Peace on Earth…

...and mercy mild. God and sinners reconciled. Or so we’re told at this time of the year. But though it’s supposed to be the season of goodwill we won’t see much of it in this sceptred isle the heartland of imperialism. The great and the good will make their annual obeisance to the Prince of Peace, whom they claim to worship, while ignoring his teachings for the rest of the year. They rejoice at regime change in Syria while turning a blind eye to the sectarian violence that is now sweeping the country. They fuel the proxy war against Russia in Ukraine while ignoring the Zionists’ genocidal war against the Palestinian Arabs in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip.
Celebrating the winter solstice goes back to hallowed antiquity. Stone Age hunter-gatherers whose lives revolved around the seasons appeased the gods to ensure the return of spring. The Romans called it Saturnalia – when masters served their slaves in orgies of feasting and drinking in a festival in which all the rules of society could be temporarily broken.
Though some of these traditions linger on in today’s orgy of consumer delight we are still supposedly celebrating the birth of Jesus of Nazareth, the man who told his followers that it was “easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God”. But do any of the rich, or his latter-day apostles, believe it?
The Pharisees churn out the usual platitudes about the “poor and needy” while ignoring the words of their Master who drove the money-changers out of the Temple and told his followers to “go, sell what you possess and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven”. Meanwhile the Archbishop of Canterbury resigns after a report revealed that he failed to act on allegations of boys being flogged by a man closely linked to the Anglican hierarchy while the Archbishop of York comes under similar fire for not taking action against another pervert within the Church of England. 
The Starmer government pleads poverty to justify means-testing the pensioners’ winter fuel benefit. It won’t pay compensation to the three million or so women born in the 1950s who were not properly informed about the state pension age increase. But it can find plenty to fuel the proxy war against Russia and pay for Trident and the rest of our so-called nuclear “deterrent”.  
But there are reasons to be cheerful. The Starmer government is deeply unpopular and the Tories are split over the Faragist challenge. Though Starmer has driven Jeremy Corbyn and most of his supporters out of the Labour Party the former Labour leader is back in Parliament leading the Independent Alliance on the opposition benches. A new fight-back against austerity has begun and London is rocked on a monthly basis by hundreds of thousands of protesters demanding justice for the Palestinians and an end to the genocide in Gaza.
The ruling class maintains that capitalism is the only game in town. And it is – but only for themselves. Capitalism, in the final analysis, is simply a system designed to perpetuate the rule of the landowners, industrialists and capitalists to ensure that a tiny handful of parasites can live the lives of Roman emperors off the backs of the millions upon millions of working people. There is only one solution to the capitalist crisis and that is socialism. Let’s make that our resolution for the New Year. Speed the day!