Author: icsswpadmin

8 Years Before Donbas Documentary Filmmaker – Don Courter – January 15, 2023 – 10:30 AM Pacific Time

8 Years Before is an independently-funded documentary film directed by international journalist Donald Courter and produced collaboratively with international heavyweight fighting champion Jeff Monson.

The film portrays in stark detail the long saga of suffering that the Donbass people endured at the hands of the Ukrainian military, following the 2014 Euromaidan coup d’etat. Through primary source accounts and interviews with ordinary citizens of Donbass, human stories with a perspective never before seen in the mainstream media are brought to light.

Speaker: Jeff Monson Moscow-based filmmaker, international heavyweight fighting champion, and activist. He is the co-producer of 8 Years Before

Read More

The Volatility of US Hegemony in Latin America – Roger Harris – Sunday Dec 18, 2022 10:30 AM Pacific Time

Latin America and the Caribbean have taken on a becoming pink complexion, all the more so
with historic left victories this year in Colombia and Brazil. These electoral rejections of the
rightwing followed left victories last year in Peru, Honduras, and Chile. And those, in turn, came
after similar routs in Bolivia in 2020, Argentina in 2019, and Mexico in 2018.
This surging “Pink Tide” protests the neoliberal model imposed by the US and its collaborators.
Neoliberalism has failed to meet the needs of the peoples of the region and is losing its
legitimacy as a prototype for development. However, the countries of the region must of
necessity engage in a world financial order dominated by the US, which circumscribes the
possibilities for developing their economies successfully.
The limitations of the social democratic politics, the emerging role of China in the hemisphere,
and the future of explicitly socialist Cuba, Nicaragua, and Venezuela will be addressed.

Our speaker, Roger Harris, taught political science at a Historically Black College in
Mississippi in the late 1960s and did community organizing in East Harlem. Roger is currently
on the state central committee of the Peace and Freedom Party and on the board of the human
rights organization, Task Force on the Americas. He is on the program committee of the Niebyl-
Proctor Marxist Library and the executive committee of the US Peace Council. He is active in
the #FreeAlexSaab and the SanctionsKill campaigns. His political writings may be found at
Counterpunch, Dissident Voice, Mint Press News, Popular Resistance, and the Orinoco Tribune.
For further reading, see: https://popularresistance.org/the-volatility-of-us-hegemony-in-latin-
america-part-iii/.

Read More

Iran’s Role in the Anti-imperialist Struggle – Bahman Azad – Sunday, Dec 11, 2022 10:30 AM Pacific Time

Our program will address current events in Iran and the international reaction to them. US-led forces are exploiting events in Iran to push for violent regime change. Unilateral and illegal economic sanctions imposed by the US are killing Iranians. These sanctions are responsible for much of the Iranian people’s suffering and anger. They have served as a background for the outburst of different protests and are intentionally aimed at destabilizing the Iranian society through instigating a “velvet revolution.” Iran is targeted by the imperialists because of its key role in an emerging multipolar world through strategic alliances with countries and movements such as Syria, Russia, China, and Venezuela, and Hezbollah.

Read More

Racism, Anti-Communsim and the CPUSA’s Struggle Against Both in U.S. History – Norman Markowitz – Sunday, December 4, 2022 10:30 AM Pacific Time

“Every Liberal is a Socialist. Every Socialist is a Communist. Every Communist is Moscow’s Spy.” So went a poster used in an anti-May Day “Loyalty Day” march in the high cold war period after WWII.

But anti-Communism went far beyond traditional conservative and reactionary groups and became the foundation of a “cold war consensus” for U.S. domestic and foreign policy in the post WWII period. In my presentation I will examine the relationship between color racism as the model for anti-radicalism at home and in U.S. imperialism abroad, and the role of the Communist Party USA in its struggle against both.

Norman Markowitz was born in 1943 and grew up in the South Bronx. He attended the then free tuition City College of New York (1962-1966) and the University of Michigan on a “National Defense Act” Fellowship and received his PhD in 1970. He taught history at Northern Illinois University (1969-1971) and at Rutgers University/New Brunswick (1971-present).
He has written numerous articles for various print and internet publications, scholarly journals, encyclopedia, and Marxist and Communist publications and websites on topics which include the history of the Communist movement in the U.S. and its activists, and the role of anti-Communism in U.S. history.
He served on the editorial board of Political Affairs, the theoretical journal of the CPUSA for many years and is currently a member of the International Department of the CPUSA.

Read More