Posts Tagged ‘Australia’
USA : Immigration Cops (ICE) arrest prominent California trade union leader David Huerta – Tidal Wave of Solidarity Spreads – The workers’ movement across the globe should act
The arrest of California union leader David Huerta is galvanizing a new element—solidarity:
David Huerta Arrest – SEIU Update
SEIU California :
UPDATE: David Huerta has been released from the hospital but remains in custody.
His words: “We all collectively have to object to this madness because this is not justice. This is injustice.”
Free David Huerta. Free them ALL.
Read the rest of this entry »Birds of a Feather Flock Together – Vladimir Putin, Donald Trump, Nigel Farage and Sammy Wilson MP (DUP, East Antrim)
There is more to this story than initially meets the eye. Much capitalist development is based on Ethnic Cleansing of original populations and the plantation of new non-indigenous populations – it happened in the United States of America (USA) and Australia – naming just two. It did not happen so brutally in Ireland – but British imperialism made a significant effort.
Links :
Plantation of Ulster
Ethnic Cleansing of Ireland – Wikipedia
The Northern province of Ulster was “planted” in the 1600’s, but the native Irish were not completely exterminated. Waves of native Irish emigrated – especially in the 19th century after a misnamed Famine (in reality a “Great Hunger” caused by British Imperialist Policy) drove millions of the native Irish to the four corners of the globe. These emigrants kept alive the idea of Irish freedom, and played a significant role in every attempt to rid Ireland of British rule.
The stubborn Irish “national question” remains on today’s agenda because of the 1922 Anglo-Irish Treaty which divided Ireland into 2 sectarian states. A key feature of extreme Irish Unionism is identification with plantation/ethnic cleansing forms of capitalism – and that goes a long way towards explaining Irish far-right Unionist sympathy for the present day attempted ethnic cleansing of Palestine and Ukraine. We should situate recent pro-Putin and anti-Ukraine statements by the British far-right politician Nigel Farage and Sammy Wilson within this framework :
Link :
The Russian imperialist occupation of Crimea, Luhansk and Donetsk is ethnic cleansing capitalism in action – accompanied by child stealing and abuse similar to the behaviour of the Catholic Church in the 26 county bit of Ireland from the 1930’s to the 1990’s.
An excellent Ukrainian blog, Ukr-Taz, covers the story of Putin’s ethnic cleansing dreams in Ukraine, and Donald Trump’s enthusiastic support :
Trump on Putin’s “dream”
29 06 2024
For all that can be said about Thursday’s debate between Joe Biden and Donald Trump — including about the former’s dismal performance and about the boundless creativity of Trump’s fabrications on almost every topic under the sun — Trump’s curious note about Putin’s “dream” stood out to me:
Read the rest of this entry »How well did the left go in the June 9 European election? – by Dick Nichols, Green Left (Australia)
A recommended article :
Source ;
How well did the left go in the June 9 European Election?
How well did the left go in the June 9 European election?
Provisional results of the 2024 European Elections, as at June 19. Source: results.elections.europa.eu
At first glance it looks as if the parties to the left of the social democracy held their ground against the surge of the far right and mainstream right that marked the June 9 European Union (EU) parliamentary elections (see here for results in detail).
Although the smallest of the European parliament’s seven groups, The Left managed to maintain its EU-wide vote at 5.4% and increase its seat tally from 37 to 39 in the 720-seat assembly.
In addition, left green Members of the European Parliaments (MEPs) and those representing stateless nations (part of the Greens group as the European Free Alliance) at least maintained their numbers in the chamber.
See also
Finland: Mass workers’ strike wave continues against gov’t attacks on workers, unions, welfare
Interview: Fascism and resistance in France today
Ukrainian unionists: Oligarchs, not Europe’s poor, should pay for weapons and aid to Ukraine
Workers’ Party of Belgium gains ground in European, national elections
Yet the Greens group as a whole shrank from 71 seats to 53 while that of the liberals (known as Renew) fell from 102 to 79. This drop reflected that the environmental issues that in part drove the big advance of these parties in the 2019 election were less important for many voters this time.
The campaign was dominated by insecurity about the future, the cost of living (particularly housing), the fear of war, the “immigration threat” and intolerance of difference.
In this grim atmosphere the biggest growth went to the mainstream right European People’s Party and the two far-right groups (Identity and Democracy and Conservatives and Reformists): taken together the right and far right won an extra 30 seats, bring it to 324.
Because it would take only 37 ungrouped MEPs to join them to from a reactionary majority, the June 9 result poses with new urgency two old questions about politics in the European parliament. How much, if at all, does the real balance of political forces in the chamber differ from that among its formal groupings? And how much does membership of a group represent disciplined commitment to its positions?
Left divisions over Ukraine
The questions are sharply relevant in the case of the Left group, where differences over what stance to take towards the Russian invasion of Ukraine were already pointing towards a split before June 9.
On May 31, Li Andersson, chairperson of the Finnish Left Alliance told the Helsinki Times that these differences could not be tolerated in the group in the new legislature. Referring to Clare Daly and Mick Wallace, Irish left independent opponents of military aid to Ukraine, Andersson said: “The Nordic Green Left as a whole [covering Finland, Sweden, Denmark, Norway, Iceland, Greenland and the Faroe Islands] is of the opinion that if they manage to win re-election, they can’t join our group.”
For Andersson, the same went for the new Sahra Wagenknecht Alliance: For Reason and Justice (BSW), a split in Germany from leading Left group member Die Linke (The Left). BSW opposes military aid to Ukraine and supports resuming the gas trade with Russia, in common with most of Europe’s far-right parties.
Read the rest of this entry »According to Ireland’s constitution, a woman’s duties are in the home – but a referendum could be about to change its sexist wording
Eamon DeValera’s 1937 Irish Constitution contains symbolic sexist wording – the “woman in the home” clause. Laura Cahillane explains why almost everyone on the Irish and feminist left is advocating a Yes vote.
Laura Cahillane, University of Limerick
On March 8 – International Women’s Day – Irish citizens will vote in a referendum on whether or not to replace the so-called “woman in the home” clause in the Irish constitution.
This clause, which dates from 1937, specifies that: “The State recognises that by her life within the home, woman gives to the State a support without which the common good cannot be achieved.” It goes on to say that: “The State shall, therefore, endeavour to ensure that mothers shall not be obliged by economic necessity to engage in labour to the neglect of their duties in the home.”
Originally, the purpose of the provision was to acknowledge the importance of care in the home, which was then provided almost exclusively by mothers. The purpose was to ensure that mothers could remain in the home and would not be forced to work due to financial reasons.
However, the state help implied by the wording was never actually put into practice – women were never supported to provide care in the home. Worse, the constitution was often used to bolster arguments that a woman’s place was in the home and that policies which excluded women from work were acceptable.
Now, as part of a double referendum, Irish citizens will have the chance to change the constitution to a more gender-neutral wording. This is alongside another vote on whether to change the constitution’s definition of “family” to expand it beyond marriage.
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Tomás Ó Flatharta 