Truly A Winter Of Discontent.

     There is no doubt that this year is different. Yes, there has always been protests in this unjust economic system, but this year there are many more and they are more intense with greater numbers on the streets, and they go on much longer, months, and still continuing. Have The people of Iran joined this world wide revolutionary movement?

This from 325:

     The Anarchist Union of Iran and Afghanistan believes that the Islamic Republic of Iran’s regime will not hesitate to massacre millions of Iranians, like it has done in Syria and Iraq as well as in Iran these these last few days. Therefore, the Anarchist Union of Iran and Afghanistan is prepared to declare that it will cooperate with all Kurdish, Arab and Baloch armed opposition forces. With respect to the widespread repression of defenseless people in Iran, we must be able to provide them with the right tools to defend themselves, before there are more dead and the people’s movement has been permanently suppressed. Therefore the need to form an armed revolutionary front to support and defend the people against the Islamic regime’s executioners is urgent and necessary. If it is possible to transport weapons to people inside Iran, you should not hesitate for a moment to prevent more people from being bled and buried. The duty of the revolutionary and radical opposition outside of Iran is to provide logistical and strategic support to the struggles and resistance of the people inside Iran

     I don't agree with everything in the following article but it is an excellent source to see the extent of these prolonged mass protests and gives hope that they will be joined by others rather than morph into some sort of formal agreement with the various states. Our support and solidarity could help immensely in preventing this morphing from happening.  From Democracy Without Borders: 

Youth celebrating the Lebanese revolution in 2019. Photo by Vicken Vincent Avakian with kind permission (source)

     This year has seen an extraordinary number of significant mass protests in over twenty countries or territories, many of which in a national context represented the biggest in recent times. They are often spontaneous, with a distinctly revolutionary nature. In many cases protesters would face a serious risk of arrest, injury or death. The ruling class, government or even the whole system of government, are the targets. Corruption, authoritarianism and/or austerity are their key motivators. ------

And:

    -------Obviously protests occur constantly, and we haven’t done a thorough data analysis comparing this year with historical averages. However, it’s generally accepted that the current protests aren’t normal. CNN’s Fareed Zakaria called them  “this autumn of protest”, and noted that “the politics of each of these movements seems quite distinct. But they are all occurring against a worrisome backdrop: a collapse of [global] economic growth”, which is now at its lowest point since the 2008 crash.

       We can take the line of thinking further and note that these various uprisings are in fact different theatres of the same conflict. 

      Protesters may be waving their national flags, and speaking of national rebirth – not global justice, but as the example of Ecuador especially shows, these national transformations can take place, but they must currently do so in spite of the prevailing global system, which is institutionally incompatible with the needs of the world’s population, captured by an undemocratic, ahistorical ideology which fetishises the balancing of national budgets with same year tax revenues which effectively prohibits effective development strategies, such as the provision of basic services or redistribution.

For the list of mass protests continue reading:

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News Or Propaganda?

 

Prague, November, 16th. 2019.,

     Protests are raging in numerous countries across the globe, more and more people are rising up against the intolerable inequality, injustice, corruption, wars and rampaging poverty that the present economic system creates and perpetuates for the vast majority of the people of this planet.

France:
 https://www.france24.com/en/tag/yellow-vest-protests/

Chile:
https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2019/11/month-protests-chile-persist-gov-concessions-191118231609475.html

Bolivia:
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/nov/16/bolivia-protests-five-killed-in-rally-calling-for-exiled-moraless-return

Ecuador:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2019_Ecuadorian_protests

Haiti:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2019_Haitian_protests

Lebanon:
https://www.voanews.com/middle-east/after-month-protests-lebanon-what-next

Iraq:
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-50440110

Sudan:
https://www.voanews.com/africa/protesters-sudan-condemn-previous-days-attack-security-forces

Czech:
https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2019/11/19/czec-n19.html

      Of course this is not by any manner of means a definitive list, there is more, much more unrest against poverty, corruption, injustice and inequality that exists amidst unimaginable wealthy and opulence, all plundered from the work and sweat of the ordinary people. The world is exploding in mass protests.

      Watching the mainstream UK TV news recently I got, each evening, over a considerable period, a roughly 10/15 minutes slot of the protests in Hong Kong, but nothing of note on any of the other mass protests taking place across our world, I wonder why? Then of course my twisted mind went into overdrive. Could it be that the UK imperialist establishment still see Hong Kong as part of the British Empire and naively believe that the UK public will therefore be more interested in that than all this other stuff going on in other people's empires. Or perhaps it is another piece of propaganda that can be used against that, in the eyes of the Western imperialist's, great evil place called China. Who knows, but for sure it is not a balanced and fully informative coverage that we are getting. It is very selective and biased in favour of the establishment view. So can we call it news or propaganda?

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Why Do We Tolerate Them.

        It would appear that the representatives of the predatory class are having a get together in Madrid this December 2nd-13th.. There they will wine and dine on the best that you and I can provide, after all it is us that produce everything and pay for their hospitality, How ironic considering that they are the creators of our poverty and deprivation. They will be meeting up to discuss how best to guarantee their privileged positions, their power and their wealth. These are the people who come with the blood of ordinary people on their hands, they plan and execute wars, killing and maiming millions, they are responsible for the destruction of infrastructure in country after country, they plunder the resources of the planet for their own power and wealth.

    However their biggest crime is probably that fact that they are responsible for the destruction of the planet, and show no serious signs of trying to do anything to halt that destruction.

    This event in Madrid will be the gathering of the enemy of the people, the friends of  the corporate juggernaut, the representatives of the gross inhumanity that burdens our world, and we are expected to applaud them. No doubt the media will paint them as wonderful planners of our future, planners of a better world, but it will be a better world for that little band of predatory parasites. Why do we tolerate them, wine and dine them?

 

This from 325:  

       December 2nd, the rulers of the world are coming to Madrid. Some of the biggest murderers of this planet, of the biggest responsible of its devastation. They come to fill their mouths and calendars with the next plans of “fight against climate change”. While global capitalism continues intact and most of the CO2 emissions emanate from industrial production, while their companies keep devastating forests and mountains to extract its natural resources.
      And if that wasn’t enough, at the same time, Chile burns and their streets are still covered by the ammunition caps from the security forces. But Piñera couldn’t see his political planning disturbed by the revolt, he couldn’t admit the mediatic focus questioning his dictation before such a social explosion. And thanks to the kindness of Spanish government, now he will be able to continue with his plans without getting disheveled.
      But in Chile, normality couldn’t be held anymore, and we neither want to hold it here. We won’t allow the world leaders meet to design the destruction under the look of sustainability and respect, as if everything continues to go normally. As if they haven’t been destroying all this time, as if they wouldn’t carry thousands of corpses in their backs. We won’t give them such legitimacy. Also, because we know, that the best way to show solidarity with the rebels is nothing but extend the revolt. Like in Hamburg, we want this summit to become hell.
     Therefore, we encourage the system enemies to meet in Madrid, in the dates when the world owners have their appointment in this city. Stay aware to the next calls and infos. There will be enabled spaces to host those coming from other places.
     On the other hand, neither do we trust that politics gestated in parliaments and offices will stop the destruction or stop the way to the collapse, that is increasingly inevitable. But we trust in the ability of every one to act, individually or in groups. That’s why we want to make a call for decentralized action to point the responsible of environmental destruction. Politicians won’t act against the Capitalism interests, but we do. Against climate change; direct action.
Attack those who destroy the Earth.

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3.5%, Is This The Tipping Point?

 Chile.

Ecuador.

        Across the world the young are turning against the enforced neo-liberalism that has brought so much hardship and misery to so many. From Chile, Haiti, Ecuador, to Lebanon, Iraq and Sudan and elsewhere, people are on the streets challenging the established authority and the symbols of this brutal exploitative system. In some states in is insurrection, and others growing mass protests. Can Chile be the spark that starts the fire?

 Lebanon.

Iraq.

    An interesting article By Medea Benjamin Nicolas J S Davies

         Uprisings against the decades long dominance of neoliberal “center-right” and “center-left” governments that benefit the wealthy and multinational corporations at the expense of working people are sweeping the world.
         In this Autumn of Discontent, people from Chile, Haiti and Honduras to Iraq, Egypt and Lebanon are rising up against neoliberalism, which has in many cases been imposed on them by US invasions, coups and other brutal uses of force. While the severe repression against these activists have led to more than 250 protesters killed in Iraq in October alone, the protests have continued to grow. Some movements, such as in Algeria and Sudan, have already forced the downfall of long-entrenched, corrupt governments.
        A country that is emblematic of the uprisings against neoliberalism is Chile. On October 25, 2019, a million Chileans – out of a population of about 18 million – took to the streets across the country, unbowed by government repression that has killed at least 20 and injured hundreds more. Two days later, Chile's billionaire president Sebastian Piñera fired his entire cabinet and declared, “We are in a new reality. Chile is different from what it was a week ago.”
        The people of Chile appear to have validated Erica Chenoweth’s research on non-violent protest movements, in which she found that once over 3.5% of a population rise up to non-violently demand political and economic change, no government can resist their demands. It remains to be seen whether Piñera’s response will be enough to save his own job, or whether he will be the next casualty of the 3.5% rule.
       It is fitting that Chile should be in the vanguard of protests sweeping the world in this Autumn of Discontent, since Chile served as the original neoliberal laboratory.
       When Chile’s socialist leader Salvador Allende was elected in 1970, after a six year covert CIA operation to prevent his election, President Nixon ordered U.S. sanctions to “make the economy scream.”
       In his first year in office, Allende’s progressive economic policies led to a 22% increase in real wages, as work began on 120,000 new housing units and the nationalization of copper mines and other industrial sectors. But growth slowed in 1972 and 1973 under the pressure of brutal US sanctions, as in Venezuela and Iran today.
        Allende was overthrown in a CIA-backed coup on September 11, 1973. The new US and Western backed leader, General Augusto Pinochet, executed or ‘disappeared’ at least 3,200 people, held 80,000 political prisoners in jail, and ruled as a brutal dictator until 1990.
         Under Pinochet, Chile’s economy was radically restructured by the “Chicago Boys”, a team of Chilean economics students trained at the University of Chicago under the supervision of Milton Friedman. US sanctions were quickly lifted and Pinochet sold off Chile’s public assets to US corporations and wealthy investors. The neoliberal program: tax cuts for the wealthy and corporations, together with mass privatization and cuts to pensions, healthcare, education and other public services, was soon duplicated across the world.
          While the Chicago Boys pointed to rising economic growth rates in Chile as evidence of the success of their neoliberal program, by 1988, 48% of Chileans were living below the poverty line. Chile is currently one of the wealthiest countries in Latin America, and one of the most unequal.
        The governments elected after Pinochet, from “center-right” to “center-left”, have abided by the neoliberal model. The needs of the poor and working class continue to be exploited, as they pay higher taxes than their tax-evading bosses, on top of ever-rising living costs, stagnant wages and limited access to voucherized education and a stratified public-private healthcare system. Indigenous communities are at the very bottom of this corrupt social and economic order.
        The neoliberal consensus following Pinochet has triggered a disillusionment with the traditional political process, as voter turnout declined from 95% in 1989 to 47% in the recent presidential election in 2017.
       If Chenoweth is right and the million Chileans in the street have breached the tipping point for successful non-violent popular democracy, Chile may be leading the way to a global political and economic revolution. 

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When Is The Time To Vent Your Righteous Anger?

        As a rule most people want to get on with their lives, see their friends and family, indulge in some sort of pastime, listen to a bit of music, whatever. What they don't want is to confront armed police, face brutal beatings, arrests and killings. However when a population comes on to the streets in vast numbers, and faces these situations, then you must accept they are very dissatisfied, angry and want something to change. 

This photo is actually from Catalunya, not Chile, but state treatment of protestors is the same.

 

      Even in the appearance of placidity that that goes as normal in most societies, for the ordinary people, in this capitalist society there is always struggle, and there is always a rumbling undercurrent of dissatisfaction and anger. Sometimes it doesn't take much of a spark for that anger to vent itself, in Chile it was the increase in fares on public transport. Once that anger is out, the original spark can fade into insignificance and all the other resentments and injustices come out into the open. That is what is happening in Chile today.

      If anyone wants to see who our so called democracies deals with those who show anger and discontent with the system, need look no further than what is happening in Chile right now, twenty first century representative democracy at work.

  This from Act For Freedom Now

        There is a State of emergency currently in Chile, decreed by the right-wing government of Sebastián Piñera as a result of the outbreak of a revolt that exploded on Friday October 18 2019.
        This text is born from the need to communicate the situation that currently exists in this territory with comrades in various latitudes of the world. We are sharing what we consider to be some of the main points to be made known to contribute to understanding the present moment from an anarchist viewpoint.
        PRELUDE: THE YOUTH IN STRUGGLE AND THE SPARK THAT LIT THE FIRE
     After a week of mass fare evasions of the underground train service, mainly by high school students during the month of October before the price increase in the transport services, multiple episodes of individual and collective disobedience spread through various parts of the city of Santiago that resulted in destruction of infrastructure and clashes with police forces inside and outside underground train stations. On Friday, October 18, the spread of these massive evasions and the level of radicality they reached was a surprise for many and unforeseen by the government which, along with its loyal journalists and social researchers, still can’t explain why these events led to a situation of widespread chaos that is still going on to this day.
       ACT ONE: OUTBREAK OF A REVOLT WITHOUT PRECEDENT IN POST-DICTORSHIP CHILE
       On Friday, October 18, the revolt radicalized at the moment when clashes with the police and the destruction of capitalist infrastructure took the streets of Santiago city centre. Initiated outside the government palace, actions of street violence quickly spread well into the night in various parts of the city. Faced with a situation of widespread rebellion and diffuse chaos in multiple urban sectors, the police forces were unable to contain the explosion of rage. Since that day this has infected broad sectors of a society that had seemed to be sleeping, tired by various forms of oppression and precariousness of life that originated in the continuity of the neoliberal economic system and from the police State installed in Chile during the recent civil and military dictatorship (1973-1990). These conditions of existence and domination were then strengthened by the centre left and right governments that have alternated in power since the return to democracy.
      To the disturbances that exploded in the city centre were soon added thousands of people demonstrating in the neighbourhoods, banging on empty pots as a form of protest. Outbreaks of rebellion, arson and destruction materialized concerning dozens of buses; public and commercial buildings were attacked, looted and burned, and, crucially, dozens of underground train stations were vandalized and set fire to by hordes of enraged individuals until late into the night.
       Clearly surpassed, the government did not lose much time before decreeing a State of emergency in the city of Santiago, a state of exception that includes the military in the streets and the armed forces in charge of order. However, a wild, inorganic, massive and unprecedented revolt in the post-dictatorship scenario was already underway, destroying in practice the obedience submission and fear imposed by decades of capitalist dominance in Chile.
   ACT TWO: EXTENSION OF DESTRUCTIVE INSUBMISSION AND BEGINNING OF THE CURFEW
      On Saturday, September 19, in the face of the persistence and heightening of the unrest the armed forces deploy in various points of the city. Soldiers guard the streets, commercial facilities and underground train stations in the centre of Santiago and suburbs. However, the protesters of every kind do not retreat and all repudiate the military presence with the vivid memory of the repression experienced a few decades ago during the years of the dictatorship. That same day the number of buses, cars and underground train stations burned by protesters increases. In parallel, the looting of supermarkets and huge shopping centres becomes uncontrollable and the image of hundreds of people taking back their lives by snatching goods in the centres of consumerism has been one of the most transcendent images of the days of revolt and were an important factor for the government, overwhelmed by the looting violence, imposing the curfew in the city of Santiago that same night.
      Quite unashamedly the President and the military chief in charge of the city communicate to the media that the restriction of “civil liberties” would take effect that day from 7 pm until 6 the next morning. That night, the demonstrations, riots, looting, fires and clashes with the repressive forces continued again into the small hours of the morning all over the city.
     Between Saturday and Sunday the spark of rage spread even more, igniting mass demonstrations and scenarios of wild violence in other parts of the country. This gave way to an ensuing moment of generalised chaos with multiple acts of rebellion and riots in various cities within a couple of days, leaving a good part of the urban infrastructure under siege, in ruins and ashes with barricades, vandalism and incendiary attacks on municipal dependencies, government buildings, shopping centres and official media premises.
      By that time the revolt had gone beyond any specific demands, meaning that people from diverse origins and places find themselves and others amid protests and riots opening up a huge critical fracture in the Chilean neoliberal system and its model of capitalist/ extractivist exploitation that affects the whole territory.
      From Sunday October 20, the State of Emergency and a curfew were decreed by the government against the cities in revolt, but nevertheless the riots continued to extend until late into the night, ignoring the impositions and demonstrating that the rage and violence unleashed by people against the established order had broken the fear and passivity that had reigned for decades in broad sectors of the Chilean population.
      ACT THREE: DIGNITY AND STRUGGLE AGAINST THE STATE’S STRATEGY OF REPRESSION
      Since the beginning of the state of emergency, State repression has heightened and has also spread openly to the various territories in revolt.
      As anarchists, we are clear that we do not hold a victimistic position, however, it is always good to share information about the tactics that dominion puts into practice as part of the confrontation with the insurgents, the rebels and the population in revolt generally.
      In the current context, the repressive arsenal of the Chilean State has materialised as:
        – More than two thousand people arrested and more than 15 people killed in addition to an unknown number of people reported missing.
      – Shooting with various types of projectiles, including tear gas bombs, rubber pellets and weapons of war against protesters leaving an increasing and not known number of people injured and killed in public roads in addition to animals and people living in the street also wounded and killed as shooting targets.
       – Beatings and physical, psychological and sexual torture in the road and inside police vehicles and police stations against people who were detained.
        – People kidnapped inside police and civilian vehicles. Images have been seen of persons being locked inside the trunks of police vehicles.
        – Shooting from behind of people in the street who are given a false chance to escape arrest.
        – False police and military authorizations to loot supermarkets that end with arrests and murders later reported as deaths from the riots.
        – Fires in large commercial premises caused by repressive forces so that companies can claim insurance. Burned corpses have appeared in some of these fires.
       – Throwing people out of moving police cars then shooting them.
       – Hanging of bodies of people killed in abandoned sites and of people alive in police barracks.
       The widespread use of social networks on the internet such as Instagram, Twitter and Facebook has allowed immediate circulation of massive audiovisual evidence of the situations described above, which is being disseminated by “alternative” groups and linked to struggles, succeeding in breaking through the communication strategy deployed by the government and historically supported by the official media in the service of power.

Read the full article HERE: 

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Chile Today - Tmorrow----

 

        It doesn't get much, if any, coverage on our mainstream media, but what is happening in Chile is a mass popular uprising being met with fierce, brutal state repression. This is happening now, and across many other countries, how long can this festering sewer of an economic system last. Well it will last as long as the people tolerate its existence, it will collapse when the people say, "enough is enough".

      Some videos of what is happening in Chile, you don't have to know the language to understand what is going on. Videos from arrezafe.

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France, Haiti, Ecuador, Chile, Now Catalunya---.

 

        Across the globe people are taking to the streets, to mention a few, Haiti, Ecuador, Chile, France, and elsewhere, now Catalunya, the demands may differ, but they all have something in common, dissatisfaction with the system. A realisation that the system isn't delivering what it says it will, it is not meeting the demands of the vast majority of the people.

This from crimethinc:

 

  Catalunya: A Week of Escalation
Could the Riots Open a Horizon Beyond National Sovereignty? 

        Starting Monday, in response to draconian sentences imposed on politicians who promote Catalan independence, tens of thousands of people across Catalunya have engaged in sustained rioting and disruption. Although the majority of the movement remains pacifistic, a few thousand participants have rejected the leadership of political parties and organizations, opting for open confrontation with police. The various mobilizations are still taking place in confluence, however, making it very difficult for the police to control. Protesters have reportedly used caltrops, Molotov cocktails, and paint balloons to disable police riot vans, while keeping individual officers at a distance with lasers and slingshots and driving away helicopters with fireworks. In the following report, we review the events of the past week and explore what is at stake in this struggle.

       As anarchists, we have a more robust conception of self-determination than mere national sovereignty. All governments are based on the asymmetry of power between ruler and ruled; nationalism is just one of several means by which rulers seek to turn us against each other so we don’t unite against them. We consider it instructive that the Catalan police have worked closely with Spanish national police throughout the last several years of repression; even if Catalunya gains independence, we are certain that independent Catalan police and courts will continue to repress those who fight against capitalism and seek true self-determination. At the same time, there is a longstanding tradition of anarchist and anti-state activity in Catalunya, and we are inspired to see some of this coming to the fore in resistance to the violence of the Spanish state. It is possible that the latest escalation of conflict in the streets of Catalunya will be a step towards the radicalization of the entire movement and the delegitimizing of state solutions.

Let’s look closer to see.

A detailed day to day report on the events: 

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Yes, Another Piece On Venezuela.

        I make no excuse for posting another article on Venezuela, for what we are witnessing in that country is the vicious hand of modern imperialism. It is being executed under a fog of misinformation, omissions, and lies, the outcome of which could be a blood bath of the ordinary people of Venezuela in the interests of the ruthless Western corporate juggernaut. The more information that becomes public the clearer we will be able to see the true situation. Such situations should never drop of our radar, knowledge of how the system works prepares us in countering its ruthless and brutish development.

From Black Rose Anarchist Federation
      The following is a statement on the current political crisis and U.S. backed coup underway in Venezuela produced by Solidaridad, a libertarian communist political organization in Chile. In the coming days we will be publishing an additional statement written jointly by anarchist groups in Brazil and Uruguay. For additional analysis we recommend our archive of articles and statements on Venezuela. Translation by Francisco C., Black Rose/Rosa Negra.

Original Link
A Public Statement on the Situation in Venezuela
        Venezuela is going through a profound crisis of which it is impossible to exempt the responsibility of the leadership of Chavismo: the failure in opening a path that allows the country to overcome the dependence of oil, the inefficiency in implementing measures that better the economic situation of the country, the bureaucracy that is drowning the popular initiative and the cases of corruption that affect officials who move key aspects of the economy. These are some of the unresolved problems.
      Nevertheless, this situation is within the framework of a polarization and conflict of classes where the Venezuelan right-wing, the loyal representative of the well-off sectors in the country in conjunction with diverse administrations from the U.S. government, has unfolded a destabilizing strategy intended to asphyxiate the Venezuelan economy contributing to the deterioration to the living conditions of millions of people. The objective of this effort is to undermine the popular support that has mainly sustained the process of change in Venezuela.
      Even worse, this right-wing, which presents itself as a democratic alternative and which hides its despise for the working class behind a false language that appeals to justice and respect to a constitution they had once insulted, operates in a criminal manner sharpening the levels of violence. Behind the figure of [self-proclaimed interim President] Juan Guaidó and the Voluntad Popular or Popular Will party, hiding behind the high-flown speeches amplified by the media has been an insurrectionary strategy which unfolded with armed attacks on military barracks, [1] destruction of health centers, [2] the burning of warehouses with food destined to vulnerable, [3] among other multiple actions of sabotage went on during these years. It came to the point where social leaders were being killed by hired hitmen [4] and to the burning alive of people simply for being Chavistas. [5]
        From what’s mentioned above we’ve learned that if the right gains power in Venezuela again, not only will it implement adjustment policies that include privatization of public enterprises, massive indebtedness with bodies like the IMF, and the opening of oil projects where private companies assume as principal shareholders, [6] but it will also be a government of revenge where the hate accumulated during these years will unfold brutally against organized sectors of the people who dared to dream of a country that would transition to non-capitalist ways of living together.
      The realization of a profound balance between Latin American progressives and in particular from the Venezuelan experience,even with all its contradictions and potential is a pending task for the left. Suffice it to say that many of these experiences have given way to political processes that directly harm the working class. Nevertheless, and despite the legitimate differences that we openly express with those who lead the Venezuelan process, the left and the people have to be emphatic in rejecting this new coup attempt – the ominous interference of the U.S and the other countries related to the destabilizing strategy which includes the government of [Chilean President Sebastián] Piñera and the political sectors who support its foreign policy all the way from Chile. Along with this we must demand the governments who quickly squared with the position of the United States to respect the rights of the Venezuelan people to its own conflicts without the interference of other states establishing as a minimum floor the non-recognition of the diplomatic delegations won over by Guaído.
       We manifest our solidarity with the people of Venezuela directly from our organization, especially with the fringes who even against the grain of the Chavista leadership and assuming all the contradictions of the change in process, protagonize [fight for] new experiences in building popular power that range from the takeovers of the land, the socialization of self-managed companies by its own workers or the government from below in rural and urban communities, [7] and obtaining spaces that prefigure the path of the people who fight against the ominous consequences of patriarchal capitalism we want to overcome.
Solidaridad, February 2019

      Notes [1]  https://www.eltiempo.com/archivo/documento/MAM-53579
[2]  https://www.hispantv.com/noticias/venezuela/408335/ataque-incendio-hospi...
[3]
https://actualidad.rt.com/actualidad/242996-50-toneladas-alimentos-quema...
[4]
http://www.resumenlatinoamericano.org/2018/08/03/asesinados-tres-voceros...
[5]
https://red58.org/cr%C3%ADmenes-de-odio-derecha-venezolana-quema-viva-a-...
[6]
https://www.elinformador.com.ve/2019/01/31/descargue-aqui-el-plan-pais-l...
[7] For an idea about the concrete experiences in building popular power in Venezuela we recommend you visit the following article written in 2016 written by two comrades of Solidaridad, “Political Situation in Venezuela: Crisis, Trends, and the Challenge of Class Independence.”

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Pinochet Lives On.

       Margaret Thatcher's buddy, the psychopath Pinochet is dead, but his legacy marches on. The present government of Chile has held onto a lot of Pinochet's dictatorial laws and agenda. The people fought the dictator Pinochet when he was  alive, the vicious structure he created aided and abetted by the power mongers of the United States of America, are still being struggled against on the streets of Chile today. The people of Chile have existed in a blood soaked society through the Pinochet era to the present day, but they are battle hardened, and the youth of the country has taken up the struggle with determination.
This from Enough is Enough:

 

       The Chicago Conspiracy takes its name from the approximately 25 Chilean economists who attended the University of Chicago and other prestigious universities beginning in the 1960s to study under the neoliberal economists Milton Friedman and Arnold Harberger. After embracing Friedman’s neoliberal ideas, these economists returned to assist Pinochet’s military regime in imposing free market policies. They privatized nearly every aspect of society, and Chile soon became a classic example of free market capitalism under the barrel of a gun.

The Chicago Conspiracy is about today. We began this documentary with the death of a dictator, but we continue with the legacy of a dictatorship.

       The Chicago Conspiracy is about the Day of the Youth Combatant. On this day, two young brothers and militants of the MIR, Rafael and Eduardo Vergara, were gunned down by police as they walked through the politically active community Villa Francia. March 29 is not only about the Vergara brothers—it is a day to remember all youth combatants who have died under the dictatorship and current democratic regime.

      The Chicago Conspiracy is about the students who fight a dictatorship-era educational law put into place on the last day of military rule. Over 700,000 students went on strike in 2006 to protest the privatized educational system. Police brutally repressed student marches and occupations.

       The Chicago Conspiracy is about the neighborhoods lining the outskirts of Santiago. They were originally land occupations, and later became centers of armed resistance against the military dictatorship. A number of them, such as la Victoria and Villa Francia, continue as areas of confrontational discontent to this day.

      The Chicago Conspiracy is about the Mapuche conflict. The Mapuche people valiantly resisted Spanish occupation, and continue to resist the Chilean state and the multinational corporations who strip Mapuche territory for forestry plantations, mines, dams and farming plantations. The government has utilized the dictatorship-era anti-terrorism law to jail Mapuche community members in struggle. Two young weichafes (Mapuche warriors), Alex Lemún and Matías Catrileo, were recently killed by Chilean police—one in 2002, the other in 2008.

         The Chicago Conspiracy is a response to a global conspiracy of neoliberalism, militarism and authoritarianism.

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While Poverty Exists … There Will Be Rebellion!

           While in prison your treatment becomes, at best, that of a second class citizen, or that of a non-person, something to be controlled, intimidated, subdued. Our solidarity with those incarcerated in the state's cages of repression should be unquestionable and unstinting.

This from Contra Info:

Juan Aliste Vega’s message from the Prison Hospital

 

      Our negotiations and tenacity inside and outside prison over the past four months have achieved a first result: on Thursday 19th July I was transferred from the High Security Prison to the Prison Hospital to have an ECG and other tests I needed. The following morning, Friday 20th July, I was transferred again – amidst a huge deployment of police and prison guards – to the INCA (Institute of Neurosurgery) to finally have an angiography, a test in order to get a more detailed image of the area where the cerebral damage I sustained from blows inflicted in the past is to be found.
        It is worth mentioning that this test is crucial and necessary for the operation that I will need to have very soon. In the end the test was carried out without any problem and the medical team involved treated me in a dignified and correct way.
           After the test I was transferred to the Prison Hospital by ambulance; from there I will be discharged soon to be taken back to the High Security Prison.
Medical language and its technical details can only partially describe my current situation. There are still many obstacles to be overcome, just as difficult or even more difficult than this test, before I can undergo the brain operation, which had already been defined ‘urgent’ last March: obstacles and barriers erected because for the State I am an outcast, closely watched by the local police who act according to the hard logic of revenge and fury, and moreover I’m submerged in a disgusting bureaucratic quagmire.
       These words are far from victimization and lament, but are full of revolutionary, untameable and subversive vitality. In the constant practice of reciprocal revolutionary solidarity, which we subversive political prisoners have been carrying out for years, it becomes necessary to relate any step taken in this battle. It wasn’t the first nor will it be the last battle we have to face as outcasts of the State.
           I’d like to take the chance to rejoice in the various initiatives carried out in Santiago, Concepciòn, Valdivia, Temuco and other places, as well as the internationalist initiatives that were able to cross the borders of Argentina, Uruguay, Brazil and Spain … Initiatives and gestures with which we put solidarity into practice, solidarity that builds and strengthens the network of subversion; initiatives and gestures that are vital to us like oxygen and support us in the path towards the ultimate liberation from prison.
         We remain here, not one step back, without bowing our head, proud of the wonderful rebel complicity that goes everywhere, spreads, multiplies and allows us to face everything that will come.

While poverty exists … there will be rebellion!

Juan Aliste Vega, Subversive Prisoner
Prison Hospital, Santiago of Chile
July 2018

    

Visit ann arky's home at radicalglasgow.me.uk

 

The State IS The Terrorist.

        In this Alice in Wonderland world, in the eyes of the state, those who fight the injustice and repression, are classified as terrorist, the fact is, the state is the terrorist. Its so called freedom is a prison fenced by total surveillance, guarded by armed militarised police, and managed by a loaded judicial system, all to protect the privileges, wealth and power of those who control the capitalist juggernaut. The freedom the state offers you is an illusion, a world of smoke and mirrors, of lies and deception, an empty life of submission to the will of capital, what resistance to this mirage offers you, is freedom and justice.

       This video was made one month after the disappearance of Santiago Maldonado in the hands of Gendarmerie. The lifeless body of Santiago was "found" on October 17 -78 days after his disappearance-in the Chubut River 300 meters upstream from the place where he was seen captured by Gendarmerie, and in an area that had been raked in different occasions by those who carried out their search. Facundo Jones Huala is still detained awaiting trial for extradition to Chile. The persecution and repression of Mapuche communities in resistance continue to grow, while in the region dominated by the Chilean state the political prisoners reach thirty. On November 25, 2017, in the territorial recovery of the Lafken Winkul Mapu community, in the vicinity of Villa Mascardi, Río Negro, Rafael Nahuel was shot dead in the back in an attempt to evict by the Argentine Naval Prefecture. Santiago Maldonado and Rafael Nahuel live in the struggle! Freedom to Facundo Jones Huala! Terrorist is the State!

 The Rebel

Rebel rebel break the rule,

What does it matter that a “wise” man sees a fool.

Not for you the herd’s dull beat

Making tomorrow, yesterday’s repeat,

Living out the life of a clone

Marching with the crowd but always alone.

Shaping your life from some dusty tome

Playing it safe, staying at home.

Rebel rebel break the rule

Swim in the sea, never the pool.

Live your emotions, feel the surge

Follow your dreams, chase the urge.

Make life though short, an exciting game

Not a mad march for fortune or fame.

Capture the moment, live it now

Being alive your only vow.

Rebel rebel break the rule

In the end, you’re humanity’s jewel.

Visit ann arky's home at radicalglasgow.me.uk

Impossible Takes Just A Little Longer.

        Where in the capitalist world is there peace? In country after country people are in direct action against this system that is foisted on us as the only game in town. Our babbling brook of bullshit, the mainstream media will ridicule, lampoon or totally ignore any suggestion that there is a better way to organise our lives other than capitalism. The system is portrayed as the pinnacle of civilisation, yet all around us is poverty, homelessness and bloody wars, for control of the earth's resources. There is mass hunger in the midst of plenty, deprivation surrounded by wealth, large swaths of our planet are being steeped in flowing warm blood of innocents, and still the babbling brook of bullshit laud this dystopia as the bringer of peace, freedom and prosperity. Yes, there is that small band of parasites that have their hands on the control levers of power, who enjoy all that peace, freedom and prosperity, but it is not the vast majority of humanity.

       However, we are awakening, across the planet the ordinary people have seen through the smoke and mirrors of the capitalist illusion, and are taking steps to challenge "the only game in town" philosophy. In small bands  and large groups, they have taken the road to challenge the hegemony of capital, and its corrosive effect on all of us, and the very planet that we inhabit. With the advent of better communications, we are linking up and joining hands, and increasing our solidarity, our small sporadic struggles are now more than ever becoming one massive battle to challenge and bring down this savage, brutal, insane system of destructive greed, exploitation and unearned privilege.

       From Chile to Australia, from Italy to Greece, from France to America, in all corners of our world, people are taking up the struggle against this capitalist cancer, we can shape the world to see to the needs of all our people, we have the numbers, the power, the skills and the imagination, this world is ours by right of our sweat and blood, we just have to make that final grasp.

Mapuches still resisting in “Chile”

By actforfreedom

       In a march commemorating the ninth anniversary of the murder of indigenous Mapuche activist Matias Catrileo, shot in the back by police, protesters stormed the financial district of Santiago, Chile.
They demanded charges against Mapuche spiritual leader or ‘Machi” Francisca Linconao be dropped. She is charged in an arson attack that killed two wealthy land owners in ancestral Mapuche lands. After a 14 day hunger strike ‘to freedom or death,’ she was released on house arrest the same day as the march and ended her hunger strike. Protesters denounced ongoing police violence against indigenous peoples in Chile.
       Decrying cases like that of Brandon Hernández Huentecol, 17, who was shot in the back by police last month. Huentecol has had 12 operations and remains in critical condition. His family denounced police efforts to buy their silence.

Australia:

       As a minimum response to the capture of our comrades, some anarchists in Sydney painted a solidarity mural.

Solidarity with the prisoners of the social war. For the annihilation of every prison.

Mexico:

       The community of Suc-Tuc in Campeche form a self-government against corruption and repression of their authorities
Demián Revart
“Impossible takes just a little bit longer”

France:

Left-wing activists have clashed with riot police during protests over new labour laws that are bringing havoc to the streets of Paris today.

And so it grows until we win.

Our Future

Once upon a time,

in our not so distant past

stood a beautiful, a unique world,

laden with promise,

a world where our future was open,

our potential vast.

Now, seduced by glinting tinsel of the mad

our reason quivers

on the edge of a dark abyss.

We have created a world

where wastelands abound

where we

the many, the marginalised, the ordinary,

struggle to survive in voracity that astounds

are seduced

to create wastelands in our minds,

slowly accepting chaos

in a world of insanity.

Here corporate monsters

of hypocrisy, contradictions,

sever the fragile cord

that unites being with being

     However, our future doesn't have to be that way, the choice is ours. 

Visit ann arky's home at www.radicalglasgow.me.uk