SPC Newsletter 1st August 2017
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THE SOCIALIST PARTY OF CANADA
worldsocialism.org/canada | spc@worldsocialism.org | twitter.com/spc_news
Secretary's Report for August 2017
Email Report
– WSP (India) EC meeting minutes No. 177, Sunday, July 2, 2017, received with thanks.
– WSP (India) Academia.edu, a fast growing website for propagating world socialist ideas, now dissplaying 60 WSP (India) papers and 12 drafts, 15 chapters of a book, and 3 teaching documents.
Good of the Movement
– One introductory package and new member application sent out; SPC welcomes our newest member, Comrade De Bortoli.
– SPC Toronto Branch meeting held Wednesday, 26 July 2017, 6:30pm to 8:30pm, The Second Cup Coffee House, 324 Bloor St W, Toronto. Visit Toronto Branch Facebook for further details: https://web.facebook.com/Toronto-Branch-Socialist-Party-of-Canada-1120836671294008/ & our website https://www.worldsocialism.org/canada/
– Toronto Branch registering for the Word-on-the-Street 2017 book festival. Cost, if successful, C$150.00. Location and date for this event: Sunday, September 24, 2017 Harbourfront Centre | 11:00 am – 6:00 pm.
– SPC@spc_news Twitter account administrated via GAC continues to be highly active. All Twitter correspondence to https://twitter.com/spc_news. With thanks to our volunteers running this site.
– Imagine Sring 2017 released July 2017 – Visit https://www.worldsocialism.org/canada/ for online version (to be uploaded soon) or contact the secretary at spc@worldsocialism.org for a PDF version.
– WSM Members group publicing An Introduction to World Socialism – A Post-Capitalist Society – a brief and well produced video of the case for Socialism. Visit https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZZonz0YE50A&feature=youtu.be
With thanks, Comrades!
– Socialist Party of Canada Facebook public page https://web.facebook.com/socialistpartycanada/ & members' page https://web.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100012582758245
– Ongoing request from Cormade Matt Culbert (SPGB Blog Committee) requesting SPC members use our Imagine Blog, dormant since November 2010. Suggestion is for members to post several times per week. Members, please write in and use this free site – The Imagine Blog http://imaginespc.blogspot.co.uk/
– Socialist content and education website for redistribution & hyperlinking, S. Shenfield (WSPUS)
http://www.whatissocialism.net/
– SPC new email spc@worldsocialism.org.
– Toronto Branch new email spc.toronto@worldsocialism.org.
General Admistrative Committee 2017-2019
– One GAC seat remains vacant.
Finances/Expenses – none to report.
Dues – $25 per year or $2 per month. Funds are used to conduct Party work such as post, photocopies, public meeting expenses and internet url services. All other Party activity is voluntarily run. Members needing dues waivers please contact our treasurer or general secretary to arrange.
Food for Thought
● On June 26, the new Progressive Conservative leader, Andrew Scheer, told the press what he would do if elected. When asked about winning over voters who distrust conservative policies, he said, “the conservative government had an excellent record on infrastructure that did improve the quality of life for people in Toronto and I want to continue that.” Exactly what they did, he neglected to say. On what he learned during the last federal election campaign, he had this to say, “The No.1 lesson I learned is that conservatives have to find a way to articulate a positive message and explain how it’s conservative policies that improve the quality of life for all Canadians;” which is very specific. With amazing gall, Scheer added, “It’s explaining the why and showing Canadians that conservatives are motivated by compassion, they’re motivated by a desire for a better quality of life.” Its doubtful any elector anywhere would believe any politician is motivated by compassion, especially if it got in the way of that other motive, which I think is called the profit motive. There it is folks; a typical political speech couched in generalities, but saying nothing specifically. Anyone who wants Scheer and his kind elected shouldn’t expect much, so they won’t be disappointed.
● A survey commissioned by Historica Canada and conducted by IPSOS asked respondents a variety of questions, most of which were too inane to be mentioned here. One that is worthy of dis-honourable mention is, “What is the best word to define Canada?” The answers were, “Freedom and Liberty.” They certainly had that right, we are all free to be unemployed and at liberty to be homeless. A country in the political context is a means whereby a small minority live well at the expense of the majority, therefore let’s work to abolish countries.
● In its June 27 issue of 24 Hours, the Toronto newssheet, columnist Sabrina Maddeaux, bitched up a storm about manufacturers going gangbusters to cash in on Canada’s 150th birthday. To quote, “Some of the more, shall we say ‘unique,’ items honouring the big anniversary include potato chips, caskets, condoms, $500 hair dryers, bars of soap, artisanal gummy candies and bottles of vodka. The opportunities to slap a maple leaf and a little bit of red and white on products seem endless.” Our girl ain’t finished yet; she also complained that many of these products weren’t made in Canada and that some were made in Bangladesh, “where workers are severely underpaid and mistreated.” It’s time for Ms. Maddeaux to get real. The profit motive is the driving force of capitalism, therefore instances like the above will always happen. If one doesn’t like it; and what is there to like?, one “can” do something about it.
● In the same issue of 24 Hours, investigative reporter, Phil Gillies, commented on the drug scene in buildings “controlled” by the Toronto Community Housing Corporation. According to Gillies, dealers could walk the hallways as freely as walking down the street. Security cameras had their wires cut and their lenses spray painted. Drug dealers came and went every five minutes. Under Ontario Law, if a person is admitted by a tenant, they are not trespassing; they are guests. Eviction procedures are lengthy and often ineffective. It can take years to remove a drug dealer from social housing. THCH lacks the resources to present a solid case to the Landlord and Tenant Board. There is, though, one sure way to deal with the problem, which is to establish a society where no one will wish to use narcotics.
Cash crass nexus of Canada 150
● The Bank of Canada raised its interest rate from 0.5 per cent to 0.75 per cent, on July 12. This was its first increase in nearly seven years. The hike was caused by expectations of stronger economic growth in 2017. It will raise the cost of mortgages, lines of credit and other loans linked to the prime rates of Canadian banks. What it will not raise are wages and salaries.
● A massive iceberg – double the volume of Lake Erie – broke off from the Larsen Ice Shelf in Antarctica during the first week in July. Scientists said it was a natural phenomenon unrelated to global change. Of course it was; 1 trillion tonne icebergs split off from ice shelfs all the time.
● Boxer, Floyd Mayweather, has 2 haircuts each week, and occasionally 3, each of which cost $1,000 US. Furthermore everywhere he goes he carries a briefcase with $1,000,000 in it, because, “I may see something I want to buy.” When one considers millions of folk have to live on less than a buck a day, doesn’t it suggest there is something seriously wrong in the society we live in?
● In June, SEARS Canada said it planned to close 59 stores and cut 2900 jobs without severance pay under the companies creditors arrangement act. What makes the whole situation so weird is SEARS plan to pay $9.2 million in retention bonuses to those whoare not being laid off, many of whom, but not all, are in management. But then whoever, “said capitalism and sense go hand in hand?”
● A report on North Korean workers in Russia, issued by the Database Centre for North Korean Human Rights, and organization in Seoul, said the Workers Party of Korea seizes 80 per cent of the wages earned by them. More money is taken to cover living expenses, mandatory contributions to a so called loyalty fund, and other donations. In other words they work for close to nothing, which is like it was in the major industrialized countries just after the industrial revolution. So things, basically, don’t change much under capitalism, which is one of many reasons it should be abolished.
● Scientists at Stanford University, recently issued a report, claiming that significant animal population decline and possible mass extinction of species, all over the world, may be imminent, and that both have been underestimated by other scientists. The study, published on July 10, by the National Academy of Scientists, said the reduction of species have been, and are still, being caused by destruction of the habitat, carbon pollution and climate change. Most people are aware this was occurring, but weren’t aware it was so rapid. One thing the scientists didn’t say, was that we, the human race, is an endangered species too.
– Sinclair's Musings –
This month we take a bit of a foray into the world of fiction commenting on wage-slavery in the “land of the free” from over a hundred years ago. It's a handy parable how capitallism swindles profits from wage slaves while wages go up, and we wonder if anything much has changed in a hundred and eleven years since it was written. We hardly think so! Seems nothing is new under the sun when it comes to capitalists duping workers to produce faster while they lose — slaves running to stand still. “All day long this man would toil thus, his whole being centered upon the purpose of making twenty-three instead of twenty-two and a half cents an hour; and then his product would be reckoned up by the census taker, and jubilant captains of industry would boast of it in their banquet halls, telling how our workers are nearly twice as efficient as those of any other country. If we are the greatest nation the sun ever shone upon, it would seem to be mainly because we have been able to goad our wage-earners to this pitch of frenzy.”
The Jungle, 1906. Upton Sinclair
For socialism, Steve, Mehmet and John
Socialist literature for your further interest & edification
– WSP (India) History of Economics: A Scientigfic Investigation into the Political Economy and Its Swindler 'Economics' published. 50.00 Rupees/CD$1-1.50. Contact E-mail: wspindia@hotmail.com; Website: http://www.worldsocialistpartyindia.org for more information to purchase.
– Red Lion Press:
Revolutionary Socialist: Life of the Socialist Party of Canada and the OBU, 1910-1922.
Fred Casey's Thinking: An Introduction To Its History and Science.
Method in Thinking: An Introduction to Dialectics.
Costs: $3 for Pritchard, $6 each for the Casey's plus postage costs. Contact E-mail: redlionpress@hotmail.com or enquire with the publisher: https://web.facebook.com/search/more/?q=Larry+Gambone&init=public
Greetings Everyone,
We hope you are all well.
Attached is our August 2017 Monthly Report for your interest and review.
Our Spring/Summer 2017 Imagine is now out and can be found at our website or by email.
Please also note our Comrades across the Atlantic have published a fine new video, An Introduction to World Socialism – A Post-Capitalist Society. Find details how to locate it in this month's report.
Keep also directing your correspondences to our Twitter account, SPC@spc_news – https://twitter.com/spc_news, and making new socialists.
Yours for Socialism,
John, Mehmet, Steve & GAC members
General Secretary, Socialist Party of Canada
PO Box 31024 Victoria BC Canada V8N 6J3
https://www.worldsocialism.org/canada/
https://twitter.com/spc_news
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