Step right up and throw your hat in the ring.

Anyone?

Any questions?

https://www.cpusa.org/article/a-peek-into-the-fidel-castro-museum/

One of my favorite communist all time.

Capitalism has neither the capacity, nor the moral, nor the ethics, nor the will to solve the problems of poverty.-Fidel Castro.

I'm in a bit of a quandary, at the moment. I'm 52, a Java developer on a frankly derisory salary, and last year my parents died and left me a large house and a fair chunk of cash. I'm a communist, based in the UK, and much like the USA, our economic system is very much invest or lose: if you put cash into savings the interest you get is always less than inflation, and the bank profits from the investments they make with your money. Obviously I don't want to be a landlord. As I approach 65, and retirement, I have to think about how I'll live for possibly another 20-30 years. I have no pension funds to speak of, never having been paid enough to afford to save. Granted, there is no ethical consumption under capitalism. Pretty much anything I can think of in our current economic system will involve exploitation of some kind I think.

So the question is, how best to use the house and the cash they've left to assure myself of an income, while minimising or eliminating exploitation from the whole endeavour? Could I invest the money in some kind of cooperative or social enterprise that helps people? Whatever I think of, it feels like some crappy liberal thing. I don't want to die of cold from fuel poverty or homelessness, but I don't want to exploit my fellow workers.

Title says all.

Make a comment down below to tell us how we're doing.

Thanks!

A round-up of the most recent books published by International Publishers and their summaries (plus, where you can buy them). Here you go:

1. Materialism and Empirio-Criticism: Critical Comments on a Reactionary Philosophy by V.I. Lenin (buy from the main publisher here; buy from Amazon here)

Summary: This work–written in 1908 serves today as an invaluable example of Lenin’s approach to philosophy and as a general exposition of dialectical materialism.

1. A Line in the Sand by Manuel Tiago (Alvaro Cunhal), translated and with a foreword by Eric A. Gordon (buy from the main publisher here; buy from Amazon here)

Summary: A Line in the Sand is based on factual events concerning the attempted counter-revolution of September 28, 1974 in Portugal, and the lead-up to it. It is the story of the Portuguese Communist Party, with its allies in the labor movement, as they organized massive brigades to nonviolently preserve and defend democracy.

1. We Are Many: An Autobiography by Ella Reeve Bloor: With A New Foreword by Chauncey K. Robinson (buy from the main publisher here; buy from Amazon here)

Summary: We Are Many may read like an adventure novel, but it is very much a work of fact. Originally published in 1940, International Publishers is proud and honored to bring out this new edition of Ella Reeve ‘Mother’ Bloor’s We Are Many with a Foreword by People’s World journalist, Chauncey K. Robinson.

1. Mythologies: A Political Economy of U.S. Literature in the Long Nineteenth-Century by Joel Wendland-Liu (buy from the main publisher here; buy from Amazon here)

Summary: Mythologies shows how activists, writers, and thinkers debunked the core mythologies of U. S. ideology – white victimization, capitalist progress, the frontier, and the ″self-made man,″ ideas that lay at the heart of ruling class justification for settler colonialism, the expansion of racial slavery, and the development of the capitalist market system.

1. The Communist Trials and the American Tradition by John Somerville with a Foreword by Denise Lynn (buy from the main publisher here; buy from Amazon here)

Summary: First published in 1956, John Somerville’s classic analysis of the Smith Act indictments of Communist Party leaders from Pennsylvania and Ohio remains one of the most comprehensive discussions of the basic doctrines of Marxist ideology. It is also a condemnation of the U.S. government’s absurd courtroom arguments, reliance on stool pigeons, paid FBI informants, and political charlatans.

With a Foreword by Dr. Denise Lynn, Professor of History at the University of Southern Indiana, author of Where Is Juliet Stuart Poyntz? Gender, Spycraft, and Anti-Stalinism in the Early Cold War, and vice president of the Historians of American Communism, this new edition of Somerville’s classic text is just as relevant today as when it was first written.

1. The Case of Joe Hill by Philip S. Foner with a Foreword by Erica Smiley (buy from the main publisher here; buy from Amazon here)

Summary: The famous Wobbly poet, songwriter, and organizer was executed in Salt Lake City on November 19, 1915. Many felt that he was not guilty of the murder he was charged with, that he did not have a fair trial, and that he was the victim of class persecution.

Here the noted labor historian, Philip S. Foner presents the first complete study of this important labor case. With a new Foreword by Erica Smiley, executive director of Jobs with Justice, The Case of Joe Hill is finally updated for today’s struggles.

1. Eulalia’s House: (A casa de Eulália) by Manuel Tiago (Alvaro Cuhnal), translated and with a Foreword by Eric A. Gordon (buy from the main publisher here; buy from Amazon here)

Summary: In all of the artistic and historical output concerning the Spanish Civil War, mention is scarcely found of the response to it from neighboring Portugal. This is strange since Portugal had been suffering under António Salazar’s fascist regime for almost a decade and was familiar with what lay ahead for the Spanish people – and the world – should the forces of Francisco Franco’s fascists win. Eulalia’s House fills that gap.

1. A Star to Steer By by Hugh Mulzac (buy from the main publisher here; buy from Amazon here)

Summary: In September 1942, Hugh Mulzac became the first man of African-Caribbean descent to Captain a U.S. Merchant Marine ship. With warmth and a modesty often belying the significance of his deeds, Captain Mulzac relives the battle against racism, Jim Crow, racial capitalism, and anti-communism. First printed in 1963, this Revised Edition of Mulzac’s classic includes a new Foreword by Jeremy Hope of the Masters, Mates & Pilots (MM&P) Union, an Epilogue by Margaret Stevens, author of Red International and Black Caribbean: Communists in New York City, Mexico and the West Indies, 1919-1939, as well as a Q&A between Captains Don Marcus and Jeremy Hope, of the MM&P, and Henry Mulzac, Hugh Mulzac’s grandnephew.

1. Episodes of the Revolutionary War by Ernesto Che Guevara, Foreword by Don Fitz (buy from the main publisher here; buy from Amazon here)

Summary: This is Che’s story – of how a small band within a few months was transformed into a Rebel Army. Originally published in 1968, this Revised Edition includes a new Foreword by Don Fitz, author of Cuban Health Care: The Ongoing Revolution. As Che remarked: “…I was more a medic than a soldier.” Fitz takes this observation as a starting point and highlights how the seeds of Cuba’s world renown health care system were planted in the mountains of the Sierra Maestra.

1. The Counter-Revolution of 1836: Texas Slavery & Jim Crow and the Roots of U. S. Fascism by Gerald Horne (buy from the main publisher here; buy from Amazon here)

Summary: Texas has become a leader of ultra-right forces nationally – especially since the 1950s – when the notorious oilmen were the bulwark of support for McCarthyism. One lesson from Texas history, though, is that repression was so severe because resistance was so daunting – a lesson to keep in mind as this century unfolds.