English

From BBC website

I'm totally in favour of Poland's election victors, Civic Platform's (PO) proposal to introduce a flat {-ulence}tax proposal of 15%. It will be of great benefit to everybody's health and the world's environment at large. For a long time now I have been telling friends, without much effect I should say, about the harm cows are doing to the environment with their pugnant methane. We humans are fairly innocent compared to the globally warming stench they omit on a daily basis. Seriously, let's look at the science.

Anarchist and libertarian news agencies around the world have had news of a victorious bus drivers' strike in Poland. Although some people think that the drivers "have control" over the company, what they really have is a bunch of stocks and a business in debt which will have to be restructured.

For those who haven't read anything about this, bus drivers in Kielce went on strike action after the city announced its plans to sell the municipal bus company to private investors. The drivers fought bravely, even when cops and private security guards came to rough them up. 17 days into the strike, after workers had even managed to occupt offices and had to be violenty removed, the mayor, who had vowed never to give into the strikers, suddenly announced that the workers could run the company and that they'd be guaranteed a monopoly in the city (despite the fact that this isn't legal).

For those workers' activists who support the capitalist workers' shareholder schemes called workers' companies, this means that "the workers had the company in their own hands". The reality of the matter is a little different.

* With a lot of rhetoric and propaganda the Chavez administration has advanced different examples of co-management which, they claim, demonstrate their desire to transform Venezuela’s relations of production. A compañero from Europe visited us recently and got to know two of the most celebrated cases: Alcasa and Invepal. Here is the report he prepared for El Libertario # 51 about the actual working conditions in the country’s most “important” co-managed businesses.

Poland: Anarchists boycott elections. Problems of the anti-election campaign and an explanation of the candidates and issues.

Today, Oct. 21, early elections will be held in Poland. The decision to hold snap elections was made after the minority government lost its coalition partners and its failure to work together with any other party became apparent. There had been talk of possible early elections way before they were announced, so anarchists prepared a couple of boycott posters.

The anarchist campaign against elections is already well-known in Poland as it has been going on for many years. It is often mentioned in the mainstream media, especially acts of altering campaign billboards. For example this year political marketing analysts who were commenting on the effectiveness of different billboard campaigns showed one particular billboard on TV. The social democrats, who had sent troops to Iraq and Afganistan, had a slogan “Smart government without stupid wars”. The “stupid wars” referred to the bitter fighting going on in the government. Anarchists added on to the billboard ‘except our stupid wars in Iraq and Afganistan”. The experts congratulated the anarchists and warned politicians that their slogans had to be “anarchist proof”. So anarchists reminded the left voters again about the militaristic, pro-US habits of that party.

A good example of an anarchist billboard can be seen here:
https://cia.media.pl/akcja_bilbordowa This billboard went up in the center of Warsaw just before the elections and says that “every authority is the enemy of freedom – boycott the elections”. It shows the leaders of all the parties in government, although for some reason it doesn’t show the leader of the social democrats, put has the ex-president, ideological leader of that party, instead. In other cities, anarchists put up posters, made newspapers or leaflets and generally agitated against elections. In the city of Opole, there was an internet poll about the boycott campaign asking people what they thought. Although a majority (55%) were against, 30% were sympathetic to it and 15% supported it.

Many, if not most, people would agree that all politicians are shit. But does that mean they support the election boycott?

At October 6, NATO had military excercises in Croatia. While political and military "elites" visited happening, anarchists organized protests in Zagreb, Pula and Split. Anarchists wanted to show that there is someone who is against participation of Croatia in this military alliance. Better to do something than to watch everything with apathy. Already longer time groups like FoodNotBombs make actions called No NATO! Beside them, there are anarcho-syndicalists and queer-anarchists who participate together with them in such actions.

Incumbent Prime Minister of Poland, Jaroslaw 'Daffy Duck' Kaczynski

Laughter has the potential to cure many ailments, and for Polish people it is a key a remedy to deal with the potential prospect of 4 more years under the conservative authoritarian Kaczynski twins, Donald and Daffy......uhh, err, aah, sorry about that slip, I mean Lech (Donald) and Jaroslaw (Daffy). You see, such humorous errors have even creeped into the writings of bright people like myself.

Abolishing the Borders from Below # 30 (October 2007)

New edition of “Abolishing the Borders from Below” – an anarchist journal from Eastern Europe just went out from print and in next days will be available at your local distributors of anarchist press.

ABB#30, October 2007, comes with 80 pages of news, reports, presentations and analyses on anarchist activities and social struggles around Eastern Europe. This issue includes four bigger chapters, “Mental Health in Sick Sociaty”, “No Border”, “Don’t Vote – Organize!” and “Anti-militaristic”, as well as dozens of further articles. Here exact presentation of the content:

Most countries throughout the world hold their elections on a day when the majority of people don't work - Saturday or Sunday, for example. Odd countries like the U.S. have elections on Tuesdays, usually between 6am-9pm so people have a fairly good window to get to their local station and vote. That is unless they are a nasty capitalist working most of the day exploiting people, or are the employee/exploitee of the nasty capitalist and despite working lots of overtime you get no extra pay.

Other weird countries, like Britain, hold their voting on Thursday. It may have something got to do with the amounts of alcohol consumed between Thursday 9pm and Sunday 11pm but I can't support that statement with any evidence.

Other odd countries have legislation to the effect that one can get off work 4 hours before the poll stations close. That is, if they close at 8pm, one has the right to be excused from work at 4pm. Pretty cool if you are anarchist and have no intention of voting, but can still get off work early.

The following are factors that election bureaucrats take into consideration when figuring out why Poles, who need a lot encouragement and brainwashing to vote (seen as they have the lowest voter turnout in the E.U.), should not vote on any other day apart from Sunday.

Poles are certainly making their mark in Ireland. The masses have integrated very well into Irish culture and daily life especially since the colossal exodus after May 1st 2004, the day Poland acceeded to the E.U.

Is Dublin to become 'Little Warsaw?'

In addition, independent Polish newspapers and magazines have sprouted alongside Irish newspapers' supplements to attract the growing Polish market; shops and restaurants provide an abundance of pierogi and bigos; Catholic masses in Polish keep immigrants adhering to their traditional faith; government agencies, banks and most other major economic institutions have literature, website pages translated into Polish; cultural centres provide spaces for people to touch base and source useful information on work and entertainment.

In the Polish city of Opole, anarchists are, like their comrades around the country, participating in anti-election campaigning. Among the different posters they are putting up is the famous old anarchist standard "Every politician is a two-faced whore" which is one of the main subjects of interest in the local press. The tough criticism of the political circus made by anarchists is the subject of an internet poll; as of publication, about 45% of readers are somewhat or totally sympathetic to the anarchists. The newspaper also tells the public where they can download anti-election posters themselves, from the pages of the Anarchist Federation.

In Moscow there has been a growing movement of residents fighting against the uncontrolled construction of luxury housing. The buildings going up are not only unaffordable for most people, but often are built in parks or public space between housing blocks. They often block the view of other residents, destroy all public and green areas and sometimes even are built in such a way that threaten the foundations of less stable buildings. The usual gentrification process often also takes place, displacing the poorer residents from areas they can no longer afford to live in.

Many of the protests have included direct actions such as blocking streets or construction work. Anarchists have been taking part in these actions.

On Oct.8, there was an action in Moscow and 19 people were arrested including 6 members and sympathizers of KRAS, the Russian section of the IWA. The arrested anarchists were kept overnight and beaten. One of them was forced to go to court and was sentenced to 4 days in jail and a fine of 2000 roubles. The rest decided that they would refuse to appear in court in an act of protest.

Poles on patrol in Iraq
The Polish Ministry of Defence has announced that a public debate on the presence of Polish troops in Iraq should be engaged in after the upcoming election, due to take place on October 21st. Government officials are annoyed that the Opposition parties have been using the issue against them, knowing that the vast majority of Poles favour a rapid withdrawal from the theatre of war.

What was the prudent information that lead to the raids being actioned yesterday, October 15? And what is the connection between the United nations and these raids?

On 14 September 2007, New Zealand was one of only four nations to vote against the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, speaking against the declaration just prior to the vote.

The landmark declaration, approved after 143 Member States voted in favour, outlines the rights of the world’s estimated 370 million indigenous people and outlaws discrimination against them – a move that followed more than two decades of debate.

Polish bishops lick State ass - again
The Polish bishops were wrong to put out an appeal to their flock on Sunday: Voting on 'Election Day' is not an 'obligation', but rather an 'automation'. And for many who are sour with the Law and Justice Party's 2 year rule, it will be a form of desperation to kick them out - desperation to the point that they may very well vote into parliament a Law and Justice-lite party who will try to privatise grass, air, birds, water, garbage collection and everything else they can get their greedy hands on.

On October 12, the Spanish Falangist Movement organized celebrations to commemorate "the Day of the Hispanic World" in Donostia - San Sebastian. Antifascists decided to organize an anti-fascist festival and try to block the arrival of the Falangists.

Eight busloads of Falangist shitheads plus many private cars headed off to San Sebastian - but they couldn't get to the center of the town. Apparently thousands of people took to the streets and barricaded the roads.