Posts by issue number/Posteos por número de la edición

During my now 65 years as a political activist, I have witnessed many things, three of which I want to single out as being of lasting significance. My appreciation of each of them today comes not so much from my “having been there,” but from an understanding of their significance gained over time, with the help and input of many comrades and friends.

1. THE SIXTIES

There is a mistaken impression that “the sixties” was an American phenomenon. What we now call “the sixties,” was actually a global upsurge of resistance and revolution extending from the late fifties through the mid-seventies. It embraced both rebellions in the advanced capitalist countries as well as socialist and anti-colonial revolutions in the Third World. 1968 alone was a year of global rebellion much like 1848. It saw the student-worker revolt in France, the Tet Offensive in Vietnam, the explosion of the Cultural Revolution in China, the massacre of student demonstrators in Mexico, the popular resistance to the Russian invasion of Czechoslovakia, the birth of the Palestinian resistance at the battle of Karameh, the Naxalite rebellion in India, martial law declared in Uruguay in response to the Tupamaros, as well as the urban uprisings in the U.S. following the assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr. and the growth of the Black Panther Party. (See my chronology of 1968 posted on www.dissident.info.)

What is important to take away from the particular experience in the U.S. is what a growing revolutionary situation can look like. It is commonplace for people who were not there, or for people who were there but have been “recouped” by the ruling class, to sneer at how foolish people must have been to think that there could have been a revolution. Really? Let's take a look.

The first ingredient of a revolutionary situation is a severe crisis in the ruling class that causes it to split and not be able to rule in the old ways. Such a political crisis does not necessarily arise from an economic crisis. In fact, the period of so much intense upsurge in the sixties, during which the ruling class was very much thrown on the defensive politically, coincided with the peak economic power of the U.S. globally.

What did happen was that masses of people threw off their superstitious awe of the state and seized the political initiative away from the ruling class. People labeled the police as pigs. Soldiers in Vietnam refused to obey orders and rolled hand grenades into the tents of officers who were too gung-ho. Students burned down dozens of ROTC buildings. Women flat-out rejected the institutions of patriarchy. There were massive urban revolts in the U.S. and a growing Black liberation movement. The state had lost legitimacy in the eyes of millions.

One result was a furious debate within the ruling class over how to handle the situation and regain control. Should there be a repressive clamp-down or should people be bought off with temporary concessions? The intensity of the struggle eventually led to a situation where both the president and vice president were forced to resign and the country had a president and a vice president who were appointed, not elected. That's what a crisis in the ruling class can look like. (For light entertainment, I recommend people read former Vice President Spiro Agnew's memoir Go Quietly... or Else.)

The second requirement of a revolutionary situation is a revolutionary-minded people. They don’t have to be a majority, but they do have to be a significant force. In the ’60s there was a great awakening to the reality that the “American Dream” was actually an American nightmare for so many people here and around the world. While there was no deep understanding of what an actual revolution would require, literally millions of people came to believe that the existing system was hopelessly flawed and what was required was a “revolution.” Far from being a social stigma, there was a great deal of approbation for people who called themselves revolutionaries.

People also began to act on their new self-identity. It was immoral to remain a passive observer. Demonstrations in Washington became so militant that the Nixon administration took to surrounding the White House with a wall of buses for fear that people would storm the seat of executive power. The call to shut Washington down in May of 1971 resulted in such an outpouring that the Army was called in to defend the capital and over 12,000 people were arrested—the largest mass arrest in U.S. history.

But while we at least had a start on the first two requirements of a revolutionary situation, what we did not have was the third ingredient: a revolutionary party with the determination, the understanding, the plan, the leadership, the organization among the people, and the program for a post-revolutionary society that could both galvanize and lead a successful seizure of power. Even the most advanced force in that time, the Black Panther Party, never sat down and seriously addressed the question of what it would take to actually overthrow the state and lead a new revolutionary society.

2. THE GREAT PROLETARIAN CULTURAL REVOLUTION

Few people today are familiar with even the outlines of the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution (GPCR), and it is probably the single most lied about event in world history. It was an amazing ten-year mass upsurge in China led by Mao Zedong to break the power of the entrenched revisionist “communists” who wanted to follow the path of the Soviet Union, a path that would—and ultimately did—lead to the restoration of capitalism. 

It was my privilege to have visited China twice during the latter half of the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution. As with the sixties, my understanding of what happened in this momentous world event comes more from study after the fact and from the insights of others, than from my own personal observations. That said, it was still amazing to see with my own eyes!

While books and films on the GPCR correctly focus on the demonstrations, mass meetings and “big character posters” that were at the heart of the struggle for power, one aspect of the GPCR that is little recognized is that it produced the most massive political education program in human history. At each point, the entire country was mobilized to read and discuss the same major theoretical work. When I was there in 1972, people were studying Anti-Dühring by Engels and in 1975 it was Marx's Critique of the Gotha Program. At one point I kind of naively asked if they really had enough copies of Anti-Dühring for everyone to read. I was told in a rather matter-of-fact way that the state publishing house had just run off another 50 million copies. Now that's taking study seriously!

Another often forgotten aspect of the GPCR that impressed me so much were the “socialist new things.” I wrote about these at the time. These were experiments from below in forging new social and economic relations at a local level that presaged what a future communist society might look like. There were places where local communities consciously turned what had been commodities into social services. The use of these services was no longer linked to or exchanged for money earned by the recipients of those services. People used what they needed and contributed to the common weal in other ways. 

In 1972, I visited a small village near the Daqing oil field in Manchuria. In this village, the women all worked—but in different sectors of the socialist economy. Some women worked in the fields as part of the local agricultural commune. They were paid mostly “in kind” from the crops. Some other women worked in a small local co-op factory that manufactured tacks. These women were paid from the money received from selling their tacks to the state. Finally, some women had jobs in the oil field and were paid cash wages directly by the state.

The interesting fact here is that all the women worked hard, yet they received quite different incomes that were based on the differing economic productivity of their labor. The women who worked in the fields had the lowest income. The women from the tack factory were in the middle. The women who worked in the oil field made the most, because the productivity of the state-owned oil field was the highest.

The women in the village were all involved in studying Marx and they were wrestling with a theoretical question: They understood why some of them made more money than others. But did it have to stay this way? They didn’t think so. So, they decided to pool their incomes from the three different sources and divide the money more evenly. This was a startling break with the laws of exchange in a market-based economy. It was, in fact, revolutionary! It was a step toward communism, made by people consciously breaking with the concepts of “cash value” and private ownership as natural and inevitable.

In the end, the socialist transition to communism was defeated in both the Soviet Union and in China; capitalism was restored. “Living labor” was once again subordinated to “dead labor” (capital as accumulated labor). The slogan “Serve the People” was replaced with the slogan “To get rich is glorious.” The great lessons learned under the leadership of Mao were that the revolutionary seizure of power is only the beginning, not the final goal, and that you cannot “produce your way to communism” by increasing the level of material abundance. The period of socialist transition is much more characterized by intense class struggle over changing economic and social relations that requires a leading core that is consciously striving for a classless society. 

3. THE BIRTH OF THE NEW COMMUNISM OF BOB AVAKIAN

The most important and lasting thing to come from the sixties is the new communism of Bob Avakian. Avakian is the architect of a new framework for human emancipation and is, without question, the Karl Marx of our time.

The defeat of socialism in the Soviet Union and China presented a big issue to “sixties people.” But Avakian refused to accept the triumphalist conclusions of the propagandists for capitalism. He has now spent over 50 years investigating what actually happened and has upheld the tremendous achievements of the Russian and Chinese revolutions. But he then dug into not only what was done right, but why mistakes (some of them quite grave) were made. With what method and approach did the leaders of these revolutionary societies address the freedoms and necessities they confronted? And how might we today do it differently and far better?

I will try to lay out what I see as some of Avakian’s important conclusions and insights, but no one should take my observations as “authoritative” and they certainly do not replace the need to actually read Avakian’s basic works.

What Avakian highlights is the failure to be thoroughly scientific; scientific meaning to bring one’s ideas into correlation with reality and not wishful thinking. Too often, 20th century communism (the “old communism”) fell into an almost religious approach, substituting belief for reality. One striking example was the teleological claim that communism is inevitable. Communism is NOT inevitable; it is possible, there is a material basis for it, but it is not inevitable.

I think what has impressed me the most in Avakian’s work is his new conception of socialism. Too many people today think of a socialist state as one with a “mixed economy” in which capitalism is restrained by the power of representative democracy while the state guarantees a basic standard of living and medical care for all.

By contrast, Avakian has built on Marx’s concept of socialism as a period of transition in which the class dictatorship of the capitalist class is replaced by the class dictatorship of propertyless working people and their allies. The conscious goals of this transition are an economy governed by social needs rather than by a commodity market, and an end to the necessity for one section of society to hold institutionalized power over the rest.

Another way of characterizing these goals was stated by Marx:  the abolition of all class distinctions, of all the production relations on which those class distinctions rest, of all the social relations that correspond to those production relations, and the revolutionizing of all the ideas that correspond to those social relations.

But a barrier to masses of people taking up this understanding was the too frequent suppression of critical thinking by the old communism. In contrast, Avakian calls for a socialist society with room to disagree and “air” for people to breathe. While maintaining socialist state power against any violent attempts to restore capitalism, the new socialist state is best characterized as having a solid core with a lot of elasticity. Communists should never fear the truth and should encourage dissent, because all truths can be learned from.

Avakian points out that contradictions can arise between the people and a socialist state. While the socialist state has to protect the people from external enemies and any forceful restoration of capitalism, the socialist state also has to protect the rights of the people from the state itself. Of particular importance is Avakian’s insistence that communists lead the state mainly through ideological and political influence and not through organizational control. Members of the communist party must be subordinate to the law and the constitution of the socialist state, and are afforded no special privileges by virtue of being members of the party. 

In particular, Avakian calls not only for the right of people to criticize the state and even call for the restoration of capitalism, but further, the state should in part fund such criticism and also fund the legal defense of persons prosecuted by the state to the same extent that the state funds their prosecution. This is a concept of legal rights that no capitalist state has ever dared espouse.

Avakian has also sharply criticized the ideas that truth has a class basis (rather than truth being objective) and that working and oppressed people have a special purchase on truth simply by virtue of being exploited or oppressed. From this flowed the faulty idea that just putting working people in positions of power, rather than fighting for all of society to have a deeper understanding of the path to classless society, would solve the problems.

Another example of faulty analysis in the old communism is the idea that the basis for communism is material abundance, from which flowed the idea that a socialist state could just “produce its way to communism.” There is a certain required level of abundance to have a communist economy, but the principal necessity is the change in people’s thinking and social relations—not how much material wealth there is to go around.

The old communism also did not always do well with issues of internationalism. The goal of communist revolution is not the improvement of the lives of the people in a given country, but rather the global emancipation of humanity from the fetters of capital. As Avakian points out, the principal task of a communist country is to serve as a base area for world revolution. Yet too often communist leaders succumbed to nationalism and concentrated on the interests of their own country.

Plus, there was a serious failure in the moral underpinnings for communism and the road to get there. The new communism of Bob Avakian is firm in holding that the ends do not justify the means. Crimes cannot be committed on the grounds that they will get us closer to communism. Rather, communist means must always flow from and be consistent with the goals of communism.

Like Marx, Avakian has been a prolific commentator on current events and has provided invaluable guidance. In particular, he has over the last forty years documented and warned of the rise of Christian nationalism and fascism in this country. (Here, see Bob Avakian’s Work on Fascism: 1996-2025.) People in Germany might have had the excuse that “no one could have seen what was coming.” People in this country cannot claim that excuse.

At the same time, Avakian has looked much more deeply into the path for revolution in developed capitalist countries, and the deadly pull on even the best-intentioned people toward overestimating the strength of necessity and underestimating the freedom that exists to transform that necessity—ultimately leading them to either denying the possibility of, or just sitting and waiting for, a revolution. Instead, what is required is an active analysis of the fault lines of the existing society and constant straining at the limits of the possible with a concrete goal in mind:  the hastening of a revolutionary situation.

It is important to understand that the body of work that Avakian has created is not an add-on, a refinement, or a particular application of Marxism. Rather it is a qualitative leap in the science itself, comparable to the leap made by Marx. At the time of Marx, capitalism had consolidated state power in America and the major states of Europe, and was spreading across the globe like a metastatic cancer. Humanity had nothing to confront it with save bourgeois democracy, syndicalism, or utopian concepts of socialism, often based in religion. Marx changed all that with a scientific explanation of the capitalist system and what had to be done to abolish it. 

Today, with the defeat of the great revolutions of the 20th century, the globalization of capitalist production, the existential climate threat to the planet, and the world-wide spread of fascist movements, the old tools of bourgeois liberalism, social-democratic labor movements, and even the best of past communist thought, have been shown to be utterly inadequate to the challenges facing humanity. It is at this point that Bob Avakian has stepped forward to address what has to be done, but with a qualitatively transformed and more scientific, evidence-based method and approach. Avakian has given humanity the tools for its next great leap.

Like Marx in his time, Avakian is a controversial figure. Marx was considered something of a dogmatist and sectarian by the reformists of his day. To get a feel for this, people should watch Raoul Peck’s film The Young Karl Marx. Yet like other great scientists before and after him, the insights of Marx have proven basically true and have come to both shape our understanding of the real world and alter the course of history.

Having been witness to this development over many years now, I can say that if you are serious about emancipating humanity then you have to become a student of Bob Avakian. I have to admit that as a student of Avakian, I was often late for class and didn't always make good grades. But I never dropped out of school. Young revolutionaries today have the most advanced revolutionary thought in the world in their hands with their whole lifetimes ahead—and I still have another 15 years. Together, let's run with it!

There is much, much more, but I would encourage people to dig into Avakian’s many written works such as The New Communism, the Constitution for the New Socialist Republic in North America, and Breakthroughs.

Codicil

In December 2020 at the height of the COVID crisis in New York City, I was living a few blocks from a major hospital in Brooklyn. Outside the front of that hospital, lines formed daily of people waiting to be seen in the emergency room. Around back, behind the hospital, there was a row of refrigerator trucks for the bodies for which there was no longer room in the hospital’s morgue. 

While that pandemic crisis has abated for now, the global warming crisis has not. We are now pretty much past the point of no return. For about three billion years, plants, algae and cyanobacteria have been patiently extracting carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, using solar energy to synthesize carbohydrates, and releasing oxygen back into the atmosphere. In the last three hundred years, that whole process has been dramatically reversed, with the burning of fossil fuels releasing carbon dioxide back into the atmosphere in massive quantities, trapping solar radiation in the form of heat. 

Today, almost everything that moves in commerce (trucks, planes, trains) moves on energy released from the burning of fossil fuels (coal, petroleum and natural gas). Yet at the same time, the amount of energy that falls on the earth from solar radiation is more than enough to meet humanity’s foreseeable needs. So what prevents simply switching to solar energy in place of fossil fuels? The capitalism system.

Many trillions of dollars of capital are invested in both fossil fuel powered equipment and in the extraction and distribution of fossil fuels. To abandon that, would require the literal destruction of all that capital. The owners of capital have zero incentive to eat that massive loss, and they have the powerful compulsion from competing capital to continue with what they are doing. Only a new communist revolution can change this and put humanity first. This is a basic reality, yet most people find it easier to imagine the end of the world than to imagine an end to capitalism.

Interrelated with the climate crisis is the destruction of the viability of life for millions of people in their home countries. One result has been the mass migration of people from the global South toward white, imperial Europe and America. The year that I was born, 1940, was the “high water mark” for white people in America. Whites made up 90 percent of the population. Today, whites make up 60 percent of the population, and an even smaller percentage of school-age children. 

That demographic change in the U.S., combined with the decline of U.S. economic power in the face of global competition and the impact of the movements of women and people of color, has provided the basis for a core of reactionary capitalists to organize a fascist movement. A movement appealing to the preservation of the economic well-being and social superiority to which white, male, Christian Americans feel entitled. Hence the emergence of a fascist movement to “Make America Great Again.”

The horrors that consolidated fascism will wreak on this country and the world are beyond the imagination of most people. Trump must be driven from power NOW, before it is too late.

Performing:
William Parker & Matthew Shipp

Tickets: 
• $25 General Admission 
• $100 Special Reception:  6pm, meet the artists and volunteers with The BA Institute 

February 3, 7 pm
at Revolution Books, NYC
437 Malcolm X Blvd/Lenox Ave (at 132nd Street)
New York, NY 10037
Tel: 212-691-3345

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Bob Avakian is the most important political thinker and leader in the world today—he is the architect of a whole new framework for human emancipation, the new communism. Learn more about Bob Avakian and access his work HERE.

William Parker is a bassist, improviser, composer, writer, and educator. He has been a key figure in the New York and European experimental jazz and new music scenes, and is co-founder of the Vision Jazz Festival.
“The most consistently brilliant free jazz bassist of all time...” – Village Voice

Matthew Shipp is a pianist, composer, and bandleader who has developed one of the most unique voices in modern jazz and improvised music. He has recorded and performed widely—and his work has been described as “state of the art in terms of the possibilities of the jazz piano.” Matthew is the author of Black Mystery School Pianists and Other Writings.

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Your tax deductible donations will go toward the mission of The Bob Avakian Institute to preserve, project, and promote the works and vision of Bob Avakian with the aim of reaching the broadest possible audience.

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The events of the past week show a society tearing apart at the seams. This is focused around the violent and utterly lawless repression being carried out by the Trump fascist regime in Minneapolis-St. Paul… and the heroic resistance against it.

Thousands and thousands of decent people are standing up against the murderous fascist shock troops of ICE; tens of thousands more are organizing in neighborhood networks to sound the alarm and to enable their immigrants neighbors to survive. Prominent artists, influencers, and athletes have boldly stood in support of the people and the protestors against the fascist Trump (for example: here, here, here, and here). And especially important: youth are joining the battle, with high schoolers all over the country going into the streets on Friday and Saturday. You could see this—and the receptivity of these youth to the message of revolution—in this clip from Los Angeles. 

Despite the fantasies of some liberals, the fascists are NOT backing down. For them this is, in the words of the fascist strategist Steve Bannon, an “inflection point”—a time when you come up against resistance and hit back all the harder. The Nazi-promoting Tucker Carlson decried “a kind of insurrection against federal authority,” and Trump's advisor and fascist architect Stephen Miller accused the right-wing Democratic senator from Minnesota, Amy Klobuchar, of “fanning the flames of insurrection for the singular purpose of stopping the deportations of illegals who have flooded the country.” What they are talking about when they say “insurrection” are people nonviolently though often militantly demonstrating, filming arrests and carrying out mutual aid (getting people food, medical care, etc.). And why they are exaggerating this into “insurrection” is in order to violently crush this.

Liberal Mayor Jacob Frey: “You Don’t Even Want to Think About It”

Liberals have divided up. Some, like the Democratic congressional leaders Schumer and Jeffreys, were still trying to cut deals with the fascists—and getting taken every time. But some individual Democrats were trying to sound an alarm. The Democratic governor of Minnesota, Tim Walz, talked about this being a “Fort Sumter-like” moment in America. (Fort Sumter was the opening battle of the U.S. Civil War!)

In that same vein, Mayor Jacob Frey of Minneapolis was quite frank about what he feared. This passage from a current New York Times interview gives a flavor of the views of many within the liberal section of the ruling class:

Interviewer: [A] judge has said that ICE has violated nearly 100 court orders since its crackdown began in Minneapolis, which makes me wonder if you think you can enforce any agreement with Homan and the federal government? 

Mayor Frey: That’s the most dangerous question that anybody can ask because we are in a world of hurt that goes way beyond any individual safety if we are talking about a federal government completely ignoring court orders. This is a foundational principle of our Republic. The battlefield that we fight on as municipalities and cities around the country isn’t one of warfare. It’s one of the law. The battlefield that we are going to win on is the law, and a precondition of that necessary fight is that once the law has been determined and a court order comes down, it’s going to be followed.…

Interviewer: What are the options if they don’t do that? 

Frey: The options you don’t even want to think about. I mean, I see where you’re leading me. This is the concern, and I don’t even want to think about what it means if court orders themselves are literally disregarded. [Underscoring added.]

“You don’t even want to think about what it means” is most assuredly NOT the way to deal with an onrushing disaster!! Unfortunately, all too many otherwise decent people adopt the same fundamentally irresponsible—and frankly immoral—mindset.

Fantasies of Trump Backing Off

Early in the week, Trump replaced the Border Patrol commander who was leading operations in Minnesota, Greg Bovino, with the supposedly more “reasonable” border czar, Tom Homan. Attorney General Pam Bondi offered a so-called compromise to Walz. Oh, and Trump’s “poll numbers” went down.

All this caused delirious joy in some quarters. Well, let’s look into it. The “more reasonable” Homan is a longtime virulent anti-immigrant fascist. Homan oversaw the 2017 program of ripping thousands of immigrant children from the arms of their parents at the border. (1,360 of these children have never been reunited with their parents!!) The supposedly gentler Homan floated that maybe there could be a deal if Frey and Walz allowed ICE into the prisons, jails and reformatories to search for immigrants. 

Meanwhile, in the frozen streets of Minneapolis, ICE raids continue with all their brutality, and new “theaters” (to use Homan’s military term for ICE targets) were opened up. More than 200 people were arrested in Maine this week. ICE broke its record for most raids in a single day (on January 28) in Los Angeles—nearly 50 raids. And this week there are rumors of an offensive against Haitian immigrants, who until very recently had “temporary protected status” due to the impossibly violent repressive and chaotic conditions in their imperialism-ravaged homeland. 

And this is something to crow about, as if “we’re winning”? Sorry, but no.

As for Bondi’s compromise, this was an offer to stop the ICE offensive in Minnesota if Walz turned over the state voter rolls, if he gave Bondi the list of all recipients of SNAP benefits and Medicaid, and if he ended sanctuary laws. In other words, Walz had to both fully cooperate in the ethnic cleansing and forced exile of Minnesota immigrants AND allow Trump to tamper with Minnesota voting rolls. 

As for “the polls,” Trump has already shown you he could give a f*ck about actual election results. In case you didn’t get this message from January 6, 2021, just this past week Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard was sent to Atlanta to once again try to make a case that Trump actually won Georgia and with it the 2020 election. Ask yourself why the person in charge of the CIA has been sent to Georgia to look into voting, and none of the answers you come up with will be any good!

And oh yeah, by Friday the supposedly chastened Trump was again back to defaming Alex Pretti.

The fantasies of Trump fascism self-destructing are deadly. And here we urge every reader to listen to—and to spread—this clip from Bob Avakian drawing from some very relevant history during Hitler’s time to answer a similar claim during Trump’s first term. 

WHY Is This Nightmare Happening?!?

This is not some bad dream we’re all gonna wake up from. This fascism has grown out of the economic and political system that dominates and shapes this society—the system of capitalism-imperialism, which is in an extremely serious and deeply-seated crisis. The old way of containing the deep contradictions within this system through a mixture of extending minor privileges and concessions, backed up by open violent repression when necessary, all within a framework of a society built on virulent white supremacy, suffocating patriarchal oppression of women and LGBT people, wars of aggression and occupation, hatred of “foreigners” and extreme ignorance—this way of maintaining the social order has broken down in the face of big economic and social changes. All this against the backdrop where those who rule this system face significant economic problems and an increasingly serious political, economic, and military rivalry with China—rivalry which could explode into all-out nuclear holocaust. Hanging over all of that is the on-rushing climate catastrophe, which capitalism has proven itself incapable of solving. For a deeper explanation of why we are facing this fascism, go here and here.

In response to that crisis, this system has given birth to an even more monstrous form of rule. One section of the ruling class has decided that the only solution is an openly repressive, lawless and violent fascist regime. The other section still clings to the “old ways” that enabled this country to “rise” to number one exploiter, oppressor and purveyor of violence in the world. That old form of rule—bourgeois (or capitalist) democracy—enabled the ruling class to settle their conflicts with each other without it spilling into open violence.

But capitalism-imperialism has always been a disaster for literally billions around the planet and for tens of millions within the U.S. And let’s be clear: the imperialists have never hesitated to go beyond the law to repress those they deem as immediate threats to their rule. But this was done within certain limits—with certain limited rights and rule of law—to preserve their “legitimacy” in the eyes of those they ruled. 

The fascists see those limits—as they apply to those who oppose the system AND as they apply to their opponents within the ruling class—as obstacles that have to be swept away. They are convinced that desperate and extreme measures, including against their rivals in the ruling class, are needed to more strongly exert U.S. domination of a rapidly changing world. The deep roots and driving dynamics of this conflict mean that this fascism is not going to just “go away”—as Trump’s “comeback” since 2021 has so amply illustrated.

What Bob Avakian said in September of last year remains starkly true:

If this fascist regime is allowed to remain in power, everything that decent people have felt they could rely on to seek justice will be brutally shut down...every uplifting moral value will be reviled and repressed...every sphere of society will be remade, in terrible ways, in line with the male supremacist, anti-LGBT, white supremacist and anti-immigrant cruelty and the anti-scientific, health and climate destroying madness of the Trump fascist regime and the bloodthirsty ravings and depraved violence of fanatics heading “the department of war,” with the deranged maniac Trump having his finger on the nuclear button.

Every vision, and every active striving, for a better, more just world, for a future worth living in, will be violently suppressed and effectively foreclosed, at least for the foreseeable future.

This is not hyperbole—it is the bitter reality that is being rapidly enforced. (from social media message REVOLUTION #133: Yes, this Trump/MAGA fascism really is that bad. And, if it is not driven from power soon, it will get far worse.)

So it is extremely important that the regime not just be temporarily stopped but that it be DRIVEN OUT. ICE is the spearpoint of a much bigger agenda. The fascists see ethnic cleansing and suppression of dissent as a matter of “national survival”—and they are more than willing to crush their Democratic opponents to accomplish it. These fascists are determined not to be backed off what they see as this existential mission.

We Need to Defeat Fascism AND We Need to Go Way Beyond This Rotten System

Even with the crucial importance of defeating this regime, there is something much deeper involved and at stake—the chance for a giant step toward REAL emancipation for humanity—revolution in the U.S. The rulers of this system cannot rule in the old way. And in any case, that "old way" would mean that we are still sitting in a world hurtling headlong to an ecological catastrophe caused by this capitalism-imperialism… that almost any conflict could quickly spiral into a nuclear war over who will control the world—even as that world is incinerated in the course of that war. Simply restoring this system, even with a new face, would allow (and require that) the racist oppression of Black people and other people of color, the patriarchal oppression of women and LGBT people, the backing of genocidal terror on the people of the world, the hatred of immigrants, and the general all-round ignorance and cruelty that poisons this society—all that would be kept basically intact. 

But the breakdown in the old way of ruling that we have described both carries huge danger and at the same time opens up equally huge positive possibility. Bob Avakian explained why all the way back in 2021:

As this situation develops, and the ruling class is more and more unable to rule in the old way, society and daily life for masses of people, from different parts of society, can become increasingly unsettled and chaotic, with frequent “disruptions” of the “normal” way things have been.

And as “the normal way” society has been ruled is failing to hold things together—and society is increasingly being ripped apart—this can shake people’s belief that “the way things have always been” is the only way things can be. It can make people more open to questioning—in a real sense it can force people to question—the way things have been, and whether they have to stay that way. And this is all the more likely to happen if the revolutionary forces are out among the people shining a light on the deeper reality of what is happening, and why, and bringing out that there IS an alternative to living this way (From This Is a Rare Time When Revolution Becomes Possible—Why That Is So, and How to Seize on This Rare Opportunity)

This questioning is happening right now on a broad scale. The homemade sign “Better to bleed in resistance than rot in obedience” at the protest in Los Angeles last Friday is a prime example. It is time now, and urgently so, to answer this challenge and call:

To everyone who can’t stand this world the way it is ... who is sick and tired of so many people being treated as less than human ... who knows that the claim of “liberty and justice for all” is a cruel lie ... who is righteously enraged that injustice and inequality go on, and on, and on, despite false promises and honeyed words from people in power (or those seeking power) ... everyone who agonizes about where things are headed and the fact that to be young now means being denied a decent future, or any future at all ... everyone who has ever dreamed about something much better, or even wondered whether that is possible ... everyone who hungers for a world without oppression, exploitation, poverty, and destruction of the environment ... everyone who has the heart to fight for something that is really worth fighting for: You need to be part of this revolution.

This revolution is not just “a good idea”—it is actually possible. (From A Declaration, a Call to Get Organized Now for a Real Revolution)

Get into Bob Avakian. 

Get with the Revcoms. 

There is a planet to save and a world to win.

As we write, the grave danger of war looms over the Middle East. The fascist Trump regime is once again threatening to launch a war on Iran. Such an illegitimate, imperialist act of aggression threatens the lives of many thousands, perhaps millions, if it spreads across the region, and perhaps beyond.

This past week, Trump warned that a U.S. armada was heading toward Iran, prepared to carry out military strikes “with great power, enthusiasm and purpose,” if Iran’s Islamic Republic didn’t bow down to Trump’s nakedly imperialist demands for submission. 

Trump’s demands? A permanent end to all nuclear enrichment (which Iran has the right to do¹); limits on the range and numbers of Iran’s ballistic missiles; and an end to all support for Iran’s allies across the region. In other words, Iran is to be left defenseless while the U.S. and Israel, with their massive stockpiles of nuclear bombs and other weapons of war, and military bases and alliances across the region, would have free rein to attack Iran and others in the region whenever they decide to.   

“Time is running out,” to accept these outrageous demands, Trump warned, “it is truly of the essence!”

The U.S. has surged military forces into the region, including the USS Abraham Lincoln Carrier Strike Group,² combat ships and destroyers, at least a dozen attack aircraft, and anti-missile systems. Long-range U.S.-based bombers can attack Iran, and the U.S. has between 30,000 and 40,000 troops already stationed in the region.

Meanwhile, the leader of Iran’s Islamic Republic has threatened to launch a regional war if the U.S. attacks.

The situation is extremely fraught and quickly developing. There are reports that the U.S. and Iran are now negotiating and may avoid war. Other reports claim the U.S. has already decided on war. 

Oppose Fascist Trump’s Imperialist Bullying and War Moves

Revcom.us will continue to follow this perilous situation and keep readers informed. But right now several key things are very clear:

1. These threats and any attack on Iran by the fascist Trump regime are completely outrageous and illegitimate. They are not being done in support of the Iranian people’s just struggle against the Islamic Republic, or to end the danger of nuclear war, just the opposite: they’re being done to more forcefully impose U.S. imperialist domination, including military domination, on Iran and its people and the entire Middle East region.
2. The people of this country have a responsibility to the people of Iran and the world to vigorously oppose any and all aggression, bullying, and military attacks on Iran.
3. The U.S. imperialists are the world’s “top predators.” But Iran’s theocratic rulers are also thoroughly reactionary: they are part of the global capitalist-imperialist system, and have just slaughtered thousands of Iranians who rose up for justice in early January. The rebellions of the Iranian people over the last period—over the severe economic privation in these past weeks, and especially in 2022 around the slogan “Woman, Life, Freedom” are overwhelmingly progressive and should be supported.
   Now is not the time to choose between oppressors. People in this country also have the responsibility of supporting the just struggle of the Iranian people, against their hated rulers, for justice and a brighter future. In this light, see Intervew with Osyan³ on the January Uprising in Iran, and War Has Casualties?! from Atash/Fire, journal of the Communist Party of Iran, Marxist-Leninist-Maoist.

The criminal and very dangerous threats by U.S. imperialism and the fascist Trump regime, as well as the crimes of Iran’s Islamic Republic, once again emphasize the urgency of the call from the revolutionary leader and author of the new communism, Bob Avakian:

We, the people of the world, can no longer afford to allow these imperialists to continue to dominate the world and determine the destiny of humanity. They need to be overthrown as quickly as possible. And it is a scientific fact that we do not have to live this way.

No U.S.-Israeli Attack on Iran!

Support the Just Struggle of the Iranian People! 

In the name of humanity, we refuse to accept a fascist America!

This whole system is rotten and illegitimate! We need and we demand: a whole new way to live, a fundamentally different system!

Feministçerçeve: We know that there is a strong tradition in Iran built through street protests. In recent weeks, we have seen demonstrations spread to almost the entire country. However, due to internet shutdowns and intense censorship, the information reaching the outside world is quite limited. First of all, we would like to hear from you: what does the current situation in Iran look like? What has happened in recent weeks?

Osyan: The protests were ignited by a sharp rise in the price of the dollar, which led to increased poverty and economic collapse across Iranian society. They began with strikes and demonstrations in the Bazaar (markets) and soon spread to universities, the streets of Tehran, and many other large and small towns. Very quickly, the protests revealed their political character, targeting the entire Islamic regime with chants such as “Down with the dictator” and “Death to Khamenei.”

The demonstrations grew wider every day and night until Reza Pahlavi, the son of Iran’s deposed king, called on protesters and promised support from abroad. At the same time, Trump issued threats of attacks on Iran, and Mossad claimed that “we are on the ground.” At this point, the protests reached their peak, and the Islamic Republic’s suppression forces confronted them with full force, as if their very existence depended on killing everyone in the streets without mercy. 

The internet was shut down, and the streets turned into a bloodbath. The exact death toll is still unknown, but the most recent estimates suggest that more than 30,000 people were killed in just 48 hours. At present, people in Iran remain under an internet blackout. Cities are effectively under military rule, with curfews starting at 6 or 8 p.m. Many are in shock or grieving the loss of their loved ones, and everywhere there is the lingering smell of bullets and blood in the air. 

Feministçerçeve: One of the main reasons behind the recent wave of protests appears to be the deepening economic crisis. The sharp depreciation of Iran’s currency against foreign currencies, rising living costs, and widespread impoverishment are affecting society in multiple ways. How are women being impacted by this economic collapse? What kinds of consequences does it have in daily life, labor processes, and care burdens?

Osyan: Women in Iran were already carrying the heavy burden of economic pressure due to unemployment and superexploitation. In 2025, the economic participation rate of women in Iran is reported to be around 13.1 to 14 percent—approximately one-fifth of that of men. Even men in Iran struggle to make a living, which means the situation is several times worse for women. 

Nearly 72 percent of unemployed women in Iran have a university education. This shows that despite being highly educated and seeking financial independence, women face systematic exclusion from the labor market and are pushed into unpaid domestic labor. The larger share of unemployed women works in the service sector, accounting for 61.3 percent of female employment—a sector that is underpaid and increasingly characterized by unstable and insecure contracts. 

As a result, many women have no choice but to create small online businesses within the informal economy in order to barely survive. The deepening economic crisis will inevitably push many more women below the poverty line. Women had a noticeable presence in the current uprising because they recognize that this crisis directly affects them and that their lives are on the brink of collapse.

We would also like to emphasize that this economic crisis is not caused solely by “sanctions.” Rather, it is the result of the functioning of a dependent capitalist state—such as the Islamic Republic—which transfers the tensions of capitalist crises onto local society with intensified force and so, has no other way of existing through shrinking the people’s livelihood and increasing their exploitation.

Feministçerçeve: On the other hand, it is known that thousands of people have lost their lives due to state violence during the protests, and many others are facing death sentences. Some reports reflected in the international media have claimed the international interventions have halted or reduced this violence. Is there any observable change in the government’s approach toward the protests?

Osyan: This claim is completely contrary to reality. While foreign powers (the USA and Israel) took advantage of the protests to advance their own interests and agendas, the Islamic Republic also exploited allegations of foreign interference to fully carry out its plan to massacre dissidents using military weapons, under the pretext of the “continuation of a 12-day war with Israel.” Not only was the violence not reduced—it intensified drastically.

On the one hand, the lives of those who were fighting for freedom were treated as worthless by the government: bodies were piled on top of one another, families were forced to pay money to receive the remains of their loved ones, and execution shots were delivered to those who were wounded.

On the other hand, these deaths were humiliated and dismissed—by Trump, who claimed they were “just stepped on in the crowd,” and by Pahlavi, who described them as “collateral damage of a war.” 

At present, we are deeply concerned for the lives of thousands of detainees, most of whom are under the age of 25. They are being subjected to torture, forced confessions, fabricated charges, severe sentences, and the constant threat of execution. While Trump boasts about having “saved” more than 800 people from execution, we know that the lives of our people cannot be protected through the deals or wars of these monsters, as they place no value on human life and operate within a system designed to destroy it. 

Feministçerçeve: Where do women stand in these protests today? With what demands and in what ways are they taking to the streets and participating in the struggle? What do you think this process means for the women’s movement in Iran?

Osyan: In recent years—especially after the Woman, Life, Freedom uprising—women have been highly active in everyday acts of resistance and civil disobedience. In the current uprising, they have once again been active, bold, and courageous. However, as patriarchal, fascist, and reactionary forces aligned with Pahlavi grew louder and attempted to co-opt the uprising, many women and progressive forces became increasingly alienated. Their demands for freedom and equality were gradually erased from the struggle.

Outside Iran, these same forces have attacked anyone who disagrees with them, using sexist and patriarchal language and even threatening those who chant “Woman, Life, Freedom.” 

This moment is therefore a critical turning point for the women’s movement in Iran, as the future of women—and of society as a whole—is being shaped. If we retreat and accept such an alternative to the Islamic Republic, women will face even harsher repression in the future.

We must stand firm and oppose any form of patriarchal order that seeks to seize power through foreign intervention, bombs, and the violent silencing of opponents. No society can be free unless women are free. Clearly, this faction of the opposition cares nothing about women’s liberation—just like its allies, Netanyahu and Trump.

Feministçerçeve: Finally, what would you like to say to feminists living in Turkey and other countries who wish to stand in solidarity with the women’s struggle in Iran? How can we offer meaningful support to the struggle of the Iranian people?

Osyan: We urge everyone not to accept this “media coup” that presents monarchists as the main—and only—solution for Iran’s future. Please help amplify our voices: an independent voice that is not backed by any power in the world, a voice against the Islamic Republic, against war, and against fascism.

We ask everyone not to believe the regime’s narrative that reduces the just struggles of the people of Iran to Mossad operations. Stand with the people of Iran despite the maneuvering and games of competing geopolitical powers.

Turkey will play an important role in the coming changes in the region. As Erdoğan prepares to exploit the collapse of the Islamic Republic for his own interests, people must be ready to organize and struggle against their governments and against their governments’ alliances with our oppressors.

To everyone around the world: please do not allow your governments to use us and our struggle as bargaining chips in geopolitical games or to interfere in our fight for freedom. The more you advance your own struggles for freedom, the more you strengthen ours. Stand with us against any war drive or imposed imperialist agenda in Iran.

Hands off Iran! Down with the Islamic Republic!

This year, the 250th anniversary of the founding of the United States, will see an ugly torrent of red-white-and-blue celebrations of America as a “great country”—spearheaded by Donald “Make America Great Again” Trump. This is a celebration of America now led by fascists. But the truth is that America was NEVER “great,” whoever was heading up the government. 

As revolutionary leader Bob Avakian said, if people are stung by that truth about America, they need to look at reality:

This “Republic” to which we are supposed to pledge allegiance was founded on slavery and genocidal robbery: keeping millions of Black people in chains for generations... killing off huge numbers of Native Americans and stealing their land... waging a war that ripped off half of Mexico, greatly expanding slavery.

So, was this a great country all during that time—when millions of people were enslaved—owned by bloodsuckers who constantly whipped the slaves to make them work harder under horrific conditions, slave-owners who raped masses of enslaved women? Was this country great then?!

Was it great when, for generations after slavery was formally ended, Black people as a whole were segregated, discriminated against, and continually terrorized, with repeated massacres of Black people and thousands of Black people lynched? Was it great when, all during that time, LGBT people were “illegal,” when women were legally treated as inferior to men—and men could legally rape their wives? Was it a great country then?!

Or is it great, now, when people are everyday denied basic rights? When the police kill a thousand people every year, especially people of color, and in the 60 years since Civil Rights Acts were passed, segregation and discrimination has remained as bad, or worse, as it ever was, and thousands of Black people have been killed by police—even greater numbers than all those who were lynched during all the years of Ku Klux Klan terror after the Civil War!

Has this country ever been great, when, right from the beginning and down to today, the whole thing has literally been built on the broken bodies, the blood and bones, of millions and now billions of people, worldwide—cruelly exploited, used and abused, by this system—with all this backed up by murder on a massive scale carried out by the police and the armed forces of this country?

No, this country has never been great. It has always been a horror for masses of people. 

(from social media message REVOLUTION #2: When has the U.S. been a “great country”?)

It’s way past time for this system—capitalism-imperialism—that rules in this country, dominates the world and now has spawned fascist rule, to be thoroughly abolished, through an actual revolution.

With this issue, we begin a series that highlights aspects of how 250 years of America has been nothing but a horror for the masses of people, here and around the world. We begin with a piece on the 1953 CIA coup that overthrew the elected government of Iran and brought in the bloody U.S.-backed regime of the Shah. We call on our readers to send in your contributions to this series—articles, video, audio, artwork, social media posts. Email revolution.reports@yahoo.com or message @therevcoms via social media.

Part 1: American Crime Case #98: 1953 CIA Coup in Iran: Torture and Repression–Made in the U.S.A.

THE CRIME: On August 19, 1953, the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) along with British intelligence launched a military coup overthrowing Iran’s popular, elected prime minister, Mohammad Mossadegh. In 1951, during an upsurge of protest against British colonialism, Mossadegh had nationalized Britain’s Anglo-Iranian Oil Company. Great Britain had plundered Iran’s oil wealth for decades.

Britain moved to destabilize Mossadegh’s government, including by launching an international boycott of Iranian oil. The U.S. soon joined the coup plotting, conspiring with Iran’s Mohammad Reza Shah [King] Pahlavi and the military, and orchestrating an anti-Mossadegh propaganda campaign.

On August 19, mobs joined by the military took over streets chanting “Long live the Shah! Death to Mossadegh!” They ransacked pro-Mossadegh newspapers and attacked his supporters. Street battles raged. By late afternoon, military units seized control of Mossadegh’s house, breaking the resistance. By evening, 300 lay dead, as General Fazlollah Zahedi rode to Radio Tehran atop a tank and broadcast that with the Shah’s blessing, he was the new prime minister.

Iran’s nationalist upsurge was crushed. The Shah ruled as an iron-fisted U.S. puppet for 25 years. Speaking out risked arrest by SAVAK, his U.S.-trained secret police. Thousands were murdered, jailed or barbarically tortured—they even threatened to torture children in front of their parents. When millions rose against the Shah in 1978-79, he shot down thousands with U.S. backing before being ousted. The 1953 coup and what followed ended up helping pave the way for a new Iranian nightmare: the 1979 founding of the Islamic Republic of Iran.

THE CRIMINALS: After covering up for 60 years, the CIA admitted in 2013:

The military coup that overthrew Mosaddeq and his National Front cabinet was carried out under CIA direction as an act of U.S. foreign policy, conceived and approved at the highest levels of government.

In the U.S., that meant President Dwight Eisenhower on down through the State Department, the CIA, and the military. In Britain, Prime Minister Winston Churchill and on down.

THE ALIBI: For decades, the U.S. and British rulers covered up and lied about having orchestrated the anti-Mossadegh coup, and their media cover story turned reality upside down. It portrayed this U.S.-led fascist military coup against a widely supported, elected leader as a popular “revolution” against a Hitler-like lunatic trying “to make himself unchallenged dictator of the country,” as the New York Times put it.

THE ACTUAL MOTIVE: A CIA memo spelled out U.S. goals: “to effect the fall of the Mosaddeq government; and to replace it with a pro-western government under the Shah’s leadership with [General] Zahedi as its prime minister.”

The U.S. used the 1953 coup to muscle into Iran and replace Britain as top dominator. Mossadegh’s nationalization was reversed, and U.S. oil giants were cut in on the spoils, reaping enormous profits. The coup was a warning against similar moves to nationalize imperialist companies. And it embedded Iran as a key military outpost for the U.S. against regional liberation struggles and in its Cold War clash with the Soviet Union.

REPEAT OFFENDERS: In 1979, the Shah was overthrown and replaced by the Islamic Republic of Iran (IRI), a regime that, while reactionary, quickly came to be viewed by the U.S. as an obstacle to its immediate interests. In the decades since, the U.S. has bullied, intervened, and threatened Iran. It fueled the bloody 1980-1988 Iran-Iraq war, which left a million dead or wounded, to weaken both. In 1988, as a warning to Iran to halt the war, the U.S. warship Vincennes “accidentally” shot down an Iranian civilian airliner, killing all 290 on board. Since then, the U.S. has imposed punishing sanctions and threatened war repeatedly, and it still seeks to dominate and control Iran.

The Trump regime rode into 2026 on a rampage. From Venezuela to the streets of Minneapolis, the regime murders with impunity and demonizes whole peoples and countries without any pretense of the rule of law.

On January 7, an ICE agent murdered Renee Good in cold blood for daring to stand up for her immigrant neighbors. On January 24, CBP agents beat Alex Pretti to the ground and executed him. These are Trump’s Gestapo thugs—unleashed in Minneapolis on a campaign of terror and vengeance. The regime has responded not with accountability, but with lies, justifying murder through the twisted logic that anyone who resists deserves to be shot down.

This is fascism, a different form of brutal rule to enforce white supremacist, patriarchal, and xenophobic oppression and violence. As long as this regime remains in power, this terror will not only continue—it will accelerate. The events of this month—from illegally bombing Venezuela and kidnapping the leader of a sovereign nation to murdering civilians in the streets—have brought this home in blood and should dispel any complacency.

This regime will not be bound by any laws or measures of decency that stop them from advancing their aims. They have:

• begun genocidal ethnic cleansing of non-white immigrants, rounded up and sent to concentration camps by lawless masked men;
• unleashed war and terror abroad, while moving aggressively to crush dissent at home;
• branded anti-fascist protesters and political opponents as “domestic terrorists,” laying the groundwork for mass repression.

SHREDDING ANY RULE OF U.S. OR INTERNATIONAL LAW, and getting away with it over and over, is paving the way for horrors that surpass those of the Nazi regime. There is no living with this.

The protests in Minneapolis and across this country have been righteous and inspiring. They must continue—and they must grow. And we must join our righteous fury in the streets with the only demand that truly measures up to the threat this regime poses to all of humanity:

Trump Must Go Now!

No community is safe while the fascist Trump regime controls federal agencies and consolidates power. There is no restraining or abolishing ICE when Trump’s attacks on immigrants are the battering ram and linchpin of his fascist program. To stop ICE terror—and every outrage of the last year—the whole regime must be stopped.

Nothing but massive nonviolent struggle by you, and millions of others like you, can do that. By walking out. By shutting down. By millions rising in massive, unrelenting, nonviolent protest and resistance. By coming back stronger in the face of attack and repression. By uniting, not dividing, across many viewpoints and backgrounds.

We must not wait for future and rigged elections.

The power of the people must drive the Trump Fascist Regime out of power now—before it is too late.

ICE Must Go
The Whole Trump Fascist Regime Must Go Now
In the Name of Humanity, We Refuse to Accept a Fascist America

1. Throughout its history and its development into an imperialist power, the United States of America depended on the exploitation, often in extreme conditions, of generations of immigrants, numbering in the many millions, who were driven to the USA as a result of oppression, poverty, war and upheaval. These immigrants—including those from Europe who came to the USA during the latter part of the 19th and the first part of the 20th century, or at least several generations of them—were also subjected to discrimination and demeaning treatment, although after a period of time many of these immigrant groups were integrated into the larger “white European” population in the USA and, on the basis of expansion and conquest by U.S. imperialism, and the spoils acquired in this way, many were able to rise from the ranks of the working class and poorer sections of the population and become a part of the “American middle class,” with a more or less privileged position in relation to especially the lower and more exploited sections of the proletariat and the masses of Black and Latino people and others concentrated, and forcibly contained, within the decaying and repressive confines of the inner cities of late imperial America. At the same time, and in a heightening way through the end of the 20th and the first part of the 21st century, as a result of the domination and plunder carried out by U.S. imperialism throughout most of the Third World in particular, and the devastation and massive dislocation that resulted from and accompanied this, great numbers of immigrants from Mexico and elsewhere in Latin America, as well as other parts of the Third World, were driven to the U.S., many of whom were not able to secure legal entry and consequently were forced to live in the shadows and remain vulnerable to extreme exploitation as well as to discrimination and to violence and terror carried out by the state and by mobs encouraged by reactionary policies, actions and statements of the government and government officials. And the ruling forces of the imperialist USA seized on this situation to further tighten control over, and unleash more terror against, these immigrants and to subject many of them to even more extreme exploitation, while whipping up a xenophobic and fascist anti-immigrant atmosphere.

The defeat and dismantling of the imperialist USA and its machinery of violent destruction and repression has radically changed this situation. In this revolutionary struggle, and its victory, large numbers of immigrants, as well as masses of Black people and other oppressed nationalities within the former imperialist USA, played a crucial role, and they can and must continue to play a vital part in the continuing transformation of society, and the world as a whole, as part of the backbone of the New Socialist Republic in North America.

2. At the time of the establishment of the New Socialist Republic in North America, all those residing within the territory of this Republic—with the exception of those who played a leading role in opposing the revolution which brought about the establishment of this Republic, and/or who may have been found guilty of war crimes and/or other crimes against humanity—shall have been accorded citizenship in this Republic, with the rights and responsibilities of citizens, in accordance with this Constitution. And, from that time forward, all those born within the territory of the New Socialist Republic in North America, as well as all those, wherever they are born, who have at least one parent who is a citizen of this Republic, shall be citizens of this Republic.

3. The orientation of the New Socialist Republic in North America is to welcome immigrants from all over the world who have a sincere desire to contribute to the goals and objectives of this Republic, as set forth in this Constitution and in laws and policies which are established and enacted in accordance with this Constitution. From the time of the establishment of the New Socialist Republic in North America, anyone residing outside of the territory of this Republic who wishes to enter its territory, and any such person wishing to become a citizen, or a permanent resident, of this Republic, must follow the relevant laws and procedures which have been established on the basis of this Constitution. Anyone who applies for asylum in this Republic and, through the relevant procedures that have been established for this purpose, is found to have been persecuted, or to have a well-founded fear of persecution, on account of having taken part in just struggles against imperialist and reactionary states or other reactionary forces, or on account of scientific, artistic, or other pursuits which have brought them into conflict with reactionary powers and institutions, shall be afforded asylum in the New Socialist Republic in North America, so long as they pledge to act in compliance with the Constitution of this Republic, and do act accordingly. Provided that they do not engage in any serious violation of the laws of this Republic, people granted asylum have the right to remain within the territory of this Republic for as long as they choose to do so, and shall be accorded the same rights as citizens, with the exception that, so long as they have not become citizens, they may not vote in elections or be elected or appointed to public office. They shall have the right, after a certain period, determined by law, to become citizens of this Republic, with the same rights and responsibilities as all other citizens. The citizenship process, as well as review of the asylum status of all those granted asylum, shall be carried out in accordance with the laws and procedures established for these purposes.

4. Anyone who is discovered to have entered the territory of this Republic without following the relevant laws and procedures, shall be detained and provided with a timely hearing, conducted by the government institution with the relevant responsibility, to determine the reasons for their presence within this Republic. In connection with this process, such persons may apply for asylum or seek residency on some other basis, and these requests will be considered in the light of the basic orientation and principles set forth here. If, however, evidence emerges which would indicate that the person, or persons, in question have entered the territory of this Republic not only by means that are in violation of its laws, but also with the intent to further violate the law in an effort to carry out sabotage or otherwise do harm to this Republic and its people, then criminal proceedings shall be instituted against such a person, or persons, in accordance with laws and legal procedures established on the basis of this Constitution.

(pp 60-63)

On January 28, a Day of Grassroots Solidarity with Iran’s rebels on the streets and in prison was held amid an extraordinarily fraught situation. The date had been set to coincide with the culmination of two years of the “No to Execution Tuesday” weekly hunger strike among prisoners, now in 56 prisons across Iran. It was co-hosted by the IEC and the Unitarian Universalist Society of San Francisco (UUSF) Human Rights Working Group. 

In late December, a powerful uprising broke out in Iran, said to be the largest and most destabilizing uprising in the history of the Islamic Republic of Iran (IRI). The regime responded with a horrific massacre in the streets to crush it, and massive arrests. As January 28 dawned, the massive USS Lincoln and three destroyers arrived in striking distance of Iran, Trump making a gangster-style offer: “MAKE A DEAL… The next attack will be far worse.” These events made the solidarity actions with the radical politics of both supporting the Iranian people AND opposing the U.S./Israeli war moves all the more significant, and at the same time, controversial. 

On January 28, people passing through the busy intersection outside the UUSF showed their support for a couple dozen people holding signs and banner with messages like “U.S. & ISRAEL: No War Moves on Iran! IRAN: Stop the Executions! Free All Political Prisoners!”; “104 Weeks of hunger strikes to stop executions, 55 prisons across Iran”; “From U.S. Fascists to Iran Mullahs, Down with Anti-Women Tyranny”; as well as hand-drawn posters against ICE and Trump. 

That evening, a program at UUSF greeted the in person and online attendees with four videos: a freestyle rap from The Neighborhood Kids supporting the people of Iran; animated drawings based on photos of the uprising; a statement from Miles Solay of the band Outernational; and a music video produced by music students in Iran.

Co-initiator of the IEC and contributor to revcom.us, Dolly Veale, welcomed the attendees with a tribute to the late IEC co-initiator Carol Downer, who died in 2025. Dolly Veale’s introduction to the PBS documentary about the 2022 Woman, Life, Freedom Uprising, spoke to the source of the fury of women and the liberatory revolution needed. She said,

Because we do live in extraordinary times in world history, I feel a responsibility to speak frankly tonight and not hold back. The film tonight is very powerful in capturing the raw fury women feel about the world and the need to end gender oppression. But as much as I admire the courageous people in repeated uprisings in Iran, there is a question that asks itself… Are we condemned to just rise up repeatedly or are we reaching for emancipation?

Dolly Veale’s opening remarks are posted in full here.

She directed people to the website of the Communist Party of Iran, Marxist-Leninist-Maoist (cpimlm.org), which has translated many of Bob Avakian’s writings and speeches into Farsi. “They have great clarity about the new breakthroughs he has made in the science of communism.” A Revolution Books Berkeley spokesperson also pointed to works by Bob Avakian and from the CPIMLM available at the store. 

Four inspiring statements were sent to the program highlighting polemical elements of the struggle in standing with Iran’s rebels and against U.S. imperialism. See links for full statements.

• “Nota de Solidaridad/Note of Solidarity” from A Quemar la Jaula (Colombia)
• “We stand with the people of Iran… We have learned some of the horrors U.S. imperialism inflicts on the people of the world through being part of its war machine:” Two members of Veterans for Peace Seattle Daniel Ellsberg Chapter
• “To those imprisoned: you are not forgotten… We will continue to speak where you are silenced until freedom, justice, and life prevail”: Zanan Group Northern California, an independent Iranian women’s group
• “To Trump and Mossad: Hands off Iran! To the People of Iran: We will Overthrow the Islamic Republic Ourselves!”: Osyan (“Rebel”), a group of women from Iran and Afghanistan

The conclusion of the Quemar la Jaula (Burn the Cage) statement puts out a sharp and eloquent challenge:

Amid the recent uprising in Iran, some have emphasized that in spite of the brutality with which the Islamic Republic repressed the demonstrators, the solidarity and support from the world was absolutely insufficient and they felt “alone” in this struggle. This must change. The Iranian people and political prisoners are not alone, the people of Iran are our people, their struggle is our struggle, and it is our duty to work so that their struggle not only invokes the world’s solidarity but that it serves as an inspiration to advance in the struggle to put an end to all the oppression and exploitation that weighs on humanity.

During the Q&A period, Dr. Stephen Zunes, Professor of Politics and International Studies at the University of San Francisco, spoke about the history of Iran, the complexities of its power relations and its relation to the U.S. in particular. He countered in numerous ways the erroneous thinking that 1) the IRI is “anti-imperialist” simply because it has conflicts with the U.S., and 2) U.S. intervention could have any kind of positive effect, and emphasized: “It could only make things much, much worse.” 

Grave Danger to Political Prisoners and Recent Detainees

Still under a near-total internet blackout, inmates in Iran’s Ghezel Hesar Prison managed to send out the sound of their chants on the day that marked the start of the third year of consecutive weekly hunger strikes against executions.

The No to Execution Tuesdays campaign managed to send another communication, posted by Burn the Cage. In it they warn:

During these days, the government of execution and repression executed more than 355 people this month alone [December 21-January 19]... Not only has it not stopped executing people, but it has also brought the wave of killing and execution to the streets, hospitals, detention centers, and even people’s homes…

Therefore, we, the members of the "No to Execution Tuesdays" campaign, warn against any harsh sentences against those arrested in the recent [January 2026] protests and their harassment and killing.

Threats against Narges Mohammadi and Dissident Leaders

On January 28, a doctor in Los Angeles known for his slavish promotion of the monarchist Reza Pahlavi (self-marketed to Trump as a pro-U.S., pro-Israel regime change leader), posted a photo of Narges Mohammadi, the 2023 Nobel Peace Prize laureate⁴ currently imprisoned incommunicado in Iran. The comment from the fascist doctor, Shahram Makoui, was, “Narges Mohammadi: ‘Stop the War’. Shahram Makoui: ‘Execute Narges Mohammadi.’” Then in his reply to himself, as reported by readers and later deleted, he demanded, “They should all be slaughtered according to Islamic law.” This is ugly self exposure of the basic symbiotic unity between the fascist pro-U.S./Israeli and fascist pro-IRI axis in the world today. It reveals the thoroughly reactionary nature of the die-hard monarchists: they hate and fear the Iranian masses and their leaders, and they fawn on bloody warmongers like Trump and Netanyahu. They are both ruthless oppressors who are against the interest of the people for a better world. 

50,000 Detainees in Grave Danger

The exact toll of the street massacre which occurred mainly on January 8 and 9 varies to date, but its scale and ferocity was unprecedented, even in Iran’s turbulent history. As of February 1, HRANA confirmed only 6,713 deaths, with 17,091 more reported deaths still to verify. Because they verify each individual report, these figures are somewhat conservative, and do not reflect the number of forced disappearances, burials in mass graves, and the dead and injured hidden by their families.⁵ Several other accounts indicate the death toll to surpass 30,000.⁶

Of especially grave concern is the situation of almost 50,000 detainees, many not identified, sometimes held in irregular facilities such as local military bases or warehouses where they are subject to torture, often forced to confess on TV to being foreign agents and/or killing security agents. The great majority are reportedly youth under 30.

In the weeks since the street massacres, the Islamic Republic has raided neighborhoods, hospitals and schools and hauled away hundreds or even thousands more. A particular target has been activists, doctors, and lawyers and writers.

This fact underscores the urgency for justice-loving people around the world to highlight the grave situation of political prisoners in Iran and to amplify their extraordinary tenacity and courage in the face of great odds.

The concluding words of our Emergency Appeal of 2020 ring all the more urgently true today:

The governments of the U.S. and Iran act from their national interests. And, in this instance, we the people of the U.S. and Iran, along with the people of the world, have OUR shared interests, as part of getting to a better world: to unite to defend the political prisoners of Iran. In the U.S., we have a special responsibility to unite very broadly against this vile repression by the IRI, and to actively oppose any war moves by the U.S. government that would bring even more unbearable suffering to the people of Iran.

We demand of the Islamic Republic of Iran: FREE ALL POLITICAL PRISONERS NOW!

We say to the U.S. government: NO THREATS OR WAR MOVES AGAINST IRAN, LIFT U.S. SANCTIONS!

On November 26, two National Guard soldiers in Washington, DC were shot at close range. Sarah Beckstrom, a 20-year-old woman, died, and Andrew Wolfe, a 24-year-old man, is still in the hospital with extremely serious injuries. Rahmanullah Lakanwal, a 29-year-old Afghan man who fought on the U.S. side in the Afghanistan war has been charged with first degree murder and three other felonies. He has pleaded not guilty.⁷ Lakanwal was shot on the scene and is still in the hospital. 

The shooting of the two National Guard members was a heinous act. And as Refuse Fascism said in a statement, “Incidents such as this have nothing to do with and only do harm to the nonviolent mass struggle of millions that is needed to drive the fascist Trump regime from power.” But Trump and the other MAGA vultures were quick to jump on this tragic situation to further whip up hatred against Muslims and overall anti-immigrant sentiment, and to impose even more restrictions on immigration from the “Third World.” 

Although even the police say that they don’t know what motivated the shooting, Trump declared it was “terrorism.” Kristi Noem (head of the Department of Homeland Security) claimed (without evidence) that Lakanwal had been “radicalized” by people in the Afghan community in Washington state. She said that that whole community needed to be “investigated.” Republican Senator Tommy Tuberville tweeted “We must IMMEDIATELY BAN all ISLAM immigrants and DEPORT every single Islamist who is living among us just waiting to attack.” Trump called for a “reexamination” of all Afghans who had previously been granted asylum or other legal status. 

Trump also called for the expulsion of all Somali immigrants, calling them “garbage,” and saying they should “go back to where they came from” and that “their country is no good for a reason.” And he ordered major ICE operations targeting Somalis in the Minnesota-St. Paul area, where more than 80,000 people of Somali origin live.

In that same cold-blooded xenophobic (immigrant-hating) spirit Trump’s chief advisor, Stephen Miller, posted this (responding to criticism of Trump for blaming whole countries for the [alleged] act of one person):

This is the great lie of mass migration. You are not just importing individuals. You are importing societies. No magic transformation occurs when failed states cross borders. At scale, migrants and their descendants recreate the conditions, and terrors, of their broken homelands.

How America “Broke” Afghanistan

As one Pakistani novelist said on hearing this, “Who broke the homeland!!?” 

This is exactly the right question! The answer to that starts with the fact that Afghanistan is “cursed” by its strategic location bridging Central and East Asia to the Middle East. So imperialist powers have repeatedly fought to control it. Britain invaded three times in the 19th century. In 1979, the former Soviet Union, which was a social-imperialist country (whose dominant power is now Russia), invaded to prop up a friendly government. In response, the U.S. helped organize, arm and fund Islamic fundamentalist armies to overthrow the pro-Soviet government. At least one-half million Afghan civilians were killed, and Afghanistan’s Islamic theocratic fascist forces were given a tremendous boost. This was part of U.S. imperialism’s drive to control the entire region of Central Asia and the Middle East. Yes, all these countries had all the problems of oppressive class societies to begin with—but by the second half of the 20th century, U.S. imperialism was the power that mainly set the terms for who did and didn’t rule, and what did and didn’t happen in these countries.

In reaction to this and other developments, nationalist political movements rooted in Islam arose in this region. Bob Avakian summed this up in 2007 in a way that explains much about the international dynamics of the past 30 years:

What we see in contention here with Jihad [Islamic fundamentalism] on the one hand and McWorld/McCrusade [increasingly globalized western imperialism] on the other hand, are historically outmoded strata among colonized and oppressed humanity up against historically outmoded ruling strata of the imperialist system. These two reactionary poles reinforce each other, even while opposing each other. If you side with either of these “outmodeds,” you end up strengthening both.

While this is a very important formulation and is crucial to understanding much of the dynamics driving things in the world in this period, at the same time we do have to be clear about which of these “historically outmodeds” has done the greater damage and poses the greater threat to humanity: It is the historically outmoded ruling strata of the imperialist system, and in particular the U.S. imperialists.

The U.S. War Against the Taliban

One grouping of those theocrats, the Taliban, came to power in 1996 after a period of civil war. They imposed extreme oppression of women as well as minority religions and others. In 2001, Osama bin Laden operated out of a base in Afghanistan to engineer the bombing of the World Trade Center in New York. The Taliban offered to negotiate bin Laden’s turnover to the U.S., but the U.S. instead seized the opportunity to invade and occupy Afghanistan and overthrow the Taliban. They cobbled together a corrupt and widely despised puppet government in its place. War erupted between the U.S. and its lackey government on one side and the Taliban on the other, leading to an estimated 241,000 civilian deaths by violence, and hundreds of thousands more from war-caused hunger and disease.

Forty years of war, generations being born, living and dying surrounded by death, destruction, brutal oppressors and foreign armies. Agriculture devastated, and the economy increasingly dependent on war spending and other funds, almost all of which either came from or were controlled by U.S. imperialism.

What It Really Means to Work for American Occupiers

During the U.S. occupation many thousands of people worked for the U.S., the pro-U.S. government, or NGOs or businesses tied to the U.S. Some were thugs and gangsters tied into one or another warlord that the U.S. allied with, but some took these jobs either to ward off hunger, or in the misguided belief that the U.S. was actually there to help liberate them from the oppressive Taliban. But doing this also put them at odds with many in their families or neighbors who opposed the U.S. occupation even as they also hated the Taliban. And it put them at risk of being killed by the Taliban.

Rahmanullah Lakanwal was one of them, reportedly recruited into the CIA-led Unit 03 of the Kandahar Strike Force in 2012, when he was just 16 years old. These Strike Forces (also known as “Zero Units”) were in fact death squads, committing war crimes against the Afghan people. In 2019, Human Rights Watch (HRW) reported on 14 documented incidents in which these units carried out night raids, bursting into homes as people slept, and slaughtering civilians, including small children and elderly people, and other crimes.⁸

When the U.S. was recruiting Afghans to work with them, they always promised “we’ll protect you, we’ll have your back.” But then when the U.S. pulled out, it made no serious provision for the safety of tens of thousands of people who had worked with them, whether as teachers, soldiers or political leaders. There was a desperate scramble for people to get out as the Taliban retook the country. Some thousands did escape, and then (like Lakanwal) were put through intensive vetting to prove, again and again, that they were “loyal” enough to enter the U.S., while the U.S. government sought to wash its hands of them as quickly as possible.⁹

We don’t know a lot about Lakanwal, but one thing that has been reported by friends, family and social workers is that he appeared to be going through a mental breakdown, spending weeks in a dark room not talking to anyone, going off for weeks in the family car. And this was reportedly bound up with his experience in the Zero Unit.

So when it comes to the question of “who broke the homeland?” it is clear it is the imperialist system, with its built-in drive for imperialist powers like the U.S. and its rivals to divide and redivide the world. Then, when things go sideways for them, they have the nerve to turn on the victims of their butchery and treachery, and question their humanity, and demand that they be cast out of society or driven into the shadows? Afghanistan is not unique in this. You can look at our series American Crime and find some similar stories all over the world, including from more than one of the 19 non-European countries from which Trump has now banned all immigration to the U.S.

Faced with a huge crisis of that very system, the fascist section of this imperialist ruling class—Trump, Miller, Vance and all the rest—are on a mission to save that system through a fascist form of rule. In their view, a fascist form of rule—one rooted in blatant, open and violent white supremacy, in male domination of women and repression of LGBT people, and in open hatred and massive scapegoating of  those they consider “foreigners”; one saturated in anti-scientific ignorance and theocratic fundamentalist Christianity; and one in which due process and civil liberties are essentially wiped out—is the only thing that can save the empire.

In the face of this, once again, we revcoms say:

In The Name Of Humanity, We Refuse To Accept A Fascist America!

This Whole System Is Rotten And Illegitimate!
We Need And We Demand: A Whole New Way To Live, A Fundamentally Different System!

We are in the midst of a major fascist leap in the suppression of protest and dissent—but most people don't even know about this. Revcom.us has been reporting on the extreme repressive moves which are otherwise getting very little attention—in the mainstream media or among anti-fascist writers. And this urgently has to change.

This week, we are pulling together a number of these articles and encouraging readers to spread these widely. Grapple together about what is required to combat these fascist repressive moves as part of defeating Trump/MAGA fascism and as part of building up the forces for revolution to bring a radically different, and far better system into being. How do we sound the alarm throughout society? How do we raise standards among the decent people who oppose this fascism? How do we build a movement that has each other's backs?

In a December 15 article on a memo from the fascist Department of Justice, we wrote:

This memo almost certainly foreshadows a major leap in repression. This can neither be brushed off and treated as empty threats, nor can we allow ourselves and all the decent people opposed to this fascism to be preemptively scared into submission. Such moves—if people are mobilized to understand the threat they pose—could politically backfire on the fascists.

But that only happens if consciousness is raised about the real danger of these moves and if standards are adopted in the movement against Trump that “an injury to one is an injury to all,” with individuals and organizations standing with anyone under attack.

In addition to articles from revcom.us, we want to highlight a few other voices sounding the alarm from different perspectives:

Pam Bondi’s Ominous New Memo: “Operationalizing” Trump’s All-Out Fascist Vision, revcom.us, December 15, 2025. 

An overall analysis and dissection of the Justice Department memo issued by Attorney General Pam Bondi, its implications, and what to do in the face of it.

***

Regime Launches “All-of-Government Effort to Dismantle” All Opposition to Fascism, revcom.us, October 20, 2025. 

An overall analysis and dissection of two September executive orders from Trump—one designating “antifa” as a “Domestic Terror Organization,” the other calling for an all-out campaign against political dissent and opposition using the pretext of “domestic terrorism.” 

***

“Don’t Talk”—A Fundamental Principle for Resisting Repression and Defending the Rights of the People, revcom.us, February 10, 2025. 

Essential reading that prepares people to understand and deal with encounters with FBI and other “investigators” being unleashed by the Bondi memo.

***

How Can The President Go After Citizens, Senator Elissa Slotkin, December 17, 2025.

A short YouTube talk on how and why the Bondi Memorandum is another major step in repression.

***

The Bondi Memo’s Quiet Rewriting of Domestic Terrorism Rules, by Thomas E. Brzozowski, Lawfaremedia.org, December 12, 2025.

Brzozowski writes, "If you were not already on high alert, you should be now." Brzozowski is a former Counsel for Domestic Terrorism in the Counterterrorism Section of the U.S. Department of Justice. 

***

U.S. Military Willing to Attack “Designated Terrorist Organizations” Within America, General Says, Nick Turse, The Intercept, December 16, 2025.

Head of the U.S. Northern Command testifies in a Senate hearing that if he was ordered lawfully to deploy troops in cities against “designated terrorist organizations,” he would “execute the order.”

***

FBI Making List of American “Extremists,” Leaked Memo Reveals, Ken Klippenstein, December 6, 2025.

Klippenstein was the first to report on the Bondi memo. 

***

In a hit piece on Substack, Kris Goldsmith relies on tired slander and anti-communist distortion to attack Refuse Fascism for its association with the revcoms and Bob Avakian, the revolutionary leader and architect of the new communism.  Goldsmith paints a cartoon caricature of sinister communists working behind the scenes to take advantage of people in protests against fascism for "visibility."  He repeats the lie that the revcoms are a "cult."  Absent in his essay are any actual statements from Avakian or the revcoms.

Goldsmith laces his argument with dire warnings that Refuse Fascism and the revcoms will do damage to the fight against Trump/MAGA fascism. This is despite the fact that Refuse Fascism (an organization involving people from different perspectives which was formed just weeks after Trump's first election) has been the most consistent, and usually the only, national organization that has recognized what we are facing as fascism and called on people to act commensurately. 

Goldsmith's whole argument is based on the Trumpian logic that "a lot of people are saying" so it must be true. 

But repeating crude slanders and cheap lies does not make those slanders and lies any more true, or less harmful—and invoking others who have spewed the same lies and slanders does not make them any more credible.  It only puts you in the company of others using unprincipled methods, and joins in the harm such unprincipled attacks do.  This is especially terrible now, given the monumental stakes involved in the fight against this Trump/MAGA fascism. 

Many people have called out these divide-and-conquer schemes, seeing the urgent need to unite all who can be united behind the single demand: The Trump Fascist Regime Must Go NOW!  But there are unfortunately too many others who take up the "I heard it on the internet so it must be true" logic, believing lies and distortions about the position of the revcoms and Bob Avakian without having the intellectual integrity to look into it for themselves.

These attacks—and the accompanying gossip culture—do the dirty work for Trump fascism by working to undermine the broad and principled unity needed to defeat this fascism.  These tactics—relying on rumor, lies and distorting people's views to isolate and silence them—smack strongly of the tactics of the right wing fascist forces in this country and the political police (the FBI, etc.) who create pretexts to go after revolutionary groups, and who engage in character assassination to discredit revolutionary leaders. (See: “In the 1960s, the Government Spread Lies to Foment Violent Conflict Within the Movement...”)

Especially as the Trump fascist regime is moving to classify all anti-fascist opposition—from Democratic Party politicians to No Kings protesters—as "domestic terrorism," these attacks are extremely dangerous.  Don't fall for it.

Principled debate over strategy and analysis are essential to any movement for positive change.  But that is very different than lies, slander, and personal attacks.  With Goldsmith in particular, these attacks seem to be covering over and distracting from major differences about this fundamental truth: the Trump fascist regime cannot be contained, it must be stopped.  And the only way to stop it is to drive it from power through sustained, nonviolent determined protest centered in Washington, DC at the seat of power.  This is what the organization Refuse Fascism, involving people from different perspectives and viewpoints, has been tirelessly organizing people to do. 

Three Essential Differences

Central in Goldsmith's attack is a dishonest distortion about who Bob Avakian is and what his work and leadership are actually about. 

Bob Avakian (or BA) is a revolutionary leader and the architect of the new communism.  He’s played a role in the revolutionary movement going back over 60 years now, to the Free Speech Movement in Berkeley and working closely with the Black Panther Party.  You can learn more about him, his work and his life here. 

Here, we are going to focus on three crucial points at issue: how serious is this fascism; on what basis should the dividing lines within those fighting this fascism be drawn; and what does good leadership consist of.  As part of that, we’ll go into BA’s work on fascism, leadership and the importance of critical thinking so that people will actually have some basis to judge right and wrong.  We’ll also show how Goldsmith avoids original sources and instead relies on rumors and innuendo and why Goldsmith’s mode of attack is not only incredibly dishonest but dangerously irresponsible. 

Difference number one: How dangerous and how consolidated IS this fascism?

The single most important question facing people in this country today is the rapid imposition of fascism on America. 

In his hit piece, Goldsmith talks about the “creeping normalization of fascist politics in America.” “Creeping normalization”—sorry, but that ship sailed a long time ago. “Creeping?” Please. As the Refuse Fascism call states, “Fascism is upon us.”

It’s not creeping. It’s in power and moving to consolidate that power daily.  Do you want to deny the truth of what Bob Avakian said less than three months ago?

If this fascist regime is allowed to remain in power, everything that decent people have felt they could rely on to seek justice will be brutally shut down...every uplifting moral value will be reviled and repressed...every sphere of society will be remade, in terrible ways, in line with the male supremacist, anti-LGBT, white supremacist and anti-immigrant cruelty and the anti-scientific, health and climate destroying madness of the Trump fascist regime and the bloodthirsty ravings and depraved violence of fanatics heading “the department of war,” with the deranged maniac Trump having his finger on the nuclear button.

Every vision, and every active striving, for a better, more just world, for a future worth living in, will be violently suppressed and effectively foreclosed, at least for the foreseeable future.

This is not hyperbole—it is the bitter reality that is being rapidly enforced.

No, this didn’t happen overnight. Bob Avakian has studied the question of fascism in America, and he has written and spoken on it for 30 years.  He’s traced its development and scientifically analyzed its deep roots in American society, as well as the dynamics driving it. Go here from 2004, here from 2017, and here from two months ago to get a sense of the content, through-line and the development of this analysis.  So yes, not overnight, but way the hell away from “creeping”—and with Trump Two, all this has taken a further leap.

A History of Attacks Which Serve to Hide the Real Difference

Goldsmith hinges much of his argument on recycling old attacks on Rise Up 4 Abortion Rights, a national organization that revcom Sunsara Taylor founded along with abortion provider Merle Hoffman, feminist writer Lori Sokol and others.  What Goldsmith doesn't tell you is that the organizations who launched this attack were the same ones who refused to call for mass protest against the overturning of Roe v Wade. These groups focused only on distribution of abortion medication and abortion funds.  While both provide an essential service, this was a losing and defensive strategy.  In contrast, Rise Up 4 Abortion Rights called people into the streets with the aim of preventing the ripping away of the fundamental right to abortion nationwide. 

The organizations that attacked Rise Up followed the longstanding line of the Democratic Party—minimizing the fascist danger, ceding the moral high ground to anti-abortion fanatics, compromising on women's lives, and working within the “normal channels” of this system, even as an illegitimate fascist-packed Supreme Court was ripping away basic rights, and the fascists were shredding those “normal channels.” 

But, as Goldsmith does today, instead of openly debating out these differences over strategy and analysis, they relied on lies, slander and personal attacks to shut down this debate.

And whatever the intention, Goldsmith's attack on Refuse Fascism serves the same goal: keeping people's thinking and actions confined to terms set by the “normal channels” of this system, even as once again and even more rapidly, those channels are being shredded.

Goldsmith says he is seeking to protect the "Removal Coalition” from the "co-optation efforts" of Refuse Fascism.  The Removal Coalition is a relatively new grouping, started in June 2025.  Goldsmith writes: “Veterans, activists, and content creators gathered in Washington right now for the Remove the Regime rally have every reason to be proud. This is the kind of pro-democracy organizing we need more of—creative, strategic, and grounded in community.”

But he does not speak to the important differences over strategy.  In writing about the three days of protest organized by the Removal Coalition on November 20-22, revcom.us wrote: 

All this brought important energy and public pressure and opposition to Trump into the nation's capital and this is a positive contribution to the mass struggle that is needed to bring about the regime's removal. At the same time, while impeachment could be one means through which this demand is met, it is not the only means through which Trump could be nonviolently removed. Even more essential: it is unlikely in the extreme that it would be brought about without a massive, nonviolent, sustained struggle of millions demanding Trump's removal. Also, the terms and pacing of this struggle must not be set by congressional calendars and procedures; the pace of the fascist juggernaut is way too urgent for that. And while lobbying can certainly play a role, such activity cannot substitute for what must ultimately be millions in the streets in sustained nonviolent protest—centered in Washington, DC.

Goldsmith Indulges Himself in Fantasy and Delusion in the Face of REAL Danger

Goldsmith repeatedly downplays the extreme danger of Trump MAGA fascism, danger that is posed right now.  He does this in a recent video when he says that “Senator Mark Kelly is being investigated for sedition—and that’s a good thing.”  He paints a rosy scenario in which Kelly will certainly be acquitted and at the same time this will finally wake up the Democrats and, through a series of elections, allow for the threat of fascism to be crushed.  Goldsmith blinds himself to the actual threat being posed to Kelly and to the rapid and radical fascist-driven transformations of the officer corps and military justice system (that Goldsmith assumes will acquit Kelly). He refused to deal with the actual reasons the Democratic Party as a whole has up to now not resisted fascism, and to the great likelihood that the 2026 elections—if they happen at all—will be rigged by Trump and MAGA (a process already being set in motion). 

Even if somehow this extremely complicated and extremely unlikely chain of events should come to pass, it is profoundly immoral to wait until the midterms while thousands of people are being chewed up and destroyed by Trumpian fascism and the whole planet is being imperiled. 

So, that’s difference number one—“creeping normalization” and relying on the Democrats vs. coming to grips with the reality of the fascist transformation of America NOW.

Difference number two: On what basis should the movement against fascism unite?

Goldsmith further argues, “Opposition to fascism, on its own, is not a political compass. What matters is what they want in its place.” 

To the contrary, at this time opposition to fascism is in fact the most important political dividing line in the country.  The single thing that has to unite millions—communists, Democrats, never-Trump Republicans, social democrats, all the decent people who refuse to capitulate to dark ages fascism—is the determination to drive the Trump fascist regime from power.  Whether you want to restore what you see as “the promise of America,” or whether like us you advocate for getting to a world “without everything America stands for and everything it does in the world,” we must come together behind one single unifying demand: The Trump Fascist Regime Must Go NOW!

As Avakian has repeatedly argued for:

Many individuals, organizations and groups will have different views on what has given rise to this fascism, and what should replace it, and we revcoms (revolutionary communists) will continue to forthrightly put forward and argue for our views on this, and encourage others to similarly put forward their own perspectives. But this must take place in the context and atmosphere where we are all pulling together to overcome every obstacle—including “divide and conquer” schemes, from whatever source and in whatever guise—uniting all who can be united, in the millions and millions, to achieve the truly historic goal of driving out this fascist regime.

Part of Goldsmith's "warning" is that Avakian and the revcoms supposedly have sinister and nefarious goals in trying to unite with others, trying to "coopt" mass movements.  Aside from the capitalist mode of thinking that movements against oppression can be "owned," we have to ask: why is wanting to defeat fascism to restore the status quo seen as a legitimate position, but wanting to defeat fascism because you are driven by the interests of humanity all over the world to live free from exploitation and oppression is somehow suspect? 

Last December, in a social media message Avakian predicted that this accusation might be made by "people looking for some reason, or excuse, not to rise to the challenge of defeating this fascism"

I am not calling for a mass movement to defeat Trump/MAGA fascism as some kind of “gimmick” whose aim is not really to defeat this fascism but is to somehow “trick” people into supporting a revolution to overthrow the whole system. One of the most fundamental principles of the new communism I have developed is the need to consistently approach things in a serious, scientific way—and this means being open and honest about what our objectives are. As I said at the beginning, we revcoms (revolutionary communists, based on the new communism) are serious about defeating this fascism—because this fascism represents a very real horror not only for the people in this country but for people throughout the world.

At the same time, as I have repeatedly emphasized, this fascism has been brought forth by—has grown out of the very soil of—the system of capitalism-imperialism and its development through the history of this country. By its very nature, this system has continually brought forth horror after horror; and only an actual revolution can open the way to finally ending the terrible atrocity and needless suffering constantly caused by this system.

We revcoms will continue to work urgently to win people, in the thousands and then millions, to see the need—and to act on the need—for revolution. If it turned out that a massive movement actually succeeded in defeating Trump/MAGA fascism, without that involving the revolutionary overthrow of the whole system of capitalism-imperialism, then we would certainly not somehow be “disappointed”! We would recognize the great importance of this victory, for the cause of humanity. And we would continue to work tirelessly to carry forward the struggle toward the goal of revolution which is necessary to end the endless horrors of this whole system of capitalism-imperialism, and bring into being a much better system—as set forth in the Declaration at revcom.us: WE NEED AND WE DEMAND: A WHOLE NEW WAY TO LIVE, A FUNDAMENTALLY DIFFERENT SYSTEM.

Difference number three: The question of leadership

Without a real argument of substance to make, Goldsmith falls back on the favorite of those who want you to avoid engaging Bob Avakian, that the revcoms are a “cult.”  Avakian himself has spoken to this more than once, including why this kind of thing too easily gets over in the current culture. 

Beyond that, though, one of the hallmarks of the new communism that Bob Avakian has brought forward is the recognition of the need for a scientific, evidence-based approach to understanding and radically changing the world. He argues for a process that fosters debate and dissent.  Speaking about the Constitution for the New Socialist Republic in North America which Avakian authored, he said:

It is a fact that, nowhere else, in any actual or proposed founding or guiding document of any government, is there anything like not only the protection but the provision for dissent and intellectual and cultural ferment that is embodied in this Constitution, while this has, as its solid core, a grounding in the socialist transformation of the economy, with the goal of abolishing all exploitation, and the corresponding transformation of the social relations and political institutions, to uproot all oppression, and the promotion, through the educational system and in society as a whole, of an approach that will “enable people to pursue the truth wherever it leads, with a spirit of critical thinking and scientific curiosity, and in this way to continually learn about the world and be better able to contribute to changing it in accordance with the fundamental interests of humanity.”

Avakian goes on to say, in this same message (“Irresponsible Opportunist Distortions Should Not Be Allowed…”), 

The principles and methods that have led to the development of the Constitution for the New Socialist Republic in North America are also the basis and the guideline for how we revcoms approach working with many others, of different political perspectives, in order to unite all who can be united in massive, powerful, sustained and relentless non-violent struggle to defeat and remove the Trump fascist regime—which, from our perspective, is a crucial part of moving to bring about the revolution that will lead to the profoundly liberating system that is embodied in the Constitution for the New Socialist Republic in North America, aiming for the emancipation of humanity as a whole from all systems and relations of exploitation and oppression everywhere in the world.

This is what I and the revcoms actually stand for, and have dedicated our lives and efforts to fighting for. Honest questions or principled disagreement about this is welcome and can be the basis for meaningful discussion and debate—at the same time as everyone who refuses to accept a fascist America is united as a powerful force to meet the urgent need to defeat and remove the Trump fascist regime.

That is the principle, clarity and urgency needed now.  As the fascist regime is moving so so quickly to lock down an all-out fascist America which threatens humanity and the planet, it is everyone's responsibility to not fall for dishonest divide-and-conquer schemes, and call these out when you see them. 

Did you know that from 1956 to 1971 the FBI conducted a program designed to foment conflict within revolutionary movements, as well as broader movements for reform—conflicts which not only crippled these movements, but served as a cover to carry out frame-ups and even outright murder of revolutionary fighters and activists?

Did you know that they sent undercover people into these movements specifically to create or magnify conflicts? Did you know that they relied on unsubstantiated gossip and often inventions, as well as forged documents as part of their arsenal?

Did you know that they took statements out of context to distort the real views of activists and revolutionary fighters and use these as pretexts for smear campaigns and attempted prosecutions?

All this came to light in 1971, when some brave and heroic people appropriated the files revealing this program in a nighttime operation to go into an FBI office and bring these criminal activities by the government to light. As a result, many people in the movements of the time and even beyond, in broader society, adopted different standards for settling inevitable conflicts over politics and ideology in a principled way, and preventing the police, FBI and other government agencies from spreading slanders, fomenting conflicts and endangering the lives of people active in the struggle for justice.

Now, decades later, a new generation is way too unaware either of the FBI activities or the protocols widely adopted. We saw the results of this in 2022, with the vicious and very dangerous slander campaign that was launched against Rise Up 4 Abortion Rights, the revcoms, Bob Avakian and Sunsara Taylor. And now, in light of the heightened repression from Trump fascism and the low standards that exist among people broadly, we are reissuing this article.

We urge people to read and spread the article below, and to insist on principled discussion and debate over disagreements and to oppose any dangerous campaigns of lies, disinformation and distortion.

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COINTELPRO was launched by the FBI in secret in 1956 in the context of the rising civil rights movement, and operations were later “signed on” to by the Kennedy administration. Its reach was broad and vicious. The FBI, working in sync with local police “Red Squads” (political police) wrote leaflets fomenting conflicts between different groups. They sent anonymous letters warning parents and school administrators of what their children and students were supposedly doing. They conducted police surveillance and repression against antiwar coffee houses opening near military bases. And those the FBI identified as leaders, in particular, were marked for “neutralization” by the FBI, a euphemism for being framed up on serious criminal charges or killed.

One of the earliest, ugliest and most grievous FBI operations was against Malcolm X. We recently covered this, and we are including it here as a companion to this article.

Going After Martin Luther King Through Personal Slander and Harassment

One element in COINTELPRO attacks on the civil rights movement was the dissemination by the FBI of allegations about Martin Luther King’s sex life that had nothing to do with the struggle for civil rights, or debates within that movement or in society as a whole. The FBI bugged King’s bedroom(!) and then, directly or posing as “concerned individuals” sent supposed taped “evidence” to media outlets and others, including colleges where King was invited to speak, demanding he be disinvited. They even sent such a tape to his wife, Coretta Scott King, in the hope of causing anguish and breaking up the marriage.

The FBI also circulated allegations that King’s movement had organizational and financial connections to communists, playing on anti-communist prejudices, to push (and provide an excuse for) white liberals and what the FBI identified as “the responsible Negro community” to stay away from the civil rights movement at a time when civil rights activists were being brutally attacked and murdered by police and the KKK, and as a cover for massive surveillance of the civil rights movement. Whether or not the authorities were directly involved in King’s murder in Memphis in 1968 as his family and close associates have insisted, the COINTELPRO operation created conditions that facilitated his assassination and was continued for a year after his death.

Going After the Panthers: Fomenting Conflicts to Murder Leadership

A major objective and focus of COINTELPRO was isolating and setting up the most revolutionary forces at the time, especially the Black Panther Party (BPP), for attack. FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover, in a secret memo, wrote to offices calling for “imaginative and hard-hitting counterintelligence measures aimed at crippling the BPP.” (Emphasis added.)

As they did with Malcolm X (see the accompanying article), the FBI often focused on setting up others to do the actual dirty work. To take one notorious example, the FBI forged a letter, supposedly from someone in the community, to Jeff Fort, the leader of the Blackstone Rangers, a Chicago gang at the time, claiming that the Black Panther Party was getting ready to move on him. In this case, in the climate of the times when there was both a broad culture of being alert to moves by the authorities to forge accusations to set people up, and when there was broad respect for the Panthers and the revolution, Fort decided the threatening letter was not credible. This letter was part of a larger COINTELPRO operation that set into motion events that led to the assassination of Panther leader Fred Hampton by Chicago police and the FBI in 1969.

In another COINTELPRO operation, the LA office of the FBI came up with a plan to forge a letter claiming the US Organization (United Slaves), which had been attacking the Panthers, believed that the BPP had a contract out to kill their leader. The LA FBI office wrote that the objective was for “this counterintelligence measure [to] result in an ‘US’ and BPP vendetta.” The operation was part of what led to the terrible murder of Black Panther leaders John Huggins and Alprentice “Bunchy” Carter by US members in Los Angeles.

Again, there were real issues to resolve, questions to investigate, and debates to struggle out among those struggling for a different and better world in different ways, coming from different outlooks at the time, as now. The pattern and practice of COINTELPRO was to exploit these contradictions to twist them into vicious, destructive personal attacks, with an aim of disintegrating the movements for social change and an edge of isolating and setting up the most radical and revolutionary forces and leaders for what COINTELPRO documents euphemistically referred to as “neutralization.”

Conclusion: don’t fall for—and don’t tolerate—the kinds of behavior that mimic what the FBI has used to destroy social movements. Call it out.

Resources:

The book The COINTELPRO Papers, by Ward Churchill and Jim Vander Wall contains a vast collection of original FBI memos and reports including documentation for the incidents described in this article. It is available as an online PDF.

This article draws on installments of the American Crime series at revcoms.us: American Crime Case #41: COINTELPRO—The FBI Targets the New Left, 1964-1971 and American Crime Case #42: COINTELPRO—The FBI Targets the Black Freedom Struggle, 1956-1971.

An important letter drawing lessons for today from the COINTELPRO operation against Malcolm X: A Reflection on Piggery—Then and Now.

Trump/MAGA fascism is being aggressively imposed on this society in many horrifying ways, instilling fear and a pull towards cooperation with government authorities. One of the ways people are being confronted with this is in situations where people are stopped as they go about their daily business at school, work, or shopping for food and necessities. Right now, that is a living reality for people who are being targeted as “illegal” immigrants, based on how they look or talk. But there are other situations that can be equally frightening: like when someone is arrested at or in connection with a political protest, or when someone is being questioned by police when they don’t have any idea what it is about. In all cases, people need to know what is the best way to respond to prevent these government agencies from doing great harm. 

In the popular culture in movies and TV shows, to the ever-present law-and-order shows of one kind or another, and even the news, all trumpet the same theme: if the police want to talk to you, you are already assumed to be guilty—of something. To exercise one's legal rights is viewed as further evidence of guilt; even the most basic right—getting a lawyer to defend oneself from the legal and illegal onslaught of cops, prosecutors and judges—is depicted with a sneer as "lawyering up," as though this shows you must be guilty or have something to hide. 

Sometimes you hear the police reading what’s called the Miranda warning (see box) to a person they are intending to interrogate, stating that you have the right to remain silent and the right to a lawyer. But then everything proceeds as though the person being questioned is showing their guilt by refusing to answer questions and getting a lawyer to represent them.

But in real-life situations, the best advice lawyers give anyone who is being arrested, questioned or contacted in any way by the police is: DON’T TALK. 

It is important for people to know what rights they DO have when agents of repression come sniffing around. And it is especially important to insist on those rights even as they are increasingly coming under attack. 

Bob Avakian has spoken to this point in his social media message @BobAvakianOfficial REVOLUTION #106:

As we revcoms (revolutionary communists) have made clear in the Declaration WE NEED AND WE DEMAND: A WHOLE NEW WAY TO LIVE, A FUNDAMENTALLY DIFFERENT SYSTEM: “So long as we are still living under the rule of this system of capitalism-imperialism, we will defend people against attacks on their lives and on the rights that are supposed to be guaranteed under the U.S. Constitution.”

So, what rights based on the U.S. Constitution are supposed to apply whether during an arrest or in any contact with police or government agencies? How should people defend their rights individually and collectively, and what kind of culture is needed to resist the government forces of repression?

The Right to Remain Silent—Don't Talk

When facing agents of government repression (here we are talking about the local police and prosecutors, state or federal law enforcement or various government agencies), the principle of "Don't Talk" is an important legal principle overall, and it is crucial in fighting to protect the various movements of resistance and of revolution from government repression. This principle is stressed very strongly by criminal defense lawyers and civil rights organizations—you have a RIGHT to remain silent.

Many legal rights organizations, such as the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) and National Lawyers Guild (NLG), have published materials to inform people of their rights. The most important thing they all advise is to assert your right to NOT answer questions. 

For example, the following is from a brochure published by the ACLU of Southern California: 

WHAT TO DO IF YOU’RE STOPPED BY POLICE, IMMIGRATION AGENTS OR THE FBI:
YOUR RIGHTS 

• You have the right to remain silent. If you wish to exercise that right, say so out loud.
• You have the right to refuse to consent to a search of yourself, your car or your home.
• If you are not under arrest, you have the right to calmly leave.
• You have the right to a lawyer if you are arrested. Ask for one immediately.
• Regardless of your immigration or citizenship status, you have constitutional rights.

And the National Lawyers Guild advises what to do if an FBI agent or police officer knocks at the door:

Do not open the door. State that you are going to remain silent. Do not answer any questions, or even give your name. Anything you say, no matter how seemingly harmless or insignificant, can be used against you or others. Ask the agents to slide their business cards under the door and tell them that your lawyer will contact them. If the agent or officer gives a reason for contacting you, take notes and give the information to your lawyer.¹⁰ 

What Harm Can Talking Do?

There are many myths and lies promoted in the dominant culture and by the police themselves which leave people confused and feeling they have no choice but to cooperate. This is absolutely wrong and dangerous to any movements of resistance from among the people. 

Myth #1—Cooperating will make the authorities go away.

In fact, it often does just the opposite. After all, if they size someone up as a "talker" or weak link, they'll milk this person for all the information they can get. They may return with more questions or continue this line of questioning with others.

Myth #2—Talking will prevent being arrested.

The authorities promote the illusion that a person should try to "save their own hide" by cooperating and talking. In reality, as the ACLU and NLG underscore, in many circumstances talking may increase the chances of a person being busted, and may be sealing the case against himself/herself as well as others.

Myth #3—As long as the information provided is harmless, there's nothing wrong with talking.

When people don't know their rights and talk freely to the authorities, this can do great harm—no matter what information they provide.

First of all, because the person doesn't know the full agenda of the authorities, he/she has no basis to evaluate whether or not information is "harmless." Even if the authorities claim to be investigating something that has nothing to do with your politics or political activities (or those of others), appearances can be deceiving. The authorities can and will twist any information to their advantage.

Secondly, the act of talking encourages the authorities to pursue this tactic and go after others.

Finally, and most importantly, talking fuels the government's efforts to eliminate any movements of opposition and dissent, while standing firm and not talking as a matter of principle contributes to building a culture of resistance and defiance.

Myth #4—If I don't cooperate, won't it look like I have something to hide?

According to the Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR),

This is one of the most frequently asked questions. The answer involves the nature of political "intelligence" investigations and the job of the FBI. Agents will try to make you feel that it will "look bad" if you don't cooperate with them. Many people not familiar with how the FBI operates worry about being uncooperative…. (T)hey [the FBI] are intent on learning about the habits, opinions, and affiliations of people not suspected of wrongdoing....

They will do anything to get a person to talk: from good cop/bad cop approaches (aimed at getting the person to "open up" to the more sympathetic cop) to threats and outright brutality. They also use "mind games" such as saying that others have already informed on a person; or even going so far as falsely telling someone a family member has died in order to get the person to let down his/her guard and reveal information about themselves or others.

Any information that a person provides—no matter how seemingly insignificant—can be twisted and used against that person themselves, or against people and organizations who expose and oppose the crimes of this system. The government has a long history of lying about the facts and fabricating "evidence" in order to frame movement activists and revolutionaries. They take intelligence gathered from a variety of sources and use it in the most sinister ways, even including murder. Consequently, there is no reason to be in the least defensive about not talking to or cooperating with authorities.

If a person thinks that he/she can just "bullshit" an agent, this too is a trap. The investigators are trained to be "friendly" and listen to people's stories. To quote a textbook on interrogation techniques, "Letting the subject tell a few lies, and letting him apparently get away with them, is an excellent technique, and works well with many types of subjects. We have seen that lying on the part of the subject works to the advantage of the interrogator...." The NLG has pointed out:

Keep in mind that although they are allowed to lie to you, lying to a government agent is a crime. Remaining silent is not. The safest things to say are "I am going to remain silent," "I want to speak to my lawyer," and " do not consent to a search." [emphasis added]¹¹

Conclusion

As spoken to throughout this article, as part of trying to beat down movements of resistance and of revolution, agents of the government (police, FBI, prosecutors, etc.) have developed methods to trick, intimidate and brutalize people into giving up legal rights and protections established by the legal system in this country. This basic dynamic and truth needs to be clearly understood, and if various organizations and movements are serious about the challenges they face, they need to grapple with how—mainly by relying on mass movements of the people—to resist such repression.

History has shown that when the decent people refuse to concede the moral authority on what is right and what is wrong, they are better able to withstand repression and continue to develop resistance. If they do not take this approach, they find themselves in a situation where: That which you do not resist and mobilize to stop, you will learn—or be forced—to accept. Part of building a culture of defiance and resistance among people standing up against fascism and the crimes of this system is refusing to allow the government to either intimidate or bamboozle people into giving up resistance, and refusing in any way to enter into complicity with such intimidation and repression.

In this context, the legal principles underlying "Don't Talk" take on heightened importance. Those confronted by police agents should not be bamboozled into giving up the legal rights they do have, as this will only lead to strengthening the repressive apparatus of the state, and help to undercut the ability to struggle against the crimes of this system and to build a movement for revolution to overthrow this system and bring about a fundamentally different and much better system. 

Readers’ Corner highlights views that you, our readers, send us on the big questions about making revolution. Questions about building the movement for an actual revolution. Or responses to, and thoughts provoked by, the social media messages from Bob Avakian—the revolutionary leader and architect of the new communism. Thinking and questions you may have on other important documents from Bob Avakian (BA) and the Revcoms. As well as reflections on the new communism brought forward by BA, both overall and in relation to the urgent moment at hand. Now especially is a time for collective scientific grappling.

Please send these to revolution.reports@yahoo.com. If your submission isn't reposted, it will still feed into our overall enriched understanding of what questions we should be speaking to.

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