The European Union’s parliamentary elections revealed the fraying alliance between the U.S. and the European Union (EU), as well as the weakening of U.S. imperialism and its liberal world order. The voting also exposed the growth of openly fascist movements and the widening ruling-class splits within the most important countries in the EU. Finally, it underlined the urgent agenda for the main-wing, finance capitalist bosses as they move toward the next global military conflict.
The instability and splintering within longtime U.S. allies like Germany, France, and Britain, alongside the sharpening rivalry between the U.S. and rising imperialists in China and Russia, points squarely to an eventual world war. That’s the only way imperialists can solve their contradictions, even if only temporarily. At the same time, this volatile period offers a strong opportunity for Progressive Labor Party to organize and turn the guns around for communist revolution.
The old-guard European leadership includes the French banker president, Emmanuel Macron; Germany’s lame-duck chancellor, Angela Merkel; and Britain’s imploding Conservative/Labour establishment. They want to continue to ally with the U.S. main-wing bosses, represented by liberal Democrats like Nancy Pelosi, Joe Biden, Bernie Sanders, and Elizabeth Warren.
EU split
These Big Fascists, whose multinational alliances (like the EU and NATO) protect their long-term imperialist profits, are the ones who continue to hold lethal state power in both the U.S. and most of Europe. They’re still the main threat to the international working class. If anything, the far right’s recent surge enhances the liberal bosses’ ability to mislead workers into backing “the lesser of two evils.”
At the moment, however, the Big Fascists are under siege from more domestically-oriented bosses. These Little Fascists are crudely racist nationalists who share an isolationist, short-term, profit-taking outlook. They don’t want to be taxed for the next big war because their investments are less directly tied to imperialism. As finance capital finds its core interests threatened, the main-wing bosses will necessarily resort to fascism to unite and discipline their own ranks. Then they will intensify their attacks on the working class in preparation for World War III.
The growing split between these two camps can be seen in the EU parliamentary election results in the following countries:
- Germany: The ruling main-wing coalition parties, the Christian Democrats and Social Democrats, both took major hits. The Little Fascist Alternative for Germany made gains in eastern Germany, while the outsider liberal Greens grew among young, urban voters, mainly in the west.
- Italy: The openly fascist, anti-immigrant League swept the field and won more than a third of the vote, expanding from its base in the north and more than doubling its support in just one year.
- France: Marine Le Pen’s National Rally won big on an anti-immigrant platform, mainly in rural areas, defeating Macron’s En Marche! party, which remained strong in cities.
- Britain: Nigel Farage’s anti-EU Brexit Party, formed just six weeks earlier, won an easy victory. The Conservative and Labour Parties, which together represent London-based finance capital, combined for just 23 percent of the vote.
In general, the centrist coalition that has run the European Parliament for decades lost its majority of seats, declining from 54 percent to 43 percent (npr.org, 5/27).
Weakening EU vacilates between imperialist rivals
The European Union, made up of 28 European countries, or 27 if and when Britain leaves, was created in 1993 to counter the almighty rule of U.S. imperialism in the post-Soviet era. The EU is essentially a borderless union to increase the bosses’ profits through a free flow of goods and labor. On one level, the Union has worked well for the blood-sucking bosses.
The EU’s trade structure has propelled it to become the world’s second-largest economy after China. It produced $19.9 trillion….China produced $23.1 trillion and the U.S. was third, producing $19.4 trillion(The Balance, 2/27).
As the EU rulers attempt to cope with both their struggling economies and waning political influence, some are turning toward China and Russia—and away from a weakening U.S.—for trade, alliances, and security. A number of countries are actively hedging their bets. In fact, the escalating trade war between the U.S. and China appears to be pushing much of the EU toward the China camp. France and Germany have publicly resisted U.S. President Donald Trump’s threat campaign to ban the Chinese telecom giant Huawei, though two British carriers “said they would not offer Huawei phones to customers who wanted access to their new 5G services” (New York Times, 5/24).
Meanwhile, Europe’s open fascists seem to be pivoting toward Russia. In a recent scandal in Austria, the deputy prime minister and leader of the far-right Freedom Party was forced to resign after a video showed him offering government contracts to a reported Russian oligarch’s niece (CNBC 5/22).
The main danger
Millions of workers in Europe are rightly skeptical about the EU, a capitalist creation that has created widespread unemployment and gross inequality. But because of the decline of class consciousness since the reversal of the communist revolutions in China and Russia, many of these workers are falling for the old divide-and-conquer trick of racism. “...In some countries, such as Poland and Germany, extremist parties have risen in popularity despite decent rates of G.D.P. growth. Migration, racism, demagoguery, and the development of social media have all played significant roles” (New Yorker, 5/30).
Despite the alarming rise of a new generation of open Nazis, the liberal Big Fascists remain the main danger to our class. These main-wing finance capitalists are committed to maintaining U.S. control over the Middle East and its cheaply extracted oil and natural gas. They are pulling out the stops to build a patriotic, multiracial mass movement to convince workers to fight and die in the next world war. They’re creating reformist anti-revolutionary mass movements like Black Lives Matter or the various European Green parties to channel working class anger into electoral politics and an agenda for war and fascism.
When workers lack class consciousness and a communist understanding of the world, they see reforming capitalism as their only option for a better life. They side with one camp of bosses or another. But relying on any bosses’ side is a lose-lose strategy for our class. Neither the Big Fascists nor the Little Fascists can make capitalism work for workers. They can bring us only exploitation, oppression, and a living hell on earth.
Fight for communism!
The rulers’ deepening instability means increased racism, sexism, nationalism, and attacks on the working class. But as we immerse ourselves in the rulers’ mass movements, injecting communist politics, exposing the bosses’ hypocrisy and fighting off their attacks, we will build confidence in the working class. This is a necessary step toward building an international communist movement and transforming the bosses’ wars into communist revolution. Only then will our class be able to seize state power and lead society for the benefit of billions, not the profits of a few billionaires. Join us!
CHICAGO, May 22—Over 30 workers from Mount Sinai Hospital on the city’s west side united this morning to boldly challenge their racist and sexist bosses. What began as a mild speak-out organized by the union around contract negotiations, evolved into a much more militant action, as workers courageously decided to sharpen this reform struggle.
Communist workers in the Progressive Labor Party (PLP) are in this fight to improve working conditions and help build for an egalitarian society without racism or sexism. We envision a bright future when we smash the capitalist profit motive, and replace it with communism, a society that filfulfills the needs of our working class brothers and sisters.
Black, Latin, and white workers, young and old, male and female were all present in an inspiring display of multi-racial unity. Many different job classes were represented, from dietary workers to nurses, from housekeepers to respiratory therapists, as we sharpened our understanding of our common interests against the bosses’ exploitation.
Marching on the bosses
Today marked the start of new contract negotiations between the Mount Sinai workers, represented by the SEIU healthcare union local, and the bosses. Among our chief demands for a new contract are higher wages, safe staffing, dignity and respect on the job, and employer-paid healthcare. We are also making the demand that all other groups of hospital workers get recognition from the bosses and become part of a wall-to-wall hospital-wide union.
The union first organized us to speak at a rally in front of the hospital, then march inside to deliver a poster board with our collective demands signed by hundreds of Mount Sinai workers to the CEO, Karen Teitelbaum. The entire group of workers crammed into the executive office, only to be informed that she had not yet arrived. (Funny that, workers have spoken up about being disciplined for being just one minute late while the boss can stroll in whenever she wants!)
Thinking the action was drawing to a close, we left the poster board in the office and started making our way out of the hospital. Just then who should we see walking in the hallway but Teitelbaum herself. We wasted no time in confronting her.
A worker shouted, “We want better working conditions!” At this, Teitelbaum showed her true colors, condescendingly raising her finger and insisting that we be silent out of respect for the patients. As if she really cared about the patients over profits! Flustered, she stammered something about “proper time and place” and a “chain of command” before storming off in a huff.
Not boxed in by bosses or unions
Most of us were pretty shocked by her response, and the union organizers started to usher people back to the entrance of the hospital to start talking to the media. But one nurse wasn’t having any of it. She marched directly after Teitelbaum to confront her personally in her office. Like many others, she knew that individual workers who try to go through the “chain of command” are ignored or pacified with little or no action by the hospital administration. It becomes obvious the bosses are there to oppress workers and to keep a lid on any fightback.The nurse was fully ready to confront Teitelbaum by herself, but a PLP comrade quickly
organized the majority of workers in the hallway to go back into the executive office to support the nurse’s bold move. More than 20 of us found ourselves back in the office, demanding to address our complaints then and there, not waiting for the official start of the bargaining meetings. This was workers learning how to organize ourselves to fight back. This was a taste of workers’ power. This was a glimpse of a communist future when workers run all of society.
Our class enemies, were clearly shaken by our initiative. They agreed to an impromptu meeting in which workers took turns blasting them for the racist and sexist working conditions. They pretended to be concerned and made notes about our grievances. It was satisfying to see them squirm as the workers briefly got the jump on them.
It was also satisfying to see workers move past the boundaries of the union’s passive action and turn it into something more militant. The unions have a lot of resources and talk a big game, but at the end of the day, their role is to put caps on the workers’ movement and keep the racist and sexist capitalist system intact. Only by fighting for true workers’ power – communism – by building a mass PLP can we ever expect to overcome the deadly attacks of capitalism and create a society that serves our needs.
Workers deserve communism
The working class is capable and deserving of more than what any union or boss can offer them. It’s up to those of us in PLP involved in this campaign to broaden the scope of this anti-sexist, anti-racist struggle and win more comrades and friends to the only real fight for workers’ liberation: communist revolution. More on this fight to come!
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Haiti: Small victories and revolution grow out of fightback
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- 15 June 2019 75 hits
Haiti—These are bad days for the bosses and their lackey politicians. There is hardly any growth in the capitalist economy. But it’s even worse for workers—double-digit inflation, currently at 15% (worldbank.org). The value of the Haitian gourde is falling at breakneck speed (currently 95 hgd (Haitian gourdes) to $1 U.S.,while just last year it was 66 :1), meaning the cost of living really went up about 50 percent. And with an unemployment rate of 70 percent (haitipartners.org), life is an agonizing struggle. The masses are angry!
Tens of thousands took to the streets throughout Haiti on June 9 to demand the ouster of Pres. Moïse Jovenel, just found guilty of allowing the theft of PetroCaribe funds (profits from the sale of subsidized Venezuelan oil). As our comrades here pointed out, amid the police bullets and teargas, the whole damn system is putrid and cannot be fixed just by putting another actor in the same role. The whole play has to be rewritten—communism—with the working class and its communist party in charge.
Capitalism feeds Haitian workers misery
The world produces enough food to feed twice the number of inhabitants on the planet (Jean Ziegler, La faim dans le monde expliquée à mon fils, 2011). Yet food insecurity (a socio-economic term, indicating hunger and starvation) threatens 2.6 million working class people here (out of a population of 11 million), and 386,000 in phase 4 starvation, according to the last report of the CNSA (National Council for Food Insecurity, cnsa509.org). Each working class person—here or anywhere in the world—who dies of starvation is actually murdered, and the capitalist system is the assassin.
Six million Haitians live below the poverty line with a daily income of $2.41 U.S. ; 2.5 million live in “extreme poverty,” with $1.23 U.S. per person (worldbank.org). Although tuition is “free” in public universities in Haiti, the rulers line their pockets by increasing the “fees.” In Public University of the South, the university fees were 4,000 hgd in 2015; between 2016 and 2018 they were raised to 10,0000 hgd. This year, the school administrators demanded another 25 percent. Most students in public universities are children of the working class, who clearly don’t have the economic ability to pay these outrageous fees and fee hikes. University bosses know this, but cast a blind eye to the difficulties of their students and their parents. They are only concerned with digging an even deeper ditch of social inequality. Yet things didn’t go as expected.
PLP, a party for the international working class
A member of Progressive Labor Party (PLP) is studying at this university. While most students were complaining about fees, she gathered friends to demand no fee hike. They wrote a letter to the university dean and demanded a meeting to discuss the issue. Never having experienced a militant and unbending student delegation protesting a university decision before, the dean was speechless. He feared the birth of a radical movement on this campus, following the tradition of militant communist student movements throughout the region. The dean rescinded the fee hikes, for the moment!
But the struggle is clearly not over. Our PLP comrade made it clear to her classmates that raising fees in one public university where there is already hardly enough funding and resources for those who want to attend, let alone enough students who have the economic means to attend, is just another attempt to block access of the working class to education in general. They agreed that this was a class question and would have to be fought by the working class as a class. And that this was a small victory that might be taken away at any moment, and that they must keep up the fight. Our comrade was initially disappointed that many more students did not join the struggle, out of fear of repercussions or inexperience in struggle. However, she learned the important lesson of working with the most advanced and class-conscious students around her, building their confidence in organizing struggle, with the outlook of having them bring along others as the struggle grows.
Our Party is a party of the working class; we are involved in class struggle, big and small. We point out every attack against our class in order to fight for and win the liberation of our class from the yoke of capitalist exploitation and misery. Our young student comrade has only recently joined the Party. Yet with the support of the Party, she is learning to arm herself with the ideas Marxism-Leninism and to bring these ideas to the class struggle on her campus, and beyond. Her plan is to organize a PLP study group with some of her friends in struggle, to develop both her and their revolutionary leadership.
While millions of workers and their families in this part of the world currently known as Haiti can’t find enough to feed themselves, and many more are under constant exploitation, engaging in anti-capitalist and pro-communist class struggle is more important than ever. For a small few, it’s a good life, but at our expense! The only way out of this trap is to make the commitment to fight the system and smash it completely. The only solution is communist revolution, under the leadership of the PLP.
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Letter: Anti-abortion fight plays into hands of Democrats
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- 15 June 2019 77 hits
Voting for liberals will not protect women’s reproductive rights. This fact was not the atmosphere of the May 21 rally that Planned Parenthood of NYC hosted against the anti-abortion laws. It was the kind of rally the bosses wanted. It was a collection of middle-class white women who believe that the next presidential elections will put an end to the Trump trend. There also were a few white middle class men there. Routine.
Six states passed a six-week abortion ban, including Georgia, Ohio, Mississippi, Kentucky, Iowa, and North Dakota. Most women don’t even realize they’re pregnant at that time. This includes cases of rape, incest, and human trafficking. Alabama governor Kay Ivey signed a near-full ban on the procedure, the harshest anti-abortion measure in the country (The Cut, 5/21).
The issue of reproductive rights is an attack by the bosses. It’s the same bosses who let police kill Black and brown youth—including young women like
Shantel Davis, Kyam Livingston and more. It’s the same bosses who pay white males more than any other group and pay Black women the least. These workers must take a multiracial stand on all these issues. Working-class women are affected the most. Working-class men need to show up. Once we see the connection, the workers cannot be defeated.
Anything you believe is a feminist issue, we see as a communist issue. The workers cannot win if we are divided. That was our stance as we distributed CHALLENGE. This led to a fairly cool response from the crowd but we stuck to our position.
The workers who unite will be victorious when it comes to reproductive healthcare issues. The answer to the sexism women face is communism. We don’t simply mean that communism is good for women; we mean that women should be leading the fight for communism. It’s the only way sexism, police terror, or any other fascist attacks the workers face will be beaten back.
On May 13, on Chicago’s West Side police shot and killed yet another Black man, 26-year-old Sharell Brown. A Progressive Labor Party member was informed soon after the deadly shooting by one of their hospital co-workers. They quickly relayed this to fellow Party members who went door-to-door in an effort to get more information about the killing. It was reported on the Internet that Sharell was shot multiple times in confrontations with two cops, who—of course—claimed he was shooting at them. PL’ers went to neighborhood people to give PL’s perspective on the need to organize in order to advance the fight against these racist murders. They brought CHALLENGE with them too to help bring home that racism pervades the whole country and is the life-blood of U.S. capitalism. Capitalism needs and breeds racist hatred and racist murder, and if there’s going to be an end to racist murders it means building and winning the revolutionary fight for communism. It’s the only way.
Just like police killings all over the U.S., this police murder came as no surprise to the West Side. Police murders here are not rare. Last summer, another young Black man, 15-year-old Steven Rosenthal was killed by a cop who claimed that Steven committed suicide at the back door of his grandmother’s house after being chased on foot by the cops. PLP joined Steven’s family and friends in many marches to protest this fake account, which was supported by the Chicago Police Department.
The lives of Black folk in poor neighborhoods like the West Side are cheap to capitalist bosses. They not only don’t care but have to harass, pin crimes on, jail and terrorize working people, especially Black workers, to keep them down. The police are an essential part of the whole machine that oppresses working people and then blames them for the problems we face. Those who run the U.S. look like they’re above it all, because the cops do their dirty work.
PL’ers distributed CHALLENGEs and made contacts in an effort to develop a bigger base to keep the fight going. We’re clear that we need to get the word out to our co-workers and neighbors. One way was to have our May Day March and Dinner this year in the community itself. As we marched, many said that we all need to get better organized. It’s said that the bosses create their own gravediggers, but it’s not enough to be a gravedigger. You have to take the life out of capitalism first to have something to put in the grave. We’ll be continuing to protest this latest killing and to organize for the struggles to come.
