September 4, 2009 – The New Dark Age

Much has been said about white working-class voters. But those who’ve been doing all the talking are pollsters and political operatives. As part of our Long View series, ANP traveled to rural Virginia to talk to someone who’s lived the life and knows from personal experience what those voters are thinking — author Joe Bageant. His highly-acclaimed recent book, Deer Hunting With Jesus, was lauded by one reviewer as a “raging, hilarious, and profane love song to the great American redneck.” In addition to being that, it’s also one of the most prescient pieces of analysis about American politics and culture in this election year (2008).

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3 September, 2009 — Climate and Capitalism

Climate change too is class war. Copenhagen is the next battle.

Editorial from the coming issue of Socialist Resistance, Thanks to Liam Mac Uaid for making it available.

In December the world’s rulers will meet in Copenhagen to discuss what they will do when the notably unsuccessful Kyoto Protocol expires. They won’t be alone. Lobbyists from the aviation, petrochemical and mining industries will be pressurising them in defence of their ‘right’ to alter the planet’s climate by pumping millions of tonnes of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere.

Writing in this issue Phil Thornhill of the Campaign Against Climate Change says of Kyoto, ‘it was so weak and so full of holes that it was not going to achieve any significant concrete results.’ In Copenhagen the stakes are much higher. Earlier this year Kim Carstensen of the WWF said, ‘We are at the point where our climate system is starting to spin out of control… the latest science confirms that we are now seeing devastating consequences of warming that were not expected to hit for decades.’

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