United States

Elections can reveal a lot about a country, and the fast-approaching U.S. presidential election is proving to be no exception. Above all, the current election shows just how much working Americans need their own political representation. This fact is expressed and cynically taken advantage of by Barack Obama’s campaign slogan: “Change We Can Believe In.” Even the “old guard” represented by John McCain has had to raise the idea of change in his campaign rhetoric.

Millions have hoped against hope that Barack Obama represents real change. But these sincere hopes were dealt another blow with the selection of Senator Joseph Biden from Delaware as Obama’s vice presidential running mate. Biden has had a long career in politics, and is often portrayed as a “liberal.” However, a brief look at his policies only goes to show the sorry state that bourgeois liberalism finds itself in!

It’s official. Barack Obama is the presidential candidate of the Democratic Party. His rapid rise to national prominence and eventual nomination have left millions of American workers and youth dizzy with hope for real change. Many have lamented or attempted to justify his shift to the right since he won the nomination (a shift from the so-called “center” of U.S. politics as he has never been on the “left”). But few have drawn the logical conclusion from this: that as we have explained time and again in the pages of Socialist Appeal, Obama does not represent real change and is organically incapable of changing anything fundamental. How could he? He is a Big...

The death of another female US soldier fighting in Iraq has aroused serious suspicions as to the circumstances that led to her death. The war in Iraq is causing far more casualties than the official figures indicate. The case of LaVena Johnson is yet another tragic example of why we demand the troops be brought home now! For more information, please visit www.lavenajohnson.com.

The U.S. is in the worst housing slump since the Great Depression as home prices fell by a record 15.3 percent from a year ago in the first few months of the year. Mortgage defaults and home repossessions have skyrocketed as working people are unable to make ends meet.

The rising cost of oil, and gasoline in particular, is having an effect on everything, further stretching the limits of the already strained wallets of US workers. The oil and energy barons are making big profits at the expense of US workers. It is time to call for the expropriation of these parasites.

The US Marxists analyse the situation that is developing in the USA, dealing with the deepening economic crisis, the impact of the ongoing war in Iraq, the upcoming elections and the future that awaits the US workers and youth.

Inflation in the USA is rising across the board. And it's not just housing, gasoline, heating, transportation, health care and education. The cost of that most basic of all necessities - food - is now also quickly rising for American workers and their families.

Almost overnight, the media, corporate CEOs and government officials have gone from proclaiming that the U.S. would somehow avoid an economic slump, to all but recognizing that the country has probably already entered a recession. They are simply acknowledging what millions of workers have known for months and even years: the economy is in trouble, and working people and the poor are being hit hard.

Many people are looking to the Democrats, and in particular to Barack Obama for a real change, especially when it comes to the Iraq war. But on the question of war and foreign policy, does Obama really differ from the current White House administration, or from his party mate Hillary Clinton, or for that matter, from the entire DC political establishment?

The situation in the USA is one of increasing crises. The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan continue to trail on, costing nearly $275 million per day. The situation at home is one of increasing unemployment and continual crisis in the housing and credit markets. US workers will be called on to go to the polls to elect a party of big business, but this era of crises will only serve to cause more people to question the world in which they live. Editorial for Socialist Appeal Issue 37.

Alan Woods' introduction to the latest book from Wellred USA. The book includes four Marxist classics: the Communist Manifesto, Socialism: Scientific and Utopian, State and Revolution, and the Transitional Program.  It is intended to introduce readers in the USA to the most fundamental aspects of Marxist theory. Available from Wellred USA.

Obama may well end up being the official Democratic candidate in the US Presidential elections. But what kind of an alternative is he? Luiz Bicalho, a leading member of Esquerda Marxista in Brazil, explains that Obama promises many things but remains a defender of capitalism. The answer is not Obama. The answer is an independent party of the US working class fighting to change society.

For those following US electoral politics right now, it is clear that the big business candidates are presenting their respective religiosities as credentials of a sort to prospective voters. The open pandering to the "faith vote" displays the cynical depths the representatives of the ruling class are willing to go to win votes. This is not simply a harmless phenomenon but a noxious indication of the rottenness of the system.