A report from Haiti: Building fightback amid super exploitation

For readers of CHALLENGE it is not uncommon to read reports of super exploitation and crisis in Haiti. Workers in Haiti have been faced with the daily violence of capitalism, mishandled natural disasters that keep them fighting for their lives, and mostly recently have been front page news as the latest target of racist border attacks. These reports, time and again, show a working class in Haiti and internationally amidst a continuous life-and-death struggle. Progressive Labor Party (PLP) is on the ground in Haiti and taking leadership from Black workers as we build class consciousness and a revolutionary spirit!

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Buenaventura, another affirmation of why Black workers are key to revolution

COLOMBIA—Buenaventura is a city on the shores of the Pacific Ocean with 400,000 inhabitants, of which 90% are Afro Colombians, 82% are in poverty (according to DANE data) and 42% in misery. It is the most important port in the country that generated in 2020, 14,356 million dollars of income. It is through this port that 70% of Colombia’s exports leave the country.
Before 1957, when this port belonged to the state, it had more than 10,000 dock workers, most of them Black workers. It is worth mentioning that in turn, in most of the coal mines on the Atlantic coast, in the salt mines throughout the country and in the sugar cane plantations, 100% of their workers are Black. After the privatization of the port, there are no more than 5,000 workers, despite the fact that the port terminals have been increased from one to thirteen. Through this port, all kinds of merchandise are imported and exported, from cocaine, arms, bananas and coffee, to trafficking displaced workers and children from different parts of the world.

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The Spanish Civil War International Brigades to fascists: ‘They shall not pass!’

“No Pasarán.” They will not Pass.
These gripping words of the Spanish communist leader Dolores Ibarruri (“La Pasionaria”) captured the anti-fascist determination that brought thousands of working-class volunteers to the battlefields of Spain eighty-five years ago. Now fascism is rearing its racist head again – all over the world. The international working class must rise up again, but this time to smash fascism and its capitalist masters forever with communist revolution, where the working class rules.

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Remembering The Red Army: The Battle of Moscow sets the stage for Hitler’s defeat

The capitalists of the world are more afraid of communism than anything else. The Soviet Union was a nightmare for capitalists and their hangers-on. For 35 years the then-socialist Soviet Union proved that the working class: could rule a huge country; transform it from a ruined, peasant society into a modern industrial country; eliminate unemployment; and provide free medical care, education, retirement pensions, paid vacations – a decent standard of living for every worker.
The international communist movement, headed by the Soviets fought fiercely against sexism , racism, and every form of oppression. It was a mortal threat to capitalist rule everywhere.The largest attempt in history to destroy this, the world’s first workers’ state was the invasion of the Soviet Union by Adolf Hitler’s Nazi army.

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Newark Firefighters, reject racist bosses’ infighting!

NEWARK, NJ, September 8— Members of the Newark Firefighters Union, Newark Fire Officers Union, Newark Fraternal Order of Police, Newark Police Superior Officers Association, and a union called Newark Council 21 held a protest to oppose a vaccine mandate ordered by Newark’s nationalist liberal boss, Mayor Ras Baraka. This debacle is between different factions of the local Newark ruling class. One side is represented by liberal racist Baraka against the gutter racist, opportunistic police department unions backed by their fascist kkkops on the other side.

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Letters of Dec 15

Working-class leadership, the personal is political
I lost the Condo Board of Directors’ election but advanced the political struggle just a notch. I had run for a seat on the Board of Directors at the urging of my new neighbors at the old but solid building complex I settled into last spring.
It started over a grill. I had asked a ground floor neighbor if they wanted my charcoal grill (allowable under management rules). She declined because she did not want to become a target of building management again.

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COP26 conference: Capitalists don’t cop to climate corruption

Over the 12 days of the climate summit in Glasgow, Scotland, fossil fuel companies extracted a billion barrels of oil from the ground. As diplomats tap-danced around the climate crisis, capitalists guaranteed that even more Earth-warming carbon would clog the atmosphere. Beneath their fake show of unity and pathetically inadequate (and unenforceable) pledges to cut greenhouse gas emissions, the bosses did what bosses do.  The COP26 conference was driven by the capitalist law of maximum profit and by the inter-imperialist rivalry heading toward global war. The only thing that unites the world’s ruling classes is their need to build racism, sexism, nationalism, and fascism to prepare for that war. Only communist revolution, led by Progressive Labor Party (PLP), can save a habitable planet by putting science and workers’ needs first.

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Astroworld “Travis”-ty shows the only antidote is communist revolution

As the capitalist world becomes more volatile, the world of entertainment cannot escape the instability it produces. In fact, bosses use culture as a key arena for keeping workers distracted from the source of our problems. The November 5 pandemonium at hip hop artist Travis Scott’s Astroworld Music Festival killed 10 young people. This event gives workers yet another reason to see that only a society led by and for workers—where money does not exist—can prevent such needless tragedies from occurring in the future.
Profit-driven greed from the concert’s Live Nation promoters. Fascist “crowd control” tactics from Houston, Texas police. A megalomaniac mindset on the part of Travis Scott himself and the cult-of-personality worship on the part of concert participants. High levels of drug and alcohol-induced violence–in the midst of the pandemic. These factors all culminated in the literal crushing to death and murder of these young people and critical injuries to countless others.

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From Bolshevik Revolution to Striking miners: FIGHT FOR WORKERS POWER!

NEW YORK CITY, November 4—Strikes and struggle marked this year’s 104th anniversary of the Great October Socialist Revolution in Russia, the first time the working class seized state power and freed millions of workers from capitalism and imperialism. On Thursday, November 4, hundreds of workers, miners, members of the communist Progressive Labor Party (PLP), and friends demonstrated in solidarity with the multiracial Alabama miners who continue their nearly eight month  strike. On November 6, PL’ers and friends held an anniversary event in honor of the Bolshevik (revolutionary communists in Russia) Revolution, while also applauding the ongoing miners’ strike. This was a  multiracial social event connecting  revolutionary history to  present day reform struggles that displays our resolve to fight back amidst the growing imperialist threat of World War III.

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LA: to abolish the kkkops, abolish capitali$m

LOS ANGELES, November 17—After two years of being immersed in the mass movement against police terror, Progressive Labor Party (PLP) here has been connected  with lots of people interested in abolishing the police. The kkkops, used to uphold and defend capitalism, will never be abolished under capitalism. We will need our Party to lead a violent revolution to overthrow this system. Only then can we abolish the police. At the suggestion of an impacted family member, we brought this understanding to 20 members of our base through an engaging forum.

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