Last week’s killing of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson has unexpectedly made the suspect a folk hero and triggered a tsunami of class rage over the US’s barbaric healthcare system. This sudden surge in class consciousness is a hopeful sign for revolutionaries, but it also shows that it will take more than lone avengers to combat the capitalist class.
Stalinist academic Grover Furr has dedicated his career to zealous defense of the Soviet Union with cherrypicked data and crude falsehoods. His latest book, Trotsky’s Comintern Conspiracy, is no exception. Filled with conspiracy theories and pseudoscience, it justifies Stalin’s show trials with the logic of fairy tales and the Inquisition.
Maoism is a political tradition with enduring appeal on the left, especially for its association with the Chinese revolution and other liberation movements. Thus it is important to understand the ways Maoism diverges from Marxism. Maoism’s orientation on guerrilla warfare, its view of “labor aristocracy,” and its dismissal of the self-emancipation of the working class contradict revolutionary socialism and are doomed to failure.
What does the election say about current consciousness? Are a majority of Americans now MAGA racists? People approach elections pragmatically. The majority decides how to vote on the basis of lesser-evilism. They estimate which candidate will be better for themselves...
This article is a partisan intervention. Being a communist means taking sides, specifically the side of the international working class and all oppressed peoples. As Marx and Engels wrote, communists “have no interests separate and apart from those of the proletariat...
Read part one here: Why Socialists Don’t Vote for Our Enemies Won’t it be easier to organize under a Democrat? All else being equal, probably not. The variables at work in determining the prospects for working-class organization go beyond which party is in the White...
As imperialism keeps intensifying through new and expanding military operations around the world in the drive to access new markets for the capitalist class, communists must understand why we should view soldiers as workers. We also need to consider how to persuade...
Is fascism an immediate threat in the US, or anywhere else? A lot of people with different kinds of politics seem to think so. As someone who looks at the leftist corners of the internet quite a bit, I can safely say I see the word “fascism” used to describe things...
Read Samidoun’s statement: We keep resisting: US and Canada sanction Samidoun. “The first casualty of war is truth.”—Aeschylus On October 15, the US government sanctioned the Palestinian prisoner support network, Samidoun, and declared it a “sham charity” that...
Sir,We congratulate the American people upon your re-election by a large majority.If resistance to the slave power was the reserved watchword of your first election, the triumphant warcry of your re-election is, Death to Slavery.— Karl Marx to Abraham Lincoln,...
Firebrand attended the annual Socialism Conference in Chicago over Labor Day weekend. The four-day event gathered socialists and other radicals from all over the United States, and featured dozens of panels and discussions on many subjects relevant to the broad left. ...
In his 1997 text “The Metaphysics of National Bolshevism,” the Russian fascist philosopher Aleksandr Dugin said the coming together of the political left and right under the banner of national Bolshevism represented the future: The rule of National Bolshevism, its...
Read part two here: Marxists and Elections: FAQs Joe Biden’s withdrawal from the presidential race and the candidacy of Kamala Harris has changed the character of the coming election. Instead of just another in the endless, monotonous slog of election cycles, with the...
The outbreak of civil war in Sudan in April 2023 plunged the country into one of the world’s most devastating humanitarian crises. The current war, pitting against each other two reactionary forces — the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) and the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) —...
What will it take to liberate Palestine? It starts, of course, with the heroism and sumud (steadfastness) of Palestinians we’ve witnessed over the past 75 years. That’s why Firebrand supports Palestinian resistance in all its forms. But international action is also...
The Black Antifascist Tradition, by Jeanelle K. Hope and Bill Mullen, is an extensive overview of the politics of anti-racist struggles by Black people in the United States. Published earlier this year by Haymarket Books, it is, first of all, a very interesting and...
The religious right-wing, made up largely of white evangelicals, holds a great deal of political power in the United States. They form a formidable voting bloc, with presidential candidates seeking and depending on their endorsement. As a dominant force among...
The eruption of Gaza solidarity encampments on college campuses around the world has been a welcome and unexpected shot in the arm for the Palestine liberation movement. In hindsight, the pot simmered on campuses for months before boiling over. Last fall, universities...
Karl Kautsky’s grandson John told a very revealing anecdote about attitudes towards his grandfather in the 1960s. He recalled a historian named Georges Haupt, who had many discussions among students about the history of the Second International. During those talks,...
In Marxist theory, primitive accumulation is, as Marx defined it in Capital Volume I, “the historical process of divorcing the producer from the means of production.” Occurring at different times in different regions around the world, primitive accumulation is the...
Auraria Campus, Denver Report by James Radek A protest encampment in solidarity with Palestine was established on Thursday, April 25 on Denver’s Auraria Campus, which is home to the University of Colorado Denver, Metropolitan State University, and Community College of...
On April 13, 2024, the President of Hobart and William Smith Colleges in New York state summarily dismissed Jodi Dean, professor of politics, from her teaching position at the institution. The dismissal is ostensibly temporary, pending an investigation into claims...
Fascism arose in the 20th century as a capitalist response to its own crises and the increased threat of the communist movement after the Russian Revolution. Fascism is a symptom of capitalism in decay, and is especially centered on the ruined petty bourgeoisie and...
According to the dominant view on the broad liberal-left, to achieve progressive change we must elect officials with progressive politics. Liberalism claims we can eliminate the problems inherent in capitalism without eliminating capitalism itself, and by using the...