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The Bullet

	Date	Author	Title ISSN 1923-7871
100.	Apr 25, 2008	Zac Smith	Countering Palestine Solidarity Work in Canada
Over the past several months of 2008, Israel advocacy organizations have entered a period of ongoing mobilization in an effort to decisively counter what they see as the growing influence and impact of the Palestine solidarity movement.
99.	Apr 23, 2008	Richard Roman	The Mexican Crisis and the Oaxaca Commune
The Oaxaca Commune was an extraordinary experience of popular insurgency and democratic self-governance. Though its rise and fall was conditioned by the particularities of the Mexican political crisis of 2006, the forms of the struggle have a universalistic relevance.
98.	Apr 16, 2008	Joan Kuyek	The Ontario Mining Act, Political Prisoners and the Right to Say “NO”
In February 2008, the leadership of the Ardoch Algonquins were sentenced for contempt because of their unwavering opposition to uranium exploration on their traditional territory in eastern Ontario. Bob Lovelace, a university professor from Queen’s University and an Ardoch spokesperson, was sentenced to six months detention and fined $25,000 (with further costs against himself and other community members pending). Chief Paula Sherman was fined $15,000. Leaders of the Shabot Obaadjiwan First Nation also face contempt charges.
97.	Apr 9, 2008	Jon Thompson	Interview with KI Political Prisoner Cecilia Begg
Cecilia Begg is the Head Councillor of Kitchenuhmaykoosib Inninuwug (KI) First Nation in Northern Ontario. She is the lone female community leader in what has come to be known as the KI6, a group serving six months for contempt after blockading a mining company from its licensed operations on disputed land near their community.
96.	Apr 4, 2008	John Riddell	Farmers Seek Defenses Against the Giants of Agribusiness
Around the world, farm income is plummeting, pushing farmers off the land and into destitution. At the very same time, soaring food prices are putting tens of millions onto starvation diets. Welcome to the bizarre world of capitalist agriculture, where the drive to boost profits of giant transnational corporations is imperiling the production of our means of survival.
95.	Mar 31, 2008	Justin Podur	Canada's latest political prisoners
On March 18, 2008, the Ontario Superior Court’s Judge Patrick Smith sentenced Chief Donny Morris and six other council members from the Kitchenuhmaykoosib Inninuwug (or KI) First Nation, a community of about 1200 people in northern Ontario, Canada, to six months in jail for ‘contempt of court.’
94.	Mar 30, 2008	Greg Albo	China and the World Market: Thirty Years of the ‘Reform’ Policy
It is now thirty years since the People’s Republic of China announced its market reform policy at the Third Plenum of the 11th Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) in December 1978, under the then new leadership of Deng Xiaoping...
93.	Mar 29, 2008	Bryan Evans	The Poverty of Ontario’s Liberals: The 2008 Budget
The 2008 Ontario budget is a particularly revealing political statement. Until now, the McGuinty Liberals have had a comparatively stable economy to contend with. Year after year since 2003, they have been able to very modestly expand public spending...
92.	Mar 21, 2008	Fletcher Baragar	The Credit Crisis in Canada: The First Six Months
The 2007 credit crisis irrupted in Canadian financial markets in mid-August. The immediate backdrop to this was the growing concern in financial markets about the value of assets underlying commercial paper, and especially the extent to which these assets were connected to a deteriorating real estate market in the United States...
91.	Mar 16, 2008	Karen Wirsig and Stefan Kipfer	Mayor’s Panel Dreams of White Shiny City by the Lake
Ten years after Toronto’s amalgamation, a new report commissioned by Mayor David Miller signals consensus among city power-brokers, local politicians (progressives, social democrats, centrists and right-wingers alike), and Premier McGuinty that the logic of the neoliberal restructuring of Toronto has triumphed...
90.	Mar 14, 2008	Michael Skinner	Afghanistan: Why Canada Should Withdraw Its Troops
This Thursday the House of Commons passed a Confidence Motion put forward by the Conservative government of Prime Minister Stephen Harper to extend the Canadian mission in Kandahar, Afghanistan to December 2011 past the current commitment to 2009...
89.	Mar 13, 2008	Sungur Savran	Turkish incursion into Northern Iraq: Military Fiasco, Political Debacle
The February incursion of the Turkish army into northern Iraq has ended in a terrible debacle for both U.S. imperialism and Turkey. The two allies are at loggerheads once again, after the thaw in their relations achieved at the White House talks between Bush and Turkish Prime Minister Erdogan on 5 November 2007...
88.	Mar 8, 2008	Richard Roman and Edur Velasco Arregui	A Continental Campaign for Living Wages and Social Justice
A coalition of Mexican unions and social movements has been calling for a continental workers’ campaign for a living wage and social justice in the three NAFTA (North American Free Trade Agreement) countries...
87.	Mar 7, 2008	Roger Annis	Manley Report: Ottawa Gets Advice On Prolonging Afghanistan War
Troubled by the failures of the U.S./NATO war in Afghanistan, the Canadian government commissioned a review last October of the war and Canada’s participation. A panel of five corporate and political figures was cobbled together in an effort to reach broader consensus among the war’s proponents...
86.	Mar 4, 2008	Paul Kellogg	Venezuela: The Spectre of Big Oil
"Never again will they rob us – the ExxonMobil bandits. They are imperial, American bandits, white-collared thieves. They turn governments corrupt, they oust governments. They supported the invasion of Iraq." This was the response from Venezuelan president Hugo Chávez ...
85.	Mar 1, 2008	Center for Labor Renewal	Statement & Call for the Elimination of Two-Tier Workplaces
On Saturday, January 26, 2008, over 80 U.S. and Canadian auto industry worker/activists met in Flint, Michigan, birthplace of militant unionism in the Auto Industry in the late 1930s. The agenda was how to measure and respond to the crippling impact of the 2007 auto industry collective bargaining agreements...
84.	Feb 29, 2008	Bryan Evans	Budget 2008: Taxes and the Forward March of Neoliberalism
Budgets are fundamentally political instruments. They reflect clearly who in society is winning, who is losing, and who is left standing still. They are a kind of political scoreboard. Canada’s 2008 Federal Budget, introduced by the minority Conservative government of Prime Minister Stephen Harper on February 26th, clearly states that if you work for a low or modest wage or salary, live in an urban centre, are women or a member of our First Nations, then you have lost....
83.	Feb 26, 2008	Éric Toussaint	Differences between 1982 and 2007-2008
In 1982, the external public debt crisis of the developing countries was triggered by the combined effects of the rise in interest rates imposed by the United States two years earlier, and the fall in prices of raw materials, particularly oil. The epicentre was in the South and the first casualties were the governments of the developing countries, who suddenly found themselves owing enormous amounts in debt repayments...
82.	Feb 23, 2008	Sam Gindin	Two-tier Wages, Second-Class Workers
When Autoworker President Buzz Hargrove makes new pronouncements, they carry weight within and beyond the labour movement – even when, as has recently been the case, they seem to undermine what Canadian unions have always stood for...
81.	Feb 23, 2008	Sungur Savran	Operation Independence Kosovo: NATO and the New Step Toward "Greater Albania"
The celebrations by the Albanian people of Kosovo upon the declaration of an "independent and sovereign" state were aired on television extensively. Two flags were waved during these celebrations. One was the familiar U.S. flag. And the second one? This flag with a double-headed black eagle on a red background, which country might that belong to?...
80.	Jan 31, 2008	Leo Panitch	Putting the U.S. Economic Crisis in Perspective
It is time to take stock. The centrality of the American economy to the capitalist world – which now literally does encompass the whole world – has spread the financial crisis that began in the U.S. housing market around the globe. And the economic recession which that financial crisis has triggered in the U.S. now threatens to spread globally as well...
79.	Jan 11, 2008	Bryan Evans and Greg Albo	Limited Horizons: Ontario's Election and After
There are two initial observations to be made of Ontario's October 10th election. First and foremost, the voter turnout: the lowest voter turnout to date had been 54.7 percent of the potential electorate, recorded in 1923. This was 'bested' on October 10th when those motivated to cast a vote fell to a new record low of 52.8 percent...
78.	Jan 1, 2008	CLC; BASN	Canadian Workers in Support of Bolivia and Morales
In recent months, the process of democratic renewal and indigenous liberation in Bolivia, headed by president Evo Morales, has come under violent assault from rightist forces aligned with the U.S. government. Physical disruption of Bolivia's Constituent Assembly prevented it from meeting for several months. Now that the Assembly has presented its proposed new constitution for referendum, the rightists are threatening a breakaway by Bolivia's eastern provinces...
77.	Dec 18, 2007	Kevin Skerrett	Ottawa hotel workers exercise their right to strike – and win
Workers fought hard over many decades to win legal recognition of the right to strike. Most unionized workers now have this right, and most trade unions work hard to defend and occasionally exercise it...
76.	Nov 29, 2007	Sam Gindin	The UAW-Big Three Settlements: From Defeat to Rebellion
The 2007 United Autoworkers (UAW) agreements with the Detroit Big Three represented – as many people inside and outside the union have noted – the greatest economic concessions in the history of the union...
75.	Nov 26, 2007	Geoff Bickerton	First FFA Collective Agreement Restricts Workers Democratic rights
On November 5, 2007 the CAW and Magna International signed their first Collective Agreement under the terms of the Framework of Fairness Agreement (FFA). Most of the anti-democratic features of the FFA have been incorporated into the collective agreement which was ratified overwhelmingly by the workers at Magna's Windsor Modules plant with one important exception regarding the selection process for the Employee Advocates...
74.	Nov 18, 2007	SP Labour Committee	Windsor Modules: The CAW-Magna Deal Delivers – Or Does it?
On November 7, 2007, the CAW made an historic announcement. The first collective agreement under the new CAW-Magna Framework of Fairness Agreement (FFA) was ratified at Windsor Modules, a plant of some 250 workers...
73.	Nov 14, 2007	Adam Hanieh	Next Steps for the Palestinian Solidarity Movement
The launch of this book is an extremely timely and important contribution to understanding the current situation in Palestine. We all know from the daily reports that this situation is one of the most difficult ever faced by the Palestinian people...
72.	Nov 6, 2007	Herman Rosenfeld	MAGNA IS NOT CAMI
In Bob White’s October 30th Op-Ed piece in the Toronto Star, the retired CAW president refers to the current Magna deal as a form of "innovation", comparing it to the 1980s fight against concessions and the formation of the new Canadian auto union...
71.	Nov 3, 2007	Sam Gindin	The CAW and Magna: What if Magna Builds an Assembly Plant?
In the discussions of the proposed Magna-CAW (Canadian Auto Workers) ‘Framework of Fairness’ deal, the focus has been on Magna as a components company. But what if Magna opened an assembly plant? Under the language of the ‘Framework of Fairness’, it too would be part of the deal...
70.	Nov 3, 2007		The Hamilton Declaration on the Palestinian National Struggle
We the Palestinian Canadian community assembly at the Palestinian National Voice Preparatory Conference in Hamilton, Canada, issue this letter out of profound concern regarding the present state of the Palestinian national struggle and the November 2007 "peace" conference to be hosted by the United States in Annapolis, Maryland...
69.	Oct 31, 2007	Ingo Schmidt	Financial Capital: Crises Are Part of the Game
Everything went well during the summer of 2007. The economy was in an upswing and stock-market prices rose even faster. Then the end of the housing boom in the United States triggered an international financial crisis. Up to now it has been contained by heavy central-bank intervention; but the euphoria is gone...
68.	Oct 30, 2007	Sungur Savran	Turkey into the Vortex of the Iraq Quagmire: Another breach in U.S. policy
A new dimension of immense importance is being added to the contradictions of U.S. policy in Iraq and the Middle East at large. Turkey, a staunch U.S. ally for over half a century and a NATO member, is threatening to militarily intervene in Northern Iraq, i.e. Iraqi Kurdistan...
67.	Oct 24, 2007	Geoff Bickerton	Magna-CAW Framework of Fairness Agreement is an Affront to Union Democracy
Like most agreements between Unions and Employers the devil lies in the details. The Framework of Fairness Agreement between the CAW and Magna International is no exception. Much has already been said and written about this agreement...
66.	Oct 23, 2007	Michael Skinner	Why Canadian Forces Should Immediately Withdraw From Afghanistan
On 18 October 2007, two thousand delegates at the national convention of the Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE) decided in a nearly unanimous vote to demand the Government of Canada immediately withdraw the Canadian Forces from Afghanistan. CUPE is the largest union in Canada representing half a million Canadian workers. Later on the same day, CBC, the Globe and Mail, and La Presse released ...
65.	Oct 19, 2007	Sam Gindin	The CAW and Magna: Disorganizing the Working Class
Through the 1980s and 1990s, as the attacks on past working class gains intensified, the Canadian Auto Workers Union (CAW) was widely recognized – not just in North America but abroad – as standing at the forefront of working class resistance. With the Magna-CAW Agreement signed on October 15, 2007, the CAW now seems at the forefront of working class desperation and defeat...
64.	Oct 17, 2007	John Peters	The Charming Cynicism of the ‘Third Way’: The McGuinty-Sorbara Victory and the Problems for Ontario
Even though it was the first time in over seventy years that a Liberal premier had won two straight majorities in Ontario, Dalton McGuinty's victory wasn't much of a surprise. Going into the election all the pollsters were predicting a close race and even a possible minority government. They couldn't have been more wrong...
63.	Oct 7, 2007	Dennis Pilon	Against All Odds: Winning Electoral Reform in Ontario
On October 10, 2007 Ontarians will go to polls in a provincial election. But this time, in addition to casting a ballot for a politician, voters will also be asked to make a choice about the kind democratic institutions they think the province should use....
62.	Oct 6, 2007	Sam Gindin	One Sided Class War: The UAW-GM 2007 Negotiations
In 1978, then United Auto Worker (UAW) President Douglas Fraser, frustrated with corporate America's new aggressiveness, accused U.S. business of waging a 'one-sided class war against working people, the unemployed, the poor, the minorities, the very young and the very old, and even many in the middle class of our society.'...
61.	Oct 2, 2007	Roger Burbach; Evo Morales Ayma	Andean Struggles
The revolts against neoliberalism and American imperialism in Latin America continue to unfold in dramatic and unexpected ways. The election on September 30, 2007 for a constituent assembly in Ecuador has been decisively won by President Rafael Correa of the Alianza Pais...
60.	Sept 25, 2007	Socialist Project Labour Committee; Dianne Feeley	General Motors, the UAW Strike and Concessions
As this introduction is being written the UAW is currently on strike against General Motors. The strike began on Monday, September 24th and was a surprise. The union and employer were reportedly close to an agreement on reducing GM's retiree medical costs and the UAW's leadership had refused to mobilize the membership to challenge the basic assumptions of the corporation...
59.	Sept 23, 2007	Bryan Evans	Treading Water: Four Years of Ontario's Liberals
The champagne corks were popping the night of October 2, 2003, the night four years ago when Dalton McGuinty and his Liberal party sent the Common Sense Revolution to the dustbin. Eight years of the most repugnant government in Ontario's postwar history had concluded....
58.	Sept 20, 2007	Socialist Project	Ontario and the Funding of Religious Schools
In what might turn to be the defining issue of the Ontario provincial election set for October 10, Conservative leader John Tory proposed that faith-based schools be fully funded. In a province that already funds Catholic schools through the high school years. The Tories are claiming the mantle of 'fairness' by extending funding to other religious schools....
57.	Sept 17, 2007	Sam Gindin	Empire's Contradictions, Our Weaknesses: The Empire Stumbles On
Today's two most conspicuous global flashpoints – the Middle East and Latin America – have widely exposed the fact of U.S. imperialism and highlighted some of its limitations. Adding the apparent cracks in U.S. economic hegemony seems to indicate an empire in decline. Yet a more cautious assessment would recall that the earlier defeat in Vietnam did not derail U.S. global expansion, while the new Vietnam has become a model member of the WTO....
56.	Sept 9, 2007	John Clarke	Raise the Rates: The Vital Struggle Against Ontario's Sub-Poverty Welfare System
A drastic reduction in the adequacy of income support payments is key to the neoliberal agenda. This is especially true in a country like Canada that had earlier seen the consolidation of a basic social infrastructure. However much the balance is tilted in favour of the employers...
55.	Sept 2, 2007	Socialist Project Labour Committee	Reviving the Labour Movement Through Reviving Class Solidarity
As Canada and Ontario's labour movement marches in this year's Labour Day Parade it does so with something to celebrate: an increase in the provincial minimum wage. That victory, all the more significant for victories being so rare in recent times, was partial...
54.	Aug 28, 2007	Labour for Palestine	Responds to U.S. Anti-Boycott Statement
In July 2007, a group of labour leaders from the U.S. issued a statement opposing the growing international campaign of boycotts, divestment and sanctions (BDS) against Israel. The statement was signed by a number of presidents from unions including the American Federation of Teachers, the American Postal Workers Union, the Communication Workers of America, the International Brotherhood of Teamsters, and the AFL-CIO...
53.	Aug 27, 2007	Socialist Project	In Opposition to the SPP
The Security and Prosperity Partnership (the SPP) was originally launched in March, 2005 by U.S. president George Bush, and the former leaders of Mexico and Canada, Vincente Fox and Paul Martin, in Waco, Texas. The SPP is not a signed treaty, debated and passed in parliament. It is a semi-secret informal process – driven by the executive levels of the state and major capitalists in all three countries...
52.	June 28, 2007	James Lawson	June 29, 2007: AFN Day of Action
On May 31, the Assembly of First Nations (AFN) called for a national day of action on June 29, to force changes in key features of federal aboriginal policy. On June 12, the Harper Conservative government responded with an important reform of "specific claims" settlement policy. Now as the day of action approaches...
51.	June 13, 2007	Michael A. Lebowitz	Human Development and Practice
The Bolivarian Constitution, in my view, is unique in its explicit recognition (in Article 299) that the goal of a human society must be that of ‘ensuring overall human development.’ In the declaration of Article 20 that ‘everyone has the right to the free development of his or her own personality’ and the focus of Article 102 upon ‘developing the creative potential of every human being and the full exercise of his or her personality in a democratic society’ – this theme of human development pervades the Constitution. ...
50.	June 1, 2007	Labour Committee	The Crisis in Manufacturing Jobs: Struggling for Answers
The last weeks of May have seen major demonstrations of workers’ discontent with the crisis that has been unfolding in Canada’s manufacturing sector. Some 52,000 jobs have been lost in the manufacturing sector since January alone. ...
49.	May 11, 2007	Richard Roman and Edur Velasco	Mexican Workers Call for a Continental Workers' Campaign For Living Wages and Social Justice
Capital and the state of all three countries of the North American Free Trade Agreement have worked together to push down wages and working conditions, undermine the social safety net, and privatize anything that could be turned into a source of profit. ...
48.	Apr 18, 2007	Herman Rosenfeld	Labour for Palestine: Can We Build the BDS Campaign?
Just less than a year ago in May 2006, the Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE) Ontario unanimously passed in convention its pathbreaking Resolution 50 in support for the global campaign against Israeli apartheid. The resolution called on the union to educate its members on the apartheid nature of the Israeli state. It also mandated that education be undertaken on Canadian political and economic support for these practices. CUPE Ontario would also participate in the international campaign of boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) against Israel until the realization of Palestinian self-determination and the right of return of Palestinian refugees. ...
47.	Mar 28, 2007	Susan Spronk	A Movement Towards or Beyond ‘Statism’? Bolivia in 2006
The active imagining of an alternate global politics could hardly be more pressing. Mounting global inequalities, the turbulence of climate change, and recurring military interventions by Western powers have been the daily fare of the neoliberal world order. This world order was constructed over the last two decades under the hegemony of the U.S., in alliance with key European, Japanese and Canadian allies. ...
46.	Mar 21, 2007	Greg Albo	Canada and World Order After the Wreckage
It is now more than three decades since neoliberal economic and political ideas began to supplant Keynesian orthodoxies within the treasuries and finance ministries of Western governments and in the policy-making centers of development agencies and financial institutions. ...
45.	Mar 13, 2007	collection of essays	Income Inequalities, Living Wages and Union Organizing
It is now accepted across a wide spectrum of political thinking that the period of neoliberalism has sharpened income inequalities. This has occurred along a number of dimensions. The capitalist class has seen an increase in wealth from an increasing concentration of assets; a rapid run-up in asset prices; and corporate profits having been restored to historically high levels. ...
44.	Mar 5, 2007	Zac Smith	A Great Success: The Third Annual Israeli Apartheid Week
The week of February 12-17, 2007 saw various North American and British campuses take part in the third annual Israeli Apartheid Week (IAW). This year's week of events included a series of critical lectures, film screenings, a host of cultural events, and in some cities, demonstrations. A keynote speaker in several cities was Jamal Zahalka (MK), a Palestinian member of the Israeli Knesset who spoke on “Debunking the Myth of Israeli Democracy.” ...
43.	Feb 20, 2007	York Ad Hoc Committee Against the War	Against War: Resisting Empire and the Canadian Mission in Afghanistan
It is now five years since Canadian troops were first deployed to Afghanistan, entering from the outset into a combat position. Canada moved into a war in Afghanistan without any Parliamentary sanction or debate. ...
42.	Feb 8, 2007	Sam Gindin	Is the Big Ship America Sinking? Contradictions and Openings
Are we in the midst of a momentous turn in world politics? Donald Rumsfeld has been shuffled out of the Pentagon. Daniel Ortega, Washington's nemesis from the Sandinista Revolution of the late 1970s, is back as President of Nicaragua. Hugo Chavez has been triumphantly re-elected, and Bolivia and Ecuador also have new left-populist presidents. U.S.-led neoliberalism is scrambling in Latin America; ...
41.	Feb 1, 2007	Nathan Rao	Canada, Quebec and the Left: Outflanked Again?
The surprise Conservative motion recognizing that the “Québécois form a nation within a united Canada” and the unexpected selection of Chrétien protégé, technocrat and Clarity Act point man Stéphane Dion as Liberal leader have shown (yet again) just how important Quebec is to Canadian political life. And for at least the fifth time in the last quarter century, the Left has been caught flatfooted by developments shaped by Quebec’s weight in the federation and its enduring national aspirations. ...
40.	Dec 18, 2006	Richard Fidler	A “Québécois Nation”? Harper Fuels an Important Debate
The House of Commons voted on November 27 to support a Tory government motion that “the Québécois form a nation within a united Canada.” What does it mean? And why now? ...
39.	Dec 5, 2006	Bryan Evans	Renewing Democracy in Ontario From the Top Down
Throughout Canada, as in much of the world, there has been a marked decline in voter turnout over the past twenty years. This general though uneven trend cuts across class, gender, racial, age and regional lines. ...
38.	Nov 28, 2006	Collective La Pepa; Richard Gott	Ecuadorians Vote for Systemic Change
The Bullet here presents three reports on the election on Ecuador which now appears as another turn to the left. This would make for an important axis of Cuba, Venezuela, Bolivia, and Ecuador pressing beyond the social democratic governments of the southern cone. ...
37.	Nov 24, 2006	Greg Albo	Empire's Ally: Canadian Foreign Policy
Since the coming into power of the Stephen Harper Conservative government in January of this year, there has been much gnashing of teeth over the foreign policy stance of Canada. In particular, Canada's relation with the U.S. on a phalanx of fronts has been at the centre of controversy. ...
36.	Nov 11, 2006	Stefan Kipfer; Ahmed Allahwala	The Miller Regime and Suburban Growth Politics
In the City of Toronto, the 2006 municipal elections brought few surprises. Incumbent Mayor Miller was declared the winner seconds after the polls closed. The composition of City Council changed little. Most incumbents were reelected comfortably. NDP and labour-backed candidates failed to unseat right wingers like Case Ootes and Cesar Palacio. ...
35.	Nov 11, 2006	Palestine House; Jamal Jumaa	The Beit Hanoun Killings, Israeli Apartheid and Canadian Policies
The slaughter by Israel of innocent Palestinians, including at least 8 children, and the injury of dozens more, in Beit Hanoun in Gaza this week adds to the tally of war crimes from the occupation. Some 2,300 Gazans have been killed over the past six years by Israel, including some 300 in the last four months. Tens of thousands have no doubt been wounded as well. ...
34.	Nov 10, 2006	Yen Chu and Greg Albo	Neoliberalism and the Municipal Elections
The municipal elections taking place across Ontario this November have generated little controversy and even less excitement. This is all quite different from even three years ago when there was much interest stirred in the hope of a ‘new deal’ being struck with senior levels of government to rebuild Canada's sharply declining physical and social urban infrastructures. ...
33.	Nov 3, 2006	Rogelio Cuevas Fuentes and Lindsay Windhager	Oaxaca En Lucha
The crisis in Oaxaca Mexico has intensified over the last week. The popular uprising, which began with teachers’ strikes and has now extended into a wider revolt, and open confrontation with the Mexican state. ...
32.	Oct 27, 2006	TUAW	Unionists, Canada and the Afghan War
On this Saturday October 28, tens of thousands of people across Canada will demonstrate in support of the demand to bring Canadian troops home from Afghanistan. This pan-Canadian day of action is being led by four major organizations: the Canadian Peace Alliance, le Collectif Échec à la guerre, the Canadian Labour Congress and the Canadian Islamic Congress. ...
31.	Aug 10, 2006	Michael A. Lebowitz	The Social Economy and the Bolivarian Revolution
On 15 August 2004 President Hugo Chávez of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela won a striking victory in a recall referendum challenging his presidency. ...
30.	July 29, 2006	Herut Berhane	Another Front? The Proxy War in Somalia
One of the more interesting things about the North American media coverage on the Middle East is the way it ignores the inextricable political and historical links between those countries located on the northern eastern part of the Red Sea with those located on its southern and western shores. ...
29.	July 19, 2006	John Peters	The Wrong Way to Boost Jobs and Incomes
In the early 1990s, with rising unemployment and widespread economic recession, the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) began to analyse unemployment, job growth, and labour market policies, and to push a rather malicious theory which they call the ‘jobs/unemployment trade-off’ in order to justify all kinds of regressive policies and reforms. ...
28.	July 16, 2006	Saseen Kawzally and Jerome Klassen; Greg Albo	Lebanon in a State of Siege
The military conflicts in Gaza and Lebanon have the whole world on edge. The wanton military assaults by Israel have been out of massive disproportion to the soldiers kidnapped, and brought wanton destruction of civilian lives and infrastructure. ...
27.	July 14, 2006	Sam Gindin	Toward A New Politics? After the CAW-NDP Divorce
On April 21, 2006, the Canadian Auto Workers (CAW) broke with a tradition that extended over half a century and voted to leave the New Democratic Party (NDP). ...
26.	June 29, 2006	David Kidd and Herman Rosenfeld	CUPE ‘Boycott Israel’ Debate Rages On
As trade union and community activists, socialists and officials in our respective union organizations, we strongly support the recent Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE) Ontario resolution supporting the international Boycott Israel campaign. The resolution criticises Israel’s continuing occupation of Palestinian territory, characterising it as “apartheid.” ...
25.	June 22, 2006		Political Conflict and the Mexican Presidential Election
Mexican Presidential elections are always spectacles of the cultural symbols and clichés of Mexico – mariachi bands, twirling parasols, huge flags, marches, the invocation of the cultural heroes of the Mexican revolution and charged speeches. ...
24.	June 9, 2006	R. Aída Hernández Castillo	State Violence and Gender in San Salvador Atenco, Mexico
It is a remarkable commentary on the media monopolies of North America that the violent assault on social movement leaders in Atenco, Mexico in May has been met with silence. Better that the mythologies of Mexican democratization and human rights progress within the confines of NAFTA continue. ...
23.	June 7, 2006	COSATU	Open Letter in Support of CUPE Resolution
The passing of a resolution on 27 May 2006 by the Ontario Division of the Canadian Union of Public Employees in support of the Palestinian peoples has sparked a great deal of notice across the North American labour movement, and, indeed, the international labour movement. ...
22.	May 31, 2006	Adam Hanieh	Canadian Union Takes Important Step Against Israeli Apartheid
At the annual convention of the Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE) Ontario, held 24-27 May 2006 in Ottawa, the union passed a resolution of historic importance. Resolution 50 — adopted unanimously by the 900 delegates at the largest convention in the union's history — expressed support for the global campaign against Israeli apartheid. ...
21.	May 22, 2006	Ann Porter	The Harper Government: Towards A New Social Order?
The election of Stephen Harper's Conservative government on January 23, 2006 has significantly shifted the terms of the social policy debate in Canada. ...
20.	May 17, 2006	Richard Fidler	Québec Debates: Tories' Move to Prolong Afghanistan Intervention
Bloc supporters challenge Duceppe: Vote with the Québécois, defeat the Harper government! ...
19.	May 15, 2006		Palestine, Israeli Apartheid and the Canadian State
Canada has a long and inglorious history of supporting the Israeli occupation of Palestine. This has included the indirect support of Canadians furthering the illegal colonial settlements in the Occupied Territories....
18.	May 8, 2006	Greg Albo and Cy Gonick	Figuring out and Fighting Harper
The January 2006 Federal election results in Canada unexpectedly yielded a minority Conservative Government. The 'great moving right show' is having yet another run. ...
17.	May 1, 2006		May Day Canada 2006
The fight of popular movements across the world against neoliberal capitalism over the last decade has not been an easy one. The increasing reliance on global markets and corporate power as the vehicles for organizing economic, social and political life has yielded increasing inequalities between and within countries. ...
16.	Apr 21, 2006	Richard Harding	Who's Getting It? The Canadian Mission in Afghanistan
Since relieving American forces in Kandahar on 28 February 2006, Canada's casualties in Afghanistan have come from a suicide bombing, an Armoured Personnel Carrier (APC) accident, an axe attack on a soldier, and a killing by apparently friendly fire. ...
15.	Apr 6, 2006	Sam Gindin	Rewriting History: The CAW Turn
In response to criticism of the concessions made by the Canadian Auto Workers (CAW) at General Motors's Oshawa facility this winter, the union has made four counter-arguments. ...
14.	Mar 22, 2006	Sam Gindin	Concessions in Oshawa: The End of an Era?
In the early 1980s General Motors workers in Canada refused to follow their American parent (UAW) in opening their collective agreement. The ensuing conflict eventually led to the Canadians breaking away to form their own Canadian union (CAW). ...
13.	Jan 31, 2006	Adam Hanieh	The End of a Political Fiction?
Hamas's landslide victory in the January 25 elections for the 132-seat Palestinian Legislative Council (PLC) is an unprecedented turning point for politics in both Palestine and the broader Middle East. Arguably for the first time since the establishment of Israel in 1948, an official administrative power in the West Bank and Gaza Strip has strong popular support and is not directly beholden to Israeli or Western interests. ...
12.	Jan 19, 2006	Rianne Mahon	A Real Alternative: The Canadian Election and Child Care Policy
It's a good thing that child care has become a key issue in this Federal election campaign. Canadians need a well-developed network of early learning and child care programs. It begins to recognise that child care represents a good investment in our future, establishing strong foundations for lifelong learning. ...
11.	Dec 20, 2005	Khashayar Hooshiyar	The Anti-semitism of Iran’s President: Stupidity or Deliberate Strategy?
Since the death of Ayatollah Khomeini in 1989, Western governments became somewhat accustomed to the conciliatory gestures of both the Rafsanjani and Khatami administrations. The overtly hostile message and aggressive tone coming from Tehran these days therefore seems a bit surprising. ...
10.	Dec 14, 2005	Sam Gindin	The CAW’s Direction: Some Questions
A number of questions about the CAW’s general political and more specific electoral orientation are being asked both inside and outside the union. These are questions of importance to the Canadian Left as a whole. We cite a few such questions and invite comment. ...
9.	Dec 3, 2005	Graham Erion and Michael Dorsey	Montreal 2005 Climate Change Conference: Neoliberal Bird Flu Infects Climate Talks
For persons in the Artic watching permafrost and polar ice melt; in small island states watching the sea levels rise around them; in drought-filled regions watching another year's crop fail; or in the path of yet another destructive hurricane watching their homes and livelihood get destroyed, the fact that climate change is happening is not a news story they have to read about to comprehend. ...
8.	Nov 30, 2005	Bryan Evans and Greg Albo	This Election will Not End the Impasse of Canadian Democracy
By a margin of 171 to 133, the united parliamentary forces of the Conservatives, Bloc Quebecois and New Democratic Party felled the federal Liberal Government of Paul Martin at 7:09 pm of November 28 on a motion which simply read "This House has lost confidence in the government". Thus the 38th Parliament of Canada ended. On January 23, 2006 the peoples of Canada will vote for a new government.. ...
7.	Nov 25, 2005	Sam Gindin	The GM Layoffs and the Logic of Neoliberalism
The perverse logic of neoliberalism took even more twisted turns on 21 November 2005. General Motors, the largest manufacturing company in the world, had just months ago been promised $450 million in government money to create jobs in Canada. ...
6.	Nov 22, 2005	Govind Rao	The French Riots and Canada
The fires lighting up the nights of the suburbs of France over the last month have stripped even more gloss off the already tarnished ideology of neoliberalism. Against the alleged 'harmonies of the market' producing benefits for all, the seething outrages of the excluded and the marginalized from market society now need to be even more firmly set. ...
5.	Nov 14, 2005	Sam Gindin	GM, the Delphi Concessions and North American Workers: Round Two?
It is important to recall that until the 1970s, collective bargaining in the United States and Canada was largely about workers demanding improvements from their employers. But a new era in collective bargaining erupted at the end of the 1970s that was soon dubbed 'concessionary bargaining'. ...
4.	Nov 7, 2005	MESS	Ariel Sharon Visits Toronto: Campaigning Against the New Apartheid
Activists across Canada have been gearing up in preparation of a visit to Toronto by the Israeli Prime Minister, Ariel Sharon. Sharon is scheduled to be keynote speaker at the United Jewish Communities General Assembly in Toronto on Monday, November 14. ...
3.	Nov 5, 2005	Richard Fidler	PQ's rightward shift opens space for new left party in Quebec
Ten years after the 1995 Quebec referendum on sovereignty, with its razor-thin victory for the No side, and 25 years since the first referendum, mass media and academics alike have been immersed lately in speculation on the likely result of a third such vote, which could occur as early as 2007. ...
2.	Nov 2, 2005	Susan Spronk	The Suspension of Elections in Bolivia and Left Strategy
The small Andean nation hit the news again on October 31 with the announcement that elections originally scheduled for December 2005 are postponed indefinitely. ....
1.	Oct 20, 2005	Sharon Yandle	BC Teachers’ Federation - On Strike
What should we make of the current teachers' job action in British Columbia? The short answer: B.C. teachers are very courageous in taking a stand....