The kidnapping of 43 Ayotzinapa students: We do not forgive. We do not forget

What does a country reap if it sows bodies?

September 26 is the fourth anniversary of the forced disappearance of 43 students from the  Ayotzinapa School for Rural Teachers, one of a series of such colleges set up in the wake of the Mexican Revolution.

For decades the successive Mexican governments have been in conflict with the schools and their mission to train teachers for Mexican rural communities and especially for Indigenous peoples. This has been true above all of the Raúl Isidros Burgos school of Ayotzinapa in the combative State of Guerrero, where Genaro Vásquez and Lucío Cabañas, two of the most important leaders of the armed resistance to the Mexican State during the dirty war of the 1970s that followed the Tlatelolco Plaza massacre of hundreds of students On October 2, 1968.

The 43 stuidents were kidnapped the night of September 26 by the police of the city of Iguala acting together with other government institutions and the drug cartels that supply and are financed by the U.S. market. This is just one incident of many that have cost the peoples of Latin America tens of thousands of lives due to the U.S. "War on Drugs." This half-century long fraud is used to as a weapon of imperialist domination of Latin Americas and domestically to repress and dominate the Latino and Black communities.

--José G. Pérez

A dishonest sliming of the DSA and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez

On August 31, Counterpunch published a bizarre and dishonest racism-baiting attack on the Democratic Socialists of America by Andrew Stewart.

“Grappling with the racism of the DSA’s Founders” has the peculiarity that three of the five “founders” of the DSA --described by Stewart as “its early leaders/thinkers”—in reality had nothing to do with the DSA. So much so that one of them –Max Schactman—had been dead for a decade by the time DSA was founded in 1982.

The other two, Albert Shanker and Bayard Rustin, were close associates of Schactman. Rustin was the head of the Socialist Party and its successor organization, Social Democrats USA. Shanker was president of the New York teacher’s union from 1964 to 1985 and a close friend of Schactman’s, though as far as I know not actively involved in socialist groups like the SP during those years.

By the early 1970s these three were the political enemies of the figure most associated with the DSA’s founding, Michael Harrington.

Harrington and those three had all been part of the Socialist Party, a political current of anti-Stalinist socialists. Over time, the SP’s anti-Stalinism increasingly became plain right-wing anticommunism and even in domestic politics the group shed most vestiges of its socialist past, coming out against the antiwar movement and the Black movement.

But a small part of the SP led by Harrington resisted the drift to the right and instead began to move to the left under the impact of the antiwar and other protest movements of the 1960s, leading to a split in the early 1970s between the progressive minority that founded the Democratic Socialist Organizing Committee, one the organizations that eventually joined to found of the DSA, and the right wing majority which, to make clear that they were not socialist and not a party became “Social Democrats USA” in 1972.

Max Shachtman: right-wing social democrat
supposedly cofounded DSA 10 years after he died

Stewart lies by saying the three from the right wing were founders of DSA. They were not. The purpose of the lie is to then saddle DSA with political responsibility for Schactman’s rabid anticommunism, Shanker’s reactionary teacher’s strike in New York in 1968 against Black and Latino control of the schools in their neighborhoods, and Bayard Rustin’s attacks on Black nationalism taking advantage of his well-deserved prestige as the key behind-the-scenes organizer of the 1963 March on Washington.

And if you insist that DSA is somehow responsible for the actions of those who years before the DSA existed were in the same group as Michael Harrington, then why not give DSA the credit for the 1963 "I have a dream" March of Washington, Shachtman’s leading role in resisting the rise of Stalinism in the 1920s and 1930s, and the things Shanker did to defend the legitimate interests of New York Teachers?

The reason, of course, in that this is an outrageous frame-up, the sort of thing I’d expect from Fox News or Inforwars, not a web site like Counterpunch.

Stewart also brings up Harrington’s opposition to the founding Port Huron Statement of Students for a Democratic Society in 1962. But Harrington later reversed course and the DSA was founded by the fusion of DSOC with the New American Movement, a group descended precisely from the early SDS.

Stewart begins his Philippic by trying to shield himself from the obvious criticism that this construct of his is based on events from a half century ago, has nothing to do with the real world DSA of today by admitting as much:

OK, with a serious dose of honest humility and respect, I will admit readily that the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) membership is doing some great stuff at the grassroots level.... So this polemic will be relegated entirely to the founding generation of Democratic Socialists of America and its early leaders/thinkers.

But he continues by assailing the DSA’s electoral work with the paper-thin disguise of countering “a meta-narrative” supposedly being foisted by Jacobin and other outlets. According to Stewart, this story holds that after decades of failed efforts by everyone from the Greens to the SWP and the Communist Party, in its first try the DSA “has finally … brought socialism into the mainstream electoral realm,” and concluding in ironic bold type: “And with that, dear comrades, we shall now proceed to construct the Socialist order!”

And, of course, of course, of course, he proceeds to deconstruct to his own fabrication:

I am compelled to recall the great quote of Amilcar Cabral, “Tell no lies, claim no easy victories.” … Unfortunately, we are not on the verge of a great socialist electoral upsurge.

But Stewart has nothing but his own straw man compelling his recollection of “the great quote of Amilcar Cabral,” (by which I assume he meant to say, “a quote from the great Amilcar Cabral” instead of implying that only once in his life did Cabral say anything memorable.)

Despite his disclaimers, the real target of Stewart’s attack is not people who have been dead for decades but today’s DSA. It has just reached 50,000 members and has growing political impact and recognition.

He betrays that the electoral success of some DSA members is a special concern (and provides another example of his dishonest methods) by recommending to us to his “recent dismantling of the mythic Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez candidacy over at Washington Babylon.”

That story, “How Long Was Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez Planning Her Run For Public Office?” slimes her by implying she is a Kennedy family puppet.

It takes off from a tweet from her that mentions in passing her internship in Senator Ted Kennedy’s immigration office and leads to a Stewart rant about “the political circus known as the Kennedy family” and especially “the ne’er-do-well Patrick,” a carpet-bagging Boston Brahmin who had the temerity to move to Rhode Island and get elected to Congress.

But soon he remembers that he meant to talk about Ocasio-Cortez and not the Kennedys.

“An internship in Ted’s office was a great career booster in government agencies and/or the Democratic Party,” he snarks, adding:

Ocasio-Cortez worked in Kennedy’s office from early 2008, when she was 19, until his death in the summer of 2009. Prior to that, she was active in the National Hispanic Institute’s Lorenzo de Zalvala Youth Legislative Session.

Actually, in “early 2008” Ocasio would have been 18, not 19, since she was born in October 1989. And, of course, there’s that week-long Youth Legislative Session summer camp and never mind that the name is “Lorenzo de Zavala” and not “Zalvala” with an extra “L” as Stewart would have it. But what are facts to the rapier thrusts of this polemicist?

Put those two together, the internship and the summer camp, and the conclusion is supposedly inescapable: “this is the resumé of someone who wanted to run for public office as a teenager.” And worse.

I’d even have to wonder if she joined DSA because she saw a wellspring for free interns and staff for a campaign she has been planning since the Dubya administration.

Of course! The woman is so brilliant that she foresaw the radicalization of working class millennials that powered her campaign on the cheap even before the economic depression that sparked the radicalization had taken place. And so she positioned herself to take advantage of it by attending a “Boy’s State”-type summer camp in high school.

But despite that, don’t give Stewart all that bull about her brilliant primary victory.

Certainly the “miracle primary victory” narrative is partly mythological horse shit. AOC had connections within the Democratic Party and would have been able to target a vulnerable but liberal district like Joe Crowley’s…. That’s the MO of a Kennedy operation top-to-bottom, I’ve watched them do it forever.

So that explains it. Why is this woman sitting at the table instead of waiting on it, her previous job? Because Massa put her there.

I mean, you don’t really think a young, working-class Puerto Rican woman from the Bronx could have done it herself, do you?

I only have one more thing to say to Stewart about his attack on the DSA’s “racism”: for your next hatchet job, try getting a cleaver made of firmer stuff than bovine excrement. So you don’t get splattered.

--José G. Pérez

Will Russians hack elections again?

Well, if they do, it won't be "again."

There has been no evidence presented that the Russians did anything in 2016 save the normal spying all the "great" powers do to each other. And what they are accused of doing makes no sense. For example, we are told that the Russians had penetrated the Democratic National Committee (DNC) network by the summer of 2015, but all the FBI did was call the DNC computer help desk which did a quick check and finding nothing, forgot about it.

There was a second penetration of the DNC severs in the spring of 2016, which took much of the same material as the first one but was so incompetent that even the DNC noticed. Crowdstrike, a computer security firm was called in.  That led to the first very successful penetration finally being spotted, and both were supposedly cleared by completely nuking and rebuilding the DNC network (including each and every computer) in mid-June. Three days later, the head of the private security firm that cleared the system, who happens to be a Russian emigre who is active in anti-Putin groups, published all the details in the firm's blog.

Several things. First the FBI considered this sort of spying routine and could not even be bothered to walk the half mile to the DNC offices to discuss it with them. The reason they thought it was the Russians is because data was being sent to an IP address they thought was connected with Russia. That was all.

And having completely owned the DNC network by capturing or creating an admin login, Putin (and supposedly he ordered it personally) sends in a second group, who are so incompetent even the hapless DNC staff notices. That's simply not believable. It is a violation of the most obvious norms for spying to send in a second operation on top of one that already is getting *everything*.

The penetration is so sensitive that a private security firm headed by a Russian national takes care of it, not the FBI, NSA or CIA. Really?

And then contrary to even the most obvious principle of counter-espionage, full details are put on a blog three days later by the anti-Putin Russian who --what a coincidence!-- says it was Putin. And that way Putin can know how much we know and how we figured out it was him.

Meanwhile at Hillary headquarters top dog John Podesta gets an email claiming his gmail password has been compromised and please click here to change it. An aide checks with someone more competent in computers who tells them to follow this other link to change the password (the real link to Google) and to turn on two-factor authentication. So Podesta's people dig up the original phishing email, follow the fake link, give away access to the email account, and do not turn on two factor authentication.

This, we are told, was a sophisticated Russian attack called "spear phishing." But actually what was really involved is that Podesta and his people were brain dead. There can be no security mechanism that can cope with that level of stupidity.

Russians? It was probably a middle school student having fun with her iPad. Or the equivalent. Because a really serious intelligence operation would have used the penetration to get access to Hillary's network. But they didn't. They just took Podesta's emails from gmail servers.

Then the Russians take the stuff and leak it. The Russians could have leaked the secret contracts showing the DNC was in the tank for Hillary in February or March. Their slogan would have been  "Anybody but Hillary." But if they were going to try to knock her out, that was the moment to do it. Either that, or in October, with a classic October surprise.

But instead they give it to Wikileaks in the middle of the summer. They could have leaked it to the New York Times, CNN, the Guardian -- none of them would have refused the material and the Russians could easily have covered their tracks. The obvious explanation of why it went to Wikileaks is because almost certainly it wasn't the Russians but a lone hacker, perhaps an inside job, and Wikileaks has ways to receive leaks securely and anonymously, which major press outlets do not.

Well, the Russians were pretending to be a lone hacker. But if this was their cover story, it is idiotic to let the false story they were developing get in the way of using the devastatingly compromising material they got on Hillary in the most effective way.

The Facebook plot is even more ridiculous. The Kremlin was going to spend literally thousands of dollars, perhaps hundreds of thousands, to influence an American election. Really? A billion dollars or more were spent on the election. And the Russians supposedly thought they could make a difference?

And, again, absolutely no evidence of the nefarious Russian schemes has been given to the public.

Could the Russians have done anything more serious? You be the judge:

A couple of weeks ago at the annual Defcon hackathon in Las Vegas it took an 11 year old girl 10 minutes to hack into a  replica of the Florida statewide election system. Someone else took only two minutes to hack the voting machines being used in 18 states. Of course it's not fair to compare. The two minute hack was done by Rachel Tobac who is an adult and has her own security firm.

Supposedly the Russians, determined to have Trump instead of Hillary, passed on the obvious and multiple vulnerabilities that had already been covered in the U.S. press and instead focused on trolling with a half dozen invented characters and a couple of stolen identities which they needed to pay for Facebook Advertisement.

For sure. I honestly and sincerely believe that Ms. Goody Two Shoes, KGB Colonel Vladimir Putin, could not bring himself to steal the election and merely sought to influence the outcome.

Not.