Check out the two videos listed below. They show the Cuban celebration of May Day. Remember that May Day is the holiday that commemorates the achievement of the U.S. workers in establishing the 40 hour work week. Too bad we didn’t have one million people in Washington, D.C. or NYC or Chicago or LA or Houston or any other U.S. city celebrating May Day.

Two videos from May Day parade in Havana, Cuba, 2011.

concert band and closeups

flags waving at end of parade

Reflections by Comrade Fidel

By Fidel Castro Ruz

http://www.cuba.cu/gobierno/reflexiones/2011/ing/f060511i.html

The men who executed Bin Laden did not act on their own: they were following orders from the US Government. They had gone through a rigorous selection process and were trained to accomplish special missions. It is known that the US President can even communicate with a soldier in combat.

A few hours after accomplishing that mission in the Pakistani city of Abbottabad, home to the most prestigious military academy of that country as well as important combat units, the White House offered the world’s public opinion a carefully drafted version about the death of Osama Bin Laden, the chief of Al Qaeda.

Of course, the world and the international media focused their attention on the issue, thus pushing all other public news into the background.

The US TV networks broadcast the President’s carefully drafted speech and showed images of the public’s reaction.

It was obvious that the world realized how sensitive the matter was. Pakistan is a country of 171 841 000 inhabitants –where the US and NATO have been carrying out a devastating war for ten years now- that has nuclear weapons and is a traditional ally of the United States.

There is no doubt that this Muslim country can not agree with the bloody war that the United States and its allies are waging against Afghanistan, another Muslim country with which it shares the troublesome and mountainous border traced by the British colonial empire. Common tribes live on both sides of the demarcation line.

The American press itself understood that the President was concealing almost the entire information.

The western news agencies –ANSA, AFP, AP, REUTERS and EFE- the press and important websites have published interesting reports about the incident.

The New York Times asserts that facts differed greatly from the official version announced on Tuesday by the White House and top intelligence officials, according to which Bin Laden’s death –who they finally recognized was unarmed, although they said he `resisted’- had occurred in the middle of an intense gun battle.

But, according to the New York daily, “the raid, though chaotic and bloody, was extremely one-sided, with a force of more than 20 Navy SEAL members quickly dispatching the handful of men protecting Bin Laden.”

The New York Times states that “the only shots fired by those in the compound came at the beginning of the operation, exactly when Bin Laden’s trusted courier, Abu Ahmed al-Kuwaiti, opened fire from behind the door of the guesthouse adjacent to the house where Bin Laden was hiding.”

“After the SEAL members shot and killed Mr. Kuwaiti and a woman in the guesthouse, the Americans were never fired upon again”, the newspaper states based on reports from said sources, whose identity was not revealed….

On Tuesday, the White House spokesman, Jay Carney, in an account of events, had asserted that in the early hours of Monday morning, the US commando “were engaged in a firefight throughout the operation.”
Leon E. Panetta, the director of the C.I.A., said, “there were some firefights that were going on” as these US elite military were clearing the upper floors of the residential compound where Bin Laden was hiding.

However, the newspaper asserts that, although Bin Laden had not raised any weapon when he was gunned down, the commandos that found him in one of the rooms “saw Osama bin Laden with an AK-47 and a Makarov pistol in arm’s reach.”

Today, May 6, news continue to pour in.

From Washington, one of the agencies reports that a sole gunman had shot against the US forces. It continues to report that, on Sunday evening, “several helicopters ferry 79 commandos towards Osama bin Laden’s compound in Abbottabad, north of Islamabad, flying low to avoid detection by radar, as Pakistan has not been told of the raid in advance.

“Two helicopters deliver more than 20 US Navy SEALs to the residence, which has four-to-six meter walls covered with barbed wire. One of the choppers, a MH-60 Blackhawk apparently modified to evade radar, is out of commission due to “mechanical failure,” according to initial reports from US officials.

“One group of commandos moves toward a smaller guest house next to the compound’s main building. Bin Laden’s trusted courier opens fire and is shot and killed, along with his wife.
The courier is the only man at the compound who fires on the Americans, contrary to earlier accounts from the White House that described a firefight throughout the nearly 40-minute operation.

“…Another US special forces team enters the main three-story house.”

“… They encounter the courier’s brother…who was shot and killed”, according to a US official who offered no further details. According to NBC news, the man “has one hand behind his back” when the team entered the room, “causing the SEALs to suspect he may have a gun, which turns out not to be the case.

“The commandos move up the stairs and in one of the rooms meet up with Bin Laden’s adult son, Khalid, who is also killed…”

“On the top floor, they find Bin Laden and his wife in the bedroom. She reportedly tries to move between her husband and the commandos, and is shot in the leg. Bin Laden, who gives no signal of surrender, is shot in the head, and some media say he is also struck in the chest. Earlier versions of the raid said Bin Laden “resisted” and that he had used his wife as a human shield, but the White House later acknowledges those details are incorrect.

“President Barack Obama, following events from the White House, is told the SEALs have tentatively identified Bin Laden. A Time magazine report, based on an interview with CIA Director Leon Panetta, suggests Bin Laden was killed less than 25 minutes into the raid.

-“In Bin Laden’s room, the US team finds an AK-47 assault rifle and a 9 mm Russian pistol. Other weapons are discovered in the compound, but no further details are given.

“The special forces find cash and telephone numbers sown into Bin Laden’s clothing…”

“The Navy SEALs hauled away everything that could offer a lead to further information: note pads, the five computers, 10 hard drives and more than 100 storage devices (CDs, DVDs, USB).

“…The U.S. team destroys the downed helicopter after moving the women and children in the compound to a safe area.

“…Thirty eight minutes after the start of the raid, U.S. helicopters fly away, carrying away the corpse of Bin Laden.”

The AP published information of political and also human interest:
“One of three wives living with Osama Bin Laden told Pakistani interrogators she had been staying in the Al-Qaeda chief’s hideout for five years, and could be a key source of information about how he avoided capture for so long, a Pakistani intelligence official said Friday.”

“Bin Laden’s wife, identified as Yemeni-born Amal Ahmed Abdullfattah, said she never left the upper floors of the house the entire time she was there.

“She and Bin Laden’s other two wives are being interrogated in Pakistan after they were taken into custody following Monday’s American raid on Bin Laden’s compound in the town of Abbottabad. Pakistani authorities are also holding eight or nine children who were found there after the U.S. commandos left.

“Given shifting and incomplete accounts from U.S. officials about what happened during the raid, testimony from Bin Laden’s wives may be significant in unveiling details about the operation.

“Their accounts could also help show how Bin Laden spent his time and managed to stay hidden, living in a large house close to a military academy in a garrison town, a two-and-a-half hours’ drive from the capital, Islamabad.

“The Pakistani official said CIA officers had not been given access to the women in custody.”

“The proximity of Bin Laden’s hideout to the military garrison and the Pakistani capital has also raised suspicions in Washington that Bin Laden may have been protected by Pakistani security forces while on the run.”

The EFE news agency inquired what Pakistan citizens thought about that.

According to that agency, 66 per cent of Pakistanis do not believe that the US Special Forces killed Osama Bin Laden, the leader of Al Qaeda; they think they killed another person, according to a joint poll ran by the British demoscopic institute, YouGov, and Polis, from Cambridge University.

The poll was said to have been carried out among Internet users, who usually have a higher educational level, in three big cities: Karachi, Islamabad and Lahore. The poll excluded rural demographic groups, which makes results to be all the more surprising, according to researchers.

Reportedly, 75 per cent of those polled said they also disapproved the violation of Pakistan’s sovereignty by the United States during the operation to capture and kill Bin Laden.

It was also reported that less than three fourths of those polled do not believe Bin Laden approved the 9/11 attacks against the United States, which justified the US invasion in Afghanistan and the war against Islamic terrorism.

According to the poll, 74 per cent think that Washington’s government does not have any respect for Islam and considers itself at war with the Islamic world; 70 per cent disapproves the Pakistani policy of accepting US economic aid.

Eighty six per cent are said to oppose also to the fact that the Pakistani government may in the future –and criticized the possibility that they may have done in the past- authorize attacks using drones against military groups.

Sixty one per cent of the Pakistanis who were interrogated said they sympathized with the Taliban or believed they could represent respectable viewpoints, against only 21 per cent who are radically opposed to them.

Reuters equally published some interesting reports:

“One of Osama bin Laden’s wives told Pakistani interrogators that the Al Qaeda leader and his family had been living for five years in the compound where he was killed by U.S. forces this week, a security official said on Friday.

“The official, who identified the woman as Amal Ahmed Abdulfattah, the youngest of Bin Laden’s three wives, told Reuters she was wounded in the raid.

“The security official said Abdulfattah told investigators: `We have been living there for the past five years’.”

“Pakistani security forces took between 15 and 16 people into custody from the compound after U.S. forces removed Bin Laden’s body, said the security official. Those detained included Bin Laden’s three wives and several children.”

According to a report published by ANSA, a US drone killed today no less than 15 persons in Waziristan, north of Pakistan. Others were seriously injured. But, who would care about those daily killings in that country?

However, I ask myself one question: Why is there so much coincidence between the assassination that was carried out at Abbottabad and the attempt to simultaneously assassinate Gaddafi?

One of Gaddafi’s youngest sons, who was not involved with political issues, Sarif al Arab, was accompanied by his little son and two little cousins at the house where he lived; Gaddafi and his wife had visited him shortly before the attacks launched by NATO bombers. The house was destroyed; Sarif al Arab and the three kids were killed. Gaddafi and his wife had left shortly before the attack. That was an unprecedented event. But the world has hardly known about that.

Was it a mere chance that such an event coincided with the attack against Osama Bin Laden’s refuge, which was perfectly known by the US government, which kept a close watch on it?

News released today by Vatican City reported as follows:

“May 6 (ANSA) – Giovanni Innocenzo Martinelli, Apostolic Vicar of Tripoli, said today to the Vatican’s agency FIDES: `I certainly do not want to interfere with the political activity of anyone, but I have the duty to declare that the bombings on Libya are immoral’.

“I am surprised that statements were made on the fact that I should deal only with spiritual matters and that the bombings have been authorized by the UN. The UN, NATO or the European Union doesn’t have the moral authority to decide to bomb Libya, he said.”

“Let mi stress that bombing is not dictated my moral or social conscience of the West or humanity in general. Bombing is always an immoral act.”

Another news published by ANSA on May 6 reports that the governments of China and Russia expressed their deep concern about the war in Libya and said they will work together to call for a cease fire.

According to the Chinese Foreign Minister Jechi Yang, they strongly believed that the most important goal was to achieve an immediate cease fire.

Truly worrying events are happening.

Fidel Castro Ruz
May 6, 2011
8:17 p.m.
Here is another article by Fidel Castro on the world tensions generated by the death of Osama bin Laden and activities in North Africa.
http://mltoday.com/subject-areas/communist-forum/the-assassination-of-osama-bin-laden-1135-2.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+ml2day-recent+%28Welcome+to+MLToday.com+%7C+Recently+Added+Content+%7C+Please+Subscribe+to+Our+Feed%29

By Jim Lane

Check out this article on a holiday ignored in the USA but celebrated abroad.

http://peoplesworld.org/victory-day-celebrated-abroad#PageComment_15497

ORIGINAL FRENCH ARTICLE: Lire et relire Lénine, pour préparer l’avenir

by Jean Salem, philosopher, interviewed by Laurent Etre

Translated Friday 6 May 2011, by Hervé Fuyet and reviewed by Henry Crapo

Jean Salem, is professor of philosophy at the University of Paris I Panthéon-Sorbonne. Jean Salem is notably the author of “Lénine et la révolution”, published by Encre marine, 2006.
Jean Salem:

In the present major crisis of capitalism, even when one is tempted to pretend to ignore the rise of the extreme right and other symptoms of despair, we do discern a need for a political perspective – a need that is expressed here and there in the world in very different mobilizations. The works and actions of Lenin, a major thinker of the Revolution, will be instructive in this search. I can see in his works six theses which seem to have retained all their pertinence.

1. The Revolution, first of all, is a war.

Lenin compared politics to military art, and stressed the need to ensure the existence of organized, disciplined revolutionary parties : because a political party is not just a think-tank (French Socialist Party leaders: thank you for the show!).

2. For Lenin, as well as for Marx before him, a political revolution is also, and above all, a social revolution, that is to say a change of status for classes into which society is divided.

This means that it is always appropriate to question the true nature of the State, of the “Republic”. Thus, the crisis of autumn 2008 clearly demonstrated how, in the leading centers of capitalism, the State and public money could be used to serve the interests of banks and a handful of privileged people. The state, in other words, is most surely not “above classes”.

3. A revolution is a series of battles, and it is up to the vanguard party to provide, at each stage of the struggle, slogan and watchwords adapted to the situation and to its potential.

Because it is neither the mood attributed to the “people” nor the “opinion” allegedly measured by pollsters that are able to develop such slogans. When, at the climax of a succession of days of demonstrations, 3 million people are in the streets (which is what has happened in France at the beginning of 2009), there is a need to offer them a perspective other than yet another meeting between union leaders. Otherwise, the movement runs out of steam, and it discourages those who waited in vain for an indication of the precise nature of the objectives and the way to reach them …

4. The major problems of people’s lives are always settled by force, Lenin also emphasized.

“Force” does not necessarily mean, far from it, open violence or bloody repression against the other side! When millions of people decide to converge in one place, such as Tahrir Square in central Cairo, and indicate that nothing will force them to back up in the face of a hated power, it is already fully a matter of force. According to Lenin, it is crucial to dispel the illusions of parliamentary and electoral cretinism, leading, for example, to the situation we are in presently in France: a “Left” geared almost entirely toward electoral campaigns, from which the masses of citizens, rightly, expect .. almost nothing. 


5. Revolutionaries must not despise the struggle, contenting themselves with reforms.

Lenin was certainly aware that at certain times, a given reform can be a temporary concession, or a decoy, with the consent of the ruling class, better to put to sleep those who try to resist it. But he considers, nevertheless, that reform is most of the time a new leverage for the revolutionary struggle.

6. Politics, finally, since the dawn of the twentieth century, begins when and where there are millions, even tens of millions of people involved.

In formulating this sixth thesis, Lenin sensed that revolutionary situations will tend to develop increasingly in colonial or semi-colonial dominated countries. And indeed, since the Chinese Revolution of 1949 till the independences in the 1960s of the last century, History has largely confirmed the latter prediction.

In short, one should read Lenin,
especially after the flood generated by “the end of real socialism”. Let’s read and reread Lenin again and again, to better build the Future!

http://www.humaniteinenglish.com/spip.php?article1761

Arise, then, women of this day! Arise all women who have hearts,
whether our baptism be that of water or of tears!

Say firmly: “We will not have great questions decided by
irrelevant agencies. Our husbands shall not come to us, reeking
with carnage, for caresses and applause. Our sons shall not be
taken from us to unlearn all that we have been able to teach
them of charity, mercy and patience.

We women of one country will be too tender of those of another
country to allow our sons to be trained to injure theirs. From
the bosom of the devastated earth a voice goes up with our own.
It says “Disarm, Disarm! The sword of murder is not the balance
of justice.”

Blood does not wipe our dishonor nor violence indicate possession.
As men have often forsaken the plow and the anvil at the summons
of war, let women now leave all that may be left of home for a
great and earnest day of counsel. Let them meet first, as women,
to bewail and commemorate the dead.

Let them then solemnly take counsel with each other as to the
means whereby the great human family can live in peace, each
bearing after their own time the sacred impress, not of Caesar,
but of God.

In the name of womanhood and of humanity, I earnestly ask that a
general congress of women without limit of nationality may be
appointed and held at some place deemed most convenient and at
the earliest period consistent with its objects, to promote the
alliance of the different nationalities, the amicable settlement
of international questions, the great and general interests of
peace.

Julia Ward Howe
Boston
1870

By Houston Communist Party

The recent upsurge in interest in socialism and communism prompted us to write this article as a clarification of how we would envision a socialist society in the U.S A recent Rasmussen poll indicated that 11% of U.S. voters believe that communism is morally superior to capitalism. This means that in spite of the campaign of misinformation that has been ongoing since the early part of the 20th century, 34 million people in this country believe that communism is morally superior to capitalism.

This paper is largely based on how the classic works of Marxism-Leninism envision a socialist society. Of course, the classic works also maintain that socialism would be developed differently in various sovereign nations according to democratic struggles and the historical context of the various societies in which socialism develops.

Let us examine what these key terms mean for working people and how they might be worked out in a developing socialist society.

Private property

Many people in the U.S. do not know the meaning of socialism and have little understanding about it, although the label “socialist” is often bandied about these days. Most people misunderstand concepts like social-ownership simply because they do not know what Marx and Lenin meant when they talked about “Private Property.”

Private property, when referred to by communists, only refers to private ownership of industry or the means of production; the things you own personally are not private property in this sense. Marx and Lenin would just call them personal belongings. Socialist economic systems seek to end private property by making the means of production collectively owned and democratically operated by the workers; the state protects the workers’ ownership of the means of production. This means real democracy in the workplace.

In a socialist system, the state would not come and take your things; that’s nonsense! The mainstream media (e.g. Fox News) would have you believe that socialists and communists will take your fingernails and toenails. Nothing could be further from the truth. Lenin wrote that if people try to accumulate and hoard publicly-owned property for their own private gain, then they will have all their personal belongings confiscated and will be sent to prison. But he never says anything about personal belongings in any other sense. The only ideology on the left in which theorists advocate the abolition of all personal belongings are the ultra-left deviations such as anarchism and Maoism. So it is very important to be precise when speaking about private property.

It is important to remember that the capitalist system leads the way in confiscation of working people’s property. The bottom 60% of households in this country owns only 4% of the nation’s wealth. The top 1% owns 37% of all the capital and the top 10% owns 90% of all capital. So, it is important to consider who is seizing what.

Rights of the capitalists

The bourgeoisie (the current ultra-wealthy, ruling class in capitalist countries that own all of the means of production, but do none of the work) will have their rights curtailed. The word “freedom” in capitalist countries has generally been used to refer to the rights of the capitalist to oppress, and exploit the workers in order to maximize profits. Socialist countries who do not extend the freedom to capitalists to exploit workers are deemed to be “not free” by the capitalists and their cheerleaders, which historically has included hypocritical politicians and other community leaders such as right wing clergy, professors and teachers. Some union leaders have also fallen into this trap. Capitalists in a socialist society would be forced to follow the will of the people and maintain dignity and respect in the workplace and would accrue severe penalties for discriminatory, oppressive and exploitative workplace practices.

In a socialist system, the workers would become the ruling class and as such would be fully compensated for their labor which is the basis of all wealth. Profits for the capitalists would be severely curtailed and eventually phased out. When capitalists and their cheerleaders smear socialists by branding them “totalitarian, and undemocratic”, we have to ask with whose democratic rights are they concerned. The answer is obvious, they are concerned about the freedom of capitalists to steal from their workers and amass great fortunes based on the labor of people other than themselves.

Universal health care, socialism vs. reformism

Socialism is not defined by reforms. For example, universal health care is not a defining feature of socialism. Universal health care is one of the many goals of a developing socialist society and it would represent an incremental improvement in any system, capitalist or socialist, since it would make health care accessible to all peoples. However, some capitalist systems have achieved universal health care, but are not socialist economies.
A socialist society would provide health care based on need, not ability to pay. Lenin argued that it is necessary that health care delivery increase in socialist systems to meet the public demand for health services. Hospitals and clinics would be built and organized based on the concrete needs of the community rather than consideration of the “profit margin.”

What does socialism do?

What is the purpose of socialism? To raise the material (i.e. concrete) standard of living of the workers, end the exploitation of one person by another, end all forms of oppression, end racism and sexism, end patriarchy and white-supremacy, end the violence of imperialist warfare, and eventually reach the goal of communism, a society without the struggle between the classes.

How do you identify a socialist country? By asking a very simple question: who owns the means of production and who controls the state? If the answer is the workers, then it is a socialist country. If it is the bourgeoisie, it is a capitalist country (no matter how liberal or “social-democratic” it is). In socialist countries, commodity production for private profit ends; production is no longer designed for the sake of the market, but rather determined by the actual needs of the people.

How does socialism happen?

Socialism must go through many stages. Unfortunately, it is difficult to specify these stages. As Marx pointed out, these stages are necessarily relative to the individual societies that develop socialism. One of the important tasks of communists is to figure out what these stages are in their societies and to educate the workers accordingly. Important questions like “what stage of socialism are we in?” should have a definite answer based on the existing material conditions and historical developments of the community in which they develop.

In the first stages of socialism, the goal is to raise the material standard of living for the working people. That means raising wages and benefits for workers. Socialist societies would provide everyone an opportunity to get an education and this will be most important for the workers. The purpose of education in a capitalist society is to train workers both for manual and intellectual labor. In capitalist countries, worker’s exposure to and preparation for appreciation of the arts and cultures of the world is very limited. A socialist education would give workers the capacity to fully enjoy and appreciate literature, art and music and would prepare them to think critically and understand scientific concepts. In a socialist system, workers would be trained to develop their own art as an expression of their own consciousness of the environment in which they live.

What would communism look like?

As the stages of socialism progress, the workers will eventually attain a comfortable standard of living and will have received a thorough education. All workers will have access both to public libraries and their own books, all of the wisdom of the ages being available to them, just because they are human beings and thus deserve all of the fruits of humanity.

Only when the final goals of socialism are met and a communist society is established will people truly be free; for in capitalist countries, most of the things that people call freedoms are really false freedoms. The freedom to buy one commodity over another is not true freedom. The freedom to choose McDonald’s over Burger King is not freedom. Neither the workers of McDonald’s nor Burger King have any say so over how these corporations are run. The community does not participate in the decisions made about how these companies produce their food. The decisions are made based on the owner’s best guess as to what product will maximize their profits.

There is no such thing as “economic freedom” in a society based on class exploitation. Only in a communist society, where the working class is no longer prevented from living the good life based on their lack of money, will there truly be freedom for all.

Who can make this happen?

Only the working class can liberate itself and claim its historic role. Only the working class can break the chains of capitalism and pave the bright path to true freedom. This can only be done by organizing and unifying the working people of this nation and the world. When working people unite and fight for their rights, it will be possible for the working class to become the ruling class. This is what we are about. This is the side that communists have fought for historically. We want a truly egalitarian and democratic society by the workers, of the workers and for the workers.

Check out this video of the May day celebration in Cairo, Egypt