me, it sounds like libertarianism, although I think they might qualify that as libertarian anarchism. I also learned that his thinking is very similar to James Corbett who has been a proponent of technology has furnishing a means of confronting "the powers that be" (I hate that expression!) in an alternative way. 

I use "the powers that be" expression deliberately because I think both of them, along with many other activists, regard the capitalist ruling class as invincible if opposed head on, or maybe they don't see any alternative. And they consider the latter as consisting of only protests and militant demonstrations against "the powers that be". This I think reveals a lack of imagination and a lack of understanding of what humans are really up against and ways to carry on a revolutionary struggle. It may also reveal a desire to keep things quite the same because they personally are very comfortable, and they don't want to rock the boat too much for fear that it might affect their comfort.

I don't have time, or maybe the ability, to really take apart their activist ideology, but I can't let their politics go as a promising form of resistance pass unchallenged. I have been an activist for over 60 years in which I grew from a petition-signing person trying to convince our immediate masters in the government to behave better, to a protestor and militant demonstrator, all the way to a convinced revolutionary. 

The capitalist system can tolerate many forms of alternative economic practices as long as they don't disturb the system. They also welcome these alternative practices because they see them as sort of experiments of doing business; and whenever they succeed, they will be integrated into corporate practices. This is precisely what has happened to much of the organic food movement. I've watched it from the sidelines since the 1960's when it began, and it hasn't interfered with business as usual one iota for the capitalist governing class.

The same goes for technology. I remember reading articles by James Corbett extolling the virtues of what he calls a new "peer to peer economy" illustrated by entrepreneurs using the internet in creative ways to rent out extra rooms in their houses or to use their vehicles to earn money transporting people. And sure enough Uber company has taken control of this latter service and earning huge salaries for their officers. There is growing criticism about this company. I think the same is likely true of Airbnb and maybe Bitcoin.

Exposed: Plans to Balkanise #Syria

Click here if you wish to access the 14:21m video directly from YouTube. 

I think SyrianGirl and the Syrian soldier she interviews place too much emphasis on nationalism and the sanctity of the state concept by attacking the federalism that is advocated by Syrian Kurds. On the other hand, the Empire and its allies like to use religious sectarianism to break up states to make them weaker and more easily dominated. Michael Jansen also sees federalism as simply a ploy backed by the Empire to divide and conquer regions of the world. 

History reveals that states have been created on the ruins of the old feudal system when kingdoms were established through violence after the Roman Empire disintegrated. The capitalist class took over control of these regions which were integrated into states that we see today. Imperialist capitalists have also used the divide and conquer strategy in many parts of the world to establish new states, particularly in the Middle East, to break up nations that posed threats to their control or to their access to resources. Thus states can be regarded as a creation of the capitalist class. It is interesting that now under neoliberalism that the US-led Empire is trying to reduce the power of all states in favor of the transnational rule of the Empire.

I think there is another position of federalization that can be argued as a progressive development: the breakup of states on the basis of natural bio-regions. Also there are various degrees of federation that can be used to decentralize power and to promote more grassroots participation in decision-making which is what the Syrian Kurds have been thinking based on the influence by progressive thinkers like the American Murray Bookchin and Kurdish Abdullah Öcalan and the concepts related to Libertarian Municipalism (see this, this, and this). SyrianGirl, Jansen, and others simply don't understand some of the progressive ideas of the Syrian Kurds. But it may also be true that the Kurds don't understand that they are being deliberately led by US agents down the path of national independence for a Kurdish state which would facilitate the breakup of Syria, the Empire's "Plan B".

On the other hand, I think it is a bit dangerous to experiment with such ideas of decentralization while the Empire goes about breaking up states for their purposes of world domination. It is the Empire, and particularly the US that needs broken up, and this likely should be accomplished first before other states do it.

I perused a Kurdish website this morning and found more evidence that the US is supporting and courting the Kurdish desire for greater independence. The fact that this article was re-posted to a Kurdish website suggests some naivete among the Kurds. To agents of the US Empire this, of course, means balkanization of Syria . And I just found a post that indicates that the Syrian Kurds have declared themselves to be a "federation". But the details of what they mean by federation are missing.

Most Russians Would Return to the Soviet Economic System - Poll

Click here to access article by Simon North from Russia Insider, but "originally appeared at Levada Center - public opinion company".

So, why was this posed as only a choice between two systems? Aren't there other possibilities besides a private ownership-market economy and a corresponding ruling capitalist class and an economy and state that is bureaucratically planned and governed?

Learning from the life of Murray Bookchin

Click here to access article by Eirik Eiglad from Reflections on a Revolution (ROAR).

Eiglad presents a review of a new book entitled Ecology or Catastrophe: The Life of Murray Bookchin by his companion of 20yrs, Janet Biehl. He makes reference to the title of this review with this statement: 

This book, however, is not only for the initiated. It deserves to be read by anyone who would like to know more about American radicalism in the last century, or learn more about the genealogy of social ecology.

And reaches this conclusion:

Biehl’s book presents a lucid overview and a lively introduction to Bookchin and the emergence of social ecology.

Liberal ideology

Click here to access article by David Ruccio from Occasional Links & Commentary.

Economist Ruccio gives an excellent explanation about the limits of debate that is tolerated in the capitalist form of "democracy" also known as "bourgeois democracy".

I know what liberal ideology in economics is all about. I’ve encountered it at every turn, even before I began my formal studies in economics. The same is true of liberal ideology in politics, which has shown its ugly face once again in the current electoral campaign.

In both cases, liberal ideology is based on the idea that the existing system, while perhaps imperfect, is the only game in town. It is a conception both of what is and of how change can and should take place—gradually and without major disruption. According to liberals, the biggest threat is populism, when the masses of people challenge the existing common sense and seek radical change.

Thoughts on Rojava: an interview with Janet Biehl

Click here to access this interview (posted on Reflections on a Revolution) conducted by Zanyar Omrani, who is an Iranian Kurd and an independent journalist and documentary filmmaker, with American Janet Biehl who was Murray Bookchin’s companion and collaborator for his last 19 years.

The interviewer, Omrani, asked various questions that were designed to get Biehl's opinion as to how much conformity there was in the actual decision-making operations as practiced by the people in Rojava with the ideology of Bookchin's bottom-up political ideology.

Specifically to Bookchin, the institutions of democratic self-government that they described corresponded to much of what he had envisioned (under the name libertarian municipalism). At the base of democratic confederalism is the citizens’ assembly (in Bookchin) or commune (in Rojava). The commune sends delegates to the confederal council at the neighborhood level, and the neighborhood council sends delegates to the district, and the district to the canton. In this multi-tiered structure, as Bookchin described it, power is to flow from the bottom up.

Has the vision become real?

Although Biehl's observations were interesting, I finished reading the interview without any conclusive answers. And I think one should not expect any conclusive answers at this point in time.

One part of the interview compared the historical experience of the Russians during their revolution and their subsequent war with the West which supported factions that were inclined to capitalism (the White armies). 

People in Rojava seemed very aware of the danger that a bottom-up system can turn into a top-down system. That’s what happened, after all, in Russia. In 1917, the multi-tiered system of soviets, or councils, all over Russia, was originally supposed to carry power from the base to the summit. But once the Bolsheviks came to power, they were able to use those very institutions as conduits for top-down power, indeed for totalitarian domination. 

Essentially this question dealt with the question whether such a bottom-up political apparatus could survive particularly in a wartime situation. The specific Russian experience and the latter general question has always intrigued me. My studies of various writings particularly by Trotsky, who commanded the Red Army, and Isaac Deutscher, who studied and wrote about the revolution extensively, caused me to reach a tentative conclusion about what went wrong with the Russian Revolution. 

Trotsky and others both in the Bolshevik party and outside did not question the authoritarian structure of a military command once the war began in earnest. Thus they readily adopted it. After the Bolsheviks won the war, they relied on this structure to defend the revolution from all the problems they faced after victory: widespread famine, poor crops, epidemics, destroyed infrastructure, etc. Then it was only a matter of time when the top-down command structure completely replaced any independent power of the Soviets. People such as Stalin, who were particularly susceptible to the addictive power of control and domination (like people predisposed to alcoholism are particularly susceptible to alcohol), took over the command structures of the Communist Party and the Soviet Union.

This always led me to the following questions. Could the Russian Revolution have succeeded if they had adopted a bottom-up command structure to prosecute the war against the White and Western capitalist armies? Given that wartime conditions often see people supporting a tight and efficient command structure, how can a people suddenly dismantle a military command structure and foster a bottom-up political structure after the war is won?

Of course the Communist party leaders always explained the success of the revolution depended upon the revolution immediately spreading to other advanced capitalist countries, especially to Germany, and when this did not happen, deterioration of communist practice was inevitable. 

The crisis, the alternative, and the commons movement

Click here to access article by CNS-EP Collective posted on Capitalism Nature Socialism (CNS) website. 

The crisis of the dominant system marks the end of an epoch. It is not another phase of the same.

Capitalism is unable to keep its promises of eradicating poverty and hunger, ensuring social justice, respecting the environment, and overcoming the South-North divide.

This Italian collective is recognizing the need for a radical change in societies if humanity is going to survive the many crises that capitalist rule is creating. They are calling for a conference in Italy and elsewhere to come up with radical plans for a transformation.

Cynicism as the cultural expression of neoliberalism

Click here to access a book review by Pete Dolack of J.D. Taylor's book entitled Negative Capitalism: Cynicism in the Neoliberal Era.

After reading Dolack's review I think that the main significance of this book, together with other critiques of the status quo by many intellectuals (for example, Henry Giroux), is that they are seriously questioning the existing system and are now beginning to consider the need to radically change it.  

Dolack explains that Taylor's book focuses on the culture of capitalism and how it creates feelings of cynicism, apathy, and passive fatalism among its citizens thereby preventing any significant opposition to form which might contest the rule of capitalists.

Feelings of hopelessness must be engendered. Although such injections can be, and often are, spread via propagandistic techniques — Margaret Thatcher’s “there is no alternative” being a prime example — an absorption into the bones of a society must be accomplished through multiple channels. Continual cultural reinforcement is critical to maintain a system such as neoliberal capitalism and the austerity that is imposed in ever more harsh forms.

A bleak cynicism — a deep pessimism that, bad though things are, there really is no alternative — keeps a populace in check better than bullets can.

Assemblies for Democracy: A Theoretical Framework

Click here to access article by Richard Gunn, R.C. Smith and Adrian Wilding from Assemblies for Democracy (Britain).

In their actions against the Greeks, capitalist leaders in the Eurozone have inadvertently taught many activists all over the world that even the largely fake version of capitalist "democracy" doesn't matter when it conflicts with the interests of international capitalists. It was a wake-up call to all those activists who thought that working within the existing system could bring ameliorative relief from neoliberal austerity policies. This has invigorated many activists to study more radical solutions to the rule of international capitalists in this new neoliberal stage of capitalism. This article is an illustration of this kind of effort.

General elections are top-down events: attention focuses on political parties and their leaders. Personalities and success or failure move centre-stage. Policies get a mention, but are assessed like moves in a game of chess. Can this top-down perspective be reversed? Can a form of politics be found which retains a grassroots or ‘bottom-up’ emphasis?

In these notes, we attempt to do two things. We explain why, in our view, this question is important. And we explore challenges that a grassroots politics must face.

Barter Networks – Lessons from Argentina for Greece

Click here to access article by Marina Sitrin from Telesur.

This multi-talented author and activist has visited Greece many times in recent years and she reports on her discussions with Greek activists about what Argentinians learned about dealing with a collapse of a capitalist economy.

In this article I focus on the Argentine barter networks, both because it is a specific question that is raised repeatedly in Greece, and also because there are some very concrete forms of organization and lessons that can be derived from the experience. It is also because there are already many different forms of barter throughout Greece, from local villages trading based on history and custom, within families and family to family to an increasingly large number of activist and community organized spaces of exchange. Within this culture of barter, immediate questions are arising as to how the networks can be expanded, if they are the right base for a currency based network, and what sort of support to ask for from the government to help ensure their existence.

“In every neighborhood people were able to eat because of this barter relationship -- we were all involved – and it changed us all.” (Nicolas, sub.coop, a conversation in Buenos Aires, Argentina in 2003)  

What does degrowth mean to you?

Click here to access a 3:36m video by Marc Menningmann from degrowth (Germany).

Hear what German activists are saying about the need to consider other ways of living in order to live in harmony with nature--our planet's ecosystem.

In this video, some of the scientists, activists and ordinary people who gathered at last year’s Degrowth Conferenc in Leipzig share their personal understanding of degrowth. It shows how many different facets degrowth can have. Now we have added English subtitles to it which can be activated by clicking on the little green box saying “CC” in the bar at the bottom of the video.

Sexual equality is in our genes

Click here to access article by Chris Fry from Workers World.

Fry reports on a recent paper published in Science (behind a paywall) which confirms some long held Marxist opinions about the original humans and human nature: the social structure was based on mother-right, or matriarchy, in which a fundamental equality existed between women and men. Today this period of human social development is often called the primary commune.

Fry also sees this confirmation has having support for those Marxists and other activists who believe that humans are capable of creating very different societies to replace today's dominant patriarchal type that is reinforced by capitalism.

Not satisfied with just academic research on this, Marxists view the legacy of egalitarian matriarchy, of the primary commune, to be a springboard into the present-day struggle against this outmoded, racist, sexist, anti-gay, oppressive class society.

Because of the early level of the productive forces, humans in the original communes faced a tough, uphill struggle against the forces of nature. Yet they provided evidence that we humans can build a powerful social model in which to survive and grow, based on equality and filling the needs of the whole community.

Today, we humans have developed vast powers of production that could be used to satisfy our needs. Instead, in most countries, economic life is chained to the profit motive. To reach the next step on the ladder of social development — the construction of a society that meets the needs of all people on a much higher level — this rotting capitalist system has to be overthrown.

The Struggle As The Women We Are: Communiques From The Zapatistas

Click here to access article by the Zapatistas from Upside Down World. 

The article provides an illustration of how the indigenous people in the Chiapas region of Mexico are empowering women as well as men, and constructing bottom-up authority and radical egalitarian political structures to defend their lands and people from the predations of capitalist agencies. In this region activists are fully conscious of the necessity of empowering all people so that the truth expressed in the slogan "the people united can never be defeated" can be fully realized. A "united people" requires that all, or most, people are educated in the realities of existing power structures as well as being empowered themselves within activist organizations.

Meanwhile, read in a Nation report how the people in Central America are fighting back against exploitation of their lands by US and Canadian corporations and interference in their political affairs by US agencies. Better yet, read a piece from Latin American in Movement entitled "7 Reasons to Scrap the $1 Billion Aid Package to Central America". This is another US "aid" bill which would actually worsen conditions for ordinary people in Central American countries while strengthening the existing dictatorships.

SYRIZA in power, social movements at a crossroads

Click here to access article by Theodoros Karyotis from is blog atonomias. (Note: Theodoros Karyotis is a sociologist, translator and activist participating in social movements that promote self-management, solidarity economy and defense of the commons in Greece. Like most Greek writers, he frequently makes reference to the word "imaginary" which in English appears to be a word that is only used by sociologists. Here is an excellent definition. ) 

The dire circumstances in Greece compel the social movements to reposition themselves in front of the SYRIZA government.

This writer for Greek grass-root social movements clearly see the need for the grassroots' social movements to formulate a plan of action now that the middle class Syriza party has caved in to the neoliberal demands of European capitalists.

...at the end of February a forum of thinkers and activists of grass roots movements took place in Athens, with hundreds of participants, under the title “Prosperity without growth”, with the explicit goal of translating their activities into concrete proposals, addressed as much to the political powers, as well as to society. Starting from the premise that economic growth is already incompatible with social wellbeing and environmental sustainability, the grassroots movements seek to complement the creative resistance to neoliberal politics and the construction of viable alternatives from below with the demand for radical reforms: from the introduction of a basic universal income, to the institution of new regimes of management of the commons, to the creation of a legal framework that permits the operation of recuperated factories, like Vio.Me in Thessaloniki. ....

.... ...one of the most relevant initiatives that emerged from the forum was the effort to connect and integrate antagonistic projects in defence of the commons into a political agent capable of playing a protagonistic role in a postconsumerist society, helping thereby to overcome the artificial dilemma between austerity and growth.

Where to begin with Climate Justice?

Click here to access article by Joanna Cabello from degrowth (Germany).

Climate justice is a relatively new term. Being a key concept in the Degrowth in Action – Climate Justice Summer School 2015, it is important here to expand upon the different understandings of, and some of the debates surrounding, the term ‘climate justice’ – though of course no single understanding is right or wrong, and no group can lay claim to a particular concept. 

.... For many of the groups and networks that participated in CJA [‘Climate Justice Action’] the broad position underlying the use of the term is the politicisation of climate change – understanding that it results from our current and historical social relations, and that in order to address it we need fundamental changes to our economic and political systems.

Reimagining our collective powers against austerity

Click here to access article by Max Haiven from Reflections on a Revolution. (a must-read)

Wow! Absolutely stunning in its advancement of revolutionary thinking!

It's so encouraging to see people popping up in various parts of the world who are actively engaging in both theoretical projects and practical experiments to build a sustainable and peaceful world. This time we see a Canadian contribute with this essay to this grand effort.

Haiven challenges us to think deeper about what really constitutes revolutionary thinking.

Is a right something granted by a state or sovereign, or is it something that emerges more organically from communities as they struggle? I think the latter is true.

And so then how can we speak of a “right” to the commons? I think we cannot imagine that this right will ever be “granted” to us by those in economic and political power. In the end, the ideal of the commons (horizontalist, grassroots democracy, sustainable reciprocity, community-level decision-making and radical autonomy) is completely antithetical to the state-form and the Eurocentric regime of sovereignty that has, to date, been the “container” of “rights” as we are accustomed to imagining them. So any “right to the commons” would necessarily need to be an insurgent right, a radical demand aimed at undermining and replacing state sovereignty.

Kurdish autonomy between dream and reality

Click here to access article by Alex de Jong from Reflections on a Revolution. 

Alex de Jong is editor of the socialist journal Grenzeloos and an activist in the Netherlands.

The Kurdish people in the Rojava region of northern Syria have been a source of revolutionary inspiration for activists throughout the world. Because of the chaos imposed on the region through the policies and actions of Zionist influenced Empire directors and their Arab cronies, the Kurdish people especially in the Rojava region of northern Syria have been forced to deal with the realities of revolutionary issues on an almost daily basis. This Dutch activist is clearly well-informed about their struggles and offers his views of what is going on.