Obama-file 20 Young Communist League Backs Barack Obama-Again

Obama-file 19 here

The Young Communist League USA is the youth wing of the Communist Party USA.

Like its parent body, the YCL is backing Barack Obama for the Democratic presidential nomination. If Obama fails, the YCL will line up behind Clinton-anything to defeat the hated Republicans.

According to an October 2007 YCL board report

But even though the ultra-right is in retreat, kicking and screaming and even calling Hillary Clinton’s half public-half private healthcare proposal “socialist”, they still haven’t been defeated. As Communists, we have to finish the task of isolating the ultra-right and completely removing them from power—using the Democrats to finish the job.

For now the Democrats have their uses-but that will change when it suits the Communists.

The Communist Party has infiltrated the Democratic Party to support Obama, all over the US, including in Baltimore and Los Angeles.

In 2004 the Chicago Communist Party campaigned for Obama in his successful US senate race. The Chicago YCL also helped out;

In Chicago YCL members were very active in the Youth for Obama efforts

In 2008 the YCL has mobilised across the US, from New York to Chicago to Missouri, to ensure Barack Obama clinches the Democratic nomination.

In the knife edge world of US elections, the combined efforts of several thousand dedicated Communists and several hundred enthusiastic YCLers could be enough to push the US to the left.

From Colombia News Service

The Young Communist League is the stuff of the late-Sen. Joseph McCarthy’s worst nightmares: Several hundred motivated young people organized in 17 chapters in cities that include New York, Chicago and Milwaukee. But unlike McCarthy’s Red witch hunts of the 1950s, when communists were lying low to avoid persecution, Reds are openly pushing their agenda these days by campaigning for mainstream presidential candidates.


YCL leader, Erica Smiley hands out "Vote for Obama" leaflets in Brooklyn

This election, the league is largely banking on the candidacy of the junior Senator from Illinois, Barack Obama. (Erica) Smiley, who has been at the helm of the league for the past two years, noted that they will support any Democratic candidate who may potentially loosen labor laws and pass broad social reforms.

“Obama is an excellent candidate, but it’s not about Obama or Clinton,” she said recently over a breakfast bagel in a coffee shop down the street from the Obama campaign office in Brooklyn. “It’s about beating the extreme right wing; at the end of the day, they’re just playing their roles.”

The league doesn’t claim official ties to the Obama campaign, and the Obama campaign did not respond to repeated phone calls and e-mails to its Chicago headquarters seeking comment.

Rather than introducing its own candidate, as the Communist Party last did in 1984 with Gus Hall, the league decided to back the Democratic Party candidate who members believe supports the most proletariat-friendly platform.
“If we were to run our own candidate this year,” Smiley said, “some people would vote for him, taking away votes from Clinton or Obama, and McCain might jump in. That would be terrible!”

Smiley, who sported a red T-shirt with the words “Troublemakers Union,” said the league members fear that an official endorsement of Obama could hurt the senator’s chances to become president because a stigma is still attached to communists.
“It’s better then it used to be in my parents' generation,” Smiley said, “but it’s still very taboo. The Bush administration puts communists and fascists together.”

Even within the league, not all members refer to themselves by “the C-word.” Hector Gerardo, 24, co-chair of the league for Harlem and the Bronx, prefers to call himself a socialist.

Outside New York, league comrades also are up in arms.
Docia Buffington, co-chair of the Chicago chapter, which has about 30 members, said in a phone interview that they have concentrated their campaign efforts on Little Village, a predominantly Latino area of the Windy City.

“I think it was clear that most people were excited about Obama rather than other candidates,” Buffington said. “I think that he does represent a certain kind of change, or it seems so.”

The leadership of the Young Communist League is honest about its long-term goals: to home in on the ultra-right Republicans by supporting Democrats now, and then to carry on their struggle--eventually against their former allies.

For some of the group, the excitement of Super Tuesday has faded along with hopes of a decisive Obama victory that day. Regardless, Smiley vowed that her organization will unify behind whoever wins the nomination in August.
“We don’t want to sit on the sidelines,” she said.

The Democrats are in a bind. If the admit that the Communists have infiltrated their party to help Obama, the publicity could be hugely damaging.

If someone else exposes it, the results could be even worse.

The Republicans won't have the guts to do it. The MSM is almost as bad as the democrats.

That leaves the independent media and the blogosphere.

Do your duty, patriotic American bloggers.

Obama-file 21 here

"One Night Bricking Shops"

Auckland Animal Action activist, Suzanne Carey died recently.

A friend of Ms Carey's related this incident on an Indymedia thread;

One funny story I can relate now about Suzy was how she got a small scar on her face. One night bricking shops in West Auckland a friend hiffed a large brick that bounced because it was aimed at the middle of the window rather than the edges and hit Suzy in the face. Seriously funny later but a little difficult to explain to A&E that night when she was bleeding badly.

Says something about the casual criminality of the "animal rights" movement.

Obama-file 19 Obama '08 "All the Way With DSA"

Obama-file 18 here

If Barack Obama's campaign for the US presidency has an unofficial slogan, it should be "All the way with DSA".


The Marxists of Chicago Democratic Socialists of America helped launch Obama's political career and have supported him ever since.

DSA linked unions have endorsed Obama's campaign for the Deocratic nomination and DSA linked figures such as Congresswomen Jan Schakowsky and Barbara Lee have come out strongly for the Senator.

While the iron disciplined Communist Party USA has committed itself totally to the Obama cause, the looser DSA is less obvious about its support.

Traditionally DSA allows its members more freedom to back candidates of their choice, but several prominent DSA members have stood up for Obama in recent times.

These range from senior union officials, to street level supporters, to well known academics.

An interesting example of Obama/union/political solidarity occurred in Chicago on March 3rd 2007.

I quote from blog Public Affairs

Speaking in a vernacular and cadence that showed the Harvard Law School and Columbia University trained Barack Obama can connect with working class people, the third year U. S. Senator wowed and energized a mostly labor union crowd of about 1600supporters this morning...

The event attracted some of Labor’s big hitters to join Obama on the dais and speak, including John Sweeney, President of the AFL-CIO and Gerald McEntee, President of AFSCME. Congresswoman Jan Schakowsky [D-Evanston, 9th CD], an early and big-time supporter of Obama’s in the 2004 Senate Primary and Senator Dick Durbin [D-IL] also spoke...

Eight other individuals spoke at the rally, including local labor leaders and health care workers, as well as a local favorite for liberals, Dr. Quentin Young.

Cong. Jan Schakowsky [D-Evanston, 9th CD]: … Employers can intimidate, fire, threaten to move people from the day shift to the graveyard...it is a new day in our nation’s capital, it’s a new day for Resurrection workers and their friends, it’s a new day for immigrant workers, it’s a new day for all our working Americans who dream of the justice that ONLY the Union Movement can deliver. And, to the doubters I say, you ain’t seen nothing yet. Just wait until we have a Labor Department under President Barack Obama.

Its a safe bet that Jan Schakowsky is angling to head the US Labor Department under President Obama.


John Sweeney, president of the AFL-CIO is the USA's most powerful labour leader. he is also a long time DSA member.

Gerald McEntee, the nation's top public sector unionist is a strong Sweeney ally. He is also allegedly a DSA member.

According to San Francisco DSA member Michael Pugliese;

BTW, for what it's worth McEntee, is one of the DSA notables in the labor bureaucrat column. As is John Sweeney.

Quentin Young is a well known Chicago DSA member and early Obama backer, who seems to have come back to the cause, after a period of disillusionment with his friend and neighbour.

Jan Schakowsky has close ties to DSA. Dick Durbin is a strong Obama backer and is regarded as one of the most far left members of the US Senate.


Illinois Senators Dick Durbin, Barack Obama

I found this interesting piece from the Young Democratic Socialists online magazine, the Activist.org

It even refers to yours truly!

It is true that Obama has delivered a lackluster performance in the Senate and that there are some bizarrely conservative people in his campaign. But Barack has some real left-wing street cred in Chicago. I will let this inaccurate right-wing attack on Obama (associating him with a certain organization near and dear to us) speak for itself: http://newzeal.blogspot.com/2008/01/obama-file-7-barack-obama-and.html . He is probably the only person running for president who could identify, say, Antonio Gramsci, and that should count for something shouldn’t it?

He has often attacked for being less outspoken than the Senior Senator from Illinois, Dick Durbin, but Obama actually takes his cues from Durbin who, along with DSA-friendly Jan Schakowsky, has been his main political sponsor.

A leading academic Obama backer is Princeton University professor of Religion and African American Studies, Cornel West.

An honorary chair of DSA, West was initially a Clinton backer and very cool towards Obama.



Now West is an unabashed Obamaphile.

Here Cornel West Introduces Barack Obama at the Apollo Theater, November 29th, 2007.

Note that West describes Obama as his "companion and comrade".



Further down the socialist/academic food chain is California State University, Sacramento, professor Duane Campbell.


A leader of DSA's Anti Racism and Latino Commissions, Campbell is an Obama zealot.

His blog Choosing Democracy focuses more on Obama than even mine does. He is a leading activist in the Sacramento area Obama campaign, including the Sacramento Obama Meetup group.

According to Cal State's The Hornet

Barack Obama's presidential campaign was brought to the attention of those who walked by a booth that was set up on the Library Quad today.

Bilingual and multicultural education professor Duane Campbell, who has been involved with political activities since the 70's, volunteers his time three days a week to educate students of the presidential candidate's campaign

DSA members certainly working hard to put their man in the White House.

Obama-file 20 here

Canterbury Clubs Day

Checked out Clubs Day at Canterbury University today.


Rick from Silent Running and the KLUB was manning the ACT on Campus stand, with Andy, Trent, Scott and Rodney.

The boys signed up 40 odd members and did some preliminary coalition negotiations with some of the other parties on hand.

I had had some good talks to some of the new members. They're a diverse bunch, ranging from a very switched on Ayn Rand fan from Australia to a couple of very well informed guys from the Christian Union-one was a long time New Zeal reader.

Also had a good talk to Marc Alexander from the Nats-(ex United future MP). He's standing against Jim Anderton in Wigram and is hoping that favourable boundary changes and the swing against the left will give him a fighting chance.

My only disappointment was missing my mate Byron from the Workers Party. I went over to say hello, but he'd buggered off.

Maybe tomorrow?

Obama-file 18 Will Obama Be the Communist Party's "People's President"?

Obama-file 17 here

Far from being dead as most Americans imagine, the Communist Party USA remains an important political player.

While only a few thousand strong the CPUSA's influence in labour unions, the peace movement, black and Latino mass organisations and the Democratic Party gives the communists a significant say in US politics.

The CPUSA is strong in several large cities, including Chicago, where it has influenced city and state politics for decades.

In 1983, the party and its Marxist allies from Democratic Socialists of America, was a driving force behind the election a very sympathetic Chicago mayor, the late Harold Washington.

In 1992 the CPUSA and DSA helped elect another sympathiser, Carol Moseley Braun to the US Senate.

For several years the CPUSA and DSA have backed another Chicago rising star-Barack Obama.

The CPUSA learned a lot from Harold washington's successes. Indeed the Harold Washington campaign appears to be almost blueprint for Barack Obama's spectacular presidential campaign.

The CPUSA has high hopes for Barack Obama.

The Party still calls their protege, Harold Washington-the "peoples mayor".

Now the CPUSA wants to make Barack Obama, the "people's president".

Joel Wendland, managing editor of the CPUSA's theoretical journal outlines Harold Washington's successful campaign and its significance for Barack Obama and America's future in the the latest Political Affairs

The 1980s opened with a huge transformation in American political and social life unseen since the Great Depression...The New Deal was decimated. Reagan and his successors shifted national resources to military spending and war, weakened federal oversight of consumer goods and worker protections, eliminated and stripped education, housing, health care, affirmative action and welfare programs...


But in this wave of Reagan reaction and corporate greed, there stood an island of hope, a city with a new idea for fighting back. At the helm of that city was a people’s mayor named Harold Washington, the first African American mayor of Chicago... In Chicago in the run-up to the 1983 election, the coalition Washington helped bring together included the labor movement infuriated over the loss of jobs and plant closings, reformers tired of corrupt and racially divisive machine politics, and growing African American and Latino communities struggling for civil rights and a voice in city government. One former 7th ward coordinator for Washington’s 1987 campaign said, “I loved the Washington days; it was magical.”

Throughout this early period of his political life, Washington worked hard to breakdown racial barriers for young African American political hopefuls in the city government using coalition politics, shrewd political maneuvering, and mobilizing new participants in the process. Mostly, however, Washington confronted hostility in Chicago’s Democratic machine toward any challenge to the “way things are done.”

In 1964, Washington won election to the Illinois state house of representatives where he served until 1976... Elected to the state senate in 1976, he turned in 1977, following the death of Mayor Richard J. Daley, to a failed attempt to win the Democratic nomination for Chicago mayor. In 1981, Washington won election to the US House of Representatives from Chicago’s predominantly African American 1st district.

Along the way, Washington was an advocate for the labor movement, the peace movement, and a variety of people’s causes. Long-time Chicago peace and labor activist Beatrice Lumpkin, recalled a rainy afternoon in the early 1970s at which a few hundred Chicago residents gathered at a rally sponsored by the Chicago Peace Council to protest the war in Vietnam. Lumpkin recalled, “Harold spoke strongly against the war. He was one of the more progressive legislators. I was very impressed that he spoke in the rain and grateful to him for coming and giving our rally greater impact.”


Beatrice Lumpkin was a leader of the Chicago Communist Party. The Chicago Peace Council, like its parent body the US Peace Council was a front for the CPUSA.

Washington’s relationship to the labor movement went back a long way. When plant closings in northern Illinois, Indiana, and southern Wisconsin pounded the Chicago region economically in the late 1970s and early 1980s with no relief in sight, Washington could be counted on to be part of the struggle to save jobs and provide relief...

The 1980 closure of Wisconsin Steel located in Chicago’s east side was the final straw for many disaffected workers...

Retired African American steel workers Frank Lumpkin, who had also campaigned for Harold Washington in his earlier state and federal campaigns, along with other laid off workers and angry retirees, formed the “Save our Jobs” committee.

They organized public protests, demanding relief for workers in the form of the benefits that Harvester, the billion dollar operation that owned Wisconsin Steel, refused to pay after the mill closed. and the organization of resources to keep the mills opened. The committee circulated a petition, gathering some 4,000 steelworkers’ signatures, and delivered it to the Illinois state legislature and to members of Congress, including Rep. Harold Washington.


Frank Lumpkin was of course Bea Lumkin's husband. He was also a leader of the Illinois Communist Party.

By the middle of 1981, the struggle to re-open Wisconsin Steel, win back benefits and to re-gain lost jobs, shifted as Ronald Reagan took power. It seemed clear that Reagan would simply defund the federal Economic Development Administration, which held the Wisconsin Steel plant, and force its closure.

In the end, the struggle was partially victorious, retirees were paid partial benefits, but the plant never re-opened. According to Beatrice Lumpkin in Always Bring a Crowd, the biography of Frank Lumpkin, Washington won the support of Chicago’s steelworkers with his strong support for their struggle. Washington’s determination to speak up on this issue enabled him to win labor’s endorsement in the campaign for mayor even as the party machine set up obstacles to that labor endorsement

Having been soundly defeated in the 1977 mayoral primaries, Washington made his 1983 candidacy for mayor contingent on the success of registering 100,000 new Black voters and raising a certain amount of funds before an official campaign would be put together. But he refused to confine his appeal to African Americans. In the summer before the 1983 primary, he said, “As a practical politician, I would seek to build a coalition of Black and white campaign workers throughout the city. The issue would not be anti-race, but anti-greed and anti-corruption.” After the 1983 victory, Washington stated:

In our ethnic and racial diversity, we are all brothers and sisters in a quest for greatness. Our creativity and energy are unequalled by any city anywhere in the world. We will not rest until the renewal of our city is done. ...[W]e are going to do some great deeds here together.

Washington felt that white voters who initially resisted his candidacy could be won over if a dominant theme of his campaign and his administration of the city was to eliminate corrupt forces that also hurt the city’s white residents as much as its people of color.

Chicago journalist Ron Dorfman, who edited the recently published photographic essay of Washington’s career, Harold!: Photographs from the Harold Washington Years, said...“Harold brought together different factions in the Black community together.” Uniting labor progressives, nationalists, and traditional civil rights people in the African American community, Dorfman suggested, was a key element of Washington’s candidacy, and “there really wasn’t anybody else who could pull that part of the coalition together.”

Within three months or so, organizations like Operation PUSH, welfare rights organizations, African American churches, and labor unions helped register over 200,000 new African American voters in the city. Public figures like Stevie Wonder, Rev. Jesse Jackson, Sr., African American elected officials state representatives Carol Mosley Braun and Danny Davis, and US Rep. Gus Savage appeared at many public events to promote the voter registration drive.

Danny Davis is a member of Democratic Socialists of America. He and Obama were endorsed by DSA in 1996. Gus Savage was close to the Communist Party.

African American educator and activist and Chicago resident Dee Miles... said, initially there was concern about whether or not Washington’s candidacy would take hold in the African American community. But when it did, “the support for Washington in the African American community grew quickly. Literally you could feel it, you could cut it with a knife it was so thick.”

Myles, who worked in the 1983 campaign as a precinct worker and in the 1987 campaign as a ward coordinator in the independent political committee in the 7th ward, described the campaign of 1983 as a real people’s movement. She remembered people riding on the bus to work in south Chicago wearing their blue Washington for Chicago buttons. After his election, a city ban on public musicians was lifted, and there just seemed to be more music in the city, Myles said. “It was really a period of engagement that was quite astonishing.”

Dee Myles, is a Chicago based member of the National Board and National Committee of the CPUSA. She is also head of the CPUSA's Education Commission.

Washington knew he couldn’t rely on the Democratic Party to either win mayoral elections or to govern with his reform program. “It was understood that if stability was going to be produced, and progress and building support was going to be maintained from election to election, an independent operation was needed so that he wouldn’t have to depend on the regular Democratic Party machine,” said Myles...

Indeed, after his victory in the 1983 primary, the Democratic machine appeared to be aloof to his candidacy and even proposed running Mayor Jane Byrne, whom Washington had defeated in the primary, as a write-in candidate...

Washington appealed to independent voters from a large cross-section of the city’s electorate: a broad coalition of Democrats, independent-minded Democrats, others on the left, and still others who held no specific ideological viewpoint but were alienated form the process by corruption in or the ineffectiveness of city government. To succeed at this unorthodox approach to politics, Washington encouraged the formation of independent political organizations to boost his campaign and to promote his program.

One of the most important elements of the Washington campaign was the drive for interracial, inter-ethnic unity. Washington found in racial diversity a source of strength. In his first inaugural speech, he said: “We are a multiethnic, multiracial, multilanguage city and that is a source of stability and strength.”

While all observers of those events seem to agree that the unique unity of Latino and African American voters helped send Washington to City Hall, it is also true that a growing number of whites who came to see his program and accomplishments as beneficial to all Chicagoans. According to former Chicago Alderman and Washington supporter Dick Simpson, though Washington never received more than 20 percent of the white vote, it was clear that had he lived, Washington’s share of that vote would have grown.

Washington’s Republican opponents, and even some within the Democratic machine, successfully promoted fears among white city residents that handing power to an African American would cause the city to fall apart or promote “retribution against whites,” Simpson noted. Washington “did diffuse that sentiment. There was no longer fear of African Americans in positions of power by the time his regime ended,” Simpson recalled. “He was successful in diffusing that racial animosity, but not successful enough by 1987 to win over a majority of white ethnic voters.” Still, the trend favored an anti-racist majority in the city.


Dick Simpson was, in the late '70s a close associate of the Marxists who went on to form Democratic Socialists of America.

Here again, the labor movement played a key role. The Coalition of Black Trade Unionists pressed the Chicago Federation of Labor to endorse Washington during the general election battle.

The Coalition of Black trade Unionists is heavily influenced by the Communist Party.

Latino community leader and garment workers union organizer Rudy Lozano was among several organizers within the growing Latino community who helped forge support among Latinos and put together a strong base of support both for Washington’s candidacy and in the battle to win Washington’s reform platform in the city council. Lozano, who had also been a key figure in the “Save Our Jobs” campaign, was based in the 22nd ward and led the formation of that ward’s independent political organization.

A battle over redistricting had begun. Machine politicians fought redistricting in order to block Washington’s reform platform. They had succeeded in the past of forcing Mayor Jane Byrne, who had also run as a reform candidate, to back off ethics reform by keeping control of the city council and brow-beating her into submission. But Washington and his supporters, armed with the independent political forces and a broad multiracial coalition as the tool for winning popular support, took their stand.

The organization that Lozano and his allies put together in the 22nd Ward was an unrivaled model of grassroots organizing. Get-out-the-vote campaigns mobilized huge sections of the population who had not participated before behind Washington’s reform program. Some people close to Lozano also suspect that his assassination in June 1983 was directly linked to his efforts on Washington’s behalf.


Rudy Lozano was a probable member of the CPUSA. His son Pepe Lozano is now a leader of the Chicago Young Communist League and is a strong advocate of mobilising the Latino vote for Barack Obama.

April 2008 will mark the 25th anniversary of Washington’s inauguration as mayor of Chicago. In honor of the anniversary, the Harold Washington Commemorative Year was established to celebrate his life and work by holding dozens of public events around the city, church services, music programs, and university symposia as well as the publication of the book Harold!: Photographs of the Washington Years. The Commemorative Year is headed by numerous prominent Chicago elected officials as well as many of the people who actually fought by Washington’s side all those years ago.

Some of Washington’s accomplishments are tangible and remain part of the political life of Chicago to this day. With the people behind him, organized and willing to fight, Washington won many of the battles in the city council...

Washington’s affirmative action policies were another key change he brought to city government. “He opened city hall to not only African Americans but also Latinos, women, gays, Asians – everybody that had been locked out,” said Simpson. Leadership and management positions in the city government included more women and people of color. “It is now just a part of the city fabric,” said Dorfman. “Absent Harold, it wouldn’t have happened. Harold did it and it stuck.”

Another unquantifiable part of Washington’s legacy is his enduring influence on national politics. Just about everyone interviewed for this story eventually came around to talking about another emerging Chicagoan – Barack Obama. Perhaps it is no accident that he too talks in broad, hopeful terms about change, reform, and empowering the people to reclaim democracy.

Indeed, is it mere chance that Obama’s main campaign image is a rising sun over a flag and the words “Obama for America”? Those blue buttons that dotted Chicago’s landscape in those exciting days of 1982 and 1983 showed rays of the sun like hope rising above the words “Washington for Chicago.”


Perhaps Washington’s very greatest legacy is the insurgent challenge to politics as usual Obama represents on a national stage. Perhaps “the peoples’ mayor” will inspire the making of “the peoples’ president.”

The same organisations that backed Harold Washington-the Communist Party and Democratic Socialists of America are now backing Obama.

They were successful with Harold Washington, so it is no surprise they are using the same tactics with Barack Obama.

Will they succeed in making Barack Obama, the "people's president".

Obama-file 19 here

Left Totalitarians on March in Germany

The totalitarians are back on the march in Germany.


Die Linke-the left Party-is the reincarnation of the old East German Communist Party, with some Trotskyist and left social democrat add-ons.

Formerly fairly strong in the East, the communists are now making electoral gains across Germany.

From Socialist Worker's UnityBlog

The Left Party took 6.4% of the vote in the Northern German city state of Hamburg, winning 8 seats in the provincial legislature. Merkel's CDU won 42.6 percent of the vote compared with 34.1 percent for Kurt Beck's Social Democratic Party, the SPD's second-worst result in Hamburg since World War II, preliminary results showed today. The Greens, which took 12.3 percent last time, landed at 9.6 percent, while the Free Democrats, with 4.7 percent, fell short of the 5 percent threshold to enter the state parliament.

The arrival of the Left Party in Hamburg scuppered the hopes of the SPD and the Greens of forming a coalition. The Left's gains in Hamburg bring its representation to 10 of Germany's 16 regional assemblies, underscoring the party's widening national appeal. The Left's rise, bolstered by an investigation this month of hundreds of people on suspicion of evading German taxes by funneling funds to Liechtenstein, makes coalition-building between the main parties and their political allies increasingly problematic.

The Left Party, a combination of former Communists, disillusioned Social Democrats and western radicals and revolutionary socialists, won enough votes last month in the states of Hesse and Lower Saxony to win parliamentary representation. While the Left Party is well represented in the east and has parliamentary seats in the northern city-state of Bremen, it had never sat in one of the large western states’ parliaments.

New Zealand Socialist Worker is trying to build a similar party in this country.

Are Marxists Mental? Are Lefties Loony? Are Anarchists Addled? Are Socialists Psychotic? Are Pinkos Peculiar?

In December 2006 I posed the question-are socialists psychos?

My arguement was that socialists are not simply wrong-headed, they are soft-headed as well.

Now a US psychiatrist has given a scientific underpinning to my ground-breaking thesis.

Dr Lyle Rossiter has written a book confirming what many of us have long suspected.



Socialists, Dr Rossiter confirms, are sick.

Using the US term "Liberal" (not to be confused with the ACT Party small l "liberal" which is a synonym for political sanity), Dr Rossiter explains that socialists do not simply profess foolish political opinions, but actually suffer from psychological illness.

"A social scientist who understands human nature will not dismiss the vital roles of free choice, voluntary cooperation and moral integrity – as liberals do," he says. "A political leader who understands human nature will not ignore individual differences in talent, drive, personal appeal and work ethic, and then try to impose economic and social equality on the population – as liberals do. And a legislator who understands human nature will not create an environment of rules which over-regulates and over-taxes the nation's citizens, corrupts their character and reduces them to wards of the state – as liberals do."

Check out this review

Are Liberals Out of Their Minds? Why do modern liberals think and act as they do? The radical left's politics and its destructive effects on our basic freedoms have provoked many to speculate on what makes these people tick. "The Liberal Mind" answers these questions. This book is the first systematic analysis of the political madness that now threatens to destroy the West's greatest achievement: the American dream of civilized liberty.

In his penetrating analysis, Dr. Rossiter reveals modern liberalism's assaults on:

The freedom of adults to make good lives for themselves by cooperating with others
The ability of families to raise children to be self-reliant and mutual
The morals, rights and laws that protect our freedoms

"Modern liberalism's irrationality can only be understood as the product of psychopathology. So extravagant are the patterns of thinking, emoting, behaving and relating that characterize the liberal mind that its relentless protests and demands become understandable only as disorders of the psyche." "The Liberal Mind" reveals the madness of the modern liberal for what it is: a massive transference neurosis acted out in the world's political arenas, with devastating effects on the institutions of liberty.

The author is an MD who received his medical and psychiatric training at the UNiversity of Chicago and served for two years as a psychiatrist in the U.S. Army. He is currently in private practice in Chicago.

Dr. Rossiter is board certified in both general and forensic psychiatry and has diagnosed and treated mental disorders for more than 40 years. He has been retained by numerous public offices, courts and private attorneys as a forensic psychiatrist and has consultted in more than 2,700 civil and criminal cases in both state and federal jurisdictions.

Hat Tip The Autonomist

Communists Conquer Cyprus

From Stuff

a href=Communist party leader Demetris Christofias has won Cyprus' presidential election after pledging to revive talks to re-unite his Greek-Cypriot south side of the island with the breakaway Turkish Cypriot north.


Final results showed Christofias won 53.36 per cent of the vote, becoming the island's first communist president, albeit a communist who accepts the country's market economy. His right-wing rival Ioannis Kassoulides had 46.64 per cent.

Soviet-educated Christofias believes strongly in Cypriot, rather than ethnic identities. He says he wants resumption of talks with Turkish Cypriots through a UN process.

Christofias, 61, will be the only avowed communist leader in the 27-member European Union.

Although proud to declare himself a communist, he says he will not tamper with the free market economy. His AKEL party still boasts busts of Lenin and red flags at its headquarters but it also owns a number of large lucrative businesses on the island.

According to Wikipedia

Dimitris Christofias studied at the Institute of Social Sciences and the Academy of Social Sciences in Moscow from 1969 to 1974 from which it is claimed that he graduated with the Diploma and degree of Doctor of Philosophy in History (Ph.D.History).

After South African President Thabo Mbeki, Demetris Christofias is the second Commonwealth leader believed to have studied at the Soviet Union's prestigious training school for future leaders.

Clark's Choice

Whilst on her morning walk, Prime Minister Helen Clark falls over, has a heart attack and dies because the accident and emergency dept at her nearest hospital is too understaffed to treat her in time.

So her soul arrives in Heaven and she is met by Saint Peter at the Pearly Gates.

'Welcome to Heaven,' says Saint Peter, 'Before you settle in, it seems there is a problem. We seldom see a Socialist around these parts, so we're not sure what to do with you.'

'No problem, just let me in; I'm a good Christian; I'm a believer,'says the PM.

'I'd like to just let you in, but I have orders from God Himself. He says that since the implementation of His new HEAVEN CHOICES policy, you have to spend one day in Hell and one day in Heaven. Then you must choose where you'll live for eternity.'

But I've already made up my mind. I want to be in Heaven,'replies Clark.

'I'm sorry .. But we have our rules,' Peter interjects. And, with that, St. Peter escorts her to an elevator and she goes down, down, down...all the way to Hell.

The doors open and she finds herself in the middle of a lush golf course. The sun is shining in a cloudless sky. The temperature is a perfect 22 degrees Celsius. In the distance is a beautiful club-house. Standing in front of it is David Lange and thousands of other Socialist luminaries who had helped her out over the years --- Norm Kirk, Bill Rowling, etc. The whole of the Labour Party leaders were there. Everyone laughing, happy, and casually but expensively dressed.

They run to greet her, to hug her and to reminisce about the good times they had getting rich at the expense of 'suckers and peasants.'

They play a friendly game of golf and then dine on lobster and caviar. The Devil himself comes up to Clark with a frosty drink, 'Have a tequila and relax, Helen!'

'Uh, I can't drink anymore, I took a pledge,' says Clark, dejectedly.

'This is Hell, Helen. You can drink and eat all you want and not worry and it just gets better from there!'

Clark takes the drink and finds herself liking the Devil, who she thinks is a really very friendly bloke who tells funny jokes like herself and pulls hilarious nasty pranks, kind of like the ones the Labour Party pulled with the Education, Immigration, Tough on Crime promises.

They are having such a great time that, before she realises it, it's time to go. Everyone gives her a big hug and waves as Clark steps on the elevator and heads upward.

When the elevator door reopens, she is in Heaven again and Saint Peter is waiting for her. 'Now it's time to visit Heaven,' the old man says, opening the gate.

So for 24 hours Clark is made to hang out with a bunch of honest, good-natured people who enjoy each other's company, talk about things other than money and treat each other decently. Not a nasty prank or short-arse joke among them.

No fancy country clubs here and, while the food tastes great, it's not caviar or lobster. And these people are all poor.

She doesn't see anybody she knows and she isn't even treated like someone special!

'Whoa,' she says uncomfortably to herself. 'David Lange never prepared me for this!'

The day done, Saint Peter returns and says, 'Well, you've spent a day in Hell and a day in Heaven. Now choose where you want to live for Eternity.'

With the 'Deal or No Deal' theme playing softly in the background, Clark reflects for a minute ... Then answers:

'Well, I would never have thought I'd say this -- I mean, Heaven has been delightful and all --but I really think I belong in Hell with my friends.'

So Saint Peter escorts her to the elevator and she goes down, down,down, all the way to Hell.

The doors of the elevator open and she is in the middle of a barren scorched earth covered with garbage and toxic industrial wasteland, looking a bit like the eroded, rabbit and fox affected Australian outback, but worse and more desolate.

She is horrified to see all of her friends, dressed in rags and chained together, picking up the roadside rubbish and putting it into black plastic bags. They are groaning and moaning in pain, faces and hands black with grime.

The Devil comes over to Clarke and puts an arm around her shoulder." I don't understand,' stammers a shocked Clark, 'Yesterday I was here and there was a golf course and a club-house and we ate lobster and caviar and drank tequila.

We lazed around and had a great time. Now there's just a wasteland full of garbage and everybody looks miserable!'

The Devil looks at her, smiles slyly and purrs, 'Yesterday we were campaigning; today you voted for us!

Obama-file 17 Major Union Federation Endorses Barack Obama-More Socialist Links

Obama-file 16 here

A major labour union federation, Change to Win has endorsed Barack Obama.

Their six million members, muscle and money may be enough to clinch the Democratic nomination for Obama. That is certainly their stated objective.


From the Communist Party USA's latest People's Weekly World.

Citing his promise to re-negotiate the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) and saying that it is time for the race for the Democratic presidential nomination to end, the seven union, six million member Change to Win federation, on Feb. 21, endorsed Sen. Barack Obama.

In a telephone conference with reporters, CtW Chair Anna Burger said the federation acted now, essentially, to push Obama to wins in the coming primaries, including Texas and Ohio.

“One reason we endorsed now is because we think we can make a difference,” Burger said. “It’s time to bring this process to a close. There’s a movement building here and the winds of change are blowing for Barack Obama, and it could possibly be time for (Hillary Clinton) to recognize they’re blowing for him. We’re hoping to get to that point sooner rather than later.”

“Obama’s stands on trade, on achieving the American Dream and on the war in Iraq – he was against it even while in the Illinois state senate before entering the U.S. Senate – really resonated with our members,” Burger continued.

The CtW endorsement means that four of its seven unions – SEIU, UFCW, Teamsters and UNITE HERE – are joining forces now to make phone calls, leaflet and canvass in the upcoming primary states. The Laborers and Carpenters have yet to complete their internal canvassing while the seventh CtW union, the Farmworkers, endorsed Clinton.

“But they’re comfortable with our decision,” Burger said.

Ohio, Rhode Island and Texas vote March 4. Pennsylvania votes April 22. The biggest impact of the CtW endorsement may be in Ohio where Burger said CtW already has staffers on the ground and where member unions are mobilizing in different cities. CtW unions have 175,000 members in Ohio and Burger said the federation intends to get 110,000 votes for Obama out of that total. CtW unions have 60,000 members in Texas and 20,000 in Rhode Island.

Change to Win's endorsement is no surprise as one its major constituents, the Service Employees International Union came out for Obama last week.

SEIU president Andy Stern founded Change to Win in 2005 and is considered a leader of the federation.

Change to Win's declaration for Obama follows a pattern of strategic endorsements by leftist politicians and unions-many connected in some way to Democratic Socialists of America.

Change to Win's seven constituent unions are not all leftist controlled, but two members of the organisation's governing council have links to DSA-particularly the Chicago Branch that was so helpful to the young Barack Obama.


Andy Stern leads the SEIU in conjunction with two DSA affiliated vice-presidents, Eliseo Medina and Gerry Hudson.

Stern worked closely with DSA founder Michael Harrington in his early career.

Stern also trained at the DSA founded Midwest Academy in Chicago, which was formed by former Students for a Democratic Society radicals Paul and Heather Booth, to train militant community organisers and union officials.

Heather and Paul Booth were regular sponosors of the Chicago Debs dinners in the late 1970s. The Debs Dinners were then organised by the Democratic Socialist Organising Committee, which in 1982 became Democratic Socialists of America.

Heather Booth was honoured for her work at the 1987 Debs Dinner.

Steve Max, associate director the Midwest Academy is a DSA Vice-Chair, while current executive director Jackie Kendall is a close associate and probable member.


Bruce Raynor, President of UNITE has more direct ties to Chicago DSA.

Chicago DSA New Ground of May June 1999 carries this report of that years Debs Dinner. Jackie Kendall, Heather Booth and Bruce Raynor all get a mention as does key Barack Obama supporter, Congresswoman Jan Schakowsky.

The 41st Annual Eugene V. Debs - Norman Thomas - Michael Harrington Dinner was held on May 7th at the Holiday Inn City Centre. It was a resounding success. The Program Book, 40 pages of congratulations to Awardees Jackie Kendall of the Midwest Academy and James Tribble of UNITE, was a record.

First presenter was past Awardee, Heather Booth, founder of Midwest Academy. Heather spoke of Jackie Kendall's organizational ability, and how she inspired people to live up to their potential by giving them confidence in themselves. Jackie will go anywhere to help an organization draw up programs and help facilitate them. With Congressperson Jan Schakowsky who was in attendance, she fought for, and got, consumers the right to know the freshness of their food by having dates put on all perishable items.

In accepting the Award, Jackie Kendall told how grateful she was to receive the Debs - Thomas - Harrington Award; how, at Catholic school, she became aware of socialism (for years, she said, she thought all socialists were nuns); and how one's life should be about what they can do to make life better through a just society. The Midwest Academy, Kendall said, gave her the opportunity to train women and men to stand up for themselves and work in good causes.

The presenter of the Award to James Tribble was UNITE's secretary - treasurer, Bruce Raynor. Bruce Raynor established a great record of militant organizing in the South and is likely to be the next President of UNITE. Raynor spoke of Jim Tribble's leadership on the front lines in organizing and negotiating, and his contributions at the International Board meetings of UNITE by being a union man who spoke his mind.

Bruce Raynor also presented the Debs award to union activist Lynn Talbot at Chicago DSA's 2004 Debs Dinner.

In between the two Chicago events, Bruce Raynor served on the awards committee for Boston DSA's Debs-Thomas-Bernstein Award Dinner in 2001

When it comes to Barack Obama, all roads seem to lead back to Chicago Democratic Socialists of America.

Obama-file 18 here

Anti Anti-Smacking Bill Petition Doing Well

The petition to force a referendum to overturn Sue Bradford's Anti-Smacking Bill is ahead of target.

With one week to go, the petition has well over the 286,000 signatures needed to force a referendum, but is going for a safe buffer.

From Family First


LET'S PUT IT BEYOND DOUBT!

Thanks to the efforts of people like you, there IS going to be a Referendum at the upcoming general election on the extremist anti-smacking bill which has targeted good parents and has failed miserably to target the real causes of child abuse.

The reason we have 'upped' the target?

In the last petition demanding a referendum (Norm Wither's 1999 law and order referendum), almost 60,000 signatures were disallowed by the Clerks who check the validity of the signatures. While we don't expect anywhere near as many disqualified signatures, it is beneficial to have a 'buffer' of signatures! Submitting well over the legally required 286,000 signatures would also drive the point home that this legislation is hugely unpopular and ineffective. (that's why we originally set the target as 300,000).

We believe the politicians need to listen to the voice of the NZ public on this issue.

Thanks for your support. It has been a phenomenal 'team' effort.

Congratulations to Family First for a superb effort.

Aussie Communists Praise Rudd's Apology

From the Communist Party of Australia's latest Guardian


The Central Committee Executive of the Communist Party of Australia (CPA) welcomes the apology by Prime Minister Rudd to the Stolen Generations in Federal Parliament on February 13. The CPA sees this as a first step towards compensation, restoration of stolen wages, democratic election of an Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander organisation and land rights, on the basis of genuine consultation and co-operation.

Hardly surprising as the Communist Party of Australia has been a key player in the Aboriginal rights movement for nearly 90 years.

NZAID Scams Damned By Auditor

At least an MP with the guts to tackle the huge scam that is NZAID.

From National MP Murray McCully's website.

NZAID Flunks Audit

New Zealand’s overseas aid budget will this year hit $429 million, headed for $600 million in 2010. The critics in the aid community maintain the traditional refrain that this is too little, too late. But recent reports suggest that they would be better occupied focusing on the quality, not the quantity, of the current aid expenditure.

In late 2007, Parliament’s Foreign Affairs Committee commenced its annual financial review of NZAID. Such reviews are commenced with a report from the Audit Office, detailing their findings from the mandatory audit process. And last year’s review, the results of which became public this week, do not make for pretty reading. The Audit Office report identified a litany of serious deficiencies:

NZAID had “entered into contracts for services without having gone through a normal tender process,” had “failed to ensure the agency was not being funded for the same work by other donors,” could not produce “evidence to indicate whether or not NZAID had considered ‘value for money’,” and had departed from “what we regard as good practice around paying only on delivery of services, or, when paying in advance, only paying a proportion to minimise the risk of public money not achieving desired outcomes”.

The Auditors also criticised a lack of “any provision to retain funds pending successful contract completion”, and identified an aborted contract where no attempt had been made to recover pre-payments.

Asked to explain, the NZAID officials argued that the pace of aid budget increases had given them speed wobbles. In fact, the report was truly damning, its criticisms going right to the heart of the organisation whose role is to deliver the assistance generously provided by New Zealand taxpayers to the intended recipients. And with more taxpayers’ money in the pipeline for next year, the Audit Office identified “major improvements” as being required, “to which the entity should give urgent attention.”

The great irony, of course, is that NZAID sits under the wing of the Foreign Affairs Ministry (MFAT) as an autonomous entity. The Audit report on MFAT itself was positively glowing. So, how could it be that an entity that was part of MFAT, until the current government decided to make it an autonomous being, could attract such a shoddy audit report, when its parent is, we are told, in pristine audit condition? Ammunition, to be sure, for those critics who saw the original split as an expensive exercise in political correctness.

More Critical Reviews

There was more bad news for NZAID last week when the Audit Office produced a performance audit of selected projects currently in the pipeline. The performance audits are part of a programme of regular reviews of government agencies for which the Audit Office has received additional funding.

The Auditors selected a sample of nine NZAID funding arrangements. They found “poor practice in six of the nine funding arrangements.” So, what sort of poor practice did the auditors find? Well, fundamentally poor practice, when you consider the nature of the NZAID work programme:
-“contractors being contracted before a search was carried out on the ACS database.”
- “management of conflicts of interest not being documented.”
-“contractors starting work before a contract was in place.”
-“contracts not being tendered when the contract value exceeded the stated limits.”
-“contractor fee rates increasing during the contract without a clear documented reason for the increase” and
-“contract variations for retrospective funding.”

In any government agency, these findings would be serious. In an agency whose sole business is the efficient administration of $429 million of aid monies annually, they strike at the heart of its reason for being.

McCully Accuses NZAID of Funding Radicals

National MP Murray McCully, a long time critic of NZAID, has picked up on my first expose of the CID NGO Travel Fund-probably through the good work of The Hive.

From Murray McCully's website

NZAID Funds Radicals and Trouble-makers

Like nature’s innocents located at the worldwide headquarters of mccully.co, most New Zealanders will have fondly imagined that the aid monies generously provided by this country’s taxpayers are targeted at improving the lives of the World’s poor and dispossessed. And, at least in part, we would all be wrong. Leaving aside the sneaking suspicion that rather too much of our aid budget ends up indirectly in the hands of NGO bureaucrats, it is clear that some NZAID monies are ending up in the hands of the least deserving.

Take for example the 2002 donation of $2000 from the Council for International Development-administered NZAID NGO Travel Fund to well known leftist Professor Jane Kelsey for the purpose of representing the radical organisation ARENA at “The World is Not For Sale” meeting in Oslo. This was not, in an ordinary sense, a conference, but rather a gathering of extreme leftist forces from around the world for the purpose of disrupting the World Bank conference being held at that time. As a reasonably well-paid professor at a major New Zealand university, it might have been imagined that Ms Kelsey could afford to indulge her left-wing fetishes at her own expense, without stripping funds from the mouths of the World’s starving millions.

An inspection of the list of donations over the years demonstrates a propensity on the part of NZAID to dispense small amounts of taxpayers’ cash to such activists. That the recipients appear to be uniformly of a left-wing persuasion raises questions of judgment about the officials who dispensed the cash. That left wing activists are paying fancy hotel bills with cash intended to feed the World’s poor and hungry is something that must, in due course, be addressed.

Better get on to the rest of the series.

New Zeal's Obama Expose Spreading Fast

Cliff Kincaid's Obama's Communist Mentor article, based on New Zeal's Obama's Marxist Mentor post has been picked up by Democratic Underground, National Review Online, Jews Against Obama, The Ron Paul War Room, Townhall, Canada Free Press, World Net Daily, Mississipi Sun/Herald , FreeRepublic, Texas Fishing Forum and dozens, if not hundreds more blogs and websites.

My hit count has trebled in the last few days.

Wait until the US picks up on Obama's extensive list of Marxist connections.

Obama-file 16 Barack Obama and the Legacy of Harold Washington

Obama-file 15 here

Barack Obama did not rise to prominence from nowhere.

He was groomed for the national stage by a coalition of Chicago socialists.

This alliance, comprising the Communist Party USA, their Marxist comrades from Democratic Socialists of America and the far left of the Democratic Party has been influential in Chicago since the early 1980s.

The coalition came together in 1982/83 to elect Chicago's first black Mayor Harold Washington. A Democratic Party Congressman, Washington bravely and successfully ran for mayor against the previously invincible Daley machine.

Washington died in office in 1987, but his coalition remained intact and went on to elect one of their own, Carol Moseley Braun, to the US Senate in 1992.

That same coalition groomed the young Barack Obama. It has broadened out across the USA and plans to put their man into the White House.

Writing in the latest Peoples Weekly World, Chicago Young Communist League leader and Barack Obama fan, Pepe Lozano gives some history of the 1983 Washington campaign and touches on its relevance to Obama's campaign.


Washington’s election was the outcome of a multi-racial citywide coalition beginning within the African American community. Then immediately he included the involvement of Latino and white working-class communities representing a progressive and independent reform movement that eventually carried him to victory.

One thing that has been unsung was how the Chicago labor movement, especially Black trade unionists, led the way in registering tens of thousands of new voters, including a recruitment drive of petition signers, door knockers, phone bankers and an army of volunteer foot-soldiers on Election Day.

It was precisely labor’s role in Chicago that helped shape Washington’s campaign turning it into a broad people’s movement that revolutionized the city’s Democratic machine politics under former Mayor Richard J. Daley.

Washington was a progressive leader who stood up for working people’s causes including the peace movement, civil and immigrant rights and especially the rights of workers.

By 1983 when Washington decided to run for mayor, he was a respected member of Congress and became an important ally in progressive political circles throughout Chicago. Still, many people in the city’s political machine just didn’t believe an African American could win. And some – deeply influenced by racism — were extremely hostile to the idea of a Black mayor.

Washington had ties to the Communist Party since the 1940s and was also closely associated with the Marxists who went on to form Democratic Socialists of America in 1982.

These Marxists organised a major dinner every year to honour US socialist leaders, Eugene Debs, Norman Thomas and Michael Harrington.

Harold Washington MCed the 1981 Debs Dinner but had to cancel out of the 1983 event.

The 1983 Norman Thomas - Eugene V. Debs Dinner was held at the McCormick Inn on Saturday, May 7... Newly elected Mayor Harold Washington was unable to attend at the last minute. Carl Shier, who was to have introduced him, read a message from him instead, and spoke of DSA's considerable role in Washington's election campaign.


Future DSA leader Carl Marx Shier, veteran socialist Egidio Clemente and Harold Washington at the 1981 Debs Dinner

Despite the racism, a labor coalition for Washington was formed and led by Black unionists. It became one of the most organized forces in his campaign.

Before the 1983 mayoral primary, the Chicago Teachers Union held a delegates’ meeting where pro-Washington campaign literature including “Washington for Mayor” buttons were passed out before a motion was made to have the union endorse his run.

During the meeting teachers were chanting Washington’s name, and the white and Black union leadership had no choice but to endorse him with overwhelming support. After that, support for Washington started steam rolling within some of the city’s unions.

Leaders of the Coalition of Black Trade Unionists (CBTU), including service workers and Teamsters, endorsed Washington. It was CBTU that pressed the Chicago Federation of Labor — made up of integrated unions with white, Black, Latino and Asian memberships — to endorse Washington in the 1983 general election.

“We saw Washington as a viable candidate and we endorsed him wholeheartedly, and we felt he was more qualified than those before him,” said Elwood Flowers who just retired as vice president of the Illinois AFL-CIO and was a close friend of Washington. “But we as labor were just one arm of the Washington movement.”

Union endorsements and support are a large part of the momentum building behind Barack Obama in his campaign for the Democratic nomination. Obama's campaign is Chicago 1983 "upsized".

There were a number of African American labor leaders who were important allies for Washington and played influential roles in his administration, Flowers said. For example, he cited Charles Hayes, vice president of the then United Packinghouse Workers Union (now known as the United Food and Commercial Workers union), who won Washington’s seat in the 1st District, a powerhouse African American community on the city’s south side, after Washington was elected mayor.

Other notable allies of Washington at that time included Addie Wyatt, who was the first African American woman vice president of the Packinghouse Workers, and Jim Wright, who was the first Black director of United Auto Workers Region 4. Jackie Vaughn, the president of the Chicago Teachers Union and first African American to hold that post, was also instrumental in Washington’s administration. All were leading members of CBTU.

The Coalition of Black trade Unionists was and is a Communist Party/socialist front.

Charles Hayes helped Washington win the mayoralty, then took over his congressional seat. Less than a decade later, Barack Obama helped Carol Mosely Braun win a seat in the US Senate, then took over the same seat in 2004.

Like many black trade unionists of the era, Hayes, (as was almost certainly Harold Washington himself) a long time secret member of the Communist Party.

From the late '70s on Hayes was also heavily involved with the the Debs Dinner socialist set.

Addie Watt was a regular sponsor of the Debs Dinners in the late '70s and was herself honoured with a Debs Award in 1979.

Jackie Vaughn headed the re-elect Harold Washington Campaign in 1986 and was honored for her work at that years Debs Dinner.


Congressman charles Hayes left, Jacquie (Jackie) Vaughn centre and DSA founder Michael Harrington at the 1986 Debs Dinner

In the predominantly Latino communities of Pilsen and Little Village, my father, the late Rudy Lozano was also a key ally in Washington’s labor-based coalition.

He was also a community activist and decided to run for alderman in the 22nd Ward, a predominantly Mexican and Mexican American neighborhood. Although he narrowly lost, Lozano was a rising political star and leader that advocated for multi-racial coalitions and worker unity. He rallied and mobilized the Latino constituent base to vote for Washington.

Lozano understood the need for Black, Latino and white working class unity, especially the importance of union solidarity among all workers including undocumented immigrant workers. Lozano’s independent and grassroots-based organizing, along with Washington’s mayoral victory, sparked a movement throughout Chicago’s Latino communities, which hardly had any representation in City Council. Washington’s victory galvanized the majority of the Latino electorate and soon new Latino leaders emerged as viable elected officials under his administration.

Rudy Lozano was murdered in 1983. He was known to be very close to the Communist Party.

Twenty-five years later the struggle for workers rights and the fight for multi-racial unity continues — perhaps not on the same level that Washington was able to achieve — but it continues. Witness the 2007 aldermanic elections where labor-backed candidates won and helped to strengthen the City Council.

The Communist Party backed several successful candidates in last years Chicago municipal elections.

The movement to elect Barack Obama today is almost identical to Washington’s, but nationwide, said Flowers. “Our members wanted to be involved in the political process, similar to people today for Obama,” said Flowers.

“What Obama can do for the country will help all communities including providing jobs and health care. And the number one issue is stopping the Iraq war, which is draining our economic resources. If those things bear fruit, then they will benefit all working-class communities,” he added.

It was Washington’s example and the power of working people that will always remind us about what is possible. The greatness is in our hands.

Harold Washington's Chicago mayoral campaign victory inspired a young Barack Obama to move to Chicago.

Will Harold Washington's political legacy, now send Barack obama to the Whitehouse?

Obama-file 17 here

US Communists On Fidel Castro's Resignation

Will Fidel Castro's relinquishing of the Cuban presidency make any difference?



These people don't think so.

CTU to Play Race Card at Election Time

Unions stirring up racial tensions yet again.

From Waatea News

The Council of Trade Unions is picking Maori and workers' rights as issues for this year's election.

The organisation has been in Rotorua looking at its political strategy and the future of the labour movement.

Sharon Clair, the CTU's Maori vice president, says the cornerstones of the strategy are protecting and enhancing workers' rights, stronger public services, and higher wages.

The role of Maori in the workplace is also important.

“We are the ones who are at the bottom of the rung, particularly Maori women, when it comes to income, and skill and qualification, and this is all of course a continuation of colonialism and the impact of that upon us in our development,” Ms Clair says.

Obama-file 15 Socialist Octagenarians for Barack

Obama-file 14 here

Barack Obama is a creation of the Chicago far left.

He is the product of a radical alliance that elected Chicago's Marxist mayor, Harold Washington in 1983 and Illinois' socialist Senator Carol Moseley Braun in 1992.

That coalition still exists and has backed Obama since his first Illinois State Senate race in 1996.

Though nominally a Democrat he has long been supported by Chicago members of the Communist Party, its offshoot, the Committees of Correspondence for Democracy and Socialism and the equally extreme Democratic Socialists of America.

Two of Obama's Chicago comrades have supported him for many years. Both are octagenarian icons of the Chicago far left. They move in the same circles and have crossed paths in many campaigns.

One has backed off in disappointment at Obama's movement to the "right". The other still stands behind his man.

Dr Quentin Young is a leading national campaigner for "single payer"- socialised medicine.

Young has been active in Chicago socialist circles since the 1930s. In the 1960s he was Martin Luther King's personal physician.

In the early 1980s Young was a leading member of Harold Washington's inner circle and was rewarded with the post of President of the Chicago Board of Health.

In 1992 Chicago Democratic Socialists of America awarded their most well known member with their highest honour-the Debs Award

You have been there in the struggles for Civil Rights, for social and economic justice, and against all forms of discrimination. You were there in 1951 to fight against discrimination in Chicago medical institutions. You were there in 1983 for Harold Washington to win the mayoralty. You were there when Carol Moseley Braun announced her intention to run for the U.S. Senate. You have demonstrated your understanding that trade unions are a social force for Progress and Justice in our country.


Quentin Young at the 1992 Debs dinner

For you dedication in the fight for universal and comprehensive health care for all and for your lifetime commitment to change our society to the better, the Debs - Thomas - Harrington Dinner Committee hereby presents to you its annual award this First Day of May, 1992.

In the 1990s and early '00s Obama and Young were politically on the same page.

Obama also advocated "single payer" health. As a state Senator Obama and another leftist colleague and state representative William Delgado presented the The Health Care Justice Act to the Illinois House and Senate.

According to blog Thomas Paine's Corner

Barack Obama is quite familiar with the concepts and the specific merits of single payer. Back in the late 1990s, when he was an Illinois State Senator representing a mostly black district on the south side of Chicago, he took pains to consistently identify himself publicly with his neighbor Dr. Quentin Young.

He signed on as co-sponsor of the Bernardin Amendment, named after Chicago's late Catholic Archbishop, who championed the public policy idea that medical care was a human right, not a commodity. At that time, when it was to his political advantage, Obama didn't mind at all being perceived as an advocate of single payer.

In an interview with Healthcare Now Quentin Young explains his changed relationship with Barack Obama.

"I knew him before he was political,” Young says of Obama. “I supported him when he ran for state Senate. When he was a state Senator he did say that he supported single payer. Now, he hedges. Now he says, if we were starting from scratch, he would support single payer.”

“Barack’s a smart man,” Young says. “He probably calculated the political cost for being for single payer – the shower of opposition from the big boys – the drug companies and the health insurance companies. And so, like the rest of them, he fashioned a hodge podge of a health insurance plan.”

Young said that the last time he spoke with Obama was in early 2005. In January 2005,Obama voted to confirm Condoleeza Rice as Secretary of State.

“When I heard about the vote, I wrote him a letter,” Young said. “I told him I was disappointed in him. Rice was the embodiment of everything that was wrong with this administration. So, he called me back and he said – why didn’t you pick up the phone and call me? And he said – do you think Bush would ever send to the Senate a nominee for Secretary of State who I could vote for? I said – you are the Constitutional lawyer. It’s about advice and consent, right? You should have denied him your consent.”

Young says that none of the leading Democratic Presidential candidates supports single payer.

Dr. Young is looking for an alternative.

One who is not looking for an alternative is Chicago historian, Timuel Black, A long time friend and admirer of Barack Obama.


Young Timuel Black became interested in socialism in the 1930s inspired by Communist Party street speakers Claude Lightfoot and Ishmael Flory.

Black became an active unionist in the late 1930s and associated with Communists and Trotskyists.

On joining the US Army in WW2 Black was denied officer training because military intelligence claimed he had secretly joined the Communist Party-a charge Black still denies.

After the war, Black's activities were monitored by the Chicago Police Department's anti-radical "Red Squad", for many years.

Black was active in the Communist Party infiltrated Progressive Party in the late 1940s.

Later he served as Assistant Coordinator of the National Teacher Corps, the Teachers Committee for Quality Education and the Congress of Racial Equality.

He became president of the local chapter of the allegedly communist controlled Negro American Labor Council.

In the early 1980s, Timuel Black led the campaign to register 250,000 voters to help elect Chicago mayor Harold Washington.

Black also held leadership roles in the Justice Coalition of Greater Chicago and the Chicago Committee to Defend the Bill of Rights. Recently he has been active in the anti Iraq war, Peace Action Committee.

In the 1970s, Timuel Black was involved with the annual Chicago Debs Day Dinners, the highpoint of of Illinois socialist calendar.

At that time the dinner was run by remnants of the Socialist Party USA. After 1982 the event was taken over by the newly formed Democratic Socialists of America.

Timuel Black helped sponsor the event in 1970 (with well known writer Saul Bellow), 1976 and 1977.

At the 1989 Debs Dinner, Timuel Black presented an award to ex-communist DSA member Milton Cohen, while featured speaker was DSA member Quentin Young.

The Master of Ceremonies for the evening was Alderman Danny K. Davis, a DSA member, current US Congressman and associate of Barack Obama.

DSA leader Carl Marx Shier also presented an award to DSA member William Winpisinger.

Given his company on the podium and his history with the event, Timuel Black was very likely also a DSA member.

Certainly Mr Black has not abandoned socialism.

Timuel Black currently serves on the advisory board of the Communist Party breakaway organisation, Committees of Correspondence for Democracy and Socialism alongside former communists such as black radical Angela Davis and leftie folk singer Pete Seeger.

CCDS has long worked closely with DSA and there is considerable cross membership.

Another CCDS advisory board member Manning Marable is a former DSA leader, while yet another, linguist and activist Noam Chomsky, is currently also a DSA member.

Timuel Black has known Barack Obama since at least 1996. That year he he attempted to mediate a dispute between leftist Illinois State Senator Alice Palmer and her anointed successor Obama.

Alice Palmer had allegedly promised Obama the seat if she was successful in a run for the US Congress.

She wasn't successful, but Obama refused to stand aside and went on to win the seat unopposed-after getting all his opponents (including Palmer) disqualified on voting technicalities.

"I liked Alice Palmer a lot. I thought she was a good public servant," Obama said. "It was very awkward. That part of it I wish had played out entirely differently."

His choice divided veteran Chicago political activists.

"There was friction about the decision he made," said City Colleges of Chicago professor emeritus Timuel Black, who tried to negotiate with Obama on Palmer's behalf. "There were deep disagreements."

Despite the mess, Timuel Black became and remains an admirer of the ambitious young politician.

For most Americans, the 2004 Democratic National Convention was their introduction to Obama. However, another friend, South Side historian Timuel Black, said he was impressed with Obama's intelligence.

"My first impression was this was a very, very brilliant young man," Black said.

Black said Obama's biggest obstacle would not be from whites, but from blacks.

"The biggest thing he has to face is the accusations by some blacks that he is not black enough," he said. "He has to overcome that without being so black that he alienates potential white supporters."

Timuel Black addressed a largely black audience at the Woodson Regional Library auditorium on Feb. 11, 2007.

Speaking of Barack Obama’s presidential campaign he said;

“Obama is the test of how deep racism is in this country...Barack is the recipient of the struggle of other generations...That means that you feel proud of your ancestors, your successes...(Obama), based on the opportunities that were opened to him by others, is in the position to prove to the world whether the United States of America is a true democracy, or is a continuing hypocrisy.”

Fine words.

Unfortunately Barack Obama's political heritage comes not from the struggles of Black America, but from the street agitators, back-room dealers and influence pedlars of Red Chicago.

Obama-file 16 here