Portside

The world needs to end this confrontation in Ukraine, increasingly dangerous in East Asia. Regardless of differences it must be halted. Not bloodily as in Shakespeare’s tragedy, but with some form of détente,, however reluctant either side may be.

The world needs millions to join in this fight, this fight back! In the United States, there have been models enough of genuine patriots. There is a need for U.S. patriots who are at the same time “world patriots.”

"A rich man and a poor man, there they stood, And judged each other as best they could. The poor man said, his voice at low pitch, If I were not poor you’d not be rich." -- Brecht

Berlin Bulletin #206 January 17 2023 The lack of homes for working class and also for middle-class seekers is a nation-wide emergency. Somehow, allegedly due to rising costs, there is never enough money to build affordable homes, repair schools, open needed kindergartens and reverse damaging reductions in public health care.

I defected to the GDR 70 years ago, finding neither Utopia nor the hunger, poverty and misery American media might have led me to expect. I hope that new generations learn from the GDR, and not only from its blunders, nasty habits and limitations.

The decades of efforts by people on all continents to ease tensions between the three greatest powers, to work for a friendlier, ecologically improving world of peace has been set back for years, perhaps for decades. We need an anti-fascist, anti-militarist voice for people’s rights.

My overriding hope is that current talks may lead to peace, to an end of death and destruction, and to the repair and renewal of all efforts to build a world without exploitation, without aggrandizement, without aggression, without war.

While Germans may not be much more interested in Ukraine than Americans, their grandparents told them enough about that last big war to keep a majority from wanting to risk another one.

The big questions are now: can the Left become a street and shop level fighter in coming struggles? Can it maintain its positions against armaments and military interference around the globe?

Debate on the national scene revolves around one key question; who with whom? If the SPD with Olaf Scholz wins first place, it will still need partners to form a government.