Image is from this Black Agenda Report article by the Communist Party of Kenya.
In June, large anti-government protests shook Kenya. President Ruto and his parliament were attempting to pass the new Finance Bill 2024, which, among other things, would have hiked taxes on the population, with a 16% sales tax on bread and a 25% duty on cooking oil, as well as new taxes on financial transanctions and vehicle ownership. There would also have been levies on women's sanitary products and digital goods such as phones, among other measures affecting hospitals.
Hundreds of protestors stormed the parliament building and began to tear the place apart. Shortly afterwards, on June 26th, Ruto announced that he was withdrawing the bill, calling the tens of deaths and hundreds of injuries "unfortunate". A couple weeks later, Ruto then fired his entire cabinet (aside from his foreign minister) and communicated his wish to the nation to form a "broad-based government". Funnily enough, in July, it was announced that the majority of positions were to be filled by members of the old cabinet, while other positions were taken by members of the opposition. This has prompted scepticism among the population, including calls to resign, but there haven't (yet) been any major anti-government events to pressure this outcome. The Communist Party of Kenya has been working to get some of their comrades back after they were abducted by the police during the protest period, and have otherwise supported the protests against Ruto.
The measures in the bill were strongly encouraged by the IMF. Kenya's debt is currently around $80 billion, of which about 10% is owed to China for infrastructure projects (such as a railway linking the capital, Nairobi, to the port city of Mombasa, as well as 11,000 kilometers of road throughout the country). The rest is owed to a combination of the US, IMF, World Bank, and Saudi Arabia. More than half of government revenue is going towards repaying the debt - but despite these massive payments, it has only grown. The most recent round of IMF plundering (and the impetus for current events) began in 2021, when they offered a 38-month programme to "help" Kenya, which would involve the usual warfare on the poor and the dismemberment of any useful societal institutions.
The COTW (Country of the Week) label is designed to spur discussion and debate about a specific country every week in order to help the community gain greater understanding of the domestic situation of often-understudied nations. If you've wanted to talk about the country or share your experiences, but have never found a relevant place to do so, now is your chance! However, don't worry - this is still a general news megathread where you can post about ongoing events from any country.
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Israel-Palestine Conflict
Sources on the fighting in Palestine against Israel. In general, CW for footage of battles, explosions, dead people, and so on:
UNRWA daily-ish reports on Israel's destruction and siege of Gaza and the West Bank.
English-language Palestinian Marxist-Leninist twitter account. Alt here.
English-language twitter account that collates news (and has automated posting when the person running it goes to sleep).
Arab-language twitter account with videos and images of fighting.
English-language (with some Arab retweets) Twitter account based in Lebanon. - Telegram is @IbnRiad.
English-language Palestinian Twitter account which reports on news from the Resistance Axis. - Telegram is @EyesOnSouth.
English-language Twitter account in the same group as the previous two. - Telegram here.
English-language PalestineResist telegram channel.
More telegram channels here for those interested.
Various sources that are covering the Ukraine conflict are also covering the one in Palestine, like Rybar.
Russia-Ukraine Conflict
Examples of Ukrainian Nazis and fascists
Examples of racism/euro-centrism during the Russia-Ukraine conflict
Sources:
Defense Politics Asia's youtube channel and their map. Their youtube channel has substantially diminished in quality but the map is still useful.
Moon of Alabama, which tends to have interesting analysis. Avoid the comment section.
Understanding War and the Saker: reactionary sources that have occasional insights on the war.
Alexander Mercouris, who does daily videos on the conflict. While he is a reactionary and surrounds himself with likeminded people, his daily update videos are relatively brainworm-free and good if you don't want to follow Russian telegram channels to get news. He also co-hosts The Duran, which is more explicitly conservative, racist, sexist, transphobic, anti-communist, etc when guests are invited on, but is just about tolerable when it's just the two of them if you want a little more analysis.
On the ground: Patrick Lancaster, an independent and very good journalist reporting in the warzone on the separatists' side.
Unedited videos of Russian/Ukrainian press conferences and speeches.
Pro-Russian Telegram Channels:
Again, CW for anti-LGBT and racist, sexist, etc speech, as well as combat footage.
https://t.me/aleksandr_skif ~ DPR's former Defense Minister and Colonel in the DPR's forces. Russian language.
https://t.me/Slavyangrad ~ A few different pro-Russian people gather frequent content for this channel (~100 posts per day), some socialist, but all socially reactionary. If you can only tolerate using one Russian telegram channel, I would recommend this one.
https://t.me/s/levigodman ~ Does daily update posts.
https://t.me/patricklancasternewstoday ~ Patrick Lancaster's telegram channel.
https://t.me/gonzowarr ~ A big Russian commentator.
https://t.me/rybar ~ One of, if not the, biggest Russian telegram channels focussing on the war out there. Actually quite balanced, maybe even pessimistic about Russia. Produces interesting and useful maps.
https://t.me/epoddubny ~ Russian language.
https://t.me/boris_rozhin ~ Russian language.
https://t.me/mod_russia_en ~ Russian Ministry of Defense. Does daily, if rather bland updates on the number of Ukrainians killed, etc. The figures appear to be approximately accurate; if you want, reduce all numbers by 25% as a 'propaganda tax', if you don't believe them. Does not cover everything, for obvious reasons, and virtually never details Russian losses.
https://t.me/UkraineHumanRightsAbuses ~ Pro-Russian, documents abuses that Ukraine commits.
Pro-Ukraine Telegram Channels:
Almost every Western media outlet.
https://discord.gg/projectowl ~ Pro-Ukrainian OSINT Discord.
https://t.me/ice_inii ~ Alleged Ukrainian account with a rather cynical take on the entire thing.
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This is August Landmesser
He was a member of the nazi party attending a nazi rally.
He attempted to marry a jewish woman, and the couple was persecuted for it, resulting eventually in both their deaths (she was murdered, he was conscripted into a penal battalion)
He is pictured refusing to salute hitler, yet still attending the rally for the nazis. Hes not fighting for her life, hes not taking up arms, hes not re-evaluating his choices.
All hes doing is refusing to hold up his arm.
You live in nazi germany. Whether or not you attend the nazi ritual festival of "election day" will make no change to the outcome of the country's progression. After election day check your states voting results. If the vote margin is more than exactly zero (ie tied), your vote wouldve been worthless. Voting is purely a show of loyalty to the American Empire, voting for trump is like if Landmesser saluted, voting kamala is like when he didnt. Youre still attending the nazi rally.
Im sorry for being so confrontational but i feel strongly about this subject.
I reckon youd make a better contribution to the world if you stayed home and read theory all day on election day
So when people were comparing Tlaib to him, it turns out they were right to do so but not in the way they think.
I only learnt his story because of a twitter poster making that exact point
Libs truly cannot help themselves. They worship literal Nazis who regretted that there are consequences for them personally, more than they will ever put themselves into the shoes of a partisan or someone like Thalmann. They worship this one fascist who felt bad when the leopards ate his face, but they pay to respect to say Zoya when the nazis once again tear down her image as an example. It is always about dissent, never opposition. Hell it is why they loved RBG, her dissenting opinions, ie when she did nothing but stated that she didn't like the bad things she tacitly supported
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No amount of symbolic ritual failures will lead to liberals suddenly having epiphanies. Reality is already staring them in the face.
She was the vice president when Roe v. Wade got removed
Just remember the democrats were in charge when they appealed roe v wade. Harm reduction is a joke in amerikkkan elections.
The idea of voting for her and thereby validating a genocide affecting millions of people is really fucking with me
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At this point in history i do not believe the democrats will take meaningful action on reproductive freedom.
But, like, if you think it's worth it, go for it. Can't really make things worse at this point.
The Democrats might have better beliefs about abortion rights, but they don’t act on those beliefs. Might as well vote based on someone’s favorite football team.
tbh my opinion is since its now its become a states' rights
issue after roe was overturned, the federal government will have to really flex their muscles if they are going to get anti abortion states to play ball. Regardless if kamala cares or not I don't think her government is going to want to rock the boat at home with all the instability abroad. And for the same reason I think Trump will do the same for pro abortion states, both will just allow a new status quo to exist in regards to swaths of the country being denied access to essential medical care (so what else is new here eh?)
I would guess that the biggest difference will be mostly on things the president directly controls, like if the troops can get abortions or not. Which is something but I don't think that's really what most people are worried about with abortion rights. there simply isn't much gain for either of them to get into a battle with state governments over "just" abortion when the dems want all hands on deck to fight the ruskies again and trump doesn't care enough to get into a major fight about it.
that's just my thoughts though and a little game theory. Its definitely a possibility the GOP crazies feels emboldened to pick more battles if trump wins, I don't know how bad that would be for abortion rights and much he'd support them if they did. So I don't think your worries are unreasonable either.
How many pregnant people in Gaza are able to get abortions right now?
Trump is already running on being less extreme on abortion. They've already lost that, if he actually comes out and states he's against his original plan for the border wall (that kamala is promising to build) then he will actually be the "harm reduction" candidate.
Crazy that this guy will become a moderate (lol) Republican while kamala also turns out to be the another "moderate" Republican.
Pick your color: maroon or dark red
Dun matter
Trump doesn't care about abortion. He would probably try to avoid the issue so he doesn't spoil the insane misogynists' fun while also avoids scaring away normal people.
Copmala, on the other hand would shake her head so everybody can see how much she disapproves of the unelected supreme court's decision to remove the right to abortion. This is the closest thing to applying the power of the presidency to protect women's reproductive rights she will ever get.
Trump is the one who put in the judges to make it possible. He doesn't care, sure, but that just means he cedes these decisions to the same Neo-conservative ghouls and Heritage Foundation fucks as always who will absolutely apply their power. It's why he basically just ran the country like a normal, but ruder and more fashy Republican, except for maybe his anti-NATO rhetoric.
So will Kamala
I don't waste braincells thinking about voting because I don't live in a swing state.
there's no braincells to waste. lesser evilism and voting for genocidal party is unacceptable for any socialist. that simple.
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Hypothetically if there were two identical candidates with their only difference being that candidate #1 will enact abortion rights, I think voting for them is a valid form of harm reduction.
However just look at the track record of Kamala and the Dems. Just this campaign they have been willing to fund genocide, imprison immigrants, increase police funding and completely ignore climate change. They have no moral compass, the only guiding principle for them is whatever will earn them more money or votes. And abortion rights happens to earn them both a lot of donation money AND a lot of voters. They have no incentive to ever fight for it in the same way they will never fight for M4A or free college education. It is simply another tool to force large part of the working class to forever vote for them.
I personally won't label anyone who votes for her thinking they are fighting for abortion rights as an evil person, but for me it's just a completely useless act. Even if dems do act to protect them, they will 100% do it in a way that Republicans can easily re-ban next election.
Trump is already running on being more moderate on abortion access.
Trump was always against abortion ban because he knew how much it will help drive Dem turnout
Trump calls DeSantis abortion ban ‘a terrible mistake,’ sparking anger from some key Republicans - September 19, 2023
Trump privately called a Roe v. Wade reversal ‘bad’ for his party - June 24, 2022
Yeah exactly. The Dems actually have nothing to stand on, they just gaslight and browbeat people into believing that they're the lesser evil
How dare you accuse them of not fighting for climate change by trying to restrict imports of stuff like EVs and green energy units produced in the PRC?
If you can stomach voting for a person conducting a genocide because it will personally affect your abortion rights, you don't deserve abortion rights.
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