The growing influence of nationalist and far-right forces across Europe is neither accidental nor a development occurring outside the capitalist system. It is closely connected with the needs of capitalist power itself, at a time when imperialist rivalries are intensifying, preparations for war are accelerating and the established bourgeois parties are finding it increasingly difficult to secure popular consent for their policies.
Marco Rubio’s speech at the historic Pnyx in Athens on October 7 was a textbook exercise in imperialist propaganda. Invoking ancient Greek democracy, philosophy and civilization, the US Secretary of State attempted to give Washington’s pursuit of global supremacy the appearance of a noble historical mission. Behind the grandiose rhetoric, however, stood the familiar doctrine of US imperial power, military superiority and capitalist domination.
“America will never be a communist country,” declares the 30-second advertisement now appearing on American television. Images of Donald Trump flash across the screen alongside boasts about tax cuts and economic performance, before the message arrives at its most revealing line: “Paid for by the U.S. Government.”
The White House calls it an “educational” public-service announcement; the administration says such spots simply encourage Americans to “love their country.”
By Nikos Mottas
The despicable threats against Israeli filmmakers Yuval Abraham and Rachel Szor expose the increasingly authoritarian character of Benjamin Netanyahu’s far-right government. Their award-winning documentary NAZA, based on testimonies from Israeli military and intelligence personnel, investigates the conduct of the Israeli army in Gaza. Rather than confront its revelations, the government has chosen to intimidate those who brought them to light.
When Elon Musk publicly intervened in defense of Greek neo-Nazi Ilias Kasidiaris, the significance went far beyond another provocative post by one of the world’s richest men.
Kasidiaris was not an obscure dissident punished for an unpopular opinion. He was a leading figure and former spokesman of Golden Dawn, the Greek neo-Nazi organization whose leadership was convicted of operating as a criminal organization.
There is another September 11, one that communists, socialists and progressive people around the world remember for very different reasons from the date that dominates mainstream Western political memory. On 11 September 1973, in Santiago de Chile, a military coup led by General Augusto Pinochet, with the active support of the United States, overthrew the Popular Unity government of Salvador Allende.
There are moments when political developments strip away every disguise and expose the class character of political forces with unusual clarity. The latest oil agreement between Washington and the government of Delcy Rodríguez is one such moment. After years of “Bolivarian,” “anti-imperialist” and even “socialist” rhetoric, Venezuela’s social-democratic leadership is presiding over a further opening of the country’s strategic energy wealth to U.S. monopoly interests.
For more than six decades, the United States has attempted to disguise its aggressive imperialist policy toward Cuba as a question of “national security,” diplomatic pressure or concern for “democracy”.
Behind this sanitized vocabulary stands a far more brutal reality: economic strangulation, political coercion, extraterritorial intimidation and the deliberate worsening of the material conditions of life of an entire people because that people refuses to renounce its Revolution.
“Socialism is and will be the hope, the only hope, the only path for the peoples, the oppressed, the exploited, the plundered. Socialism is the only alternative" — Fidel Castro Ruz
A century after the birth of Fidel Castro Ruz, on 13 August 1926, the hatred directed against him has hardly diminished. Nearly ten years after his death, the same vocabulary is repeated with remarkable persistence: “dictator,” “tyrant,” “totalitarian.” Fidel is vilified, the Cuban Revolution is slandered, its achievements are denied or reduced to inconvenient footnotes, while the Cuba that existed before January 1959 is carefully pushed out of sight.
Andy Burnham's arrival at 10 Downing Street has, once again, been accompanied by the familiar chorus of illusions. Britain, we are told, has entered a "new era." A new Labour prime minister promises hope, fairness and renewal.
Yet beneath the new rhetoric lies the same old reality. The faces change. The managers change. The class character of the British state does not.
On July 16, during the U.S. State Department's Ministerial on the Resurgence of Political Terrorism, Secretary of State Marco Rubio delivered one of the most openly anti-communist speeches heard from a senior American official in years.
Speaking before representatives from more than sixty countries, Rubio declared that communism envisions "a world without courage, without creativity or ambition, without heroes or glory... without God." He went even further, portraying Marxist revolutionaries as ideological companions of terrorists and urging a renewed international campaign against what he called "far-left political terrorism."
As NATO leaders conclude their summit in Ankara, once again proclaiming their commitment to "security," "stability" and the so-called "defense of democracy," the peoples have every reason to reject the mythology surrounding an alliance whose history is inseparable from imperialist aggression, intervention and war.
Behind the carefully orchestrated communiqués, diplomatic handshakes and declarations of unity stands an organization created not to defend peace, but to defend the strategic interests of the dominant capitalist powers.
The fireworks have faded. The speeches have ended. Once again, the American ruling class celebrated another Independence Day beneath the familiar banners of liberty, democracy and the "American Dream." Yet beneath the official anniversary lies another America—one that rarely appears in presidential speeches or television retrospectives.
There has always been more than one America.
For years, FIFA has insisted that football must remain free from politics. This principle has repeatedly been invoked to sanction supporters over banners and slogans, to warn players against political gestures and to remind national federations that the game must not become a platform for political expression. Yet this proclaimed commitment to keeping politics out of football has proved remarkably selective.
Ten years ago, millions of people in Britain went to the polls to decide whether the country should remain in or leave the European Union.
The referendum was hailed as a historic democratic exercise, a choice that would supposedly determine the country's future. Workers were told they had only two options: remain in the EU to safeguard prosperity, democracy and stability, or leave to "take back control," restore national sovereignty and build a better future outside Brussels. In reality, they were offered no real choice at all.
"If a man tells you he got rich through hard work, ask him: 'Whose?'"
The old remark by Don Marquis has never been more relevant.
Elon Musk has officially become the world's first trillionaire. Predictably, the newspapers, television networks and business magazines are treating it as a historic achievement. A monument to innovation. A triumph of genius. Proof that capitalism rewards talent.
But a trillion dollars is not a measure of talent. It is rather a measure of power.
Communism has supposedly been reduced to a relic of the past for more than three decades. Bourgeois politicians, media commentators and professional anti-communists have spent years assuring us that Marxism-Leninism belongs to the past, that socialism was decisively defeated, and that history has already delivered its final verdict. Yet a simple question remains unanswered:
If communism is truly dead, as they claim, why do so many governments continue to fight it so fiercely?
One hundred and fifty-five years later, the 1871 Paris Commune remains one of the clearest guides to understanding both the possibilities and the limits of revolutionary struggle. Its enduring significance lies not simply in the fact that it was the first historical attempt by the working class to establish its own power and confront the bourgeois state in practice, nor in the extraordinary heroism of the Communards, but in the lessons it provided on the central question of every revolution: What must be done with bourgeois power?
Raúl Castro is certainly not a criminal, regardless of how desperately the Trump administration attempts to portray him as one. He is a revolutionary who dedicated his life to the struggle against dictatorship, foreign domination and capitalist exploitation in Cuba. The renewed threats surrounding a possible U.S. arrest warrant against him are nothing more than another act of imperial arrogance by a state that has spent more than sixty years trying to suffocate the Cuban Revolution through blockade, sabotage, economic warfare and permanent political aggression.