Anti-imperialism and anti-imperial resistance is what we’re talking about today. We just had the 109th anniversary of Ireland’s Easter Rising against the British Empire in 1916. On April 30th we had the 50th anniversary of the Fall of Saigon, the end of American imperialism in Vietnam and the re-unification of that country after decades of struggle against multiple colonial empires. Today Palestine resists. Today Gaza fights. And Yemen stands with the Palestinians, choking off Israeli trade in the Red Sea and defying a murderous bombing campaign waged by the U.S. Navy and Air Force.
In our last episode, I apologize for being so busy, Israel had yet to resume its genocidal offensive in Gaza. But it didn’t take long for the Apartheid state and its American backers to do just that. Gaza has experienced two months of indiscriminate bombing, starvation and now a resumption of ground invasions by Israeli troops. These have been met by heroic resistance and this continues daily as the people fight back against this genocide.
Meanwhile, wither Canada? The country of my birth. For once, I’m pleased to say that I was not present to partake in such a pathetic election. Such a pathetic resurgence of the two-party and first-past-the-post systems that have traditionally done so much to limit democracy in this country. The Liberals have another minority government. The Conservatives came in second. The NDP and the Greens have been crushed. The Liberals have been in power for the past 14 years, the Conservatives before that, all the problems that Canadian voters say they care about have been created by or been exacerbated by successive Liberal and Conservative governments. Let’s look at the Abacus poll data for what voters listed as the most important factors determining their vote in 2025. For a more extensive breakdown, I would strongly recommend watching Dmitri Lascaris’s recent interview on Geopolitical Economy Report.
45% said reducing the cost of living was their #1 priority.
30% said dealing with Donald Trump.
20% said making housing affordable
19% said growing the economy
18% said improving the healthcare system
15% said making Canada a better place to live
11% said managing Canada’s federal debt
11% said protecting public services
9% said keeping Canada united
6% said running an ethical and scandal-free government
6% said representing Canada internationally
5% said dealing with climate change
2% said supporting Ukraine
2% said achieving reconciliation with indigenous peoples
Besides the disturbing figure that only 2% of voters seem overly concerned about indigenous sovereignty, it’s notable that 45% of people are mainly concerned about the cost of living and inflation. Housing is also up there. Both of these things are the result of bi-partisan Liberal and Conservative policies. Same with public services and healthcare. And yet voters expect these guys to clean up their own mess and have entrusted a banker, Mark Carney, to secure Canada’s sovereignty in the face of U.S. aggression. I wanted to laugh when I heard that. It’s pathetic. A banker. A banker is going to defend Canada’s sovereignty. When confronted with a hostile American administration, Canadians turn to the same people who oversaw the cost of living crisis, the resulting homelessness crisis, and the undermining and hollowing out of the public sector. It takes a heavily propagandized population to consider those people “the safe option” in a time of crisis. And while Palestine wasn’t on that polling list, it’s worth noting that both Liberals and Conservatives are firm in their support of Apartheid Israel while the majority of Canadians are not. Canadian politics are not the politics of solidarity, they are the politics of frightened, isolated individuals who turn to their abusers for protection. And it makes me sad. I’ve been in politics. I’ve run in elections and it’s just so hard to break through the sheer normalcy of it all.
But I keep trying. Because we need people-centred politics. We need socialism, not barbarism.
I’d like to return to the subject of Gaza now. A new documentary has just been released about the student encampments that emerged in solidarity with Gaza across the States over the past year. It’s called “The Encampments” and Kei Pritsker of Breakthrough News, a journalist I have a lot of respect for, played a lead roll in its development. Kei was just on the Electronic Intifada this past week and this is the interview that he had with Ali Abunimah. This is how solidarity is done, folks.
Sources
The Electronic Intifada "The Encampments paints portrait of US student movement for Gaza"
Geopolitical Economy Report "Canada's new elite banker PM is not a real alternative to Trump"
