Ecuador’s election wasn’t free — and its people will pay the price under President Noboa
Politics in the rear-view mirror
A nostalgia for a false golden age pervades US politics and most of the left is adrift in a sea of old and failed ideas. It is a new future that must be fought for, argues ZOLTAN ZIGEDY
Richard Nixon (left) and (right) Barack Obama
Join the traditional march from Clerkenwell Green, which will bring together countless international workers’ organisations in a statement against the far right
The money tap to anti-Cuban agitators will never be shut off under Trump
Mountains of research show that hardcore material harms children, yet there are still no simple measures in place
We face austerity, privatisation, and toxic influence. But we are growing, and cannot be beaten
Trump’s economic adviser has exposed the actual strategy: forcing other countries to provide financial support for US hegemony
Activist Angie Zelter has been arrested more than a hundred times. She’s not stopping now, writes LINDA PENTZ GUNTER
From the Indians who welcomed the pilgrims
And to the buffalo who once ruled the plains
Like the vultures circling beneath the dark clouds
Looking for the rain
Looking for the rain
Just like the cities staggered on the coastline
Living in a nation that just can’t stand much more
Like the forest buried beneath the highway
Never had a chance to grow
Never had a chance to grow
And now it’s winter
Winter in America
Yes and all of the healers have been killed
Or sent away, yeah
But the people know, the people know
It’s winter
Winter in America
And ain’t nobody fighting
’Cause nobody knows what to save
— Gil Scott-Heron (1974) Winter in America
WHEN Gil Scott-Heron wrote these words, the US seemed to be in swift decline. Watergate had cast a shadow over government legitimacy; the US had lost/was losing the imperialist war in Vietnam; economic inflation, unemployment and stagnation were crushing US living standards.
For many in the post-war generation, the early 1970s were a low point in the prestige and influence of the US.
Scott-Heron was masterful at blending politics with his art, without compromising either.
More from this author
The transformation of a stable secular state into a fractured ruin largely ruled by Western-backed fundamentalists exposes the hollow nature of ‘multipolarity’ and the absence of principled anti-imperialism today, writes ZOLTAN ZIGEDY
ZOLTAN ZIGEDY reflects on the lessons from two books looking at the US labour movement and the recent history of spontaneous mass uprisings – and finds two pernicious ideologies working against the interests of the people
ZOLTAN ZIGEDY argues Trump’s victory shows the deep failure of liberal calculations that write off huge swathes of the electorate and mirrors the worldwide rise of right-wing populism amid Establishment collapse
From ‘middle class’ to ‘microaggressions,’ from ‘fascism’ to ‘terrorism,’ ZOLTAN ZIGEDY makes an anguished cry for us to turn away from the most misused and misleading terms and tropes – or at least use them accurately
