Vancouver Needs Another Olympics Like The US Needs a Second Trump Term
The Thorn On Thursdays - Nov 5th Edition
Welcome to the third edition of The Thorn on Thursdays!
Just say ‘No’: Motion for Vancouver to bid on 2030 Olympics delayed for staff input
Last night Vancouver City Council voted to have city staff consult with stakeholders on the possibility of bidding to host the 2030 Winter Olympics. The motion passed on a 6-4 vote that saw Mayor Kennedy Stewart, 3 out of the 4 NPA councilors and 2 of the 3 Green councilors voting together to have staff report back on the issue in 2021.
This is frankly a terrible idea, and this motion introduced by the NPA’s Melissa De Genova should have been soundly defeated. Councillors Jean Swanson (COPE), Christine Boyle (OneCity), Pete Fry (Greens), and Colleen Hardwick (NPA) voted against.
Jean Swanson spoke to the CBC ahead of the vote about being an anti-poverty activist during the 2010 Winter Olympics, concluding, “"If we spent the same amount of money that was being spent on the Olympics on ending poverty and homelessness, we could do it.”
On a similar note, Christine Boyle tweeted in opposition to another Vancouver Olympics: “Counter offer: We could put an ‘Olympic’ level of ambition into addressing housing and homelessness, a toxic drug supply, and the climate emergency.”
Even as she promoted the idea of spending dump trucks of money on another Olympic Games, De Genova led the charge on social media against the City’s proposed measures to address the climate emergency.
Just say ‘Yes’: Climate emergency measures could come to a vote today
Today, Vancouver City Council will continue to hear from speakers about the various measures proposed by city staff in the Climate Emergency Action Report.
The climate measures in the report don’t go far enough in targeting the biggest polluters, the super-rich. As for the myriad proposed measures including mobility pricing, reducing public land allocated to free private vehicle storage and increasing transit and multimodal transit infrastructure, even if council votes in favour this week it will be many years and many report backs from staff before most are implemented.
Vancouver needs to pass this motion, while doing more to ensure that green and social justice measures go hand-in-hand in our city. Climate justice is the goal, and much credit should go to grassroots groups like Our Time Vancouver, Force of Nature, and the Sustainabiliteens for pushing for stronger action.
Marc Lee, senior economist with the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives, was quoted in support of the Climate Action Plan in an article in the Vancouver Sun: “If we’re saying this is a #climateemergency, then we need to pull out all the stops. There’s going to be some costs. But the benefit is if all the other cities & countries do the same, then we have a planet that our grandkids can live on.”
The sorest loser? Donald Trump tries to steal U.S. election and undermine the democratic process
Election night results in the U.S. presidential election showed incumbent President Donald Trump ahead in the key battleground states, and potentially on track to win the 270 Electoral College votes needed to become President. However, millions of mail-in ballots in several battleground states had yet to be counted. The red Republican mirage lead in many states like Georgia and Pennsylvania has been falling hour-by-hour as the mail-in ballots are counted.
In a widely anticipated move, Donald Trump declared on election night that he had won the election, and that media and state officials who had not yet declared a Trump victory were “disenfranchising” his voters. Trump indicated that his campaign plans to launch legal challenges to throw out ballots counted after election day.
As of publication time, the final results of the election are still unknown; however, the counting of mail-in ballots appears to have put Biden on track to secure the 270 Electoral College votes needed to win the presidency.
The mainstream media has largely failed to call out Trump’s blatant attempt to steal the election and undermine basic democratic rights.
Some of the clearest analysis of Trump’s authoritarian moves can be found in the socialist and independent press. In an article published in Jacobin Magazine on election day, Julia Rock and Walker Bragman explicitly argued that Donald Trump and the GOP are trying to steal the election.
A slightly different view was taken by Jon Schwartz in The Intercept. He argued that while Trump believes the election is being stolen, Republican Party leaders aren’t so sure. Read Schwartz’s full take on the election here.
On Wednesday, Trump supporters tried unsuccessfully to stop the counting of absentee ballots in Detroit; and a large pro-democracy protest was held in Philadelphia, one of the other counties where significant mail-in ballots remained to be counted. In Arizona, some Trump supporters including armed men formed a menacing crowd outside one key vote counting facility.
In an election day article for In These Times magazine, Jeff Schurke reported that several unions nationwide are planning large scale protests, up to and including general strikes, if Trump tries to steal the election. On Wednesday rallies were held in several key cities with the simple demand to “Count Every Vote.”
Good news: socialist candidates elected!!
On a more hopeful note, a number of socialist and socialist-endorsed candidates were elected in Congress and state legislatures across the U.S.
Prominent Democratic Socialist congresswomen and squad members Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (NY), Rashida Tlaib (MI) Ilhan Omar (MN), and Ayanna Pressley (MA) were handily re-elected.
Newly elected democratic socialist congresspeople include Jamaal Bowman (NY) and Cori Bush (MO).
Cori Bush is likely the biggest win of the night for democratic socialists, both for her strong social movement roots, and because she hails from a long-time red state. The Sunrise Movement tweeted that “We were told that progressive candidates can’t win, but once again we’ve proven them wrong. Cori is a community leader & activist who ran on #DefundPolice, a #GreenNewDeal & #MedicareForAll and won! Congratulations Congresswoman Bush!”
In a tweet on Wednesday, the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) reported that “DSA last night won 28 of 37 national races and 8 of 9 major ballot initiatives -- all written and organized by chapters. We helped put @CoriBush into the squad and now have democratic socialist caucuses in 14 statehouses including MT. Not too shabby, comrades.”
Bad news: California Proposition 22 a defeat for workers
In a major setback for gig economy workers, California voters appear to have voted yes to Proposition 22, which classifies app based drivers as independent contractors rather than workers. As of writing, the yes side is leading by 58.4% to 41.6% for the No side, with 72% of votes counted.
According to an article in Mass Transit Magazine, Uber and Lyft spent over $200 million on the campaign. Labour unions, including the Service Employees International Union, pushed the California state legislature to pass Assembly Bill 5 in 2019, which classified many gig economy employees as workers. They opposed the ballot measure, but could not match the campaign spending levels of Uber and Lyft.
Slow Learner #1: A review of Grace Blakeley’s ‘The Corona Crash’
Verso Books has published a timely series of pamphlets on current political topics.
This week we’d like to highlight ‘The Corona Crash - How the Pandemic will Change Capitalism’, by Grace Blakeley.
This slim text is divided into four chapters ‘The Last Days of Finance Capitalism’, ‘Into State Monopoly Capitalism’, ‘The New Imperialism’, and ‘Reconstruction’.
Blakeley’s writing does an excellent job in summarizing the global economic transformations since Bretton Woods, the processes of financialization and neoliberalism that have brought us to our present crisis.
The response to the 2008 financial crash and the pandemic have exposed the immense powers of what Blakeley calls state monopoly capitalism. With the power of governments to intervene and backstop markets revealed, states can no longer hide behind claims that they can’t afford to increase spending when deemed necessary. The question becomes whose interests do they serve, those of capital, or those of the people.
The effects of the pandemic have been a concentration of power and wealth in the hands of the elite, central bankers, senior politicians, and the capitalist class. The task before us is to wrest this power away from corporatist forces and into the hands of the people.
Blakeley ends her text with a now familiar call for a Green New Deal. Failure to act will cause immense suffering as the effects of climate change are felt across the world. She reminds us that socialism does not mean merely citizen control of the means of production, but also a broader democratization of power within our societies.
Verso’s pamphlet series is now available to be ordered, in digital and print, on their website.
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What’s happening in Vancouver and online: Upcoming Events
Time-Lapse: Posthumous Conversations
Oct 29 - Dec 1
SUM Gallery
Facebook Event Page: https://www.facebook.com/events/746893299375078
A memorial exhibition of visual art by Geoff McMurchy, a storm force fag who blew open disability art in Canada and whose legacy includes a generation of disabled artists who thrived under his mentorship. Curated by Yuri Arajs, SD Holman and Persimmon Blackbridge, and in partnership with Kickstart and All Souls at Mountainview Cemetery.
Massy Books 50/50 Raffle to Support Battered Women’s Support Services
https://www.massybooks.com/fundraiser/
Deadline: December 16, 11:59 PM
Draw: December 17 @ 7:00 PM
Other events can be found here
https://www.facebook.com/democraticsocialistsyvr/events/?ref=page_internal
And here