Tomás Ó Flatharta

Looking at Things from the Left

Archive for the ‘USA’ Category

“Be Patient and Never Give up the Struggle” An interview with Tommy McKearney

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International Viewpoint has published a stimulating interview with Tommy McKearney,

http://www.tommymckearney.com/Site/Blog/Blog.html

 

A Patient Revolutionary Socialist

Tommy McKearney - A Patient Revolutionary Socialist

 

We hope soon to carry a review of Tommy’s recently published book

Goodbye Armalite, Hello Ballot Box?

Tommy welcomes the United Left Alliance Project :

Q: In late 2010 the United Left Alliance came together to contest the February 2011 general elections in Ireland, winning five seats. What is you assessment of the ULA?

TM: The ULA is a positive and progressive development. The fact that organizations of the left have come together at any time is good and that these groups are doing so at this time of capitalist crisis is heartening and encouraging. The ULA has also given some needed visibility to the left through its articulate and high-profile spokespersons such as Richard Boyd Barrett and Joe Higgins.

Asked about Ed Moloney’s “Voices From the Grave” and the British state attack on the Boston College Belfast Project, Tommy says : Read the rest of this entry »

Scores of Paramilitaries Interviewed – Few Know Their Names |

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How Can We Build the Socialist Movement in the 21st Century? by Dan DiMaggio

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Louis Proyect has delivered another very interesting post on organisation at his Unrepentant Marxist site. It’s a long article from Dan DiMaggio a US activist who was until recently a member of Socialist Alternative, the US affiliate of the Socialist Party’s international, the CWI.

http://louisproyect.wordpress.com/2012/01/06/how-can-we-build-the-socialist-movement-in-the-21st-century/#comment-59586

Written by tomasoflatharta

Jan 8, 2012 at 3:38 pm

Boston College Betrays Interviewees

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The legal dispute between Boston College and the British State over the “Belfast Project”, a series of confidential interviews with participants in Northern Ireland’s “Troubles”, has taken a dramatic turn in a foul direction :

Some background: Boston College sponsored the Belfast Project, an effort to secure interviews with former members of paramilitary organizations on both sides of the Troubles in Northern Ireland. Because such a project would require people to speak frankly about their participation in acts of unlawful violence, the project’s researchers promised participants that their interviews would be embargoed until their deaths. Each tape and transcript of an interview with a former member of the Provisional IRA, for example, or the Ulster Volunteer Force, would be closely held in BC’s Burns Library, securely locked away from historians and journalists until the contents of the material could no longer cause legal harm or political retribution to the interviewee.

http://chrisbrayblog.blogspot.com/2011/12/boston-college-time-for-resignations.html

More news will follow.

 

Written by tomasoflatharta

Dec 28, 2011 at 5:41 pm

Occupy and the Tasks of Socialists by Pham Binh

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The Occupy movement is not as marginal as its Dublin manifestation might  suggest.  Here an  American socialist participant,  Pham Binh, long an advocate of the broad new left approach,  reflects on how socialists are relating to Occupy in the US:

http://louisproyect.wordpress.com/2011/12/15/occupy-and-the-tasks-of-socialists/

Written by tomasoflatharta

Dec 16, 2011 at 6:30 pm

Occupy Wall Street 2011 Meets Mexico City Olympics 1968 Black Power – Viva John Carlos

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Dave Zirin Writes

Last night I had the privilege of introducing 1968 Olympian Dr. John Carlos to the General Assembly at Occupy Wall Street. This morning I had the duty of introducing John Carlos to Sen. Chuck Schumer in the MSNBC green room. Both were unforgettable experiences

http://www.commondreams.org/view/2011/10/11-10


Written by tomasoflatharta

Oct 10, 2011 at 2:59 pm

Kings of Plagiarism: a Prime Minister (Taoiseach), a President and Unionist Small Fry

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Stephen King – the Unionist who once wrote a regular Irish Examiner column looks trapped –

Reports say his column is suspended.

His big mistake – plagiarism.

But, let us remind ourselves that the rot usually starts at the top : Enda Kenny, Taoiseach (Prime Minster) of the Republic of Ireland (a failing state, covering a little more than two-thirds of a large island situated to the west of Britain) has form.

Kenny, elected regularly to Dáil Éireann, since 1975, spoke with US president Barack Obama in Dublin’s College Green, and delivered a speech lifted directly from his Yankee colleague.

A letter writer to the Irish Times cut through some pathetic excuses : Read the rest of this entry »

Written by tomasoflatharta

Oct 8, 2011 at 1:56 pm

Tale of the tape pits law against history

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Liam Clarke has written a very good article about the PSNI (six-county police) “attempt to gain access to Boston College’s Belfast Project Archive of the taped testimonies of IRA and loyalist figures.”

It can be read here on the excellent Newshound site :

http://www.nuzhound.com/articles/Sunday_Times/arts2011/jun19_Tale_of_tapes_BC__LClarke.php

Written by tomasoflatharta

Jun 20, 2011 at 11:22 am

Nobody is denying US torpedoed plan to save the Irish State €20bn — Only Gene Kerrigan is asking

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We are paying Gene Kerrigan the compliment of reproducing his entire article in today’s Sunday Independent (June 19 2011).

We covered this ground during the recent general election campaign.

https://tomasoflatharta.com/2011/02/05/make-a-bonfire-of-irish-banking-vanities/

No apologies for the action replay.

We also recommend the following articles from Vanity Fair and the British Guardian – very relevant to Gene’s article.

Let us hope the United Left Alliance TD’s run with this ball

http://www.vanityfair.com/business/features/2011/03/michael-lewis-ireland-201103

http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/ireland-business-blog-with-lisa-ocarroll/2011/feb/02/ireland-merrill-lynch-research-note-irish-banks

We’re shamed by conspiracy of silence

Nobody is denying US torpedoed plan to save the State €20bn — but no one’s asking either, writes Gene Kerrigan Read the rest of this entry »

Eamon Gilmore – Are You telling the Truth, or Is that what you are telling the American Embassy?

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Labour Party Leader Eamon Gilmore, lord-lieutenant to King Kenny in the Dublin Government, is having a difficult time.

Did he have one policy in opposition, and is he following an opposite line in government?

Yes,  we will come to that – but first something completely different

Gene Kerrigan  reports on the Labour Party leader’s reaction to the defeat of the first Lisbon treaty referendum in 2008: Read the rest of this entry »

Written by tomasoflatharta

Jun 6, 2011 at 9:54 pm