Central Valley Communists

Making a Comeback

2010-08-19T23:59:00.000-07:00

Hello comrades!
Well, it has been well over a year since my last article.
Life has been very busy, well...to be honest, it's been insane.
I will be writing a new piece soon, hopefully returning to posting regularly.
Thank you for all who are following my blog and I sincerely hope my next few articles won't disappoint.

Racism and Capitalism: A Poem from comrade Matt

2009-09-02T10:09:00.000-07:00

Here is another awesome poem from our comrade Matt.

Racism and capitalism

If you find the confederate flag offensive

So too should you find the nickel

If you find the confederate flag offensive

So too should you find the name of this nations capital

If you find the confederate flag offensive

So too should you find the American flag they all stand

For the same fucking thing…

Racism and capitalism

When rich kids pass through cities

Such as Watts, South Central, East Los Angeles, Compton

They are told to watch their wallets

When Governors, Mayors, city council members

Discuss allocating funds

For cities such as Watts, South Central, East Los Angeles, Compton

We are told to remember the budget

But they still find ways to build more prisons

Ramp up police departments

Staffed by lawless men

Who run wild through these cities

Making the law as they go

They call this service and protection

But they have always had a funny way of looking at things

Like history books that teach our children

To hallow hollow preambles

That include phrases such as

We the people! We the people?

As drafted by slaveholders and land barons

Invaders and treaty breakers

Backstabbers and bastards

Enshrined as our founding fathers

But I hear things are changing

In a slow but steady progress

A uniquely American process

But to be honest

I don’t feel any change

And I don’t see much difference

Between gentrification

And trails of tears the Chavez Ravine

Or post Katrina New Orleans

Cause when the hurricane struck

When the Levees broke

With a few pen strokes

They set in motion what they had already planned

They don’t want them back

It wasn’t negligence it wasn’t incompetence

It was some straight up evil shit

Oh they plan to rebuild New Orleans

Along the lines of an amusement park

A beautiful place to visit

With nowhere to live

They don’t want them back

Who are they?

What do I mean by them?

Let me be clear, let me be clear

I am not talking about a Black, White

Latino, Middle Eastern, Asian divide

I am talking about the fortune five hundred

America incorporated

Give us your tired, your yearning, your huddled masses

So we can work their asses

Give us your coffin ship Irish

So we can turn their children

Into factory workers

Send your sickly Italians

To Ellis Island

Well take em all over the country

Turning them into coal miners

Dying of the black lung

Or in Ludlow Massacres

See back then

If you wanted to form a union

The color of your eyes the complexion of your skin

Offered no protection no you would have to shoot it out

With Carnegie and Rockefellers men

Jim Crow and Jay Gould walking hand in hand

In the robber baron era of white privilege

Poor whites had the right

To mob violence to terrorism

The privilege to lynch

Black men, kill Indians

Beat Mexicans and then starve

Right alongside with them

Because you cannot eat racism

And you cannot clothe your children in racism

And when they question

Mom where are we going to sleep tonight

I don’t know son

But at least were not spics

Is not a suitable answer

Because racism can only be used

By a privileged few

To divide the many

To divide us to divide we the people

We are the people

And you cannot lift a finger for the immigrants

Without the courage to raise your fist

In defense of all of us

And you cannot solve black poverty

Without solving all poverty

Because attacking racism without attacking capitalism

Is like chopping down strange fruit

And leaving the fucking tree

A fun game

2009-07-25T19:08:00.000-07:00

There is a great free online game in which you can create your own nation and run it!
Click here to play Cyber Nations!

Support the Employee Free Choice Act

2009-04-23T11:01:00.000-07:00

Worker's rights are under constant attack by the most reactionary sectors of society daily. One of the most crucial of these rights is to organize a union to protect against employer aggression and provide better/safer work environments. You can sign a petition to put the bill into action by looking to the bottom of this post and clicking the "Join one million strong for the Employee Free Choice Act" button.

The Rand Illusion-Colbert Report

2009-04-09T12:32:00.001-07:00

I saw this video and couldn't stop laughing.
Although light-hearted, this short video is a sharp attack on bourgeois paradigm and religion at the temple of the wealthy individual (as preached by the capitalist messiah Ayn Rand of course).
It goes without saying that the Colbert Report contains no Marxist content whatsoever, but worth watching nonetheless.
Enjoy!

The Colbert Report

Mon - Thurs 11:30pm / 10:30c

The Word - Rand Illusion

colbertnation.com

Colbert Report Full Episodes

Political Humor

NASA Name Contest

Fascism: What it is and How to Stop it

2009-04-01T12:58:00.001-07:00

Too many people in the bourgeois media today throw around the F-bomb with little or
no understanding of what the word means or represents. It has become the new trend for the Right-wing reactionaries to label people on the left as Fascists, culminating in ridiculous and oxymoronic accusations such as "commie fascists" (I didn't make that up, I have seen a conservative nutjob use exactly those words). Libertarians of all stripes attempt to group the fascist with the communist as "statist" or "authoritarian", which is really an attempt for the Right to wash their hands of the fascist movements and project them on the left. However, the Right has never objectively analyzed fascism and it's economic roots. All attempts at such were hindered by their bourgeois intellectual limitations and class bias.

So what is fascism? I will try not to be too long winded but describe it as concisely as possible. Fascism is ultimately a system dominated literally by capitalist executives and their corporations. The fascist state consists of the largest corporations in industry each taking a place of power over that facet of society (health corporation, communication corporation, etc). CEOs act as both corporation overseers and dictators within the government as they set prices and wages for their workers. Power is "delegated" to them from a sort of fascist "labor union" which includes not only workers but the CEOs and management themselves! This situation is intentionally lopsided, giving the latter complete sway within the "union" and its decisions. The workers are left utterly powerless as strikes are outlawed, seen as a product of class war. The fascist state's official ideology is one of class collaboration and devotion to the state monopoly government (i.e. the large corporation dictators). The state, being an instrument of force, actively pursues militarism as a means of protecting monopoly capitalist power from proletarian demands and taking foreign markets/resources.

Property relations remain as they do in capitalist society, which is private ownership.
Entrepreneurship and competition is encouraged by the state, so long as these smaller private enterprises do not interfere or challenge the supreme economic authority over capital of the state monopoly corporations. Despite the claims of fascists themselves that the system they support is anti-capitalist, they are the most violent and ravenous protectors of private greed. Adolf Hitler himself was involved in creating private businesses for his family members. If Fascism is anti-capitalist socialism, then ask yourself if Lenin ever started a private business. Nazi Germany would have never been possible if it weren't for the power of big capitalists such as the Thyssen family. Ultimately, fascist economics is violent monopoly capitalism which upholds the profit and power of the monopoly class over the proletariat.

As I stated earlier, fascist philosophy entails that the individual dedicate himself entirely to the nation and its state monopoly government. He must entrust those CEOs, fascist party leaders, and generals with control over his life. To him, his country and government is first; being a proud and true German or Italian, for instance, is most important. Those people who are deemed alien to their culture can never be assimilated. Racial purity for the fascist is the key and minority populations are the problem. As a Jew or other minority, you are not seen as able to overcome your "selfish" pursuit of your own greedy aspirations which are separate from that of being German, Italian, British, etc. Should the minority or Jew be able to overcome this "selfishness", then they would be exploited and separated into their own societies cut-off from majority populations; a sort of racist conception not too different from "separate but equal" scams. As you can see, the minority is treated as a disease capable of destroying the unity of nation and state. Therefore, these potential "problems" are to be dealt with in the harshest degree by the fascist state.

In short, the fascist society has a few central components. First is private ownership of property with slightly limited competition. Secondly, fanatic devotion to the culture, nation, and state (CEOs and generals as supreme government dictators, legitimized militarism\xenophobia). Third, class collaboration; the working class giving up their power to the monopoly capitalists and abandoning class war, including the right to organize unions and strike. Lastly, the worship of the individual as a driving force in society. These ideological foundations are not only anti-socialist in general but completely born of Right wing paradigm. Fascist society is impossible without laissez-fair and late imperialist capitalism. For instance, the progression of the capitalist market and competition created huge corporations which grew larger after each economic crisis. As many businesses fell through, these corporations ate them up and dominated the market. Finance would grow to such an extent that it would merge with industrial capital and later literally obtain seats of power within government. The capitalists, now inseparable from the state, would protect themselves from collapse and profit loss using force/coercion from state mechanisms. As capitalism falters and grasps for air in this late stage of development which Lenin called imperialism (our current stage of development), nothing but more force could protect the legitimacy of the claim the capitalist giants have over distribution of wealth. Thus, the only way to keep private profit alive would be fascism. This could not have been, however, without the central tenants of laissez-fair. These include the sanctity of private property, no government interference with the market. This last facet of market fundamentalism is most important as it allows the formation of business associations, cartels, corporations who hold unrivaled wealth and power. With little government control over economy or economic procedure, CEOs are fully capable of entering government and acting in their own favor. Furthermore, traditional conservative trends such as negation of class conflict and fear of labor rights play perfectly into the hands of monopoly capitalist interest. All the while, the working class is exploited by selling their labor for not even a fraction of the wealth they generate for the capitalist.It is appropriate to quote George Dimitrov, a great Marxist-Leninist thinker, from his report to the 7th World Congress of the Comintern:

"...fascism in power ... [is]the open terrorist dictatorship of the most reactionary, most chauvinist and most imperialist elements of finance capital. (p.2)"

The privileged bourgeois who triumph their individual wealth stores over their fellow human being will gladly embrace force to keep the working class in a state of destitution; exploited and oppressed in the utmost violent manner. The capitalists knows nothing more than reducing profit loss.

As Dimitrov points out, Fascism is no ideology of working class origin:

"No, fascism is not a power standing above class, nor government of the petty bourgeoisie or the lumpen-proletariat over finance capital. Fascism is the power of finance capital itself. It is the organization of terrorist vengeance against the working class and the revolutionary section of the peasantry and intelligentsia. In foreign policy, fascism is jingoism in its most brutal form, fomenting bestial hatred of other nations."

The power of finance capital can only survive if it remains imperialistic, always gobbling up new markets and resources like a ravenous beast. Profit can only be gained by dividing up the world and it's labor.

So how do we prevent this from happening? The proletariat, i.e. the sector of society which has only their labor to sell, must seize the means of production and destroy the old bourgeois property relations and create new ones; common ownership of property. The working class must organize their own party and government which represents their interests. The government must be of the proletariat for the proletariat, against bourgeois reaction and imperialism. We must rid ourselves of nationalism/xenophobia and embrace socialist internationalism. Bourgeois dictatorships must always be resisted as they are the reason for concentration of wealth, poverty, disease, racism, sexism, and war. Class war must never be negated or forgotten but accepted and fought as a proletariat defender. No amount of private bail outs, printing of money, or war will alleviate the suffering from capitalism's contradictions; the whole system is falling and we must hasten it to create a socialist society. Failure to do such will be catastrophic for the proletariat and the human species in general. Fascism, a 100% Right-wing ideology, comes to fruition in the absence of socialism.

*For Georgi Dimitrov's complete report to the 7th Congress of the Communist International, follow this link:
http://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/dimitrov/works/1935/08_02.htm

The Lie of Soviet Anti-Semitism

2009-01-26T19:25:00.001-08:00

Another piece from my good comrade and friend Micheal Wood of the Gus Hall Action Club.

The Lie of Soviet Anti-Semitism

(A few preliminary words: V.I. Lenin was right: "Shame on those who foment hatred towards the Jews!" Down with the lie that equates anti-Zionism with anti-Semitism! Zionism is reactionary bourgeois nationalism that upholds Israel's state policies of aggression in league with the forces of Wall Street imperialism. "It is U.S. imperialism which has bolstered and dominated the Israeli economy and has supplied Israel with arms (and billions in grants, credits and cash). It has followed such a policy because it accords with the interests of the dominant sections of U.S. finance capital in the Middle East, with their desire to use Israel as a weapon against the Arab liberation movement and its threat to U.S. oil investments."--Hyman Lumer.)

Gus Hall, Marxist-Leninist former leader of the Communist Party of the United States, said that "Zionism is an unmitigated force for reaction and deadly enemy of the Jewish (and Palestinian) people.
" Instead of condemning the Zionist expansionist imperialist state policies of the aggressive Israeli ruling class, capitalist propaganda screams that Jews were persecuted in the former socialist Soviet Union! The USSR is slandered as the land of anti-Semitism.
But this lie, as Gus Hall expressed eloquently, "turns historical facts on their head!" Victor Perlo noted that "such propaganda is forced to nitpick at dubious or marginal cases (in order to) distract attention away from the massive and continuous expressions of anti-Semitism and racism in the United States and other capitalist countries, as well as the racist actions and anti-Semitic actions--stoning of synagogues, etc., which have no counterpart in the USSR.
" Gus Hall, the great Communist, tore through the lie about the USSR: "the truth is there is anti-Semitism. But it is in the capitalist world. And, like racism, it is on the rise right here in the United States.
" (Victor Perlo, Economics of Racism USA, 1980, Third Printing, International Publishers; Gus Hall, "The Big Lie and the Jewish-American Community," in Anti-Semitism and Zionism, First Printing, 1987, International Publishers)

Before the October Socialist Revolution of 1917, anti-Semitism was whipped up and frenzied chauvinist mobs attacked Jewish communities. The Tsar used anti-Semitism as a weapon to divide working class, peasant and oppressed peoples in order to carry out a monstrous robbery of the people. The great Communist leader V.I. Lenin, an enemy of anti-Semitism, spoke out: "Shame on accursed Tsarism which tortured and persecuted the Jews.
Shame on those who foment hatred towards the Jews!" And Lenin ripped the smokescreen off of anti-Semitism: "Capitalists foment hatred towards the Jews in order to blind the workers, to divert their attention away from the real enemy of the working people--capital.
" (Lenin, Anti-Jewish Pogroms, 1919)

(V.I. Lenin: ’It is not the Jews who are the enemies of the working people. The enemies of the working people are the capitalists of all countries.’)
Socialism in the former Soviet Union, by smashing capitalism’s material basis for racism, achieved unprecedented gains for Jews and masses of distinct nationalities.
Anti-Semitism, rotten in every fiber, was a "throwback to the past" days of an exploitative society and, as Hall revealed: "Soviet socialism completely wiped out the degrading oppression, the poverty-stricken, pogrom ridden ghetto existence of the Jewish people under czarism.
" Henry Winston, a deceased African-American militant with the Communist Party USA, witnessed the gains made by oppressed peoples in the USSR and spoke out boldly: "the Soviet Union (was) a multi-racial, multinational society born out of a struggle based on the solidarity of the Russian working classes of more than 50 oppressed nations and peoples.
" The great Communist Gus Hall was indignant: "The Soviet Union is accused of anti-Semitism but it (was) the only country in the history of the world that had pursued a policy of affirmative action, the Leninist policy of equality and justice for all peoples and nationalities!" And in the former socialist Soviet Union, racist, nationalist and anti-Semitic propaganda and actions were illegal.
(Henry Winston, Strategy for a Black Agenda; Gus Hall, "The Big Lie and the Jewish-American Community," in Anti-Semitism and Zionism, First Printing, 1987, International Publishers)

Jews were educated, not persecuted, in the working class' first homeland of socialism.
A book which examined the socialist countries reveals that "more Jews attended college in the USSR than in Israel, despite the fact that the Jewish population of the USSR was smaller than that of Israel. The percentage of Jews among Soviet college students (was) twice as high as the percentage of Jews in the Soviet population as a whole." And "according to Soviet sources, the USSR (had) a greater proportion of college graduates per 1,000 Jews than any other country in the world.
" (Erwin Marquit, The Socialist Countries, 1981, Third Printing, MEP)

Capitalist America, not the former Soviet Union, is a cesspool of anti-Semitism.
As Gus Hall said, "the Jewish people in the U.S. (overwhelmingly working class) are subjected to discrimination in employment, housing and other aspects of life. And they are a chief target of the fascist ultra-Right.
" We must fight against anti-Semitism and anti-Jewish discrimination in the United States! We also have to speak out in America, along with progressive Jewish people, against Zionist "bourgeois nationalism" that is "a base of support to Israel’s policies of aggression.
" Down with the Zionist lie that equates anti-Zionism with anti-Semitism! Zionist government policies make Israel U.S. imperialism’s expansionist watchdog in the Middle East, oppressing Arab peoples and "separating Jewish working people from other workers and (tying) them to the Jewish capitalists.
" As Black Communist Henry Winston said: "Zionism is imperialism; it is racism.
" (Gus Hall, Our Nation’s Crisis and How to Solve It; Henry Winston, "Against Apologists for Imperialism, Zionism, Racism," Anti-Semitism and Zionism, First Printing, 1987, International Publishers)

Check out the Gus Hall Action Club blog at http://gushallactionclub. blogspot. com/

Some People Say I am Biased

2009-01-18T22:57:00.000-08:00

Another piece of proletarian poetry by our own comrade Matt.
Enjoy!
(Btw, look out for a new blog post covering the topic of a vanguard party)

Some people say I am biased

Some people say I am biased
They say you know you got a lot to say
About how bad this country really is
But what about the other side huh
What are we gonna do about all these illegal aliens
Listen up assholes
Cause I am only going to say this once
First off
No you know what
Fuck that
Illegal aliens? Illegal aliens?
What the fuck you talking about man
Bootlegged copies of ET
Cause I know damn sure
You are not talking about members
Or friends of my family
Cause if you are let me assure you
I am not related to ewoks
Extra terrestrials or Marvin the fucking Martian
Some people say I am biased
You are God damn right I am biased
You are talking about destroying families
Wrecking communities and not in some distant land
You are talking about people I grew up with
Cause mom's got papers son's got papers
But dad doesn’t
And though my birth certificate reads American
I am not more you than I am them
And personally I wouldn’t whipe my ass
With your documents
They might stain my bowels
Some people say I am biased
They say you know you got a lot to say
About our economic system
But which side are you really on?
How do you propose we win the war on terrorism
To which I respond
I don’t see how that correlates but
Terrorism? Really? Terrorism?
Be they the Taliban, UNITA, ARENA,
Pol Pot after being deposed by Vietnamese communists
The contras, the KLA or the KKK
This country does business with terrorists
In fact those cats are just subcontract
America is in the business of terrorism
And they are in it to win it
Don’t believe check out the financial stats
On Boeing and McDonnell Douglas
They stay in the black
Like Blackwater
A whole army of mercenaries
Running roughshod in Iraq
Accountable to no one
You know after Katrina
They were patrolling New Orleans
And in much stronger force than FEMA
Terrorism how about the racist PD’s
Seems every few months they make the news
But they are gunning down dudes
Daily
Don’t talk to me about terrorism
I have lived ghettoes and barrios
I know terrorism all to well
Some people say I am biased
Saying you know you talk a lot about problems
But I don’t hear a whole lot of solutions
Whats your answer
That’s easy
Abolishing private property
The complete abolition of capitalism
That’s easy
Getting there is the hard part
Cause you see I am talking revolution
And I know the odds
And I know the historical conditions
And at this point in history
I know how ridiculous that must seem
But when this shit does pop off
I wanna be eagle scout ready
I am talking revolution
And you are God damn right I am biased
And you are God damn right I am angry
But I am not using poetry
To be some dystopian
Offering no solutions
Misanthropic …. Loser!!!
NO I AM TALKING REVOLUTION
And I am in it to win it
Some people say I am biased
But then again
Some people aint got shit to say

Nueva Cancion and The Eternal City- Poetry by Matt

2008-12-23T12:26:00.001-08:00

Nueva cancion

I don’t sing I spit
But if I did
I would like to think
I would sing neuva cancions
Like that peoples singer
The martyr Victor Hara
Aqui mi quedo
“Yo no quiero la patria dividida
ni por siete cuchillos desangrada”
I don’t want to see the country divided
Or stabbed to death by seven knives
I would sing
Aqui mi quedo
And if that didn’t work
If something was lost in translation
If I forgot my Spanish
If I just couldn’t sing la neuva cancion
I think I would like to
Change directions
Shift my tone
Twist my tongue
Maybe try my hand
At some Irish fight songs
And sing out
“This land was always ours
Twas the proud land of our fathers
It belongs to us and them
And not to any of the others
Let them go boys
Let them go boys
Let them all go to where the rivers all dry”
Cause I
Like Victor Jara or Shane Mcgowan
Aqui mi quedo
Here I stand
Speak of me as I am
Cause like that
Great people’s singer
Old man river
Paul Robson
I just keep rolling along
Cause while I don’t sing I spit
I too “was born by the river
In a little old tent
And just like that river
I have been running ever since”
But I am “bringing it on home”
And reaching back into the annals of history
Into the thirties to prophecies
Wandering folk singers
Because like Woody Guthrie
I am on a path bound for glory
“and in this life you’ll ramble
and in this life you’ll roam
I’ve never seen an outlaw
take a family from his home”
Because Bank of America’s
First born didn’t take their first steps
In that kitchen
Washington Mutual didn’t
Bring home from college
Their first really serious girlfriend
And neither did American general
Or Chase Manhattan
That home is yours
Because we are the public
Private interests are the enemy
And “we gotta fight the power
We gotta fight the powers that be”
And rage against the machine
And let them know
“Fuck you I wont do what you told me
No Fuck you I wont do what you told me”
And create new pathways to new days
Being blazed in new ways
And in more ways than one
So when the revolution comes
I will step away from the mic
And bear whatever burden
Carry whatever banner
And be wherever and whatever it needs me to be
But till that day
I am gonna say what I say
Preach what I preach
Teach what I teach
And if you say I am wasting my time
I say watch what you say because
I don’t debate with liars
And I don’t suffer any fools
And like an angry Iraqi journalist
I be throwing my shoes
“So comrades, come rally
And the last fight let us face”
Cause this is the nueva cancion
Breathing music and poetry into that new day

The eternal city

So they televise the rise
Right before your very eyes
Of a new black bourgeoisie
And even if you’re not black
You think hey that could be me
Hey he did it we did it
Times are changing in the eternal city
Little by little increment by increment
You don’t want to get carried away
But you imagine this must be how the sun first rose
Before the onset of that cruel and tragic history
We are going back to the beginning
Getting it right this time forging new histories
It’s a new beginning
Even the sun sheds light differently
These days in the eternal city
And you don’t want to get carried away
But you think today
Is your day built by your involvement
You made this happened
You not only lived it
You gave it birth you gave it breath
Change began with you
But I think you are getting a little carried away
On these winds of change
And these wings of hope
Change the name change the time
Ride the wave of history
Its bound to trickle down right
I hear the church bells ringing about change and progress
And they draw from a supposed rich history
Of overcoming boundaries and tests
But while watching the glow on faces
And listening to others speak
I have set my mind to reference checks
Fingering through all the primary texts
And I have come to see
That progress and new prospects in the eternal city
Means nothing but the opportunity
To line pockets with white supremacists
And leave everyone else in the dust
In the streets, in a prison cell
Because even without the color line
There is still only so much room behind
The velvet rope, on the first floor
In first classes
Through the corridors of power
In that class
And the walls are closing in
The waiting list to be VP
That VIP room is actually shrinking not expanding
And no amount of contracts
Paper stacks
Or police forces that enforce them both
Will ever convince me
That private property has divine right
To anything or to anyone and certainly not to me
And with all this talk of hope
I remain unconvinced
And I want to believe
I want to believe
I want belief
But I know
Hope is something offered
When facts are absent
Proof is scarce
And something else is really happening
And something is happening to be sure
But I have read enough history to know
That capes of good hope
Lead only often to looting of hope diamonds
Leaving those desperate for hope
Hoping for a better tomorrow
Betting bottom dollars
On days that never come
For suns that will never shine
Praying for the next boom
The next bubble
Hoping it wont burst
Leave you singing
“Once I built a railroad, I made it run, made it race against time.
Once I built a railroad; now it's done. Brother, can you spare a dime?”
And I can hear the march just as well
As anyone
I can hear that sound
That is the sound of one thing being said
And everyone hearing something else
And I can see the news where the money is being accrued
And I can see the streets and know where it is not
And I can see the news and hear of the dead
And know where the borrowed money is being spent
And in the long run we are all dead
But in the here and now
Only the dishonest lie to themselves
And not a damn thing changes in the eternal city
Lets burn this mother down

Even if the Truong Son Mountains Burn-Revolutionary Poetry

2008-12-08T01:05:00.000-08:00

Here is the first piece of working class revolutionary poetry contributed by my good comrade Matt for a section of the blog dedicated entirely to his artwork.
Enjoy art with revolutionary proletarian character!

Even if the truong son mountains burn

Some people say there is no such thing as a stupid question

That’s a lie

People come up to me and ask me stupid shit

All the time

Heres an example

Say you know you’re political

Do you think Iraq is our generations Vietnam

You stupid arrogant presumptuous prick

Vietnam was never ours to begin with

You know people always running their mouths

About something called the Vietnam era

Also something known as the sixties

Which evokes memories

Of marching in the street

Free sex, protests FREE SEX

Electric acid kool aid tests

Flower children hippies

And who could forget

The grateful dead

Jamming on Haight Ashbury

I wonder how the Vietnamese

Look back on the sixties

A decade which brought them carpet

Bombing of their countryside

And various acts of genocide

Such as landmines that the us government

Still will not offer the locations of

But no words could do justice to the inhumanity unleashed

Nor would they even bring a modicum of justice to the Vietnamese

So instead sit back and get comfy

Because I am gonna tell you all a little could be story

To all potential and for all would be revolutionaries

And while I can teach you certain facts

And certain principles

I cannot teach you courage

And I cannot teach you balls

Tonight’s lesson

Revolves

Around Ho Chi Minh

Whose balls were so big

They could not fit

In North Vietnam alone

That’s why they had to unify the country

In nineteen nineteen a Vietnamese waiter

Sometimes cook sometimes gardener

Stormed the treaty of Versailles

And demanded independence for Vietnam

His name was Ngyuen tat thanh

But the world would come to know him

As Ho Chi Minh

Who before he ever picked up the works of Marx or Lenin

Knew first hand of imperial humiliation

And subjugation

You see two thirds of world is ocean

And most of that remaining third

Are broken up into chunks of land called third world countries

They used to just be called colonies

That is until just about the nineteen fifties

The Vanguards at smashing the past five centuries of history

Without a doubt have been the Cubans and Vietnamese

In nineteen forty five

With the first abdication Bao Dai

The French slash Japanese slash French again

Later still American puppet

(Where do they find these guys)

Ho Chi Minh

Would declare Vietnam independent

But that was just the beginning

But the story begins a little earlier

You see before he read the works of Marx and Lenin

He saw the humiliation and subjugation of his people

All done in the name of humanism

And he knew it was bullshit

Because these conclusions are quite natural

When they argue you that you are less than human

You see French imperialists argued they were Annam

Not to be confused with a man and certainly not a Frenchmen

But the French would come to know this man

As ho chi Minh

Who closed the first Indochina war

In nineteen fifty four

With what maybe come to be seen

As the most significant military victory

Of the past five centuries

Dien Bien Phu

Then the Americans came in

Sending in the poorest of the poor

To fight the war

Against Vietnamese independence

In that first wave they sent the harlem black

The bordertown spic

Midwestern quote end quote trailer trash

In the name of freedom and democracy

If it weren’t so tragic

The Vietnamese might have seen it as funny

You see for centuries

The French tried the same thing

Instead they called it

Fraternity equality and liberty

The Japanese called it spheres of co prosperity

And while playing with words and dirty tricks

Might work with

In name and flag alone nationalists

Fighting for flag independence

Ho chi minh was a

Anti imperialist

I realize an imperialist is an imperialist

Vietnam must know independence even if the truong son mountains burn

I said it I meant it

Just give me the facts and statistics

For every one we kill of you

You can kill ten of us

And even at those odds

We will still win

Marxist Leninist

And the moral of the story is this

We all have the opportunity

To shape and change

The course of history

In 1919 a Vietnamese waiter

Sometimes cook sometimes gardener

Stormed the treaty of Versailles

His name was Ngyuen Tat Thanh

But the world would come to know him

As Ho Chi Minh

Socialism Won't Come from Wall Street

2008-11-03T23:25:00.000-08:00

In the wake of one of the most extreme (although characteristic of a capitalist system) economic crisis in American history many pundits, angry Right-wing bloggers, and coffee shop liberals are dropping the "S" bomb more than usual. One cannot turn on the news or open up a newspaper without someone crying "socialist" in regards to the Wall Street bailout or the Obama campaign. In reality, giving extremely wealthy CEOs several billions of dollars (over 700 billion to be exact) of working class tax payer money for their screw ups in a wildly fluctuating capitalist market is the furthest from socialism that one could get. This sort of bourgeois fear-baiting misinformation is frustrating to say the least for sincere, honest, and true Marxist-Leninists who are out in the fold fighting for working class power and socialism. Even more upsetting is the claims of certain self-proclaimed "socialists" that this bailout is a great idea. I have had enough with the blatant lies, so I will set the record straight on exactly what socialism is and isn't from a Marxist-Leninist perspective.

In essence, socialism is a transitional stage of human development between capitalism and communism. In the current capitalist stage of development, the means of production (land, factories, machines, capital, etc.) are privately owned by a very small number of individuals who extract profit from the unpaid labor of their workers. The workers make up the class of what Marx called the proletariat who own no real wealth, property, or capital. The only thing they have of worth is the labor they sell to the capitalist. Capitalism itself has become increasingly imperialistic over it's development, as Lenin pointed out. This is due to the inherent contradictions of the capitalist mode of production, the anarchy of market forces, and competition between private firms leading to domination by a few cartels. As these contradictions become more acute, the working class (the creators of the very germ of all value and subsequently wealth) becomes more exploited and seeks to eradicate capitalism by means of revolution. What capitalism is replaced with is socialism, a system in which the means of production come under common ownership by the proletariat. The proletariat then reorganizes and assumes control of the state itself, making it a uniquely working class power mechanism fighting solely for its interests against that of the toppled bourgeois (and their ideology). During the socialist stage of development, state owned enterprises are used to redistribute wealth equally among the working class regardless of gender, sexual orientation, ethnicity, or religious preference. Out of such a relation, private profit at the expense of the working class is impossible. After the old capitalist ruling class, their bourgeois ideology, mode and relations of production are destroyed and replaced by working class rule, exploitative class relations would also have been rendered an anachronism. Only then would society have reached a communist stage of development free of classes, exploitation, and poverty.

I know what you're asking: "Well you said socialists nationalize enterprises and that's just what this bailout is doing. How can this not be socialist?" Well, mere nationalization is not socialism, it is just nationalization. Socialist governments may nationalize certain enterprises to fight exploitative capitalist practices, neo-colonialism, and class domination. Nationalization in this sense is done with the ultimate aim of building socialism and redistributing wealth among the working class (I cannot stress this enough, as I bold the hell out of these statements). Nationalization of private debts and/or enterprises set in place by state monopoly capitalist societies such as our own, however, do so only temporarily for the sole purpose of saving capitalism from itself and subsequent destruction. In the former example of nationalization, the working class is the ultimate benefactor. In the latter, however, big capitalists are protected at the cost of already struggling working class families. This is not socialism in any way, shape, or form. What we have here with the Wall Street bailout is and example the bourgeois government utilizing state power to defend the ruling class status and wealth at the expense of the proletariat. This, my friends, is the ugly face of the dictatorship of the bourgeoisie.

H.G. Wells, a famous socialist English author, interviewed Stalin in the wake of the Great Depression and following New Deal Era. These were extremely trying times for the working class of the United States. Capitalism was floundering and the free market was accountable for such a fall. In order to prevent the ultimate collapse of the market system, many government regulations were being implemented. Much like today, these regulation policies were being dubbed socialist. Wells brought up the developments in the United States and incorrectly stated that the American capitalists were striving to become socialist. Stalin responded by saying:

" The aim which the Americans are pursuing, arose out of the economic troubles, out of the economic crisis. The Americans want to rid themselves of the crisis on the basis of private capitalist activity, without changing the economic basis. They are trying to reduce to a minimum the ruin, the losses caused by the existing economic system. Here, however, as you know, in place of the old, destroyed economic basis, an entirely different, a new economic basis has been created. Even if the Americans you mention partly achieve their aim, i.e., reduce these losses to a minimum, they will not destroy the roots of the anarchy which is inherent in the existing capitalist system. They are preserving the economic system which must inevitably lead, and cannot but lead, to anarchy in production. Thus, at best, it will be a matter, not of the reorganisation of society, not of abolishing the old social system which gives rise to anarchy and crises, but of restricting certain of its excesses. Subjectively, perhaps, these Americans think they are reorganising society; objectively, however, they are preserving the present basis of society. " (Marxism Versus Liberalism, J.V. Stalin, 1934).

Stalin was very correct in his assessment of government regulation of the market economy.
There was, as is the same for today's situation, no intention of reorganizing society along a working class line. This state monopoly tactic was devised only as a way to preserve the power and dictatorship of the capitalist, the absolute ruler of our era.

I find the claims of the Right calling presidential candidate Barack Obama a Marxist less than amusing. These jackasseries are a mere part of the fear-baiting campaign that the McCain camp has used in the most horrid means imaginable. One thing should be clear, Obama is no socialist. His interests are clearly bourgeois as he supports the imperialist war on terror to the fullest extent. Obama has defamed the Cuban revolution and defended the privilege of the capitalist ruling class on national T.V. Barack's economic policies are in lock-step with the typical regulated market capitalist line of the Democratic Party. It is simply a case of misrepresentation, Obama is not radical or as Left as he is portrayed. Anyone who does not believe this simple fact should visit projectvotesmart.com and check his voting record and speeches for yourselves, you will not find him quoting Marx, Engels, or Lenin.

With that said, one can only conclude that this Wall Street bailout plan and Obama's campaign are about as socialist as Ronald Reagan's greasy f**ked up hair-do. When you are faced with such lies as these, just disregard them as quickly as you would yesterday's trash. Those who own the means of production also own the means in which information is conveyed, fight their lies with truth and reason. Socialism is for the working class and against Wall Street tyranny.

John McCain: Leader of the Corporate Manifest Destiny

2008-10-31T01:36:00.000-07:00

This video, produced by yours truly, briefly describes John McCain’s fight against the indigenous Navajo-Di’neh people of Arizona. He authored a bill back in 2006 that would forcibly relocate the indigenous by 2008 from their ancestral land in order for capitalist mining giants such as Peabody Coal to suck the land dry. It is of no surprise that John McCain and the bourgeois ruling elite do not allow such injustices to reach the eyes and ears of the American and global working class. The capitalists own the means of production, and subsequently own the means of which information is dispersed. Stand against such crimes perpetrated by the worst of ruling circles, vote against McCain.

The Soviet Union: Where Workers Had Power

2008-10-10T17:21:00.000-07:00

This article was written by my good friend and comrade Micheal Wood of the Gus Hall Action Club, based out of Minnesota.
Thank you so much for your contribution, companero!

Written especially for the Central Valley Communists blog by Michael of the Gus Hall Action Club:

Gus Hall, the former Marxist-Leninist leader of the Communist Party USA, said that the former Soviet Union was a society where workers had power. Gus Hall considered the Soviet Union as "the most powerful, successful and influential socialist society. " He explained the Russian Socialist Revolution in a few words. "In 1917," Hall writes, "the working class of the Soviet Union decided they didn't need the owners who were getting richer while the people got poorer. In fact it was just this class of leeches that held back all social advances for working people. So the working people took over. " (Gus Hall, "Where Workers Have Power," Working Class USA, 1987, International Publishers)
William Z. Foster, the Marxist-Leninist leader of the Communist Party USA preceding Hall, pointed out that "the Communist Party (was) the brain and heart and nerves of the Russian Revolution, and so it must be in any proletarian revolution. " (William Z. Foster, Toward Soviet America, 1932, International Publishers)
And the ruling capitalist classes of the world freaked out! V.I. Lenin, great Communist leader of the Russian 1917 Socialist Revolution, answered their capitalist slanders of the Soviet Union eloquently. V.I. Lenin said: "for every hundred mistakes which we commit and which the bourgeoisie and their lackeys are dinning into the ears of the world, ten thousand great and heroic deeds are performed. " (Lenin, Letter to American Workers, 1918)
In his book, Working Class USA, the American Communist Gus Hall exposes the capitalist lies about the Soviet Union. The former USSR was a society where, Gus Hall stated, "workers (had) power. " John Eaton, in Political Economy, notes that: "Socialism is planned production for use on the basis of public ownership of the means of production. " Leontyev said that "the building of socialism begins only after state power passes from the hands of the bourgeoisie into the hands of the working class. " And socialism in the former USSR, Gus Hall wrote in an essay entitled "Where Workers (Had) Power," brought free education, medical and dental care. Employment was guaranteed and workers were the majority on all government bodies. The socialist economy guaranteed that there was no economic crisis or corporate capitalist profit. Racism and discrimination were outlawed as criminal offenses. Unions were a valued part of socialist society. There had been no unemployment in the Soviet Union since 1930. And all profits from production went to funds to provide for the mass welfare, paid vacations and housing for the Soviet people. (Gus Hall, "Where Workers Have Power," Working Class USA, 1987, International Publishers)

(V.I. Lenin: 'for every hundred mistakes which we commit and which the bourgeoisie and their lackeys are dinning into the ears of the world, ten thousand great and heroic deeds are performed. ')
Karl Marx and Frederick Engels taught that communist society had two phases. Socialism, which Karl Marx referred to as "the first phase of communist society" is a transitional stage to highly developed communism, "a higher phase of communist society," where there is a classless social system and full social equality of all members of society. (Marx, Critique of the Gotha Programme, 1875)
And socialism, "the first phase of communist society," in the former Soviet Union brought enormous gains to the working class. Gus Hall explained that the working class and unions, not the capitalists, called the shots in the former Soviet Union and socialist countries. "In the socialist countries," Gus Hall said, "workers are their own bosses. They are the real economic and political power. There is no drive for maximum private profits, there are no privately-owned corporations, and no tax shelters inducing companies to close plants and move to more profitable locations leaving human devastation in their wake...
"The basic truth is that it is only in a socialist society that trade unions acquire real political and economic power because they work, speak and act for the class in power--the working class...Under socialism people come first and profits are made to serve them. " (Gus Hall, "Where Workers Have Power," Working Class USA, 1987, International Publishers)
William Z. Foster correctly said that "In a world thrown into deepening disorder and demoralization caused by the growing general crisis (of capitalism), the superiority of the system of planned socialist economy stands out like a great mountain!" (William Z. Foster, Toward Soviet America, 1932, International Publishers)
And V.I. Lenin was absolutely right that, with the birth of the Soviet Union, "a new era in world history has begun!" (Lenin, The Third International and It's Place In History, 1919)

The Nazi-Bush Connection: CEOs of the World Have No Countries

2008-09-30T00:08:00.001-07:00

As Marx said, theexchange of commodities is one of the most common place and crucial activities to occur within a capitalist society. Profit, extracted from surplus value of unpaid labor of workers, is passed along from ruling class circles internationally by means of trade. This drive for profit is the fire which compels the bourgeois entrepreneur to invest and engage in relations with his foreign counterparts (concurrently increasing levels of exploitation of the working class), who also share the same goal of expansion. Politicians, most of whom come from the ranks of these individuals, support such relationships by passing legislation that opens up new international markets and pools of labor to be exploited. These transactions now have full legal sway, legitimized by the sanctity of private property and enforced by the militaries and police from each respective nation doing business. From looking at this reality, it is self-evident that the power of capital has negated any national boundaries, notions of sovereignty, and the natural rights of working people who create the wealth that the capitalists enjoy. This ever expanding growth and blinding speed by which capital moves, coupled with the advances in communications technology that helped make this speed possible (and vice versa), created what we know today as globalization. What does this mean for the accountability of multinational corporations? If capital can move so easily across the globe, then where does the true loyalty of a company lie when their country of origin is at war with another they simultaneously engage in trade and help to make profit with? What does this quandary say about nature of capitalism?

Let's examine a certain scandal within the Bush family. That's right, none other than the latest political dynasty of the United States, from which we have the pleasure to call two of it's members commander-in-chief. President Dubya's grandfather, the late Prescott Bush, was placed on the directing board of the Union Bank Corporation prior to World War II. This bank was set up in order to provide a place within the U.S. for one of Germany's most powerful and rich industrial families, the Thyssens. Patriarch August Thyssen set up an international connection of banks with which they would stow away assets overseas if their operations were ever threatened, as such was the case in World War I. His son Fritz inherited the corporate empire just as the German economy was collapsing under the weight of various sanctions placed upon it by the victorious nations of the first World War. Looking for the best investment with which he could save his fortune, Fritz became enthralled with Adolf Hitler, who was agitating for power. The Thyssens threw their financial lot in with the Nazi party, Fritz even became a member. At this time UBC, directed by Prescott Bush, sold eight million dollars worth of U.S. treasury bonds, gold, steel, and other materials to Germany. This arrangement continued and coincided with Hitler's rise to power and the invasion of Poland in 1939, which was in part financed by Prescott Bush's company. An even more surprising discovery was made with the relations UBC had with another private banking firm "Consolidated Silesian Steel Company (CSSC)," which was "based in mineral rich Silesia on the German-Polish border" (Campbell 2004). This company was known for profiting from slave labor in concentration camps, most notably from the infamous Auschwitz. Prescott Bush sat on the boards of three companies confiscated by the Office of Alien Property after World War II for operating in benefit of the German Nazi government and war effort, trading with the enemy. Not surprisingly, Prescott Bush would go on to become senator and found the Bush political and financial dynasty. His son George H.W. Bush would go on to Yale, join Skull and Crossbones, and become president of the United States, as his son would after him.

There you have it. The identical interests of the bourgeois, i.e. maximum profit, had transcended national barriers and even the devotion to one's nation that was trumpeted and preached to the working class of the U.S., the U.K, etc. These very same people that had harangued the proletariat to pick up a rifle and run blindly into machine gun fire in the name of their country were helping their capitalist counterparts in Nazi Germany build the same tanks that lobbed shells at our countrymen. This just goes to show that capitalist drive for profit knows no boundaries or allegiance to any flag, only that for new opportunities to accumulate wealth, including war. Instances such as this are not isolated cases, nor are they mere anomalies. Rather, this is an exposure of the very nature of capitalism. The same was true of revolutionary Russia during World War I. The Russian bourgeoisie, while sparing no effort in trying to keep the proletariat and peasants fighting on the front line with no food, simultaneously began talk of allowing the German army in to prevent any democratic worker's uprising. What patriotism! This is why the working class of all the world must realize petty nationalism is a tool of the ruling class to extract maximum profit, to instigate meaningless war against peoples who have never met to make more money. It must be true what Marx said then, that workingmen of the world have no country, considering the same is correct of international capitalists.