Rouge Forum Update--1-25-09--from Rich

Dear Friends,

An up front reminder on the Rouge Forum Conference, May 14 to 17, in Ypsilanti Michigan. Proposals due very soon. http://web.mac.com/wayne.ross/Rouge_Forum_Conference_2009/Welcome.html

Centered in the key organizing point of North American life, the Rouge Forum represents the only voice of the left, recognizing that at the core of our many crises, economic collapse to perpetual war and all in between, lies the system of capital. This conference represents a gathering of people who have learned that friendship can arch over political differences. Come join us!

From Monthly Review, here is one of the better economic analyses of why things are as they are in the growing depression. http://www.monthlyreview.org/081201foster-magdoff.php This is the conclusion: "In this sense we are clearly at a global turning point, where the world will perhaps finally be ready to take the step, as Keynes also envisioned, of repudiating an alienated moral code of “fair is foul and foul is fair”­used to justify the greed and exploitation necessary for the accumulation of capital­turning it inside-out to create a more rational social order. 49 To do this, though, it is necessary for the population to seize control of their political economy, replacing the present system of capitalism with something amounting to a real political and economic democracy; what the present rulers of the world fear and decry most­as “socialism.” 50"

What is missing from the analysis is the dual role of war. It was war that ended the last depression, not Keynesian hyper-spending, and it is also imperialist war that lies, in part, at the base of the current deepening collapse.

And from YouTube, here is Noam Chomsky on the election, capitalist democracy (those who spend most, win, among other things) and what is next http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LSHD9JzXJvI&feature=related (part one of three).

The take on election results from the Daily Show: http://www.thedailyshow.com/video/index.jhtml?videoId=216538&title=changefest-09-obamas-inaugural
<http://www.thedailyshow.com/video/index.jhtml?videoId=216538&title=changefest-09-obamas-inaugural>

Michael Klare hoping for the unlikely event; that Obama will abolish the Carter Doctrine on Mideast Oil http://www.fpif.org/fpiftxt/5809

Reminder of the March on the Pentagon on the anniversary of the Iraq invasion, March 21, Washington DC. https://www.natassembly.org/About_Us.html

Short update this week, but plenty of reading.

Thanks to Amber, Tom, Bob, Adam and Gina, Karl, Dave, Glenn, Candy, Sharon A, Lucy, Michael, Dell, Mary, Chris, Ruthann, Paul, Zoey, Carl G, Sandy, Van, and Tina.

best
r