I think the big tragedy of the Cuban Revolution was that it became dependent on the Soviet Union, and it became dependent on the Soviet Union under a very reactionary bureaucratic regime led by Leonid Brezhnev.

The function of a bourgeois democracy is to secure the consent of the masses to their own exploitation and oppression.

In many parts of the world, including the Arab world, the Latin American world, and even parts of the Western world, there is a tradition of writers being quite engaged. Particularly in the Arab world you have had very, very strong traditions of literature and poetry and most of the writers have been deeply committed to the cause of the Arab nation.

I think the big tragedy of the Cuban Revolution was that it became dependent on the Soviet Union, and it became dependent on the Soviet Union under a very reactionary bureaucratic regime led by Leonid Brezhnev.

If there is a Greek exit from the Eurozone, I think the German elite will be quite pleased that they can then use that to restructure the Eurozone and make it a zone where only strong countries are allowed in. There would then be two tiers within the European Union, which is in fact already happening. But you cannot simply get rid of German control by raising the specter of the Third Reich. That's ahistorical.

The European Union has lost virtually all of its credibility amongst large swaths of the European population.

I've called David Cameron worse things than joker....and a former Prime Minister Tony Blair is widely referred to as a war criminal.