Archive: October 2008
The archive below lists all articles that have been posted on the World Socialist Web Site by date. To visit the archive for other months, return to the Archive Monthly Index.
1 October 2008
- Angolan election: MPLA party consolidates control and eyes role as regional power
- Arrested SEP member speaks to the WSWS following his release
- Australia: Shares crash amid warnings of prolonged recession
-
Benelux countries intervene to bail out Fortis
The rise and fall of Fortis - Boeing strikers continue fight to defend jobs
-
Electoral debacle for conservatives in Bavaria
Consequences for the federal government - Future conditional: The Nation counsels Washington on the financial crisis
- Paul Newman (1925-2008)
-
Public meetings in UK and Germany
SEP candidate Jerry White to speak on crisis of US and world capitalism - The Democratic Party and Wall Street
- The Historical and International Foundations of the Socialist Equality Party—Part 3
-
As the international finance crisis intensifies
Turkish economy falters - Washington imposes sanctions on Bolivia
- World financial crisis reveals vulnerability of Russia’s economy
2 October 2008
- Asian stocks tumble after rejection of US bailout package
-
Australia: Public meetings mark 70th anniversary of the Fourth International
Historical lessons discussed - BBC reveals how Britain’s spies monitored Omagh bombers
-
Banking crisis hits Germany with full force
Billions for speculators - Bradford and Bingley: British government nationalises second failing bank
- Canadian elections: NDP platform highlights “fiscal responsibility”
- Germany: 130,000 demonstrate against rundown of health care system
- The Historical and International Foundations of the Socialist Equality Party—Part 4
- The Wall Street bailout and the threat of dictatorship
-
US Senate passes Wall Street bailout bill
Obama backs the bailout
3 October 2008
- Austrian elections: rightist forces benefit from decline of social democracy
- Britain: Forty percent of children live in poverty
- First Minister Alex Salmond pleads for Scottish finance to be saved
- Iraq parliament enacts partial provincial election law
-
Neanderthals and modern humans--a key to understanding human evolution
Part 1 - SEP brings campaign to American Axle workers in Detroit
- South African President Thabo Mbeki resigns
- The Historical and International Foundations of the Socialist Equality Party—Part 5
- The Senate bailout bill: How the Democrats do the bidding of Wall Street
-
SEP public meetings in Australia
The enduring significance of the founding of the Fourth International -
SEP election meetings
The origins and implications of the financial crisis: A Marxist analysis - US congressman: “If we don't pass this bill, we’re going to have martial law in the United States”
- Workers Struggles: Europe, Middle East & Africa
4 October 2008
-
159,000 drop in US payrolls signals deepening recession
GM to close Ohio plant by year’s end - Australian government retains key “Work Choices” measures against workers
- Britain: “Convention of the Left” promotes nationalism
-
Nick Beams addresses 70th anniversary meeting
Capitalist breakdown and the revolutionary perspective of the Fourth International
Part 1 -
US House backs Wall Street bailout
Democrats credit Obama with shifting vote -
Canadian Elections
Leaders’ debates underscores parties have no progressive solution to economic crisis
Canada and the Afghan War -
Neanderthals and modern humans--a key to understanding human evolution
Part 2 - The Boeing strike and the Wall Street bailout
- The Convention of the Left: Britain's radical groups lurch to the right
- The Historical and International Foundations of the Socialist Equality Party—Part 6
-
SEP election meetings
The origins and implications of the financial crisis: A Marxist analysis - US vice-presidential debate: A window on the right-wing character of an Obama-Biden administration
- Workers Struggles: Asia, Australia and the Pacific
5 October 2008
6 October 2008
- British diplomat paints bleak view of Afghan war
-
Nixon and Bretton Woods
Capitalist breakdown and the revolutionary perspective of the Fourth International
Nixon and Bretton Woods - European leaders fail to agree on a common strategy for the financial crisis
- Germany: union organises celebration for Chancellor Merkel at VW works
- Irish government organises massive support package for banks
-
In the eye of the storm
New York City workers condemn Wall Street bailout
Bureaucrats back Obama as workers hit bailout - New York’s Mayor Bloomberg cites financial crisis in bid for third term
-
Thirty days to US elections
Obama and McCain agree on Wall Street bailout and war - Scandinavian countries respond to Russia-Georgia conflict
- Sri Lankan president at the UN seeks to justify communal civil war
- The Historical and International Foundations of the Socialist Equality Party—Part 7
7 October 2008
- Boeing machinists in Washington discuss their strike
-
Nick Beams addresses 70th anniversary meeting
Capitalist breakdown and the revolutionary perspective of the Fourth International - European stock markets in freefall following Paris financial summit
- Germany: IG Metall union calls for 8 percent wage increase—and prepares sellout
- Iceland suspends trading in bank shares as financial crisis hits Scandinavia hard
-
India: Hindu communalists target Christian minority in Orissa and other states
Karnataka and Kerala - Letters from our readers
- Panic grips global financial markets
- Sri Lankan officials offer empty reassurances over the global financial crisis
- The Historical and International Foundations of the Socialist Equality Party—Part 8
-
SEP election meetings
The origins and implications of the financial crisis: A Marxist analysis - Workers Struggles: The Americas
8 October 2008
- Asian markets continue to fall
- Australian central bank interest rate cut reveals fears of global recession
- California father, despondent over financial losses, kills family and himself
- California seeks massive loan from US Treasury to deal with financial crisis
-
Canada’s Greens: an aspirant establishment party
The German example -
Nick Beams addresses 70th anniversary meeting
Capitalist breakdown and the revolutionary perspective of the Fourth International—Part 4 - European Union remains paralysed in face of market turmoil
- Picked to direct the Wall Street bailout: Who is Neel Kashkari?
- The Historical and International Foundations of the Socialist Equality Party—Part 9
-
SEP election meetings
The origins and implications of the financial crisis: A Marxist analysis - US stocks plunge amid mounting signs of global recession
- US: Screen Actors Guild may organize a strike vote
9 October 2008
-
Canada’s prime minister admits jobs and savings in peril
Wall Street meltdown spreads to Bay Street - Continuing US air strikes in Pakistan’s tribal agencies
-
European history in the longue durée
Europe Between the Oceans by Barry Cunliffe - Fears in China about the impact of global economic crisis
- Germany: Government fears crisis will spur political radicalisation
- Labour government pledges up to £500 billion for Britain’s banks
- Letters from our readers
-
Second US presidential debate
Obama, McCain offer platitudes in the face of an economic disaster - Rate cuts, UK bank bailout fail to stem global financial panic
- Special prosecutor appointed to investigate US attorney firings
- Support the SEP campaign fund!
- The Historical and International Foundations of the Socialist Equality Party—Part 10
10 October 2008
- Fiji: Military junta pushes pro-investor “Peoples Charter” reforms
- Iceland faces national bankruptcy
- Machinists union to resume talks with Boeing
- McCain-Palin campaign’s attacks on Obama: a whiff of fascism
- More than 300 workers arrested in immigration raid on South Carolina plant
- The Historical and International Foundations of the Socialist Equality Party—Part 11
- The art of Gustave Courbet in his epoch and in ours
- Wall Street crashes amid mounting signs of global recession
- Workers Struggles: Europe, Middle East & Africa
- World financial crisis leads to auto industry layoffs across Europe
11 October 2008
- A Comment on Art and the Marxist Party
- A discussion on Ethiopias’s role in Somalia
- As share market plunges, political crisis in Thailand deepens
- Australian share market’s “black Friday”: another sign of economic crisis
- Canada: Afghan war could cost in excess of $18 billion
- Ethiopian famine significantly worsens as Western powers fail to respond
- India: Tata Motors announces pullout from West Bengal
- Letters from our readers
- The Aesthetic Component of Socialism
- Turkish manufacturing sector hit hard by financial crisis
- US intelligence, military deliver dire estimates of Afghanistan war
- Widespread public support for teachers strike in Detroit, Michigan, suburb
- Workers Struggles: Asia, Australia and the Pacific
- Worst week for global markets since 1929
13 October 2008
- Britain and Iceland in bitter conflict over banking collapse
- Britain: Brown’s National Economic Council consolidates government by the super-rich
- China’s first space walk signals new rivalry in outer space
- Germany: Left Party supports austerity measures in Hesse
- International financial crisis exposes vulnerability of Indian economy
-
Canadian elections: Workers need new party
Reject “Anybody but Conservative” trap - The revolutionary implications of the decline of American capitalism
-
Hard winter ahead
US heating and power costs to rise, utility cutoffs to follow -
Vancouver International Film Festival 2008—Part 1
Life in its incontrovertible reality - Wall Street demands free hand with funding from US Treasury
- Washington’s “shock” over AIG’s post-bailout junket
14 October 2008
-
SEP public meetings in Ann Arbor, New York, and California
70th Anniversary of the Fourth International: Socialism and the Future of Humanity - Australia: A revealing day at the Haneef “terrorism” inquiry
- Banks dictate conditions of US financial bailout
- Britain and Iceland in bitter conflict over banking collapse
- Britain: Labour government to buy majority stakes in failing banks
- Canada: Listeriosis epidemic continues—Liberal and Tory policies culpable
- Fires claim lives of seven in New York City
- France: LCR holds meeting for New Anti-Capitalist Party in St. Denis
- Letters from our readers
- Robert Hughes: A refreshingly frank comment on the art market
- Solomon Islands’ parliamentary review highlights illegality of Australian occupation
- The G7 and the Euro Group agree to pour billions into banks
- The revolutionary implications of the decline of American capitalism—Part 2
- Workers Struggles: The Americas
- The Communist Manifesto
15 October 2008
- Afghanistan: Growing talk of a political deal with the Taliban
- Burn After Reading: Another “league of morons” from the Coen brothers
- Bush administration belatedly takes North Korea off terrorism list
- Canadian elections: Whose class interests does the Bloc Québécois defend?
-
New US Supreme Court term opens
Threats to slash consumers’ rights, expand police powers - No sacrifice for the bankers
- Obama floats economic plan: tax breaks and austerity
- SEP candidate Jerry White addresses successful meetings in Britain
- Socialism vs. the government bailout of capitalism
- Talks collapse in Boeing strike
- The German bailout of the banks and the role of the Left Party
-
SEP public meeting in Sri Lanka
The international financial crisis and its implications for South Asia - The stock market’s false rallies--what history tells us
- Turkey: Another political detainee tortured and killed in prison
- US government expands bank bailout on Wall Street’s terms
16 October 2008
-
Vancouver International Film Festival 2008—Part 2
Art, artists, the difficulties of the 20th century - Australia: Rio Tinto hints at a new round of government-backed strike breaking
- Austrian right-wing politician Jörg Haider dies in car crash
- Canada: Conservatives lose votes, but retain power
- Corruption and shoddy construction behind school collapses in China earthquake
- Letters from our readers
- New York Times demands escalation of Afghanistan war
- Redesigned World Socialist Web Site begins Wednesday, October 22
- Stock markets fall as global recession takes hold
- US Supreme Court clears way for execution of likely innocent death row inmate
- US Treasury meeting: How the financial aristocracy laid down the law
- “Working Poor” report: Nearly 30 percent of US families subsist on poverty wages
17 October 2008
- Asian markets plummet amid fears of global recession
- China’s land reform will deepen the gulf between rich and poor
- EU call for global financial regulation masks intra-European and international tensions
- In defense of Bill Ayers
- A political farce, not a debate
- German government rushes through €500 billion rescue package
- Britain: Lies begin to unravel in police murder of Jean Charles de Menezes
- Behind the creationism controversy at Britain's Royal Society
- Workers Struggles: Europe, Middle East & Africa
18 October 2008
- Plant closures, layoffs mount in US and Europe
- The Washington Post endorses Obama
- US bank losses wipe out years of paper profits
- Australian government props up banks as signs of a deep global recession emerge
- US Republicans target ACORN: the great “voter fraud” fraud
- Britain: Brown government caves in to banks’ demands
- US infant mortality rate now worse than 28 other countries
- Jerry White in Berlin: “At the heart of the financial crisis lies the historical decline of US imperialism”
- Workers Struggles: Asia, Australia and the Pacific
- Letters from our readers
20 October 2008
-
Colin Powell endorses Obama
Growing ruling class consensus behind Democratic candidate - Pakistan facing bankruptcy as world financial crisis deepens
- US Supreme Court denies Mumia Abu-Jamal’s appeal for new trial
- France: €360 billion to bail out the banks
- IMF: Spain to be hit hard by recession
- Detroit residents speak on economic crisis and US elections
- Malaysia’s prime minister to step down next year
- An interview with Li Yifan, director of The Longwang Chronicles
-
Vancouver International Film Festival 2008—Part 3
The oppressed and excluded - Stalinism and Bolshevism - 1937
21 October 2008
- Iraqis protest against proposed security agreement with US
- India: Police accused of summarily executing “terrorist suspects”
- Housing crisis accelerates blight in Detroit neighborhoods
- Britain: Labour scapegoats immigrants for the financial crash
- US: Screen Actors leadership calls for federal mediator
- East Timor: Political crisis deepens as divisions in police force re-emerge
- Workers Struggles: The Americas
- Sex, consolation for misery: Chuck Palahniuk’s Choke comes to the big screen
- Letters from our readers
- Leon Trotsky - The Transitional Program - 1938
- A Letter to Trotskyists Throughout the World - 1953
- A Petty-Bourgeois Opposition in the SWP - 1939
- Leon Trotsky - In Defense of October - 1932
- Leon Trotsky - Report on the World Economic Crisis and the New Tasks of the Communist International - 1921
- Leon Trotsky - Three Conceptions of the Russian Revolution - 1939
- Socialism: Utopian and Scientific
22 October 2008 (front page)
- Fiji: High Court rejects former prime minister’s legal challenge to military junta
- The Democrats’ “economic recovery” fraud
- Under cover of “voter fraud” allegations, Republicans suppress the vote—Part 1
- Welcome the redesigned World Socialist Web Site
-
Biden’s chilling remarks at fundraiser
What “incredibly tough” foreign policy actions is Obama preparing? - OECD report ranks US third worst in inequality and poverty
- More signs of recession in Japan
- Irish government imposes harsh budget cuts
- Stella D’oro strikers rally in the Bronx, New York
-
The Frankfurt School vs. Marxism:
The Political and Intellectual Odyssey of Alex Steiner—Part 1 - W: A crude approach is not good for grasping much of anything
- An introduction to the new World Socialist Web Site
- Leon Trotsky - Lessons of October - 1924
23 October 2008 (front page)
- Eastern European economies face bankruptcy
- Germany: Parliament authorises €500 billion bank bailout
- Job cuts mount as global recession takes hold
- Letters on the World Socialist Web Site redesign
- “Socialism” intrudes on the 2008 elections
- Can China fund the US and European bailouts?
- Detroit area house fire kills four
- General strike in Greece amid deepening financial crisis
- Canada’s shame: the incarceration, torture, and exile of Abousfian Abdelrazik
- Under cover of “voter fraud” allegations, Republicans suppress the vote—Part 2
-
The Frankfurt School vs. Marxism:
The Political and Intellectual Odyssey of Alex Steiner—Part 2 -
Vancouver International Film Festival 2008—Part 4
Repentance, betrayal and the less dramatic - Letters on “In defense of Bill Ayers,” and a reply by David Walsh
- Australian by-elections record massive anti-Labor swings
- Leon Trotsky - Culture and Socialism - 1927
- Vladimir Lenin - Karl Marx - 1914
24 October 2008 (front page)
- Highland Park, Michigan residents speak on deadly fire
- US layoffs mount, home foreclosures rise
- Workers Struggles: Europe, Middle East & Africa
- More recriminations over US/NATO quagmire in Afghanistan
- The economic crisis and war
- Britain in recession: Mervyn King’s moment of clarity
- Fearing default, Argentina moves to nationalize private pension funds
- Britain: Millions threatened with negative home equity and repossession
- Mass strike in Italy against Berlusconi government
- German Social Democrats meet in the shadow of the financial crisis
- French Airbus worker: “Boeing and Airbus workers have the same enemy—we should fight them together”
- Indian politicians threaten to resign over Sri Lankan war
- Canada: Toronto transit system avoids essential service designation
- The Political and Intellectual Odyssey of Alex Steiner—Part 3
- Little Audrey by Ruth White: a family in postwar Virginia
25 October 2008 (front page)
- The New York Times’ endorsement of Obama
- Warnings of recession send global share markets plunging
- European auto industry in crisis
- US federal appeals court stays Troy Davis execution
- More setbacks for Guantánamo show trials
- Britain: Labour, the Conservatives and the oligarchs
- Workers Struggles: Asia, Australia and the Pacific
-
Socialist Equality Party UK public meetings
Art and Socialism—a talk by David Walsh, WSWS arts editor - SEP candidates to speak in Canada
- More letters on the World Socialist Web Site redesign
27 October 2008 (front page)
- Warnings of deep recession as US layoffs spread coast-to-coast
- The “dirty little secret” of the US bank bailout
- Pakistan forced to seek IMF bailout package
- Political furore over Australian government’s bank guarantee
-
Canada: As economic crisis deepens
Conservatives to press ahead with right-wing tax-cutting agenda - Martti Ahtisarri: Advocate of imperialist intervention awarded Nobel Peace Prize
- Economic crisis overshadows New Zealand elections
-
Vancouver International Film Festival 2008—Part 5
Six films: problems of perspective, passivity - An interview with Azharr Rudin, director of This Longing
-
SEP public meeting in Ann Arbor, Michigan on Saturday, November 1
70th Anniversary of the Fourth International: Socialism and the Future of Humanity
28 October 2008 (front page)
- US carries out fresh air strike in Pakistan
- US military forces attack Syrian village, killing eight
- Global recession threatens mass lay-offs in China
- Britain: Socialist Workers Party member becomes government adviser
- Increasing social inequality and poverty in Germany
-
In wake of global financial crisis
Scottish nationalism’s perspective in tatters - One week until the US elections
- Letters from our readers
- Marxism and Science: An addendum to “The Frankfurt School vs. Marxism”
- Living on thin ice: Frozen River
29 October 2008 (front page)
- Global economic crisis hits Japanese banks, exporters
- What is behind US-Taliban talks?
- Machinists union accepts job-cutting deal in bid to end Boeing strike
- Oil price drop undermines stability of Iranian regime
- Britain: the SWP and Galloway’s Respect Renewal on the economic crisis
- Sarkozy intends to partly nationalise “strategically important” companies
- Detroit residents and firemen denounce social decay in fire deaths
- Alaska Senator convicted on seven corruption charges
- German economics expert compares bank managers to persecuted Jews
- New York City cops arrest immigrant day laborers
- Workers Struggles: The Americas
30 October 2008 (front page)
-
The German October: The missed revolution of 1923
Part 1 - US defense secretary expands pre-emptive war doctrine to include nuclear strikes
- Opportunism versus socialism: lessons of two “left” conferences in Britain
- US Federal Reserve cuts interest rates as recession deepens
- Advocate of Afghan “troop surge” selected as head of British Army
- Ford Australia sackings signal a wave of auto job losses
- Detroit residents denounce social decay in fire deaths
- Canadian Government defends export of asbestos to poorer nations
- Letters from our readers
- Turkish court provides explanation of its ban on headscarves
- World Bank places Sri Lanka among the “highly vulnerable” countries
-
The Baader Meinhof Complex
A superficial treatment of the history of the Red Army Faction
31 October 2008 (front page)
- Evidence grows that UK is entering a sharp recession
- GDP, consumer spending contract as US plunges into recession
- The Historical & International Foundations of the Socialist Equality Party
- History and the revolutionary party
- Italy: Protests and strikes against Berlusconi education cuts
- Iraqi cabinet stalls on US security agreement
- After six years, Australian jury clears Jack Thomas of all terrorism charges
-
The German October: The missed revolution of 1923
Part 2 - Workers Struggles: Europe, Middle East & Africa
Follow us on