Bangladesh child ship breakers (Mike Hettwer) June 2015

If eyes are the window to the soul, you are looking into the abyss of human suffering felt by children without hopes or dreams. These small boys are workers in a Dhaka, Bangladesh ship yard. Bangladesh has long been the leading country in the ship breaking industry (since 1964). Ship demolition is extremely dangerous work with a high profit margin because Bangladesh is designated one of the worst in the world for workers’ rights–& today, that’s saying a mouthful.

Workers, including children as young as four or five, work around asbestos, lead, cadmium, arsenic, & other toxic chemicals (which workers remove with their bare hands), diesel & other fuels, & in blistering hot, noisy, stinking conditions with little formal training & no safety equipment. The ship yards are notorious for the high number of workers injured (including amputations) or who die in gruesome ways, including from blowtorches they use & explosions.

They have no access to emergency services for an accident; no compensation if injured or disabled on the job; work at less than minimum wages with no overtime, sick, or vacation pay; & have no right to form a union.

There are many terrestrial & marine environmental problems created when dismantling ships but the health problems for unprotected workers are an entire catalog of horrors: heavy metal poisoning, cancer of the skin, intestine, kidney, liver or bladder; asbestosis; mesothelioma; disruption of the hormonal system; an entire range of respiratory, skin, & eye problems (including blindness). And lots of children are working under these conditions! The average life span is 40 years old. It doesn’t get more barbaric than that.

One media report showing workers suspended precariously off a ship said “Frequently without goggles, risking serious injury or blindness, workers climb tall rope ladders to the ships’ highest points, risking death if they slip, yet they keep working, enjoying building the ships.” Such rubbish could only be written by someone who’s never worked a day of hard labor in his life. It’s the old “Whistling while they work” routine from Disney movies which hasn’t a damn thing to do with the lives of these men & boys.

These little guys have a right to dreams–including one for having a long healthy, happy life. If this ain’t barbarism, then what is it? Meanwhile the number of billionaires in Bangladesh tripled in the past few years, according to the central bank.

Our fullest solidarity with the workers of Bangladesh. May they rise up & kick ass!

(Photo by Mile Hettwer)

Vote for Scully and Bach, independent socialist candidates

A recent Gallup poll found that US voters are quite ecumenical about who they’ll vote for. Nine in 10 say they would vote for a qualified presidential candidate who is Catholic, a woman, Black, Latino or Jewish. A high percentage say they’d vote for a Mormon, gay person, evangelical Christian, Muslim, or atheist. But the headline read, socialist presidential candidates are the “least appealing” to US voters.

In fact, socialist presidential candidates are so little appealing that only 47 percent of Americans say they’d vote for one. And that’s bad news!? That’s millions more than the number of people who elected Obama & got a bum rap in the deal. We could say things are looking good for socialists.

Vote Mary Scully & Alice Bach

The quality of barbarism is not strained

Tsipras, Merkel & Italian guy (Geert Vanden Wijngaert:AP) June 26 2015

We trust Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras understands the quality of neoliberal mercy is not strained by conviviality. When EU politicians whoop it up with you & put their arms around your neck, it’s more akin to a noose than a gesture of solidarity which they’re incapable of feeling.

Greece & its “creditors” are engaged in negotiations for more euros to save the country from bankruptcy. The only way to save Greece from continuing crises is not to bargain with bankers & creditors but to mobilize Greek working people & give the old heave-ho to the EU & IMF.

The two noose-bearers here with Tsipras are the Italian PM Matteo Renzi & German Chancellor Angela Merkel.

(AP Photo/Geert Vanden Wijngaert)

The Jewish-only state and African refugees

Eritrean refugee in Israel (Baz Ratner:Reuters) June 26 2015

This woman is an Eritrean refugee protesting outside the meeting of a European Union (EU) delegation near Tel Aviv, Israel. (Apparently the EU doesn’t honor the boycott of Israeli apartheid though it could just as well have met in Belgium.) The media caption said “Eritrean migrants living in Israel” were calling on the EU to act on the recent 500-page UN report citing the Eritrean government for systematic use of extrajudicial killing, torture, rape, indefinite national service & forced labor. She is demonstrating a torture technique used in Eritrea.

Actually, there are an estimated 45,000 Eritreans & Sudanese who sought political sanctuary in Israel while others flee across the Mediterranean Sea to Europe. The UN report said countries should provide refuge to Eritreans & establish procedures for incorporating them into society. Is Israel as a Jewish-only state exempted from UN guidelines & ancient human practices of sanctuary? Does Zionist exceptionalism allow Israel to continue jailing Eritreans & other African refugees & deporting them to Uganda & Rwanda to elude accusations of barbaric immigration policies? These are the sarcasms of Israeli immigration policy which continues to recruit Jews from around the world for aliyah & resettlement but denies refuge to those fleeing war & persecution.

Immigration is a human right & Israel is no exception. Open the borders! Stop deporting refugees!

Build the economic, cultural, & academic boycott of Israel (BDS)!

(Photo by Baz Ratner/Reuters)

Refugee camp in France called the “jungle”?

Calais refugee camp ( Michel Spingler:AP) June 26 2015

The Guardian-UK, that bastion of progressive media, posted this photo of a camp set up by immigrants in Calais, France where they’re gathering to make their way without papers through the Channel Tunnel to Britain. The caption read: “Migrants walk past a shelter at a makeshift camp known as the jungle.” Known by whom as the jungle? Certainly not the immigrants.

One stands aghast at the primitive social Darwinism of the Guardian. If they’re going to resurrect jungle as a metaphor for savage & subhuman, let’s take a look at the officials of neoliberalism, the barbaric phase of capitalism. Let’s take a look at the US government & its savage wars; at the European Union (EU) letting thousands of refugees drown in the sea & leaving thousands of Rohingya drifting in death ships without sending aid; at Israel bombing Gaza into smithereens; at the EU & IMF trying to bleed the people of Greece to make an interest payment on a loan. Now we’re talking savage!

We apologize to our brothers & sisters for the primitive idiocy & ugliness of our so-called leaders. We welcome you in the hopes you can join us & kick their asses from here to Kingdom Come.

(Photo by Michel Spingler/AP)

Lindsey Graham: they don’t come dumber

Lindsey Graham (AP:Bill clark) June 25 2015

Lindsey Graham, the US senator from South Carolina, usually looks like he’s half in the wrapper & when he opens his mouth to speak he emits sounds more often smothered in the nether regions–& just as unseemly. But even if he hung off the sauce our man is a loser in the battle of wits & proof-positive that racism makes you stupid.

Last week he claimed the murder of nine Black worshippers was an attack on Christianity. Yesterday in a speech about the massacre on the Senate floor where the chamber is usually half-asleep, he said, “That’s Mideast hate. That’s something I didn’t think we had here but apparently we do.”

Media says he’s known for his bluntness. Actually he’s known for his idiocies. At an AIPAC meeting last month he said “everything that starts with ‘al’ in the Middle East is bad news,” referring to the Arabic word for “the.”

Boneheads like Graham show the power of wealth & privilege in US politics because on a fast food job, he’d be the guy scraping swill.

(Photo of Graham by Bill Clark/AP)

Will Southern Poverty Law Center answer questions about its relationship to Shurat HaDin, the Mossad law firm?

Am I the only progressive who considers the “hate crime” designation ambiguous & deeply problematic? Surely I’m not the only one who thinks that before the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) starts raising money around Charleston it has some questions to answer about its association with Nitsana Darshan-Leitner, a Zionist zealot & the Israeli who founded Shurat HaDin law center which recently won a case against the Palestinian Authority in a NYC court.

Shurat HaDin has connections to the Israeli government & engages in what they call “lawfare,” bringing suits on behalf of ‘terror victims’ against “Islamic & Arab groups engaged in terror attacks”–that is, Palestinian groups, their political leaders, & who they consider the financial patrons. There are reports they are preparing legal actions against BDS groups.

One disturbing fact is Darshan-Leitner’s admission in an interview that she was schooled personally by the SPLC. This is not the first time the SPLC has been accused of facilitating Zionist projects. They have been criticized publicly for identifying antisemitism with anti-Zionism & have not refuted that criticism.

Shurat HaDin models its strategy on the SPLC strategy of bankrupting who they define as hate groups, like the KKK. But the question is, what gives SPLC the authority to define who is a hate group if they cannot distinguish between antisemitism & anti-Zionism? If their commitment is to Israel, will they eventually place BDS groups on their hate list? And if Shurat HaDin can file suit in US courts against Palestinian groups, will SPLC file suit in Israel against systemic racism & violence against Ethiopian Israelis & the ethnic cleansing of Palestinians?

Zionism integrated into neoliberal barbarism

Gaza children (- Wissam Nassar:Xinhua Press:Corbis) June 24 2015

The Boycott, Divestment, & Sanction movement (BDS) called by Palestinian groups against Israel has played an indispensable role in educating about the conflict & building Palestinian solidarity. But who could have imagined how BDS would expose the fault lines of neoliberalism & the deep connections of Zionism to neoliberalism?

That political connection is not just an affinity, but a political interpenetration going back to the inception of Zionism (in the 19th century). A movement emerged to oppose pogroms & persecution of Jews but it was based on supremacist views & it collaborated with & adopted the political methods of colonial powers like England. The die was cast; there was nowhere to go politically that could overcome such corrupt origins.

It’s disheartening to see the role Zionists play in anti-immigration, eugenics programs, even in feminism where they are pro-militarist for Islamophobic reasons. It’s not because all Zionists are inherently reactionary. It’s the deadly combination of supremacy, elitism, & the quid pro quo of the original Mephistophelean bargain that ties it into the very functioning of neoliberal politics.

The growth of BDS on campuses around the world has exposed the nexus between Zionism & neoliberalism. There are increasing attempts, most notably in Australia, the UK, Canada, & US, to brand & outlaw BDS activities & criticisms of Israel as antisemitism. There are also legislative initiatives in several US states. The most prominent campus initiative now is from Janet Napolitano, formerly US Secretary of Homeland Security & now president of the University of California system. She is campaigning for the UC system to adopt the US State Department’s definition of antisemitism which includes criticism of Israel. The campaign has gone on for a few years now since Zionist groups appear to be targeting the UC system to test out their strategy of criminalizing any criticism of Israel.

The State Department’s definition is cribbed almost wholesale from a definition cooked up in 2005 by Zionist ideologues for the Fundamental Rights Agency (FRA) of the European Union (EU). It’s not an official EU definition though Israel & its supporters tout it as such. It includes “demonizing,” “delegitimizing,” & “applying a double-standard to the state of Israel.” It’s a complete affront to the Bill of Rights & freedom of speech. We can criticize our own government but if we sneeze in the direction of Israel, we’re cooked & will be penalized in some unspecified way!? But of course, once criticizing Israel is outlawed, all criticism of the US will be outlawed right after.

As ludicrous as it is, it is also a serious political attack, not just on BDS & Palestinian solidarity, but on civil liberties. We have to ask why criticizing & exposing Israeli apartheid is so pivotal in world politics? And we can eliminate any concern for the welfare of Jews in the considerations. The regimes pushing this stuff don’t care any more about Jews than they do about the African & Middle Eastern refugees drowning in the Mediterranean Sea or the Rohingya adrift & starving in the Andaman Sea.

Israel serves a purpose in international politics. It’s a military fortress in the Middle East to maintain US & European control. It functions like the repressive regimes in Saudi Arabia, Jordan, & Bahrain & the military junta in Egypt–as bulwarks against democracy. The US can militarize Israel up to its eyeballs but that is not security for Jews; it’s a death trap, as anti-Zionist opponents of Israel have always warned.

That’s what makes the Palestinian struggle so historic, so momentous, so vital to win. Their struggle represents the forces for democracy in the Middle East. That’s what makes BDS so important for them to defeat. When Obama chides Netanyahu or when Netanyahu gets lippy with Obama, it doesn’t represent a new strategic orientation of the US. Netanyahu knows damn well the US will not pull the plug on military equipment because Israel is pivotal to neoliberal prospects in the region.

These are Palestinian children in Gaza City playing in the rubble of buildings destroyed in Operation Ethnic Cleansing last summer. The US supplied the weapons to destroy Gaza, it is part of making sure Gaza is not rebuilt, it is a party to Israeli apartheid & ethnic cleansing because Israel serves its economic & political interests.

When the US & other regimes tie BDS to civil liberties, they expose a neoliberal fault line. There’s no reason in the world to panic. But there is every reason to commit ourselves to building BDS & to educating & broadening support for Palestinians.

(Photo by Wissam Nassar/Xinhua Press/Corbis)

The Confederate is an abomination symbolizing white supremacy: it’s gotta go

Confederate tombstone (Kim Hairston:Baltimore Sun) June 24 2015

In the US, the Confederate flag isn’t just a symbol & the furor over flying it at government buildings is not a distraction from more important civil rights matters like opposing violence against the Black community. The ugly-assed thing has gone through several designs with a preoccupation that it not appear a symbol of truce with Black equality. The reason the damn thing matters is because it is the banner & battle cry of white supremacy which refuses to not only acknowledge defeat in the Civil War but in the ongoing battles for democracy & equality for Blacks.

South Carolina’s politicians are blithering now about how it’s time to remove the flag but they’ve put a legislative process in place against such political eventualities. When the heat over the racist murders of nine people dies down, so will the blitherings & all attempts to remove the flag. The same goes for retailers like Walmart, Sears, eBay, & Amazon which say they’ll remove it from sale. Just till the heat dies down, because for white supremacists it’s now become a hot item & still the symbol of defiance.

And that doesn’t even address the other states that wave the thing or incorporate it into their state flags & license plates–or the hundreds of Confederate monuments all over the South & throughout the US. These monuments are maintained at great expense by organizations like the Daughters of the Confederacy & Sons of Confederate Veterans. The monuments aren’t just intended as shrines or even just gestures of contempt but are part of the ongoing campaigns against Black equality. These creeps are committed to white supremacy.

Protests going on to remove the flag are part of the civil rights & Black power struggle–lest in the future we have to face storm troopers carrying the ugly-assed thing in the streets. We should defeat it now while it’s still just hanging like a piece of stinking, dead, fly-infested meat on a flag pole.

(Photo of Confederate tombstone by Kim Hairston/Baltimore Sun)

Immigrants from Africa and Middle East gather in Calais to cross to England

Immigrants at Channel Tunnel (Philippe Huguen:AFP:Getty Images) June 23 2015

This is a group of immigrants in Calais, France near the highway accessing the Channel Tunnel to England where there is a lot of commercial traffic they can hitchhike or stowaway on. The UK foreign office has warned drivers against stowaways but if international solidarity were what it should be, the drivers would be piling them into their lorries.

These immigrants are thus far among the lucky ones who survived crossing the Mediterranean without drowning, managed to evade border patrols & cross the Italian-French border, & escaped the EU naval operations against immigrants that began yesterday. We wish them Godspeed on their journey.

Imagine if all the creativity, tenacity, & organizational brilliance that got them from African & Middle Eastern countries to Calais could be used not for survival but to build a humane world, to address child labor, mass starvation, sweatshops, environmental plunder, inequalities, social divisions & hatreds of every kind. We might not be coming up close on Utopia yet but national borders dividing & isolating peoples from each other would be thought historic monstrosities & school children will study them as historic crimes, marveling at the ancestral foolishness.

Immigration is a human right! Open the borders!

(Photo by Philippe Huguen/AFP/Getty Images)