For the international working class, the moves by Barack Obama and Vladimir Putin to rid Syria of chemical weapons ring hollow. Neither capitalist front man honestly seeks to end the slaughter of our sisters and brothers there. Even if chemical weapons were to be eliminated — a dubious outcome — the war in Syria will not end. Many more workers will still die. Already, two million people have been forced to flee their homes. More than two million live in extreme poverty, on less than $2 per person per day.
Obama and Putin do not care about these workers or about the 1,400 who reportedly were killed in last month’s gas attacks. Both of these imperialist stooges are exploiting the attacks to gain leverage in a rivalry headed towards a far more deadly global war. Obama tried to use the gas attacks as an opportunity to launch sophisticated missiles and kill still more workers while proving yet again that the U.S. can unleash massive military force anywhere on earth. An unmatched capacity for killing underpins the U.S. global empire. It assures protection to allies and clients and destruction to enemies.
But Putin outfoxed Obama. He exploited the U.S. president’s difficulties —notably a divided U.S. ruling class — in mounting a strike on Russian (and Chinese) ally Syria. As a result, Putin comes across as the “the good guy.” (Can a Nobel Peace Prize be far off?) He succeeded in brokering a deal that halted U.S. action, at least for the time being. But Putin is no less hypocritical than Obama. He hopes to use the situation to increase Russia’s power in the battle for control of the region’s oil and gas reserves and pipelines.
Broader Regional War Looming
Reasserting Moscow’s influence, Putin has called into question the ability of U.S. imperialism to defend its interests with lethal force. If he gets away with it, he could enable others to develop their own nuclear capabilities. Far from establishing peace, the Obama-Putin bargain over Syria brings broader regional conflict even closer than before.
Weeks before Putin’s coup, Stratfor (8/27/13), an outfit that provides geostrategic intelligence to U.S. corporations, declared, “This is no longer simply about Syria. The United States has stated a condition that commits it to an intervention. If it does not act when there is a clear violation of the condition, Obama increases the chance of war with other countries like North Korea and Iran.”
Obama didn’t blunder when he drew his “redline” on Syria’s chemical arms a year ago. U.S. imperialism needs to establish these tripwires to justify its use of military force. But now that he has failed to follow through, the credibility of the U.S. war machine stands at risk. This sequence of events can only embolden other U.S. foes building weapons against Washington’s wishes.
U.S. allies, too, have cause for concern. Saudi Arabia and Israel, the cornerstones of U.S. imperialism in the Middle East, were counting on the military umbrella that Obama aimed to open in Syria. Similar fears are shared by the twelve former Soviet bloc nations that belong to NATO but lie on or near Russia’s borders. In the Pacific, South Korea, Japan, and the Philippines must now be wondering about how far they can count on unconditional U.S. protection against aggression from China’s bosses.
Back in 2008, Putin made clear his anti-U.S. imperialist intentions by invading what was formerly Soviet Georgia. The world saw “Russian tanks entering a U.S. client state, defeating its army and remaining there until they were ready to leave” (Stratfor, 9/10/13). At the time, the U.S. was bogged down in both Iraq and Afghanistan. But even as they have withdrawn and wound down from wars in those countries, it has taken a toll on the U.S. rulers’ home front.
Masses Oppose Obama’s War
While George W. Bush’s “shock-and-awe” invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq gained a measure of popular support in the U.S. (though not without mass demonstrations in opposition), this is no longer the case. Polls show nearly two-thirds of the U.S. population opposed to Obama’s strike in Syria. Students and faculty at the City University of New York are campaigning to kick out former CIA director and war criminal general David Petraeus from his new post as honors professor. Mass popular resistance to Obama’s proposed war strikes in Syria has grown in Britain, Germany and the rest of the European Union. In France, President Francois Hollande’s backing of Obama has met with widespread protests. Polls show a majority of the population in opposition to Hollande’s Syria policy.
Obama tried to share the responsibility for a U.S. strike in Syria by seeking Congressional approval, on the premise that Congress represents the “will of the American people.” Hogwash. The U.S. Senate and House of Representatives routinely endorse policies that oppress the working class. While cutting all manner of social services, they repeatedly approve war budgets in the hundreds of billions to fund more than a thousand military bases in 130 countries. This spending has been sanctioned by every president since World War II.
Obama has tried to weaken working-class opposition to his war plans with the claim that conditions are “improving” in the U.S. In fact, unemployment and underemployment remains well above 20 million. One of five children lives in poverty. Racist murders by the rulers’ cops are regular events. And 95 percent of the recovery from the Great Recession has landed in the pockets of the top 1 percent (NY Times, 7/10/13).
The liberals who say they oppose Obama’s war adventures claim that Putin’s deal will yield a “peace dividend” to fund social services for the working class. But capitalism does not function that way. Workers have yet to see a dividend from the end of the Vietnam War or from any conflict since then. Wages have stagnated for the last 50 years. The purchasing power of today’s minimum wage is less than what it was in the 1970s. Bosses always drive for maximum profits and always will, as long as capitalism exists. That is the nature of the beast.
Workers Fight Back
Now as always, however, the working class is fighting back against this profit-mad system. Workers in the fast food industry, among the lowest-paid in the country, have engaged in a thousand strikes in 60 cities to demand that their minimum wage rates be doubled. In Mexico, 80,000 teachers have struck and demonstrated in cities across the country, fighting the rulers’ cops in their struggle against anti-worker government reforms. In France, 80 percent of the working class opposes another pension reform that would lower their standard of living even more. Many of them are fighting back in mass street demonstrations.
Striking subway motormen have stormed train stations in Buenos Aires to win their annual bonus. Sanitation workers have joined them. Teachers in Uganda have struck for a 40 percent wage hike.
Demonstrations, strikes and mass protests are a good start. But they cannot overcome the fact that the bosses control the means of production and also hold state power through their laws, courts, cops and military. They use this power to enforce their system and control the mass media. Their politicians attempt to divert our class into dead-end reforms.
This is why the Progressive Labor Party is organizing for a communist revolution to wipe out the bosses’ system and its wars, unemployment, poverty, racism and sexism. This can be achieved only in a society that eliminates bosses and profits and puts the working class in control. Building a mass PLP to smash the bosses’ dictatorship is our goal. Join us!
MEXICO — Thousands of striking teachers, battling tear gas and water cannons, are continuing their month-long protest against President Neito’s racist educational reform of privatization. Teachers occupied Zocalo Square for three weeks before being brutally evicted. Protesters used steel grates and plastic traffic dividers to block the streets. Many were arrested. This is a direct battle against the ruling class and its state.
GREECE — Like Mexico, teachers and civil servant workers are on strike for a week in response to a new law of planned layoffs demanded by foreign creditors. While the bosses get bailed out, thousands of public sector workers are losing their jobs, and tens of thousands are coerced with pay cuts. Thousands marched through the streets of Athens to parliament chanting, “Let’s kick the government, the EU, and the IMF out!” Students and other workers occupied the schools in solidarity.
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Racist General Petraeus: Wanted for Mass Murder
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- 19 September 2013 363 hits
NEW YORK CITY, September 16 — Shouts of “David Petraeus you can’t hide, we charge you with genocide!” rang out as nearly 100 people protested against the former general and CIA Director as he entered the Macaulay Honors College to “teach” his seminar. City University of New York (CUNY) students and more than 20 professors and staff were joined by high school students and teachers.
The corporate media consider Petraeus to be a military genius, a warrior-scholar. In fact he is a war criminal. In Iraq he was put in charge of creating the Special Police Commandos, a paramilitary unit with thousands of troops known for exceptional brutality, and the establishment of 14 detention centers that tortured and killed prisoners on a daily basis. In Afghanistan, Petraeus terrorized the population with nighttime special-forces raids and drone plane attacks which killed thousands of civilians.
PLP students and professors helped plan and build the rally. Challenge was distributed and banners displayed. A comrade spoke about the need for building a better world, a communist world. Others advanced the need to build a massive international movement to defeat imperialism. We need to build this movement on every campus, in the cafeterias and in the classrooms.
While many people with various ideas spoke, one highlight was the remarks of two high school students. One spoke about the horrors of war and how war was “unnatural.” The second explained that she would probably attend CUNY, but that her mother wouldn’t be happy with her attending a school with murderers on the teaching staff.
Petraeus’s invitation to teach at CUNY is only one part of a plan to militarize the university. A social science division at City College was named after General Colin Powell and Reserve Officer Training Programs (ROTC) have been established at three campuses.
At a fourth campus, College of Staten Island professors are organizing to resist the administration’s imposition of ROTC on their campus (more on this next issue).
Last week after the rally, students chased Petraeus, screaming at him as he walked toward the subway. This time the NYPD whisked Petraeus into an SUV parked in front of the building. With an unmarked police car following, the vehicles moved quickly down the block where police cars with flashing lights were ready to clear the intersection. Despite these maneuvers, students were able to block the intersection and catch up with the SUV, chanting “Petraeus, Out of CUNY!” and “Every week David!”
Yes, we will be back every Monday to harass this monstrous war criminal but we must certainly step up our daily campus activities to win masses of students to see that only by destroying capitalism can we have a decent future.
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PL Exposes Bosses’ Racist Assault on Health, Jobs
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- 19 September 2013 336 hits
CHICAGO, September 16 — “You PLers!” The nurses’ union organizer nearly shouted. “What is this s***? All you do is attack our union!”
The doctor and the half dozen nurses witnessing this sudden outburst while waiting for the Board meeting to begin were taken aback. The doctor responded, “I read that leaflet. It also criticizes my union, the Doctors’ Council, Service Employees International Union (SEIU), for not doing much to fight the administration’s attack. And I agree with what it says. Neither union has done much, really.”
“Well quit trying to organize my nurses.” She turned to the nurse who was writing down her phone number for the doctor. “This is what those people are about!” the union hack went on, jabbing her finger into the “Fight for Communism” logo part of the PL leaflet.
“I don’t see why you are getting so mad at him,” the nurse replied calmly. “He takes care of patients just like I do and just wants to keep the administration from closing his unit. We’re fighting for the same thing.” The doctor was pleasantly surprised when the nurse finished writing down her phone number for him.
The PL leaflet that angered the union organizer exposed the hospital administration’s plan — together with the politicians and bankers — to privatize Stroger Cook County Hospital and bust all the unions. The doctors and nurses from the newborn unit would be the last ones to disagree with PL’s analysis, since their unit has been under the most attack. As the only unit in this public hospital with 100 percent insured patients (thanks to Kid Care Medicaid payments,) it’s the only unit that actually brings in money for the public hospital system.
Profiting Off Sick Babies
So the bosses of the private hospital across the street, Rush Presbyterian, have their eye on those well-insured sick babies. When Rush built their new hospital, they doubled the size of their newborn unit, apparently planning on taking those public patients (as long as they are insured).
It is unclear why the public system’s administration wants to put their newborn unit out of businesss to lift the profits of the rich hospital across the street. Some think the County bosses are just trying to speed up the financial collapse of the public system so it can be privatized. One politician even said she wanted to “get the County out of the healthcare business.” This makes sense from her capitalist perspective — hospital costs keep rising and federal dollars keep declining. Others speculate that Rush has made a pledge to the campaign fund of County Board president, Toni Preckwinkle, so she will pay them off with $20 million a year’s worth of Medicaid neonatal intensive care unit patients.
Whatever the bosses’ motivation, it amounts to a racist attack on low-income black and immigrant working-class patients and another union-busting scheme to lower the living standards of healthcare workers.
PL’s analysis resonated with hospital workers. One department chair was bemoaning the fact that his resident doctors were all calling up to ask if Stroger hospital was really going to privatize. They demanded to know what would happen to their training program. Apparently somebody liked the leaflet enough to make copies and stuff them in all the medicine residents’ mailboxes. A lab worker saw to it that all the clinics and exam rooms got a copy.
At the Board meeting Dr. Ram Raju, the CEO who is always smiling and slapping people on the back in a jovial mood before meetings, looked like he had severe indigestion that morning after the leaflet came out. With a growing number of doctors and nurses questioning the motives of the administration, the CEO has ample reason for discomfort.
Under capitalism, decisions on healthcare and all other aspects of society are made based on what will make the most profit for the bosses, regardless of how many may die. And the union misleaders, by defending capitalism, take the bosses’ side. Under communism, healthcare will be a right for all. All decisions will be made based on our class’ needs. So how will our Party turn this increasing mass distrust of the administration and politicians into trust in communist leadership and action? Stay tuned. The struggle continues.
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DC Rallies vs. Racist Attack on Transit Workers
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- 19 September 2013 377 hits
WASHINGTON, DC, September 12 — Today 60 anti-racists, transit workers from Amalgamated Transit Union Local 689, community residents and others, picketed the transit authority’s monthly board meeting to protest its racist hiring and firing policies. Some challenged the transit authority’s board directly in the public comment time. We demanded they hire and retain workers who’ve been jailed in the past and “done their time.”
We explained that many former inmates have already worked successfully for years at Metro. Now that opportunity is gone. Communists, lawyers, civil rights activists, returning citizens and public health workers demand the policy be reversed!
Metro workers are also under attack. The DC region officials are gradually breaking up the unified transportation system to create multiple non-union systems. Privatization in transit, as in schools and hospitals, is aimed at making profit at the expense of the workers by driving down wages and benefits in a “race to the bottom.” Signs calling for “One System, One Union” signaled the transit-worker fightback.
Power of Multiracial Unity
The rally’s multi-racial alliance of workers and other anti-racists exemplified the power we can exert to win this demand, build our strength and eventually create a communist system where the working class actually controls transit systems, along with all aspects of society.
The Metropolitan Washington Public Health Association’s Health Disparities Committee (MWPHAP) organized the rally along with Progressive Labor Party, Metro workers, returnee organizations, community residents, civil rights groups, and workers’ rights coalitions. For months, we’ve had community meetings on the issue of jobs for returning citizens (former prisoners returning to the community). Workers have eagerly signed petitions in Wards 7 and 8, at health outreach efforts, Metro garages and on-line.
We’ve met several workers who’ve been fired or refused hiring under this policy. Some spoke to the Board and joined the rally. In a growing movement, others are working with progressive lawyers to challenge the policy as well as their individual firings.
Metro workers have the power to overturn this current hiring ban and to stop Metro’s plans to sell bus lines to a for-profit company that will lower wages and break the union. To build for this rally, we struggled with our co-workers at Metro to see these battles as everyone’s fight. This is an important step in raising broader issues and class consciousness among Metro workers. In the recent contract the policy was not even debated by the union leadership, which still does not want to defend its members or fight for jobs for all. In fact, the union president attacked the rally against racism as a diversion from their focus on opposing privatization. If they were serious, they would instead see how the issues and struggles are interrelated and can strengthen each other. But bascially they defend the bosses’ system.
The New Jim Crow
Our discussions at the garages exposed many contradictions besetting workers. Some thought it was okay to have harsher hiring practices, even though they themselves might have a criminal record. As we spoke more about the “New Jim Crow” criminal injustice system, many workers changed their minds and agreed that people in our communities shouldn’t be shut out of a decent job because of a criminal record.
People agree that the jail system is inherently racist, but it is still a struggle to win current Metro workers to care about those who might be hired after them. One co-worker at the rally said people must see that this struggle affects all of us, even if it doesn’t seem so right now. He had a true class outlook and took a CHALLENGE and a handful of flyers to take back to his garage. Another co-worker spoke about the bravery of the civil rights marchers, which we need to emulate.
The mass imprisonment of black and Latino workers since Nixon and Reagan instituted the war on drugs results in millions of people with records for minor drug possession. The police arrest black and Latino workers at much higher rates than whites. White residents in DC use drugs at the same rate as black people, but 8 out of 10 people arrested for drug violations are black.
Metro’s refusal to hire people with convictions makes this racist inequality in criminal justice much worse since returnees are prevented from getting relatively high-paying jobs when released. A Metro speaker said that Trayvon Martin’s killer walked away free while black people are locked up on a daily basis for much less!.
MWPHA will continue to pressure Metro to overturn this policy. PLP members invite our friends to our study/action groups to organize to overthrow the entire capitalist system, which only enriches the top 1% while driving down our wages and living standards to the lowest possible levels.
