MIM Notes ***

MIM Notes 284 · July 1, 2003 · Page 1

MIM Notes

July 1, 2003, Nº 284

The Official Newsletter of the Maoist Internationalist Movement (MIM)

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On the web: www.prisoncensorship.info/archive/etext

ix weeks after George Bush

declared major combat in Iraq

over, ambushes and search-and-

destroy operations involving thousands of

Amerikan troops continue--and the

Amerikans have yet to find any proof that

Iraq had weapons of mass destruction

(WMDs), the ostensible reason for the

ground invasion. Bourgeois media and

Democratic Party publicists are now

making a lot of noise about Bush's shaky

(and in some cases fabricated) evidence

of Iraqi WMDs--never mind that others

had made these same arguments long

before the war.

Before the war, these same media put

Colin Powell's speech to the United

Nations laying out the U.$. government's

tired old excuses for invasion on page one

and buried criticism of Powell's sources

deep inside the paper. Apparently now

that the war is a done deal it is safe to

score some partisan points.

MIM does not claim to know whether

Saddam Hussein had WMDs in April of

this year or not. Part of our criticism of

capitalism is that it creates governments

that carry out military operations in secret

and withhold or twist important

Much Ado About

Weapons of Mass Destruction

HOUSANDS

SAY

ATRIOT

LOS ANGELES, 30 May

ore than 3,100 signatures

opposing Patriot Act II were

delivered to Senator Barbara

Boxer's office as MIM, RAIL and other

members of the "Stop Patriot Act II

Coalition" rallied outside. Patriot Act II

(a.k.a. "The Domestic Security

Enhancement Act") is a proposal from

Attorney General John Ashcroft which

would give the executive branch of the

Federal Government "sweeping new

powers to increase domestic intelligence

gathering" (1) and curtail rights which the

bourgeois authors of the Amerikan

Constitution made part of the highest law

of the land, exactly so that they could not

be waived by corrupt and dishonest

people in government in the name of

momentary "security."(2)

RAIL brought a stack of signs bearing

anti-Patriot Act slogans. Protestors

gobbled these up, and a few came with

signs of their own. Cars honked in support

as protestors waved their signs and got

signatures from the downtown lunchtime

crowd. The proportion of passers-by who

had not heard of Patriot Act II was higher

than at anti-war rallies, so a new

informational pamphlet by a RAIL

comrade came in handy.(3)

A reporter from a pro-Korean-

reunification website attended the rally,

commenting that Patriot Act II would

have a chilling effect on political debate

in the United $tates. North Korea is part

of George Bush's "Axis of Evil," she

pointed out, so under the loose guidelines

in Patriot Act II advocates of peaceful

Korean reunification could be jailed as

"terrorists."

A representative from Barbara Boxer's

office who had earlier made an

appointment to discuss the petition failed

to appear.

MIM started collecting signatures

against Patriot Act II in February, just

after the draft proposal was posted on

the internet. Several weeks later, MIM

and RAIL joined Kabataang maka

Bayan-USA (Pro-People Youth), Asians

for Jericho & Mumia, Comite pro-

Democracia en Mexico, and BAYAN

information to gain military advantage.

Our opposition to the war in Iraq does

not depend on whether Iraq had weapons

of mass destruction or not, or whether

Bush lied about what he knew or not.

Conservative Michael Novak, writing

in the National Review in an attempt to

exonerate Bush, only makes our point.

"[T]he public has not been made aware

of how small a set of objects the U.S. is

now looking for. In January, Hans Blix

ILM

MAKES

MONEY

THE

OLD

FASHIONED

WAY

The Matrix Re-Loaded (2003)
Andy and Larry Wachowski, dirs.

We were very worried that this sequel

to the original "Matrix" would lose too

much or change directions too much. As

we read the critics describe all the action

scenes and sex, we realized before it

opened that this part II would make much

money. After making the original, the

directors deserved to make a lot of money

and gain influence the Amerikkkan way

with sex, romance and violence. The

combination of dance, martial arts and

special effects is once again trend-setting

and we won't mention it again in this

review.

Rebutting the critics

We defend the Wachowski brothers

against some critics who nitpicked this

and that about superheroes. In contrast

with most comic strips and Hollywood

directors exploiting the idea of superhero,

the Wachowskis show us how Neo came

to be from an ordinary humyn step-by-

step. Granted, Neo arrives in the future

Matrix sequel puts the message on pause

after humyns have learned how to do a

lot of things they cannot do now, most

importantly, loading computer information

into the backs of their necks.

Most superheroes in the arts arise out

of pure philosophical idealism and

individualism. In "Re-

Loaded," we learn that

Neo can see all the

subcomponent parts of

the Matrix and thus we

are not surprised that he

can fly--the most

criticized aspect of the

film. We're also not

surprised that he

chooses to fight the 100

agent Smiths to learn

about them instead of

just flying away. The

enemy does the same

thing to him--arranging

fights just to learn

something. Odd threads

At the heroes' dinner

with one of the enemy

computer programs, we

learn perhaps some of

the rationale behind Trinity's name. The

enemy starts by greeting Morpheus, then

Neo and finally adds Trinity. It becomes

clear that without her there would not be

three.

Continued on page 9...

Continued on page 4...

Continued on page 7...

MIM Notes 284 · July 1, 2003 · Page 2

What is MIM?

The Maoist Internationalist Movement (MIM) is the collection of existing or emerging

Maoist internationalist parties in the English-speaking imperialist countries and their English-

speaking internal semi-colonies, as well as the existing or emerging Maoist Internationalist
parties in Belgium, France and Quebec and the existing or emerging Spanish-speaking
Maoist Internationalist parties of Aztlan, Puerto Rico and other territories of the U.$. Empire.

MIM Notes is the newspaper of MIM. Notas Rojas is the newspaper of the Spanish-speaking
parties or emerging parties of MIM. MIM upholds the revolutionary communist ideology
of Marxism-Leninism-Maoism and is an internationalist organization that works from the

vantage point of the Third World proletariat. MIM struggles to end the oppression of all
groups over other groups: classes, genders, nations. MIM knows this is only possibly by
building public opinion to seize power through armed struggle. Revolution is a reality for

North America as the military becomes over-extended in the government's attempts to
maintain world hegemony. MIM differs from other communist parties on three main
questions: (1) MIM holds that after the proletariat seizes power in socialist revolution, the

potential exists for capitalist restoration under the leadership of a new bourgeoisie within
the communist party itself. In the case of the USSR, the bourgeoisie seized power after the
death of Stalin in 1953; in China, it was after Mao's death and the overthrow of the "Gang

of Four" in 1976. (2) MIM upholds the Chinese Cultural Revolution as the farthest advance
of communism in humyn history. (3) As Marx, Engels and Lenin formulated and MIM has
reiterated through materialist analysis, imperialism extracts super-profits from the Third

World and in part uses this wealth to buy off whole populations of oppressor nation so-
called workers. These so-called workers bought off by imperialism form a new petty-
bourgeoisie called the labor aristocracy. These classes are not the principal vehicles to

advance Maoism within those countries because their standards of living depend on
imperialism. At this time, imperialist super-profits create this situation in the Canada, Quebec,
the United $tates, England, France, Belgium, Germany, Japan, Italy, Switzerland,

Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Israel, Sweden and Denmark. MIM accepts people as
members who agree on these basic principles and accept democratic centralism, the system
of majority rule, on other questions of party line.

"The theory of Marx, Engels, Lenin and Stalin is universally applicable. We should

regard it not as dogma, but as a guide to action. Studying it is not merely a matter of

learning terms and phrases, but of learning Marxism-Leninism as the science of revolution."

- Mao Zedong, Selected Works, Vol. II, p. 208.

Editor, MC206; Production, MC12

Letters

MIM Notes

The Official Newsletter of The Maoist Internationalist Movement

ISSN 1540-8817

MIM Notes is the bi-weekly newsletter of the Maoist Internationalist Movement. MIM

Notes is the official Party voice; more complete statements are published in our journal,
MIM Theory. Material in MIM Notes is the Party's position unless noted. MIM Notes
accepts submissions and critiques from anyone. The editors reserve the right to edit
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are members of the Party. The Revolutionary Anti-Imperialist League (RAIL) is an anti-
imperialist mass organization led by MIM (RCs are RAIL Comrades). MIM's ten-point
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eMail: <mim@mim.org>

WWW: <http//www.prisoncensorship.info/archive/etext>

Glamorizing war

I tried following the news about the

war, but to be honest, all of the "USA the

benevolent" rhetoric being rammed down

people's throats is sickening. And just the

fact that the news is so one-sided is

indicative that the truth is not... otherwise

why would they have to lie about it? I'm

not sure how it's being presented to the

rest of the U.S., but all the mainstream

media I've been seeing is that way, and I

have a very strong suspicion it's like than

even for out there. I guess as always the

only way people really get to see the truth

is if they intentionally go out looking for

it... otherwise it's the "USA the

benevolent" cookie cut-outs that gets put

on the primetown news. And did I hear

this right? Somebody came up with a

theme song for the war? It must have

been difficult but somehow they found a

way to make war glamorous.

--a Pennsylvania prisoner,

5 April 2003

What good are
petitions?

Internet reader: I apologize for sounding

like a pessimist, but I don't see how

gathering signatures helps ANY cause.

they're going to do what they're going to

do regardless of what we want as a

majority in anything. They're not going

to give up power they've already taken

from us, they may make it appear that

they do from time to time, but they don't.

MIM reponds: We will be delivering

the online petition signatures together with

those we gather on paper (3100 and

counting) to federal representatives. It is

getting much harder for congresspeople

to ignore opposition to the USA Patriot

Act & Patriot Act II now that close to

100 U.$. communities have passed

resolutions condemning the

unconstitutionality of the USAPA, and we

are making more noise about PAII.

The USAPA passed both houses of

congress within hours of their

introduction. That's why it is so important

to voice opposition to the Patriot Act II

now. MIM is also not the only organization

working on this. From basic advocates

of the U.$. constitution like the Bill of

Rights Defense Committee to the civil

libertarians in the ACLU, to the anti-war/

peace activists who are working on

getting city council resolutions passed to

block enforcement of the USA Patriot

Act, there is a broad range of people allied

against this civil-liberties-stripping,

privacy-invading, due-process-denying

legislation.

Internet reader: I wish I could be as

optimistic as you about all this. But like I

said, they're going to do what they're

going to do. If you stop their legislation

here, they'll slip it into something else.

As a matter of fact, the amount of

publicity and resistance that's being

generated over this legislation, makes me

wonder if they're not using it as a

diversion to slip in the real nightmare

while everyone's making such a fuss over

this. The only thing those bastards in

Washington understand is violence.

Unfortunately, it seems that's become the

only attention getter around the world. I

don't want this legislation any more than

you do, but then, there's a massive

amount of legislation that's been put into

effect in just the last few years that pretty

much deny us the essential rights this bill

does. And with all the corruption in the

local judicial entities, your rights don't

really mean much anyway. If you ain't

got no witnesses, you ain't got no rights.

I do wish you the best of luck and hope

you don't beat your head too hard against

this block wall. I'll just keep collecting

my firepower and wait `til they label me

a terrorist.

MIM: From a long-term perspective,

MIM agrees with you that violence is the

only language Amerika understands. We

would go farther and say that it is the

only language the Amerikan people

understand, not just the government.

After all, the U.$. armed Saddam Hussein

throughout the 1980s, essentially created

Osama bin Laden by arming the

mujahedeen against the Soviet presence

in Afghanistan, and oversees the daily

humiliation of the Palestinian people both

from Washington and from its bases in

Saudi Arabia. Yet the populace that

sponsors this activity can't be bothered

to show concern for the Middle East until

after 9/11. (e.g., see http://www.etext.org/

P o l i t i c s / M I M / m n / s e p t 1 1 2 0 0 1 /

sept112001.html and the rest of the http:/

/www.prisoncensorship.info/archive/etext/mn/

sept112001/ page)

But we disagree that these rights don't

really mean much anyway. The right to

speak out and criticize our government is

central to our ability to organize. This is

especially true for those of us who think

the current U.$. govt. is long past doing

the people of the world any good. The

right not to be arrested in secret is real,

and arguable in court, as is the right not

to be searched or tapped without a

warrant. As a practical matter, these are

rights we can defend.

MIM Notes 284 · July 1, 2003 · Page 3

by MC5

May 22, 2003

Before the Iraq War intensified with a

ground invasion by U.$. troops, England

was preparing to join the Euro, the

common currency of its European

neighbors. Thanks in large part to war-

mongering in connection to France and

Iraq, now the wind of public opinion is

blowing against England's joining the

Euro; even though only 8% of the English

believe that they will never join the

Euro.(1)

Granted, the Iraq War put off major

public discussions of major issues like the

Euro. The expectation had been that

England would discuss and vote on the

issue this year or next.

The latest sign of how the rulers wish

this decision to be shrouded is that Prime

Minister Tony Blair met with four or five

ministers of his cabinet individually and

others in groups.(1) Presumably some

matters are so private, with some

ministers having so much more to say

that this procedure became public. The

image created suggests one of hedging

bets and taking information from various

sources and angles, especially since most

ministers are supposedly pro-Euro. If any

minister said something blunt in public it

could cause the financial markets to spin

wildly. At this moment, the dollar is

especially subject to a total collapse if

someone should be rather rash.

In truth, the hubbub about the Euro is

one of the more difficult and important

issues facing the imperialists. For a long

time, bourgeois economists have been

talking about how the dollar holds an

advantage over other currencies traded,

because the dollar is the universal

currency, the index currency so-to-speak.

Governments globally hold their foreign

currency reserves in dollars and they often

conduct trade among each other in dollars.

This practice is one-of-a-kind in the world

and causes a demand for the U.$. dollar

currency which causes its price to rise

against other currencies.

The first salvo to prop up the dollar after

the occupation of Iraq was simple. The

English equivalent of treasurer said he

opposed joining the Euro. Rather than be

too brash, and as is typical in the financial

world, the British rulers followed up with

take-backs to soften the blow.(2)

Next we heard reports aimed at English

nationalism that England's unemployment

rate and growth rate are better than in

the part of Europe using the Euro.(3)

Unless the English imperialists really

believe Rumsfeld's idea about "old

Europe" just not being able to do better

than "tag along" with the United $tates,

we do not expect this argument to hold

water very long. In fact, some would

argue by moving to convert to Euros now

when England has a good situation would

mean at least a temporary advantage,

because it would secure whatever

advantages of the current exchange rate

there are to Britain. It was in reference

to this whole debate, that the various

leaders of the various factions said they

Brit moves on Euro reveal fears of economic disaster

May 31, 2003

San Francisco

Activists protested at a Ford Motor

Company dealership kicking off a national

campaign demanding that Ford live up to

its pledge to make cleaner vehicles.

Rainforest Action Network, Global

Exchange and Bluewater Network

hosted the demonstration, hanging a big

banner from the roof of the Ford building

and placing bodybags (inhabited by

people) in front of the dealership to

represent the deaths to people and the

environment at the hands of the Ford

corporate practices.

MIM agrees with the protestors'

message that capitalist corporations like

Ford must be held responsible for the

global destruction they wreak.

Environmental reforms which have

proletarian content are possible under

capitalism--witness international

regulation of ozone levels.(1) However,

such reforms are tenuous. Capitalists will

not make changes unless they see short-

term profit in them (which they will

sometimes due to competitive pressure).

Furthermore, because black markets

thrive under capitalism where cash is

unlimited and can purchase unlimited

goods, there is a strong attraction to

getting around environmental regulations

in capitalism.

A banal example of such a black market

is the sale of high-volume flush toilets in

areas where water-saving toilets are

mandated. Just as with SUVs, this is a

case of people with lots of cash creating

a demand for a luxury good (detrimental

to society at large). Where such harmful

luxury goods are banned, profit-hungry

capitalists risking punishment to meet that

demand. Socialism attacks this problem

from several directions infeasible under

capitalism. It regulates production; it

regulates money supply and controls

inequalities in income; and it carries out

mass education campaigns without having

to worry about offending some capitalist

profiting from a harmful product.

According to speakers at the rally, Ford

has the least fuel efficient cars of all car

manufacturers and their average fuel

efficiency is now worse than it was in

1980. Their current president, Bill Ford,

came in posing as an environmentalist

and promising to make Ford a global

environmental leader, but while he lives

in a solar home, his company is the worst

Ford boycott demonstrates failure of capitalism

Continued on page 9...

Continued on page 8...

by a prisoner in California

In July 2002, police officers in

Inglewood, California were videotaped

brutalizing a teenager. Two officers now

face criminal charges for this attack.

Incidents of police brutality are not

isolated. Within the community of law

enforcement, such outrageous conduct is

a rite of passage and a fact of life. Nearly

all scandals involving police misconduct

end up stifled and downplayed by defense

attorneys. When the lawyers take over,

the big picture becomes lost in the frame-

by-frame recantation of what seems like

an act of unmistakable criminality.

Defense attorney John Barnett has

already begun to bring doubt into the

minds of the jury pool. His explanation is

very simple: Inglewood Police Officer

Jeremy Morris was defending himself

from someone who grabbed his crotch.

In other words, this is the story behind

which a skilled attorney can launch a

meritorious defense for an obviously guilty

client.

Mr. Barnett is an expert in creating

doubt in the minds of jurors. In the case

of motorist Rodney King he was able to

convince an all-white jury the beating of

Mr. King was justified -- despite the

videotape. And he is ready to do so again

because he understands that people

simply do not want to believe the truth

when a well thought out lie is much easier

to digest.

Law enforcement takes violence very

serious, with some cops being more prone

towards violence than others. Yet, in the

case of beating a suspect, they are simply

not willing to hold themselves to the same

legal standards they are empowered to

enforce. In their minds, they are above

the law.

When I see an episode of police

brutality I do not need to have the incident

explained to me by a defense attorney,

prosecutor, police spokesperson, or some

so-called expert on such matters. For

those of us who grew up on the streets,

getting beat up by the cops was often one

of our rites of passage into adulthood --

with our bumps and bruises, cuts and

injuries, being our red badges of courage.

Absent a group confession by conscience-

laden officers, or an unforeseen video

camera, cops simply have little about

which to worry in cases of abusing their

arrestees.

I find it lamentable and grow weary of

seeing police brutality on the news, then

to have an array of persons going on

record trying to justify or downplay an

obviously troubling problem. I know from

being somewhat expert in such matters,

that if I am a skinny, mentally challenged,

16 year old kid--and handcuffed as

well--I am not a threat to anyone. In such

a situation--and I have been at the

receiving end of similar beatings--one

cannot be in a more vulnerable position.

The fact that Donovan Jackson was

outnumbered and handcuffed renders

what Officer Morris did to him

unacceptable in any situation. This was

the act of a coward.

[Of course, from MIM's perspective,

even if the young man had grabbed the

officer's crotch, it could be seen as a

justifiable act of self-defense. Morris had

already singled this young Black man out

for harassment, shackled him, and thrown

him on the hood of a car. Officer Morris

thought his badge--and the gun at his

hip--gave him the authority to pick a fight

without repercussions. He and the system

which gives cops the power to act as an

occupying army are to blame if this young

man did not respond to Morris' aggression

by turning the other cheek.]

To claim the acts of Officer Morris

were justified, prompted by the

unproveable acts of a skinny, handcuffed

minor is preposterous. Police brutality is

alive and well in drug war-torn America.

And until we dismantle the criminal

injustice system, which enforces the

imperialist system of national oppression

in Amerika, police brutality will continue.

Inglewood police beating: a rite of passage

Is Donovan Jackson

the next

Rodney King?

MIM Notes 284 · July 1, 2003 · Page 4

by mim108@mim.org

The State of Texas, like many other

states, is having a budget crunch resulting

from the recession and decline in tax

income. Texas is trying to make up for a

$9.9 billion budget shortfall without raising

taxes.(1)

As a result, the governor has asked the

Texas Department of Criminal Justice

(TDCJ) to cut 7% from their $5.1 billion

budget for the current fiscal year, and

maybe 9% from next year's budget. The

TDCJ is looking for more places to pack

in prisoners on a smaller budget. As of

February, the prison system was growing

by 500 prisoners per month (5,500

incoming, 5,000 released per month), with

a total of 147,565. Officially, the system

was at 97.5% capacity. (1)

So what will they cut? Prisoners have

already reported to MIM some effects

of budget cuts. As one prisoner wrote in

February, "We're lucky to get a piece of

meat around here; they're cutting back

on everything, such as vocational

programs, GED for prisoners, food,

clothes, bath towels, soap, medical needs,

family phone calls, pictures during visits,

commissary privileges, recreation time,

gym time, television time, and time to eat

the little food they do care to serve."

A closer look at the budget and

proposed cuts reveals a lot about the

priorities of Amerikan injustice. One

proposal is, "Eliminating college courses,

vocational training and job placement

programs." Obviously, that would be self-

defeating IF the goal of the system was

to help prisoners turn their lives around

and improve the opportunities--which of

course it is not. However, even that

draconian cut would only save the system

$2.2 million--a tiny fraction of what they

need to cut--which just shows how little

the system invests in that approach in the

first place.(2)

Although Texas makes extensive use

of slave labor in its prison system, the

system does not exist primarily to make

labor profits. In fact, according to the most

recent detailed budget we could find

online, for fiscal year 2000, the prison

system recorded $55.2 million in

"correctional industry receipts,"

compared to $2.1 billion coming from the

state's general revenue fund.(3) Sales

from Texas Correctional Industries to

other state agencies apparently grew to

$80 million by FY 2002.(4) That is money

the TDCJ makes selling prisoner labor.

They also save unreported millions of

dollars from prisoner labor doing the work

of running the prisons and supporting the

prisoners: maintaining vehicles,

transporting freight, warehousing, laundry,

food, and so on.

But the fact remains that most of the

money to run the gulags comes from tax

revenues. That's why the lieutenant

governor and the head of the pardons and

parole board gingerly raised the possibility

of increasing the rate of paroling

prisoners, while insisting that would only

be done as a last resort, if it could be done

"safely."(1) They would like to make up

the budget by cutting education and health

care for prisoners, but if they can't, they

might have to shrink the system.

If the system were a money-maker, they

would be trying to increase the number

of prisoners, not considering a decrease.

The Amerikan prison system does make

money for some capitalists, politicians,

and labor aristocrats. But it is primarily a

means of national oppression and social

control, not profit- making. As such, in

addition to being one of the biggest

institutions of oppression in world history,

it is also one more wasteful burden

generated by imperialism's short-sighted,

self-interested global rule.

Notes:

1. Houston Chronicle 20 Feb 2003, p.

A19.

2. Associated Press in Amarillo Globe-

News 8 Feb 2003.

3. TDCJ FY 2000 Agency Budget,

http://www.tdcj.state.tx.us/finance/

budget/TDCJ-FY2000-Budget.pdf

4. TDCJ FY 2002 Statistical Summary,

http://www.tdcj.state.tx.us/publications/

e x e c u t i v e / s t a t _ s u m m a r y _ f y 0 2 /

stat_summ ary_fy02_toc.htm

Texas prison budget cuts expose priorities

The Animatrix (2003)
Various directors
Warner Home Video

Review by MC206

7 June 2003

The nine animated shorts in the

Animatrix explore themes from the

Matrix movies and give some important

backstory, including a history of how

humyns enslaved the intelligent machines

that later overthrew and enslaved

humyns.(1) Refreshingly--and in keeping

with the style of the movies--none of the

shorts by various directors adopt the

cutesy Disney look. Instead, styles range

from impressionistic watercolors to

realistic computer graphics to jarring

expressionistic sketches (e.g. Peter

Chung of "Aeon Flux" fame directed the

final short).

Thematically, the Animatrix is closer to

the first film than the second (see our

reviews here (2) and here (3)). Several

shorts emphasize self-sacrifice for the

common good ("The Final Flight of the

Osiris" and "Program"); several

emphasize the choice between truth in

the depressing real world or individualist

stupor in the dream world of the matrix

("Kid's Story," "World Record" and

"Program"); and several emphasize the

organized (and justified) distrust of the

cells fighting the matrix ("Detective

Story" and "Program"), just as the first

movie showed Trinity's crew frisking

Neo for bugs at gunpoint.

Aside from some exposition left out of

the movies ("The Final Flight of the

Osiris" and "Kid's Story"), the Animatrix

raises several new ideas, two of which

we briefly discuss here. First, "The

Second Renaissance" puts an interesting

new twist on the old quasi-Luddite sci-fi

"the machines have taken over" story.

At some point after the intelligent

machines began to resist exploitation by

humyns and humyns consequently carried

out anti-machine pogroms, humyn

governments banish the machines to a

country of their own (ironically in the

"birthplace of civilization" i.e. what is now

Iraq). However, due to a combination of

anti-machine chauvinism and good-old-

fashioned capitalist competition--the

machines flood the world market with

hyper-cheap goods--humyn governments

decide to nuke the machine nation. This

leads to the war that the humyns end up

losing catastrophically--in large part

because they keep reaching for bigger

and bigger weapons.

Second, "Matriculation" hints at the

possibility of post-"Matrix" machine-

humyn cooperation, although it also

suggests that humyns aren't quite up to

the task yet, perhaps because they still

see intelligent machines as their servants

or because they still harbor anti-machine

prejudices.

It's tough to say whether these shorts

would pack any political or philosophical

punch on their own. But in the context of

the other Matrix films, they stir up some

provocative images and leave the viewer

with something to think about.

Notes

1. You can watch four of the shorts for

free at www.intothematrix.com.

2. http://www.prisoncensorship.info/archive/etext/

movies/review.php?f=long/matrix.txt

3. http://www.prisoncensorship.info/archive/etext/

movies/long/matrixreloaded.html

Matrix sequel puts the

message on pause

On the other hand, regarding any

parallel to the Catholic trinity, at the end

of the movie, we see conflict between

Neo and Morpheus as Neo spills the bad

news that he did not inevitably defeat the

whole Matrix as Morpheus thought;

although he still has 24 hours --

presumably in Matrix III-- to do the job.

In fact, much to our delight, "Re-

Loaded" put any fantasies about

"oracles" and fate in their proper place.

Even the Oracle is connected to computer

programs. It turns out that not all

computer programs are completely

compatible with each other. The only

question Neo has to deal with is whether

or not the Oracle is a plot against humyns

by the machines or not.

In place of the question of fate, the

Wachowski brothers now give us the

question of causality or "why we do what

we do." Unfortunately, the enemy seems

to be the rational side in this movie, and

Neo takes up the role of the irrational

humyn in denial, as the enemy computer

Architect points out.

In the past, Neo denied that the humyn

was a source of heat energy used in a

vast system controlled by robots. He

thought his choices in the Matrix were

real. However, Neo learned to surpass

that attitude of his and accept the truth

about the Matrix. In part III, we are

hoping Neo can learn something from the

enemy in Part II and advance yet further

in the spiral of development. Neo's

choices

In part I, Neo chose to sacrifice himself

to save Morpheus for the good of his

species. It turned out that he survived his

altruism. In part II, he gave up the good

of the species for his love Trinity. One

could say he made the same choice in

Part I, because in both cases he chose

the individual he knew over the

abstraction. On the other hand, in Part I,

he believed the abstraction false, because

the Oracle told him he was not "The

One." Hence, he never chose between

the abstraction and Morpheus. He simply

made an altruistic act toward the species

by trying to save Morpheus at the cost of

what he thought would be his own life. In

fact, by sacrificing his own life he was

choosing "the abstraction" of the greater

good of the species.

The focus on sex and romance in "Re-

Loaded" is definitely a downer. Neo

chooses his sexual love above everything

else and that seems to be merged into

some vestigial Christian imagery.

We are not unhappy with how Neo

looked inside Trinity as a mass of electrons

to save her life. The fact that he does so

in connection to love and not as an

ordinary duty in combat is what distresses

us. It leaves us wondering if he would

not make the same effort for others

caught in the Matrix. One fellow, the

Keymaker shot by enemies in the Matrix

before Trinity is not so fortunate: Neo

leaves him for dead.

There was at least one critic who did

not like the fact that "Re-Loaded" called

on some Christian imagery only to make

Zion into one writhing dance and sex

party. In contrast, we were thankful for

the juxtaposition of the short prayer,

Morpheus's fairly grounded speech, and

the ensuing sex and sexy dancing.

Morpheus makes a speech to the

masses of Zion in which he says he has

confidence in face of a massive robot

attack, because humyns have been

fighting the machines for a long time and

Continued on next page...

MIM Notes 284 · July 1, 2003 · Page 5

they are still alive, not because of any

belief that he has regarding prophecies.

Thus while Morpheus is zealous, he

proves sober-minded.

Under-discussed themes

There were a few points that critics I

read did not seem to cover. One

interesting point is the title of the movie,

which makes some sense in light of Neo's

discussion with the Matrix architect.

Computers keep re-loading altered

software in order to control humyns better.

Neo's enemies get better in fighting and

systems of control expand and vary.

The most important point that seems to

have passed by the critics is that Neo ends

the movie fighting outside the matrix. He

stops robot warriors in their tracks. Trinity

picks up Neo in a coma--outside the

Matrix--and says she cannot explain

what happened.

Perhaps we are in for some

explanations of how what Neo learned in

the Matrix world is now changing his

corporeal self outside the brain connected

to the Matrix. In a few months, in part

III, we will know.

This does not have to be the only review

of "Re-Loaded." Send us your communist

ideas about the "Matrix."

--May 18, 2003

"Matrix Reloaded:
The Album" (2003)

Various artists
Warner Bros.

by mim3@mim.org

June 9, 2003

Our favorite track on this album is the

Rage against the Machine "Calm Like a

Bomb" song. Fittingly, considering Matrix

Reloaded's vestigial Christian imagery

and paeans to Zion, there is also a Christian

rock track by P.O.D. titled "Sleeping

Awake." We also hear the music for the

dancing and sex scenes in the movie in

close proximity to the religious imagery--

which we appreciate as the conscious

intention of the film directors.

The Dave Matthews Band treats us to

an image of people having sex while the

world is ending. That sums up the Neo

and Trinity love scene pretty accurately.

The whole CD easily could have gone

off the apocalyptic Christian deep-end,

but instead it often substitutes sex where

spiritual lift-off would occur in the mind

of the more Bible-prone.

We should also mention Marilyn

Manson's abuse of the public in the song

"This is the new shit." It's about the

predictability of sex, parties, violence and

rebels and could be seen as mocking

himself, the movie and the audience.

Despite these songs with lyrics

mentioned above the most important part

of the album is instrumental music. When

the robots attack Morpheus's ship with a

thud, the "thud" is actually music.

Likewise, when the masses are dancing

after a Zion sermon, there is instrumental

music.

After one sees a movie like "Matrix

Reloaded," each of the songs on an album

like this one conjures up specific images.

In such a context, we Maoists favor the

use of instrumental music. In contrast,

playing instrumental music today from

composers hundreds of years ago usually

ends up supporting reactionary ideas,

because the context is missing or reflects

the pre-occupations of the rising

bourgeoisie or the petty-bourgeoisie in

their day hundreds of years ago.

The problem with all instrumental music

occurs when it becomes detached from

its original context and distributed for

money or other reasons unconnected to

its original purpose. The fact that people

can make money or use music to pacify

various people in various different

situations is not the fault of composers,

but such a truth should be the assumption

of all composers.

To act as if instrumental music has no

politics and hence no context is to aid the

money-making abilities of those trying to

profit from original artistic work. It is

above all the bourgeoisie that wants to

use music of all people for "universal"

purposes, all the better to sell the music

in more places. Hence, a symphony made

originally to celebrate Polish revolutionary

nationalism may end up at funerals, in

churches or debutante balls of the rich

and famous. It will be like seeing the

music of today by the "Clash" used to

sell deodorant or the "Sex Pistols" to pass

the time on elevators.

Likewise, but on a lesser scale, the

king's court in monarchist societies also

has its political purposes for music

sometimes beyond the original intentions

of the composer. While we are in favor

of remaking music to fit revolutionary

purposes through "recycling," such

recycling by revolutionaries differs from

that by profiteers or monarchists and other

status quo or reactionary opportunists in

that we recognize we have to change the

music at least slightly to fit a revolutionary

purpose for today.

That is to say, "original" music does not

drop from the sky. It arises from music

prior to it. No music is so "original" as to

escape all the social context of the

composer.

Even music that originally had

revolutionary intentions, becomes

reinterpreted and misunderstood to the

point of being co-opted over time. In this

case, we are going to give the "Matrix

Reloaded" soundtrack a pass, because it

accompanies a progressive movie (at least

up to this point: the last part of the movie

is not out yet).

Over time though, this sort of CD

product starts a reactionary movement

that detaches the symphonic music from

its original context. There will be those

listening to it who do not know what it is

connected to. In that case, the music will

serve the status quo, by pacifying its

unknowing listener.

On the other hand, we can hope that

this symphonic music will not take on

much of a life of its own in the cultural

world apart from the movie. Whatever

sickness in society that occurs where

people latch on to the music without

knowing what it refers to is offset by the

progressive use of the music in connection

to the movie. The "Matrix Reloaded"

soundtrack is in fact an example of one

of the best ways to sell symphonic music

today. We only hope the money does not

go to supporting more classical music

concerts for Beethoven, Bach etc.

That raises yet another political

question--the question of financial

priorities and hence music production--

which is separate from the content of

music itself. Symphonic music expressing

the moods of then new but now old or

gone classes from hundreds of years ago

deserves to have no market outside

museum-like audiences--at least until the

day when we can all upload information

through cartridges in the neck like the

people do in the "Matrix." For now, most

pre-rock "classical" or symphony

instrumental music plays in snobby

venues where the only common

knowledge of the listeners is that upper

classes used to listen to the same music

hundreds of years prior.

During the Cultural Revolution in China

(1966-1976), Chao Hua addressed the

controversy surrounding politics and

instrumental music: "In fact, a composer

clearly has in mind what he wants to

praise or oppose and what content and

mood he means to convey, when he is

composing the absolute music." We can

see how this truth applies almost 30 years

later in the "Matrix," because each

symphonic soundtrack goes specifically

with a movie scene.

The belief that humyn moods are not

political is wrong. All people feel sorrow

and joy, but they do so for different

concrete reasons having to do with class,

nation and gender. There is no

transcendent humyn mood expressed in

music just as not all people at this time

are from the same class, nation and

gender. At this time, some music drives

toward the future of communist unity

better than other music. Such progressive

music deserves airtime and publicity.

It is important to note as Chao Hua and

Lu Hsun did that the feelings of the

famine victim collecting cinders for a

living and a rich old retired man growing

flowers do differ for concrete reasons.

At the same time, now that post-

modernist subjectivism is the fad, we do

not want to push that difference to the

point of saying that rich men cannot know

the feeling of the famine victim. We can

say that the rich man's moods are

produced by his circumstances, but it is

incorrect to say that each persyn has his

or her own circumstances and individual

mood unknowable by others. The general

conditions producing moods and the

moods themselves of the varying classes

can be known generally. If this were not

true, it would not be possible to make music

for fictional worlds like the "Matrix" and

have MIM give it approval.

Note: Chao Hua, Peking Review #9,

1974.

A Maoist commentary on how all instrumental music has politics

Militarism is war-mongering or the

advocacy of war or actual carrying out

of war or its preparations.

While true pacifists condemn all

violence as equally repugnant, we

Maoists do not consider self-defense

or the violence of oppressed nations

against imperialism to be militarism.

Militarism is mostly caused by

imperialism at this time. Imperialism

is the highest stage of capitalism--

seen in countries like the United

$tates, England and France.

Under capitalism, capitalists often

profit from war or its preparations.

Yet, it is the proletariat that does the

dying in the wars. The proletariat

wants a system in which people do not

have self-interest on the side of war-

profiteering or war for imperialism.

Militarism is one of the most

important reasons to overthrow

capitalism. It even infects oppressed

nations and causes them to fight each

other.

It is important not to let capitalists risk

our lives in their ideas about war and

peace or the environment. They have

already had two world wars admitted

by themselves in the last 100 years and

they are conducting a third right now

against the Third World.

Even a one percent annual chance of

nuclear war destruction caused by

capitalist aggressiveness or "greed" as

the people call it should not be tolerated

by the proletariat. After playing

Russian Roulette (in which the bullet

chamber is different each time and not

related at all to the one that came up in

previous spins) with 100 chambers and

one bullet, the chance of survival is

only 60.5% after 50 turns. In other

words, a seemingly small one percent

annual chance of world war means

eventual doom. After 100 years or turns

of Russian Roulette, the chances of

survival are only 36.6%. After 200

years, survival has only a 13.4%

chance.

What is militarism?

Continued from previous page...

MIM Notes 284 · July 1, 2003 · Page 6

May 30--Tom Ridge's latest Orange

Alert announcement has inspired the city

of Los Angeles to beef up security locally.

While California Governor Davis put state

cops on 12-hour shifts, L.A. Police chief

Bratton reminded residents to call in any

"suspicious" behavior to the LAPD's

terrorism tip line. He cited "taking pictures

of a reservoir or other facility" as an

example of suspicious behavior that

should be reported to the police.(1) Not

such a good time to be a tourist in L.A.

Police Chief Bratton is telling ordinary

Angelenos to take up a practice that the

U.S. Congress shot down in the form of

"Operation TIPS." The Justice

Department originally proposed this as a

"national system for reporting suspicious

and potentially terrorist-related activity"

by recruiting "millions of American

workers who, in the daily course of their

work, are in a unique position to see

potentially unusual or suspicious activity

in public places." When the ACLU and

some Congress members protested, the

Justice Department tried to save

Operation TIPS by excluding mail

carriers, utility workers and others with

access to people's homes from

participating. But Congress explicitly

banned "any and all activities" to

implement Operation TIPS in the

Homeland Security law it passed in

2002.(2)

Now in a two-pronged attack, many

Amerikan localities are instituting

Operation TIPS on their own and under

different names, while the Justice

Department tries again with Patriot Act

II. A citizen spy program called CAT

Eyes is training regular people to spy on

their neighbors and report activity to the

Feds if it activates their "it-feels-wrong"

button.(3) A Boston resident who went

to one of that city's CAT Eyes trainings

pointed out that Amerikans are too well

schooled in chauvinism for their feelings

to be trustworthy, asking: "what is likely

to activate the it-feels-wrong button in a

society that has been conditioned to

regard Muslims and people of Middle

Eastern appearance as potential

terrorists?"(4) Amerikans have answered

this question by reporting Arab- and

Muslim-looking airplane passengers for

suspicious activity like using the toilet too

often during a flight.

In spite of the obvious threat of fanning

anti-immigrant hysteria and the fact that

the Congress has banned this sort of

activity, Bedford County, VA and towns

near Philadelphia are looking into or

setting up CAT Eyes programs.

Burlington County, NJ has implemented

the program and Bordentown, NJ is

investigating it. According to the CAT

Eyes website "the NJ Regional

Community Police Institute has set up

training for over 30 NJ Police

Departments and is having the

Department of Justice Review the

program."(5)

As if John Ashcroft hadn't already

LAPD nixes civil liberties, starts own `Operation TIPS'

demonstrated his incapacity for being in

charge of anyone's civil liberties, the

Justice Department has its own proposal

to make community spying a reality. The

draft law is called the Domestic Security

Enhancement Act or "Patriot Act II" and

among other things it would grant legal

immunity to businesses that give tips to

the government in terrorism

investigations. This means the

government can enlist cable companies,

internet service providers and banks to

violate customers' privacy and even lie

about customer activities, and cannot be

taken to court for it. The ACLU points

out that "false information can ruin a

person's reputation, lead to erroneous

arrest and even to violence" and the new

law would "weaken the incentive for

businesses to think twice before using a

false tip to law enforcement to settle a

private score or indulge in invidious

discrimination."(6)

For these reasons and many more,

MIM is organizing to stop Patriot Act II

from becoming law. Check out the Civil

Liberties page of our website,(7) get

yourself some more information and help

us shut down this column of the march

toward fascism.

Notes:

1. KPCC 20 May, 2003

2. "Proposal to enlist citizen spies was

doomed from the start," The Washington

Post 24 November, 2002.

3. This is what an imperialist-country

economy looks like. CAT Eyes hires

trainers from National Protective

Services, a business that describes itself

as "a variety of personnel with verifiable

backgrounds in the military and law

enforcement. [The company's president]

has been responsible for anti-terrorism

programs both in the United States as well

as in high-threat theaters of operations

overseas, including managing the training

of personnel, developing plans and

programs, and conducting threat and

vulnerability assessments. He has also

been responsible for the security of U.S.

military nuclear assets as well as serving

as the commander of a military Special

Weapons and Tactics (SWAT)

T e a m . " ( h t t p : / /

www.nationalprotectiveservices.com)

The Amerikan military incites "terrorism"

by warring overseas to expand U.$.

hegemony, and graduates of its training

programs use their special knowledge to

make money in the private sector fighting

this "terrorism."

4. The Boston Globe May 18, 2003.

5. Lynchburg News and Advance,

March 31, 2003; The Philadelphia

Inquirer, 12 December, 2002; http://

www.cateyesprogram.com/

6. http://www.aclu.org/SafeandFree/

SafeandFree.cfm?ID=11817&c=206

Click on link "For a detailed section-by-

section analysis."

7. http://www.prisoncensorship.info/archive/etext/

agitation/civlib/

by PIRAO Chief

June 3, 2003

May saw our web traffic suffer a huge

drop-off from the previous month, thanks

mostly to the u.$. public's relaxation

regarding the Iraq War. The report is also

rather dismal-looking, because in

comparison last year we had 150%

growth on our web page, which was hard

to build off in an impressive way.

Iraq-related traffic dropoff affects our

agitation and MIM Notes the most. To

the extent that people are also not picking

up the MIM Notes on the street at a rally,

people are also asking fewer basic

questions about MIM for our FAQ

department.

As the sun is up more in the united

$tates, we lose traffic after April in

general. I'm sorry not to have

implemented all our plans for countering

the loss in traffic, but there is also an extent

where we cannot overcome the fact that

people do not like our topics during the

good weather. A number of departments

such as Chinese gained great ground but

could not make up for the season and Iraq

situation.

This month, the Black Panther page had

more hits than the home page. The table

counts the languages all the same way,

based on number of visitors. It reveals

that Chinese is now language number two,

Spanish third and French fourth for our

web page.

Summary statistics comparing May 2002 and May 2003

Statistic

May, 2002

May, 2003

Change

Different computers MIM served

28,050

42,949*

+53.1%

MIM pages served per day

2,361

3,180

+34.7%

MIM data transferred/day

102.329MB

120.46MB

+15.1%

MIM Notes printed copies
compared with pre-911=100

167

MIM prison circulation averaged
over two months Jan 2002=100

Number of Art page users

Unknown

4,699

Number of different MIM web page
files actively chosen from

3,495

4,100

17.3%

Amazon visitors sent from web page

355

814

+129%

May 2003 Central Task Report

*This report excludes all art, and most robots and developer hits for 2003 but not 2002.

Web traffic broken down by department: April vs. May 2003

(From high to low by May figure)

Department

April users

May users

% change

Bookstore

10,764

10,169

-5.6%

Agitation

7,209

2,683

-62.8%

Art

6,355

4,669

-26.5%

MIM Notes

6,213

4,755

-23.5%

FAQ

5,674

5,120

-9.8%

Black Panther page

5,101

4,868

-4.6%

What is MIM?

5,089

4,935

-3.0%

MIM Theory

2,882

3,240

+12.4%

RAIL

2,570

1,915

-34.2%

Movies

1,995

3,010

+50.9%

Prisons agitation

1,668

1,540

-7.7%

Notas Rojas

1,318

1,450

+10.0%

French

1,103

931

-15.6%

Contemporary controversies

/countries page

1,088

1,129

+3.8%

California

1,062

928

-12.6%

Chinese

1,204

1,977

+64.2%

Classic quotes

763

949

+24.4%

RAIL fliers

(within RAIL page)

562

283

-49.6%

Maoist Sojourner

248

261

+5.2%

German

230

380

+65.2%

Finnish

168

167

-0.6%

Russian

135

157

+16.3%

Study packs

118

115

-2.5%

Albany

104

107

+2.8%

Philadelphia

N/A

Turkish

-10.5%

New York City

-9.9%

MIM Notes 284 · July 1, 2003 · Page 7

As the Attorney General John Ashcroft

schemes to remove judicial oversight over

police agencies via Patriot Act II, the

Supreme Court is busy giving it away. The

Supreme Court ruled at the end of May

that an Oxnard, California police officer

did not violate the 5th amendment rights

of Oliverio Martinez by interrogating him

without informing him of his right to

remain silent--all while Martinez was

awaiting treatment for the five bullet

wounds police gave him.

The Los Angeles Times, obviously ill-

informed about current police

interrogation tactics, still managed to draw

the correct conclusion:

"While Supreme Court justice Clarence

Thomas labored to justify the bullying

interrogation of a farm worker whom an

Oxnard police officer had just gravely

wounded, Justice John Paul Stevens,

dissenting, called the inquisition what it

was: `the functional equivalent' of torture.

Thomas' majority opinion rolls back

decades of constitutional procedures and

all but invites the backroom rough-em'-

up police tactics of old.

"Oliverio Martinez is blind and partly

paralyzed from the five bullets that police

pumped into his body after they stopped

him in connection with an investigation

of possible drug sales in his Oxnard

neighborhood. Although Martinez initially

complied with orders to dismount from

his bike, a scuffle resulted when the

officers discovered he was carrying a

knife and Martinez was shot.

"Paramedics arrived and carted away

Martinez, bleeding and screaming, to a

hospital. For nearly an hour, as Martinez

waited for medical treatment and then as

doctors treated him, the officers pressured

him to confess to starting the fight."(1)

Martinez' case is particularly brutal, but

police tactics aimed at skirting people's

right to remain silent are neither old nor

exceptional. Anybody who has been

arrested or has seen trashy cop shows

like "NYPD Blue" and "Law and Order"

knows that cops will try all sorts of dirty

tricks to squeeze self-incriminating

information out of arrestees before they

"lawyer up."

MIM gives the pigs credit: they're good

at what they do. That's why we

encourage people to give cops as little

information as possible before and after

they are arrested; don't try and beat the

professionals at their own game.

An ACLU "friend of the court" brief

quoted at length from a police training

video describing techniques to get

information from arrestees even after

they have invoked their right to remain

silent. It ends with the smug observation

that in practice cops can break the rules

with impunity. "`Won't I get sued in civil

court for violating his civil rights?' Well

just ask yourself, have you ever seen

hundreds--hundreds and hundreds--of

published cases where court found a ...

violation. Did any of those officers get

sued? Zero."(2) The Supreme Court's

ruling endorsed this practical impunity.

Some people say the police can't fight

crime if their "hands are tied" by

regulations protecting those they

interrogate. These people miss the point.

Civil liberties like the right to remain silent

protect against corrupt and dishonest

people in government.

Cops and prosecutors have a careerist

self-interest in arresting and convicting

as many people as possible. They look

great to the "tough-on-crime" yahoo

majority when they pressure scared kids

into confessing to a rape they did not

commit. And ten years later, when the

truth comes out, it's not like the cops and

prosecutors will be sent to jail for their

lies and incompetence.

Under socialism a.k.a. the dictatorship

of the proletariat, high standards for public

servants like police and prison guards will

be maintained through stiff penalties.

Thought-reform personnel will be held to

especially high standards, expected to be

some of the most self-sacrificing people

there are in their concern for all people.

Such personnel will not run camps or

prisons to take perverse or sadistic

pleasure with internees--or profit from

them. Even abuses like stealing pens and

paper (currently commonplace in

Amerikan prisons) will be punished.(3)

Furthermore, the "tough-on-crime"

crowd fail to notice that their approach

does not reduce crime. You can thank

capitalism for the persistence of the drug

trade, prostitution, etc. Make something

illegal and you make it more profitable;

where there is profit to be made you will

find those who will take the risk.

Notes:

1. Los Angeles Times, 28 May 2003.

2. supreme.lp.findlaw.com/

supreme_court/briefs/01-1444/01-

1444.mer.ami.aclu.pdf

3. For more discussion on prison and

thought reform under the dictatorship of

the proletariat, see: www.etext.org/

Politics/MIM/wim/cong/freespeech.html.

Supreme Court OKs coercive interrogation

Int'l.-USA in the "Stop Patriot Act II

Coalition" to promote the petition and

carry out civil liberties agitation from an

internationalist perspective.

Notes:

1. http://www.public-i.org/dtaweb/

report.asp?ReportID=502&L1=10&L2=

10&L3=0&L4=0&L5=0. A complete

draft of the Justice Department's proposal

can also be found there.

2. From our review of Gore Vidal's

"Perpetual War for Perpetual Peace"

(http://www.prisoncensorship.info/archive/etext/

bookstore/books/violence/vidal.html):

"The politically naive say, `if you have

nothing to hide, why should you fear

giving up your privacy (and other civil

liberties).' What these people do not

understand is that civil liberties protect

against corrupt and dishonest people in

government. It is not a question of hiding

something. It's a matter of preventing

government-sponsored terrorism. It is a

HOUSANDS

SAY

ATRIOT

matter of not trusting the government and

giving it unaccountable power. This was

at the core of the racist, white founding

fathers' philosophy having suffered the

oppression of a tyrannic government. And

despite the slavery and genocide against

the First Nations rampant at the time,

MIM would say that that idea is still more

advanced than what we hear today about

the need to sacrifice freedom for safety.

The founding fathers had a `theory' of

how to keep government under control

of the people. We at MIM do not think

that theory is exactly right, but we

recognize and share concern for the

question that drove that theory. Most of

what we hear today on the subject is pure

emotion driven by fascist agitators in the

media and government."

3. For an archive of stories, flyers and

pamphlets against "Patriot Act II" see

http://www.prisoncensorship.info/archive/etext/

agitation/civlib/.

Continued from page 1...

MIM Notes has seen a big spike in

circulation since the "war on
terrorism" began. It's not surprising:

MIM Notes is a free and independent
newspaper. Yes, there are especially
now knee-jerk patriots who believe

everything Bush says and pass by a
chance to read MIM Notes. There are
other patriots and internationalists

who realize that at this time papers
like MIM Notes can undo the huge
spectacle that Uncle Sam is creating

for its own benefit.

Sure, you have seen MIM Notes

around, but MIM Notes needs people

to do two simple things: 1) Pay for it
(postage and printing), 2) Distribute
it!

MIM is looking for sponsors,

distributors and officers. Sponsors pay
for papers; distributors get them onto

the streets and officers do both
distribution and financial support.

Distribute # Cost per year

12 (Priority Mail)

$120

25 (Priority Mail)

$150

50 (Priority Mail)

$280

100

$380

200

$750

900 (Express Mail!)

$3,840

900 (8-10 days)

$2,200

If you know you have some good

places to do distribution, we suggest
starting at 200 and working your way

up higher. If you are not willing to do
distribution, just send money. If you
are not willing to pay, then request

papers after somehow proving to the
party that you are serious (words
won't count). You who will cough up/

raise the money to distribute 900
papers each issue and then do the
distribution, you are what drives this

party forward.

A call for MIM Notes

sponsors and distributors!

Make anonymous money orders payable to "MIM." Send to MIM,

attn: Camb. branch, PO Box 400559, Cambridge, MA 02140. Contact

MIM in regards to this campaign by writing mim3@mim.org

MIM Notes 284 · July 1, 2003 · Page 8

Behind the Invasion of Iraq
by Research Unit for Political
Economy
New York: Monthly Review Press,
2003, 144pp. pb

This is the best of the available books

on the invasion of Iraq, from an overall

perspective. Despite the title, the material

stems from December 2002 and February

2003, just before the invasion. Readers

of MIM Notes have already seen most

of this material, but already at least one

reviewer has expressed satisfaction in

seeing many items pulled together in one

book.

The authors were confident the invasion

would occur and named the economic

reasons for it as well as the colonial

administration that did take shape after

the invasion. In other words, nothing in

the book proved wrong once the invasion

actually occurred.

The most important aspect of this book

is that it goes back into history and

interests the reader in economic subjects,

but in a highly accessible manner. Readers

who become interested in this material

and who want heavier analysis can find

it later from the same Monthly Review

Press, especially in the 1960s and 1970s

titles concerning China. It is by reading

books like this one that the public can build

up its understanding of political economy.

MIM has only very slight complaints.

One is that the RUPE authors correctly

dwell on the competition of the euro and

the dollar. However, it is not quite correct

to say that the existence of dollar

reserves, and dollar-denominated trade

has created the only financial basis for

the united $tates to fund its trade deficit.

This is a misunderstanding of finance

capitalism and how it works. The status

of the dollar is a factor in the dollar's own

price relative to other currencies, but

financing of trade deficits is related to

things such as the nature of investor

beliefs about asset values in the united

$tates. For example, as the RUPE

authors mention, Japan has been in a long

recession.

Japanese investors going into the united

$tates do so not just because there is a

bias toward the dollar internationally, but

because they believe there is no other

proper outlet for capital. To say that the

united $tates is a mess does not leave

Japanese investors with a necessarily

better outlet.

Two, in passing, the authors mention

that the united $tates will use revolts by

the Arab peoples as an excuse for further

intervention. Happily, the RUPE authors

also explain that the global masses will

have a say in how the U.$. strategy for

empire works out. We had only a

momentary concern that the RUPE might

be saying it was time not to revolt.

Something worth mentioning before we

close is the authors' sharp exposure of

the Indian rulers fueling hatred against

Islam and lining up evermore loyally with

the u.$. imperialists. This book sheds

welcome light on the geopolitics of the

region near India and many other regions

as well.

Indian researchers write exemplary book on Iraq

would decide on "long-term" bases, not

just the graphs of the year.

The unspoken truth is that Bush and

Blair nearly killed the dollar with the Iraq

War. Politically, the escalating Middle

East wars seriously wounded the dollar

as Arabs and various global investors

flocked to the Euro. Economically, the

war seriously wounded the dollar when it

became clear that the warriors would pay

for this war, not the Euro zone government

budgets.

Even the Euro zone countries have some

reason to fear the overly rapid rise of the

Euro, again because the rulers know their

class well--its inclinations to panic. One

advantage that socialism and physically

planned production have is that it is not

subject to the mentality of a relatively

small portion of the population known as

speculators alternately paralyzed and

jolted forward by fear and greed. While

speculators may make moves that

damage the economy and they may

create self-fulfilling prophecies to hold

back economic growth, the proletariat has

no such inclinations. Of course, even the

proletariat has mood changes, but in

general it has the greatest interest in

moving the economy forward, even and

especially in the face of adversity, since

the proletariat is most hurt in bad times.

The rise of the Euro causes imports to

be cheaper in the Euro-using countries,

so Germany's chancellor Gerard

Schroeder recently said he does not

expect any deflation risk in Germany,(4)

as a way of saying not to worry too much.

The dollar is down 29% since its high in

2000,(4) but Germany's official position

is that deflation won't happen. Those

who would favor moves to prop up the

dollar would be saying the risk of deflation

is too great in the Euro zone.

Readers may ask what all this has to

do with the struggle for communism.

Some have said that U.$. imperialism's

parasitic position depends on the status

of its currency which allows U.$.

imperialism to borrow more on

Brit moves on Euro reveal fears of economic disaster

international markets to finance deficit

spending. Billionaire Warren Buffet said

as much: "`Any other country in the world

that [bought imports] on that scale would

have had a much greater currency

depreciation already.'"(5) The United

$tates is now importing 5% of its gross

domestic product without matching

exports and it has been doing this a long

time.(5) In contrast, we believe the

currency issue is only one very important

manifestation of parasitism: bankers do

have other ways of accomplishing much

the same thing.

The Euro is much more significant in

geopolitics as a symbol to keep an eye

on. France and Germany are in the Euro

zone and England and the United $tates

are not. Although Spain and many eastern

European countries favored the war on

Iraq, political and currency speculators

have to assume that the European

economy is shaping up to have different

interests than those of U.$. imperialism.

It is not for no reason at all that England

waited till just after the war to put the

brake on the Euro.

At the same time, the United $tates has

so far resigned itself to a falling

currency.(6) The Japanese and other

Asian currencies have arranged that the

fall be against the Euro and not against

their own currencies by building up U.$.

dollar reserves--holding a bunch of

dollars. Thus far in life, the Japanese and

other export-oriented "Four Tigers" of

East Asia appear to have to put their

exports first and that means keeping a

strong dollar. "The euro rose 27.6 percent

against the dollar in the last year, while

the Japanese yen rose 8.4 percent, and

other Asian currencies even less."(7)

Thus the major Asian currencies are not

as yet a "hedge." Although Europe's

economy is doing poorly, investors are

betting on it because the alternatives are

even worse. Some are calling it

"diversifying" by holding Euros and

dollars. "`We are strongly tied to the

dollar,' Rizal Ramli, the former finance

minister of Indonesia, said in an interview.

"`But with the dollar's decline, it is wise

for Indonesia to diversify its reserves into

euros.'"(8)

Already the bond trading situation is

equalized: "In the four years since the

common currency began trading,

however, 44 percent of new global bonds

have been issued in euros, nearly equaling

the 48 percent issued in dollars."(8)

Without a major political upheaval, the

U.$. dollar advantage as a manifestation

of parasitism will equalize between the

United $tates and Europe. However,

since the capitalists of the various

countries have long had the "right" to

invest in each other's businesses and they

move trillions across borders with blinding

speed, the profits of European and U.$.

imperialists have not been much out of

step with each in the last 25 years. If any

of them seriously believed the U.$.

imperialists had an advantage via their

currency, they would have invested in

U.$. imperialism.

Notes:

1. http://politics.guardian.co.uk/euro/

story/0,9061,955669,00.html ; http://

www.nytimes.com/financialtimes/

business/FT1051390225478.html

2. http://www.nytimes.com/2003/05/

16/international/europe/16BRIT.html

3. http://politics.guardian.co.uk/euro/

story/0,9061,958867,00.html

4. http://www.nytimes.com/

f i n a n c i a l t i m e s / b u s i n e s s /

FT1051390223827.html

5. http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/

business/AP-Buffett-Weak-Dollar.html.

This marks one imperialist in favor of the

U.$. imperialists' giving up their special

privilege in currency trading. Associated

Press, May 21 2003.

6. http://www.nytimes.com/2003/05/

20/business/20DOLL.html

7. http://www.nytimes.com/2003/05/

20/business/worldbusiness/20EURO.html

8. http://www.nytimes.com/2003/05/

18/international/europe/18EURO.html

Continued from page 3...

MIM Notes 284 · July 1, 2003 · Page 9

said that, among other things, 8,500 liters

of anthrax were unaccounted for. How

much space do 8,500 liters occupy? That's

about 45 drums - the size of oil drums -

probably spread out in several different

hiding places.

"If one contemplates how much

damage a single teaspoon of anthrax

caused in Washington, D.C., when it was

spread through the mail in October of

2001, the United States was right to be

worried about the enormous damage that

a suitcase full of anthrax delivered by a

small cell of terrorists might wreak.

"That is why our troops in the field are

not expecting to find huge warehouses

or enormous storage spaces. They are

looking for materials that may be hidden

in somebody's basement, behind a false

wall, in a space the size of a clothes'

closet."(1)

According to Novak's logic, Amerikan

troops might never find the WMDs if they

are there. Bombing the bejeezus out of a

country and then invading with 100,000

heavy-weapons troops does not seem like

the best way to find a suitcase buried

under some farmer's doghouse, but it's a

sure way to piss more people off, maybe

to the point where one of them will dig up

Much Ado About

Weapons of Mass Destruction

Continued from page 1...

that suitcase.

The Amerikan leadership's police

approach to stop the proliferation of

WMDs does not work. What's needed

instead is a serious approach to solving

the problems that lead to conflict and

war--chief among them competition over

resources created by capitalism and the

simple profitability of war under

capitalism. It's an old joke: on the one

hand you have the Amerikan government

calling for unfettered trade and selling

more weapons than any other nation

(including chemical, biological, and

nuclear technology), on the other you

have Donald Rumsfeld wringing his hands

over the possibility north Korea might sell

a nuclear bomb to another country.

Amerikans need to dump their current

war-mongering leadership in favor of

internationalists who can really address

the causes of poverty and war. Socialism

and international co-operation can do

more to reduce the risk of nuclear or other

WMD catastrophe then any strategy

proposed under capitalsim.

Notes:

1. National Review, 12 June 2003.

polluting auto company.

Speakers did correctly attack

Amerika's drive for oil at the expense of

peoples around the world. A Global

Exchange speaker criticized Amerika

fighting wars to get at resources in other

countries. And a flyer passed out by the

organizers noted that "The U.S. has less

than 5 percent of the world's population,

yet we consume more than 25 percent of

the planet's oil." This flyer tried to appeal

to Amerikan's fears about national

security by arguing that oil dependence

endangers national security. MIM agrees

with this, although our point differs from

the parochialism usually behind that

argument: stealing resources from other

peoples will naturally create enemies

wanting to attack back.

Organizers were also correct to point

out that auto companies continue to

manufacture cars that are tremendously

fuel inefficient in spite of possessing

technology that would allow them to build

cleaner and safer cars. This again is a

product of capitalism and particularly the

way that capitalist competition stifles

creativity and technological advances. Just

as drug companies make millions of

dollars by withholding needed treatments

from people who can not afford their high

prices, auto companies make millions of

dollars by keeping secret advances that

Ford boycott demonstrates failure of capitalism

would make cars last longer, or would

require them to change their

manufacturing technology to build more

efficient cars. Production under

capitalism is not for the people, it is for

the capitalists to make a profit. And as

was seen with the Firestone tire scandal

a few years back, this aspect of

capitalism is literally deadly.

The Bluewater Network is encouraging

people to take a pledge to join the boycott.

As the director of the network explained,

"Until Ford does the right thing, let's all

promise not to buy Ford cars and trucks."

The goal of the boycott is to force Ford

to both build cleaner vehicles and lobby

Congress for a doubling of federal fuel

mileage standards. Bill Ford lobbied

congress against increasing federal fuel

mileage standards last year. The

Bluewater press release provides further

evidence of MIM's point that capitalism

benefits from squelching technological

advances: "Ironically, Ford already has

the technology to build affordable, clean

vehicles--they recently developed a

virtually zero-emission, hydrogen-

powered internal combustion engine car,

called a Model U, but have no plans to

make it available to the public."

The Bluewater speaker went on to say

"Ford has every excuse in the book not

to build cleaner, safer cars." These

excuses have included cost and also the

claim that it would lead to job loss. Clearly

this argument is targeted at Amerikan

workers since few in the U.$. care if

workers in the Third World lose their jobs

in Ford parts plants overseas. The RAN

speaker addressed this argument saying

"Jobs would be more plentiful for auto

workers if we would switch technology."

This statement was reiterated in the

organizer's flyer: "The U.$. lost 10 percent

of its manufacturing jobs in the last four

years. During that same time, the U.S.

lost clean-energy market share to foreign

companies in Japan and Europe. Higher

fuel economy will create about 47,000

new jobs in the auto industry."

Of course if cars run better and longer

and people buy fewer of them then some

manufacturing jobs might be lost in the

long run. But activists should not be

focusing on Amerikan labor aristocracy

jobs regardless. Pitting the nationalist

interests of Amerikan labor against that

of workers in other countries (even other

imperialist countries) is not progressive.

It only leads to further Amerikan

chauvinism. Furthermore, under socialism

jobs and livelihoods will be guaranteed--

there will be plenty of worthy things for

people who used to build Navigators and

Hummers to do.

MIM stands firmly against

environmental destruction and we are

taking up the necessary battles to win

control of the environment for the world's

people. The only sure way to end global

environmental destruction is to overthrow

capitalism and replace it with a system

that serves the majority of the people.

Only then will the people be able to protect

the environment against its greatest

enemies.

Notes:

1. See our review of "Ozone

Diplomacy" by RE Benedick at

www.prisoncensorship.info/archive/etext/bookstore/

books/enviro/benedick.html.

Continued from page 3...

What questions do YOU have?

Wasn't Mao a butcher? Why do you spell it "Amerika"? Shouldn't you try

non-violence first? What is internationalism? Isn't hating white people reverse

racism? Why don't you leftists work together? Why don't you tone it down?

What is a cardinal principle? What is your program? What is necessary to

join MIM? What concrete actions can I take? How do I write articles for

MIM? What is your copyright policy?

Go to http://www.prisoncensorship.info/archive/etext/faq and get real answers to

these and other questions.

MIM Notes 284 · July 1, 2003 · Page 10

MIM on

Prisons & Prisoners

MIM seeks to build public opinion

against Amerika's criminal injustice sys-

tem, and to eventually replace the bour-

geois injustice system with proletarian jus-

tice. The bourgeois injustice system im-

prisons and executes a disproportionately

large and growing number of oppressed

people while letting the biggest mass mur-

derers -- the imperialists and their lack-

eys -- roam free. Imperialism is not op-

posed to murder or theft, it only insists that

these crimes be committed in the interests

of the bourgeoisie.

"All U.S. citizens are criminals--

accomplices and accessories to the crimes
of U.$. oppression globally until the day
U.$. imperialism is overcome. All U.S.
citizens should start from the point of view
that they are reforming criminals."

MIM does not advocate that all

prisoners go free today; we have a
more effective program for fighting
crime as was demonstrated in China
prior to the restoration of capitalism
there in 1976. We say that all prisoners
are political prisoners because under
the dictatorship of the bourgeoisie, all
imprisonment is substantively
political. It is our responsibility to
exert revolutionary leadership and
conduct political agitation and
organization among prisoners --
whose material conditions make them
an overwhelmingly revolutionary
group. Some prisoners should and will
work on self-criticism under a future
dictatorship of the proletariat in those
cases in which prisoners really did do
something wrong by proletarian
standards.

Under Lock & Key

News from Prisons & Prisoners

Tennessee censors
MIM Theory

I received your memo regarding MIM

censorship and forwarded a copy to the
Shelby court jail administrator - Chief Joseph
Ponte. I also filed a grievance because the
MIM Theory journal you sent me titled "Diet
for a Small Red Planet' was refused by
mailroom staff.

The grievance coordinator conducted an

investigation and claims they were unaware
of my mail being rejected. They further said
that they tried contacting MIM through
nationwide directory assistance and was told
that no such name as MIM was listed with
nationwide directory. At any rate, they're
requesting that `Diet for a Small Red Planet'
(MIM Theory) be resubmitted. I am as well.

It appears that whomever the mailroom clerk

was who rejected my mail overstepped his/
her patriotic boundaries. MIM Theory
obviously not only killed his mailroom clerk's
curiosity about what he/she was reading, but
MIM Theory also invoked the mail clerk's
biased oppressive nature, which
consequently caused the mail clerk to interfere
with my communist/anti-imperialist/anti-
capitalist/anti-american studies.

Imperialist ideology seeks to destroy that

which is in conflict with its own train of
thought, while at the same time laying the
ground work for it's very own destruction
through self-contradiction and hypocrisy.

-- a Tennessee prisoner, May 2003

Solitary used to punish
politically active

You have published my last letter to you,

under lock & key "NYSDOCS targets ALKQN
leader"... well I'm still here with the Solitary
Confinement. I want MIM to be aware that if
this letter is stopped I will be subjected to
more time in the SHUs here in NYS. I guess
my form of politics and my activities are
considered a threat to the safety and security
of the New York State prison system. At the
present time I, along with my attorneys are
making a stand against the NYS Dept. of
Corrections against their unfair policies and
racial profiling.

--a NY prisoner, March 2003

Organizing Points in
New Jersey

Revolutionary Greetings to all the comrades

at MIM,

...I've been spreading the word about the

Maoist Internationalist Movement, and
brothers seem interested in your communist
platform. Like I've said, I'm steering my "Folk
Nation" into a communist direction. And I
appreciate the insight that MIM has to offer
us young striving communists. I'm in the
midst of exposing these "Devilish Pigs" in
Bayside State Prison. I'm going to attack them
here:

1) They don't have college courses for

those that want to further our education inside
these U.S. gulags.

2) BSP limits our reading material to 12

books. I believe prisoners should be able to
obtain as much reading material as he pleases.

3) Prisoners are required to wear ID's inside

of BSP at all times. If you happen to groom
yourself (get a shape up, braid your hair or
twist your locks), they want to make prisoners
get new ID's at our own expense and they
cost two dollars.

4) Somehow it's state law that all prisoners

get screened for TB and nine times out of ten
the method for screening is injecting that
poison into our bodies. Something must be
done about that.

--a New Jersey Prisoner, May 2003
MIM responds: We support this comrades

effort to organize for more educational
opportunities and control over prisoners'
healthcare. Forcing prisoners to pay for the
bureaucratic expenses is just one more form
of expropriating the wealth of the oppressed.
MIM agrees with this comrade that there is
no good reason to limit access to books and
supporters on the outside can help make sure
that prisoners do have access to revolutionary
materials by supporting our Books for
Prisoners program and helping with legal
battles to oppose censorship in prisons.

Initiative and
persistence pay off

I am writing to let you know the Department

has resolved the lawsuit [against censorship
of MIM Notes]. They released to me on April
4, 2003 the disputed MIM Notes.

I would like to say how persistence pays

off to those who are willing to make sacrifices
for their First Amendment rights to read MIM
Notes.

--A Pennsylvania prisoner
MIM responds: This comrade initiated a

lawsuit against the Pennsylvania Department
of Corrections after it withheld several MIM
Notes on the bogus charge they posed a
"clear and present danger" to the security of
the institution. At one point no MIM Notes
were getting to any prisoners in his
institution. He persisted in his lawsuit for over
a year, with only minor support from MIM.
Now not only has he received the issues
which were censored, but prisoners in his
institution receive MIM Notes without
hassle.

This comrade's self reliance is exemplary.

Oregon repression by
"minority affairs"
coordinator

In the August issue of MIM Notes (#264)

you printed an article called repression in
Oregon. The article expressed some concerns
regarding the minority affairs officer here at
the Eastern Oregon Correctional Institution.
Right on! Brothers and sisters in the
revolutionary fight, freedom must continue.

We can no longer accept the blunt racial

acts of this institution nor the discrimination
of minority group literature, such as cultural
magazines, religious materials, and catalogs

that have to do with books written by people
of color. We can't put up with Institutional
Imperialism and the conspiracy to deny us of
cultural growth and knowledge of our own
people and heritage.

This institutional bigotry must stop! We

can no longer allow these imperialists to treat
us as outsiders. They are using prison tactics
by using the words "gang related" to deny
us the same rights as others. Racism is racism.

On April 29, 2002 I filed to discrimination

complaints regarding the censorship of Islamic
religious material mailed to me, which
mailroom staff used institutional mail rules to
deny. This rule was never administered until
after it was being enforced. The rule stated
that catalogs, advertisements, brochures,
pamphlets and materials where the primary
purpose is to sell a product or service shall
be prohibited. At the same time, under the
same rule, allowing others to receive the same
materials.

Upon asking someone for an administration

review I was first denied until filing my
discrimination complaint 4/29/2002. My
complaint was not answered until 4/4/03. Four
months after not receiving an answer from
the institution, I say Mr. P. Maine over near
the education department. I questioned her
concerning my complaint, she told me she
was busy and she didn't have time. Also that
I needed to send her a communications kite.

I waited thinking I'd hear something form

this woman, as to acknowledge if she was
doing her duties and minorities affairs (her
job is Minorities Affairs coordinator). After
not hearing anything again months later, I
wrote her a communications kite. This was 2/
10/2002. I explained in my request for an
answer that the rule stated I would receive an
answer within 90 days per DOC policy.

I received a written notice only almost one

year to the date of my initial complaint, 4/29/
02. I believe this lady and the institution
correctional staff thought that if they waited
long enough I would just lay the matter aside
and forget about it. Fact still remains that the
institution is continually in violation of our
constitutional rights here at EOCI. While this
minority affairs woman, who just happens to
be of white heritage, is working to receive
information for the institution.

This woman isn't doing anything but

providing cultural get-togethers and movies.
Blacks, Latinos, Asians and other groups
continue to tell me this woman is a farce.
Reality has shown me that this woman can't
be responsible enough to fight for our rights.
We are being mistreated, abused, denied our
constitutional rights as well as our human
rights, and fighting legal issues are impossible
due to prison delay tactics.

The truth is that Mrs. Minority Affairs

overseer P. Maine is not allowing us to have
a voice here in this prison and we need
someone to help us as the minority group.
Fact being that in 1999-2000 an officer was

able to get away with wearing a white
pillowcase over his head on the Westside of
the institution and intimidated Black inmates
and nothing was done about it.

--an Oregon Prisoner, May 2003

Oregon pigs attack
prisoner, then charge
him with assault

I am fighting the Department of Corruptions

against a court case for assault on a corruption
officer I refused to obey a order so I was
gassed and jumped on by several DOC pigs
(guards) and while I was being bodily dragged
away I drooled on one of their books as I was
gaging for air after I got sprayed with tear gas
so I received 180 days in the segregation unit
(DSU) plus a $200 fine and 28 days LOP (loss
of privileges upon release from segregation)
plus a court case and I am being charged with
assault on a public official that carries 75
months in the state of Oregon.

I just want to let you know there is also a

MIM Notes 284 · July 1, 2003 · Page 11

Facts on U$ imprisonment

The facts about imprisonment in the United $tates are that the United $tates has been the world's leading prison-state per capita for the last

25 years, with a brief exception during Boris Yeltsin's declaration of a state of emergency.(1)

That means that while Reagan was talking about a Soviet "evil empire" he was the head of a state that imprisoned more people per capita.

In supposedly "hard-line" Bulgaria of the Soviet bloc of the 1980s, the imprisonment rate was less than half that of the United $tates.(2,3)

To find a comparison with U.$. imprisonment of Black people, there is no statistic in any country that compares including apartheid South

Africa of the era before Mandela was president. The last situation remotely comparable to the situation today was under Stalin during war
time. The majority of prisoners are non-violent offenders(4) and the U.S. Government now holds about a half million more prisoners than
China; even though China is four times our population.(5)

The rednecks tell MIM that we live in a "free country." They live in an Orwellian 1984 situation where freedom is imprisonment.

Notes: 1. Marc Mauer, "Americans Behind Bars: The International Use of Incarceration 1993," The Prison Sentencing Project, 918 F. St. NW, Suite

501, Washington, DC 20004 (202) 628-0871 Reference: SRI: R8965-2, 1994
2. Ibid., 1992 report.

3. United Nations Development Programme, "Human Development Report 1994,:" Oxford University Press, p. 186.

4. Figure of 51.2 percent for state prisoners there for non-violent offenses. Abstract of the United States 1993, p. 211.
5. Atlantic Monthly December, 1998.

lot of corruption here in the prison system
here in Oregon. I will send you a copy of their
misconduct grid that you may print under lock
and key if you wish.

I am going to continue to fight the

Department of Corruptions and also the
imperialists who runs the USA and trying to
cause a world war as it is now. It is hard for me
to support MIM with any type of donation of
money or stamps because as it is now I owe
the doc $165.89 in fines and I am in the DSU
unit and am not receiving any money from
the outside.

-- an Oregon prisoner, March 2003

Medical neglect in OR

Can you tell me what gives the state of

Oregon the right to feel they can be or they
are above the actual law itself? And the
department of corrections also believe they
are above the law, untouchable to do as they
please with those they have incarcerated.
They play judge, jury and executioner by
misusing and abusing their authority given
to them by the state to perform the duties and
responsibility of each one's job while working
under the color of state law.

The state of Oregon and Department of

Corrections both failed in their duty to
provide adequate and properly qualified
staffing or employees or a safe living
environment. Some medical staff have very
little if any value for human life. By causing
or being deliberately indifferent to the health
and safety, or the well being of a person's
medical needs, I myself know from four years
of mental and physical abuse.

I am crippled, forced to live in pain, having

all specialists or any orders ignored, delayed,
refused, or plain interfered with by medical
department. I have been refused correcting
devices such as glasses and footware
because of my inability to pay. There are more
like me in this boat that are indigent or the
state works them, takes their money or
whatever the case might be.

This also stops one from buying soaps,

envelopes, doing legal work or what may be
needed. When one tries to seek help by chain
of command its interfered with, it's passed
around like hand me down clothes until when
someone feels like responding. Medical
knows there's no other means of treatment
but through them, the medical department has
a TLC committee that determines your medical
needs. This is very wrong as they are not
qualified to make their own diagnosis or
decisions, and some medical staff on
committee don't see or examine you. They
are not qualified to refuse specialist orders.

This committee should be court ordered out
of the institution.

By doing these things to you they're

wishing to intimidate you to do as they want
you to. Their actions and conduct and
behavior is always justified even when proven
wrong.

If there's a meaning to the word justice,

how about some correcting in the Oregon
Department of Corrections. If there's a
meaning to the word justice, who's going to
step in and correct the unjustifiable treatment
we receive?

- a prisoner in Oregon, May 2003

Hunger strike in CA

I've always felt prisoners are at a loss within

the system but recently I've been pushed
over the edge. On May 9th a certain guard
threatened me with "playing with my food".
Being in Administrative Segregation there's
not much I can do. But I tried to hold the tray
slot on the door to talk to a higher official and
while holding the tray slot the same guard
called `assault' on his person. Even though I
never touched the guard I've now been put
on shit status. With this `assault' charge it
leads to DA referral which leads to more time
and can even generate my 3rd strike.

The issues here can go on for days.

Threats, brutality, racial slurs, food
contamination, falsifying reports, on and on.
But I've had enough! As of May 9, 2003 a
hunger strike has been implemented as a first
level outcry. Inmates at CA prisons must go
to dramatic measures to be heard. Therefore
as I said I'll continue my hunger strike until
some action is in effect.

Hopefully MIM and our counterparts can

help me. Can you put pressure on Lancaster
State Prison from outside thru phones and
letters? All this would be appreciated. Others
will be joining the hunger strike and join in
when my next level starts.

- a CA prisoner at Lancaster, May 2003

California TB
injection protest

There was a T.B. injection protest at the

bay a couple of weeks ago. Some prisoners
refused to be administered the annual T.B.
injection - consequently getting cell extracted
(forcibly removed from cell) to be injected.
T.B. shot is mandated by state law. The protest
was in regards to CDC's arbitrary and
capricious gang policy. Well this event as well
as the likelihood of future protests (if CDC
doesn't cease their arbitrary and capricious
validation of prisoners and their placement

or retention in SHU) has gotten the attention
of Senator Romero. One of Senator Romero's
staff consultants, Rocky Jaramillo Rushing,
wrote to a prisoner in the SHU saying that
she plans on visiting the Bay and speaking
to some prisoners who have the most flagrant
validation/cases. The senator's proposed visit
will likely happen June-July 2003.

- a CA prisoner, May 2003
MIM responds: We have been carrying out

a campaign against the Security Housing
Units (SHU) and the California gang policy
along side out comrades behind the bars who
are fighting any way they can. We have sent
hundreds of letters and petition signatures
to Senator Romero demanding the SHU be
shut down. The work of MIM and RAIL, along
with other organizations and individuals
seems to be getting the attention of the
Senator. This underscores the need to keep
up the pressure. Letters of protest demanding
the SHU be shut down can be sent to:

Senator Gloria Romero
State Capitol Room #5051
Sacramento, CA 95814

Prisons used for
social control

I'm somewhat of a political prisoner as I

was assaulted by a police officer at a U.C.
Berkeley protest. The reality of the situation
is I was assaulted first and I was merely
protecting myself against a psychotic pig. So
contrary to popular belief, the seriousness of
a crime is not the most crucial element in
predicting who goes to prison and who does
not. In fact, the real roots of crime are
associated with a constellation of suffering
so hideous that, as a society, it cannot bear
to look it in the face. So it hands its casualties
over to a system that will keep us from its
sight.

In prison you see a lot of abnormal things.

In fact, if one had systematically and
diabolically tried to create mental disorder,
one could probably have constructed no
better system than the Amerikan prison
system.

Most of the brothers in here committed

economically related "crimes." From this
perspective, prisons may be seen as
warehouses for people who have no place in
the economic order of things. However, the
reality of unemployment creates economic
and psychological stress that frequently is
manifested in so-called "criminal" behavior.

Since I've been incarcerated I've been

studying our oppressor and it is my clear
conclusion that white people are profoundly
sick. Dr. Frances Cress-Welsing describes this

sickness in her profound text entitled "The
Isis Papers, the Keys to the Colors" very
clearly. The historical relationship between
Afrikans and psychopathic whites has been
sadomasochistic in nature. So, let us be alert,
alert in the twofold sense: since the Afrikan
holocaust we know what crazy white folks
are capable of. And since Hiroshima we know
what is at stake. My understanding of racism
(white supremacy) is that it is fundamentally
a commitment to maintaining, through
discriminatory action or inaction, a higher
ethnic status than Afrikans and other people
of color.

Most Europeans (worldwide) are convinced

that a capacity for civilization is an inborn
racial trait limited to Caucasians. However,
traditional African civilizations have more
than proven on the contrary that all human
beings have an overwhelming capacity for
(highly advanced) civilization and that current
"superiority" of the west is a historical
accident and nothing more

It's really unfortunate about what

happened on September 11th, but the reality
is that people around the world are sick of
Amerika's shit. It is dangerous to divorce
"terrorism" from politics, yet the U.S. media
continue to talk about an abstract war against
terrorism without mention of the issues of
context that lie behind them. Terrorism is a
political act, a response to Amerikan foreign
policy. It is an act of war waged by people too
weak to have a conventional army or one large
enough to take on this racist bitch known as
the united states of Amerika! (United Snakes
of Amerika).

It should also be noted that many New

Afrikans in here are the victims of the so-
called "war on drugs". The war on drugs is a
war on New Afrikan and Brown people. It is
not a war! It is not a war on drugs. There are,
since 1998, 7 percent more people in prison.
Since 1990, that means eight of those ten years
were under the watch of a Democratic
Administration. This is a war being fought
by both political parties against the Black
community. They criminalize drug use for
Black people and medicalize it for white folks.
And if you go to a drug treatment center, 60
percent of the people in that center are white.
If you go to a state or federal prison, 60
percent of those people in there for drug
possession are New Afrikan or Brown.

-- a California prisoner, April 2003

MIM Notes 284 · July 1, 2003 · Page 12

Notas Rojas

julio 1, 2003, Nº 284 Fragmento del Periodico Oficial del Movimiento Internacionalista Maoista

Gratis

¿Que es el MIM?

El Movimiento Internacionalista Maoísta (MIM) es un partido revolucionario

comunista que ejerce el Marxismo-Leninismo-Maoísmo. El MIM es una organización
internacionalista que trabaja desde el punto de vista del proletariado del Tercer Mundo;
es por esto que sus miembros no son amerikanos sino ciudadanos del mundo.

El MIM lucha para acabar con la opresión de todos los grupos sobre cualquier otro,

naciones por naciones, clases por clases, y géneros por géneros. La revolución es una
realidad para los Estados Unidos mientras su ejército continúa extendiendose en su
esfuerzo por asegurar la hegemonía mundial.

El MIM difiere de otros partidos en tres puntos basicos: (1) El MIM sostiene que

después que el proletariado conquiste el poder estatal, existira aún el potencial para una
restauración de tipo capitalista, bajo la dirección de una burguesía nueva dentro del
mismo partido comunista. En el caso de la Unión Soviética, la burguesía se apoderó del
gobierno después de la muerte de Stalin, en 1953; y en China después de la muerte de
Mao y del derrocamiento de la llamada "banda de los cuatro' en 1976. (2) El MIM
sostiene que la Revolución Cultural en China es la fase ms avanzada a la que llegó el
comunismo en la historia. (3) El MIM afirma que la clase trabajadora blanca de los
EE.UU. es primordialmente, una élite trabajadora no revolucionaria en el presente. Es
por esto que no es el principal vehículo para avanzar el Maoísmo en este país.

El MIM acepta como miembro a cualquier individuo que esté de acuerdo con estos

tres puntos basicos, y que acepte al centralismo democrtico, el método de gobierno por
la mayoría en lo que se refiere a cuestiones de línea del partido. El MIM es un partido
clandestino que no publica los nombres de sus miembros para evitar la represión estatal
dirigida históricamente contra los movimientos revolucionarios comunistas, y anti-
imperialistas. Si Ud. desea una suscripción para cualquiera de nuestros periódicos o
libros teóricos, en español o en inglés, por favor mandar dinero en efectivo o un cheque
al nombre de MIM a esta dirección:

MIM · P.O. Box 29670 · Los Angeles CA 90029-0670

MIM

SACA

CONCLUSIONES

CALCULA

TRAYECTORIA

TERRORISTA

[Octubre 2001]

El clímax que hoy día se presencia en la

historia, aclara muy bien la política yanqui.

Según las encuestas, el 92% de los yanquis
están a favor de la guerra mientras que el

8% está en contra de la misma. Un solo

miembro del Congreso se opone a la guerra.
El entero partido Demócrata y el partido

Republicano se han unido.

La unidad de los partidos Republicano y

Demócrata demuestra que el sistema está

a punto de quebrar. La estupidez de los

republicanos y los demócratas en el poder
saltará a la vista del pueblo de una vez por

todas.

En EE.UU., la clase gobernante ha

asumido un gran riesgo, del cual tal vez no

va a poder recuperarse. Cuanto más dure

la alianza entre los Demócratas y los
Republicanos, la probabilidad de que el

pueblo estadounidense tenga que enfrentar

la incometencia por parte de la clase
gobernante en su esfuerzo por lograr la paz

y la justicia, será mayor.

La clase gobernante actual va a gastar

105 mil millones de dólares no más para

retirar los escombros del World Trade

Center. Otras pérdidas económicas
relacionadas al terrorismo alcanzan cientos

de miles de millones de dólares, mientras

que las pérdidas en la bolsa de valores han
llegado a los 1.4 trillones de dólares. (1) El

dinero que EE.UU. han perdido en el

conflicto hasta el momento- sin contar los
miles de millones de dólares otorgados

anualmente a Israel en forma de ayuda

militar- pudo haberles alcanzado para

comprar la región entera de Long Island
con fin de fundar un estado de Israel. Hoy

en día, gracias al creciente número de

policias federales a bordo de los aviones y
guardias de seguridad por todos lados, la

economía está brindando mucha seguridad

pero menos servicios y mercancías. Esta
pérdida de vidas humanas que se desgastan

guardando cosas en vez de producirlas, es

resultado de la incapacidad del gobierno
actual para lograr la paz y una armonía

económica. Sin embargo, desde el punto

de vista de nuestro gobierno actual y el
presente sistema económico, estas pérdidas

no afectan el lucro capitalista; de hecho,

es posible sacar ganancias incluso con
establecer compañías de seguridad. Es por

eso que los capitalistas no se oponen a este

tipo de gastos e ineficiencia. Los socialistas
son los únicos capaces de cuestionar si

los arreglos políticos actuales están

malgastando la labor humana.

En cuanto al caso ántrax, durante las dos

primeras semanas en octubre, se reportaron

2300 incidentes de ántrax. (2) El MIM
denomina esto como el principio del señuelo

ofensivo. El ataque de tipo señuelo

ofensivo es particularmente eficaz contra
rivales de alta tecnología y gigantes

financieros, como es el caso del gobierno

estadounidense.

Para explicar porqué es poco probable

que una facción terrorista (los yanquis)

derrote por completo a otra alegada facción
"terrorista" (por ejemplo, Osama bin Laden

patrocinado por la CIA) por vía militar, o

porqué es imposible alcanzar aunque sea
un cierto grado de la paz mediante una

liquidación de la "mayor parte" de otras

facciones terroristas, algunos reporteros

de la Internet cubriendo el caso ántrax han

aclarado cómo funciona el ántrax falso sin
que sean captados los responsables de su

difusión. La gente compra guantes y evita

dejar huellas o su DNI, o compra guantes
con 1000 huellas dactilares. Lo peor es que

las cartas destinadas a agencias del gobierno

estdounidense pueden ser mandadas de
cualquier lugar del mundo. Cuando la

posibilidad de recibir un sobre con una

verdadera amenaza de ántrax es 1 entre
1000, la clase dominante no se las puede

arreglar. Por lo tanto, un solo ataque es

acompañado por 999 ataques de tipo
señuelo ofensivo.

Una falsa amenaza a la Agencia de

Protección de Medio Ambiente de
Connecticut ha costado 1.5 millones de

dólares. (3) Aún con 2300 amenazas

recibidas hasta el momento, a la clase
gobernante no se le ocurre ser honesta con

su pueblo y decirle que es imposible ganar

esta guerra y que la única solución viable
consiste en tomar pasos hacia una armonía

económica y social en vez de dar la

bienvenida a la expansión del dominio
estadounidense. Es imposible defenderse

contra un señuelo ofensivo bien planeado,

pero nuestra clase gobernante no alcanza
a comprender que aun teniendo las fuerzas

militares más poderosas y unos servicios

de inteligencia de la más alta tecnología, es
imposible ganar a personas que posean

armas nucleares en forma de maletines y

que implementan tácticas acompañadas por
ataques de tipo señuelo ofensivo. Por ahora,

los casos de ántrax falso son relativamente

escasos. Si los servicios gubernamentales
de China y Rusia decidieran mandar a

EE.UU. correo con polvo blanco o llevar a

cabo amenazas más sofisticadas, ¿se podría
imaginar lo sobrecargado que estaría el FBI?

Por otro lado, dentro de EE.UU. parece

haber cierta confusión. Ya en junio de 2000,
una página web sobre materiales peligrosos

aseguró que era casi imposible trasmitir

ántrax por vía de correo.(4) Este tipo de
confusión sin duda aumenta los gastos del

gobierno estadounidense, y una de las

condiciones de la caída de un gobierno es
su inhabilidad de conseguir más

prestamos.

¿Se imaginan lo fácil que sería bloquear

los mecanismos de espionaje con tan sólo

establecer redes telefónicas y electrónicas

capaces de originar señales falsos? ¿Cuánto
tiempo tardarían "los terroristas" a los que

el imperialismo estadounidense les está

jugando una pala pasada, en adaptar la
misma táctica? El uso de esta táctica- el

señuelo defensivo - agobia hasta a los

servicios de inteligencia de la más alta
teconología. Es por eso que la presente

retórica en torno a la "seguridad" e

"inteligencia" no puede tener éxito. Cuando
los imperialistas prosiguen con sus planes

de espionaje, señuelos defensivos aseguran

que la mayor parte de la información
obtenida sea falsa. Al contrario, el señuelo

ofensivo contiene falsa información

contribuyendo a que un solo ataque
acompañado por 999 amenazas resulte

exitoso sin haber sido impedido.

No es ningún secreto que el estado de

Florida tiene una tasa impresionante de
desemlpleo porque la industria turística ha

sido minada. Según unos rumores en la

Internet, puede que se lleve a cabo un
bombardeo de DisneyWorld para acabar

con la economía de Florida. Wall Street

está aún más horrorizada que el resto de la
economía: "Muchos inversionistas están

diciendo: `No vemos luz al final del túnel.

No han ningunas señas que indiquen el fin
de la presente recesión económica'".(5)

La lista sigue. Por ahora es el ántrax,

pero existe un sinfín de otras amenazas
semejantes, cada una de las cuales será

acompañada por señuelos ofensivos o

defensivos.

Desde luego, EE.UU. tiene la capacidad

militar para matar a todo el mundo, en cuyo

caso ya no habrá señuelos ofensivos ni
defensivos. Sin embargo, según

comprueban los recientes casos terroristas,

una economía en expansión requiere un
mínimo de colaboración global. Es irónico

que los gobernantes de un país dedicado al

indiviuo, no logren comprender que el
poder destructivo del individuo ha

alcanzado una fase en la que la única

posibilidad de sobrevivir y seguir con la
expansión económica a largo plazo se

plasma en la necesidad del comunismo.

"Otorgarle el poder al idividuo"- ¿Acaso
no ha sido este el lema de los fundadores

yanquis? Es mejor que tomemos medidas

para llegar al comunismo antes de que los
individuos que han obtenido el poder acaben

con todos nosotros.

El propio ex-presidente Clinton señaló

que EE.UU. tenía que reducir el campo que

origina terrorismo. Esto significa liquidar

las raíces del terrorismo, sobre todo, el
terrorismo estadounidense que compone

la mayor parte del terrorsmo mundial.

Instamos a todo el pueblo estadounidense

y a toda la gente del mundo que se

encuentra bajo peligro u oprimida por el

gobierno yanqui, a que dejen de tolerar la
estupidez de los Republicanos y los

Demócratas que proponen "soluciones" en

forma de bombardeos, "seguridad" o
"inteligencia". Estos gobernantes están

arriesgando las vidas de ustedes en una

guerra que jamás podrá ser ganada, y
ustedes no tienen que aguantarlo.

Notas:
1. www.nytimes.com, 4Oct2001. "Una semana
brutal en Wall Street," http://cnnfn.cnn.com/
2001/09/21/markets/markets_newyork/ ;
además, según Edward Said, (http://
www.newleftreview.net/NLR24502.shtml) a
partir de 1967, el gobierno estadounidense ya ha
gastado 92 mil millones de dólares en ayuda a
Israel.
2. http://www.fbi.gov/pressrel/pressrel01/
mueller101601.htm
3. http://www.marketplace.org/shows/2001/10/
16_mpp.html
4. http://www.emergency.com/hzmtpage.htm
5. http://www.foxnews.com/story/
0,2933,36863,00.html

¿Porqué la facción terrorista estadounidense no puede ganar?