THE COMMUNIST MOVEMENT IN NORTH AMERICA

vol.1, no. 29

“Here’s to you Nicholas and Bart
Rest forever here in our hearts
The last and final moment is yours
That agony is your triumph!”


Joan Baez wrote these lines to remember the struggle of two Italo-American revolutionaries, Sacco and Vanzetti, who fought injustice in USA and were executed in 1927 for the sake of combating the power of Big Capital and US establishment (YouTube here’s to you Joan Baez).


It happened 10 years after the socialist October Revolution in Russia led by the communist party (Bolshevik). It shows that struggles for the workers’ power are not that easy. But, we cannot live in the past. Joseph Stalin wrote about the 1905 revolution in Russia - that failed- and concluded that: “This was a period when our Party turned from the open revolutionary struggle against tsardom to roundabout methods of struggle, to the utilization of each and every legal opportunity – from mutual aid societies to the Duma (Parliament, Ed.) platform…” (Verbatim Report of the Fifteenth Party Congress, Russ. Ed. pp. 366-67, 1935)

In Canada, always in the aftermath of cold war, the Saskatchewan Peace News reported that “over 100 people were treated to two hours of nearly non-stop entertainment […] Bob Hughes from the Saskatchewan Coalition Against Racism and one of the festival’s organizers summed things up by saying, ‘The turn-out was great, the weather fantastic and everyone had a wonderful time and is looking forward to next year!’ Progressives, including communists join in action; in this November 2010 issue, they also ‘support the call for parliament to discuss and end Canada’s military presence in Afghanistan!’”
(Photo Internet: Joseph Stalin)


In Toronto, people sharing those viewpoints met in September 2010 to declare with their president, Michael Lucas: “Although it was many times a hard road to travel before we reached this 20th anniversary, the gratification, the successes, the influence that NSC (Northstar Compass, Ed.) gained in 76 countries of the world with its English, French, Russian and Spanish Editions, is something that we all should cherish and vow to ourselves to keep on going, as friends of Socialism, Soviet People and for the rebirth of a New Union of Soviet Socialist Republics!” (NSC, vol. 20 # 8-9, Sept./Oct. 2010, Toronto, p. 3)


We are no more in years of retreat. Now is the time to move forward and propose to Canadians the way-out to the crisis and re-establish the reputation of Canada as a peace-loving country. This is why; it is rather strange to read the last Editorial of the communist newspaper People’s Voice that printed “… Mr. Harper can never be trusted to keep his word on anything, other than his commitment to turn Canada into a loyal foot-soldier for U.S.Imperialism. […] We must also note the shameful role of other Parliamentary parties in this endless war. On this occasion, Michael Ignatieff’s Liberals were the main offenders, singing the ‘humanitarian’ chorus which gave Harper a fig leaf to claim support for extending Canada’s military role. But Jack Layton’s NDP also bears its share of blame. […] While the Harper Tories are the most dangerous, militaristic party in parliament, the Liberal and NDP opposition parties also have blood on their hands.” (People’s Voice, December 1-31, 2010, p. 4)


So, nobody is good! It is a bit schematic. In the Province of Québec, for instance, La Vie Réelle in English maintains very courteous relations with members of the Liberal Party of Canada, the main opposition party in Ottawa; the contacts are even friendly with some former deputies, including some Secretary of State in the House of Commons. We all share the deeply-rooted aspirations of the French-Canadian people for peace and return of the Canadian troops from Afghanistan. Although, we have a rather superficial knowledge of the situation in English-speaking Canada, we have the belief that millions of workers share the attitude of their French-Canadian counterparts.


The Communist Party of Canada must take the lead and call upon all peace-loving forces in Canada, including small-business, self-employed and working-class people to force the Harper Tories to respect the initial decision, i.e. the return for July 1st 2011 of the Canadian troops, which would open the road to a new majority in the House of Commons and the rout of the Conservatives all over Canada in the coming electoral race.


Let’s come back to the years of the past-General Secretary Tim Buck (1929-1962). The party had then elected seats in Canada at several levels (provincial, federal, municipal). It was deeply involved in the trade-union movement.

The skeptical will nod. But, what about Stalin? The Australian communist Guardian paper underlined in its November 24 issue (Bob Treasure, Ed.): “The aim of the revisionist history, therefore, is to conflate Hitler and Stalin as roughly the same (after all, they were both ‘dictators’), revivify Hitler’s purpose in smashing the Soviet Union and the ‘communist menace’, and portray Stalin as a blundering and heartless leader who had needlessly sacrificed his people on the altar of Marxist ideology. Stalin is made responsible for the loss of some 20-30 million Russian lives in WW2.
[…]
Now, however, a goldmine of source material has been made available: the minutes of Politburo meetings, Stalin’s conversations with his many visitors in the Kremlin, wartime and military archives, as well as police files. Geoffrey Roberts, an English Don and no friend of communism, has written a revealing book (Stalin’s Wars) which gives the lie to the prejudices and downright falsehoods being spread in many present-day documentaries and media-grabs on the subject of Stalin and the German invasion of the Soviet Union.”


Except for a recent article of The New York Times (Dec. 6th 2010), the media are rather silent about the real criminals, the torture-makers of the Nazi regime, protected by the CIA in USA. A report of the Department of Justice declares that more than 10 000 of these henchmen found a refuge in our southern neighbour territory. The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) was informed of this horrible reality; a former SS Waffen soldier, Tscherim Soobzokov confirmed his role to the CIA during the war, soon after he entered in USA.


The FBI on the other hand published facts on Hate Crime Statistics, which can be alleged as political offenses. “Today (November 22, 2010, Ed.), the FBI released 2009 statistics which indicated that 6 604 criminal incidents involving 7 789 offenses were reported as a result of bias toward a particular race, religion, sexual orientation, ethnicity/national origin, or physical or mental disability. The Reporting Program includes data from hate crime reports submitted by law enforcement agencies throughout the nation.”


In this country, many observers join their voice to support the California’s new top cop, San Francisco’ progressive District Attorney Kamala Harris, vowed to insure ‘the law of this state is on the side of the people.’” (Ref. People’s World, Dec. 7th)


However, is she, alongside with other Democrats, going to solve a major problem, source of criminality in any capitalist country: unemployment? The New York City Metro newspaper said the same day: “… despite signs of improvement, strains remain in the labor market. The number on emergency unemployment benefits increased 142,874 to 3.94 million in the week that ended Nov. 13 […] The White House urged Congress on Thursday to extend unemployment aid and warned that failure to act would inflict a heavy toll on millions of Americans that could put the U.S. economic recovery at risk.”
(Photo Internet: Tim Buck, General Secretary of the Communist Party of Canada, 1929-1962)



Nevertheless, the American working people will be represented at the coming 16th Congress of the World Federation of Trade Unions in Athens (Greece), April 6-9th 2011. With the thousands representing 80 million workers of more than 130 countries, the U.S. representatives, including some from Washington, will discuss with their comrades from around the world and map out an alternative to the economic crisis, inherent to the capitalist way of “living”.

North American workers are entering into a new stage. Surely it has a lot to do with those courageous American workers rebuilding their Communist Party, club after club, with the aim to give a more militant tone to the voice of the organized labor, the AFL-CIO.


Meanwhile, the Canadian Communists are, on their own, rebuilding their networks of solidarity and unity, wherever you come from: Québec or English-speaking Canada, especially putting forward the legacy of our giants such as Tim Buck.


“Communism, did you say?” The Canadian youth will tell you –with a smile- that they don’t know concretely what it's all about, but at first sight, like anything else, it does not scare them; after all: “I have somebody in the family who went to Cuba during the winter season and he found that it is just great there, especially for a small country!”



danieleugpaquet@yahoo.ca



La Vie Réelle in English: http://wwwlavienglish.blogspot.com/



Marxism-Leninism Today (USA): http://mltoday.com/

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