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Scan page 11

Pro Toronto Convention Centre, the party’s left wing won several significant policy and procedural victories. Leader Andrea Horwath adapted to the situation, some­ what desperate to present a progressive face to the sparse crowd, and to a some­ what indifferent electorate. The provincial Liberal government of Kathleen Wynne is in crisis, while the Tories led by Patrick Brown lead in the latest opinion polls.

“Pharmacare for Everyone” is now a central plank in the NDP platform for the 2018 Ontario provincial election. Dental Care was part of the same policy adopted, but so far is being ignored by Horwath.

Still, the gain registered for free medical drugs coverage is major, and it is in large part due to the foundation building work and steady agitation of the Socialist Cau­ cus over the past five years Moreover, it took a successful floor challenge to the resolutions appeal committee, which tried to bury these linked issues in a long list of motions.

Similarly, delegates raised the priority of a resolution calling for free post-second­ ary education, and passed it handily. This was a welcome riposte to Horwath who sidelined a similar policy adopted at the previous provincial convention. A motion calling for a big increase in welfare rates carried too.

In the mandatory Leadership Review vote, 89 per cent said no to opening up a leadership contest. This was hardly a sur­ prise given that the next provincial elec­ ... North Korea (continued from page 12: “Nuclear insanity! U.S. threatens N. Korea”)

That war saw U.S. and allied troops slaughter some 1.5 million Koreans and Chinese, with the latter entering the war only after General Douglas MacArthur, defying Pres­ ident Truman’s orders, crossed the Yalu River, intent on invading China as well. Some convincing figures put the number of Koreans and Chinese lost at more than triple this figure! U.S. troop losses were 30,000.

As with the Vietnam War, which began little more than a decade later and saw the U.S. murder 4 million Viet­ namese, the Korean War was undertaken by U.S. imperi­ alism in the name an anti-communist crusade. The now dominant post-World War II U.S. military power pro­ ceeded to extend its imperial control around the world, including through the 1953 CIA coup that overthrew the popular and elected government of Prime Minister Mohammad Mosaaddegh in Iran and U.S. military sup­ port the same year to a coup that installed a dictatorship in Guatemala, which slaughtered 400,000 indigenous peasants to defend “U.S. interests.”

In the U.S. during the same period, the McCarthy-era Cold War witch hunt was launched, which sought to (continued from page 7: “How to counter right-wing speeches”)

If neoliberal deforestation and mining is driving the emergence of multiple pathogens, where’s the money that is funding that deforestation? This is why in the book I talk about how Hong Kong and New York and London should be considered “hot spots” of disease.

That’s where the sources of capital that are driving the deforestation and development originate.

But it is not just the public health scene but the broader media and political consciousness that is or­ ganized around accepted premises that are required to continue a system that exploits people here in the States and abroad. I see it time and again in public health: brilliant, good hearted people, doing the right thing but repeatedly arriving at the wrong conclusion because they accept the premises of the system that drives the outbreaks and on which they rely.

BS: In your opinion, what should we be doing dif­ ferently, and why aren’t we doing what we should be doing?

RW: If you look at the genetics of influenza or Ebola or HIV, they are evolutionary machines. They speed through point mutations with extraordinary speed to the point where—and I describe this in the book— their evolution violates our notion of cause and effect.

HIV or influenza weekly come up with solutions to tion is a mere 14 months away. Noteworthy is the fact that over 11 per cent expressed non-con­ fidence in Horwath so late in the process, reflecting simmering discontent with the 2014 ONDP election campaign and the lead­ er’s performance since then.

Former OFL President Sid Ryan made two inspiring speeches at a floor mic. One called for public ownership of Hydro in its entirety. That prompted Horwath to quote Ryan, somewhat sheepishly but approvingly, and state that the party will strive for public own­ ership of both electricity gen­ eration and transmission lines in Ontario.

Scores of delegates wore SID stickers, encouraging him to run for federal NDP Leader. The four registered NDP Lead­ er candidates (Peter Julian, Niki Ashton, Guy Caron and Charlie Angus) cruised the outer hallway, chatting and glad-hand­ ing, but not matching the excitement that Sid Ryan and the left generated. Sadly, on April 26, Ryan pulled the plug on his po­ tential candidacy, citing personal reasons, website: http://socialistaction.ca