Cyber-Shield: Brazil Announces Government System To Block NSA

Brazil is creating an email system intended to shield the government from NSA spying. The country is set to vote on a cyber-security bill following revelations the US spy network had infiltrated the highest levels of Brazil’s administration.

Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff tweeted the news, stressing the need for greater security “to prevent possible espionage.” 

Rousseff said the Federal Data Processing Service (SERPRO) had been charged with creating the spy-proof system for the Brazilian government. 

“This is the first step toward extending the privacy and inviolability of official posts,” Rousseff said. 




Furthermore, Brazil’s Minister of Communication Paulo Bernardo said that the new system would most probably be put to the test at the end of the month. SERPRO is also developing an email security system that will be freely available for the Brazilian public. 

The initiatives are part of a number of measures being introduced by the Brazilian government to shore up internet security. It comes after security leaks by former CIA employee Edward Snowden revealed that the NSA had been spying on the communications of the Brazilian government. 

The classified cables obtained by American journalist Glen Greenwald and published by Brazilian newspaper O Globo revealed that the US spy agency had infiltrated the state-run oil giant Petrobras. The NSA had even managed to hack into President Rousseff’s email account. 

Canada was also implicated in the scandal for spying on Brazil’s Ministry of Mines and Energy and then disseminating the data among the others in the ‘Five Eyes’ intelligence network – the US, UK, New Zealand and Australia. 

“They [Five Eyes] are sharing all the information, handing over documents to let other countries know exactly what they are doing,” Glen Greenwald told Brazilian current affairs program Fantastico. 

President Dilma condemned the NSA’s spying as a breach of Brazilian sovereignty and made it clear that Brazil would not tolerate such activities. She called on both Canada and the US to cease the ‘cyberwar’ they had started against Brazil. 

“Without respect for [a nation’s] sovereignty, there is no basis for proper relations among nations. Those who want a strategic partnership cannot possibly allow recurring and illegal action to go on as if they were an ordinary practice,” she said in a speech to the UN in September. 

In retaliation, Dilma postponed an official visit to Washington and announced that Brazil will host an international conference on internet governance next year. 

Meanwhile, the White House has released a statement saying President Barack Obama had ordered an investigation into the US intelligence program in Brazil. 

"As the president previously stated, he has directed a broad review of US intelligence posture, but the process will take several months to complete,” said the informant. 

Janet Yellen: Not About Gender Just The Same Old, Same Old

There was a lot of talk among women about whether Obama would pick the first woman to be Federal Reserve Chair over that old sexist pig Larry Summers. Well yes he picked Janet Yellen but no the policies are the same ones that hurt women and everyone else in the working class. Jack Rasmus makes it all very clear.

OCTOBER 10, 2013

Bernanke's Backup Gets the Nod

On Janet Yellen as Federal Reserve Chair

by JACK RASMUS

On October 9, 2013, President Obama appointed Janet Yellen, current vice-chair of the Federal Reserve, as the new Fed chair, to replace Ben Bernanke expected to retire at year’s end. Obama’s appointment, subject to Senate confirmation that is likely, comes after a general consensus in recent weeks that Yellen would be Obama’s choice.

That followed prior weeks of heated public debate and maneuvering involving Yellen, as favorite of liberals in and out of Congress, and Larry Summers, favorite of Obama administration staffers and in-siders. Summers withdrew his candidacy several weeks ago, however, under pressure from conservative elements, who viewed his role as former Obama adviser, as too liberal on fiscal spending in Obama’s administration, and liberal elements, who viewed his role as former Clinton administration Secretary of the Treasury as too accommodating to bankers and financial deregulation.

It has been interesting to watch how liberals, within and without the Obama administration in recent weeks organized aggressively on behalf of Yellen. Yellen was the ‘Fed Dove’, willing to continue Ben Bernanke’s generous free money policies of QE and near zero interest rates. In contrast, Summers was the monetary ‘hawk’ that would likely accelerate a withdrawal from QE faster. Of course, both profiles were mostly spin.

Noted liberal economists, like Paul Krugman of the New York Times, fell completely into the Yellen camp, praising her policies and more liberal credentials. Even progressives of the moderate persuasion fell for the ‘Yellen as Fed Dove’ fiction.

But a closer inspection would have revealed that neither Summers nor Yellen would have departed much, if at all, from current chair Bernanke’s policies.

Those policies, in the form of QE (quantitative easing) and ‘zero bound interest rates’, since 2009 have had little if any impact or effect on the real economy—and therefore on housing recovery, jobs, or middle class incomes.

In the course of four years of both QE and zero rates, the Federal Reserve has pumped more than $13 trillion in liquidity (money) into the US and global banking system (and shadow banking system) to bail out the banks. In terms of QE alone, this occurred in at least three versions—QE1, QE2, and now currently QE3—which together will have provided by year end 2013 (along with QE 2.5—called ‘operation twist’), nearly $4 trillion of liquidity injections to bankers as well as individual wealthy investors seeking to dump their collapse subprime mortgage bonds on the Federal Reserve.

QE and the $13 trillion resulted in record booms in the stock and bond markets in the US and globally. Much of that likely flowed out of the US economy into the global, serving to stimulate real growth in emerging markets and even more in generating financial asset speculative bubbles around the world since 2009. There is in fact a very high correlation between the announcement, introduction, and conclusion of QE programs and stock-bond, derivative, and other financial asset booms and declines since 2009. Conversely, there is virtually no such connection between housing, jobs, and other real sectors of the US economy.

Bernanke Fed monetary policies have thus boosted financial capital gains and in turn the incomes of the wealthiest in the US and globally, as real disposable income for US households has consistently declined for four consecutive years. As recent data on income distribution from studies of economists at the University of California have shown this past summer: The wealthiest US 1% households have accrued for themselves no less than 95% of all the income gains in the US since 2009.

Yellen has been perhaps the strongest supporter of out-going Fed Chair, Ben Bernanke’s policies of QE and zero bound rates, which have directly resulted in this lopsided income inequality. So why were liberals so impressed with her as the preferred choice for next Fed chair? It certainly wasn’t for her policies. Or was it?

Perhaps they still labor under the false notion that, in the world of 21st century global finance capitalism, that low interest rates create jobs? But that academic economics fiction no longer has evidence in reality. It belongs in the same trash bin with other fictions, like more business tax cuts create jobs. Or that more free trade agreements , like the pending Transpacific Partnership, pushed by the Obama administration and liberals, will create jobs. Here again, the empirical track record shows that neither have, or will, create jobs. But liberals nonetheless adhere to these false notions, believing in the various forms of ‘trickle down’ economics.

Yellen as Fed Chair will do no more for jobs and real middle class-working class incomes than Obama’s appointment of General Electric’s CEO, Jeff Immelt, did for jobs since 2010 by getting the Obama administration to pass new free trade agreements with Panama, Columbia and Korea, or more tax cuts for multinational manufacturers like GE, Microsoft, or big pharma have done for jobs.
But Yellen was given the ‘dove’ tag and therefore the liberal endorsement.

Yellen as Fed Chair will continue policies no different in content than has Ben Bernanke. Yellen will continue to pump QE into bankers and investors, stocks and bond markets, global speculators and offshore investors, as had Bernanke. If she really were liberal, she’d take the $1 trillion given them in just the past year of QE3 liquidity injections and use it to fund a government direct job creation program. That would create 20 million $50k a year jobs, and jump start the economic recovery overnight.

But the Bernanke-Yellen policy of giving that $1 trillion (and $12 trillion more) to bankers and investors will instead continue to prop up the stock, bond and other speculative financial markets. And just as Bernanke ‘chickened out’ this past summer when he rapidly backed off suggesting the $85 billion a month QE3 injections might be reduced by modest $5 billion, so too will Yellen go slow, and reverse course quickly as necessary, when the bondholders revolt again at any such suggestion.

There will be no fundamental change, in other words, from a Bernanke Fed to a Yellen Fed. As currently structured and led, the US Federal Reserve is an institution serving bankers and wealthy investors. Before the Fed can ever begin serving the rest of the economy, the country and its citizens, it will have to be radically restructured and its leadership democratically chosen.

The Federal Reserve will have to be democratized and the bankers and investors totally marginalized from its operations. The Fed will have to become an institution that functions as a ‘public banking entity’, not a private banking conduit. It will then provide low money cost loans to households, small businesses, students, and workers—instead of wealthy investors, bankers, and speculators.

And instead of issuing QE for the latter, it can then issue QE to create jobs, raise incomes, and generate a sustained economic recovery for all instead of a perpetual subsidized recovery for the 1%. But that won’t happen under a Yellen Fed, or under a government led by the dual one-party system in the US today. It will take a new, grass roots movement for real democracy in the US, and a new party based upon that movement.

Dr. Jack Rasmus is the author of the book, “Obama’s Economy: Recovery for the Few”, published by Pluto Press, London, April 2012. He is the host of the weekly internet radio show from New York, ‘Alternative Visions’, on the Progressive Radio Network, prn.fm. His website is www.kyklosproductions.com and he blogs at jackrasmus.com. His twitter handle is drjackrasmus.    

At The UN, A Latin American Rebellion

Laura Carlsen

October 4, 2013

Foreign Policy in Focus

Without a doubt, the 68th UN General Assembly will be remembered as a watershed. Nations reached an agreement on control of chemical weapons that could avoid a global war in Syria. The volatile stalemate on the Iran nuclear program came a step closer to diplomacy.

What failed to make the headlines, however, could have the longest-term significance of all: the Latin American rebellion.

For Latin American leaders, this year's UN general debate became a forum for widespread dissent and anger at U.S. policies that seek to control a hemisphere that has clear aspirations for greater independence. In a region long considered the United States' primary zone of influence, Washington's relations with many Latin American nations have gone from bad to worse under the Bush II and Obama administrations. And judging by the speeches at the General Assembly, they may be nearing an all-time low.

One after another, Latin American leaders came to the podium to denounce the U.S. government and its policies. Most criticism was directed at the espionage programs revealed by former National Security Agency contractor Edward Snowden that made friendly nations such as Mexico and Brazil marks for political and industrial spying.

The other target for regional antipathy was the signature U.S. security policy in the Western Hemisphere: the drug war. Even formerly stalwart allies like Guatemala, Mexico, and Colombia came out against Washington's drug war and called for alternative approaches.

The High Price of Spying on Your Neighbors

Brazilian president Dilma Rousseff led the charge against U.S. international surveillance activities on the first day of the general debate at UN headquarters in New York City. Information from the Snowden leaks revealed that the U.S. spy program in Brazil targeted President Rousseff's personal and governmental communications as well as the state-owned oil company, Petrobras.

This understandably infuriated Brazil. One can only imagine the response in the United States if the tables were turned--"Brazil found spying on U.S. government and companies through private Internet and telecommunications companies."

Brazil is an ally with no intention whatsoever of attacking the United States. According to the Brazilian daily O Globo, Washington has been spying on Brazilian businesses and Petrobras to give a potential advantage to U.S. companies bidding for oil contracts. This month, Brazil is putting up a bid for oil development in the Libra subsalt oilfields in the Santos Basin, with a reported 12 billion barrels of recoverable oil. Chevron is reportedly in the running. Inside information fed to U.S. companies by the leaks could favor them in the bidding process.

Rousseff called the program a breach of international law and an "affront to the principles that must guide the relations among friendly nations." She added that the U.S. program constituted "a grave violation of human rights and civil liberties; of invasion and capture of confidential information concerning corporate activities, and especially of disrespect to national sovereignty." Rousseff vowed to take measures to protect Brazil from U.S. spying in the future.

The Brazilian president had previously cancelled a state visit to Washington over the revelation--to the chagrin of the State Department, which had been carefully courting Brazil as the economic leader in the region, as well as the most accessible member of the South American bloc that challenges U.S. political and military hegemony. The White House downplayed the incident, failing to seriously address the allegations--despite the fact that the Brazilian chill raises some serious issues about Latin American frustration with Washington.

Next up, Bolivian President Evo Morales not surprisingly went even further, questioning the U.S. commitment to diplomacy and democracy as it spied on its allies. "What kind of democracy is it when espionage services of the United States violate the privacy and security of other nations, using private companies. It turns out they not only spy on democratic governments, but on their own allies, even on the United Nations itself. I think this shows a lot of arrogance," the indigenous leader told the Assembly.

Latin American countries recently rallied around President Morales when his flight from Russia was denied airspace over Europe and forced to land in Austria, supposedly by U.S. orders on the suspicion that Snowden could be on board.

Ecuador echoed criticisms of the spy program, saying that confidence had been seriously eroded by "the unlimited acts of the United States, through its spying on global communications" and demanding that the United States explain its surveillance programs.

Bolivia and Ecuador criticizing the United States is a common occurrence since leftist parties took power in their respective capitals. But even Mexico--normally submissive due to its high economic and geopolitical dependency on the United States since NAFTA--used part of its moment in the international spotlight to warn against violations of the "right to privacy." Foreign Minister Jose Antonio Meade stopped short of mentioning the United States, calling for a full investigation and insisting that "the parties responsible be held accountable." Mexico has been muted in its criticism, but sent a diplomatic note when the leaks showed the NSA had targeted now-President Enrique Pena Nieto when he was running for office.

The U.S. media has kept Edward Snowden, who has been granted temporary asylum in Russia, out of public attention as much as possible. But the UN statements showed that Washington is paying a high price for spying on its friends and neighbors, and not just in the Western Hemisphere.

On September 30, Jesselyn Radack of the Government Accountability Office read a statement from Snowden to the European Parliament as it takes up the issue of mass surveillance. "The surveillance of whole populations," Snowden wrote, "rather than individuals, threatens to be the greatest human rights challenge of our time." As a sign of its indignation, the Parliament recently nominated Snowden for its highest human rights award.

Demands to End the Drug War

Latin American leaders have grown increasingly discontent about more longstanding U.S. policies as well.

"Right here, in this same headquarters, 52 years ago, the convention that gave birth to the war on drugs was approved. Today, we must acknowledge, that war has not been won," Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos said, noting that his country "has suffered more deaths, more bloodshed, and more sacrifices in this war" than almost any other.

Santos, as he has done before, called for changing tracks rather than intensifying the war. He noted that he led the effort in the Organization of American States to study "different scenarios" (meaning alternatives to the drug war approach) and commissioned studies that will be made available to the public and evaluated in a UN Special Session in 2016.

He concluded with a jab at the U.S.-led drug war. "If we act together with a comprehensive and modern vision--free of ideological and political biases--imagine how much harm and how much violence we could avoid," he said.

Central American nations repeated the need for a new model. Costa Rica's Laura Chinchilla cited a regional agreement including Mexico and Guatemala "to reevaluate internationally agreed-upon policies in search of more effective responses to drug trafficking, from a perspective of health, a framework of respect for human rights, and a perspective of harm reduction."

Guatemalan President Otto Perez Molina, a military man who has somewhat ironically assumed the mantle of drug reform champion, told the UN, "Since the start of my government, we have clearly affirmed that the war on drugs has not yielded the desired results and that we cannot continue doing the same thing and expecting different results." He called on nations to "assess internationally agreed policies in search of more effective results" and urged approaches based on public health, violence reduction, respect for human rights, and cooperation to reduce the flow of arms and illegal funds.

Perez Molina openly praised the "visionary decision" of the citizens of the U.S. states of Colorado and Washington to legalize marijuana, and heralded "the example set by [Uruguayan] President Jose Mujica in proposing legislation that regulates the cannabis market instead of following the failed route of prohibition."

Mexico's minister used the same terms, quoting the regional agreement and placing a priority on prevention, arms control, and opening a global debate. Bolivia's Morales noted that according to UN data, his country has made more progress on fighting drug trafficking "after liberating ourselves from the DEA," referring to his decision to expel the U.S. agency from Bolivia.

This onslaught of drug war opposition is not welcome in Washington. The Obama administration has been actively trying to divert or dilute Latin American calls to reduce its militarized counternarcotics operations, concerned more with maintaining and expanding the U.S. military presence in the region than eliminating drug trafficking, which a recent report again shows has not diminished.

Listening to Latin America

Spying and the drug war weren't the only criticisms. Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro cancelled his UN participation altogether, citing "provocations" against him and fears for his safety were he to visit the UN's New York City headquarters. His demand to move UN headquarters out of the United States was reiterated by other Latin American leaders.

Tensions have been high between the United States and Venezuela despite the death of U.S. nemesis Hugo Chavez. Maduro just expelled U.S. charge d' affaires Kelly Kiederling and two others for allegedly encouraging acts of sabotage against the Venezuelan electrical system and economy in meetings with right-wing groups.

Criticisms of inaction on global warming were also aimed northward. Mujica of Uruguay lashed out at U.S. consumer culture, saying, "If everyone aspired to live like the average U.S. citizen, we'd need three planets."

Amid all this, the mainstream media paid little attention to Latin America.

It's time to listen to what they're saying.

This is a bold new Latin America speaking. Not only are these nations reclaiming a right to differentiate their views from those of the global superpower and refusing to render it diplomatic tribute--whatever your views, a step forward in self-determination--they are also standing up in defense of rights we should all be defending far more vigorously.

Brazil and its allies sounded an alarm that should be heeded by all nations and by U.S. citizens especially: it is not acceptable to assume that in the modern age we no longer have the basic right to privacy. U.S. government eavesdropping on President Rousseff and others--thanks to the global reach of ATT, Microsoft, and Google, and their unprincipled compliance with the unprincipled requests of the NSA and other spy agencies--affects everyone. The spy-versus-spy scenarios that made for intriguing novels have given way to a spy industry vs. common citizen reality on a global scale.

And once again, our generation is demonstrating a terrible willingness to sacrifice rights that our ancestors fought for and our children may never inherit.

The evident anger in the words of these Latin American heads of state shows just how far Washington's relations with the region have deteriorated. It demonstrates the growing gap between rhetoric and reality since Obama promised the region a relationship based on "mutual respect" and "self determination" at the beginning of his first term. Diplomacy, reaffirmed in the 68th Assembly, has been steadily eroding in U.S. relations with Latin America as the Pentagon dominates the agenda.

Does it matter for the United States to have good relations with Latin America, including the left-leaning leaders? Apparently, Washington has decided it doesn't. Its defensive response to the spy scandal, its efforts to pit its free-trade allies against countries that have turned away from neoliberal economies, and its use of regional allies like Colombia and Mexico as proxy militaries has sought to create rifts rather than mend them.

The U.S. government continues to play the neighborhood bully long after the kids on the block have grown up. The flurry of state visits to the region have generally aimed to reinforce unpopular policies, including the drug war and free trade, rather than listen to the calls for change.

In-the-box Washington pundits view the hemispheric outburst in the UN as a PR problem. But the Obama administration doesn't need to work on its niceties or polish its Spanish. What it needs to do is ditch the offensive policies and practices that stirred up regional ire. The voices of outrage from the South brought an important lesson to the UN floor: Deception and strong-arm tactics eventually backfire.

Was anyone in Washington listening?

Foreign Policy In Focus columnist Laura Carlsen directs the Americas Program for the Center for International Policy in Mexico City.

Submitted By Juanita

The AFL-CIO Warns That Obama May Offer The "Chained CPI" In Grand Bargain To End Government Shut Down

The AFL-CIO is not usually an activist organization but they can see the writing on the wall.  The Obama Administration has in the past supported attacks on Social Security checks by using the benign sounding term “Chained CPI”. This will cut Social Security income for retirees and people with disabilities and will hurt Social Security recipients for years down the line.  It is particularly nefarious because the rich pay nothing to Social Security on any income above $113,700.

There was a small rally in Washington D.C. on October 4^th and a few brave Democrats spoke out against using the government shut down as an excuse to implement the “Chained CPI”.

My favorite speaker was Rep. Mike Honda (D-Calif.) who quoted his mother: "Instead of talking about the 'chained' CPI or cutting benefits, my mom would say you just need to make the pie bigger, we're just going to talk about one cut—and that's cut the crap....Cut the crap, scrap the cap." Scrapping that arbitrary cap would go a long way to shoring up Social Security's future.

But the AFL-CIO needs to be organizing demonstrations all over the country against the Chained CPI before it becomes a reality. We need to do more than have small rallies in Washington D.C.  The Labor Movement needs to lead a fight to be reinvigorated and this is a good one.  But until then call your Democratic Senators and Representatives to let them know you are watching. Those of us around the country who have seen the bipartisan attacks on our pensions at the State level cannot take it any more and we are with Mike Honda’s mom, “CUT THE CRAP, SCRAP THE CAP”! 

UNAC To Tour Malalai Joya: A Woman Among Warlords, Prospects For Afghan Women And Non-Intervention In My Country

On the 12th anniversary of  the US invasion and occupation of Afghanistan, UNAC, in conjunction with the Afghan Women's Mission is sponsoring a national tour of former Afghanistan legislator, women’s rights and antiwar leader, Malalai Joya.  Please see the Schedule below.  To get involved, please contact the tour organizer listed for each cities

The tour is co-sponsored by UNAC and the Afghan Women's Mission, www.afghanwomensmission.org/ Tour Schedule: (for details of appearances in each city, please click here) October 3-5 New York,        jlombard@nycap.rr.com       October 6-7  Boston, Contact:       marilynl@alumni.new.edu October 8 Amherst, Mass. Contact:      cmgauvreau@me.com October 9 Albany, NY, Contact:      jlombard@nycap.rr.com  October 10-11  Chicago. Contact:      Phunt45@aol.com October 12-14  Madison. Wisconsin, Contact:       Jasmine.Clay@housing.wisc.edu October  15-16  Twin Cities (Minneapolis/St. Paul), Contact:      scsrn@yahoo.com October 17-18  San Francisco Bay Area, Contact:      jmackler@lmi.net October 19-21 Los Angeles, Contact:      sonali@sonaliandjim.net October 22-23 San Diego, Contact:      aka0001@hotmail.com

SEIU 503 (OR) Activists Send Letter To Washington Locals Urging Endorsement of Socialist Kshama Sawant

Fourteen Rank And File elected leaders of SEIU 503 (OR) both past and present have signed onto a letter urging the Washington SEIU locals and the Washington SEIU State Council to endorse and work for Socialist Alternative candidate Kshama Sawant for Seattle City Council Position 2.

Letters and e-mails went out to officers, leaders and rank and file activists in SEIU locals 6, 775NW and 1199NW, 925. There were a significant number of former and current members of the SEIU 503 CAPE Council who signed the letter.  This is the union body which interviews and recommends endorsements of political candidates.

The timing was just right as about the same time as the message from Oregon arrived Sawant was featured as the cover story of The Stranger which has a circulation of over 100,000 people in Seattle.  There are actually two articles.  One article targets her opponent and 16 year incumbent, Richard Conlin as having an agenda which “largely reflects the city’s wealthiest interests”.  The other article describes why Kshama Sawant is “the real deal”. The importance of this article for the unionists at the receiving end of their Oregon brothers and sisters petition is that it states that the city council needs at least one member who represents the working people of Seattle. http://www.votesawant.org

In addition the Minnesota SEIU State Council has endorsed Ty Moore who is the Socialist Alternative candidate for the Minneapolis State Council. http://www.tymoore.org/seiu_endorsement.

This is the text of letter from Oregon SEIU members:

Greetings From Rank And File Elected Leaders Of SEIU 503 (OR)

We are delighted to see the opportunity that our SEIU brothers and sisters in Washington have in the campaign of Kshama Sawant for Seattle City Council Position 2. While we are all struggling to hold politicians accountable to working families we finally see a candidate who represents our vision of "justice, economic fairness, and the dignity and worth of workers", per our union's mission statement. Best of all she understands like SEIU activists that it requires  building a movement to make social change. When she received 35% of the vote in a three person primary it was clear that she is a viable candidate.

Then it was encouraging when the SEIU State Council in Minnesota endorsed Ty Moore also a member of Socialist Alternative for the Minneapolis City Council saying he was the best candidate they had interviewed. http://www.tymoore.org/seiu_endorsement.

Some of us have been to Seattle to support the Fast Food Workers Strike for $15/Hour Minimum Wage And The Right To Unionize Without Retaliation.  Those of us who went had an opportunity to talk with Kshama Sawant and also see her opponent Richard Conlin side by side. This is a Democrat who is against the $15/hour minimum wage, the only vote on the Seattle City Council against paid sick leave and against expanding mass transit. We hope you will take this opportunity to endorse the candidate that represents the SEIU vision. We are so tired of politicians who tell us one thing and answer only to their corporate donors after they are elected. Sawant continues to receive endorsements from union locals. Most recently the American Postal Workers Union was added to AFSCME, AFT, CWA, and IBEW.

 http://www.votesawant.org/about 

Claiming Salem's public space

 

Cultural or art actions by ordinary people in many places in the US and in the world --- including Salem, Oregon --- are claiming public and sometimes privately owned space, creating webs of interconnection between people, and providing free cultural materials, art, and more. The Occupy movement may have given strength to these actions by its claim of public space.

Four of these actions/activities are described below.

Little Free Libraries

These are free book exchanges housed in small structures in neighborhoods.

From the “official” Little Free Library site:

“What is a Little Free Library?  It’s a “take a book, return a book” gathering place where neighbors share their favorite literature and stories. In its most basic form, a Little Free Library is a box full of books where anyone may stop by and pick up a book (or two) and bring back another book to share.” 

 

The LFL site doesn't claim they are completely original and they acknowledge other people and groups that have gone before with similar efforts. Yet it seems that the idea of LFLs inspire because they can be created and maintained near one's own home and their success depends on people taking from and giving back to the LFL. Several LFLs have been created in Salem, Oregon.   Not all little free library structures are “registered” with the official LFL, but if they are, they are placed on the list/map maintained by this site. You can find if there is a LFL near you on the map on the site here.

Free Art Friday

Free Art Friday is a grassroots movement where people create art of some kind and leave it in a public space to be claimed for free.

There is a wide-ranging definition of art at work here – from painting on canvas to origami to masks to recycled crafts and so on). This helps moves “art” out of commercial galleries, gives artists freedom to create, and gives finders something free to take home which is unconnected to any exchange of money. At this site you can read more, see photos and find a FAF near you. See also https://www.facebook.com/FreeArtFriday.

Salem, Oregon has had an active FAF group (https://www.facebook.com/FreeArtFridaySalem) for several months.

Yarn bombing

This activity has been around a while and involves textile crafters (knitters and crocheters mostly) moving their work into the public sphere. Yarn bombing can be defined as “a type of graffiti or street art that employs colorful displays of knitted or crocheted yarn or fiber rather than paint or chalk.” (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yarn_bombing)

Yarn bombers often cover existing structures in the public space, such as bike racks, poles, tree branches, etc. Groups or individuals may have different motivations for yarn bombing, some making political statements (such as covering the rifle of a statue) but the effect is to claim and personalize often cold and sterile public space.

Are there any YB-ers in Salem, Oregon? Someone started a Facebook page called United Yarn Bombers of Salem Oregon , but it appears there has been no recent activity; let's hope that changes soon.

Guerrilla Gardening

From Wikipedia:

 “Guerrilla gardening is gardening on land that the gardeners do not have legal right to use, often an abandoned site or area not cared for by anyone. It encompasses a very diverse range of people and motivations, from the enthusiastic gardener who spills over their legal boundaries to the highly political gardener who seeks to provoke change through direct action.

The land that is guerrilla gardened is usually abandoned or neglected by its legal owner. That land is used by guerrilla gardeners to raise plants, frequently focusing on food crops or plants intended to beautify an area. This practice has implications for land rights and land reform; it promotes re-consideration of land ownership in order to reclaim land from perceived neglect or misuse and assign a new purpose to it.

Some guerrilla gardeners carry out their actions at night, in relative secrecy, to sow and tend a new vegetable patch or flower garden in an effort to make the area of use and/or more attractive. Some garden at more visible hours to be seen by their community. It has grown into a form of activism.”

Seed bombing (“a technique of introducing vegetation to land by throwing or dropping compressed bundles of soil containing seeds or live vegetation”) is considered the beginning of the guerrilla gardening movement.

Anyone doing guerrilla gardening in Salem? I think yes, but some of it must be really underground at this point.

****

What does all this mean? Perhaps people move in small steps, and the Left needs to meet people where they are. People who are involved in the activities described above may have no background in politics or organizing, but the steps they take when involved in these activities may put them on track toward what Occupy was/is trying to do.

There have been reports in the Trotskyist press, as well as a recent posting here on the Willamette Reds blog, that the FRSO has taken a position in support of the brutal Assad regime in Syria. It should be noted that there are two organizations that go by the name Freedom Road Socialist Organization. FRSO split in 1999. Two related questions led to the split: What is socialism? How do you build a party?

The first came up in the '80s. A few members, based in the Midwest, decided that any country ruled by a self-defined Communist Party was de facto socialist. The Tienanmen Square Massacre of Chinese workers and students in 1989 became the line in the sand. The Midwest comrades held that it had saved socialism.

Unimpressed, the 1991 Congress, by a considerable majority, adopted "On The Crisis of Socialism," which called for a rethinking of the history of the socialist model established by the October Revolution and identified questions, like democracy, for which answers had to be developed. It became one of FRSO's three basic unity documents.

The party building issue got sharp later in the '90s. The Midwest grouping firmly opposed a proposal that Freedom Road should center its work on Left Refoundation, a different approach to building a revolutionary socialist party—or parties—in the US that would draw a wide range of organizations and individuals into an extended process of rebuilding the left. The comrades from the Midwest favored a traditional party building approach of recruiting people to the existing group, all in line with long-established and unchanged Marxist-Leninist orthodoxy. Left Refoundation, focusing as it did on the crisis in socialism in theory, organization and practice, was anathema to them and they openly declared their intention to drive out its advocates. When they could rally no one else to this effort, they left. 

Posted on September 16, 2013 by FRSO/OSCL National Executive Committtee

The War Drive Against Syria Has Been Stalled—Let’s Stop It Cold!

1. It has been a whirlwind couple of weeks since Barack Obama announced that US armed forces would launch a military attack on Syria, because of the Assad regime’s alleged use of poison gas in the civil war there.
Day by day, drama ensued. Global support was minimal. The British parliament voted against participating. The UN Security Council would not endorse it, nor would NATO. Representatives in Congress demanded a debate. Inconsistent and shifting statements from the administration about what was planned, and when, and even why, deepened the drama. Syria and Russia seized on one such statement, by Secretary of State John Kerry, to force the US to agree to negotiate over a plan for stripping Syria of its chemical weapons without an attack.

As news reports track the changing situation, we should not lose sight of one key thing: the principal factor in forestalling this attack is massive opposition from citizens of the US. From the start polls were negative, and only got more so. Senators and Representatives report being deluged by call and emails. Protests developed in smaller cities and towns across the country.

2. It is imperative that the attack be stopped dead, not just stalled.
The immediate results of a drone and bomber attack on Assad regime will be death and destruction for the Syrian people. Short term, it will intensify and probably prolong the bloody civil war there and increase the likelihood that the US military will be drawn deeper in. Already there’s talk of sending “advisors” to train forces in the Syrian armed opposition to use the vehicles, state-of-the-art communications equipment, and “light” weapons that the CIA and American allies like Saudi Arabia are shipping to them in massive quantities.

Longer term, it will result in more suffering for the Syrian people and more refugees. It will also increase hatred for the US and strengthen Islamic reactionaries and jihadists, the best organized forces opposing the US in the region. The consequences for the people there will be dire.

3. The official rationale for the attack is to punish the use of poison gas by the Assad regime, a crime under international law.
It seems highly likely that sarin gas was used in the Damascus suburbs (although the UN inspection team has not yet issued a report). What’s unclear is who did it, with three main possibilities: Assad ordered it; some Syrian Army officer did it without authorization; or it was done by elements in the armed opposition either by mistake, or as a false flag operation.
For the US to claim the right to judge which international laws get enforced and which ignored is just bizarre. The most deadly use of poison gas since World War 2 was committed by Iraqi forces with CIA oversight and assistance at the town of Halabja. Nor has there been any mention of Israel’s massive chemical warfare program, which was confirmed by US intelligence years ago.

The proposed attack on Syria itself would be a massive violation of Chapter VII of the United Nations Charter, governing circumstances under which one country may lawfully attack another.
Defenders of the plan for a US attack sometimes do a humanitarian bait-and-switch. They say that Assad has killed over 100,000 of his countryman, and to let him get away with it is like letting Hitler go unchallenged. To be sure, Bashar al-Assad is a brutal ruler (twice victor in one-candidate elections) and a target of massive protests during the Arab Spring. But that 100,000 number is the overall death toll in the civil war which has been raging in Syria over the last two years. Many of those deaths were caused by the Free Syrian Army and the other forces which make up the disunited Syrian armed opposition.

4. What are our rulers trying to get out of this? There are obvious splits in ruling circles over the advisability of attacking Syria.
One big stake is oil. Syria has no significant reserves, but planned pipelines to fuel Europe run directly across its territory. More important, Syria has become a proxy in the complex protracted battle for dominance in the Middle East. At the regional level, this pits Shi’ite-ruled societies like Iran, Iraq and Syria against the Sunni monarchies of Saudi Arabia and the Gulf States. Barely behind the curtain, though, are the US imperialists (joined at the hip to the Zionist state in Israel), and so are their Russian and Chinese rivals, backing Syria and Iran. Our own imperialists want to reinforce Israel, weaken the Iranian regime and maintain regional stability to keep the oil (and the petrodollars) flowing.

The debates over the costs of various courses of action, with the dangers posed by direct US intervention, manifest a constant theme: Will whatever the US does in Syria be worth the likely price of intensified hatred from the masses of people in the region, and throughout the Islamic world, the kind produced by the devastation of Iraq?

At the same time, the instability of the situation causes some to argue that the safest course of action is to make sure the Syrian civil war continues, with no force permitted to approach victory. This would weaken the bloc of governments hostile to the US in the region, without giving too much of a boost to the Saudis and Gulf emirates. The death and devastation such a calibrated approach would cause the Syrian people is presumably an unfortunate side effect.

5. Will failing to act decisively in Syria weaken the US?
We certainly hope so. US imperialism is still the most ferocious enemy of the people of the world, even though its dominance has been considerably diminished over the past two decades. If inability to follow through on saber-rattling or to impose the US will in some other part of the globe shows weakness and further decline in US dominance, that’s an important and positive thing.

There is also an opportunity for the current contradictions within the ruling class and political leaders about the attack on Syria to set a precedent against the unilateral power of the President to take military action. Putting pressure on Congress now to fully uphold and defend the War Powers Resolution can help put the brakes on future US aggression.

6. Shouldn’t we be supporting someone in this war?
There are some assumptions in this question that need to be unpacked. First, we must consider what concrete support we as revolutionary socialists in the US can actually give. In the short term at least there is little we can do to support any side or group.

It is also important to remember that the anti-war movement has no leverage to fine-tune a military intervention. Once an attack is underway it will not necessarily be limited to the goals stated at the beginning. If some convincing and positive proposal in Congress or the United Nations actually gets traction, then we can evaluate it. But we have very little capacity to generate such proposals or force them into the public discourse.

The Syrian opposition to the Assad dynasty has many roots: an economic crisis and population dislocation triggered by several years of severe drought (likely caused by global warming); a government that represses civil society and has maintained rule over the Sunni Muslim majority by means of massacres and persecution; and the inspiration drawn by urban workers and intellectuals from the Arab Spring in Tunisia and Egypt.

So why not root for them? Even during a period of brutally repressed demonstrations, opposition forces adopted the strategy of overthrowing Assad by force of arms, triggering a civil war. With no central command, hundreds of local militias picked up the gun. The majority of the armed opposition tentatively allied under the banner of the Free Syrian Army, but the FSA is based outside of the country and has shown limited ability to organize and command the hundreds of groups affiliated to it.

The best organized, funded and supplied forces to emerge have been Sunni fundamentalists like the Al Nusra Front and its recent split-off, the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria, which have recruited many experienced jihadi fighters from outside Syria. Both the FSA and its rivals have been responsible for sectarian attacks on Alawi Muslims, the Shi’ite sect to which the Assads belong, and Syrian Christians. These two minority groups each make up about 10% of the country’s population and have found themselves forced to rally around the Assad regime, as have many secular Sunnis. Now there are frequent armed clashes pitting Al Nusra and the Islamic State against the Free Syrian Army as well as the government, as they seek to dominate a post-civil war Syria.

A single bright spot is that the Kurdish population in Syria’s Northeast (10% of the country’s total) has started to exercise its right to self determination by taking control of most of the region where they predominate. This is similar to what Iraq’s Kurds have done in the North of that country since the first Gulf War. Many regard this as the next step in creating a cross-border autonomous region and eventually a new state for the largest nation in the Middle East without one. The Kurdish Supreme Committee permits the armed opposition to cross their area, but has, in the main, refused to take part in the civil war.

7. A few of the better recent analyses of the internal situation in Syria raise an important issue largely ignored by the mass media: the probable contribution of the global climate crisis to the political crisis there.
From 2006 to 2011, a severe drought hit Syria’s Western agricultural areas. While periodic droughts are nothing new there, this one was deep and extended, most likely exacerbated by global warming. The result was serious social dislocation, with herds dying of thirst or liquidated and farmers abandoning the countryside for the cities. There they had to compete for scarce jobs and resources with long time residents and also Palestinian and Iraqi refugees.
While there was no widespread famine, like those which had caused rioting in much of the Third World in the second half of the decade, demands on the Assad government for jobs and relief provided tinder for protests inspired by those which had already toppled the Tunisian and Egyptian regimes.

Droughts and the ensuing fall in water tables, crop failures and herd collapses will doubtless make their mark on increasing swathes of the world in coming years. The suffering caused by this and the disruptions and even breakdown of the old social order are factors we will have to take into account in our analyses of developments on a global scale.

8. Our immediate tasks
We have a big job on our plate. It is essential to stop (not just postpone) a US military attack on Syria. We also have to do so in a way that makes it difficult for them to carry out less blatant forms of intervention in the Syrian civil war.

We do so under circumstances far more favorable than we are used to. From the first announcement of the proposed attack on the Assad regime, polls showed the people of this country were not behind it. This sentiment got stronger and stronger over the days that followed.
It turns out that the famously short historical memory in the country extends back at least a decade, to the invasion of Iraq. Lies about WMDs and fantasies about an easy and painless armed attack sounded familiar–and alarming. And people even remember that the US helped arm and train Osama Bin Laden’s forces while he was part of the Islamic fundamentalist armed resistance to Soviet occupation in Afghanistan.

(One unusual factor that deserves mention is the strong opposition from many in the white conservative base of the Republican Party, Tea Partiers, and libertarians. Some are essentially isolationists who actually oppose US military adventures as a rule. More just hate anything identified with Obama, period. Of course there can be no question of political unity with these forces.)

It wasn’t just public opinion polls that got the message across. People spontaneously called their Senators and Representatives in massive numbers, stunning their staffs. These politicians started to speak out against war in Syria or at least to express skepticism. That, and the British parliamentary vote to reject participation, forced Obama to say he would put the issue before Congress, something he had never intended to do. The flood of opposition continued to swell, and the administration announced that it was postponing a vote to pursue global negotiations.
This opposition has to be strengthened and made effective. If and when a vote in Congress does take place, it will surely be carefully framed to appear as narrow and limited. We have to work now to increase that Congressional “No” vote. Politicians who have committed to oppose the attack should be encouraged to stick to that decision; those who are wavering should be forced to commit; and those who support the attack should catch some fire.

That means calling their offices. Get friends, coworkers, and neighbors to call. Petitions make less impact than calls. But even more important than calls is organizing protest in the streets, and in our workplaces and communities.

Demonstrations around Syria started off small and low-spirited. But by the end of the second week of the crisis, they were taking place outside of the usual demo belt, in small cities and towns where the last protest may have taken place during the height of the Iraq War. This is excellent! It should be kept up as long as practical.

Meanwhile in our organizing, we can strengthen the arguments against US aggression by referring to recent events. The deadly series of car-bombs in Iraq, the murderous US drone attacks in Afghanistan, Pakistan and Yemen, the collapse of the Libyan economy, the coup staged by the Egyptian military (with US backing and financing)—all of these reenforce how correct the masses are in their instinctive rejection of an attack on Syria.

We must also be prepared for this issue to recede in months to come. It is in the interests of the Obama Administration to minimize it rapidly, whether they are still intent on a “display of strength” aerial attack on Syria or instead on intervening in other ways. So time is of the essence to decisively crush this attack, and lay the groundwork for a movement that can also beat the next outburst of US aggression.

- See more at: http://freedomroad.org/2013/09/the-war-drive-against-syria-has-been-stalled-lets-stop-it-cold/#sthash.tMPDbnKB.dpuf

Syria: A View From Venezuela And The U.S. Left

Venezuela

This is from a statement on Syria that was issued by the Venezuelan revolutionary organization Marea Socialista (“Socialist Tide”) on 8 September 2013. Active since the beginning within the Chavista movement and the Bolivarian process, Marea Socialista is a current organized within the PSUV (United Socialist Party of Venezuela), founded by Hugo Chavez. It advocates deepening the popular process in Venezuela and mobilizes against the bureaucratization of this process.

The erroneous argumentation of comrades who support Bashar al-Assad

For comrades who only see the bloody imperialism of the United States, the world is something simple and predictable and history repeats itself like an endless wheel. They see the international reality as a black and white photograph between on the one hand the intentions, hopes and policies of Obama - or any Yankee president - and the rest of humanity on the other. They do not seem to have learned yet of the death of the USSR and the end of the Cold War, or the restoration of capitalism in Russia and China, or the global crisis that erupted in 2007 and is the most serious crisis of the last hundred years. They close their eyes to a process of regional rebellion that has lasted two and a half years. And when they talk about it, they describe it as a plan meticulously designed by the United States, which they present as omniscient and omnipotent, thus despising the popular revolts.

The arguments of these sectors rely fundamentally on the denial of facts and reality. For them, there is no real civil war in Syria, but they publish in abundance photographs of "rebels killing Syrian soldiers." There was no use of chemical weapons, but at the same time they assert  "only the rebels have used them." They characterize as identical the foreign fundamentalist brigades and forces which oppress and act against the objectives of the revolution, and the rebel Syrian people, thus justifying Assad’s repression against this people.

They say that if we do not defend Assad, we are necessarily in the camp of the imperialist intervention. They argue that there is not a massive sector of the Syrian people who reject the regime and as proof of this, they say that Assad is still in power. But they overlook the fact that the regime maintains itself by conducting a massacre against a poorly armed people and by the destruction of much of the country.

They do not speak of the figures advanced by UN bodies such as UNHCR, which estimate the number of victims at more than 100,000 dead , two million refugees and half a million wounded. But they demand that the UN publishes the report of its inspectors on chemical weapons and that it finds a political solution to the conflict. A conflict whose nature, besides, they deny.

And those who have no problem denying the dictatorial nature of the regime of this hereditary republic justify its defense in the name of the "lesser evil."

This superficial and conspiratorial view of history is at the same time intolerant with those who, though in the camp of the opposition to imperialist intervention, think differently and do not accept to defend the Assad clan. And when their arguments fall short, they spend their time discrediting, making groundless accusations against and criminalizing those who have different opinions.

The need to make the voice of the radical Left heard

We do not take it upon ourselves - and we think it would be a mistake and a lack of respect for those who are struggling in the region – to enter into tactical discussions. We believe that we must respect the views of those who, in the ongoing popular processes, defend revolutionary objectives. That is why we call for this statement signed by organizations from different countries in the region, and among them, Syria, to be made known widely.

However, we cannot limit ourselves to expressing our rejection of imperialist intervention and solidarity with the Syrian people in their struggle. There are many of us in the world who have, since the beginning of the Arab Spring, supported unconditionally these revolts. But we have so far done so in isolation from each other, each in our own countries, where we live. For we who struggle against capital, the recovery of the internationalist tradition is a fundamental task in order to confront the new times that are emerging today. A first step in reviving this tradition is the need to create spaces for discussion and for joint action and solidarity that has an international impact.

If we do not act, the position of those sectors of the Left in the world who support the Syrian regime will represent a debt that the mass movement will make all those who situate themselves on the left pay, without distinction.

It is necessary for the voice of the radical Left to be heard on the level of its real power. So that the peoples who are struggling in the world can see that there is a different Left; plural, democratic, anti capitalist, genuinely committed against imperialist brutality and against all forms of barbarism.

Behind the toxic clouds that cover today the daily life and death of the rebel Syrian people, our duty is to take steps forward, towards an international coming together of the radical Left, which acts as an amplifier of the cry for freedom and the dignity that comes from deep within the collective memory of the peoples who are struggling .

The U.S. Left

"These same discussions are happening in the U.S. left. Some groups claim that opponents of U.S. imperialism must necessarily support the Assad regime. In mid-September, several of these organizations sent representatives to Damascus to meet with Bashar al-Assad himself. In many cities, these forces have tried to stop the rest of the movement from saying anything even faintly critical of the Assad regime's brutality--claiming that such criticism only feeds into the U.S. drive to war. There are groups claiming that opponents of U.S. imperialism must necessarily support the Assad regime. In mid-September, several of these organizations sent representatives to Damascus to meet with Bashar al-Assad himself. In many cities, these forces have tried to stop the rest of the movement from saying anything even faintly critical of the Assad regime's brutality--claiming that such criticism only feeds into the U.S. drive to war.

The question must be raised how can FRSO, Workers' World Party and Party of Socialism and Liberation support the Assad regime's use of savage and deadly repression against all opponents, its embrace of free-market neo liberalism and its collaboration with the U.S., including torturing people "renditioned" to Syria during the "war on terror."

When the Syrian uprising began, opponents of the Assad regime stayed committed to nonviolence for many months, even in the face of an increasingly bloody crackdown by the regime. Fairly quickly--and continuing to this day--in areas of the country liberated from regime control, Local Coordinating Committees sprang up to address the population's needs and to network with other liberated areas.

The Syrian rebellion is fed by the same sources as the Arab Spring in general--anger at growing inequality as a result of neoliberal economic measures imposed from above, high levels of youth unemployment, poverty among urban workers and rural peasants, and the lack of the most basic democratic rights.

The Assad regime's response has been barbaric. Though there is no definitive evidence that it has used chemical weapons, there is no doubt that the Syrian military has carried out savage artillery and air assaults against civilian populations, including the bombing of neighborhoods, university campuses and even hospitals. The death toll has now soared above 100,000." Sources: International Viewpoint and Socialist Worker