> WW News Service Digest #204
>
> 1) Economic bad news: Can nothing be done?
> by "WW" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> 2) Gov't vs. Mumia advocate: Clark Kissinger jailed
> by "WW" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> 3) Protesters defend WBAI against Pacifica management
> by "WW" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> 4) Day of Rage in West Bank, Gaza
> by "WW" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> 5) Taking credit for Yugoslav coup
> by "WW" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> 6) Cuba set to cut phone service to U.S.
> by "WW" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
>
>-------------------------
>Via Workers World News Service
>Reprinted from the Dec. 21, 2000
>issue of Workers World newspaper
>-------------------------
>
>ECONOMIC BAD NEWS: CAN NOTHING BE DONE?
>
>By Gary Wilson
>
>It's hard to compete with the election news, but bad
>economic news is starting to make some headlines.
>
>The question is, what does it mean and can't something be
>done about it?
>
>The reports range from grim to grimmer. A study by UCLA's
>Anderson Business Forecast says there is a 60 percent chance
>of a sharp recession in 2001. The study says that the
>downturn will sweep all sectors of the economy, including
>the "seemingly untouchable" high-tech industries.
>
>Another report goes even further. The current Esquire
>magazine has a report titled "Nine Signs We're Already in a
>Recession." According to CBS.MarketWatch.com's Paul Farrell,
>the signs listed in Esquire are convincing; a recession has
>already begun.
>
>The Wall Street Journal had an in-depth report Dec. 4
>titled: "Despite New-Economy Tools, Overcapacity May Loom."
>
>OVERCAPACITY MEANS OVERPRODUCTION
>
>Overcapacity is another way of saying overproduction, the
>term used by Karl Marx to describe the source of capitalist
>economic crises.
>
>The Wall Street Journal report is very detailed in showing
>that not only is there a looming crisis of overproduction,
>but the old capitalist boom-bust cycle is rearing its ugly
>head. In fact, it never went away, no matter what they said
>before.
>
>"Vehicle factories from Detroit to Newark, Del., sit idle as
>the industry struggles with bloated inventories," the
>Journal reports. "On Friday the Big Three auto makers
>reported their weakest sales so far this year. A broader
>survey of purchasing managers released the same day shows
>that U.S. manufacturers ranging from textile makers to paper
>mills slowed their pace in November for the fourth
>consecutive month."
>
>The Journal says: "During past booms, business executives
>tended to get carried away, building too many new stores and
>factories even as demand for their goods softened. That
>worsened the blow when the bust finally came and they were
>forced to shutter their unused capacity.
>
>"This time around was supposed to be different," the Journal
>reports.
>
>"New technologies, such as sophisticated software programs
>that track sales, inventory and supply lines, were supposed
>to give companies better, more timely information about
>their markets. That was going to let them fine-tune
>production to demand, and thus smooth out--or even eliminate-
>-the old boom-bust cycles.
>
>"Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan, for one, has
>repeatedly espoused this theory," the Journal continues.
>
>"Yet new pockets of overcapacity emerge each passing week."
>
>The Journal adds, "It sounds a bit hauntingly like Japan,
>where corporate titans confidently expanded through the
>1980s, proclaiming a new era of higher growth. When
>financial and property markets collapsed and consumer demand
>plunged in the early 1990s, companies were stuck with far
>more capacity than needed, helping deepen an economic
>quagmire from which Tokyo has yet to emerge."
>
>BOOM-BUST CYCLE BUILT INTO CAPITALISM
>
>A capitalist recession can have a devastating effect on the
>working class. Factories and offices are closed; workers are
>laid off. Homelessness and hunger spreads.
>
>This is not something that anyone wants. So why does it
>happen? Why can't the new high-tech methods prevent
>overproduction?
>
>The problem is built into the way capitalism works, so there
>is no way to prevent it without putting an end to capitalism
>and replacing it with socialism.
>
>Here's what happens and why the problem is built into
>capitalism.
>
>As Marx noted, the unique feature to the capitalist economy
>that makes it different from all previous economies--and the
>future socialist economy--is that all commodities produced
>for a capitalist economy are made to be sold for money.
>Before capitalism, anything produced was made to meet a
>need.
>
>The possibility of a capitalist crisis comes from the fact
>that a commodity may fail to be sold.
>
>Marx wrote: "A man who has produced does not have the choice
>of selling or not selling. He must sell. In the crisis there
>arises the very situation in which he cannot sell or can
>only sell below the cost price or must even sell at a
>positive loss." ("Theories of Surplus Value," Part 2, p.
>503)
>
>Attempts to "plan" capitalist production in order to prevent
>such a crisis from happening have all failed.
>
>Planning isn't the problem. The new technologies certainly
>make the most complex planning possible. But planning
>involves central control and central control means that
>individual control is given up. No capitalist enterprise
>will give up individual control for any reason, and
>particularly not if it might reveal their secrets.
>
>Planning and control of capitalism is impossible. Even at
>the top of a boom, businesses will accept a falling rate of
>profit, selling at cost or even below in order to keep
>customers and protect market share.
>
>Eventually, the falling rate of profit makes itself felt.
>Production is halted. Layoffs begin. Capitalist production
>goes bust, leading to a recession or even depression.
>
>Such crises are inevitable under capitalism, like day
>follows night. This has gone on for almost 200 years. Every
>time they try to shift the blame onto some particular
>problem. Every time new "fixes" are promised that will
>prevent any more crises.
>
>No doubt there are specific problems, but making adjustments
>here or there will not prevent the next crisis. Capitalism's
>boom-bust cycles are not just imbalances, where there is too
>much of one thing and not enough of another.
>
>The source of crises is the profit system itself. As long as
>production is determined by profit and not to meet human
>needs, there will be crises, recessions and depressions.
>It's time to put an end to this madness.
>
>- END -
>
>(Copyleft Workers World Service: Everyone is permitted to
>copy and distribute verbatim copies of this document, but
>changing it is not allowed. For more information contact
>Workers World, 55 W. 17 St., NY, NY 10011; via e-mail:
>[EMAIL PROTECTED] For subscription info send message to:
>[EMAIL PROTECTED] Web: http://www.workers.org)
>
>
>
>
>
>Message-ID: <069e01c06784$a801ad00$[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
>From: "WW" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
>Subject: [WW] Gov't vs. Mumia advocate: Clark Kissinger jailed
>Date: Sat, 16 Dec 2000 12:21:41 -0500
>Content-Type: text/plain;
> charset="Windows-1252"
>Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit
>
>-------------------------
>Via Workers World News Service
>Reprinted from the Dec. 21, 2000
>issue of Workers World newspaper
>-------------------------
>
>GOV'T VS. MUMIA ADVOCATE: CLARK KISSINGER JAILED
>
>Special to Workers World
>
>Clark Kissinger, a longtime activist and leader in the
>movement to free Mumia Abu-Jamal, was jailed Dec. 6 for a
>probation violation. He is being held at the Federal
>Detention Center in Philadelphia.
>
>Earlier this year Kissinger, an organizer for Refuse &
>Resist!, received one year's probation and a fine for
>participating in a July 1999 civil-disobedience action at
>the Liberty Bell. The probationary sentence came with strict
>limitations on his ability to speak and travel freely.
>
>On Dec. 6 a judge sentenced Kissinger to 90 days in jail for
>the "crime" of traveling to Philadelphia and speaking out
>against the death penalty and the criminal injustice system
>at a protest outside the Republican National Convention.
>
>"We believe that Clark Kissinger's imprisonment constitutes
>an act of selective prosecution by the judicial system in
>Philadelphia," says a Dec. 12 statement from the
>International Action Center. "It is the same system which
>has an interest in depriving Mumia Abu-Jamal of a new trial
>since it would undoubtedly reveal widespread judicial,
>police and prosecutorial misconduct.
>
>"Clark's jailers are attempting to make his imprisonment
>more difficult by denying him routine visits from family
>members. We hold the authorities in Philadelphia and in the
>state of Pennsylvania responsible for his safety while
>incarcerated and in their custody. We demand that Clark's
>family and others be allowed to visit him.
>
>"His jailing is a miscarriage of justice. We join all those
>who demand his immediate release."
>
>The IAC asks people to call the following officials to
>demand Kissinger's release: Warden Vanyur, (215) 521-7210;
>Mayor John Street, (215) 686-2181; U.S. Rep. Chaka Fatah,
>(202) 225-4001; the U.S. Marshal's office, (215) 597-7273;
>Judge Arnold C. Rapoport, (610) 776-0369; and fax Judge
>Bruce Kaufman, (215) 580-2281.
>
>- END -
>
>(Copyleft Workers World Service: Everyone is permitted to
>copy and distribute verbatim copies of this document, but
>changing it is not allowed. For more information contact
>Workers World, 55 W. 17 St., NY, NY 10011; via e-mail:
>[EMAIL PROTECTED] For subscription info send message to:
>[EMAIL PROTECTED] Web: http://www.workers.org)
>
>
>
>
>
>Message-ID: <06a601c06784$c965a640$[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
>From: "WW" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
>Subject: [WW] Protesters defend WBAI against Pacifica management
>Date: Sat, 16 Dec 2000 12:22:37 -0500
>Content-Type: text/plain;
> charset="Windows-1252"
>Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit
>
>-------------------------
>Via Workers World News Service
>Reprinted from the Dec. 21, 2000
>issue of Workers World newspaper
>-------------------------
>
>PROTESTERS DEFEND WBAI AGAINST PACIFICA MANAGEMENT
>
>By John Catalinotto
>New York
>
>WBAI Station Manager Valerie Van Isler became the latest
>target of an assault on the influential progressive radio
>station when the Pacifica National Board tried to fire her
>in early December. By Dec. 7, some 400 supporters of the
>station had rallied in her defense, along with radio
>journalists Bernard White, Amy Goodman and others, for a
>demonstration in midtown Manhattan.
>
>Pacifica is the national network of which WBAI is a member.
>
>Goodman co-hosts the award-winning show "Democracy Now!"
>with Juan Gonz·lez. Bernard White is WBAI's program
>director.
>
>WBAI journalist Earl Maitland, who was severely injured by
>cops at the funeral of police-brutality victim Patrick
>Dorismond last spring, returned to "The Morning Show" in
>time to help rally support for Van Isler and the station.
>
>The protesters gathered at the office of John Murdock at
>Park Avenue and 47th Street. Murdock is a recent addition to
>the Pacifica National Board. He is a corporate attorney
>whose firm, Epstein, Becker & Green, specializes in
>"maintaining a union-free work place." In other words,
>Murdock is a union-buster.
>
>WBAI supporters demand that Murdock be removed and that
>Pacifica stop its attacks on the station. WBAI is the only
>listener-sponsored station in the New York area free from
>government and corporate control.
>
>Along with a selection of music and cultural shows
>impossible to find on commercial radio, WBAI broadcasts
>dozens of news and discussion programs that allow views to
>the left of the Democratic Party to be expressed.
>
>AN ORGANIZING CENTER
>
>The station is also an organizing center for progressive
>activities and meetings in the New York area, both for large
>mass events and for those organized on short notice. It is
>especially noteworthy for its thorough coverage of police
>brutality, the struggle to free political prisoners like
>Mumia Abu-Jamal, Leonard Peltier and Lori Berenson, and
>exposing U.S. human-rights violations worldwide in programs
>like "Democracy Now!".
>
>Beginning in the early 1990s, national Pacifica management
>adopted a plan to make deep structural and programming
>changes that have moved the network away from its original
>progressive, community-based focus.
>
>The Pacifica National Board majority has targeted the
>stations with the most activist and honest news programming--
>KPFA in Berkeley, Calif., and WBAI in New York. Its goal is
>to eliminate these progressive alternatives to the
>monolithic imperialist media that dominate the airwaves.
>
>VALUABLE LICENSES
>
>Because these stations operate in the large San Francisco
>and New York metropolitan areas, their operating licenses
>are also the most economically valuable in the Pacifica
>network. Some board members have promoted a plan to sell off
>one or both stations to finance the network. But the main
>objective is to neutralize Pacifica's political message.
>
>In the spring of 1999, Pacifica management flew from
>Washington to Berkeley to impose a gag order on KPFA staff.
>The Washington management had police come in and arrest
>staffers so that they could impose their own programming.
>Then they ordered the station occupied by security goons at
>a cost of $10,000 a day.
>
>The struggle grew and finally drew in the masses of KPFA
>supporters. On July 31, 1999, some 15,000 people
>demonstrated against the Pacifica National Board and for the
>KPFA journalists who had been fired.
>
>This fall, the national board turned its attention to WBAI,
>focusing its attack on the station's decisions to air Cuban
>President Fidel Castro's speech at Riverside Church, the
>support some of the journalists gave to publicizing Ralph
>Nader's presidential campaign, and Amy Goodman's impromptu
>interview with President Bill Clinton, where she asked tough
>questions instead of submitting to his agenda.
>
>It is just these decisions, many area activists believe,
>that make WBAI worth fighting for.
>
>- END -
>
>(Copyleft Workers World Service: Everyone is permitted to
>copy and distribute verbatim copies of this document, but
>changing it is not allowed. For more information contact
>Workers World, 55 W. 17 St., NY, NY 10011; via e-mail:
>[EMAIL PROTECTED] For subscription info send message to:
>[EMAIL PROTECTED] Web: http://www.workers.org)
>
>
>
>
>
>Message-ID: <06af01c06785$309730e0$[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
>From: "WW" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
>Subject: [WW] Day of Rage in West Bank, Gaza
>Date: Sat, 16 Dec 2000 12:25:30 -0500
>Content-Type: text/plain;
> charset="Windows-1252"
>Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit
>
>-------------------------
>Via Workers World News Service
>Reprinted from the Dec. 21, 2000
>issue of Workers World newspaper
>-------------------------
>
>DAY OF RAGE IN WEST BANK, GAZA AS ISRAEL TARGETS PALESTINIAN INFRASTRUCTURE
>
>By Joyce Chediac
>
>By imposing economic sanctions, sealing borders and
>blockading Palestinian cities, Israel has "devastated the
>economy of the West Bank and Gaza" according to a Dec. 4
>United Nations report. Israel has prevented Palestinian
>workers in the West Bank and Gaza from going to their jobs
>in Israel, stopped the flow of supplies to Palestinian
>factories and held back taxes due the Palestinian Authority.
>
>At the same time, in what Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak
>called "a broad operation against the Palestinian
>infrastructure," the Israeli military is systematically
>bombing the economic base of the West Bank and Gaza. This is
>much the same as past Pentagon bombings targeting the
>civilian infrastructure in Iraq and Yugoslavia.
>
>Under the guise of "retaliation," "destroying sniper hiding
>places" or "protecting Israeli settlers," Israel has
>demolished factories and administrative and police centers
>of the Palestinian Authority, leveled fields and greenhouses
>in an attempt to destroy the economic base for an
>independent Palestinian state.
>
>The oppressed Palestinian people's response to this war
>against them has been to intensify their fight for
>independence and self-determination. Thousands took to the
>streets on Dec. 8 for a "Day of Rage."
>
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