MIM NOTES No. 201 January 1, 2000 MIM celebrates 1999 accomplishments: Facing the year 2000 with revolutionary resolve MIM celebrates the turn of the century with horror at the continued existence of imperialism after so many years of suffering and struggle by the majority of the world's people. But we also look to the new millenium with hope and resolve. We see that the strength of the people's revolutionary struggle around the world grows stronger and the strength of our forces in MIM also grows. We look to the victories of the forces led by the Communist Party of the Philippines as the government runs scared; the continued strength of the Communist Party of Peru after the capture of key leaders; the advancement of a Maoist platform during the RYCL(b) Congress; and the ongoing struggles of so many other Maoist organizations in countries around the world as key victories that will carry the Maoist movement into the year 2000. MIM takes this opportunity to lay out our goals for the upcoming year and to review our accomplishments over the past year. MIM Notes MIM has been waging a campaign to expand distribution and funding of MIM Notes by 25% by the end of 1999. By January, we will have reached 60% of this goal. We are planning another increase that will take us beyond our goal in the end of March. In order for us to increase MIM Notes distribution, our greatest need is more money for printing. For a publication that is only printed twice a month and can not compete with the imperialist mouthpieces that come out daily, we can not afford to set our sights lower. MIM Notes has greatly expanded its reach over the past year, gaining distributors in many new cities as well as new writers. To continue this growth we need every person who reads this paper to help us by volunteering to distribute some papers in your city. We can offer you tips on places to freedrop the papers and we can help you get started selling MIM Notes to help fund expansion. If you are not in complete agreement with everything we print, but you think this paper is worth publishing, help us distribute! If you are already a MIM Notes distributor, we encourage you to increase your distribution and financial commitment. In the year 2000, we will again set a goal of expanding our distribution by 25%. Since we will not reach the 1999 goal until a few months into the year 2000, this is not going to be easy. But we are confident that the articles we print which are available only in MIM Notes will inspire our readers to help us reach this goal. Marxism-Leninism-Maoism on line At the beginning of 1999, MIM's Central Committee formalized organizational roles for our website and e-mail correspondence to advance the level of work in these areas and our accountability to the masses. A clear division of labor and responsibility has unleashed much energy from newer comrades in MIM and from friends of the party. As reported in MIM Notes 190, this spurt of activity in the content of our site has produced an online bookstore including the beginnings of a punk and hardcore music section. New reviews are added to the bookstore once a week, so come back often to find out what we're reading and what it says about Amerikan culture. The web page of MIM literature in Russian is also regularly expanding. We have added sets of Frequently Asked Questions, and agitation related to more timely topical debate -- including struggles generated by MIM reviews of Rage Against the Machine's Battle of Los Angeles, and new books from anarchist Noam Chomsky and Vietnam War administrator Robert McNamara. Under Lock & Key, MIM's weekly radio show devoted to prisons, is also making great strides across the Internet. The show is aired regularly on stations around the united snakes and receives additional play through distribution on radio4all.web.net as reported. MIM Theory The year 1999 did not see any progress in publication of a new issue of MIM Theory. We are lacking the funds to print the next issue although the articles have been written. The next issue covers the important topic of the United Front. It is crucial that revolutionary organizations advance both their theory and practice. In the absence of a regular theory journal, MIM Notes has been taking up the slack printing some more theoretical articles, but we need that space to report on current events and we need many more pages to cover the pressing theoretical issues of our time. We need approximately $3000 to print and distribute the next MIM Theory. We're setting a goal for the year 2000 of seeing issue number 14 printed and regaining the regular schedule of two 200 page issues of MIM Theory every year. MIM on the streets In 1999, MIM and the mass organizations we lead were out on the streets in growing force. The first year of the annual End the Amerikkkan Lockdown month (September 13-October 15) was a success as we carried out coordinated education and action across the u.$. We will continue to organize this annual month of events and build educational and protest activities as a part of our ongoing organizing against the criminal injustice system. Our focused organizing work in 1999 against the imperialist deathgrip of debt was a great success. Our call for cancellation of all debt the imperialists claim is owed by Third World countries to imperialist countries and banks brought this important issue to many people. A number of outside organizations also invited MIM to present our perspective on international debt. In the year 2000 we plan to do more work to reach people not yet exposed to Maoism. A key part of this work will be our expanded presence on the streets. We will continue to build our practice of holding public educational forums, setting up informational tables with literature and opportunities for activism, holding demonstrations against key aspects of imperialism, and organizing other anti- imperialist events. This type of day-to-day organizing helps people to see what Maoism is about and makes us more accessible for study and struggle about important issues going on in the world. If you would like to get involved, MIM activists are available to help new organizers get started, so contact us. Prisons During 1999, prisoners and outside activists at all levels of ideological unity with MIM helped to build more support for prisoners' struggles against oppression and develop organization within prisons. Many prisoners increased their commitment to build the Party itself and more people than ever worked with MIM to start basic educational study groups within prisons. On the outside our prisons work expanded with new supporters. Prisoners assisted MIM in educating students and youth. And outside supporters increased assistance to MIM helping us publish and distribute prisoners' articles and letters. Prisoners worked with MIM to help meet the needs of others behind the bars through the publication of MIM Legal Notes and other Prisoner Legal Clinic work. This year we made some gains in the front against censorship. We increased publication of legal information to fight censorship within the anti- imperialist struggle. And distribution of MIM's anti-censorship pack helped some prisoners put a (at least temporary) halt to censorship. Some prisoners took legal challenges to prison censorship into the courts. During 1999, in one state where a prisoner filed against censorship, dozens of new prisoners are now writing MIM each month asking for MIM Notes and other revolutionary study material. In some states, letters and postcards to prison officials has helped to dampen censorship. Not surprising, explaining (to a pig) the ridiculousness of prison censorship and the fact that it violates Amerika's own rules has not completely stopped prison censorship. We see the consistent monitoring of censorship that we started in 1999 and the work that the Prisoners' Legal Clinic is doing as foundations for future gains against censorship. The most important aspect of the anti-censorship campaign was our education about the evils of imperialism and the vile nature of Amerika's prisons and to organize for revolution. On this front, the campaign was successful. To expand this work in the coming year we hope to fill a censorship coordinator job with someone who can lead our work on these important battles. United Struggle from Within (USW) the MIM-led mass organization of anti-imperialist prisoners has had some set backs and some advances which in turn affects MIM's ability to organize against prison repression. Many of the USW prisoners have had material censored, but more USW prisoners than were censored received and studied material for the first continental prisoner study group. Prisoners were able to share experiences and work together toward better understanding the relationship between Maoism and organizing in prisons and the relationship between prisons and imperialism. To kick off the new century and to highlight the fascism of the Amerikan prison system MIM will be waging a year-long campaign against the criminal injustice system in the year 2000. Under Lock & Key 2000 Campaign (see page 5 for article) builds upon the work that MIM has been doing since its early years. Our attention will be focused on specific aspects of the Amerikan injustice system to build a larger arsenal to educate and organize against imperialist prisons. One of the goals of the MIM Prison Ministry for the year 2000 is to dramatically increase the organization and access to agitation material on prisons. This will be done primarily through MIM's website, but those without internet access should write because there are endless tasks you can help with to build the ULK 2000 Campaign. Two aspects in need of increased attention within MIM's prison ministry are 1) connections to prisoners' outside supporters and family members and 2) keeping in touch with released prisoners. We need prisoners' assistance in connecting us to supporters on the outside and organizing friends and family to work with us against prisons. We also need prisoners to stay in touch once released. In 1999, we did much better than in the past keeping released prisoners in the struggle, but this is still an area with room for improvement. MIM encourages increased prisoner participation in organizing support on the outside. The simplest tasks for this is the submission of articles, speeches, art work and other agitation materials that help to recruit. Our combined organizing efforts will then also improve the Party's ability to address the needs of and organize released prisoners.