Headlines at the World Socialist Web Site today:
Kishore:
We now come to the critical political questions, and here it is necessary to speak plainly. The basic problem we confront is not an absence of opposition. The problem is a lack of political clarity. The situation demands that political issues be posed directly and answered honestly. Conclusions must be drawn from the experiences through which we have passed—and the experiences through which we are now passing.
I have already spoken of the objective roots of Trump’s rise. But objective processes always find expression in politics. Political responsibility for Trump’s emergence, for the fact that he is again in the White House, must be placed squarely on the shoulders of the Democratic Party—including, and I would say especially, its so-called “left” wing: figures like Bernie Sanders and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez.
2. Wildfire smoke blankets large parts of North America
The sharp increase in the scale and impact of wildfires in the past several years is the direct result of the ongoing and accelerating ecological crisis caused by climate change. It has been predicted by climate scientists for decades that one of the impacts of global warming will be longer droughts and more severe wildfires. And starting with the sixth United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, Earth’s increasing temperatures have been definitively linked to wildfires and the associated droughts and heatwaves that exacerbate them.
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Like all crises, the Canadian wildfires expose the fundamental inability of the capitalist system, bound by the contradictions of the nation-state and the profit motive, to deal with social problems, much less environmental disasters with an international scope. A real solution to fighting fires is a massive infusion of resources to combat fires, funded through the expropriation of oligarchs like [Elon] Musk, and putting those resources toward an internationally coordinated effort to fight and prevent wildfires.
3. The Musk-Trump blood feud and the US political crisis
The eruption of a public conflict between President Donald Trump and his former budget adviser, Elon Musk—the world’s richest man—speaks to the extraordinary level of crisis and conflict within the state apparatus, generated by an intensifying economic crisis and mounting popular opposition to the corporate-financial oligarchy.
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The conflicts within the ruling class intersect with the corrupt personal interests of the individuals involved. Trump has threatened retaliation against Musk’s business empire, including the cancellation of “billions and billions” in federal contracts. Tesla stock plunged more than 14 percent on Thursday, wiping out $152 billion in market value and costing Musk personally $20 billion in a single day.
On Saturday, Trump withdrew the nomination of billionaire Jared Isaacman, a Musk customer and crony, to head NASA. Isaacman was Musk’s choice, viewed as a key ally of his lucrative—but technically challenged—SpaceX venture, which relies entirely on federal contracts.
4. Proctor & Gamble announces 7,000 layoffs, as impact of trade war mounts
The announcement was buried in corporate newspeak, but the need to cut costs in the face of growing trade war measures spearheaded by the Trump administration was obviously a major factor. The press release said the company would carry out “interventions in our supply chain—right-sizing and right-locating production” in order to enable “cost reduction” and a “more reliable and resilient supply.”
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The cuts at Procter & Gamble are the latest in a series of mounting layoffs by US-based firms, including: 20,000 job cuts at UPS, which is also in the midst of an automation-led restructuring; 6,000 more layoffs at Microsoft, following a previous round of cuts in January; 3,500 jobs at Citigroup in its China operations, following plans announced last year to cut 20,000 jobs or 10 percent of its workforce; 1,500 jobs at big box retailer Walmart, and hundreds of employees at Disney.
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The reality is that the overriding concern behind the tariffs is preparations by US imperialism for war. As Leon Trotsky observed of the spiraling trade wars of the 1930s, which led directly to World War II, “breeding places of nationalism also are the laboratories of terrific conflicts in the future; like a hungry tiger, imperialism has withdrawn into its own national lair to gather itself for a new leap.”
This drive to war was stated bluntly last Friday by Jamie Dimon, CEO of JPMorgan Chase, at the Reagan National Economic Forum. “We shouldn’t be stockpiling bitcoins,” the billionaire banker said during a discussion of the “national security” implications for industry. “We should be stockpiling guns, bullets, tanks, planes, drones, you know, rare earths. We know we need to do it. It’s not a mystery.”
5. Australia slides back into per capita recession
The biggest contribution to economic growth, such as it was, came from increased household spending. But this was not an indication of economic health but rather the reverse because one of the main reasons for the increase in consumption was rising spending on electricity, gas and fuel due to the end of some state government energy rebates. Increased rents were another factor.
6. Miserly Australian award wage rise leaves low-income workers behind in real terms
The minimum wage will increase by just 85 cents per hour to $24.95 [approximately US$16.18], but the news has been received with whoops and cheers from the country’s leading trade union bureaucrats.
7. Australia: Indigenous man dies after being violently restrained by police
Kumanjayi White, a 24-year-old Indigenous man with a disability and under state guardianship, died on May 27 after being violently restrained by police in full view of supermarket workers and shoppers in the Northern Territory town of Alice Springs. His death has ignited widespread grief and anger not only from the remote Aboriginal community of Yuendumu where White had close family ties, but nationally.
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The tragic death of Kumanjayi White is a devastating illustration of a broader and worsening social crisis, rooted in the economic conditions confronting the working class nationally. Aboriginal communities in the NT remain among the most disadvantaged in Australia, with their appalling living conditions the result of decades of government cuts to welfare, housing, healthcare and mental health services, cuts that are also increasingly affecting broader sections of the working class throughout the country.
White, a young man with known cognitive and mental health impairments, was vulnerable and in need of support. Instead, he was subjected to surveillance and criminalization. Former Alice Springs supermarket worker Gene Hill, recently spoke to the media and recalled his encounters with White: “One glance at him and you can see he’s got special needs.” Hill described assisting White on several occasions, including buying him food and explaining that items needed to be paid for.
8. Trial of ex-president Bolsonaro for fascist coup bid advances in Brazil
The last few weeks have been marked by important developments in the case against former President Jair Bolsonaro and those accused of leading the coup attempt that culminated in the invasion of government buildings in Brasília on January 8, 2023
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The fraudulent narrative about the military as “saviors of democracy” is the highest expression of the hopes of Brazil’s ruling class to solve the greatest crisis in its history through bureaucratic maneuvers and by purely judicial means. These bankrupt pretensions are exploding in the face of the contradictions that led to the coup attempt in the first place.
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The intensification of the international crisis, marked by the specter of world war, is a determining factor in the explosive unfolding of the Brazilian political situation, particularly under the impact of the violent eruption of US imperialism.
In recent weeks, the US government has significantly escalated its offensive against Brazilian state institutions.
9. Spanish metal strike in Cantabria grows, Cádiz workers to strike next week
The roots of the strike go beyond the employers’ latest attempt to impose a below-inflation wage deal and claw back existing gains such as vacation pay improvements and night shift bonuses. Fundamentally, it is a response to the betrayal of the 2022 metalworkers’ strike by the union apparatus. Workers are currently demanding a modest 3.5 percent wage increase, already far below the real rise in living costs—yet even this limited demand, set by the unions themselves, are rejected by employers.
In a recent war-mongering speech at the Shangri-La Dialogue in Singapore, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth warned that countries must not try to balance between the two superpowers, but must align with the US against China for a “potentially imminent” war.
Universities are now being realigned at an accelerating pace according to the ruling class drive for war. This underlies Secretary of State Rubio’s May 28 threats to revoke visas of potentially 270,000 Chinese students, and the June 2 arrest of Yunqing Jian, demonized by FBI director Kash Patel, accused of “agroterrorism” for plant pathogen research at the University of Michigan. The pathogen in this case is not even on the “Select Agents and Toxins” list, which designates agents posing a severe threat if misused.
11. Trump implements new travel ban, restricting travel from 19 countries
The proclamation fully restricts and limits the entry of nationals from 12 countries: Afghanistan, Burma, Chad, Republic of the Congo, Equatorial Guinea, Eritrea, Haiti, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, and Yemen, and partially restricts and limits the entry of nationals from an additional seven countries: Burundi, Cuba, Laos, Sierra Leone, Togo, Turkmenistan, and Venezuela. Under the restrictions, residents of the countries listed under the partial ban will be unable to apply for six of the major visa categories, including business, tourism and visas for students.
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At the start of his meeting Thursday with German Chancellor Friedrich Merz in the Oval Office, Trump was asked why the list of banned countries does not include Egypt. Egypt is the country of origin of the suspect in the attack in Boulder Colorado, which Trump cited in justifying this travel ban. Trump replied that Egypt “has things under control,” adding that the ban applies only to countries that “don’t have things under control.” By “have things under control” Trump means that Egypt’s authoritarian government maintains political surveillance of its population and is subservient to the interests of American imperialism.
12. Election platform: Stop militarization and cuts at universities! No to genocide and world war!
The International Youth and Students for Social Equality in Germany are running in the elections for the student parliament at Berlin’s Humboldt University, which will take place on 3 July 2025.
On April 18, 2025, the second Trump administration codified the Wuhan lab-leak conspiracy into official state policy. This is the politically engineered claim that COVID-19 began as an accidental escape from the Wuhan [China] Institute of Virology.
Donald Trump weaponized the theory five years earlier at the outset of the pandemic, but it has since gained bipartisan traction, with Democrats under Joe Biden aiding its spread. This allegation fuels anti-Chinese sentiment and lays the groundwork for war, as proven by Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s warning at the Shangri-La Dialogue that China seeks to “become a hegemonic power in Asia.”
Christian Frei’s Blame, which premiered April 4, 2025, at the 56th Visions du Réel film festival in Nyon, Switzerland, arrives as a vital rebuttal. The documentary confronts these weaponized conspiracies head-on—exposing their devastating consequences: the defunding of scientific research, mass layoffs and the public vilification of scientists. Blame is both a defense of science and a searing indictment of the political assault on public health.
14. Sri Lanka: Michelin workers continue struggle, defying management’s threats
Like all international conglomerates, Michelin operates through a global production chain. Its decision to sell the Midigama factory [in Sri Lanka] is part of a global reorganization of this giant corporation to boost its profits amid a worsening international economic crisis.
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At the same time, the US and all the other imperialist powers are restructuring their operations in preparation for war to establish their hegemony over resource-rich regions—those abundant in oil, gas and heavy metals—and to secure labour and markets.
The burden of these developments is being imposed by capitalist government and companies through job cuts, low wages and brutal working conditions. To fight these attacks workers must develop a revolutionary strategy.
The sinking of the Adriana was the largest loss of life in the Mediterranean in a single event in recent decades. It added more than 600 deaths to the 20,000-plus who have drowned in the sea over the last two decades.
17. Workers Struggles: Europe, Middle East & Africa
Finland:
Airline workers in series of strike days for pay increases
France:
Municipal Call center workers in Paris strike over intolerable working conditions
Germany:
Auxiliary workers at Charitè Hospital in Berlin, continue strike to force pay agreement
Greece:
Research scientists strike and demonstrate for improved pay and working conditions
Seafarers on Greece-Italy ferry route in 48-hour strike to protest unsafe conditions and overwork
Teachers at 28-school trust in England walk out over plans to extend working day
Further strike by Scottish Water workers over unacceptable pay offer
Phlebotomists at Gloucestershire hospitals continue long-running strike over pay
Protest by UK Oxfam charity workers over outsourcing threat
Nationwide strike by truck driver enters second week
Health workers' strike over staff shortages enters fourth week
Union tells Nigerian judicial workers to return to work
Students at University of Zimbabwe in solidarity with striking lecturers
14. Free Ukrainian socialist and anti-war activist, Bogdan Syrotiuk!
The sign says: "Peace for the world! Down with war!"
