Once the bustling heart of Christian pilgrimage, Bethlehem now faces shuttered hotels, empty streets and a shrinking Christian community, while Israel’s assault on Gaza and the tightening grip of occupation destroy hopes of peace at the birthplace of Christ, writes Father GEOFF BOTTOMS
How can the left take on the state and big business?
It vitally important for the working class movement to discuss, debate and understand the nature of the state, writes JONATHAN WHITE
OVER the course of 2007 and 2008, two things happened that were supposed to be impossible.
First, the financial systems of the most advanced capitalist states went into meltdown as the big banks stopped lending to each other, each one panicking that they were all holding worthless assets.
Far from boom and bust being a thing of the past, as Gordon Brown and others had claimed, the global economy was thrown into a massive recession.
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