In The Eighteenth Brumaire of Louis Napoleon, Karl Marx observed that class struggle can create circumstances and relationships that make “it possible for a grotesque mediocrity to play a hero’s part.”1 Donald Trump can be viewed as one such grotesque mediocrity, inflated to “heroic” proportions by his reactionary followers. Unwilling to accept defeat, Trump attempted to seize power after losing the 2020 presidential election.
An unusual special election in Seattle’s District 3 on December 7 will decide whether avowedly socialist City Councilor Kshama Sawant will be recalled from her position. The fact that Sawant’s seat is under dire threat is indicative of the contempt that Seattle’s business interests hold for her and her policies: The considerable victories Sawant has won for working people have made her the target of some of Seattle’s most powerful forces.
As more old-growth trees topple and forest industry jobs plummet, an obscure government subsidy scheme fuels the collapse
For more than 15 years, the BC government has rewarded logging companies with millions of additional old-growth trees to chop down thanks to an obscure “credit” program that allows companies to log bonus trees that don’t count toward their licensed logging limits.
Workers at Cargill’s High River, Alberta meatpacking facility have overwhelmingly rejected the company’s latest contract offer and management has escalated tensions by serving a lockout notice.
Nearly every one of the last 20 forest ministers, going back 35 years, has stood up at one point or another and indignantly denied that forestry is a sunset industry.
The fact they felt the need in the first place means the impression was out there. More and more, it looks like that impression was and is correct.
A moratorium vote on industry at centre of Wet’suwet’en standoff has been quashed repeatedly over two years
Rigged conventions. Filibustered meetings. Claims of “lost” paperwork.
For more than two years, members of the British Columbia New Democrats say their governing party has used obstructive tactics to prevent an open debate about its fracked gas industry, which last week led to another militarized police raid on Wet’suwet’en territory.
[Editor: Note that the expansion is not slated to supply local refineries.]
Nov. 24, 2021
OTTAWA—NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh is not pushing to cancel the government-owned Trans Mountain expansion, even though a veteran MP in his caucus is calling for an immediate halt to construction of the controversial oil pipeline project.
