This
morning I received an email from Edwin Maynard, a poet/photographer friend
of mine, who visited me when I was living in Mostar in the 90s. Today
he lives in California. He wrote this:
“We
have a neighbour who has been flying a large TRUMP 2020 KEEP AMERICA
GREAT flag near our driveway and another neighbour on an adjacent
driveway who was toting an assault rifle the other day to deter a
small (mostly White) unarmed Black Lives Matter demonstration that
passed by along a nearby street. The demo consisted of around 30
people tailed by four police cars. And this is regarded as a
‘progressive’ Democrat-voting state!”
He
included a pdf of his recently published, ‘Squaring the Circle’,
a book of photos and poems. It opens with a great poem about Mostar,
but this one caught my attention.
Traumerica
Forty
days of toxic rain
and
the madman in the White House
is
set lose again
as
his evangelical henchmen
lie
low and exonerate themselves
wth
vacant words in the Senate
The
streets are empty at this hour
apart
from the circling pickup trucks
flying
confederate flags
and
the lone SUV with the license-tag sting
MN8
JOY.
The
populace is silenced
and
sealed away behind screens
or
plague masks.
Fear
and hatred are the entrails
served
in the tyrant’s
blasphemous
orations
while
'Sympathy for the Devil'
plays
at the rallying call
to
the festval of lies.
Poisoned
words from the bully pulpit,
positioned
above the law,
trumpet
walls, wars, disinformation, ostracisms,
a
eucharist of dominion
over
the Earth,
and
the sodden ashes
of
tomorrow’s Rapture.'
As
I write this we don’t yet know if this tyrant will be removed from
his ‘bully pulpit’, but am I alone in thinking that there are
parallels between the bully and the Bullingon? Yes, I know. Boris
Johnson has been to Eton and can speak in Latin .
I
am reading a lot of tweets and blogs extolling the superiority of us
Brits in our scorn for the illiterate and humourless President, but
is the ability of our leader to say, ‘rideat non possum’ a cause
for smiling relief?
In
the USA any chance of a social reformist leadership was put paid to
with the replacement of Sanders with Biden. In this country we have
had the same result with, in the words of conservative commentator, Peter Oborne, the ‘political assassination of Jeremy Corbyn’ and his
replacement with Starmer, In the USA there are attempts to stop votes being counted, Here the
general secretary of the Labour Party has informed party members
imperiously that, 'You will not discuss the suspension of Jeremy
Corbyn.'
The
UK establishment are, in many ways, a lot more secure than their
American partners. This is what Theresa May told Jeremy Corbyn in
Parliament in 2015,“We will never allow you to rule”. That is
perfidious Albion with all its born to rule arrogance.
That
perfidiousness has been spotlighted most clearly by those who have lived
and stuggled against oppressions in its greatest extremities.
They
are former ANC government minister Ronnie Kasrils who is Jewish;
Pallo Jordan who narrowly escaped assassination by the bomb that
killed anti-apartheid academic Ruth First and Mandela advisor
Ismail Ebrahim who served 35 years in prison on Robben Island for his
anti-apartheid activism. Former ANC MP Andrew Feinstein, who lost
family members in the Holocaust, has also added his support.
It
says, “We are aware of the machinations within the Labour Party to
conduct a witch-hunt against Corbyn and those who support him. The
charges of anti-semitism that have been levelled against him are
patently unjust and morally groundless.”
Antonio
Gramsci was correct that now indeed is the time of monsters, but it
is also the time to bring about the birth of a new world.
Anti
Nazi Germans
Enemies
of the Nazi State within the Working Class, Merilyn Moos
German
Volunteers in the French Resistance, Steve Cushion
Book launch - 29th
November 2020, 2pm
This book may come as a surprise to many readers. We are brought up to believe
that the Nazis came to power in Germany with the overwhelming support
of the people and that the French Resistance was like an overlong
episode of “Hello Hello”.
As
Merilyn Moos argues, “It is a commonly held myth ... that there
was little resistance in Germany to the Nazis. In fact, there was a
wide diversity of opposition to the Nazi state: initially from within
the working class movement and, later, from different sections of the
State, judiciary and also the army.”
Close
to one million Leftists were imprisoned in Germany between 1933 and
1945, of whom 200,000 were killed.
Of
those who escaped this fate, around 5,000 German and Austrian exiles
fought against Franco’s fascism in the Spanish Civil War as members
of the Ernst Thälmann and Edgar André Brigades. Many of them were
Jews.
After
escaping from Germany with their lives many were not so lucky and
died at the hands of Francos forces. Those who survived fled north
into France and continued their anti-fascist struggle as part of the
French Resistance.
This
book is a harrowing account of what it meant to be a German
anti-fascist. In Germany imprisonment, torture and death were
the expected fate of resistors, but even so as late as 1943 strikes
took place in the Ruhr mines and sabotage was reported inside
armaments factories.
There
was even an alternative to the Hitler Youth , the Edelweiss
Pirates. Girls and boys managed to hold together as an anti-Nazi
force at a time when resistance had become close to impossible. “They
wore unconventional clothes, sang anti-militaristic songs, assaulted
Hitler Youth patrols, insulted uniformed officers and party
functionaries and even purchased illicit firearms"… Some
of them carried out sabotage, derailed ammunition trains, distributed
anti-Nazi leaflets and hid Jews.
A
1943 Nazi report from Düsseldorf admitted the appearance of "Down
with Hitler’ graffiti and that however often it was removed, it
would quickly reappear, especially during air-raids. The report goes
on to admit these actions negatively affected the morale of some
soldiers, who were even beginning to congregate among the Pirates.
The
book gives detailed accounts of these anti-Nazis and is a powerful acknowledgement of a tradition of German anti-fascism that goes back to
Rosa Luxemburg, the Spartacists and the Bavarian Revolution.
In
post-war Germany anti-Nazis remained criminalised. As one working
class resistor, Gertrud Koch, said "After the war there were
no judges in Germany so the old Nazi judges were used and they upheld
the criminalisation of what we did and who we were".
In
post-war France, Steve
Cushion explains, “Charles
de Gaulle was committed to reconstructing French imperialism and
wanted to stress the part that the French had played in liberating
themselves from German occupation. The
presence of German anti-fascists
contradicted this
account and they were
ignored.’
Hidden
too long from history this book is a valuable homage to anti-Nazi
Germans and recognition that Trotsky was right when he said that
‘fascism is capitalism going to the dentist’. But, as with
all dental visits, many refuse to open their mouths.
Zoom
log in details; Topic:
Mary Quaile Club public meeting
Time: Nov 29, 2020 02:00 PM
Join Zoom
Meeting
Meeting
ID: 867 0782 0322 Passcode: 993204
“The
former Labour leader was the victim of a carefully planned and
brutally executed political assassination.” Conservative
commentator Peter Oborne, who joins me in the Jeremy Corbyn cult.
Writing
in The Observer on 1 November 2020 Andrew Rawnsley made these
observations.
“Jeremy
Corbyn’s favourite role is that of the
victim ...
He presided over an antisemitism
scandal
unprecedented in the party’s history … He is refusing to accept
the damning
findings of
the
equality and Human Rights Commission investigation … Contrary
to the narrative being promoted by Mr Corbyn and those still attached
to his
cult,
the former Labour leader is not
a martyr
to his convictions … This is about whether or not the
Labour Party should
be a haven
for racists and
why it did become a magnet for antisemitic
bullies
and abusers when Mr Corbyn
and his acolytes
had charge of the party.”
As
someone attached to Jeremy Corbyn’s ‘cult’ I wish Andrew
Rawnsley had warned me much earlier about the true nature of Jeremy
Corbyn. I had not realised that, as
his
‘acolytes’, we
were
‘racists and antisemitic bullies.’ For the last sixty years I
have been under the misapprehension that racists and antisemites were
part and parcel of right, not left-wing, politics. Thank you Andrew
for, albeit late in the day for me, correcting my political naivety.
What a mug I have been, so here is a pre-Corbyn Labour Party mug. I
do hope the families queueing
up at Islington food bank will tell Jeremy to
stop being a martyr to his convictions.
One
of my all-time favourite films is Adalen 31, Bo Widerberg’s account
of the trade union and social struggles which transformed Sweden. You
can view it in full on YouTube here:
Sweden
used to be a very unequal country until the beginning of the 20th
century. Following a large social mobilization by trade unions and
the Social Democratic party, it became one of the most equal
countries in history.
Commenting
on Sweden, economist Thomas Piketty, writes, “Dominant groups tend
to be conservative and always define the existing inequality
as being natural, coming from some natural scheme or institutions or from rules that cannot be changed. But, in practice,
what you see is something very different: The way inequality is
organized can change very quickly …
It
is impossible to talk about the major issues we face today, whether
it be about privatisation of the NHS, education, social welfare, the
environment, low pay, housing, racism, mental health or the police,
without asking this question – cui bono, who benefits? The answer
is, ‘only a very few’.
In
the UK the six richest people control as much wealth as the poorest
13 million, Six billionaires have a combined fortune of £39.4
billion.
In
2016, the Office for National Statistics (ONS) calculated that the
richest 10% of households hold 44% of all wealth. The poorest 50%, by
contrast, own just 9%.
Meanwhile,
the Equality Trust estimates
that about 14 million
people in Britain live in poverty. Four million of these are more
than 50% below
the poverty line and 1.5
million are destitute. (These
figures are taken from 2017
since when the situation has worsened).
Dr
Wanda Wyporska, of the Equality Trust writes.
“Such a huge gap between the very rich and the vast majority of the
country is dangerous. Such extreme wealth in the hands of so few
people demonstrates just how broken the economic system is.”
If
we look at land ownership we find
that about 25,000 landowners – typically members of the aristocracy
and corporations – have control of half of the country. Guy
Shrubsole, author of “Who Owns England” writes that,
“Most people remain unaware of quite how much land is owned by so
few … A few thousand dukes, baronets and country squires own far
more land than all of middle England put together.”
Speaking
at the UN in 2016, Jeremy Corbyn said, “The
growing concentration of unaccountable wealth and power in the hands
of a tiny corporate elite …has sharply increased inequality,
marginalisation, insecurity and anger across the world … It’s
getting worse … If we want to live in a more egalitarian society
and fund our public services we cannot go on creating worse levels of
inequality.”
There
are powerful forces who decided that this man must go and that this
country was not going to become another Sweden. Watch Adalen 31 and
you will understand that, “the
way inequality is organized can change very quickly.”
LINKS:
Mafia-exposing
lawyer, Roberto
Saviano, who has been under police protection since exposing the
activities of Naples crime syndicate, the Camorra, has
said, “If
I asked you what is the most corrupt place on Earth you might tell me
it’s Afghanistan, maybe Greece, Nigeria, the South of Italy, and I
will tell you it’s the UK.”
I
have written before about the £12 billion contracts awarded for PPE,
‘track
and trace’
and other
Covid-related
projects. Most
to companies with no connection to the NHS, medical or health services. Many
to insolvent companies and / or Tory party donors. Some even with
personal and family connections to government.
This
has
been
taking place at the same time as the government has denied free
school meals for hungry childen and
after years of social
security cuts
and
the longest
peacetime pay squeeze in centuries.
In
order of monetary value, here
are just some of the awards, handed
out without tender and with no penalty clauses
...
Serco,
Defence, justice, transport, detention centres, £1 billion
Ayanda
Capital, investment strategy, £252 million
Unispace, interior design, £239.6 million
Uniserve,
trade management, £186 million
P14
Medical, medical instruments, £156.29 million
Randox
Health, private heath company, £133 million
Pestfix, rodent and pest control, £110 million
Clandeboyes
Agencies, confectionary products, £108 million
Crisp
Websites, website designers with £18K in the bank, £108 million
Cargo
Services, transport and shipping, £106.7 million
Globus, sanitary products, £93.7 million
Ventures
Ltd, insolvent company, £49 million
TAEG
Energy, no recorded infomation, £43.8 million
* When ssked by The Comet why there seems to be no recorded information on company activities, were told,“We’re
quite a diverse company, of the four of us working at the company,
we’ve all done various different things over the years."
Tower
Supplies, safety equipment, £40.4 million
Medicine
Box Ltd, pharmacists, £40 million
SG
Recruitment, healthcare recruitment, £23.89 million
Kau
Media, digital marketing, £19.5 million
Aventis
Solution, recruitment company, £18.5 million
Topham
Guerin, creative and digital agency, £3 million
Faculty,
technology company, £3 million
Public
First, PR company, £1 million
Hanbury
Strategy, Communications company, £900,000
Political
opposition is needed to stop this rampant corruption, but Keir Starmer’s
Labour are focussed on getting rid of those who would have acted
against our home-grown Camorra.
