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MIM Notes 313 · February 2005 · Page 1

MIM Notes

February 2005, Nº 313

The Official Newsletter of the Maoist Internationalist Movement (MIM)

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by MIM

The more than 150,000 deaths from the

earthquake and tsunami in South Asia are

an almost unfathomable disaster,

especially for those in the First World who

have never seen destruction of this scale.

Even the U.S. Secretary of State Colin

Powell said that the destruction he saw

in South Asia last week was far worse

than what he had seen at war. Still many

people in Amerika offered financial

donations for relief to the devastated

region. MIM applauds these acts of

selflessness by Amerikans not generally

concerned with people outside of U.$.

borders. It is this kind of internationalist

sentiment that we work to foster.

But at the same time we have to ask

why people don't similarly offer aid to

people fighting the repression of a military

dictatorship, or deadly attacks from

imperialist armies, or economic

devastation from IMF and World Bank

austerity measures. All of these are

disasters for Third World people, literally

killing them. The major difference is the

apparent non-political nature of the

tsunami deaths, and of course the

Amerikan government's support for aid

to the victims. But the deaths from this

tsunami were not from a "natural"

disaster, any more than the Amerikan

military's "accidental" bombing of a

civilian house in Iraq today (January 8)

was a "natural" disaster.

As MIM wrote in our theory journal

on Revolutionary Environmentalism:

"Another phenomenon which is often not

recognized as preventable is `natural'

disasters, such as floods, volcano

eruptions, and earthquakes. Sure, these

are `natural,' but why are they disasters?

The answer in many cases is that the

majority of the world does not have the

resources to deal effectively with

nature's surprises. Many communities

cannot be warned to evacuate when

necessary, because they do not have

television sets or radios. Once such

communities are destroyed by natural

events, the neocolonies' poverty prevents

the reconstruction of the infrastructure -

if there was an infrastructure to speak of

in the first place."(4)

In South Asia many of the tsunami

deaths could have been prevented with

an early warning system similar to the one

set up in Hawaii to warn the wealthy

Pacific Ocean areas of potential

tsunamis. A proposal to set up such a

warning system was dismissed for lack

of funding in the South Asian region.

A system that forces hundreds of

thousands of people to live illegally in

shacks on the beach because they can

not afford housing even though they work

long hours every day caused even more

deaths. The many fisherpeople and their

families killed by the tsunami lived in these

conditions while the wealthy in their

countries enjoyed fresh fish and

comfortable living on higher ground. In

South Asia, Amerikan economic and

military support that props up corrupt

governments which keep the wealth for

themselves and their Amerikan partners.

Indonesia is a prime example of this.

The brutal military dictatorship in that

country has enjoyed imperialist aid and

support, particularly from the United

$tates which in turn looks to Indonesia

for cheap labor for its imperialist

corporations. Indonesia massacred more

than a third of the East Timorese

population in its years long attempt to put

down East Timor's independence

struggle. In Aceh province, one of the

Fight censorship

of the Internet!

RAIL CENSORED

BY INTERNET

SERVICE

PROVIDER

HARD HAT

After signing up for an account with

Hard Hat Hosting (hardhathosting.com)

RAIL soon lost access to the server and

later received the message below from

Hard Hat CEO Eric Linberg. We reprint

this message for two reasons. First, Hard

Hat states in their Acceptable Use Policy

that they will not allow content that harms

their reputation or good will. If they hope

to maintain their reputation as web hosting

service then the public should know that

despite their claims to the contrary, they

do not respect the rights of freedom of

expression of opinions and political views.

Every web hosting company in the world

could tell us that they respect our right to

free speech, but if no one will host a site

that lists the deaths caused by imperialism

then that information is being censored

from the public.

At this point in history there are various

web hosts that will serve various types

of controversial material. People who try

to combat the bourgeois idea of intellectual

property face the greatest resistance from

website hosters who have little recourse

but to respect bourgeois property rights

to stay in business. While anti-copyright

materials pose an immediate threat to

capitalist profits, political speech is given

more leeway until it becomes a real threat.

So when push comes to shove and there's

a warrant from an intelligence agency of

the bourgeois state, then all of sudden your

servers and all the data on them are gone.

(1) And when activists take the

independent route of hosting their own

space on the web then they become easier

targets. When the feds come to take the

server they're coming to your house and

taking you with them. (2)

The second and more important point

we want to make is that this is bigger

than Hard Hat Hosting. The fact is that

the oppressed and exploited do not have

freedom of speech in the system that

exploits and oppresses them. Even as

amerikans are losing their majority control

Tsunami disaster isn't `natural'

Imperialism causes death and destruction

When people live in

squalid conditions,

they are at risk from

disasters -- but the
doesn't make their

deaths `natural.'

Children in the

Philippines living
their `normal' life,

documented in a

MIM photo.

Continued on page 3...

MIM Notes 313 · February 2005 · 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.

Production by 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
submissions unless permission is specifically denied by the author; submissions are
published anonymously unless authors insist on identification (prisoners are never
identified by name). MIM is an underground party that does not publish the names of its
comrades in order to avoid the state surveillance and repression that have historically
been directed at communist parties and anti-imperialist movements. MCs, MIM comrades,
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
program is available to anyone who sends in a SASE.

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For general correspondence, contact:

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Letter from Maoist

student in China

Comrades of MIM:

Nice to meet you!

I am a real Maoist from X university, Y

city, People's Republic of China. I am not

a member of the CPC, because I don't

think it is a real comunist party.

I do not like today's China of capital.

Your words look like a light in the night

for me, you see, I have no chance to know

some real history of China.

I will keep in touch with your

organization. I wanna know what can I

do for works of MIM.

Sorry for my poor English.

Long Live MIM! Long Live the

Revolution! Long Live the Peoples' Wars

of the Third World!

--A Chinese Maoist

Alleged Halliburton

employee writes to

MIM: "Freedom"

misused again

mim3@mim.org comments: We

received a letter from someone alleging

to work for Kellogg Brown & Root

(KBR), a subsidiary of the contractor

company called Halliburton, of Vice-

President Dick Cheney fame.

He appeared to be responding to our

article on Thomas Hamill in which we

said: "`Last September the 43-year-old

volunteer firefighter signed on to drive a

fuel truck for a year in Iraq for up to

$120,000, tax free,' according to CNN.

Hamill was working for a sub-contractor

for Halliburton.

"The sad part is that Thomas Hamill is

a microcosm of Amerika. Whether any

philistines know it or not, Amerikan jobs

and salaries depend on the global web of

exploitation created by the monster of

U.$. imperialism concretely manifested

in multinational corporations like

Halliburton. Amerikans are generally

enemies of the Iraqi people unless they

prove otherwise in action. As a truck-

driver in Iraq, Hamill was making more

(than ten times more(2)--mim3, ed.)

money than 90% of the people in the

world, because all Amerikans with legal

working rights have an extra access to

the means of production globally thanks

to imperialism.

"Others working and missing in Iraq

include seven employees of American

contractor Kellogg, Brown & Root. The

plan of the Bush administration had been

to have thousands of u.$. employees in

Iraq carrying out billions of dollars worth

of contracts.

"Communists! It's time to break with

your phony communist organizations and

work with the only organization with a

line practically opposing all aspects of the

war on Iraq. Anybody oozing any

sympathy for the Amerikan contractors

is simply oozing sympathy for imperialism.

Rather than echoing the Bush

administration on the `barbarians' in Iraq,

communists should take sides with the

Iraqi people."(1)

Alleged KBR employee:

That is as weak a statement as I have

ever heard. It must be nice to have the

freedom of speech to put people down

that are defending our Country. I myself

am a contractor working for KBR. I

happened to be on the same route as

Thomas Hamill that very day. It takes a

pretty weak minded person to think that

contractors are over in Iraq for any other

reason except to help the Iraqi people.

We are here to support the military, in

order to restore freedom of the Iraqi's.

We put our asses on the line, day in and

day out. Until you have the same fortitude

to do the same, maybe you ought to keep

your pie hole shut!!

mim3@mim.org replies:

So, how much did you make in Iraq

compared with what it would be at home/

U$A?

If you want to help Iraq, why not send

some money and let Iraqis drive their own

trucks and build their own infrastructure?

If you are for "free speech" then why

are you helping a plan that has resulted in

the shutting of newspapers and killing of

demonstrators seeking to open them?

"Two months after `liberating' Iraq, the

Anglo-US authorities have decided to

control the new, free press."

www.independent.co.uk

http://www.etext.info/Politics/MIM/

agitation/iraq/bushvshussein.html

Halliburton employee responds:

As for the money that I made over here

verses the money that I made at home,

the only difference is that it is tax free.

I'm not here solely for the money. I am

here to support the military, as well as

my country. These Iraqi people need a

lot more than money. They need some

deep support. The military is trying to put

them in a position to stand up on there

own. You need to understand that these

people have been deeply suppressed for

thousands of years. George Bush didn't

send these TROOPS in here just for war.

He got rid of one of the most powerful

dictators of all time. It's about

FREEDOM brother. Everybody in this

world should be able to enjoy

FREEDOM. That is the main reason that

we are over here. These people need to

be free. We pay a deep price in doing

this for other countries. But as Americans,

and the rest of the Coalition Forces, that

is the price that we are willing to pay.

Don't knock the Contractor for trying to

help this cause. Sure alot of us better our

financial position in life by working over

here. The world will be a better place

through finding the better source of a

people.

mim3@mim.org replies for MIM:

If you are concerned about freedom,

get the Amerikans at KBR to go back

home and work on politics there, because

the United $tates leads the world in

imprisonment per capita. Get the Brits to

go back to England, because the

imprisonment rate is the highest in Europe

there.

http://www.etext.info/Politics/MIM/faq/

freecoun.html

And if you think someone in Iraq would

have been better than Hussein, learn how

the united $tates assisted him to power

including how Rumsfeld brought him

biological weapons.

http://www.etext.info/Politics/MIM/

agitation/iraq/bushvshussein.html

To have the right to boast about

freedom, you have to earn it. When the

united $tates shows the world how to do

with the least imprisonment, then it

Continued on page 4...

MIM Notes 313 · February 2005 · Page 3

hardest hit areas, the notoriously brutal

Indonesian army continued it's

persecution of rebels even in the wake

of the death of so many people in the

region. These armed patrols are deadly

to the population both directly, and as a

potential problem for aid delivery.

The mainstream media likes to talk

about the "indiscriminate" destruction of

the tsunami. But it is not indiscriminate

that the vast majority of those who died

lived their lives in poverty. The few

thousand deaths of resort visitors were a

tiny portion of the total, and were at least

matched by the deaths of resort workers.

While CNN highlights the affect of the

tsunami on tourists and hotel operators in

Phuket, the locals who live in poverty are

brushed over with sweeping views of

devastated coastland and images of aid

delivery.

According to the World Bank, more

than 95% of all deaths caused by

disasters occur in developing (Third

World) countries; and losses due to

natural disasters are 20 times greater (as

a percentage of GDP) in developing

countries than in imperialist countries.(1)

But redevelopment aid will focus on the

recognized businesses, particularly

tourism and larger businesses. Small

businesses and illegal squatters can

expect to be pushed off of land and out

of work where wealthier people can step

in to benefit.

Professor Sumner La Croix, senior

fellow in economics at the Hawaii-based

East-West Center, an imperialist

economic mouthpiece, provides a good

example of what we can expect from

"rebuilding." The tsunami damage is

confined to mostly rural areas and so, La

Croix says: "Most rebuilding will replicate

what was previously in place: vacationers

want hotels by the beach; stores will be

located near the beach to provide goods

and services; and roads go through these

towns"(2) There is no mention of

rebuilding for the people who lived on the

coast and lost their homes and livelihoods.

Economists are predicting good

economic performance by Thailand,

Indonesia and India in spite of the disaster,

again because the people affected were

mostly not central to the economies of

those countries. La Croix explains:

"Despite the severe damage to Aceh's

economic infrastructure, the republic's

energy (mainly oil and natural gas)

production facilities in Aceh and Northern

Sumatra seem to have survived

intact."(2) So once again La Croix is

clear: the industries making money for

those running the countries are important,

while the livelihoods of the poor are

relatively unimportant. Even where 80%

of the population died, the economy will

still be fine because the imperialists and

their puppets did not lose the oil and

natural gas production facilities.

John Pilger, a journalist writing for the

New Statesman, explained the hypocrisy

of the tsunami aid well: "The victims of

a great natural disaster are worthy

(though for how long is uncertain) while

the victims of man-made imperial

disasters are unworthy and very often

unmentionable. Somehow, reporters

cannot bring themselves to report what

has been going on in Aceh, supported by

`our' government. This one-way moral

mirror allows U.$. to ignore a trail of

destruction and carnage that is another

tsunami.

"Consider the plight of Afghanistan,

where clean water is unknown and death

in childbirth common. At the Labour

Party conference in 2001, Tony Blair

announced his famous crusade to `re-

order the world' with the pledge: `To the

Afghan people, we make this

commitment, we will not walk away...

we will work with you to make sure [a

way is found] out of the poverty that is

your miserable existence.' The Blair

government had just taken part in the

conquest of Afghanistan, in which as many

as 20,000 civilians died. Of all the great

humanitarian crises in living memory, no

country suffered more and none has been

helped less. Just three per cent of all

international aid spent in Afghanistan has

been for reconstruction, 84 per cent is for

the US-led military `coalition' and the rest

are crumbs for emergency aid. What is

often presented as reconstruction revenue

is private investment, such as the 35m

dollars that will finance a proposed five-

star hotel, mostly for foreigners. An

adviser to the minister of rural affairs in

Kabul told me the government had

received less than 20 per cent of the aid

promised to Afghanistan. `We don't even

have enough money to pay wages, let

alone plan reconstruction,' he said.

"The reason, unspoken of course, is that

Afghans are the unworthiest of victims.

When American helicopter gunships

repeatedly machine gunned a remote

farming village, killing as many as 93

civilians, a Pentagon official was moved

to say, `The people there are dead

because we wanted them dead.'" (3)

MIM encourages people to take a look

at the world around them and see that

deadly disasters are created by

imperialism around the world every day.

RAIL keeps a running tally of some of

these deaths on its Imperialism Kills page

(http://www.etext.info/Politics/MIM/rail/

impkills.html). These disasters need to be

stopped, and no amount of relief aid will

accomplish this. We must fight to

overthrow this imperialist system and

replace it with a system that serves the

people rather than the wealthy.

Notes:

1. The World Bank,

www.worldbank.org

2. The Star online, Jan9, 2005

3. The New Statesman, Jan 6, 2005

4. http://www.etext.info/Politics/MIM/

mt/mt9.html

Tsunami disaster isn't `natural'

Imperialism causes death and destruction

Continued from page 1...

of the Internet, it remains controlled by

the wealthy of the world. There is no

doubt that the higher levels of

communication available with the

development of the Internet will serve the

struggle of the oppressed in the long- run.

However, the supposed right to free

speech for oppressed voices will only be

guaranteed by our determined struggle

and our creativity in the face of repression.

* * *

Hello [x],

I'm sorry it took me so long to reply.

After reviewing your existing site

imperialismkills.org I would respectfully

choose not to host this domain or any

material that might be considered

controversial.

We totally respect your right to express

your own opinions and political views,

however we do not wish to take on the

liability of hosting a site that could easily

become a target of those that have

opposing ideologies.

Please do not take this personally, there

are many hosting companies that have

lenient Acceptable Use Policies.

Our AUP can be reviewed at:

http://hardhathosting.com/customer-

service/terms-of-service.php#accept

Here is an excerpt that applies to the

situation.

"Hard Hat Hosting reserves the right

to restrict or prohibit any and all uses or

content that it determines in its sole

discretion is harmful to its systems,

network, reputation, good will, other Hard

Hat Hosting customers, or any third

party"

I apologize for any inconvenience that

this causes you. Please let us know when

you have moved your files off of the

server and we will remove the account.

Sincerely,

Eric Linberg, President Hardhat, Inc.

Notes:

1. This is what happened to Indymedia

in October 2004. see MIM Notes 310.

Nov. 1-14, 2004. p.4.

2. This was the fate of Sherman Austin

who is now on probation after spending

over a year in federal prison for something

someone else posted on the webspace

he hosted. See www.freesherman.org

RAIL CENSORED

BY INTERNET

SERVICE

PROVIDER

by the ILPS-Philippines Chapter

January 11, 2005

The International League of People's

Struggle (ILPS) Philippines Chapter

condemns the U.$. for making political

capital out of the catastrophic tsunami

which engulfed a wide swath of Asia,

including some parts of Africa, and killed

160,000 people.

The ILPS Philippines Chapter

denounces the crass opportunism

expressed by U.S. State Secretary Colin

Powell when he said that the U.$. military

relief and aid that it is giving Aceh "should

change the battered image of the United

$tates around the globe after the its

arrogant disregard of international public

opinion against the invasion of Iraq. He

likewise boasted that this aid is a

manifestation of U.$. "generosity" and

"American values in action."

Instead of sending skilled civilians, the

United $tates seized the opportunity to

send an array of U.$. warships, planes,

helicopters, and more than 13,000 U.$.

military personnel purportedly to help

Indonesia, Thailand, and Sri Lanka,

countries most affected by the December

26 disaster. The USS Abraham Lincoln,

an aircraft carrier with 6,000 sailors on

board, is currently stationed about 28 kms

or 15 nautical miles off Aceh while a fleet

of Sea Hawk helicopters from same

carrier has been flying food, water, and

medical supplies in said region where

there is an armed rebellion against the

Indonesian government. One thousand

and five hundred U.$. troops, meanwhile,

are deployed in Sri Lanka where there is

also an armed rebellion waged by the

Tamil Tigers which is fighting for self-

determination.

U.$. forces are also using Thailand's

Vietnam era air base of Utapao as an airlift

hub for the so-called "humanitarian"

mission, strengthening potential U.$.

military logistical support through

Southeast Asia. Conducting the largest

operation in Asia since the Vietnam War,

the U.$. military said that its forces could

remain in the region for up to six months.

Six months can always be extended of

course until it becomes permanent.

It is well known that strengthening U.$.

military presence in Southeast Asia is a

major element in the neoconservatives'

imperialist project of Pax Americana in

the 21st century that presupposes U.$.

imperialism's unchallenged global

hegemony. Given U.$. imperialism's

proven record of economic plunder and

destructive wars, the U.$. military

deployment augurs a calamity far worse

than the tsunami that devastated these

Asian countries.

Source: http://www.antiimperialista.com/

view.shtml?category=9&id=1105612477

U.$. military relief operations in

Asia far worse than the tsunami

MIM Notes 313 · February 2005 · Page 4

deserves some attention. Failing that, don't

be surprised that people question your real

motivations.

Postscript: This again is an example

why it's important to fight phony Marxism.

The imperialists are happy to use

"workers" such as this one and Thomas

Hamill in a propaganda game to influence

public opinion in the united $tates. In the

furor over the hostage-taking of a

contractor, our phony Marxists were silent

or at best inconsistent. Only the MIM line

has accurately identified these people as

parasites and enemies of the Iraqi people.

Only the MIM line has a consistent basis

for telling the contractors that they are

not innocent construction workers, so

they should get their a*es back home.

Notes:

1. http://www.etext.info/Politics/MIM/

agitation/iraq/thomashamill.html

2. http://www.etext.info/Politics/MIM/

faq/imperialistpopulation.html

Letters

Continued from page 3...

by mim3@mim.org and HC123

January 13, 2005

A rough calculation of the population in

the imperialist world in 2004 is 1025

million. That compares with a total world

population of 6450 million.(1) The

imperialist population is also smaller than

the populations of either China or India.

The 1025 million of imperialism is the

total of the populations of the following

countries:

U$A

Russian Federation

Kanada

"United" KKKingdom

Greece

Ireland

Iceland

France

Spain

Portugal

Italy

Switzerland

Austria

Luxembourg

Netherlands

Belgium

Denmark

Norway

Sweden

Finland

Germany

I$rael

Japan

Au$tralia

New Zealand

The list should also include various tiny

countries such as Malta, Andorra, and

Liechtenstein, but it does not make much

difference to include those. They wouldn't

affect the figures very much anyway.

Some of the smaller countries on the

above list are also questionable as

imperialists for not having multinational

corporate monopolies and the finance

stage of capitalism. Some such as New

Zealand may be extensions or enclaves

set up by other imperialists. They seem

to be allowed the privileges of imperialism

without having their own national

reduplication of all imperialist institutions.

The situation in Greece is also not

straightforward.

We do not regard the various little

Middle Eastern kingdoms as imperialist,

because they're merely selling off

resources (oil) and not exporting capital

under the dominance of domestic finance

capital as Lenin said was true of

imperialism. On the other hand, many of

the populations in these Arab oil countries

are bourgeoisified.

Eventually they'll meet the fate of

Nauru, which has tapped out its

phosphate reserves and cannot produce

food or much of anything else. These

kingdoms do, however, exploit foreign

workers and, in the case of the United

Arab Emirates (UAE), even a part of the

indigenous population (some people born

in the UAE are denied citizenship because

of their origins and are therefore

stateless).

For a first stab at the question, it would

be quite accurate to consider the 1025

million to be the world's exploiters. The

vast bulk of the world's exploiters are

found in the countries listed above and

we should not let nit-pickers distort that

basic truth for the benefit of an imperialist

chauvinist agenda.

Of the countries above, Russia with its

140 million people is the one that has a

definite majority of exploited people.

Hence, we might be off 100 million people

in making that generalization just by

lumping in Russia. In addition there are

those who are in the imperialist countries

illegally by imperialist law and thus do not

enjoy the wage conditions for the normal

exploiter-citizen.

On the other side of the ledger, where

we have missed 100 million exploiters is

the 2% of the 5 billion in the Third World

that serves as imperialist-lackey-

exploiters. There are also the non-

imperialist Arab exploiters.

When we consider the additions and

deductions from the ledger, the point

remains that 1 billion exploiters remains

a very good approximation of the global

enemy class. Even if we made a mistake

and included 10% of the Third World as

exploiters, we would only have 1.5 billion

exploiters against 5 billion exploited people

instead of 1 billion versus 5.5 billion. Such

an adjustment shows that no matter what

the vast majority of exploiters come from

the imperialist countries.

Many are familiar with the kind of

access to the means of production which

produces a situation where the income

of "150 million Latin Americans--that is,

around 33 percent of the population--is

under $2 a day."(2) However, this focus

on the bottom can also distort the global

picture.

If we count the top 10% of the Third

World as all exploiters, we will be

including some poor people. For example,

in oil-rich former Soviet republic

Azerbaijan, to get into the top 10% of the

population income-wise, one needs $72

per month.(3) That's not to say there are

not some very rich people in Azerbaijan,

only that the top 10% does not include all

very rich people. In many countries there

are 1 or 2 or 3% working for corporations

as professionals making good money.

Finding good paying jobs and businesses

to aid even 10% of the population of a

country proves to be difficult in this

imperialist-dominated world.

What is missing from most people's

picture is actually the top 10%--the

people with access to the means of

production that guarantees them income

in the top 10% of the world. According

to United Nations statistics made available

by the The Economic Commission for

Latin America (ECLA), the imperialist

countries excluding Russia in 1999

supplied 85% of the people in the top 10%

of the world by income.(4)

What is more, if we take a minimum

wage earner in the united $tates working

2000 hours a year, that persyn would be

in the top 10% of most countries in the

world. That would be true in Africa, Asia

and the ex-Soviet Union. The only region

in the world where the Amerikan

minimum wage earner would not be in

the top 10% is Latin America, and even

there, the entry into the top 10% averaged

under $13,000 a year in 1999.(4)

Less than 9% of the imperialist country

populations in 1999 were not in the top

20% of the world by income--the kind

of people MIM has emphasized are

lumpen and abused non-citizens. In fact,

someone who makes it into the bottom

11 percentile (89th percentile) of the

imperialist countries is higher than the 10th

percentile of Africa and Asia by income.

When MIM follows Lenin saying that

imperialist countries are bought off in their

entirety, we stand on the facts. Without

exception, the organizations opposing the

MIM line are chauvinist scum hiding the

warped economic situation created by

imperialism.

Our critics including all the so-called

Marxist organizations in the imperialist

countries except the handful affiliated/

friendly with MIM say that the 90% of

the imperialist countries' population is

exploited. Let's be clear what these

running dogs of the exploiters mean: It's

not just that they are letting off the hook

the 46% of the imperialist country

population in the world's top 10% but not

in the imperialist country top 10%. They

are letting off the hook 69.6% of the

world's top 10%.

The Third World languishes under the

weight of a heavy load of imperialist

parasites, almost 30% of which come

from the United $tates. It will be

interesting to watch the demographics in

coming years. Most European countries,

including the non-imperialist ones, will

decline in population in the coming

decades. So will Japan. The United $tates,

however, will continue to grow, largely

from immigration, to surpass 400 million

by 2050. Excluding Russia and using the

UN's projections for 2050, there will be

a total of 978.3 million in the

aforementioned countries. That

represents a decline in the relative

imperialist population, from 13.7% of the

world today to 11.0% forty-five years

hence. On the other hand, the United

$tates will be a larger fraction of the

imperialist world excluding Russia, going

from 33.9% in 2004 to 41.8% of the

imperialist population in 2050.

This is also important for understanding

the future of the dynamics of exploitation.

To say that the Third World has 10%

exploiters is to equate their economic

condition with that of the imperialists--a

mistake made by the vast majority of

organizations calling themselves

"Marxist" in the imperialist countries.

Some are still stuck in 1848 and others of

these organizations are conscious exploiter

representatives.

Notes:

1. Source for data: http://esa.un.org/

unpp/

2. http://www.iadb.org/res/publications/

pubfiles/pubB-1998-1999_6453.pdf

3. http://www.azstat.org/statinfo/

budget_households/en/013.shtml

4. http://www.eclac.cl/povertystatistcs/

documentos/dikhanov.pdf

Imperialist population: 1 billion

MIM Notes 313 · February 2005 · Page 5

Supreme Court

to review prison

Control Unit

classification

December 10, 2004 -- The Supreme

Court agreed to take up the case of

classifying prisoners into super maximum-

security prisons, looking specifically at

how prisoners are classified into these

prisons. Most states have the prisons, that

go by many names, including Supermax

and Control Units. MIM has been fighting

to shut down prison Control Units for

years.

Control units may vary from prison to

prison but they can be generally

characterized as: Permanently designated

prisons or cells in prisons that lock

prisoners up in solitary or small group

confinement for 22 or more hours a day

with no congregate dining, exercise or

other services, and virtually no programs

for prisoners. Prisoners are placed in

control units for extended periods of time.

Prisoners are usually placed in control

units as an administrative measure, with

no clear rules governing the moves.

The Supreme Court will review an

appeal from the Ohio supermax where

prisoners are on 23-hour-a-day lockdown

in 90-square foot cells. This appeal

follows the 6th U.S. Circuit Court of

Appeals decision on a class-action lawsuit

against the state arguing that prisoners

were not given a chance to fight the

classification into the supermax. The

Appeals court ruled that prisoners in the

Ohio are entitled to hearings, with

witnesses, before being classified into the

supermax.

This is a case well worth watching. As

the AP reported: "The case forces the

Supreme Court to revisit a 1995 decision

that limited prisoners' rights to have

hearings before they lose privileges or are

disciplined for misconduct. Chief Justice

William H. Rehnquist wrote in that opinion

that inmate liberty interests are `limited

to freedom from restraint which ...

imposes atypical and significant hardship

on the inmate in relation to the ordinary

incidents of prison life.'"

The case is Wilkinson v. Austin, 04-

495.

Notes: http://www.fresnobee.com/

24hour/nation/story/1913642p-

9863049c.html

by mim3@mim.org

Our name established in 1984 is the

"Maoist Internationalist Movement," but

the first word has a long history, behind

it, so long, that the choice of one word

concentrates a huge political struggle, the

most important one of our times in the

international communist movement. [This

work is incomplete, so you can help out if

you want by sending in your analysis and

historical references.]

In August 1948, while preparing his

speech for the opening ceremony of

North China University, Comrade Wu

Yuzhang decided to use "Maoism"

[Mao2 Ze2dong1 zhu3yi4] instead of

"Mao Zedong Thought" [Mao2

Ze2dong1 si1xiang3] and to proclaim