NEW YORK, October 19—Cheers from working-class fighters filled Chinatown’s Jing Fong restaurant in celebration today, as the 83-85 Bowery tenants (see Challenge 3/21) marked a historic victory against their racist slumlord Joseph Betesh. After a long struggle, the majority Asian tenants returned to their apartments in August. Betesh had colluded with corrupt NYC agencies like the Department of Buildings to have more than 75 tenants evicted in January after he reported building violations—ones he had done nothing to fix for years! The tenants were sent to shelters and single room occupancy hotels throughout the city. In the months before this victory, Progressive Labor Party (PLP) joined the displaced tenants of 85 Bowery, along with Black, Latin, and white workers who formed part of the Coalition to Protect Chinatown and Lower East Side, and other citywide anti-displacement groupings to swing our collective fist to beat Betesh and guarantee their return home.
Under capitalism, housing is a commodity that many working people have trouble affording, but which is the source of great fortune for developers and landlords. The lack of affordable housing is a serious crisis in NYC and other cities, with developers mostly building luxury housing and landlords trying to squeeze as much rent as possible out of tenants, while providing few services. In NYC alone, one million rent stabilized units have been lost since 2005 (wall treet journal 9/25).
Many hundreds of thousands in NYC are homeless, or doubled up with other families, or living in cramped and decrepit quarters. This in a city with the world’s highest number of billionaires!
Tenants unite against Betesh
When slumlord Betesh purchased 83-85 Bowery – along with eleven other buildings – in 2013, he began a relentless effort to force out long-time tenants and convert the buildings into luxury condos. Betesh used every dirty tactic he could to remove the tenants. It began when one worker received an illegal eviction notice. Immediately, occupants  banded together to form the 83-85 Bowery tenants’ association, dedicated to collectively resisting Bettesh’s many efforts, to evict or buy them out. Rather than falling into the trap of blaming gentrification on white workers, or viewing it as an individual workers failure, the tenants saw that these problems stemmed from the city’s rezoning plans favoring luxury development.
Throughout this fight, tenants united with the community to fight in favor of the Chinatown Working Group Plan. This is a plan developed by workers and organizations on the Lower East Side that would grant tenants legal protections and control over the city planning process. It would limit building heights, put a cap on rents, and ensure that any housing built be affordable. The tenants’ victory and their sponsorship of the plan has now galvanized dozens of neighborhood groups in the cross hairs of the city’s displacement agenda to take action.
Communism will solve the housing problem
One of the tasks that communism must devote itself to is guaranteeing that everyone has high-quality housing, integrated with nearby high-quality schools, recreational and health facilites, libraries and art spaces, and daycare and community centers. Housing will not be privately-owned, it will not be racially segregated, and it will be democratically run by councils of tenants. In the meantime, under capitalism we fight against the landlords and the city agencies that support them.
Lessons from Workers of 85 Bowery
The importance of the 83-85 Bowery victory did not lie in legal proceedings, or even the hunger strikes the tenants bravely waged. It came from elevating their battle from being against one slumlord to a much larger war against the city’s racist housing plan that is displacing workers. While housing battles historically have been reformist in nature, not challenging private ownership,  PLP workers engage in these struggle because of their potential to elevate the anti-displacement battle from a working-class reform to communist revolution.
The tenants victory did not come easily. Betesh and the city’s pro-capitalist apparatuses spared no expense to try stopping the tenants’ return efforts. In a cruel effort to break their spirit their slumlord threw their belongings in dumpsters. During a City Hall hunger strike, the Klan in Blue tried intimidating workers protesting by keeping an uncomfortably close watch, and asking us to keep our signs off their bosses’ property. Mayor De Blasio’s office removed port-o-potties, even after we received permits for them days earlier.
When the bosses discovered our plan to organize this hunger strike they mailed each tenant appointments to meet with HPD (Housing of Preservation and Development) workers for public housing in the Bronx the same day it launched! However, the tenants and their supporters continued to push back with more demonstrations and endless grit. They were able to win no rent increases, rent stabilization for both buildings, and monetary compensation.  
No reform struggle, no matter how impressive, will solve the housing crisis for working people. Yet, we must continue fighting the intolerable living conditions and the threat of displacement. The success of the 85 Bowery struggle came from its ability to unify our class around rezoning as a worker led process. Struggles such as this not only have the potential to build workers’ power, but will also build the confidence our class needs to win the more decisive battle to smash this system, and its racist borders be it locally or internationally, for a worker run communist society where decent housing will be provided for all.

HONOLULU, October 11—“This is real education!” a professor shouted as a strike-support rally at the University of Hawaii (UH) drew to an end. It truly was. The rally also inspired because it represented the potential for mass worker-student solidarity and an island-wide working-class movement against the evils of capitalism.
About 2,700 workers had been on strike against Marriott, the world’s largest hotel chain, for three days. Organizers from Unite Here Local 5 got together with faculty and student leaders to hold a strike-support rally in front of university’s School of Travel Industry Management.
Everyone cheered when it was announced that a United Airlines’ flight crew had checked out of Marriott’s Sheraton Princess Kaiulani hotel, and that the International Association of Flight Attendants was supporting the strike. The Sheet Metal Workers and the United Public Workers unions in Hawaii have also taken actions to support the strike.The slogan for the strike is “One job should be enough.” This expresses the feeling that mass poverty among U.S. workers can no longer be tolerated and awareness that only worker rebellion can bring change. Workers shouldn’t need two jobs to survive, but the grim reality is that they do. A Local 5 hotel housekeeper gets $22 per hour. The National Low Income Housing Coalition estimates that it takes more than $35 per hour to afford to rent a two-bedroom apartment.
Everyone at the rally voiced enthusiasm for building unity between workers off campus and UH students, teaching assistants, professors and workers. The rally was also the first of its kind at UH. No one could remember a campus rally led by rank-and-file workers.
The following morning, a march of about 200 workers and supporters in Waikiki picketed  in front of Marriott hotels,and ended with a demonstration on the beach next to the giant Moana Surfrider luxury hotel. The speeches and chants were an inspiring show of worker determination to fight for as long as it takes to win the strike.

What is winning?
This raises the question, what does winning mean? The Marriott workers may gain a meaningful wage hike and greater job security. But, as many of the speakers at the strike rallies have been saying, workers throughout the state have been under attack from the bosses for a long time and the working class has suffered defeats as social and environmental problems worsen.
The Marriott struggle must be seen as one part of an ongoing worker’s struggle. For example, on the same day local workers joined the nationwide hotel strike, local postal workers joined a series of nationwide protests against Trump’s latest attack on the working class, a proposal that the postal service be completely privatized. The capitalists are determined to intensify super-exploitation of workers. This means more racist, sexist and anti-immigrant attacks aimed at dividing the working class.
Strikers called for a “fair share” of the massive profits capitalists gain from tourism. Working people should not have to share anything with capitalists. We have to build a communist movement uniting all working people to eliminate capitalism once and for all. Participating in such strikes helps us learn to fight back.
The rallies this week were well organized and spirited, but they weren’t big enough. Mass leafleting in advance might have increased participation. The message that the Marriott workers’ struggle is everyone’s struggle and part of an ongoing anti-capitalist struggle must be brought out forcefully to thousands.

In late September, Meng Hongwei, a Chinese security chief and the president of Interpol, the international police organization, flew to China from his home in France—and disappeared. On October 7, Interpol announced he had resigned his position after a “watchdog” for China’s arch-capitalist “Communist” Party reported online that Meng was “’suspected of violating the law and is currently under the monitoring and investigation’ of China’s new anti-corruption body, the National Supervision Commission” (foxnews.com, 10/7).
As imperialist powers China, the U.S., and Russia prepare for World War III, they need more intense fascism, both to control and attack the working class and to discipline their own ruling classes. With its one-party system and significantly state-owned economy, unconstrained by the charade of electoral “democracy” or presidential term limits, the Chinese rulers have a head start on the rising fascist U.S. bosses—a potential advantage in the global conflict to come.  President Xi Jinping is imposing unity from above in a public crusade against corruption, acts of Small Terrorism (versus the Big Terrorism of the state), and political disagreement. Meng’s arrest sent out a flare that even the Chinese Gestapo is not safe:
The appeal by Meng’s wife for justice and fairness echoed pleas from the families of scores of people who have fallen out favor from the Chinese Communist Party under President Xi Jinping’s rule. Some of them might have been pursued by Chinese authorities under Meng’s watch as vice minister for public security.
Such targets, who have been subject to arbitrary detention and made unexplained disappearances, include pro-democracy activists, human rights lawyers, officials accused of graft or political disloyalty and the estimated one million ethnic minority [Uighur] Muslims…. [see CHALLENGE, 9/26].
Xi, China’s most powerful leader since Mao Zedong, has overseen a harsh crackdown on civil society that is aimed at squelching dissent and activism among lawyers and rights advocates.He has also used a popular and wide-ranging anti-corruption campaign to boost supervision of the party and as a powerful weapon with which to purge his political opponents (foxnews.com, 10/7).
Four days before the news broke on Meng’s fall from grace, world-famous actress Fan Bingbing, the highest-paid celebrity in China, was fined $129 million for tax evasion “and other offences” (bbc.com, 10/3). Xi was sending another message: The rich are expected to contribute their share to China’s war plans and ambitious national projects for global dominance, namely the one Belt and Road infrastructure initiative and Made in China 2025, a bid for supremacy in robotics, artificial intelligence, quantum computing, and cybersecurity, among other tech sectors. Though U.S. President Donald Trump is imposing tariffs on more than $250 billion in Chinese imports, China has shown no signs of backing down from the escalating trade war or its ambition to be the world’s number-one economy. As Chinese Commerce Minister Zhong Shan noted, “The U.S. should not underestimate China’s resolve and will” (Bloomberg News, 10/9).
China’s rising militarism
One aspect of rising fascism is the funneling of massive resources into military forces and equipment, a prelude to inter-imperialist warfare. In April, China deployed its first ever “Made in China” aircraft carrier. In the last decade alone, it has built more than 100 warships and submarines (Asia Times, 9/10/18).
In taking on the U.S., China’s bosses may choose not to go it alone. Last month, China staged its largest joint military exercise with Russia, which “has the largest [nuclear] arsenal of any country and is investing heavily in the modernization of its [7,000] warheads and delivery systems” (icanw.org]. The exercise coincided with the Eastern Economic Forum attended by Russia, China, and Japan (Economist, 9/6).  
Fasicsm strikes the Internet
According to the September/October issue of Foreign Affairs, the U.S. main-wing bosses’ authoritative publication, “the United States has ceded leadership in cyberspace to China.” While reaping “the economic, diplomatic, national security, and intelligence benefits that once flowed to Washington,” China’s rulers are also molding an Internet “that guides public opinion, supports good governance, and fosters economic growth but also is tightly controlled so as to stymie political mobilization and prevent the flow of information that could undermine the regime.”
One hallmark of fascism is ideological control over information—or disinformation—to serve the nationalist, racist agenda of capitalist bosses in crisis. At the same time, the Internet provides unprecedented power and reach for surveillance of workers and any capitalists who aren’t with the program. As Foreign Affairs notes:
Over the last five years, Beijing has significantly tightened controls on websites and social media. In March 2017, for example, the government told Tencent, the second largest of China’s digital giants, and other Chinese technology companies to shut down websites they hosted that included discussions on history, international affairs, and the military….Officials ordered telecommunications companies to block virtual private networks (VPNs), which are widely used by Chinese businesses, entrepreneurs, and academics to circumvent government censors….Beijing also announced new regulations further limiting online anonymity….
In an even more Orwellian move, authorities have rolled out a sophisticated surveillance system based on a vast array of cameras and sensors, aided by facial and voice recognition software and artificial intelligence. The tool has been deployed most extensively in Xinjiang Province, in an effort to track the Muslim Uighur population there, but the government is working to scale it up nationwide.
Workers in China fight back
Despite the fascist onslaught from the Chinese state, which has fought to bury real communism since the defeat of the Cultural Revolution in the 1970s, workers are not taking their oppression lying down. In response to a broken system that reserves decent health care for the wealthy, desperate patients and their families are rebelling at hospitals and clinics. Attacks on doctors “are so common that they have a name: ‘yi nao,’ or ‘medical disturbance’” (New York Times, 9/30).
As living and job conditions in China worsen for hundreds of millions of workers, a new surge of student activism is beginning to challenge the fake-left Chinese ruling class. These struggles are bringing together generations of Marxists, showing the potential for an organized communist movement in China.  In Huizhou, a group of recent university students converged from across the country and “attempted to put the party’s stated ideals into action” (NYT, 9/28) by organizing mistreated factory workers.
Carrying portraits of Mao and singing socialist anthems, they espoused the very ideals that the government fed them for years in mandatory ideological classes, voicing grievances about issues like poverty, worker rights and gender equality — some of communism’s core concerns (NYT, 9/28).
As more than 50 activists were arrested for the heresy of putting these ideas into practice, they began singing “The International.” Even in the hostile soil of today’s China, communist ideas will not die. The Progressive Labor Party looks to build our revolutionary organization worldwide. and especially in the face of rising fascism.  Join us!

The appointment of the sexist liar Brett Kavanaugh to the United States Supreme Court exposes the true nature of a “representative democracy”, a system where workers are excluded from any influence in decision-making. President Trump, who lost the popular vote by over 2 million people, chose the nominee. It was reviewed by the Senate, which has two members from each state regardless of the size of the state. The Supreme Court contains 9 members appointed for life who are the final decision makers for the entire judicial branch. Compare the grip of this tiny number of people over the lives of 300 million workers in the U.S. with the vast opportunity for all workers under communism.
Communism is a system where direct participation by workers is essential; where workers play a continuous active part in every aspect of running society, and where the first obligation of leaders is the development of new leaders, not keeping a grip on power.  What a better world we can build.  
Courts Are Battle Ground Between Capitalist Factions
The courts are part of the bosses’ state apparatus. They exist to give a stamp of approval to the laws that keep the bosses in power over the working class and fill the prisons with our class brothers and sisters. They are also a place where the ruling class fights out their differences. Most Supreme Court cases are disputes over business and banking issues having nothing to do with workers.
Since it has the final say, battles over the make-up of the Supreme Court have occurred throughout U.S. history and always reflect conflicts within the ruling class. Every one of these fights over the court has been between one set of racist murderers versus another.
President Franklin Roosevelt, for example, was frustrated with the Supreme Court in the 1930s.  At that time, the issue was also a split between an isolationist, anti-regulation wing of the ruling class and the then emerging global, imperialist Rockefeller wing. The Rockefeller wing wanted far more regulation of business and banking to hold onto its power. They also needed more control to allow them to make rapid decisions. They anticipated a future of U.S. imperialism launching wars across the globe. The Rockefeller wing won and held power for over 60 years.
The modern battle over control of the Supreme Court began in 1982 with the formation of the Federalist Society. (NPR 6/28/18) This group of extremely conservative and libertarian lawyers and judges has grown into a forceful voice supporting the interests of the domestic section of the ruling class (see CD Editorial 9/24). That wing has targeted control of the judiciary as a strategy for competing with the larger more entrenched main wing capitalists (NPR 3/14/18).
These domestically oriented bosses wish to cut the size of the federal government, slash all regulations, and pass a huge tax cut for the rich. The 91 judges Trump has nominated came from a list prepared by the Federalist Society (Chicago Tribune Oct. 2018). The Federalist Society now dominates large sections of the federal courts. With the Kavanaugh appointment they are now the dominant section of the Supreme Court.
The main wing of the ruling class is equally aware of the need to control the Supreme Court to try to hold onto their dying empire. During Obama’s first term there was an effort urging Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg to retire so she could be replaced by a younger person. She refused (The New Yorker Sept. 2018). Ginsberg, a liberal media icon, is herself a big racist who won’t hire Black law clerks (National Law Journal 2/1) and publicly attacked Colin Kapernick for kneeling (NY Times 10/11).
Then in early 2016, Justice Scalia, a member of the Federalist Society, died suddenly. Obama had his chance. He nominated Merrick Garland, but the Republicans refused to hold hearings to appoint him. The seat was saved til after the 2016 presidential election and the choice went to Trump.
The bosses obviously won’t say that they are fighting to control the courts to keep themselves in power. Instead they cynically use our hatred of sexism and racism to try to get us to fight their battles. When it appeared that Kavanaugh was sure to be appointed, the Democrats revealed the name of Christine Blasey Ford who credibly accused Kavanaugh of sexual assault and unleashed the honest passion of millions of anti-sexists to take Kavanaugh down. This was a corrupt ploy on their part.  These same liberal Democrats defended the serial sexual predator President Bill Clinton in the 1990s. They launched vicious attacks against the White House intern Monica Lewinsky, and several other women who had been abused by Clinton. Well known feminists of that time, like Gloria Steinem (The Atlantic 11/13/17) and women politicians like Maxine Waters (House of Representatives 12/18/98), openly defended Clinton just like Trump defended Kavanaugh.
In 1991 President George H. W. Bush nominated Judge Clarence Thomas, the most conservative of all the Justices, because he felt he needed a Black man. During those Senate hearings Anita Hill reported being sexually harassed by Thomas. It was two liberal Democrats, then Senator Joe Biden and Senator Ted Kennedy, who led the vicious, sexist attack against her. Just as with Kavanaugh, the woman was traumatized and the nominee became a Supreme Court Justice.
Don’t vote!—organize against sexism!
Brett Kavanaugh is a horrific sexist. But voting for the corrupt liberalism of the Democrats will not stop sexism. Only women and men workers fighting side by side against the bosses’ sexist division of the working class and the capitalist system that breeds it will lead to equality. Capitalism is steeped in sexist culture as we saw daily in the defenses of Kavanaugh and the Democrats exploitation of sexual assault victims. Sexist culture supports the capitalist profit generated by the gender wage gap, the super-exploitation of women and the added burdens they take on as mothers and caregivers.The Democrats are loyal to the same capitalist system as the Republicans. None are friends of workers.