It's my sad responsibility to let you all know that John Herbst (aka 5thGenDemocrat) passed away late Friday night. He was 53 years old. He had went into the hospital a week ago with breathing problems; the doctors later discovered he had advanced adrenal sarcoma throughout his entire body. He had been on a ventilator and in a medically-induced coma for a time, but was taken off those Friday evening by mutual consent of himself and his immediate family. John had made it clear that he did not wis...

By any sensible definition, Joe Stack's act was terrorism: violent, concerted, committed for ideological or political motives. On another point, Stack's death was a picture of his life: crash and burn. I have no sympathy for a man whose last words in life were a diatribe against the thought of being hurled into the working class by capitalist society. This guy basically said he'd rather be dead than become a worker -- than be like me or millions of other workers. Personally, I don't care what ...

You are wrong. I've seen four different videos of this incident now, each from different angles, and listened carefully to the audio (with and without video) and watched the video (with and without audio), and here's what I pieced together: 1. At the time the Shonan Maru closed in on the Ady Gil, the Gil had its engines off and its was adrift in the water (which accounts for the very light wake behind it). You can hear the engine power down in the video linked to in the OP. 2. The Shonan Maru...

Note: I originally had this as part of the other post, but I thought it best to break it into two for clarity. -- Martin We do need a single political party of working people, led by workers, organized by workers and composed completely of workers. Since we are talking about working people taking power and acting as the caretaker "ruling class" in the transition to a classless society, it is in our interests as a class to be our own leaders -- to be the leadership we've been waiting for. Moreo...

Note: This is a little long and rambling, but there is a lot to be said on the subject. -- Martin I've been an active communist (not capital-C, like the Communist Party USA) for all of my adult life, and I've seen up-close and personal what the problems of the left are. The problem with the left is both organizational and political, since organizational structure, procedure and "culture" are all reflections of the political program and method being employed. The organizations are run by "middl...

This was sent to President Obama, Speaker Pelosi and Majority Leader Reid, and e-mailed out to others, earlier today. -- Martin Dear Mr. President, It is with great interest that I and other members of our political party have followed the recent deliberations and decisions made by your administration, in conjunction with your colleagues in both houses of Congress. And after watching with intense fascination over the last few months, I felt it was necessary to register my sincere thanks for yo...

Those of you who have been here as long as I have remember articles I wrote like "Canary in the Mine" and "You Cannot Serve Two Masters". I spoke and screamed and yelled. I was even willing to give you the benefit of the doubt when I knew better. And at every turn, in every case, the warnings I gave -- the warnings some of you derided and attacked -- were shown to be warranted; the analysis was correct. In my own way, and through my own means, I and others warned that this was going to happen -...

As some of you know, I'm a member of another political party (but I know whose house this is, so I don't really make a push of it), the Workers Party in America. Lately, we've had a number of members, supporters and friends approach us about the dilemma of wanting to have their young children involved in adventuring and outdoors activities similar to the Boy Scouts, but not wanting to subject their kids to the religious discrimination and jingoism of that organization. So, some of us have put o...

I offer this as a comment on the OP, but, in a sense, also as a warning to those on here who might actually get their hopes up about it. Revolutions are funny things. Unless they are betrayed and crushed from within, revolutions tend to go well beyond the margins set for them by their (self-appointed, more often than not) leaderships. They get "out of hand". "Excesses" happen. Even in the most orderly and idealized revolutions in history, someone gets tarred and feathered (or whatever the equiv...

"It was the Democrats that put me here, the Democrats that have betrayed the faith of generations of my family. No one else." Yes, but why? I would argue that it is because you are collateral damage from class warfare. For decades, working people have looked to the Democratic Party as "their" party, as the party that represents their general interests in the political arena (whether it actually did, of course, is another question). But over the last two decades, all remaining pretense of acting...

For the sake of this not being just an echo chamber. DISCLAIMER: I ask that all those interested, including moderators and admins, take notice of the above statement. I'm not looking to do anything more than provide the argument for the benefit of readers, and won't reply to any response in this thread if the content of those replies to the below amount to little more than the "Am not!" side of the "Am not! Are too!" argument. Now then, to the discussion at hand.... "If he's being a good litt...

It's not about income, power or prestige for me. That's all smokescreen to obscure what does define classes -- relationship to the means of production, and relations to other classes. Income is never the issue. A CEO that receives $1 in salary -- or no salary, symbolically -- is no less a manager than s/he was when they made $6.7 million. An autoworker with 20 years in and making $45,000 a year is still selling his or her ability to work on the market -- and having only that to sell on the mark...

I posted this to the UCPAToday blog earlier today:... The latest round in rightwing "Tea Parties" took place earlier today in Washington, D.C., as thousands gathered by the Capitol to stage yet another "teabagging" event, sponsored by the reactionary corporatist "Americans for Prosperity" group and egged on by Republican Congresswoman Michelle Bachmann. Bachmann, best known for calling for investigations of other members of Congress for "anti-Americanism" and calling on reactionaries to be "ar...

I was a regular here some years ago and haunted the GD forum. But after a hiatus I decided to try my hand here again -- updated my profile, went through my Inbox, and even tossed a few bucks to the crew to get my star back. So, here's to old friends/adversaries and new!