Articles

Posted by: John Phoenix Former British Prime Minister Tony Blair at the World Economic Forum in 2008. (Photo: World Economic Forum/Wikimedia Commons) In the first decade of this century, amidst the flames of the “War on Terror” which had engulfed Afghanistan and Iraq, the late president of Venezuela, Hugo Chavez, made a private visit to London to meet Ken Livingstone, the mayor. Two days earlier British Prime Minister Tony Blair had lectured and rebuked Chavez and Bolivian President Evo Morales on the need to use the resources of his oil rich country “responsibly.” Responsibility is the act of being responsible and the Oxford English Dictionary defines “responsible” as “having an obligation to do something, or having control over or care for someone.”[1] On the other hand, what B...

Posted by: John Phoenix On April 10, 2025, The British proletariat lost another fighter for its cause, Anne Scargill passed away at the age of 83. Although her maiden name was Harper, which she had reverted to in 1998, to most who knew her she was still Scargill even after she and ex-National Union of Mineworkers, president, Arthur Scargill, had split up. Anne was pretty well-known around Barnsley, but she sprang to national (and international) prominence in the 1984-85 miners’ strike. Anne and a group of like-minded women launched a campaign to save the mining industry. This idea spread rapidly in spite of a few objections from miners who didn’t really want their wives and girlfriends on picket lines etc. (these objections became very muted after the NUM Executive Committee ga...