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 Posted: Thu May 22, 2008 6:43 am Post subject: What's new at Links: Cars & capitalism; Michael Lebowitz; fo |
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A brief socialist history of the automobile
<http://links.org.au/node/423>
By *Rob Rooke*
No single commercial product in the history of capitalism has had a
greater effect on the economy and politics than the automobile. No
other product has been such a lever to increase consumption and
increase markets in the developed world. It could be argued that the
car, more than any other product, was at the very heart of the 20th
century's economic expansion. In US society, for over a century, the
car has been raised on a cultural pedestal worshipping individuality
and defining big business' vision of freedom.
* Read more <http://links.org.au/node/423>
Global food crisis: Capitalism, agribusiness and the food
sovereignty alternative <http://links.org.au/node/417>
By *Ian Angus*
[Second of two articles. Click here <http://links.org.au/node/395> for
part one.]
/"Nowhere in the world, in no act of genocide, in no war, are so many
people killed per minute, per hour and per day as those who are killed
by hunger and poverty on our planet." /---Fidel Castro, 1998
May 11, 2008 -- When food riots broke out in Haiti last month, the
first country to respond was Venezuela. Within days, planes were on
their way from Caracas, carrying 364 tons of badly needed food.
The people of Haiti are "suffering from the attacks of the empire's
global capitalism," Venezuela's President Hugo Chŕvez said. "This
calls for genuine and profound solidarity from all of us. It is the
least we can do for Haiti."
Venezuela's action is in the finest tradition of human solidarity.
When people are hungry, we should do our best to feed them.
Venezuela's example should be applauded and emulated.
But aid, however necessary, is only a stopgap. To truly address the
problem of world hunger, we must understand and then change the system
that causes it.
* Read more <http://links.org.au/node/417>
Cuban VP: `Sustainable development requires a revolution in our
values' <http://links.org.au/node/424>
May 18, 2008
/Address by *José Ramón Machado Ventura*, First Vice-President of
Cuba's Council of State, at a session on ``Sustainable Development:
the Environment, Climate Change and Energy'', during the 5th EU/LAC
(European Union/Latin America and Caribbean) summit meeting in Lima,
Peru, May 16-17./
Your Excellency:
At the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development held
in Rio de Janeiro 16 years ago, Fidel Castro issued a prophetic
warning, stating that ``an important biological species is at risk of
disappearing as a result of the rapid and progressive destruction of
its natural living conditions: humanity''.
Time has proven him right.
Let us not mince our words: we won't attain sustainable development,
the negative impacts of climate change will not be halted or reversed,
and the environment will not be preserved for future generations, if
the irrational patterns of production, distribution and consumption
imposed upon us by capitalism prevail. The globalisation of neoliberal
policies has drastically exacerbated the crisis.
* Read more <http://links.org.au/node/424>
Indonesia: Workers, poor reject petrol price rises imposed `on
behalf of the poor' <http://links.org.au/node/422>
May 15, 2008 -- ``Let's seek the opportunity out of the world's
crisis. In responding to the increase in global food prices, let us
improve productivity. Amidst the oil crisis and price rises, let's be
thrifty. Let's develop the energy resources.'' -- Indonesian
President, Susilo Bambang Yudoyono, May 1, 2008.
The poor will benefit from the increase in fuel prices rise, he said
on May 7, 2008.
Meanwhile vice-president Yusuf Kalla said that so far the fuel subsidy
has been benefiting the rich. He added ``The protesters who oppose
this policy mean that they are helping the poor.''
Acting as if they are doing it ``on behalf of the poor'', the
Indonesian government plans to impose a 30% rise on petroleum prices.
It will be the third oil price rise under the Susilo Bambang Yudoyono
government. To help the poor survive this unpopular policy, the
government is granting direct cash transfers amounting 100,000 rupiah
per month per family. The direct cash transfer ``gift'' was also
implemented with the oil price rise in 2005.
* Read more <http://links.org.au/node/422>
Our history: John Reed's `Ten days that shook the world'
<http://links.org.au/node/421>
**/*Ten Days That Shook The World*/
By John Reed
Penguin Books 351 pages
Paperback
* Read more <http://links.org.au/node/421>
Michael A. Lebowitz: Socialism is the future -- Build it now
<http://links.org.au/node/419>
By *Michael A. Lebowitz*
Ideas become a material force when they grasp the minds of masses.
This is true not only of ideas which can support revolutionary change.
It is also true of those ideas which prevent change. An obvious
example is the concept of TINA -- the idea that there is no
alternative, no alternative to neoliberalism, no alternative to
capitalism.
* Read more <http://links.org.au/node/419>
/Links/ seeks to promote the international exchange of information,
experience of struggle, theoretical analysis and views of political
strategy and tactics within the international left. It is a forum for
open and constructive dialogue between active socialists coming from
different political traditions. It seeks to bring together those in
the international left who are opposed to neoliberal economic and
social policies. It aims to promote the renewal of the socialist
movement in the wake of the collapse of the bureaucratic model of
"actually existing socialism" in the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe.
*
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