The world economy, already in turmoil from the credit crunch, was swept further into an abyss by the thunderbolt news that the US congress had rejected` a ‘blank cheque’ $700 billion bailout of failing banks. US government leaders and treasury chiefs had dramatically warned of dire consequences if the package was not passed, so the congress vote was followed by US stocks going into freefall, with shock reverberations worldwide.

The recent phase of accelerated globalization and unfettered neo-liberal policies is drawing to a close and an entirely new period of developments is opening. Massive state intervention in the finance sector has wider implications for trade, international currency flows, and industrial policy. There will be even deeper tensions between the major capitalist powers. Prolonged stagnation, punctuated by weak recoveries and renewed recession, will provoke social crises and mighty political struggles.

After a week of unprecedented economic and political turmoil, leaders of both political parties were stunned as their bi-partisan plan to bail out Wall Street at taxpayers expense went down in defeat on Monday. The vote is a huge defeat for the Wall Street elite and it deepens the political crisis in Washington.

“If Wall Street gets away with this, it will represent an historic swindle of the American public - all sugar for the villains, lasting pain and damage for the victims.” This is how William Greider described the Wall Street bailout.

The ultra-free market model of the Bush administration and governments around the world has revealed itself not just to be a disaster for the poor, which was always evident, but also a deadly threat to their own profit-crazy system. The significance of events in September 2008, when the global banking crisis entered a new critical phase, should not be underestimated.

An Airbus union organizer and shop steward explains the situation and sends a message of solidarity to the workers at Boeing USA who are currently on strike.

Evo Morales’ MAS (Movement towards Socialism) government won a crushing victory in the re-call referendum, which took place on 10 August 2008. Following this victory, the right-wing reactionary forces in the eastern provinces of the “media luna,” went on the offensive.

The economic witch-doctors and soothsayers of capitalism were wrong and the socialists and Marxists were right. This is what the collapse of Lehman Brothers – the fourth largest investment bank in the world – means.

Boeing, the largest private employer in Washington State and one of the richest corporations in the U.S., apparently hasn’t made enough profits. Never mind the $4.1 billion they made in 2007 or the $2.1 billion they made in the first half of this year alone.

The conventions of the two main parties in US politics are stage-managed affairs. This year was no different. No real debates on policies occurred. In fact, proposed policies are barely talked about. Still, the conventions of the Democrats and Republicans showed a shift in the presidential election campaigns, which has been reflected in the polls.

The taking of these two mortgage giants – that provide over half of all US mortgages – under full government control, is the latest abrupt departure from trying to apply undiluted neo-liberal, free market ideology.

From September 1-4, St. Paul, Minnesota was home to the Republican National Convention - and four days of protests and police repression.

Despite police attempts to intimidate students from participating, hundreds of Twin Cities youth walked out of high schools on Thursday, September 4, to protest the war on the final Republican National Convention.

On September 4, thousands of students from across the Twin Cities will walk out of class and strike on the last day of the Republican National Convention (RNC) to demand an end to Bush’s wars for oil and empire. Socialist Alternative is working alongside Youth Against War and Racism (YAWR), a high school-based antiwar and counter-military recruitment organization, to organize this day of action.

Can the epic social and environmental crises we face be solved on the basis of capitalism, or is democratic socialist change necessary? Unfortunately, most opinion leaders tend to simply avoid such fundamental questions, or offer "solutions" that amount to mere band-aids on the wounds inflicted by capitalism. But serious thinkers and activists have an obligation to look deeper.

The enormous economic and social crisis engulfing U.S. society could not be more serious. Many workers and young people, desperate to see a change, are hoping this election will bring an end to the Republican policies that have been such a disaster.

Bumper stickers on thousands of cars throughout the northeastern U.S. simply read “1.20.09 — Bush’s last day.” The sigh of relief on that day will be audible from the highest peaks of the mountains of New Hampshire to the lowest valleys in the southwest. Crooked smirk Cheney, who couldn’t tell a baby quail from a business tycoon, will be exiting the halls of power too.

Justice interviewed Cindy Sheehan, the "peace mom" whose son was killed in Iraq and who is now running as an independent anti-war, pro-worker challenger to Democratic Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi.

Workers and young people need a party of our own – one that doesn’t accept a penny from corporations and fights for what the vast majority of ordinary people need: An immediate end to the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, universal healthcare, an end to discrimination, living-wage jobs, and a good quality of life.

In sharp contrast to Republican John McCain and Democrat Barack Obama, Nader is running an insurgent campaign for President as an independent to challenge the corporate stranglehold over U.S. society.

The best way to gain the maximum concessions from the political establishment is to build the strongest challenge to them. A strong vote for Nader could bring real pressure to bear on whichever corporate candidate is elected to deliver concessions or else risk a further erosion of their base to left-wing political challengers.

Barack Obama has tapped into this anger and the widespread desire for change, presenting himself as a challenger to the Washington establishment. Obama’s campaign has politicized millions of workers, youth, and African-Americans who are understandably excited by the prospect of electing the first black president. But will he bring the change he promises?

Rather than the Olympic movement’s self-professed ideals of "internationalism" and "fair play", the Games are about two at first sight contradictory forces: nationalistic flag-waving and capitalist globalization.

Members and supporters of Socialist Alternative at the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees’ (AFSCME) International Convention, in San Francisco, last week, submitted and passed a resolution on the US mortgage crisis.

Thirty-five years ago, the price of a barrel of oil quadrupled. A generation of activists empowered by the civil rights and antiwar movements took to the streets demanding that employers raise wages to keep up with inflation and that the government take action to keep prices in line.

China faces the most terrifying ecological crisis in the world. There are no parallels in peacetime for such monumental degradation of a country’s natural resources, water and land.

Speculation is once again rife on whether Israel or the U.S. will launch air strikes on Iran.

Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, twin pillars of U.S. housing finance, have been plunged into crisis. Only three months after the meltdown and bailout of Bear Stearns, the U.S. Treasury and the Federal Reserve have once again been forced to intervene with emergency measures to forestall a potential crash in the global finance system.

The world faces the horrifying prospect of major climate change with its potential for catastrophic impact on food production and living conditions across the world. Yet, the political leaders of the major capitalist economies failed to agree on any meaningful action on this question at the recent G8 meeting in Japan.

World stock markets are again reeling, this time on rumors that the two largest financial institutions in the world are technically insolvent. Their collapse would represent a financial earthquake, dwarfing previous financial shocks such as the March collapse of Bear Stearns.

The G8 (Group of Eight) kicked off its three-day meeting in Toyako on the northern Japanese island of Hokkaido on July 7, with world leaders bunkered in what the Independent (UK) described as a “fortress”. This G8 summit takes place as the capitalist system is sliding into its most serious global crisis for six decades.

Why do soaring oil price rises have such a devastating effect? What lies behind the price surge? What effect will pricey oil and speculation have on the global economy?

The rejection of the Lisbon Treaty (the renamed EU Constitution) by voters in Ireland last Thursday was a major shock for the political and business establishment in Ireland. The Socialist Party (CWI in Ireland) played a major role in the campaign for a "No" vote.

The California Supreme Court’s recent decision to over-turn the state law that banned same-sex marriage is another step forward in the struggle for sexual minorities to win full civil rights.

In Minneapolis public schools next fall, military recruiters won’t be able to operate without facing challenges to their lies by antiwar activists.

After the final state primaries, Barack Obama has effectively secured the Democratic nomination for the presidential election in November. His grand themes have been optimism and change. He has promised to "create a new kind of politics", to "transform this country", and "create a kingdom right here on earth". Will Obama deliver on the massive expectations he has aroused?

Obama has aroused enormous expectations. But, despite the radical imagery and rhetorical posturing, Obama remains a centrist, corporate-sponsored Democrat.

The Republican National Convention (RNC) will descend on St. Paul, Minnesota from September 1-4. Activists in the Twin Cities and around the country are gearing up for what will be among the largest demonstrations in the state’s history.

The onset of the recession of the U.S. economy has been ac­companied by rising prices of oil, raw materials, food and other commodities, partly because of the weakness of the dollar against other currencies. Not only has this hit workers really hard, since wages are not rising to keep up with prices, but it creates more economic uncertainty because of the increase in inflation.

Like the 1990s, the 1920s were a time of an unprecedented profit bonanza for Wall Street and the capitalist class. Then as now, this wealth never made it to most workers, who faced state repression and corporate terrorism when they fought for better wages and conditions. Millions of unskilled or semi-skilled workers in industry wanted to organize but were blocked by the conservative and narrow craft-based unionism of the American Federation of Labor (AFL) leadership. Nevertheless, those struggles produced an experienced core of radical workers that would lead the victorious strikes and movements of the 1930s.

A movement needs to be built to fight for a living wage of at least $12.50 an hour or a guaranteed income of $500 per week for all, to fight foreclo­sures, for a free single-payer universal healthcare system, to extend unemployment ben­efits and to provide relief to all who need help.

Recent trucker protests are another sign of deepening economic crisis. $4 a gallon and more for diesel fuel sparked a wave of long-haul truckers’ protests beginning in April and still continuing. New Jersey, Washington D.C., New York, Maine and other areas have seen trucker slowdowns, shut downs, horn-blaring convoys, marches and other acts of resistance.

The fastest-growing and most widely publicized union in the country has been building its dues base by making confidential agreements with employers that exclude the members. It is the opposite of union democracy: instead of members electing their leaders, these leaders work with employers to choose their members - and determine what rights and benefits they’ll have before they ever get the chance to join.

In many states, tens of thousands of signatures need to be collected in a matter of weeks. In Texas, 75,000 are needed in 75 days, and only signatures from registered voters who did not vote in the primary count. Each state creates their own unique barriers, and most have been designed to prevent working people from gaining an electoral voice.

It’s easy to get sick of the empty rhetoric and media circus that surrounds the ongoing horse-race between the main big business candidates. But in the 2008 elections, the independent campaign of prominent anti-war activist Cindy Sheehan stands out.

The Republicans have traditionally been the preferred party of big business, but in moments of political crisis corporate America has frequently turned to the Democrats to pull them through. With the Republicans imploding under the impact of Bush’s toxically unpopular policies, the more farsighted capitalist strategists are looking to the Democrats to channel public outrage safely into the ballot box.

Considering the history of racism in this country, from slavery to Jim Crow to mass unemployment, mass imprisonment and police brutality, a Black President would be a massive change. But will his policies improve conditions for working people?

The economic downturn has led to record numbers of foreclosures, an increase in bankruptcies, mounting debt, soaring fuel and grocery prices that have, in many cases, doubled.

Barack Obama denounced his former pastor of 20 years, retired Rev. Jeremiah Wright. Speaking at a press conference in response to Rev. Wright’s National press club speech Barack Obama said that Wright’s “comments were not only divisive and destructive… They certainly don’t portray accurately my values and beliefs”

Chanting "No Peace - No Work" and "Money for Jobs and Education, Not War," over a thousand union members, anti-war and immigrant rights activists participated in the historic ILWU's (International Longshore and Warehouse Union) 8-hour stop work action to protest against the U.S lead occupation in Iraq and Afghanistan.

In his 13 years of political work, Dr King’s radicalism was largely rooted in the interests, needs, and aspirations of the black working class and the poor. This was reflected in his determination to alleviate the economic, social, and political misery faced by working people and the poor with a programmatic call for a total “redistribution of wealth,” guaranteed annual income, the need to nationalize some industries, and a “revolution of values.”

A tumultuous year when the floodtide of mass revolt swept over the narrow confines of capitalism and threatened the very foundations of the system.

Around the world, strikes, demonstrations and protests have erupted as millions upon millions of workers, peasants and poor face the horror of rapidly rising food prices.

In a dazzling pre-Olympic balancing act, the Chinese regime has announced talks with the ‘evil’ Dalai Lama side

The Committee for a Workers’ International (CWI) sends warm socialist greetings to workers and youth across the world on May Day, International Workers’ Day, 2008. Socialist Alternative is the US section of the CWI.

A review of the latest book by economist and commentator Paul Krugman, ‘Conscience of a Liberal’

Justice's Joshua H. Kortiz interviews hip-hop artist, Son of Nun (SON), a former Baltimore City School teacher and current MC who performs class-conscious, revolutionary hip-hop