CHICAGO, ILLINOIS, June 15 — “These cuts make one wonder whether the Cook County Board of Health is malicious or just incompetent,” a physician stated at a recent hearing.  One of the latest budget-slashing moves by the Cook County bosses is to not re-apply for WIC (Women, Infants and Children) program.  Mostly funded by federal money, WIC provides nutritional support to pregnant women and their infants or small children. Yet the Board is aiming to literally take milk away from babies!

At a recent hearing on this issue, pediatric healthcare providers spoke out against the cut.  One pointed out that it was racist because it will affect mostly black and Latino children.  A hospital board member felt compelled to criticize the use of words like “racist” or “Nazi” (a term used by the public to characterize the board at previous hearings). This time around, the Board voted down this particular cut. But keep in mind that these Board members are the same people who are going all out to try to close two of the County’s three public hospitals. They may yet scuttle the WIC program when they meet again on June 24.

Under instructions from recently-elected Cook County Board President Toni Preckwinkle, a liberal Democrat, the Board of Health has advanced a plan to close Oak Forest and Provident hospitals, which serve primarily black and Latino patients on the city’s South and West Sides.  Multiple hearings on the closure of Oak Forest have brought out many residents to demand that the hospital remain open (see CHALLENGE, 5/11).  After the Illinois Health Facilities and Services Review Board (IHFSRB) denied permission for the closure, Preckwinkle pushed a bill through the State Senate to close the hospital without IHFSRB approval. The bill failed to reach the House floor before the General Assembly adjourned this spring. 

Despite this stay of execution, Oak Forest services had already been drastically decreased. Only about a dozen patients are slated to remain at the hospital. There will be no surgeries, no intensive care, no acute rehabilitation; the “hospital” will be a glorified emergency room.  And there is no guarantee that it won’t be completely closed in the near future.

The bosses explain that these cuts are necessary to keep the state fiscally solvent, even if it means targeting the workers at the bottom. But budget shortfalls do not exist in a void.  According to Joshua Holland of U.S. Labor Against the War, “Forty-six states face budget shortfalls in this fiscal year, totaling $130 billion nationwide. The supplemental requests for fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan this year add up to $170 billion — that doesn’t include the Pentagon’s base budget, nukes or Homeland Security.”

The priorities of those ruling the U.S. have nothing to do with providing decent healthcare or pensions to workers, the two items most often blamed for the state’s budget woes. This past year, the County allocated $126 million in their capital budget to build administrative offices at the old Cook County Hospital — enough to fund inpatient care at Oak Forest for more than five years. At every level, capitalism is full of disconnects between its relentless drive for profit and the basic needs of workers for a decent life.

Despite the cutbacks, there are positive aspects to this struggle. A number of dedicated and principled people have come out repeatedly to try to save what’s left of healthcare in Cook County. Their example is inspiring, and none of our minor victories could have happened without their speaking up and banding together.  In addition, everyone involved has learned some important lessons from the fight over Oak Forest, which has lain bare the illusions of voting and “democracy.”  Preckwinkle was billed as “more competent” and “less corrupt” than her predecessor, Todd Stroger, but she is fighting tooth and nail to strip the County of healthcare services.

Finally, it has become clear that capitalism is at the root of these problems. A system that
places profits before people requires imperialist wars to be funded above all else, leaving workers in the cold.  Although we will keep fighting to keep our hospitals open and our children fed, we know that only the complete destruction of this capitalist system will lead to healthy outcomes for all.

GREECE, June 21 — The working class in Greece is under a severe attack by the capitalist ruling class, and they are fighting back. Taking a lesson from the workers in Spain, thousands of Greek workers are occupying Syntagma Square outside of Parliament in Athens. Like the Spanish and Egyptian workers, they are setting up assemblies to discuss what actions to take against the coming cuts and layoffs. Although the workers are braving severe state repression in these acts of defiance, the assemblies are just as reformist as their Spanish and Egyptian counterparts, pushing for reformist and pacifist positions (see CHALLENGE, 6/08).

When the assemblies decided to peacefully blockade Parliament as part of a general strike against the Socialist Party-led government that approved the cuts, the state did not “turn the other cheek.” The kkkops attacked with clubs and tear gas, and the ultra-nationalist fascists in Greece began attacking many of the protestors, supporting the kkkops as paramilitary forces. So much for pacifism being anything other than a pathologically suicidal position designed to get workers to passively slaughter themselves for a pathetic “moral high ground.”

The economic aspect of imperialism is that foreign capital subjugates the national interests to the needs of the creditor states in the name of profit — and there is a lot at stake for the Greek ruling class, and capitalists around the world. The German ruling class that is behind the bailouts demands privatization of Greek resources, such as ports and utility companies. This will not only lay off thousands of workers while driving down wages, but it will also open up Greece, and thereby Europe, to their imperialist rival bosses in China and Russia, who are looking to buy ports in Thessaloniki and gain a foothold in the energy market. In addition, France, the U.S.’s closest ally in the European Union, is now in danger because a major international credit agency, Moody’s, said it might downgrade the three largest banks in France because of their exposure to Greek debt.

With a mass revolutionary communist PLP based in the native-born and immigrant Greek working class, dedicated to revolution and a communist society, the rolling strikes and looming general strikes could indeed be transformed into insurrections for state power. Unfortunately, there were a lot of Greek flags at the protest because many leftists and workers have fallen into the trap of believing that they should support their national bosses against the international bosses in the International Monetary Fund (IMF).  Unlike the old communist movement, the Progressive Labor Party believes nationalism is a dead end for the working class, and fights to organize internationally amongst all workers as a class.

Without the Party there can be no revolution.  The brave workers of Greece are inspiring to the international working class and are illustrating internationalism by learning from their class sisters and brothers in Spain and Egypt and refusing to lie down and be trampled by the bosses, but we need to build a revolutionary PLP to go all the way and seize power!

PARIS, June 18 — In order to boost the competitiveness and profits of French companies, the government is moving to lower the social security contributions paid by private business. Taxpayers — most of whom are workers — will have to make up the shortfall through a value-added tax on consumer goods. This amounts to a sales tax, and since the tax is the same no matter what one’s income, it will cost workers a greater percentage of their income than rich people.

Moreover, this is a racist tax since workers of Arab and African origin are disproportionately poorer and will pay a larger percentage of their income than higher-income people.

The idea was advanced in a June 8 report co-authored by three bosses’ organizations and three sellout trade union confederations.

This week, both the Industry Minister and the ruling UMP party’s general secretary pushed debating the scheme, the first step in passing a law. To win public backing, the measure is billed as an “anti-offshoring value-added tax.” They claim that wages in France are “too high” because of the social security contributions the bosses have to pay. The bosses pretend they won’t move their factories to low-wage countries if they get what amounts to a wage-cut for workers — the new tax would cut into workers’ wages.

Blackmail

This is straightforward blackmail: telling workers their jobs will disappear overseas if they don’t cough up.

Industry Minister Eric Besson said, “The idea of shifting company social security contributions to a tax on another tax base, like consumption, merits debate. The cost of labor is one of the key elements in competitiveness.”

By cutting social security contributions, French bosses hope to lower their costs and undersell their imperialist rivals, increasing their competitiveness. But once the new “anti-offshoring value-added tax” has been established, the second round will surely see the politicians cutting social security benefits in order to lower taxes.

Co-authoring this scheme, set out in a 40-page report entitled “Approach to French Competitiveness,” represents yet another betrayal by three sellout union confederations. It highlights the bankruptcy of the unity-at-any-price strategy pursued by the supposedly “class-struggle” unions.

In 2009, the three sellout unions — the CFDT, the Roman Catholic CFTC, and the business executives’ union, the CGC — began working with the bosses to collect data on economic indicators. Now they’ve gone a step further.  They want the bosses’ government to “rethink the tax base that finances social protection.”

A worker’s income is composed of wages and benefits, including social security benefits. The proposed cut in our income will increase the boss’s profits. The three sellout unions are quite simply urging the government to change the tax laws so that the bosses can steal more of the wealth that we — and we alone — create!

Union Leaders in Bed
with the Bosses

This attack on the working class is accompanied by nauseating class collaboration. The bosses and union leaders announced in chorus that they had “gone beyond ideological approaches.” CFTC president Joseph Thouvenel trumpeted that “confronted with a fall in competitiveness, we have exited the class struggle to look reality in the face.”

For the past three years, the three openly sellout union confederations have been working hand-in-glove with the bosses to concoct this report. Now they intend to use the document to indoctrinate their members and as a basis of reference in wage negotiations.

Throughout last year’s fight against raising the retirement age, the leaders of the so-called “class-struggle” union confederations — particularly France’s biggest confederation, the CGT (which represents 34% of all workers) — insisted on preserving unity with these sellouts (who together represent 38% of workers). They claimed this was “the key to success.”

But in effect, this strategy gave the sellouts a veto on any possible actions. It guaranteed the struggle would never exceed symbolic one-day strikes. It nixed any possibility of an unlimited general strike. The struggle against raising the retirement age was lost.

Clearly this “unity strategy” was nothing but a fig leaf. It concealed the unwillingness of the “class-struggle” union leaders to really organize against the attack on the retirement age. It allowed them to sabotage the millions-strong movement while shifting the blame to the more open sellouts. So-called “progressives” like CGT leader Bernard Thibault are no better than CFTC’s Joseph Thouvenel.

When masses of workers here understand the pro-capitalist nature of all the reformist union leaders, of whatever stripe, it will provide the basis to develop the needed revolutionary communist leadership. Organizing to convince workers of this reality is one of the important tasks of communists in France.

TRENTON, N.J., June 16 — Thousands of state workers rallied at the state capitol against massive   cutbacks in pensions, and increases in insurance contributions. The state is also making huge racist cuts in welfare programs for mainly black and Latino workers. Four Democratic members of the legislature, including Senate President Sweeney, added their votes to those of the Republicans to pass a deal made with New Jersey Governor Christie.

Christie announced the deal to a standing ovation of business executives last night. Under the bill, retirees would lose Cost of Living Adjustments (COLA) for at least 30 years, the retirement age would go from 60 to 65, and pension contributions would go up by a third. Health insurance costs would double or triple, and unions won’t be able to renegotiate contributions for at least four years.

The best the union leaders could muster in response was “civil disobedience” by a few union leaders inside the hearing chamber, and complaints that state bosses are “trampling on our fundamental democratic rights.” Capitalism is a dictatorship of the bosses over the working class, not the other way around. The union leadership has no plan to reach out to and ally with private-sector workers, much less organize massive strikes to shut down the bosses’ government. Instead, they are relying on “friendly” Democrats in the Assembly to “kill the bill.”

PLP members and CHALLENGE readers attended the rally. A flyer was given out calling for unity between employed and unemployed workers against racist cutbacks in the state budget targeting unemployed workers. The flyer was received positively and several good conversations were had with our fellow workers. Here are some excerpts from the flyer:

“Last year at this time, thousands of workers were protesting state budget cuts. One of those, the General Assistance (GA) program was put back on the chopping block in late June, 2010. But, right after the restoration, the state welfare administration sent “review teams” into Essex County welfare offices servicing GA clients. Since then there has been a “slash and burn” approach to GA, directly coming from the review teams. The latest attack is the “discovery” by the state that hundreds of “employable” GA recipients are at the end of their time limit. These clients face termination of rental assistance, followed by eviction.

“The GA program is the last resort for tens of thousands of mostly black and Latino urban unemployed workers without children. Many long-term recipients have serious medical issues. Others have social problems which prevent them from getting jobs. But the real problem for those who are able to work is that there are no jobs, and there haven’t been any for some time. This results in systemic unemployment among black and Latino workers, double what it is among white workers. Because of this built-in disparity, we in PLP say unemployment is racist.

“Capitalism, an economic system based upon huge profits for bankers and bosses, actually needs unemployment. Unemployment helps keep wages down by providing a ready market of the unemployed willing to work for less. Passivity in the face of unemployment gives the bosses the flexibility they need to relocate their businesses when their profits aren’t high enough. Only a communist system would eliminate the need for unemployment since workers would produce in order to meet the needs of the whole working class, not for the profits of the bosses.”

Instead of sitting back while our most vulnerable brothers and sisters face the wrath of the budget-cutters, employed workers should unite with our natural allies — unemployed workers who occupy a position we may soon be in ourselves — to resist these cuts. N.J. PLP members and friends are beginning a campaign to fight the cuts and build the party in the process. Stay tuned!