Yesterday afternoon, around 30 protesters against the sale of
Israeli goods in Marks & Spencer (M&S) were mobilised outside their
store in Market Street, Manchester. Some called for a boycott of
M&S, but bearing in mind that there have been protests there for
four years and it is still a busy store (and many Jewish people shop
there because it is seen as a Jewish store) it is clear that the
tactics of calling for a boycott of M&S are not working.

I have gone along occasionally, and at one point handed out leaflets
calling for a boycott of Israeli goods, which I think were produced
by the Palestine Solidarity Campaign. The last couple of times I
have gone along, I have spent most of my time chatting to David
Eaton, a former Respect candidate in the local elections in Preston
who gained 27% of the vote (but who has now resigned from Respect),
about various political issues (and I have handed out leaflets of
mine on other subjects than Palestine to protesters). Discussing
politics in public means that passers-by, shoppers and fellow
campaigners hear some of the points that we make.

At the last local elections, the Socialist Workers Party's (SWP's)
abandonment of the Socialist Alliance (SA) and dictatorial control
of its new organisation "Respect: the Unity Coalition" meant that if
a local Socialist Alliance branch wanted to stand a candidate, he or
she had to be approved by the national leadership and then stand
under the banner of "Respect: the Unity Coalition" rather
than "Socialist Alliance"! This approach was particularly damaging
for the left in Preston, because it was the only place in England or
Wales where a socialist alliance candidate Michael Lavalette was
elected (this took place on May Day last year) - Lavalette's
election was largely due to "Independent Labour" councillors being
elected in the town on previous occasions and then joining the SA.
All Respect local election candidates did pretty well this year but
none got elected - the SA had established itself as a serious
organisation, and I have no doubt that David and some of the others
would have been elected to the council if they had been allowed to
stand as SA candidates. The SWP decided to set up Respect alongside
George Galloway (who shook hands with Saddam Hussein and said what a
great guy he was, as shown on British TV, and refused to join the
wishy-washy vaguely left-wing Socialist Campaign Group of Labour MPs
on the grounds that they were too left-wing for him) and assorted
Muslims (not all of whom are socialists). The failure of the
Socialist Alliance to take off was due to the SWP's betrayal of it.
Even though their members chose who was allowed to spreak at many
important events, and the best speaker was often one of their
members and therefore in the SA, they were never announced by the
compθre or the speaker themselves as members of the SA. Most
importantly, there was no SA speaker at the rally at the end of the
2-million strong anti-war demo in London in February last year.
Instead, people like Tony Benn, who at the SWP's Marxism event in
the summer admitted that he didn't think socialism would ever
happen, give the remnants of the Labour left credibility they don't
deserved (largely due to Benn staying in New Labour despite it
becoming a party of big business). If there had been a good SA
speaker, then the SAs would not have got the pathetic votes they did
get on May Day in most of England and Wales, giving the SWP the
excuse to abandon them in favour of Respect. An illustration of how
sectarian the SWP are, is that when the SA finally got a councillor
democratically elected (rather than a merely a politician who has
defected from another party), the SA website for the whole of
England trumpeted this achievement, while failing to mention at all
the fact that six Scottish Socialist Party (SSP) members were
elected to the Scottish parliament on the same day! They even did
the same thing on the Welsh SA website! The Welsh SA has now been
disbanded, due to the SWP being a minuscule organisation in Wales
and Cymru Gogh (Welsh Socialists) uniting with an Assembly Member
who has defected from Labour to form Forward Wales. They are a broad
socialist organisation led by reformists, unlike the SSP which is a
broad socialist organisation led by revolutionaries, but Forward
Wales now have some councillors on Wrexham. In a very sectarian
move, the SWP set up Respect in Wales as well as England and were
rewarded with about half the vote of Forward Wales in the European
elections this year (the vote for Forward Wales was also very small
indicating that they are very weak outside Wrexham). Cymru Gogh had
originally united with the Socialist Party (formerly Militant) to
set up the Welsh SA (but the Socialist Party pulled out after former
Militant MP Dave Nellist led a walkout of an SA conference in
England. Nellist was once voted backbencher of the year by fellow
MPs, so seeing that Labour and Lib Dem MPs liked him it is clear
that he was far from an ideal revolutionary in Westminster, and it
was rumoured (within Militant) that he had paid his poll tax on one
of his houses (the other house's poll tax was reputedly paid by
Murdoch's Sun rag) - since he lived in his constituency (Coventry)
and London. In contrast, Militant MP Terry Fields in Liverpool went
to jail for 30 days for not paying his poll tax, and there was a
very large demonstration to Walton jail to support him.

According to a leaflet handed out by protesters
yesterday "Manchester Chief Constable Micheal Todd has banned our
picket of M&S after four years' protest in support of the
Palestinian people." Later on, it points out that "Although the ban
at present just covers the Christmas period, we have no doubt that
it will be extended at the earliest opportunity."

The picket normally takes place between 12 noon and 3pm, but there
was nobody there when I turned up at about 12.45pm. I therefore went
inside to check whether what I had heard about M&S using fair trade
coffee and prominently displaying that information was true. It was
and I handed a few leaflets to one of the people serving the coffee,
letting her know that I was actually encouraging people to come into
M&S rather than boycott the store that other protesters were saying.
However, I made it cleaz that I wouldn't hand leaflets out to
customers because I didn't want to get chucked out of the store.

I then decided to go to FOPP to buy some CDs. Richard Branson has a
reputation as a good capitalist, so a lot of young working class
people work in his stores or record company to help promote good
artists that put forward socialist messages (even though they are
often hidden within love songs). Therefore, Virgin megastores are
much better than HMV for finding left-wing music - but Branson
showed his true colours by closing down Manchester's Virgin
megastore recently! The best music store in the world, however, is
part of a small chain called "FOPP", in Glasgow, the poverty capital
of Britain and the stronghold of socialism (with the SSP getting
over 15% of the vote and two members elected to the Scottish
parliament last year). The Glasgow store is on Union Street (being
linked with trade unions helps) very near Glasgow Central train
station. Its chart showed Steve Earle's new album "The Revolution
Starts...Now" in its chart. Steve Earle and the Dukes have
established a reputation for being a very left-wing band in the USA,
but since they have tended to sing Country & Western songs, they
haven't had a worldwide audience - until they released this (soft)
rock album with a brilliant title, which will enable them to play a
key role in the world socialist revolution. A band that I will set
up soon, called Galaxia, will play even more of a role (see
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/galaxiamusic). Fortunately I came
across a really good guy of a (non-violent) anarchist persuasion
after coming off the train from Glasgow last weekend who told me
that there is now a FOPP store in Manchester (opposite the Arndale,
down the road by the Tesco Metro). The staff there are not as good
politically as in Glasgow, but there are still a lot of good CDs
prominently on display (many at £5 or £7 and the standard price for
a new release is £10).

When I got back to M&S, I saw protesters with placards saying things
like "Defend the right to protest" as well as comments about the
brutalisty of the Israeli regime. At first, I was allowed to hand
out my leaflets by the doorway. Later on, I was told by the police
that I had to keep moving or I would be arrested; I decided to
oblige.

Eventually, I was told by fellow protesters that if I wanted to get
arrested, I would have to go to a certain area, but if I wanted to
avoid arrest I should go elsewhere.

Because I am an effective political activist, I have spent large
parts of the last six and a half years in psychiatric wards, often
under a section of the Mental Health Act. I was due for a tribunal
in early December, and I had asked Rosie Kane of the SSP, the best
member of the Scottish parliament (she always attends in jeans and
wrote "My oath is the people" on her hand when forced to swear an
oath of allegiance to the Queen of England), to speak in my support.
I have been made "informal" so my tribunal is cancelled, but I have
been warned that if I step too much out of line, such as not getting
back on the ward by a particular time, then I will be sectioned
again and have to wait another two months or so for a tribunal! [I
am now editing this message and since it is important that I start
sending it out today, I am already threee hours late. I'm sure I'll
get away with it...] I have decided to set up an organisation
called "Campaign for Sanity in the NHS", with a discussion group at
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/health-service-sanity (and I've
requested a domain name www.health-service-sanity.org but not yet
put any material there to expose injustices in the psychiatric
services in this country (and in many other countries as well of
course; hence I didn't put a ".uk" on the end of the domain name or
use the NHS abbreviation) as well as opposing privatisation of the
NHS via the Private Finance Initiative (PFI) and Public Private
Partnerships (PPPs). Anyway, I chose not to get arrested because
arresting me could be an excuse to put me on a section again.

I therefore handed out my leaflets to people who had come to watch
what was going on. Soon after I started to do that, I was dragged by
a couple of police officers to join the protesters lined up against
the window of M&S. I shouted out a lot of important information when
I was being lined up. As well as pointing out things mentioned in my
leaflet about Israel:

* I mentioned police violence against many working class young
people (many of whom were black but some were white as well) at Hall
Lane police station in Wythenshawe, a campaign I was involved in at
the time (about 10 years ago; Platt Lane police station on the edge
of Rusholme which has a very high Asian population was notorious as
well but not nearly as bad as Hall Lane). It started with a black
man (a Rastafarian) called Shaun Morgan who had horrendous scars to
prove that he had been brutally assaulted. When I mentioned Shaun's
name, one of the police officers looked down at the ground with his
helmet covering his face.

* I talked about infiltration of the police force, particularly by a
fascist organisation called the "National Revolutionary Faction", as
the reason for institutionalised racism within the police force. I
invited people to do a search at Google Groups for "National
Revolutionary Faction". [I checked earlier today and a message I
sent out ages ago comes top of the list. I actually made a complete
guess (which I knew at the time was quite likely to be wrong but was
useful to say to illustrate how deep infiltration runs in society)
by saying that Tony Blair is an infiltrator from that fascist
organisation!!!

* I asked people to check out some of my most important discussion
groups, particularly http://groups.yahoo.com/group/steve-
biko "Nelson Mandela is evil!". I pointed out that Steve Biko was
assassinated because he was a revolutionary socialist, whereas
Mandela was jailed because he was a terrorist. As John Pilger
reported, in a documentary that I saw on British TV, nothing much
has changed for large numbers of people still living in shanty
towns, due to the betrayals of Mandela and the rest of the ANC
leadership. The description of the "steve-biko" group also provides
information about plans I have made for my band Galaxia to tour
South Africa (at some point fairly soon after the UK general
election). Also check out the "cry-freedom" discussion group about
the film of Steve Biko's life - it mentions other things like us
handing out free CDs to some of the best people who won't be able to
attend any of our gigs in the shanty towns. I ordered ten copies of
the DVD of "Cry Freedom" from http://www.amazon.co.uk yesterday and
they were 40% off, and cost less than £6 each (I paid quite a lot
for postage because on this occasion I wanted CDs to be dispatched
to me as soon as they arrive), and it will of course be a good idea
to take some Cry Freedom DVDs to the shanty towns as well. Don't buy
important books from Amazon because they may produce different
versions to mislead the working class; I once bought a book
called "Magic" supposedly by Isaac Asimov but it obviously wasn't,
but Amazon won't be able to produce a different version of a film,
album or single, so it is a good source of them on the internet.
[For more obscure stuff, try bidding for something at "ebay" or
ordering it from a different country at http://www.eil.com -
particularly important CDs that they say are avaiable may never
come, including Katrina & the Waves' CD "Roses" (which I refer to
later in this message).

* I also asked people to check out http://groups.yahoo.com/group/us-
electoral-fraud, where I point out the massive defrauding of Kerry
and the Democrats in the US Presidential election. I pointed out
that Kerry pledged to tax the rich and close all tax loopholes -
a "transitional demand" (as put forward by Militant) that cannot be
achieved under capitalism so the implementation of which would lead
to a socialist society. For this reason, I sent out the message (you
can find it on the archive of "us-electoral-fraud" and many other
places) saying that "Kerry is a revolutionary socialist In disguise!"

* I also pointed out the only website where you can find out what
has really gone on in the past, and what is now going on, in the
USA - http://www.oilempire.us. There is so much disinformation from
right-wingers and supposed left-wingers like Michael Moore.
In "Fahrenheit 9/11", Moore was playing into the hands of a very
right wing organisation that wants the USA to attack Saudi Arabia
next, by pointing out Bush's supposed links with the Saudi Royal
Family. He barely mentioned oil, which was of course by far the most
important reason for the war on Iraq, in the entire film. Mark, the
author of the oilempire.us website, points out that there is an
organisation called the Progressive Democrats of America, which
advises its members to check out the definitive website which
reveals what really went on with the attack on the Twin Towers on
9/11 (http://www.911truth.org). The most important things that are
revealed are: massive insider dealing on the US stock market the day
before the attack; a senior Republican advised not to fly to a city
where one of the attacks took place; and the US military knowing
that the planes were hijacked and heading towards the buildings and
having about 15 minutes leeway to shoot them down but failing to do
so.

Finally, as police officers were bundling me into the police van, I
pointed out that I had a "UK North" bus pass (which is great value
at £2 for a whole week down Wilmslow Road) and urging people to
boycott Stagecoach (and Magic Bus which they run) because it is run
by a homophobic bigot Brian Souter. He organised a private
referendum in Scotland (which the left campaigned for a boycott
making it less effective than Souter had intended) on teaching
homosexuality in schools, as part of the classic strategy of big
business of divide-and-rule. They didn't want children being told
that it is OK to be gay (or bisexual or transsexual). The Tories
portray themselves as the party of the family (but I was involved in
the Lashley Family Must Stay Campaign, opposing their deportation
from Moss Side to Barbados; the youngest daughter Takita was born in
this country and the Tories eventually said that she could stay but
the rest of the family had to leave - i.e. "the party of the family"
actually tried to split a family up!) and want children taught in
school that there should be two parents of opposite sex; the point
of this is historically the man has controlled the woman (hence the
word "obey" was used in marriage ceremonies) and they have together
controlled the children (often by hitting them -
withdrawing "carrots" rather than using "sticks" is the socialist
way of bringing up a family).

Stagecoach is also notorious for undercutting the competition in a
city to drive them out then putting the prices up. That company
dominates most of Manchester, but not Wilmslow Road which is the
road along which most university students travel between their
university and hall of residence. Stagecoach tried to offer students
special deals whereby they received cheaper bus passes if they
bought them soon after starting university rather than waiting a
couple of weeks. However, they were at rip-off prices compared to £2
for a weekly UK North pass and £3 for a weekly Finglands pass (which
was £2 as well until recently). Stagecoach even offered an annual
pass, which would obviously not be worth buying even if it was good
value (which it certainly isn't) because you could easily lose it.

I am pragmatic when it comes to boycotts. If I am in a hurry, I will
sometimes use a Stagecoach bus (despite the rip off prices a single
journey costs) or Magic Bus. It is actually quite a good idea
sometimes getting on such a bus (particularly a Magic Bus because
their relatively cheap fares mean they have a more working class
clientele) and talking to people (sometimes quite loudly) about why
they should boycott Stagecoach!

Yesterday, after being arrested, I was taken to Grey Mare Lane
police station in Beswick, with two other protesters in the same
van. I said quite a bit in the foyer of the police station,
sometimes shouting out above the voice of the police officer who was
typing stuff into the computer to make important political points. I
was put in a cell from about 3.15pm until 6pm, when I saw
a "doctor". I had told them very soon after arriving that I was an
informal patient on a psychiatric ward (Grafton Ward, Edale Unit,
Manchester Royal Infirmary) but they took no notice until I saw the
doctor, at which point they said that I would not be charged but I'd
be taken back to my ward - they didn't actually let me out of the
cell until 8.15pm, so I spent about five hours in there in total.

The time spent in my cell was very useful, particularly because they
had put a black member of the Revolutionary Communist Group (RCG,
referred to in the text of my leaflet included below) in the cell
next to mine. He is very good politically, and provided a great
slogan "Democracy not stooges" when I started a discussion at a
meeting of the Greater Manchester Coalition to Stop the War about
putting forward demands for democracy in Iraq. I have used that
slogan on leaflets ever since (and also on the descriptions of
my 'revolutionary-anti-war' and 'iraq-democracy' discussion groups).
There is no way that there will be any sort of free and fair
elections in Iraq while the occupation by Western troops continues.

Being kept longer on my psychiatric ward has actually proved very
useful, because I have got to know two young good looking women who
I have decided I want to join my band Galaxia: a black woman called
Mandy and particularly a Muslim called Samia. It would be very bad
politically if "Respect: the Unity Coalition" in which the SWP has
promoted Muslims with far from ideal politics gets somebody elected
in the next general election, but the "Democratic Socialist
Alliance" (which I am proposing that the Socialist Alliance in
England renames itself at its forthcoming conference, expected to be
in February) does not do likewise. I had a long political discussion
with Samia last night and she is very good politically and would
make an ideal candidate to stand against New Labour minister Keith
Bradley in Withington constituency (where the Socialist Party has
campaigned strongly in the past, particularly against the closure of
Withington Hospital; Bradley made his name campaigning against the
closure but then supported its closure by New Labour). I would also
like Jo Bird, of Jews for Justice for Palestinians, who I put as a
speaker for the meeting I was planning, to stand in Manchester
Gorton against Gerald Kaufman because he is also Jewish. It'd be
really good if the black member of the RCG who was in the cell next
to me as I mentioned above stands for the DSA in the constituency
including Moss Side (which I think is New Labour Minister Tony
Lloyd's Manchester Central). Obviously, we may have to do some
negotiating with Respect, who I'm sure will want to stand somewhere
in Manchester, but I'm mentioning these seats now, in a message I'll
be broadcasting far and wide on the internet to lay down my
priorities.

My main ally in the future is going to be a woman I knew at school
(Stanwell Comprehensive School in Penarth, a town about five miles
from Cardiff) called Rhiannon Williams, who I have got in touch with
again via "Friends Reunited". Cardiff South and Penarth just happens
to be the constituency of Alun Michael, the former hated Blairite
leader of the Welsh Assembly, who got deposed in favour of the
vaguely left-wing Rhodri Morgan. Alun Michael is now a New Labour
Minister at Westminster and since he is so hated, Rhiannon is bound
to oust him from his seat, by putting forward a radical socialist
programme which I will help write. I have been planning a mass
demonstration outside the Welsh Assembly calling for more rights for
that assembly coupled to greater democracy in the UK as a whole -
under the banner of the Campaign for Democracy in Wales, linked to
the Campaign for Democracy in the UK
(http://www.democracycampaign.org.uk). Hopefully, the Welsh
Democratic Socialist Alliance will put forward other candidates in
the Cardiff area (maybe including my best friend in my year at
school towards the end of my school life, Robert Ruiz).

Most of my father's side of the family regard themselves
as "socialists" or "communists" and usually get together in
Aberystwyth for New Year. I think that my cousin Lucy Hancock is the
best member of my family politically (apart from myself) - although
she didn't see the point in getting involved in any political
activity until the 2 million strong anti-war demo in London. She
will be an ideal candidate for the Welsh Democratic Socialist
Alliance in Aberystwyth, and hopefully Rhiannon and myself will
mobilise most of the family (including my brother, Sean Wallis, a
member of the SWP living in London, who maintains the national
website of the Stop the War Coalition) to build for a big meeting in
Aberystwyth at which Lucy will speak as a local anti-war activist
(and Rhiannon will speak as a representative of Penarth DSA after
its founding meeting the day before which I want her to chair). I
want Rosie Kane and Jo Bird to speak. I also want a good looking
Asian woman called Sonya Qureshi to speak at those meeetings on
behalf of "Show Racism the Red Card" (SRRC), an organisation to kick
racism out of football. [The lack of Asian footballers and the
dominance of men in the game will make Sonya an ideal spokesperson
for SRRC - and I talked a lot of politics with her when she was a
nurse and I was a patient on Nelson Ward at Manchester Royal
Infirmary - I have sent her my most important emails since, so I'm
sure she will have a great understanding of socialist politics.
Sonya lives near Manchester so I hope to meet up with her again
soon, and hopefully do a bit of karaoke since she's going to be in
Galaxia - I advised to start practising ages ago because there is no
way that I would be in an all-white band.] I will send out a message
for an SRRC organising meeting soon - I'm planning a big joint
SRRC/Independent Manchester United Supporters Association (IMUSA)
meeting, which IMUSA should be able to arrange at a big room at Old
Trafford (I went to a meeting where Ruud van Nistelrooy and Ole
Gunnar Solskjaer answered questions; Ruud proved himself much more
left-wing than Ole and he is clearly the best striker in the world
judging by his record of a goal a game in the Champions League).
It'd be best to have a black player and a white player speak, one
from Manchester United (preferably Rio Ferdinand since he spoke out
about the extreme level of racist taunts at the Spain-
England "friendly") and the other from Manchester City (preferably
Robbie Fowler since he once took his Liverpool shirt off to reveal a
T-shirt in support of the Liverpool Dockers, who had been sacked for
refusing to cross a picket line). IIt'll be important for SRRC to
have a branch in Glasgow too, mainly to oppose sectarianism between
Celtic fans (normally Catholic) and Rangers fans (normally
Protestant). SRRC produce videos featuring famous footballers which
are distributed to schools, and produce a yearly magazine which
features comments about racism and sectarianism from footballers
plus political articles from revolutionary socialists (there was a
brilliant article on Islamaphobia in a copy of the magazine I picked
up at the SSP conference last year by a black woman called Andrea
Ennisuoh who I used to know in the Militant; she looked so good
looking in the picture of her accompanying the article that it was
obviously taken when she was a lot younger but it must have had a
great effect on male and female football fans alike). SRRC printed
big posters publicising a Scottish Trade Union Congress (STUC) demo
against racism in Glasgow last weekend (there was one where I was
staying at North Street hostel). The STUC made sure the demo was
very small by advertising the final rally as taking place at a small
indoor venue; nevertheless, the sight of SRRC placards going through
the streets of Glasgow would have had some effect. I brought one
placard back with me to Manchester - that had a very good effect in
improving my credibility amongst other patients on my ward (which is
currently dominated by young black men). [There were also two
posters advertising "Steve Earle & the Dukes" concerts, in Glasgow
which I missed and in Edinburgh where I hope to take Rhiannon to
next week, on the walls - the posters publicised the new album "The
Revolution Starts...Now" so that anybody reading them would have a
fair idea of their politics! The hostel owner only charges £10 a
night (all the bedrooms are 8-bed dorms) which is significantly
cheaper than the Glasgow EuroHostel where I have stayed before. The
EuroHostel also has posters advertising gigs, but I have not seen a
single gig advertised that I'd be particularly interested in going
to there! The Glasgow EuroHostel is part of a chain whereas North
Street Hostel is independent. The owner started off pretending he
disagreed with most of my political views when I started discussing
with him, but he didn't. He told me has a farm as well as the hostel
and is a millionaire, and was looking to buy a new building to turn
into a second hostel. Other hostel owners on the side of the working
class are the owners (a husband and wife) of a four-star hostel
called Glades House, 142 Albert Road, G42 (near Crosshill railway
station). They have cheap rates for longer stays; it works out at
£17 a night for a single room if you stay for a week and I've been
given rooms with an extra bed in for the same price. On recent
occasions, they've been full up but I hope to stay there with
Rhiannon next week (starting on Friday night, so that we can go to
the best karaoke pub in the world, Strathies on Pollokshaws Road,
near Allison Road that evening - the SSP Xmas social is the
following Friday night so we won't want to go there then).

When I went up to Glasgow last weekend, I intended to go to a social
commemorating John Maclean in Edinburgh on the Saturday night.
However, the map I found on the internet was completely wrong, and
after wandering around for ages (there are very few signposts),
talking a lot of politics with people in different places, I
eventually wandered into a posh hotel. They said that they haven't
got any maps in English so they gave me one in Japanese - the street
names in the centre of Edinburgh on the map were completely
different from the actual layout of streets. This was obviously a
deliberate decision to keep Edinburgh overwhelmingly white by
putting off Japanese businesspeople who might be interested in
moving to Edinburgh (since it is a city with a lot of wealth, it is
an obvious place for wealthy Japanese people to invest). I've found
deliberate errors in all the maps I've bought of Glasgow (the Tory
blue £1 map you can buy at the central station, A-Z (particularly
bad because it's red, white and blue, the colours of the British
flag), Collins, Phillips - until finally I found an AA map (black
and yellow, and it says "Britain's clearest street mapping" on the
front). Obviously, I'll have to buy an AA map of Edinburgh for my
next visit (with Rhiannon hopefully).

I ended up going to what was advertised as "Edinburgh's best rock
pub". The noise that was playing was absolutely dreadful. I tend to
like "soft rock", but the jukebox contained almost entirely "hard
rock" tracks. The clientele reflected the jukebox - mainly white men
(but I found an attractive white woman to talk to who knew an
attractive Asian man) just before I left the pub to return to
Glasgow. There was the odd song on the jukebox that I thought may be
OK, but there was only one song that stood out and persuaded me to
put 30p in (I wasn't there long enough to hear it but never
mind): "Bohemian Rhapsody" by Queen. In my opinion, it is a very
left-wing song, and ideal as the first single for Galaxia.

I had planned to have five singers from the band, myself and four
women (all of whom are good looking, which is important to get a
genuine rapport with people); however, now I have identified two
more female singers who are both currently on my psychiatric ward.

"Bohemian Rhapsody" was originally performed by four white men; our
version will be really original. The singers will be myself (a white
but quarter-Jewish man with a big beard that looks to some like
Jesus Christ or Karl Marx), Rhiannon Williams (a Welsh woman, and
the most attractive woman in my year at school), Samia (a young
Muslim woman) and Mandy (a young black woman).

The other regular singers in the band (although it will not be
essential for all of them to attend all of our gigs) will be Sonya
Qureshi, a Jewish woman called Rebecca who I met on a psychiatric
ward and strongly supports justice for Palestinians (we sang Black's
song "Wonderful Life" together many times and we managed to sing it
even better than the version on "Live from the Bassline
Johannesburg", which you can get from
http://www.colinvearncombe.com, Colin uses his own name rather than
the pseudonym "Black" now, and that version was much better than the
original which is often played on the radio today - Rebecca went
back to Israel and I'm sure that she is doing her best to support
the Palestinian cause in the very difficult circumstances that exist
in that country) and a cousin on my mother's side called Juliet
Bowers.

For a long time, my favourite political band was Latin Quarter and
my favourite band for love songs was Katrina and the Waves. However,
the album "Roses" by Katrina and the Waves" is a very political
album, and the song "23rd Psalm" is by far the best anti-war song I
have heard, so they now stand out as my favourite band of all time.
I've just set up a discussion group for them (at
http://launch.groups.yahoo.com/group/katrina-and-the-waves). The
three Waves (Kimberley Rew, Vince de la Cruz and Alex Cooper) are
such good musicians and gel together really well that I want them
all in Galaxia. However, none of their songs involves a keyboard or
piano, so we obviously need somebody who is brilliant at that
instrument - fortunately, I know just the person. His name is
Lawrence Jones and he is a second cousin of mine (and a cousin of
Juliet's). He used to have a job at a posh hotel in Manchester and
could take requests. If he'd heard a song before, he'd have a good
go at playing it without needing to read the score (although he
could pick up music by reading sheet music very quickly as well).
The last I heard of his performing career was when he recorded a
single that he'd written himself with a very good female singer
accompanying him. [I heard them playing it live on a piano and it
was very good.] He started managing bands (presumably he distributed
copies of the single to contacts in the music industry rather than
releasing it to try and get it into the charts). Now, he owns (or
part owns) the fastest webspace provider in the UK, called
ukfast.net. That is a vital service for me, since I need a reliable
company for my websites which is not going to deny access to working
class people around the world; "hostway" which I used before said
that charitable status was needed to set up a ".org.uk" domain name
(which is a complete lie; it is used for a huge number of left-wing
political organisations based in the UK) and I have twice tried to
transfer www.galaxiamusic.net without success. I am going to have to
set up a "dodgy-webspace-providers" discussion group at yahoogroups
to expose them and force them to transfer the domain name across to
ukfast.net. [I thought about calling the group "corrupt-webspace-
providers", but that would risk them suing me.] The last time I saw
Lawrence was when he popped in very briefly to say hello to me at a
get-together at my uncle and aunt's house (Juliet's parents). His
hair used to be fairly long and he looked very attractive, but he
had deliberately had it cut really short to play the role of the
money-grabbing boss of a large small business.

There are two key classes in society, the working class and big
business. You have to be on one side or the other at any point in
time; you cannot be neutral - so middle class people (and even some
big businesspeople) often take the side of the working class.
Lawrence's wealth will be useful in helping to promote the band and
perhaps contribute to setting up left-wing organisations that the
band will build wherever we go in the world. The Waves must be well
off as well - they won the Eurovision Song Contest by the biggest
margin ever, because their song "Love Shine A Light" was about
spreading love around the world rather than hating each other and
having wars. In every country apart from the UK, that contest is
regarded very highly, because nowadays you have telephone voting
(whereas originally there were "juries" of people in the music
industry who decided how many points to give to each other country).
However, in Britain, the contest is presented by Terry Wogan (who
demanded a very high fee when he first presented "Children in Need" -
a telethon on BBC1 which disabled people have long campaigned
against and sometimes got into a studio to protest live on TV;
disabled activists demand "Rights not Charity") keeps saying it
is "fixed" when countries neighbouring each other give them maximum
points. Of course this is likely to happen, because there is a
crossover of cultures, people travel around a fair amount, hear each
other's songs on TV or radio, etc. Wogan even says it is "fixed"
when countries that have recently been at war with each other give
each other maximum points - even Serbia and Bosnia!

Anyway, back to the original subject of the message. I've included
below the contents of the leaflet that I produced:


North West International Socialist Movement
(http://groups.yahoo.com/group/northwestism)

Boycott Israeli goods

There has been an on-going campaign, by activists who support
Palestinian rights, to urge shoppers to boycott Israeli goods. Most
such activists have varied which shops they have picketed, but a
small group called the "Revolutionary Communist Group" (who sell the
paper "Fight Racism! Fight Imperialism!") have been concentrating on
picketing Marks & Spencer (M&S). The reason for this is a claim that
M&S not only sell Israeli goods but donate to the Israeli regime.
Some information about the dedication of M&S in the past to aid the
economic development of Israel is provided at the following web
page: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marks_&_Spencer.

Despite its history, M&S is a more ethical company than most
nowadays (perhaps due to the pressure of protesters and consumers):

• It was discovered that all supermarkets' own-brand milk and
other dairy products came from cows given partly genetically
modified feed – without customers being aware of it – with the sole
exceptions of the Co-op and M&S. Direct action activists got
organised and blockaded every Sainsbury's depot in the early hours
of one morning, attaching themselves to each other with long metal
bars which the police could not shift. No Sainsbury's milk appeared
that morning, and as a result, you can buy Cravendale milk, which
lasts seven days and tastes nicer.

• M&S sell 100% fair-trade coffee in their coffee shop and
advertise the fact prominently. Considering the extortionate prices
coffee houses in city centres sell their coffee for, there is no
excuse for not using fair-trade coffee – which gives poor farmers a
reasonable reward for their hard work.

• I also read a Guardian article recently which said
that "Just last week, the picture in the FTSE 100 worsened after the
most female-friendly board in the Guardian survey – Marks& Spencer,
with four women – lost its women executives after a shake-up." See
http://money.guardian.co.uk/work/story/0,1456,1351578,00.html.


[The text below is shown in a separate column alongside (in A4
landscape format); if I printed rather than photocopied them it
would be on the back.]

Israeli troops shot 13-year old Palestinian schoolgirl 20 times

Israeli soldiers recently murdered a Palestinian schoolgirl, Iman al-
Hams, in the Southern Gaza Strip, causing outrage in Israel. The
soldiers didn't even think she was male or older – they thought that
she was a 10-year old girl!

Israeli nuclear weapons whistleblower Vanunu rearrested

Mordechai Vanunu spent about seventeen and a half years in an
Israeli jail (with almost all of the first twelve kept in solitary
confinement) for revealing details about Israel's secret nuclear
weapons programme. He had told all the details he knew by the time
he was arrested the first time, yet he has been prevented from
leaving Israel or talking to the press. However, Mordechai has been
defiant and given some interviews. The Israeli state is not
concerned about secrets, merely being further embarrassed in the
eyes of the world. On the day that Yasser Arafat died, the 11th of
November, the Israeli state rearrested him, confiscating his
computer, and letting him out later on house arrest.

[in a text box]

North West International Socialist Movement
Launch Meeting
FREEDOM FOR PALESTINE
DATE & TIME TO BE CONFIRMED (email socialiststeve@...)
Friends' Meeting House,
Mount Street (behind Central Library)
Manchester City Centre
Speakers: David Eaton (recent visitor to Palestine & Preston local
election candidate)
Jo Bird (Jews for Justice for Palestinians)
Steve Wallis (Campaign for Democracy in the UK)


--
Steve Wallis (socialiststeve@...;
http://www.stevewallis.org).

Convenor of Manchester International Socialist Movement
(http://groups.yahoo.com/group/manchesterism).

Initiator of the Campaign for Democracy in the UK
(http://www.democracycampaign.org.uk;
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/campaign-for-democracy-in-the-uk).

Initiator of the Revolutionary Platform of the Democratic Socialist
Alliance
(http://www.revolutionaryplatformofdemocraticsocialistalliance.org;
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/revolutionary-platform-of-democratic-
socialist-alliance).