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IRAQ: The civil war myth

Rohan Pearce In the early days of the battle for Fallujah and the Shiite militia rebellion, almost every journalist in the corporate media would begin their reports with dire warnings about a country sliding towards civil war. In fact, the

IRAQ: Burial ground of the New American Century?

Doug Lorimer BBC television journalist Tara Sutton reported on February 4 that one of the first signs people see as they enter the Iraqi city of Fallujah in March reads: "Welcome to Fallujah — burial ground of the Americans." The mass rebellion

Loose cannons

Unoccupied I "This is [US President George] Bush's 33rd visit to his ranch since becoming president. He has spent all or part of 233 days on his Texas ranch since taking office, according to a tally by CBS News. Adding his 78 visits to Camp David

Meeting discusses global capitalism

SYDNEY — Canadian academic Leo Panitch discussed the making of global capitalism at a meeting of 25 people on April 14, organised by the Socialist Alliance. Panitch is co-editor of Socialist Register, a professor of political science at York

News briefs 2

2 ACT Labor government bans appeals CANBERRA - On April 16, the ACT ALP government responded to the Save the Ridge group's March 31 court victory by announcing not only an appeal, but also a change to land planning regulations so that objections

Love and death amid the crisis of social democracy

REVIEW BY LACHLAN MALLOCH The Barbarian InvasionsWritten and directed by Denys ArcandWith Remy Girard, Stephane Rousseau and Marie-Josee CrozeOpens nationally April 8. In the beginning, Australian audiences could be forgiven for thinking The

SCOTLAND: Socialists launch council tax rebellion

Alex Miller The Scottish Socialist Party (SSP) will initiate a campaign to abolish the local council tax wuith a mass demonstration in Glasgow on April 24, and with the presentation of bill in the Scottish Parliament by SSP MSP Tommy Sheridan. In

Troops out now!

While government and opposition ministers ruminate ceaselessly about what kind of "exit strategy" is needed to get troops out of Iraq, the anti-war movement has been shouting its strategy: "Troops out now!" Prime Minister John Howard may have

Moqtada al Sadr and the Mahdi Army

Rohan Pearce Outside of Moqtada al Sadr, most clerics in the higher reaches of the Shiite hierarchy — such as Grand Ayatollah Ali al Sistani and the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq — have had ambivalent attitudes towards the

Greens challenge ALP stranglehold on local councils

Kylie Moon& Margaret Gleeson, Sydney Despite the big increase in the Greens votes in the Sydney inner-west municipalities of Marrickville, Leichhardt or Ashfield at the March 27 NSW local government elections, no Greens councillors were elected as

Little Johnny helps festival go left

CANBERRA — A statue of Prime Minister John Howard titled 'If the boots don't fit', helped set the scene for one of the most radical national folk festivals in years, over the Easter weekend. The statue, by Melbourne sculptor Greg Taylor, was

Socialist Alliance unionists get organised

Andrew Watson After years of retreat under conservative leaderships, sections of the trade union movement are today experiencing a revival of militancy and rank-and-file workplace organising. Socialists are playing a leading role in rebuilding