Spike Lee’s Black KKKlansmen is a fascist NYPD advertisement

This summer audiences had the opportunity to contrast two films by Black directors addressing the role of the police. One, Sorry to Bother You, by first-time director Boots Riley, who proudly calls himself a communist, accurately depicts the cops attacking striking workers trying to keep out scabs. The police are friends of the company, not the workers. This social satire addresses alienation and wage slavery, collective versus individual advancement, the need for militant strikes and multi-racial unity, and the role of the state (especially the police) in protecting the owners’ profits. This is communist art, one that helps us understand and fight capitalist exploitation.

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Turkey in crisis pivots to Russia

Turkey’s currency, the lira, has plunged more than 20 percent against the U.S. dollar in the last two weeks and over 40 percent since the beginning of the year. The crisis is driven by sharpening contradictions between Turkish and U.S. bosses as the post-World War II order disintegrates. In the face of the U.S. rulers’ weakening grip, Turkey is moving closer to Russia. In response, U.S. President Donald Trump has used the arrest of an American evangelical pastor, Andrew Brunson, as an excuse to raise tariffs on Turkish goods and further pressure the lira by sowing doubts about the stability of the Turkish economy.
While U.S. imperialism stands in relative decline versus a rising China and resurgent Russia, it will never give up its empire without an all-out global fight. History shows that trade wars inevitably lead to shooting wars. The international working class, led by the Progressive Labor Party, must reject the bosses’ wars pitting workers against workers. Our class must fight for a communist society that serves the needs of the international working class.

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No free speech for racists—Army of antiracists overpowers klan

Washington, DC, August 12—A pathetic count of 24 white supremacists showed up at the “Unite the Right” rally. Thousands of antiracists came to oppose them. This morning was the one-year anniversary of the Charlottesville rally where Heather Heyer was murdered by a white supremacist. Progressive Labor Party and friends interjected the mass liberal politics with the communist idea of “no free speech for racists.” Many followed the Party’s multiracial lead.

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kkkops kill 15-year-old Steve Fight for communism for the kids who die

CHICAGO—At least 100 workers, community members and many youth, have been organizing nightly in the Lawndale neighborhood on the west side of the city, to draw attention to the alleged “suicide” of 15-year-old Black teen Steven Rosenthal. He was murdered after a foot chase by the kkkops of the Chicago Police Department (CPD).
Comrades from Progressive Labor Party (PLP), our co-workers, and friends have taken an active role in building for and supporting the nightly rallies and connecting Steve’s death to other racist attacks of the capitalist system, and the need for international communist revolution.

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Teachers’ strike vote authorization, potential to raise class consciousness

LOS ANGELES, August 23—The teachers’ union UTLA is taking a strike authorization vote to demand smaller class sizes, funding for “community schools,” and salary increases. Class sizes in regular subjects are now 42 students per class. In some subjects, it is as high as 55. Many schools have nurses and psychologists only one or two days a week. Working-class Black and Latin students are hit the hardest. Extremely segregated schools, and decades of racist policies against Black and Latin students and communities, has resulted in large racist disparities in education. As Progressive Labor Party always asserted, the teachers’ working conditions are the students learning conditions.

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Racism rises in Italy, workers strike in the name of Soumaila Sacko

ROME, August 5—“Italians first! “Immigrants, go home!” The racist movements we see around the world—from Myanmar to Hungary to the U.S.—flourishes in Italy. At the same time, workers are fighting back. At the forefront of this fight are African migrant workers.
Matteo Salvini, the leader of la Lega, Italy’s most overtly anti-immigrant political party, refuses to allow boatloads of African refugees rescued at sea onto Italy’s shores. In the last two months alone, 850 have died in the Mediterranean trying to reach Europe. “No sooner had Salvini been sworn in than he was proclaiming his eagerness to kick out the 500,000-600,000 immigrants who are reckoned to be living without authorisation in Italy” (The Economist, 6/7).

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Justice for Robert White – defeat racism everywhere!

SILVER SPRING, MD—Over 100 Montgomery County residents held a multiracial rally and march protesting the racist police murder of Robert White, a 41 year old mentally ill Black man on June 13. His crime? Walking while Black. Progressive Labor Party (PLP)distributed leaflets and connected the murderous Ku Klux Klan and the killer cops as part of the racist state power that must be overthrown with multiracial communist revolution.

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As U.S. imperialism weakens, Middle East proxy wars fill void

While U.S. imperialism is losing its grip on the Middle East, regional capitalists are at war to fill the vacuum. From Syria to Yemen, millions of workers’ lives are at stake as Israeli, Saudi and Iranian capitalists wage war to control the Middle East and its oil. The U.S. and Russian imperialists are providing military and political support to opposing sides in these wars that could escalate quickly.
The most destructive of these current conflicts are in Syria and Yemen. At least six million Syrians have fled their homes and at least 400,000 have died since 2012. In Yemen, at least six million are on the edge of starvation and over half a million were devastated in the world’s worst-ever cholera epidemic (NYT, 8/22). In both conflicts, U.S. imperialism has been mostly confined to fighting small-time terrorists (ISIS in Syria, Al Qaeda in Yemen).

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Brooklyn: college BBQ celebrates multiracial unity

BROOKLYN, August 29—This summer, a multiracial group of more than 30 Kingsborough Community College students and workers held a beach barbecue called “Unity in the Community,” to review and celebrate the past year of struggle, and plan for the year ahead. Short speeches summarizing the past year, political discussions about CHALLENGE, good food, and sports were the orders of the day as old friends reconnected and new friendships were kindled!

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Corridor of uncertainty: Pakistan bats for nationalist interest amid U.S.-China match

While Imran Khan, Pakistan’s next prime minister, is already leaning toward China, the regional power’s old bedfellow, U.S. imperialism, still has cards to play.
Since the collapse of workers’ states in Russia and China, the rivalry between the world’s leading imperialist powers continues to drive world events. Today, as a declining U.S. struggles to fend off a rising China, various smaller powers are jockeying for alliances with either one or both.

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