A week ago, the Bolivian left-wing party, the Movement Towards Socialism (MAS), currently led by Luis Arce, decisively lost the round of elections against the right-wing. This comes after a prolonged period of “infighting” between Arce, and Morales, who previously led the MAS prior to the 2019 coup which briefly installed Jeanine Anez.
I put infighting in quotes because despite the nominal similarities between Arce and Morales, it is clear that this is not merely a counterproductive battle between two men - instead, the Bolivian left has arrived at a time of unavoidable conflict between two competing strategies. The electoral strategy is represented by Arce, who has aligned himself with a more middle-class-oriented campaign that is more economically liberal, whereas Morales represents a more working-class-oriented campaign that seeks to go further than tepid reform.
Such a conflict between electoralism and revolutionary action is inevitable in any and every developing country that 1) possesses a functioning left-wing party or organization, and 2) is under internal and/or external pressure by capitalists. This crisis must be resolved eventually - and this electoral failure is how such a crisis is manifesting right now. So while the Bolivian left has indeed lost the election, it is not yet defeated. The revolutionary campaign can, if it is willing, still ultimately stand triumphant. But what must be done is a real movement towards socialism, which goes beyond technocrats reforming from above, and instead transforms the state into a full political project of the working class, in which their movements, organizations, and protests are genuinely empowered. Such a project will involve repression by the forces of reaction, not least by the United States, but it is the only road left to take.
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Israel's Genocide of Palestine
Sources on the fighting in Palestine against the temporary Zionist entity. In general, CW for footage of battles, explosions, dead people, and so on:
UNRWA 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.
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.
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.
Simplicius, who publishes on Substack. Like others, his political analysis should be soundly ignored, but his knowledge of weaponry and military strategy is generally quite good.
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.
I haven’t seen a lot of news regarding what is currently going on in France. I can do a more in depth dive if people are interested, but basically the neolib/fascist alliance currently in government is trying to pass yet another enormous austerity budget along with islamophobic laws. The most prominent far right party in France (National front) who was allowing the neolib to rule as long as they played ball with their racist agenda has said they will vote against the prime minister (They cannot afford to lose part of their white poor base as this part of their base is strongly opposed to the austerity .budget)
A popular movement has emerged with a call to a national strike starting on 10.09. Unions are starting to get behind it and Mélenchon from France Unbowed (radical left and biggest left party in France ~15-25% of the electorate depending on who you ask) has also come in support of the movement and called for a national strike.
At the same time Bayrou the prime minister will probably be ousted on the 8.09 on a vote of noconfidence.
It looks to me like France is the most likely big European state to avoid fascism by virtue of a having a powerful left movement in both the streets and elections. Do you think there’s a plausible path to victory there for the left on all fronts?
Yes France always had a strong left movements. There is a path of victory for the left but right now, it’s even hard to say whether the presidential elections will be in 2027 or if Macron will resign before (doubtful with his ego). In any case France Unbowed won’t be able to do shit even if elected if there are no strong social movements in the streets at the same time to push them even further left (like it happened in 1936 with the popular front).
There is a good chance that the right vote will get split enough to allow France Unbowed to access the second turn of the elections where it will probably be them vs National Front. In any case all of this is currently highly speculative.
Basically the electoralist factions I currently see are:
Yes the French Communist Party is catastrophic and has been for many years. They are communists in name only (Roussel their current leader is reactionary) and in any case there have been many issues with the PCF all along their existence.
I don’t think a single legacy communist party in Europe is any good so no surprise there