November 1, 1974

A closer look at AFF ownership and policy gives a vivid glimpse of the way Puerto Rican society is ruled by U.S. monopoly capital.

The AFF is the commonwealth government department that controls electric and water service on the island. In recent months it has been the target of angry consumer protests as electric bills have skyrocketed. For some residents, the rates have shot up in six months from $12 a month to $94.35. Boycotts, pickets, and public forums have been organized in many communities and housing cooperatives throughout the island.

This same AFF that pays millions of dollars a year in interest, gives lower rates to U.S. corporations, and makes deals with CORCO [the Commonwealth Oil Refining Corp.] to unload higher oil costs onto working people—pleaded poverty last year when its employees demanded better benefits. The AFF claimed that it had a $10-million deficit and refused to concede to workers' demands for better insurance benefits and overtime pay.

The domination of U.S. business in Puerto Rico's electric power utility is only one example of the ways in which Yankee imperialism exploits the people of Puerto Rico. This small Caribbean island has become a haven for North American capitalists seeking high profits. "Where else can you get 100% exemption from all taxes, federal taxes included?" exhorts a recent commonwealth government advertisement in Business Week. The ad urges U.S. manufacturers to establish plants in Puerto Rico because "wages are lower than in any other industrial area of the U.S."  
 

October 31, 1949

Stalin's pressure against Yugoslavia keeps mounting as his warlike moves multiply. Soviet troops continue to maneuver demonstratively along Yugoslav frontiers. War hysteria against the Tito regime is being whipped up to new heights in the Balkans. The Yugoslav envoy is expelled from Moscow.

Columnist Drew Pearson reported on Oct. 23 that the "chief reason why all American ambassadors from the Iron Curtain countries have been summoned to meet in London" is that the U.S. government has information from the Balkans indicating that the Kremlin "plans to infiltrate Bulgarian, Hungarian and Rumanian troops into Yugoslavia to start a revolution against Tito. Moscow would then trumpet this to the world as a revolution by Yugoslav patriots and would march across the border."

Meanwhile the political preparations for such incursions and similar attacks are being carefully carried out. Highly significant in this connection are inspired reports of mass uprisings in Yugoslavia. On Oct. 25 the Daily Worker featured a dispatch from Sofia to the effect that Yugoslav workers have allegedly been engaging in strikes and a "mass boycott" as part of a rising tide of "popular resistance" against the Tito regime. We may expect a barrage of similar reports in the next period.  
 
 
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