Perhaps nothing elicits more disagreement and debate among Marxists and other left activists than a discussion about the media. There is no doubt that the mass media is omnipresent, mediating every aspect of our lives. How one relates to and interprets the world is largely coloured by how the media informs us. The disconnect between what is happening on the ground, and how it is reported in the media becomes even more clear during periods in which workers and youth engage in mass struggle. Excluding those directly participating in the Occupy movement, the public at large was presented with a somewhat distorted picture of what was happening on the ground.

Amazing! There is no other word that can describe the situation on October 3. Workers all over Indonesia went on strike and took to the streets. This first national general strike in half a century truly raises expectations and hopes that it will be a turning point for the Indonesian labour movement.

Venezuelan president Hugo Chávez has won, yet again, the presidential elections on Sunday October 7, with a comfortable margin of 54.84% against the 44.55% of his opponent Henrique Capriles. This is another victory for the Bolivarian revolution which should be used in order to carry out the revolution to the end.

It is hard to believe that nearly four years have already passed since the election of Barack Obama. The streets were filled with honking cars, waving flags, and shouts of excitement. Tears of unbridled joy and relief streamed down the faces of many. After eight long years of Bush, change had come at last! Or had it? As the months—and the crisis—wore on, it became increasingly clear that in all essentials, Obama’s presidency was more like Bush 2.0 than a new dawn of peace and prosperity.

The National-led government has passed the legislation by one vote in parliament to part-privatise 4 state owned energy companies. This is a highly unpopular policy with the public with all polls showing 70% or more members of the public opposing the sales. Such opposition is not surprising as New Zealanders have learned through the bitter experience of the consequences of privatisations in the 80s and 90s.

On July 1^stover a $1 billion of government cuts will start to come into effect and will be phased in over the next 3 years. This is from the 2011 budget. Therefore any suggestion that the 2012 budget was austerity-lite is just a smoke screen. The 2012 budget will go down as the budget that taxed the earned pocket money of children; student allowance removed for post graduates - making it virtually impossible for working class post graduates to access such courses, as well as an attempt by government to inform the public that the way to improve a child's education is to sack a 1000 teachers and increase class sizes. The higher education proposals were met by student demonstrations showing the volatility that exists within society. Increasing class sizes was dropped very quickly indeed when it ignited a wider public furore in the country.

Since ancient times, homosexuality has been documented amongst humans. Despite this, there is considerable debate, even amongst Marxists, as to whether homosexuality is a lifestyle choice or the product of genetics or a combination of both. While many Marxist groups have come out in favour of supporting gay rights, Stalinists condemned homosexuality for decades as a bourgeoisie perversion and in most countries where the Stalinists seized power homosexuality was banned.

Just five years ago, not a day would go by without global warming making the headlines. The American politician Al Gore’s documentary film about climate change, An Inconvenient Truth, was seen by hundreds of thousands in cinemas across the world. The National Party re-branded themselves as the champions of the environment, nailing their ecological colours to the mast and urging people to ‘vote Blue / Green’. Even the arch-reactionary American president George W. Bush was forced to concede that, maybe, the environment was worth thinking about.

The Muslim Brotherhood's candidate Mohammed Mursi has won Egypt's presidential election with 51.73% of the vote. Ahmed Shafiq, the candidate of the military, got 48.27%, according to the election commission. However these figures should be treated with caution.