Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – Mikhail Gorbachev’s passing yesterday at age 91 is a good occasion to review some of the profound mistakes of the Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush presidencies regarding Afghanistan. Reagan-era officials refused to believe that Premier Gorbachev actually intended to pull Soviet troops out of Afghanistan, though Gorbachev came into […]
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Left Politics
Greens return to French Parliament in Left Coalition, as Neoliberal Macron loses Majority
Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – France’s parliamentary elections witnessed an upset, with centrist President Emmanuel Macron’s party, La République En Marche and its Ensemble coalition losing its absolute parliamentary majority. A majority requires 289 seats, and Macron’s party gained 245 seats. Among the beneficiaries are the Left and the Greens, who joined together in the […]
One-Off Demonstrations are not Enough: Progressives need Standing Mass Organizations
By Beverly Gologorsky | – ( Tomdispatch.com ) – To begin, an anecdote. This past summer, a pigeon walked through my open balcony door while my attention was elsewhere. I shooed it out, but when I turned around two more pigeons walked out of my bedroom. In the 20 years I’ve lived in my apartment, […]
France: Macron’s Pyrrhic Victory — Is his Neoliberalism Producing the Far Right?
Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – Romain Brunet at France 24 termed Emannuel Macron’s win in the presidential election a “Pyrrhic victory.” In 280-275 BC, Pyrrhus, the King of Epirus on the west coast of Greece, launched a war against the Roman Republic. He won some battles, but at such great cost that he may as […]
France’s Macron: “I am combating the Project of the extreme Right … which is to put an End to Renewable Energy”
Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – The two frontrunners in France’s presidential election who now face a run-off election against one another, Emmanuel Macron and Marine Le Pen, have diametrically opposed stances on the climate emergency and renewable energy. Le Pen, the far right demagogue known for ugly hate speech and having a soft corner for […]
The Left has to Recognize Russian Imperialism in Ukraine or it is Trapped in Americocentrism
By David Ost | – ( Foreign Policy in Focus ) – It is tough for leftists to be on the same side as the mainstream. We can easily feel at those times that we’re missing something, that we’re letting down the struggle, that by ganging up even on an admittedly bad actor we’re helping […]
A Few Magnificent Things That Happened in 2021
By Peter Certo | – ( Otherwords.org) – It would be easy to survey the end of 2021 and see another year in wreckage. There’s the pandemic that won’t end. Rising inflation. Climate disasters. A democracy that looks creakier by the day. And that was before West Virginia Senator Joe Manchin hit the brakes on […]
Bannon Vote: Republicans once Voted to Hold Hollywood 10 in Contempt for Making Leftist Movies but won’t act on Far-Right Plot to Overthrow Gov’t
Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – Anyone who knows the history of abuse in the Congress’s prerogative of subpoenaing witnesses and holding people in contempt for declining to testify is a little uneasy about the vote today to refer far-right gadfly Steve Bannon to the Department of Justice on charges of contempt of Congress. Mary Clare […]
Top Ten Reasons Liberals have the High Moral Ground
In tumultuous sociopolitical struggles, a frequent pattern is visible: Conservatives often fight to preserve their own wealth or privileges, but liberals battle for causes that don’t enrich or benefit themselves personally. This fact is clear in the long crusade to abolish slavery, and in never-ending attempts to aid the poor. Liberals are less driven by […]