While Heartening, the Chauvin Verdict Is Still an Outlier

By Matthew John

A pleasant surprise arrived on the annual stoner holiday known simply as 4/20. After a tumultuous year of monumental protests during the deadliest pandemic in recent history, a verdict on the Derek Chauvin case was finally reached. As CNN reported, “Former Minneapolis Police officer Derek Chauvin has been convicted on all charges in the death of George Floyd,” and “faces up to 40 years in prison for second-degree murder, up to 25 years for third-degree murder and up to 10 years for second-degree manslaughter.” 

Understandably, celebrations ensued.

But before the dust had settled, we received heart-wrenching news that another Black American had been killed by police. Sixteen-year-old Ma’Khia Bryant was gunned down by an officer in Columbus, Ohio 30 minutes before the Chauvin verdict was delivered. The celebrations seemed to fizzle out shortly after they began. This tragic incident is not only a microcosm of the larger systemic issue of police violence, but a lesson in the naïveté of expecting “justice” from this system in the first place. 

The ubiquitous phenomenon of American police killing Black people can be historically traced back to the very inception of policing as slave patrols in the antebellum South. Continuing through the Black Codes, Jim Crow, and the War on Drugs, American policing has always maintained a close bond with white supremacy. A ProPublica analysiseven found that young Black males in recent years were 21 times more likely to be shot and killed by the police than their white counterparts.

In fact, 64 Americans were killed by police during the trial of Derek Chauvin alone. While attention is hyper-focused on high profile cases like that of George Floyd, is it easy to forget that American police officers kill at least 1,000 people each year — a body count higher than all annual mass shooters combined. This nationwide massacre is clearly out of control and primarily encompasses an ongoing genocide against Black and Brown people that is consistent with American history more broadly. As many are reluctantly realizing, there is a good chance that this institution cannot be reformed.

While Democratic Party politicians gave disingenuous speeches exploiting the memory of George Floyd, I reflected on the fact that Floyd was killed in a blue state and in a city with a Democratic mayor. I thought about how Democratic president Joe Biden proposed increasing police funding by $300 million and sent the military to Minneapolis to further brutalize and terrorize those who dared to protest this continuous state violence against people of color. This is a systemic issue — not a partisan one. Both parties are complicit. Yet Democrats positioned themselves as the “good guys” and took credit despite upholding literally the same racist policies as Republicans.

Possibly the worst offender was House speaker Nancy Pelosi, who said that George Floyd “sacrificed” himself for the cause of justice. This was an absurd and disgusting remark — Floyd didn’t choose to be murdered. In reality, by convicting him of murder, Derek Chauvin was sacrificed to prop up an unfounded belief in justice within this inherently racist system. And this belief is indeed an extension of the American exceptionalism that is crucial to the ideological survival of this white supremacist, settler-colonial nation on the brink of collapse.

When anyone - especially an agent of “the law” - is filmed conducting a sadistic murder in broad daylight, they should be convicted every single time. The insincere gloating by the political establishment in the wake of the Chauvin verdict reveals precisely how rare anything approaching “justice” is found in the United States. We can show this empirically; between 2005 and early 2019, only 35 killer cops were convicted of a crime (a rate of far less than one percent). Based on these statistics and what we know about the profoundly corrupt culture of American policing, it is clear that the vast majority of violent crimes committed by cops go unpunished.

None of this means we shouldn’t celebrate the Chauvin verdict. We absolutely should. Seeing the Floyd family’s reaction to the news brought tears to my eyes. Although nothing can bring George Floyd back, this outcome is far better than the flagrant dismissal of justice that usually occurs in similar situations. In addition to the prospect of a fraction of justice being served, another heartening aspect of this development is the realization that activism works, that mass movements work, and — as much as the establishment doesn’t want to admit it — that property destruction works. Especially under capitalism, where human need is commodified and private property is valued more than life itself, threatening almighty property is one of the only tactics that catches the attention of the ruling class.

As Frederick Douglass famously said, “Power concedes nothing without a demand.” Without the massive protest movement (likely the largest in U.S. history) in the wake of the murder of George Floyd, that vicious thug Derek Chauvin would likely still be roaming free in the streets of Minneapolis. While we can recognize the significance of this verdict, we must also recognize that we have a long way to go to organize a multi-racial, working-class movement capable of enacting systemic change. If this is what it took to convict an obvious murderer, imagine what it will take to build the kind of society we want.

Ruth Bader Ginsburg and the Limits of Neoliberal Feminism

[Photo credit: Danita Delimont Photography/Newscom]

By Matthew John

Republished from dialogue & discourse.

On September 18, Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg died from complications related to pancreatic cancer. She was 87 years old and was surrounded by loved ones at the time of her death. Thousands attended a vigil outside the Supreme Court building and innumerable additional events took place in her honor throughout the country. Ginsburg was the second woman to serve on the Supreme Court and became known as a feminist icon and a pioneering advocate for women’s rights due to her dissenting opinions in cases like Gonzales v. Carhart, Ledbetter v. Goodyear Tire & Rubber Co., and Burwell v. Hobby Lobby Stores. An email I received from Black Lives Matter Global Network the following day concisely encapsulated public sentiment:

“Last night, we lost a champion in the fight for justice and gender equality: U.S. Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg. Justice Ginsburg was a giant in the fight for equality and civil rights — she embodied everything that our movement stands for. We stand on the accomplishments of her life’s work that have continued to amplify the need to protect and expand equal rights for women and underserved communities. And we celebrate women having a voice in the workforce while also having the ability to make decisions for their own health and wellbeing because of the work of Justice Ginsburg.”

In the wake of this national tragedy, Ginsburg’s life and legacy took center stage in political discourse and rampant speculation ensued regarding how this event might influence the nation’s future. Democratic campaign contributions skyrocketed and Republican leaders began calculating and scheming to fill the vacant court seat. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi announced that Ginsburg would be the first woman to lie in repose at the Supreme Court and New York Governor Andrew Cuomo announced that the state would erect a statue in her honor. Politicians and pundits memorialized the fallen titan, who had become a cultural icon known fondly by the moniker “Notorious R.B.G”, while others found inspiration in idiosyncratic elements of Ginsburg’s persona.

As is the case with other beloved American heroes, the national discourse surrounding the death of Ginsburg included every detail imaginable other than her cumulative record in public service. Unfortunately, the Supreme Court tenure of Ruth Bader Ginsburg encompassed more than just pussyhats and rainbows. As with any prominent figure, we must account for the “problematic” aspects of Ginsburg’s legacy as well. These include her disparaging statement regarding Colin Kaepernick’s racial justice efforts, her positive statement regarding former colleague Brett Kavanaugh (who was credibly accused of rape), her designation of flagrant reactionary Antonin Scalia as her “best buddy”, and her final case on SCOTUS, in which she agreed with the decision to fast-track President Trump’s deportations. In terms of Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s comprehensive legacy on the Supreme Court, the well-known, progressive dissenting opinions are dwarfed by her extensive résumé of anti-indigenous, anti-worker, pro-cop, and “tough on crime” decisions. (Unless otherwise noted, the following bullet points are quoted or nearly quoted from this Current Affairs article, which I’d recommend reading for more details and context.) For instance:

• In Heien v. North Carolina, the court held that the police may justifiably pull over cars if they believe they are violating the law even if the police are misunderstanding the law, so long as the mistake was reasonable.

• In Taylor v. Barkes, the Court held that the family of a suicidal man who was jailed and then killed himself could not sue the jail for failing to implement anti-suicide measures.

• In Plumhoff v. Rickard, the court held that the family of two men could not sue the police after they had shot and killed them for fleeing a police stop.

• In Samson v. California, the Court decided the issue of whether police could conduct warrantless searches of parolees merely because they were on parole. Instead of joining the liberal dissenters, Ginsburg signed onto Clarence Thomas’s majority opinion in favor of the police.

• In Kansas v. Carr, the Kansas Supreme Court had overturned a pair of death sentences, on the grounds that the defendants’ Eighth Amendment rights had been violated in the instructions given to the jury. SCOTUS informed Kansas that it had made a mistake; nobody’s Eighth Amendment rights had been violated, thus the defendants ought to have continued unimpeded along the path toward execution. The Court’s decision was 8–1, the lone dissenter being Sonia Sotomayor. Ginsburg put her name on Justice Scalia’s majority opinion instead.

• In Sherrill v. Oneida Indian Nation, the court ruled against the Oneida Tribe over a dispute regarding its territorial claim. Ginsburg’s majority opinion stated, “We hold that the tribe cannot unilaterally revive its ancient sovereignty, in whole or in part, over the parcels at issue.” Ginsburg referenced the Eurocentric, racist, and colonialist “Doctrine of Discovery” in her comments. (Source)

• In Salazar v. Ramah Navajo Chapter, Ginsburg dissented, disagreeing with the ruling that that the United States government, when it enters into a contract with a Native American tribe for services, must pay contracts in full, even if Congress has not appropriated enough money to pay all tribal contractors. (Source)

• In Kiowa Tribe v. Manufacturing Technologies, Ginsburg once again dissented, opposing the ruling, which stated that the Kiowa Tribe was entitled to sovereign immunity from contract lawsuits, whether made on or off reservation, or involving governmental or commercial activities. (Source)

• In Inyo County v. Paiute-Shoshone Indians, the Bishop Paiute Tribe of California asserted that their tribe’s status as a sovereign nation made them immune to state processes under federal law and asserted that the state authorized the seizure of tribal records. Ginsburg joined the majority in dismissing the tribe’s complaint. (Source)

• In Alaska v. Native Village of Venetie Tribal Government, the court unanimously ruled against a tribal council that wanted to collect a tax from non-tribal members doing business on tribal lands. The Court claimed the land (which was owned by the tribe) was not subject to the tribal tax because it was not part of a Native American reservation. (Source)

• In C & L Enterprises, Inc. v. Citizen Band, Potawatomi Indian Tribe of Oklahoma, the court held that the tribe waived its sovereign immunity when it agreed to a contract containing an arbitration agreement. (Source)

• In Navajo Nation v. United States Forest Service, the court ruled against the Navajo Nation, who have consistently protested the encroachment of a ski resort on Navajo territory (San Francisco Peaks). In short, the decision upheld the Ninth Circuit Court’s ruling that the use of recycled sewage water was not a “substantial burden” on the religious freedom of American Indians. (Source)

• In Integrity Staffing Solutions, Inc. v. Busk, the court ruled that workers didn’t deserve paid compensation for being required to watch theft security screenings. (Source)

• In Brogan v. United States, the court ruled that the Fifth Amendment does not protect the right of those being questioned by law enforcement officials to deny wrongdoing falsely. (Source)

• In Chadrin Lee Mullenix v. Beatrice Luna, Ginsburg sided with the majority opinion which granted immunity to a police officer who unnecessarily shot and killed a suspect. (Source)

• In Bush v. Gore, the contentious decision that decided the 2000 presidential election, Ginsburg’s draft of her dissent had a footnote alluding to the possible suppression of Black voters in Florida. Justice Scalia purportedly responded to this draft by flying into a rage, telling Ginsburg that she was using “Al Sharpton tactics.” Ginsburg removed the footnote before it saw the light of day.

• In Davis v. Ayala, Justice Anthony Kennedy wrote a lengthy concurrence condemning solitary confinement. Most notably, Justice Kennedy made no reference to any particularly vulnerable group, instead suggesting that long-term solitary confinement may be unconstitutional for all. Justice Ginsburg did not join the concurrence.

• Scott v. Harris involved a motorist who was paralyzed after a police officer ran his car off the road during a high-speed chase. Ginsburg concurred with the majority that deadly force was justified. (Source)

• In Rumsfeld v. Forum for Academic & Institutional Rights, Inc., Ginsburg approved allowing the government to threaten the withdrawal of funding in order to punish universities that ban discriminatory job recruitment by the military.

The list goes on. Of course, no one is perfect. Everyone has flaws. However, when evaluating any prominent or powerful individual, it seems the proper outlook is to weigh the harm inflicted by their actions against the positive results of their actions. For instance, Abraham Lincoln’s passage of the Emancipation Proclamation helped end the most prominent form of slavery in the U.S. (but not all forms), and because of this, many Americans are willing to forgive his racist views and perceive his overall contributions positively. By this measure, it is dubious at best to suggest that Ginsburg’s full record contains more — simply put — good than bad. That is to say, it seems that her career as a whole caused more harm to vulnerable people than any positive impact her rare instances of dissent may have had.

The simple aforementioned formulation — cumulative good vs. cumulative harm — may be a bit naïve when compared to the manner in which most citizens evaluate public figures and the process by which these figures are often lionized despite their substantial misdeeds. The cult of personality surrounding Ruth Bader Ginsburg is certainly a notable phenomenon that can be explored in sociological and cultural contexts, but the whitewashing of her record is a crucial aspect of this process that is worth analyzing.

This unfettered, liberal adulation of Ginsburg can stem from a conscious attempt to conceal the unsavory aspects of her record, from plain ignorance, or from a third, more insidious place: acquiescence to the brutality that is “baked into” the American political system and our nation’s history more broadly. This is a system founded by white supremacists who enslaved and tortured Africans on stolen, blood-soaked land — a system by and for economic elites. In this sense, Ginsburg’s consistently anti-indigenous voting record might be perceived by liberals as a “necessary evil” — a simple extension of the settler-colonial mentality and the vestiges of “Manifest Destiny.” The same critique applies to her conservative rulings that harmed immigrants, people of color, and the working class in general.

Beyond Neoliberal Feminism

It is usually the case that about half of any large population is comprised of women. When speaking of feminism, we often forget that universal issues are also women’s issues; healthcare, housing, and wages, for instance. Under neoliberalism, exploitation, austerity, vicious imperialism, and state violence are systemic aspects of daily reality. We must remember that this includes the experiences of women, and often to a greater degree. Why don’t we take into account the indigenous women, or the immigrant women, or the women experiencing poverty when discussing Ginsburg’s record or government policy more broadly?

Let’s break this down even further. Recognizing these demographics, is it “feminist” to continue displacing and attacking the sovereignty of native women? Is it “feminist” to rule in favor of employers rather than female employees? Is it “feminist” to deport women back to countries we destroyed with sanctions and military coups? Just as the lofty, foundational American ideals were designed by and for white, property-owning men, this elite notion of feminism only applies to certain groups of women under certain circumstances. This superficial feminism is a far cry from a Marxist feminism that seeks a more holistic approach to liberation and empowerment. As Martha E. Gimenez wrote:

“As long as women’s oppression and other oppressions occupy the center of feminist theory and politics, while class remains at the margins, feminism will unwittingly contribute to keeping class outside the collective consciousness and the boundaries of acceptable political discourse. To become a unifying, rather than a divisive, political and ideological force, twenty-first-century Marxist feminism needs to become an overtly working-class women’s feminism, in solidarity with the working class as a whole, supporting the struggles of all workers, women and men, and gender-variant people of all races, national origins, citizenship statuses, and so on, thus spearheading the process toward working-class organization and the badly needed return to class in U.S. politics.”

American Institutions and Systemic Violence

Deifying political figures like Ginsburg not only whitewashes their crimes against marginalized people — it also further legitimizes a fundamentally elitist, unjust, and undemocratic political system. As political scientist Rob Hunter wrote, “The Supreme Court is a bulwark of reaction. Its brief is to maintain the institutional boundaries drawn by the Constitution, a document conceived out of fear of majoritarian democracy and written by members of a ruling class acting in brazen self-interest.”

A sober analysis of Ginsburg’s rulings clarifies that America has never strayed from its roots as a genocidal, hyper-capitalist, white supremacist, patriarchal settler-colonial project with economic elites running the government and blue-clad henchmen violently enforcing this agenda through state-sanctioned terror. Some wonder if it has always been this way. Has it gotten better? Worse? Has slavery just been repackaged? What’s clear is that the advent of neoliberalism has heightened the perilous and precarious conditions of this crumbling society while technology has allowed strangers to share the visceral horrors contained therein.

It is time to stop normalizing this barbarism. Performative identity politics and the ubiquitous brand of white, neoliberal feminism are façades used to conceal the profound violence of a dying empire and to paint the “moderate” wing of capital as somehow more humane and enlightened. A society founded on land theft, on commodifying basic human needs, on exploiting, enslaving, and brutalizing the vulnerable, is a society that should not be celebrated. And it is a society where the realization of true feminism has — thus far — proven to be out of reach. As Thomas Sankara once said, “The status of women will improve only with the elimination of the system that exploits them.”

What Kind of Message Does the Biden/Harris Campaign Send to the Black Lives Matter Movement?

By Matthew Dolezal

On August 11, presumptive Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden announced that he had chosen former presidential candidate and California senator Kamala Harris as his vice-presidential running mate. In a campaign email, Biden proclaimed that Harris “is the best person to help me take this fight to Trump and Mike Pence and then to lead this nation starting in January 2021.” In an overview of the news, CNN highlighted Harris’s “multi-racial background”, indicating that the Biden campaign’s decision may have partially stemmed from a desire to embrace the reinvigorated movement for racial justice in these tumultuous times.

Following the murder of George Floyd by a white Minneapolis police officer on May 25, the nation erupted in protest, demanding justice and accountability. These massive, ongoing, nationwide uprisings are primarily a manifestation of the renewed Black Lives Matter (BLM) movement. As American police departments responded by doubling down on their flagrant brutality, the movement coalesced around efforts to “defund the police.” This was encapsulated in a July 6 post on the official BLM website:

“We know that police don’t keep us safe — and as long as we continue to pump money into our corrupt criminal justice system at the expense of housing, health, and education investments — we will never be truly safe. That’s why we are calling to #DefundPolice and #InvestInCommunities…”

On the surface, Biden’s VP pick may appear to be an olive branch to the BLM movement, as Harris’s identity as a black woman has been given significant attention. This is certainly a noteworthy development in the 2020 election season, as Harris is the first woman of color to run as VP on a major party presidential ticket (though others, such as Angela Davis, have run as third party VP candidates). Despite the historic nature of this news, we must also observe Harris’s troubling decade-long record as a prosecutor in the state of California, a topic that law professor Lara Bazelon summarized in a New York Times op-ed. For instance, during her tenure as San Francisco district attorney, Kamala Harris “fought tooth and nail to uphold wrongful convictions” and “championed state legislation under which parents whose children were found to be habitually truant in elementary school could be prosecuted, despite concerns that it would disproportionately affect low-income people of color.”

When Harris later became California’s attorney general, she fought to continue the death penalty, opposed investigating police shootings, opposed statewide standards for regulating police body cameras, and remained neutral on an initiative that was approved by voters in which certain low-level felonies would be reduced to misdemeanors. When asked by a reporter if she supported marijuana legalization, Harris laughed (marijuana prohibition is a major focus of the disastrous and racist War on Drugs). And this is just the tip of the iceberg. Furthermore, as Briahna Joy Gray observed last year, we should also zoom out from the troubling aspects of Harris’s record specifically and contemplate her decision to become a prosecutor in the first place.

Regardless of the extent to which Harris’s policies disproportionately harmed people of color and other marginalized populations, her record pales in comparison to that of her running mate. As a young Delaware senator, Joseph R. Biden supported racial segregation efforts in public schools, particularly in the area of busing. Janell Ross summarized this history last year by writing, “[Biden’s] legislative work against school integration advanced a more palatable version of the ‘separate but equal’ doctrine and undermined the nation’s short-lived effort at educational equality, legislative and education history experts say.” Biden went on to become a primary architect of the 1994 Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act (often referred to as the “crime bill”), which resulted in what we now call “mass incarceration” — a devastating phenomenon that has had a vastly disproportionate impact on minority communities.

In conjunction with the Reagan-era “tough on crime” mentality, Biden participated in the demonization of the black community through rhetoric that included the infamous term “predator” — a dehumanizing and racist dog whistle. Unfortunately, that was the least of his racist comments; he once said he didn’t want his kids to grow up in a “racial jungle”, later referred to Barack Obama as “the first mainstream African-American who is articulate and bright and clean”, and — strangely enough — eulogized the infamous racist Strom Thurmond.

Possibly in an effort to draw attention away from this disturbing record, Biden began lying extensively about his involvement in the civil rights movement (in short, he was never involved). To further exhibit his profound disrespect for the black community, Biden recently responded to questions from black radio host Charlamagne by saying, “If you have a problem figuring out whether you’re for me or Trump, then you ain’t black.”

In the era of the New Jim Crow, Joe Biden and Kamala Harris have both spent their careers playing the role of the oppressor. The Biden/Harris 2020 ticket proves that the Democratic Party is more interested in engaging in performative identity politics to entrench its corporate-backed power than engaging with the material needs of the American people, especially the most oppressed populations. Joe Biden’s disturbing record on race and mass incarceration was already a turnoff to many progressive voters and Black Lives Matter activists. It appears that the Biden campaign sought to patch up those concerns with a quick fix, a damage-control effort not unlike its appeal to women in the wake of renewed sexual misconduct scrutiny.

This isn’t to say Kamala Harris hasn’t made tremendous accomplishments. Systemic racism and sexism are indeed harsh realities, and women of color truly do face infinitely more barriers to success than individuals from more privileged demographics. But if we place significance on Harris’s identity as a woman of color, as we should, it must be even more important to take notice of the identities of those she harmed during her tenure as a prosecutor. After all, in the realm of systemic racism and mass incarceration, prosecutors play a central role in the draconian implementation of state power.

On the ground, this state power is enforced by the police, who have recently come under unprecedented levels of scrutiny. The institution of American policing initially arose from southern “slave patrols” and has subsequently maintained its inextricable link to white supremacy. We are now experiencing historic political momentum as the American people have flooded the streets to demand racial justice and an end to the domestic terrorism of police violence.

The Democratic Party has responded with a stubborn commitment to the status quo. Joe Biden and Kamala Harris have both been intimately complicit in systemic racism, mass incarceration, the War on Drugs, and violent state power more broadly. Given the backgrounds of its candidates, the Democratic Party’s plea for Americans to “vote blue” in November takes on a darker meaning, symbolizing whose lives really matter in the eyes of our callous political establishment.

Remembering Guaidó’s Last Stand

[Photo: Mark Wilson/Getty Images]

By Matthew Dolezal

Originally published at the author’s blog.

The year of our Lord 2020 will likely go down in the history books as one of the most existentially ridiculous years ever. It began with President Donald Trump belligerently assassinating Iranian General Qassem Soleimani, who was on a peace mission in Iraq. Unlike many controversial Middle Eastern figures, Solemani was universally beloved in Iran and played a leading role in the defeat of ISIS in Syria. Shortly thereafter, Chinese officials isolated a novel coronavirus strain noticing a strange influenza-like ailment afflicting residents in and around the city of Wuhan weeks earlier. Needless to say, the coronavirus behind what is now referred to as Covid-19 has led to a massive global pandemic. On May 25, with said catastrophe in full effect, a white Minneapolis police officer lynched an unarmed, nonviolent black man named George Floyd, causing nationwide rebellions and calls to defund/abolish the institution of American policing. And that’s just the tip of the quickly melting iceberg.

It has certainly been a hell of a year. But there’s a special little story that may have barely registered on the radar of all but the most avid connoisseurs of current events. During the first week of May, a ragtag gang of mercenaries launched from Colombia and was quickly apprehended by Venezuelan forces and socialist fishermen after attempting to invade the neighboring country via the coastal La Guaira State and the peninsula of Chuao. In the wake of this misadventure, news broke that two of the approximately sixty combatants were in fact American citizens and former Green Berets Luke Denman and Airan Berry. This embarrassingly botched mission, coined “Operation Gideon”, was quickly revealed to be yet another coup attempt against democratically-elected Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro and the Bolivarian government more broadly. A leaked contract described tactics that included captures, assassinations, drone strikes, and even death squads in order to “liberate” the oil-rich nation.

The lead planner behind the foiled operation was none other than Silvercorp CEO Jordan Goudreau. Gourdreau's Florida-based private security firm was contracted for $212.9 million, yet only offered the aforementioned mercenaries between $50,000 and $100,000 each for their life-threatening services. Silvercorp USA initially began with hopes of converting military veterans into school security personnel — theoretically to protect students from school shooters for a small subscription fee — but the scheme appears to have been shelved. Gourdreau, himself a U.S. Army veteran, teamed up with retired Venezuelan General Cliver Alcala, who had previously been involved in various coup plots, often with assistance from the right-wing Colombian government. This was supposed to be Silvercorp’s big break.

As journalist Lucas Koerner summarized, “Jordan Goudreau, 43, was responsible for training a contingent of 300 Venezuelan army deserters in Colombia, who were to penetrate Venezuela in a heavily armed caravan and seize the capital of Caracas within 96 hours.” These details and more had been laid out in the aforementioned contract, which, thankfully, also contained an equal opportunity employment clause, promising to be inclusive “across gender, ethnicity, age, disabilities and national origin…”

One of the most notable aspects of the contract, however, is the fact that it named Juan Guaidó as the operation’s “Commander in Chief.” Guaidó, who initially denied any involvement, is a disgraced Venezuelan politician who clumsily declared himself “interim president” of the Bolivarian republic early last year and has since become embroiled in a corruption scandal.

The political trajectory of Guaidó is fascinating in its own right. In 2007, after graduating from Andrés Bello Catholic University in Caracas, Guaidó moved to Washington, D.C. to study under neoliberal economist Luis Enrique Berrizbeitia at George Washington University. Later that year, he took part in anti-government rallies after the Venezuelan government declined to renew the license of Radio Caracas Televisión (RCTV) — a privately owned station that played a prominent role in the 2002 coup attempt against then-president Hugo Chávez (an event chronicled in a documentary entitled, "The Revolution Will Not Be Televised"). And thus began Guaidó’s tumultuous tenure in the realm of Venezuelan politics.

The young Guaidó continued taking part in anti-government demonstrations with “Generation 2007” youth activists, and, in 2009, helped establish the Popular Will Party with infamous right-wing political figure Leopoldo Lopez. During the subsequent years, Guaidó met with various regime change specialists and wealthy business owners, and even participated in the violent guarimbas in 2014, which aimed to destabilize and ultimately overthrow the government. The emerging political figure then proceeded to publicly whitewash the deadly tactics used by right-wing protesters, presenting himself as a polished and professional advocate for democracy.

Guaidó also participated in Venezuela’s National Assembly, spending many years as an alternate deputy, until the 2015 elections when he narrowly secured a seat on the governing body. The opposition-dominated National Assembly eventually selected Guaidó as its president — a position that is awarded on a rotating basis. This new development made Guaidó the perfect candidate for Washington’s regime change efforts. Despite still being unknown to 81% of Venezuelans, Guaidó declared himself “interim president” on January 22, 2019 with the full support of the Trump administration. What followed was a series of Western media misinformation campaigns, bungled coup attempts, and, after all else failed, a new wave of U.S. economic sanctions that killed an estimated 40,000 Venezuelans in just one year.

After losing his National Assembly seat in early January, 2020, Guaidó staged a childish scene in which he attempted to climb over the fence surrounding parliament. The floundering politician then faded from the spotlight until the recent failed incursion. Indeed, Operation Gideon — also referred to as “Stupid Bay of Pigs” — appears to have been a pathetic, last-ditch effort to install Guaidó as Venezuela’s president and implement a program of neoliberal “shock therapy”, primarily focused on privatizing the country's vast oil reserves.

Though appearing exotic on its surface, this quaint anecdote also fits into the “bigger picture” of 2020’s troubling zeitgeist. As part of its long-standing policy of violent imperialism throughout Latin America, the U.S. government funded the aforementioned 2002 coup attempt in Venezuela, hoping to oust popular president Hugo Chávez. Despite its consistent two-decade commitment to disrupting the progressive Bolivarian Revolution, the world’s only remaining empire has evidently failed miserably. This defeated regime change effort mirrors other recent U.S. foreign policy failures, such as that of the devastating Syrian proxy war. In keeping with its increasingly desperate imperial ambitions, the U.S. has now lashed out against China — its main competitor on the global stage and a nation that has aided Venezuela amid the aforementioned brutal sanctions. The epic downfall of Juan Guaidó is not only a tale of personal and professional shortcoming, but could also symbolize a decline in the neoliberal global order more broadly, with new possibilities on the horizon.

Coronavirus and American Exceptionalism

By Matthew Dolezal

Republished from the author’s blog.

America is the Fyre Festival of countries. It is pure hype with little to no positive results. It is a back-alley drug deal culminating in a sweaty palm gripping a wrinkled bag of oregano. It is broken promises, shattered dreams, and shameful regret. All our lives we are told with inflated enthusiasm, with charismatic apologia, that America is a spectacular monument to freedom and democracy, a “shining city upon a hill” and a beacon to lesser nations. We are told our country is “exceptional.” And all our lives we wait for supporting evidence to verify these sensational claims as we gawk with confusion at our surroundings.

In a sense, the “exceptionalism” narrative is true, but not in the sense the propagandists and gatekeepers from prominent institutions had intended. As we reevaluate the very notion of American policing — from its origins in southern slave-catching patrols, to its use as a violent deterrent against labor and civil rights struggles, to its ruthless enforcement of Jim Crow and the War on Drugs — we are also faced with a more profound question regarding the very nature of our “great” nation.

America is a political project founded, at first, by the violent ethnic cleansing of its indigenous inhabitants, then, by the colonizing of the blood-drenched land mass and, finally, by the instituting of industrial capitalism through a slavery-based economy. The European colonizers fought resolutely to maintain this barbaric system of kidnapped, forced, torturous, uncompensated labor in what historian Gerald Horne refers to as “the counter-revolution of 1776.” The subsequent development of white supremacy as a ubiquitous ideology then served the economic elite faithfully as a successful “divide and conquer” mechanism for decades and centuries to come.

As V.I. Lenin’s groundbreaking observations regarding imperialism as “the highest stage of capitalism” foresaw, the U.S. began expanding beyond its own borders — those which were initially forged through violent conquest, land theft, and treaty violations. In a stage of neocolonial domination beginning primarily with the Spanish-American War and continuing with covert military coups and death squads in Latin America, Africa, and the Middle East, the U.S. brutally secured natural resource acquisition for Western capital. The American military, globally perceived as the greatest threat to world peace, has an estimated 700 bases in 130 countries. In recent decades, the so-called “War on Terror” has taken the lives of approximately 1.3 million people. This inherently bellicose organization serves as a de-facto police force for the World Bank and the IMF, punishing any attempt at national sovereignty outside the confines of Western neoliberal capitalism.

The domestic effects of neoliberalism display themselves with such starkness that multi-billion dollar PR industries and corporate news media organizations make it their livelihoods to gaslight us and whitewash our own tangible material conditions. As the brief foray into a “prosperous” standard of living was dismantled by bipartisan Reaganomics, disillusioned Americans rejected their own ostensibly enlightened political process by refusing to vote in elections. Wealth concentration continued unabated, with three men now owning more than half the population. The prison population increased unabated, and is now the highest in the world. The for-profit healthcare system, claiming tens of thousands of innocent lives each year, continued unabated, and is now an outlier in the so-called “developed world.”

As the federal government doubled down on its commitment to serving the interests of private capital, public institutions and services were systematically gutted. This profound dedication to “profit over people,” specifically in the realm of healthcare, set the stage for America’s exceptional death toll in the wake of the voracious coronavirus pandemic. The flip side of this carnage is, of course, the ability of the ruling class to further enrich itself amidst the chaos. In a natural evolution of what Naomi Klein refers to as “disaster capitalism,” we are now well on our way to anointing the world’s first trillionaire.

If America was a political satire film, the coronavirus pandemic would be its whimsical climax; its Dr. Strangelove mass-nuking scene juxtaposed with a comforting musical score. Once again, we are exceptional, but in a rather insidious and villainous sense. In a black humor sort of way, America is the laughing stock of the world. The Global South must think our chickens are coming home to roost, just as they had on 9/11. Our lofty ideals are effortlessly unraveling before the eyes of billions, culminating in an unsightly mountain of corpses and petroleum-based consumer goods. Indeed, the empire wears no clothes.

As the late comedian George Carlin said, “It’s called the American Dream because you have to be asleep to believe it.” In lieu of the fabled “land of the free,” what persists is simply an empire in decline; something more resembling an American Nightmare for the vast majority of those affected, both domestically and abroad. All possibilities for revolution or even reform have failed. America is the Titanic of countries; an ostentatious facade naively heading toward utter destruction. The question now is who will survive this final, epic, prolonged plateau; this dark moment while the glimmering vessel ominously rests vertically, partially above water; this death rattle before rapid descent into oblivion.

Imperialist Propaganda and the New Cold War With China

PHOTO CREDIT: FOREIGN POLICY ILLUSTRATION/MADOKA IKEGAMI-POOL/GETTY IMAGES/DREW ANGERER/GETTY IMAGES

By Matthew Dolezal

Originally published at the author’s blog.

On January 24, a headline in the right-wing Washington Times read, “Coronavirus may have originated in a lab linked to China’s biowarfare program.” The claim was largely debunked and ignored. However, the story was then notably resuscitated by Washington Post columnist Josh Rogin in April. By the end of the piece, Rogin admitted, “We don’t know whether the novel coronavirus originated in the Wuhan lab.” Shortly thereafter, the claim spread to Fox News and other mainstream outlets. Soon enough, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and President Trump publicly promoted the unfounded conspiracy theory.

According to prominent sources within the scientific community, the virus in question almost certainly has natural origins. For instance, an article featured in the prestigious scientific journal Nature explained:

“Our analyses clearly show that SARS-CoV-2 is not a laboratory construct or a purposefully manipulated virus. […] Instead, we propose two scenarios that can plausibly explain the origin of SARS-CoV-2: (i) natural selection in an animal host before zoonotic transfer; and (ii) natural selection in humans following zoonotic transfer. We also discuss whether selection during passage could have given rise to SARS-CoV-2.”

Furthermore, The Lancet published a letter signed by 27 public health scientists from eight countries who “strongly condemn conspiracy theories suggesting that COVID-19 does not have a natural origin.” The letter continues by clarifying that “scientists from multiple countries have published and analyzed genomes of the causative agent, severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), and they overwhelmingly conclude that this coronavirus originated in wildlife, as have so many other emerging pathogens.”

In short, the sensational claim that the virus originated in a Chinese lab has absolutely no supporting evidence. This specific case of anti-China propaganda is simply fuel on the pre-existing fire of unfounded Western smears against this rising power in the East. For instance, in August of 2018, prominent Western news media outlets began claiming that the United Nations had compiled reports of Chinese government “internment camps” in which as many as one million ethnic Uyghur Muslims were being held. However, upon further inspection, the claim deteriorated. It turned out that the U.N. as a whole had made no such statement, and that the explosive assertion came from a single individual, Gay McDougall, who was the sole American member of the independent Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination.

According to the Associated Press, McDougall “did not specify a source for that information in her remarks at the [U.N.] hearing.” Despite the complete absence of evidence for this serious charge, more propaganda subsequently surfaced from other dubious Western sources, including a U.S. government-funded “activist group” called the Network of Chinese Human Rights Defenders (CHRD). According to The Grayzone, “ the board of the organization is a Who’s Who of exiled Chinese anti-government activists.” The CHRD has even endorsed Chinese dissident Liu Xiaobo, a neoconservative who has expressed racist views toward Chinese people and supports colonialism.

During his recent trip to China, journalist Danny Haiphong didn’t see “internment camps” in Xinjiang Province. Haiphong further explained that “it is difficult to walk more than a mile without running into a mosque. Every street sign in the city is translated in both Mandarin and Uyghur languages. Security is more plentiful in Ürümqi than in Beijing or Xi’an, and for good reason. Most Westerners are unaware that Xinjiang Province is the site of numerous terror attacks that have taken the lives of hundreds of people.” Due to the ongoing threat of Islamist terrorism, Xinjiang “has set up vocational and training centers in accordance with the law to provide courses on Mandarin, laws, vocational skills and deradicalization programs for people influenced by religious extremism and terrorism.”

Nevertheless, relying heavily on unsubstantiated Western propaganda of the aforementioned variety, the U.S. House of Representatives passed the Uyghur Human Rights Policy Act late last year. The bill, which includes additional economic sanctions, is part of a larger pattern of new Cold War-style escalations between the two powerful nations. With these tensions comes a surge in Sinophobic hate crimes buttressed by bipartisan, racist rhetoric from American politicians, replacing the hysterical Russophobia of yesteryear. As noted in the New York Times, this onslaught is “reminiscent of the kind faced by American Muslims, Arabs and South Asians in the United States after the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001.”

After its “breathtaking” response to the recent coronavirus outbreak, China has found itself further entrenched in a hybrid war with the American empire. As journalist Pepe Escobar explained, “For the first time since the start of Deng Xiaoping’s reforms in 1978, Beijing openly regards the U.S. as a threat…” It is certainly true that China is undermining America’s global hegemony by engaging in international solidarity efforts with nations that have historically been in the crosshairs of U.S. imperialism (Venezuela, Iran, Cuba, North Korea, etc.). Due to the evident domestic decline of American society, this ongoing cooperation between those consistently demonized, sanctioned, invaded, or otherwise targeted by the West could become a model for a multi-polar global future. 

On October 10, 1990, a shocking testimony was given to the Congressional Human Rights Caucus by a 15-year-old girl named Nayirah. The distraught teenager recounted an event she said she had witnessed as a volunteer at a Kuwaiti hospital after the Iraqi invasion earlier that year. “While I was there I saw the Iraqi soldiers come into the hospital with guns. They took the babies out of the incubators, took the incubators and left the children to die on the cold floor. It was horrifying,” the girl proclaimed. Although it was partially used to justify the Gulf War, the story turned out to false, just like the narrative that was used to justify the subsequent 2003 U.S. invasion of Iraq. 

Iraq is not unique. Imperialist lies have also been used to justify American aggression in Libya, Syria, Venezuela, and countless other sovereign nations around the world. Even the justification for the Vietnam War turned out to be fabricated. Such falsehoods have allowed the American empire to violently ravage the globe for decades to protect its so-called economic interests. Now that “socialism with Chinese characteristics” is providing a viable alternative to the battle-scarred neoliberal capitalist model, the imperfect, yet successful economic power that lifted 800 million people out of extreme poverty is being maligned with spurious propaganda. Don’t believe the hype.

Under Capitalism, a Pandemic Is a Time of Political Awakening

By Matthew Dolezal

To say that the Trump administration responded inadequately to the COVID-19 pandemic would be the understatement of the decade. Trump’s response was chock-full of misinformation, racism, dangerous proposals, dangerous policies, and a strain of conservative anti-intellectualism that ignores public health experts. It has even been compared to former president Ronald Reagan’s botched response to the AIDS epidemic in the 1980s. This comparison also contains an important historical lesson: Reagan and Trump represent the beginning and end points of the American political tradition marked by deregulation, austerity, and corporate-funded governance.

Though many liberal pundits decry him as an uncharted divergence from “normalcy”, Trump is simply the hideous, unmasked expression of neoliberalism — a ghastly gremlin our decaying society has vomited up after four decades of germination. In short, neoliberalism created Trump. Year after year we witnessed the dismantling of unions, the passing of job-killing trade deals, the gutting of social services, and the continued stagnation of wages. These policies tilled the political soil for an outgrowth of right-wing populism that attempts to harken back to the “great” white supremacist legacy of America. It is a faux-populism that scapegoats immigrants and minorities, blaming the most marginalized for the societal rot produced by the implementation of free market fundamentalist ideology. Trumpism as specific historical phenomenon is certainly new. But, in terms of the systemic nature of this barbarism, Trump is not an “aberration” — he is an inevitable extension of the existing system.

During the spread of the coronavirus and the subsequent economic crisis, Americans are learning the true nature of neoliberal disaster capitalism, or what journalist Naomi Klein has referred to as “Coronavirus Capitalism.” This current iteration is part of a disturbing historical trajectory. In short, corporate entities and powerful individuals have repeatedly exploited crises by swiftly implementing policies that further enrich the ruling class at the expense of everyone else — a phenomenon Klein has elucidated more broadly in her 2007 book “The Shock Doctrine.”

As we are quickly realizing, the entire system is callous and predatory, and the tattered safety net that once existed has vanished long ago. But, just like the virus itself, political consciousness is rapidly spreading. Every day on social media, I am heartened to be reminded of the true heroism of cashiers, sanitation workers, first responders, warehouse workers, grocery stockers, and delivery drivers during these perilous times. While these seemingly undesirable jobs are proven to be essential by this crisis, it has also become evident that the captains of industry don’t have any verifiable role other than extracting profit from our labor. As Jasmine Duff reminded us in a recent Hampton Institute column, “these so-called wealth creators can spend months isolated in their mansions or country estates without this having any impact on the basic functioning of society.”

During a time of crisis, the wealthy can hibernate in the midst of their infinite resources. But to average workers, every dollar counts. Many will have to decide which bills to pay in order to leave enough money for groceries and other essentials. Because of this traumatic situation, the very concept of a student loan payment is being re-examined. People are realizing that education should be a right, and that it is profoundly immoral to enslave college graduates with insurmountable debt simply for the crime of seeking knowledge to improving their life prospects. There are currently 45 million Americans saddled with a cumulative $1.6 trillion in student loan debt — an enormous burden on both individuals and the economy as a whole. In times like these, the burgeoning student debt strike has the potential to gain significant momentum toward its ultimate goal of student debt cancellation and free public college. 

In addition to the inherent injustices of the student debt crisis, our current pandemic is also laying bare the glaring inhumanity of a for-profit healthcare system. As Senator Bernie Sanders is fond of pointing out, the U.S. is the wealthiest country in the world, yet we are the only major industrialized country that doesn’t guarantee healthcare as a human right. This “profit over people” mentality leads to tens of thousands of annual deaths and immeasurable suffering. But, when a deadly virus is expanding across the nation, these realities are magnified. When young people are dying of COVID-19 simply because they lack insurance, and when people are continuing to work because they don’t have guaranteed sick leave, we realize the terrifying truth of the old labor slogan “an injury to one is an injury to all.”

During a pandemic that is exacerbated by neoliberal capitalism, people are quickly becoming radicalized. We are realizing that we don’t actually need landlords, or bosses, or CEOs — these parasites that bleed the working class dry. They are, in other words, “non-essential.” In any civilized society, housing, healthcare, food, and education would be provided as a prerequisite to the mere concept of justice. As Oscar Wilde once wrote, “The proper aim is to try and reconstruct society on such a basis that poverty will be impossible.” This means industrial production and technology should be directed toward meeting human need first and foremost. We are human beings, and our lives can no longer be commodified.

One concrete action American workers can participate in is an ongoing, nationwide general strike beginning March 31. Organizers and activists are committed to withholding their labor, their rent payments, and their student loan payments until their demands are met. As the General Strike 2020 website explains, “We are a grassroots, decentralized, non-hierarchical movement of the working class. We are a diverse, inclusive organization dedicated to building a coalition of organizations and individuals of various political tendencies to save the lives of vulnerable, marginalized people in the USA and around the world.”

The demands of the general strike include:

• paid leave for all non-essential workers through the duration of the pandemic

• personal protective equipment and hazard pay 

• the suspension of rent, loan payments, utility payments, and interest accrual

• the distribution of free meal assistance, free medical care, and free protective equipment for all — prioritizing those most at risk, including front-line healthcare workers

• an end to immigration raids and sweeps of homeless camps

• the release of all occupants of detention camps and holding facilities 

• guaranteed housing for all persons lacking shelter to self-quarantine

At this pivotal time, American workers are once again realizing the power of our labor and our strength in numbers. We’re realizing that our participation is literally essential to the functionality of our society and that simply withholding that labor, that rent check, that student loan payment, can bring the entire system to its knees. 

Indeed, there is great revolutionary potential in this time of heightened class consciousness and political awakening. Even Britney Spears gets it.

The Ballot and the Bullet: Building Socialism in ‘America’s Backyard’

By Matthew Dolezal

When faced with momentous external challenges — be they Spanish colonialism, American imperialism, or devastating hurricanes — the Cuban people have consistently risen to the occasion. In response to ongoing internal challenges, the popular new Cuban constitution (which took effect in April) entrenches the solid Marxist-Leninist foundation of the island’s socialist state while updating the 1976 constitution to better reflect the modern post-Cold War period.

Under the new constitution, each presidential term is five years, with a limit of two consecutive terms in office for those who serve. In addition, the role of Head of State is divided between the president and the newly established office of prime minister.

Other new rights and policies include the presumption of innocence in criminal cases, the right to legal counsel, and the (heavily regulated) use of private property and foreign investment to stimulate the economy (particularly to offset the revenue lost as a result of the continued U.S. blockade).

Despite the many exciting modernizations articulated by this fresh new document, much remains the same. Cuba’s Communist Party is still in only political party legally allowed to operate, and the state continues to control the land and means of production. The news media cannot be privatized, and, according to the new Magna Carta, Cuba will never return to the exploitative, pre-revolutionary capitalist system.

Bourgeois historians and pundits often glibly frame successful socialist governments as “authoritarian.” But from a materialist perspective, the vanguard party serves to protect the achievements of the proletarian revolution — including universal healthcare, education, housing, subsidized food, and land reform — from reactionary and imperialist threats (such as the CIA-backed coup Ernesto “Che” Guevara witnessed in Guatemala prior to the Cuban Revolution). In addition to the Communist Party’s general success, apologists for Western capitalism now have to grapple with the fact that significant democratic processes are occurring within Cuba’s one-party system.

The process to draft a new constitution began in August of 2018 and included the input of millions of Cuban citizens. Assemblies throughout the island were established, and thousands of “standard proposals” were debated for three months. In all, the old constitution faced 760 modifications. The proposed constitution was then featured in a referendum that took place on February 24, 2019. With massive voter turnout, the new constitution was easily passed when more than 85% voted “yes.”

Based on the long-standing solidarity between Cuba and its Latin American ally Venezuela, this recent constitutional process undertaken by the Caribbean nation may have been inspired by Venezuela’s ongoing Bolivarian Revolution. After the 1998 election of the popular Venezuelan revolutionary Hugo Chávez, the formerly discarded masses were not only lifted out of poverty, but politically empowered through a nation-wide upsurge in grassroots democracy.

As historian Greg Grandin wrote in 2013,

“Chávez’s social base was diverse and heterodox, what social scientists in the 1990s began to celebrate as ‘new social movements,’ distinct from established trade unions and peasant organizations vertically linked to — and subordinated to — political parties or populist leaders: neighborhood councils; urban and rural homesteaders, feminists, gay and lesbian rights organizations, economic justice activists, environmental coalitions; breakaway unions and the like. It’s these organizations, in Venezuela and elsewhere throughout the region, that have over the last few decades done heroic work in democratizing society, in giving citizens venues to survive the extremes of neoliberalism and to fight against further depredations, turning Latin America into one of the last global bastion of the Enlightenment left.”

Shortly after Chávez was inaugurated, Venezuelan citizens voted to replace their 1961 constitution with a new document that “expanded the rights of all Venezuelans, formally recognized the rights and privileges of historically marginalized groups, reorganized government institutions and powers, and highlighted the government’s responsibility in working towards participatory democracy and social justice.” This Bolivarian constitution includes mechanisms by which the document can be revised by the people through nation-wide participatory democracy. In 2007, for example, a series of constitutional reforms were debated for 47 days at more than 9,000 public events before a referendum finally took place.

At the height of the American civil rights movement, charismatic black liberation leader Malcolm X issued a powerful ultimatum — “the ballot or the bullet” — in his famous 1964 speech. The metaphor of the proverbial “ballot” and “bullet” can be useful in recognizing both the political and the physical dimensions of socialist struggle. A historical example of these two seemingly disparate themes merging was the short-lived alliance between Chile (“the ballot”) and Cuba (“the bullet”) in the early 1970s, iconically symbolized when revolutionary leader Fidel Castro gifted a personalized AK-47 to democratically-elected socialist president Salvador Allende.

But movements do not have to choose between these two options exclusively. Broadly speaking, Venezuela’s revolution emerged through the ballot box and was later protected through armed defense, whereas Cuba’s revolution was itself an armed struggle that would later evolve through ballot initiatives and grassroots democracy.

The ongoing Cuban and Venezuelan revolutions are impressive enough by themselves, but the material conditions they arose from and the hardships they have endured make them utterly awe-inspiring. Unfortunately, socialism doesn’t develop in a vacuum. It doesn’t grow in a petri dish. Building international socialism brings with it the baggage of constant imperialist assaults aimed at exploiting labor and extracting resources on behalf of global capital.

Now a spectre is haunting Washington — the spectre of the Monroe Doctrine. In its belligerent re-imagining of the 19th century foreign policy staple, the Trump administration has demonized and attacked the sovereignty of both Cuba and Venezuela. In conjunction with a new round of economic sanctions against the so-called “troika of tyranny”, former National Security Advisor and Bush-era war criminal John Bolton claimed last April that the “Monroe Doctrine is alive and well.”

Bolton also announced that the U.S. would reintroduce the Helms-Burton Act — a 1996 law that allows American citizens to file claims related to properties that were nationalized after the Cuban Revolution. However, as Dr. Arturo Lopez-Levy opined, “It is not the United States government’s responsibility or place to force the […] Cuban government to prioritize compensating Cuban right-wing exiles over demands for other reparations, such as for slavery or any of the many other abuses committed in Cuban history before or after 1959.” Furthermore, as author Saul Landau observed, “By 1991, […] the Castro government had settled claims with most of the nations whose properties it had confiscated and offered terms to U.S. companies as well.”

In addition, the Trump administration began restricting U.S. travel to the island in June and revived the half-century-long economic blockade that was briefly loosened under the Obama administration. These Cold War-inspired policies are certainly draconian, but it seems the American regime’s primary target is Cuba’s oil-rich ally across the Caribbean Sea. As John Bolton himself admitted, “It will make a big difference to the United States economically if we could have American oil companies really invest in and produce the oil capabilities in Venezuela.”

After winning the Venezuelan presidential election in May of 2018, Nicolás Maduro was sworn in on January 10, 2019 to begin his second term in office. Then, on January 22, Juan Guaidó — a man whom 81% of Venezuelans had never heard of — suddenly declared himself “interim president.” Although Guaidó did not run in any presidential election, American politicians and pundits quickly praised this brazen U.S.-backed coup attempt, some even insisting “this is our backyard!” Washington’s latest regime-change effort in the Bolivarian Republic has thus far failed, but the Trump administration’s brutal economic sanctions have killed an estimated 40,000 Venezuelans in just one year.

Despite this rampant imperialism, there have been notable solidarity efforts — both between Cuba and Venezuela as well as internationally. However, in its overall capacity for both relevant material analysis and tangible solidarity, the American Left has gone astray. Steve Stiffler contends that the U.S. Left’s failure to properly frame Chavismo allowed right-wing propaganda to gain control of the narrative. This defeat in the realm of discourse led not only to the empowerment of far-right forces on the ground in Venezuela, but to a diminishment of the socialist support from within the empire that was once reliable.

An indispensable historical model we should look to for guidance is the Venceremos Brigade. In 1969, a group of young American radicals volunteered their manual labor to assist with Cuba’s sugar harvest in the wake of the crippling U.S. embargo. This primary delegation to the island included 216 brigadistas who helped cut sugar cane for six weeks. Since then, the Venceremos (“we shall overcome”) Brigade spearheaded solidarity efforts between Americans and Cubans, bringing in more than 10,000 people to engage in agricultural work, construction, and other projects. Former brigadista Diana Block recently recounted, “I had traveled to Cuba with the Venceremos Brigade in 1977. At that time many radical U.S. political organizations looked to Cuba, and other global anti-colonial struggles, for inspiration and direction. Following Cuba’s lead, international solidarity was recognized as a key organizing principle.”

During my brief trip to Havana last summer I toured Museo de la Revolución, which was still a work in progress. A sizable mural of Fidel speaking to a crowd rested against a banister as workers on scaffolds renovated the neighboring room. After examining the intriguing exhibits, I browsed the items in the gift shop and came across a concise booklet entitled Notes on Che Guevara’s Ideas on Pedagogy by Linda Martí, Ph.D. In it, Martí emphasized the role of a humanistic philosophy in socialist society:

“Is humanism present in every daily decision made by every citizen of our country? Is this concept of a humanist conscience the basis of every analysis made of services, production, or education? Collectivism, as a new personality trait and an expression of humanism in interpersonal relations, was the object of study, inquiry, and experimentation of Che’s theory and praxis.”

Humanism — in an internationalist sense — can motivate the more privileged Western leftists among us to stand in solidarity with independent socialist projects of the Global South and denounce the neo-colonialist tendencies of the ruling classes. Our struggle, after all, is global. Whether utilizing the ballot, the bullet, or both, we should work toward the liberation of all people and consign Eurocentric rubbish like the Monroe Doctrine to the dustbin of history.

The 2001 Terrorist Attack on American Soil Wasn't the Only "9/11"

By Matthew Dolezal

On the morning of September 11, 2001 , four commercial airliners were hijacked by 19 members of the militant Islamist organization al-Qaeda. One plane was deliberately flown into the north tower of the World Trade Center complex in Manhattan, closely followed by another crashing into the south tower. About 30 minutes later, a third plane collided into the western wall of The Pentagon in Arlington County, Virginia. The forth and final aircraft crashed in a field in Somerset County, Pennsylvania, killing everyone on board.

The unprecedented coordinated attack resulted in a loss of nearly 3,000 lives, making it the deadliest act of terrorism in American history.

This surreal assault was monstrous and tragic beyond words, but unfortunately it wasn't the first "9/11". On September 11, 1973, a CIA-backed military coup ousted Salvador Allende, the democratically elected president of Chile, paving the way for two decades of brutal dictatorship under the rule of General Augusto Pinochet. More than 3,000 people were murdered by Pinochet's regime, and approximately 32,000 were tortured . During this tyranny, Chile was part of a broad network of Latin American despots and death squads known as Operation Condor , which was assisted by a CIA base in Panama. This episode is but one example of violent American hegemony that has contributed to global resentment and even blowback, such as the aforementioned terrorist attacks on September 11, 2001.

In a series of interviews (published as a small book entitled, "9-11"), famous linguist and political dissident Noam Chomsky discussed terrorism as a global phenomenon, including the Western double-standard regarding the term. By detailing an array of examples, such as Kosovo, Nicaragua, Lebanon, Iraq, Palestine, and Sudan, Chomsky observed that, based on the conventional definition of the word, the U.S. is a top global purveyor of terror. The immediate death, destruction, trauma, and misery caused by this vicious tactic is abhorrent, but this violence can also perpetuate itself, often continuing for generations. Regarding the 9/11 attacks and the origins of al-Qaeda specifically, Chomsky explained:

"The CIA did have a role, a major one in fact, but that was in the 1980s, when it joined Pakistani intelligence and others (Saudi Arabia, Britain, etc.) in recruiting, training, and arming the most extreme Islamic fundamentalists it could find to fight a 'Holy War' against the Russian invaders of Afghanistan."

The term "blowback" was coined by the CIA to describe the unintended consequences of covert actions undertaken by the U.S. military and intelligence agencies. The word was first used in this context during internal speculation after the agency helped overthrow the Iranian government in 1953 (which I summarized in a previous article ).

In his groundbreaking exposé of said phenomenon, the late Chalmers Johnson vividly chronicled the far-reaching tentacles of the post-war American empire. He explained how this multi-faceted hegemony causes profound resentment and hatred throughout the world, sometimes even leading to cases of blowback. Such incidents have included terrorist bombings against Americans abroad, with targets like U.S. embassies in Africa, a Pan Am flight above Lockerbie, Scotland, and an apartment building in Saudi Arabia that housed American soldiers. Blowback also includes organizations and foreign leaders whom were once armed and/or supported by the U.S. later becoming enemies of the U.S., as was the case with the Mujahideen in Afghanistan. And the presence of roughly 700 American military bases in 130 different countries only seems to fan these flames.

A post-9/11 manifestation of blowback was the formation of the gruesome terrorist organization known as ISIS , which was only possible thanks to the U.S.-led invasion and occupation of Iraq. Though ISIS committed shocking acts of violence, this outcome wasn't shocking at all; it was entirely predictable, based on the U.S. military's own research . In 2004, then-secretary of defense Donald Rumsfeld requested a report from the Defense Science Board Task Force regarding the efficacy of American policy in the Middle East. The task force's response included the following:

"American direct intervention in the Muslim World has paradoxically elevated the stature of and support for radical Islamists, while diminishing support for the U.S. to single-digits in some Arab societies.[…] In the eyes of Muslims, American occupation of Afghanistan and Iraq has not led to democracy there, but only more chaos and suffering.[…] Muslims do not 'hate our freedom,' but rather, they hate our policies."

This unsavory, yet sober analysis of our problematic role in foreign conflicts is often omitted from mainstream discourse because it is profoundly embarrassing to many of our prominent institutions and public officials. Acknowledging our own role in perpetuating mass violence calls into question the popular notions of American exceptionalism and American moral benevolence. President George W. Bush's explanation of the events of September 11, 2001 (which occurred early in his first term) revolved around the phrase "they hate our freedoms." Bush's evaluation was vastly different from the words of the actual perpetrator, Osama bin Laden, who outlined his motives in a detailed "letter to America". Though the missive is laced with Wahhabi rhetoric, it also elucidates bin Laden's political grievances, including verification that 9/11 should be categorized as "blowback."

Bin Laden's objections to U.S. policy included its support for the Israeli occupation of Palestine (including the killing of civilians and destruction of homes), its sanctions against Iraq (resulting in at least half a million civilian deaths), its military bases throughout the Middle East (including in Saudi Arabia), its military actions in Somalia, and its support for regimes that have killed and oppressed Muslims throughout the world. This al-Qaeda kingpin may have been an extremist and a mass-murderer, but his explanation certainly holds more water than Bush's glib retort.

The devastation caused by the 9/11 attacks inspired a beautiful outpouring of support and solidarity among people from all backgrounds coming together to assist and comfort one another. However, the aftermath of this atrocity also unleashed pervasive nationalism, ethnic and religious profiling, violations of constitutional rights, and imperialistic mass murder in the Middle East.

The 9/11 slogan became "Never Forget." As a nation, we certainly won't forget such a large-scale catastrophe, but in a sense, we also "Never Remember." Instead of starting the timeline only when an event affects us directly, we should analyze the historical context of such events, and have the courage to look in the mirror and see our decades of relentless global violence, both covert and overt. We should also - as participants in a democracy - evaluate our role in the profound suffering, sorrow, resentment, and blowback these policies have generated.

The Korean War may help put this in perspective: American military aggression in North Korea between 1950 and 1953 resulted in the equivalent of hundreds of 9/11s, based on the respective death tolls. The same is true of American aggression in Southeast Asia during the 1960s and '70s. In recent decades, the so-called "War on Terror" has taken the lives of approximately 1.3 million people . The scope of these blood-drenched foreign conquests, combined with consistent historic U.S. support for dictatorships and death squads , makes it easy to see why America is widely perceived as the greatest threat to world peace .

On this dark anniversary, let's honor the victims of September 11, 2001 by overcoming our tribalistic tendencies and remembering the victims of our own terrorism as well. If we change our ways, we can address the root causes of these conflicts, and prevent similar tragedies from occurring in the future. Let's acknowledge our history, confront our current complicity in mass murder (in Gaza and Yemen , for instance), and work to end this cycle of violence.

Jordan Peterson: Reactionary Guru and Accidental Incel Intellectual

By Matthew Dolezal

Jordan Peterson loves to talk about lobsters. I assume they are one of his favorite animals. In the 90-minute presentation I agreed to watch (after losing a bet), the best-selling author and former clinical psychologist recounted a cute little factoid about these crimson crustaceans.

"I was reading these articles on lobsters, and I came across this finding that lobsters govern their postural flexion with serotonin," said the gaunt middle-aged man in a crackling and nervous tone.

The anecdote was meant as an extension of Peterson's first "rule for life": Stand up straight.

"Fair enough," I thought, "That is interesting."

But shortly thereafter, mere minutes into his monologue, the "self-help" facade began to crumble. Peterson promptly advanced his discourse by using lobster "dominance hierarchies" as a vague metaphorical justification for hierarchies in human society.

This enigmatic notion got me thinking. First of all, if any behavior in nature should either be mimicked by humans or is "natural" when conducted by humans, then what about eating your babies ? Does Peterson advocate cannibalism? Secondly, if he's saying that human hierarchies are inherently justifiable simply because hierarchies exist in nature, then, in order to be logically consistent, he would have to say slavery, Jim Crow, apartheid, and other racial hierarchies were justifiable, as well as all other iterations of human dominance and coercion throughout history.

At this point I had more questions than answers. But I could surmise that Peterson was simply using the naturalistic fallacy in order to rationalize his pre-existing ideology. If I wanted to be really creative, I could defend one of my own beliefs in a similar fashion. For instance, abortions happen all the time in nature; they're called "miscarriages." Therefore, abortion is morally justifiable.

To be clear, I do think abortion is morally justifiable, but for other reasons (such as bodily integrity ). I'm not arrogant enough to claim that my specific moral views are warranted by some pseudo-pantheistic "order." Unfortunately, my entire moral outlook hinges on my ostensibly functional amygdala and subsequent experience of empathy. I am therefore entirely biased in my opposition to the systems and institutions that perpetuate unnecessary death and suffering worldwide. But apparently Jordan Peterson can just breeze through conservative moral platitudes as though they are simple math problems with but one empirical answer.

Continuing with anti-Marxist remarks and statements like, "smart, hardworking people are the most likely to succeed," Peterson asserted that individuals climb up social hierarchies based on their own competence (calling it a "competence hierarchy"). His related commentary made his support for the current class system (and economic hierarchies in general) crystal-clear. These sentiments seem perfectly delightful in a vacuum, but a glance at the reality on the ground (in the U.S., for instance) makes this meritocratic dogma look wildly delusional:

Three men own as much as half the population.

Half the population is living in or near poverty.

CEOs of large firms makes 300 times more than their average employee.

The vast majority of new income goes to the top 1 percent.

White families have nearly 10 times the net worth of black families.

Inheritance plays a huge role in determining individual wealth.

Your parents' income strongly predicts how much money you will make and whether or not you will go to college.

I continued watching and taking notes. But the rest of Peterson's performance followed suit; self-evident advice like "compare yourself to who you were yesterday" or "treat yourself like you're someone you care about" peppered with neo-McCarthyist rhetoric and social Darwinism. Toward the end, the man was ranting about the superiority of Western culture like some washed-up white nationalist . The entire presentation could be summarized by the following quote from journalist Nora Loreto :

"Peterson cloaks his anti-progressive opinions in folksy, common-sense advice. He is a master at inventing an enemy and offering young men a solution to various straw men. Peterson has perfectly tailored his self-help style to the individual, no doubt a holdover from his days as a clinical psychologist, which he mentions a lot when he talks."

To further clarify his reactionary worldview, Peterson has accused the Left of " weaponizing compassion ." Of course this is a doltish oxymoron straight out of The Onion, but it is also a bit hypocritical, since Peterson's androcentric language and influence could readily be used to weaponize male supremacy.

The general public became quickly aware of the term "incel" after Alek Minassian killed ten people in a terrorist attack in Toronto last April. The label is a portmanteau of "involuntary" and "celibate," and members of this movement have been described as "male supremacist[s][…]who believe women should be treated as sexual objects with few rights."

In a scathing New York Times exposé , Nellie Bowles interviewed Peterson in his Toronto home. When asked about the aforementioned atrocity, this highly credentialed academic said, "He was angry at God because women were rejecting him. The cure for that is enforced monogamy. That's actually why monogamy emerges."

In addition, during the same interview, Peterson stated, "The people who hold that our culture is an oppressive patriarchy, they don't want to admit that the current hierarchy might be predicated on competence," and, in a Vice interview , waxed profound when asking, "Can men and women work together in the workplace?" He later added, "How about no makeup in the workplace?"

Upon discovering these statements I realized that, in addition to class hierarchies, Peterson espouses another hierarchical concept: patriarchy. He even seems to inadvertently side with the incels. I am left wondering about his views regarding racial hierarchies, but this (along with other observations ) was sufficient evidence that lobsters would be utterly ashamed of the psychologist in question.

Toxic masculinity is already an entrenched aspect of the Western culture this man holds in such high regard. For those who espouse this destructive outlook as a latent and unquestioned tendency, Peterson is preaching to the choir. He is simply telling them what they want to hear, dressing his message in the garb of academic jargon, redundant axioms (e.g. "Endless failure is not good."), and recycled, reactionary, anti-communism. As a public figure, his style, rhetoric, and avid fan base are comparable to a combination of Dr. Atkins, L. Ron Hubbard, and Joseph McCarthy. Despite his name-dropping of psychoanalysts of yore, these are his true predecessors. Jordan Peterson is simply a bitter and paranoid huckster, attempting to protect and maintain his position of privilege while selling as many books as possible. But, due to the particular ultra-traditionalist framing of his subject matter, this pursuit of fame and fortune might not be harmless.

This article was originally posted on Matthew's blog.