Unite to Fight the Right:
Stop the Republican Attacks!
By Jack A. Smith — editor of Activist Newsletter
Republican politicians in Washington and the nation's state houses are virtually wilding in the streets. It's as though they are drunk with power, even though the Democrats actually are stronger by virtue of controlling the White House and Senate.
The actions by Wisconsin Republican Gov. Scott Walker to crush the public unions in the name of closing the budget deficit — after first gifting state businesses with tax breaks and programs amounting to $117 million — are just the leading edge of a broad national assault on worker rights, union rights, women's rights, abortion rights, minority rights, and civil liberties.
The ultra-conservatives enthusiastically attack all government programs that benefit working people, oppose environmental protection, fight against measures to halt climate change, and cater exclusively to the forces that actually guide America's destiny — big money, big business, big finance and big military, all the while whining about big government.
Why are they acting like feudal Crusaders besieging a Muslim fortress? They won the House and account for 29 governorships, but that's hardly a mandate to implement their most extreme proposals — and they know it.
But they also know something else: the Obama Administration, which sets the pace for the Democrats, would always rather compromise than fight. The Wisconsin public unions were encouraged by Democratic supporters to agree to substantial pay and benefit cuts to ward off stiffer punishments, but the Republican Senate voted last night to strip them of most collective bargaining rights, and the Assembly is set to do more damage today.
Having miniaturized their moderate wing and neutered the neoconservatives, the Republican high command evidently believes the time has finally come to overturn some of the social advances gained through the struggles of the Sixties and the Great Depression. They are taking a page out of Naomi Klein's book — "The Shock Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster Capitalism" — by cynically exploiting the economic disaster to implement regressive economic and social policies.
Right wing politicians are now fallaciously claiming that the federal government is "going broke," or "facing bankruptcy" due to the high federal deficit, and therefore "deep cuts are required" in spending programs intended to benefit working people and the poor. This is an old GOP canard, which the New York Times defined March 2 as "obfuscating nonsense."
The sky-high deficit is largely the product of three things: the Bush Administration's huge tax reductions, especially for the rich ($1 trillion extra to the richest 2% in the last 10 years), the economic recession (caused by the banks, Wall St. greed and government deregulation) and vast increases in military and national security spending during the last decade.
The unnecessary wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, for instance, are paid for by borrowing money. The amount spent just on these two wars this year alone could easily wipe out all the state budget deficits in America. (We remind our Hudson Valley readers of the March 15 public meeting on the wars and the Middle East uprisings organized by the Activist Newsletter at SUNY New Paltz. See item below, and join us.)
President Bush knew exactly what he was doing by increasing the deficit because President Reagan before him did the same thing: they railed against taxes while boosting spending, the outcome of which inevitably leads to demands to cut programs for the people. One difference between the Reagan era and today is that many Congressional Republicans in the 1980s were not willing to trash the social safety net. This time that's the target, along with the unions.
Now the emboldened conservatives preposterously blame public service workers and their unions for state deficits. For example, private sector workers in Wisconsin earn 4.8% more per hour than comparable public employees.
The real point is that Big Business has been trying to destroy the union movement for well over 100 years, and now their minions in government are trying to finish the job in Wisconsin, Indiana, Ohio, Iowa, Florida and Tennessee by adopting or planning anti-union legislation.
The GOP governors and members of Congress claim they are "doing what the voters want," but that's nonsense.
The March 1 New York Times/CBS Poll, among others, shows that the public opposes weakening public service union bargaining rights by a margin of 60%-33%. Polls show that majorities favor hiking taxes on the rich to lower the deficit. For instance, in New Jersey, which has a budget-cutting Republican governor, a March 1 Rutgers-Eagleton poll showed that voters supported a tax surcharge on “very high income residents” by 72%-26%.
It has reached the point where Tea Party-backed Sen. Jim DeMint (R-SC) declared that "collective bargaining has no place in representative democracy." This is an attack timed to coincide with high unemployment and the effects of recession upon the relatively weakened American union movement of 15.3 million workers, and scores of millions more non-union workers whose wages are higher because of comparative union standards and organizing efforts.
The right wing is out to win the class war in America. Its every move is intended to deprive the working class and middle class while privileging wealth and power. However, the attack isn't so much because of the Republican Party's strength but of the Democratic Party's political weakness, despite its great power and financing. This is an important factor impelling the conservative politicians to go for broke. It adds to their strength.
Right wing populist Tea Party nationalists, reactionary take-no-prisoners freshmen Republicans in Congress, and ultra-conservative icons such as Palin, Beck and Limbaugh intimidate the old line GOP establishment, which both embraces and fears the upstarts. They and their followers — including the far right and loony fringe — are infuriated by the presence of a "foreigner" (i.e., African American) and a "socialist" (i.e., Democrat) in the White House — an incentive to keep propelling the Republican Party ever further to the political right.
And sure enough, the Democratic Party — acting the part of a helpless giant — is dutifully trudging 10 steps behind and one small step to the left, just enough to retain the dubious honorific of The Lesser Evil.
This two-party shift toward the right has been taking place for decades, but it's been accelerating since the Obama Administration made it clear that it would govern from the center-right and compromise with the opposition. The White House conciliated on everything even when it had large majorities in both Congressional chambers. For instance, the Democrats had the power to overturn Bush's shameful millionaire tax cuts two years earlier during President Obama's first few "honeymoon" months in office, but he allowed them to expire as intended in two years, then compromised to extend them an additional two years.
The GOP knows it can gain political ground by aggressively attempting to obstruct legislation and fighting dirty. But the right wing's unstinting combativeness is only partially based on its own limited power. The other part is lodged in awareness of the Democratic Party's spineless passivity and vacillation combined with a political perspective resembling what was once termed moderate Republicanism, not the liberalism of yesteryear.
Here's a current example: In the midst of the most assertive right wing assault in modern history, the New York Times reported that President Obama was "road-testing his new message of bipartisan cooperation" in Miami March 4 "with Jeb Bush, the former Republican governor, and then used his first stump speech of the 2012 season to call on Democrats to 'find common ground'" with the GOP.
At the "risk" of sounding partisan, we must ask: When the center-right searches for common ground with the right-far right, isn't it likely to be discovered equidistant between the two polarities, that is, clearly closer to the right than the center, much less to the left?
There are, however, two hopeful signs in this bleak political picture.
One is that the Republicans and their Tea Party vanguard are foolishly overreaching. If this continues much longer, public revulsion toward right wing fanaticism probably will punish the conservatives in the 2012 elections. But there's a downside. The conservative Supreme Court's Citizens United decision now permits corporations to invest limitless funds in election campaigns, and that kind of money not only talks but it screams, perhaps loudly enough to buy the election for the conservatives despite the shenanigans of the rabid right.
Another sign, the most hopeful of all, is that the Wisconsin public workers and the union movement — supported by tens of millions of Americans throughout the country — are shouting their opposition to those who degrade democracy by attacking working families. They recognize the impending devastation implicit in this assault by corporate wealth being carried out by the politicians.
The big question is will this combative spirit take hold and spread? The more there are mass struggles and strikes for people's rights — in the workplaces and at the seats of power, in the streets and at public meetings — the more the rights of working Americans will be upheld and extended.
The best response to this sharp turn to the political right in America is a sharp turn to the left. It's time to unite, get organized behind a determined leadership willing to wage a true struggle, and fight back.
Showing posts with label Democrats. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Democrats. Show all posts
Thursday, March 10, 2011
Tuesday, October 5, 2010
10-05-10 One Nation Rally analysis
WHAT'S BEHIND THE ONE NATION RALLY?
By Jack A. Smith, Activist Newsletter
An enthusiastic crowd estimated at 175,000 people attended the four-hour rally in Washington Oct. 2 at Lincoln Memorial — a mass action by the labor movement and African American rights groups, supported by the Latino, environmental, LGBT and other liberal and progressive movements. The main purpose was to increase the Democratic vote next month.
The event was organized by a new coalition, One Nation Working Together, which is supported by some 400 groups, primarily led by the two labor federations, AFL-CIO and Change To Win/SEIU, and the NAACP. The rally was addressed by a couple of dozen speakers, mostly from supporting liberal advocacy organizations.
A constant theme reiterated by the union leaders who spoke was the need for jobs — the absence of which is probably one of the main reasons a number of voters who went Democratic in the presidential election may not vote in November. Among these leaders, and a sign of the strength of labor at the rally, was AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka, Service Employees International Union president Mary Kay Henry, UAW president Bob King, AFT chief Randi Weingarten, NEA President Dennis Van Roakel, and CWA's Larry Cohen.
President/CEO Ben Jealous of the NAACP told the crowd — which included a large proportion of African Americans — that "We've come too far to turn back now," evoking the long struggle for equal rights. "We've got to go home and ask our friends and ask our neighbors to vote. Get up off the couch and get out and vote November 2."
Up to 2,000 chartered buses — largely financed by the unions — brought participants to the demonstration from the Northeast, Mid-Atlantic and Midwestern states. Others arrived by car, commercial bus, railroad and planes from as far away as the West Coast.
The crowd reached its height around 2:30 p.m. when it extended from the Memorial along each side of the long Reflecting Pool to the end. The attendance was not as large as the Aug. 28 right wing "non-political" religious manifestation organized by TV personality Glen Beck, but the two events were so different in character that comparing size determines nothing.
The historic rally and its feeder marches in Washington Oct. 2 had several pluses accompanied by minuses, the most important being these two:
• The unity achieved at the rally between the working class, people of color and progressives in various social advocacy groups is very important in terms of the political struggle for needed progressive social change in the United States.
However, the rally's singular purpose was to increase the popular vote for Democratic candidates in the Nov. 2 Congressional election and local offices, not to build an independent liberal/progressive/left coalition to agitate for needed programs that go beyond the limited possibilities of the Obama Administration's center/center right political agenda.
• Rally speakers supported a number of relatively progressive policy initiatives, including a massive and comprehensive jobs program, advancement of civil rights and liberties, immigration reform, education reform, and union rights to mention a few. This was a major liberal event and were it the actual intention of the Obama Administration to fight for such initiatives it would be transformational.
However, not one of the speakers criticized the Obama Administration's failure to seriously embrace many such programs or to mount the political fight required to attain even watered down versions, blaming everything on "The Party of No." Even the Blue Dog conservative Democrats in Congress were off the hook.
Clearly, the administration's weak jobs program has fallen far short of making a significant dent in unemployment, which remains around 10% officially and 17% unofficially. Its anti-foreclosure efforts have failed. Civil liberties are being eroded because of White House decisions. Immigration reform is piecemeal. Education reform, based on President Obama's $4.35 billion "Race to the Top" initiative, is actually opposed by the two teacher unions that so strongly support the Democrats. The labor movement's main legislative goal —Employee Free Choice Act — can't even be introduced in Congress, in part because of conservative Democrat opposition.
One of the reasons the Democratic Party may lose a more than usual number of House and Senate seats in the midterm contest is that a number of 2008 Obama voters are disappointed that the Democrats didn't fight harder and compromise less for "the change they believe in." (For a full background, see the article "Democrats Face Tough Election," the first story in the Oct. 1 Activist Newsletter below.)
It appeared that President Obama's massive escalation of the Afghan war, extending the fighting into western Pakistan and Yemen, and continuing the occupation of Iraq would also be unchallenged by the speakers — despite the fact that the majority of Democratic voters are against the war — until Harry Belafonte shattered the silence.
Charging that "the wars that we wage today in far away lands are immoral, unconscionable and unwinnable," the famous musician, social activist and civil rights leader delivered a stunning denunciation of a top Obama Administration priority. The crowd seemed momentarily taken aback by this sharp criticism of Obama's wars (though the president's name was not mentioned) and the reception was somewhat muted, though at the finish, just after he said "let us put an end to war," he received prolonged applause.
Could it be that rally leaders were unaware Belafonte intended to deliver a strong antiwar message? His speech, the text of which we reproduce below this article, was the highlight of the afternoon as far the peace movement and left were concerned.
The only other reference to the military — aside from some patriotic comments to the troops — was Jesse Jackson's call to "Cut the military budget," but even Defense Secretary Gates says that. The rest of Rev. Jackson's talk was essentially "vote Democratic" in November because "The president can’t bear this cross alone."
One of the more moving presentations was by outspoken progressive Marian Wright Edelman, founder/president of the Children's Defense Fund, who sharply criticized politicians that promote "massive tax giveaways to the rich when 50% of our children are living in poverty," and called for increased education funding.
Van Jones, a well known environmental and civil rights activist and an expert on "Green Jobs," noted that “We can empower America by looking up for our sources of energy instead of looking down,” referring to wind and solar power. Rev. Al Sharpton earned applause when he declared: “We bailed out the banks. We bailed out the insurance companies. Now it’s time to bail out the American people.”
The only Congressman to speak was Chicago immigrant rights advocate Democratic Rep. Luis Gutierrez, who declared: "The Latino and immigrant struggle is a continuation of the civil rights struggle in this nation. There would be no Cesar Chavez without Dr. Martin Luther King, no Sonia Sotomayor without Thurgood Marshal and no Roberto Clemente without Jackie Robinson.”
The absence of Democratic Party leaders and office holders on the podium as endorsers or rally officials was intentional. Rally leaders did not wish to convey the impression that One Nation Working Together was simply organizing a campaign event to elect a fairly unimpressive collection of center/center right office holders and a small minority of liberals.
The Democrats are worried that independent voters, young voters and liberal supporters who voted Democratic in 2008 are not going to come out in large enough number to prevent the Republicans from making major gains in the House and Senate. A good proportion of these voters are disappointed in the Obama Administration's performance over the past two years, including some union workers who voted for the Democrats in the last election.
One Nation has positioned itself as independently promoting a relatively liberal agenda and is asking Democrats — who are told that the only obstacle to real progress is the GOP and the dreaded Tea Party — to vote in sufficient number to make it possible for the Democratic members of Congress to score major victories in the next two years. The disinclination of many of these politicians to consider aligning with center/center left progressive programs is notorious.
This event cost the union movement plenty. Most of the buses allowed union members — and in some cases the general public — to travel free. Our New York State United Teachers-sponsored bus from New Paltz cost a paltry $20 to D.C. and back for non-union riders, in return for which we received a bagged breakfast, dinner snack, a blue and orange AFT jersey proclaiming One Nation Working Together plus a $5 roundtrip metro fare to and from the Lincoln Memorial.
Charter buses began arriving in the huge parking lot of RFK Stadium starting around 9 a.m. on what turned out to be a day of blue skies, sunshine and comfortable temperatures. Up to 700 buses were said to be coming from New York State alone. According to local union sources buses brought perhaps 1,000 demonstrators from the Upper Hudson Valley cities and towns of Albany, Amsterdam, Latham, Schenectady, Saratoga and Troy and 500 from Mid-Hudson Valley communities of Kingston, New Paltz, Middletown, Newburgh, Poughkeepsie, Fishkill and Beacon. An unknown number took other transportation.
Thousands more probably would have attended the Washington event but there were serious bus problems in Boston, Buffalo, Rochester, Syracuse and on Long Island. Through a mix-up, some scheduled buses never arrived to pick up passengers, and some got to the nation's capital just about in time to return home.
Many buses, including ours, arrived too late to attend the scheduled 11 a.m. antiwar feeder march from 14th St. and Constitution Ave., where there were two speaking platforms, one organized by United for Peace and Justice and the other by the United National Antiwar Conference. After a while both groups agreed to use the same stage. In addition there was a Socialist Contingent nearby. When the three groups marched together to the Memorial there were about 500-600 people, we're told.
Some Union contingents, each wearing their own colored t-shirts, marched in separate feeder marches.
A number of peace and left wing groups attended the rally but not all marched, including several socialist and communist organizations which carried their own signs in the crowd and distributed leaflets and free publications. The ANSWER antiwar coalition (Act Now to Stop War and End Racism) handed out a great many large yellow and black peace posters on sticks with a photo of Martin Luther King that predominated in a large part of the rally where we were situated, and hundreds of demonstrators took them home on buses that evening. The Party for Socialism and Liberation decided to charge a donation for their paper, Liberation, an sold 1,200 copies.
This was a positive aspect of the way the One Nation event was organized. Antiwar and socialist or communist groups were welcomed to join the rally just like every other group, to arrange feeder marches of their own, to set up tables, distribute literature, and to become one of the hundreds of endorsers if they wished.
The Communist Party USA, Democratic Socialists of America and the International Socialist Organization were among the endorsers, though most left organizations did not wish to be associated at that level. It has not always been this way in union or liberal dominated events, when the left has often been discouraged from attending or excluded. Hopefully it's a new trend. Of course, the left was not invited to speak at the main rally, and didn't expect to be.
Right wing websites and blogs howled with red-baiting denunciations about the presence of the left Oct. 2, which was actually quite small — but since they already call Obama a "socialist" and believe the Democratic Party is a front for a Bolshevik conspiracy it's not a big deal.
To sum up: The various liberal groups that gathered in Washington for the One Nation rally are a positive factor on the political landscape, mainly because of their working class, multinational and progressive orientation.
Unfortunately their heightened political consciousness remains to be developed vis-à-vis (1) the inherent political limitations of the Democratic Party to which they are presently wedded; (2) their acceptance of a restrictive, closed circuit two-party system extending from the center to the far right without a mass left entity; and (3) their adherence to "lesser evil" politics that insures that "evil" in one guise or another is the only result.
Lastly, the notion of "one nation" sounds good, even inspiring, and entirely useful in the present situation. But most of us know that in reality the U.S. remains, in effect, two nations: one representing the interests of the minority — the big corporations, big banks, big stockholders, and big money that tend to rule; and the other the interests of the great majority — the working class, middle class and lower class that tend to be ruled.
The real issue is which "nation" does one support, and out of that support help to create one real nation, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.
By Jack A. Smith, Activist Newsletter
An enthusiastic crowd estimated at 175,000 people attended the four-hour rally in Washington Oct. 2 at Lincoln Memorial — a mass action by the labor movement and African American rights groups, supported by the Latino, environmental, LGBT and other liberal and progressive movements. The main purpose was to increase the Democratic vote next month.
The event was organized by a new coalition, One Nation Working Together, which is supported by some 400 groups, primarily led by the two labor federations, AFL-CIO and Change To Win/SEIU, and the NAACP. The rally was addressed by a couple of dozen speakers, mostly from supporting liberal advocacy organizations.
A constant theme reiterated by the union leaders who spoke was the need for jobs — the absence of which is probably one of the main reasons a number of voters who went Democratic in the presidential election may not vote in November. Among these leaders, and a sign of the strength of labor at the rally, was AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka, Service Employees International Union president Mary Kay Henry, UAW president Bob King, AFT chief Randi Weingarten, NEA President Dennis Van Roakel, and CWA's Larry Cohen.
President/CEO Ben Jealous of the NAACP told the crowd — which included a large proportion of African Americans — that "We've come too far to turn back now," evoking the long struggle for equal rights. "We've got to go home and ask our friends and ask our neighbors to vote. Get up off the couch and get out and vote November 2."
Up to 2,000 chartered buses — largely financed by the unions — brought participants to the demonstration from the Northeast, Mid-Atlantic and Midwestern states. Others arrived by car, commercial bus, railroad and planes from as far away as the West Coast.
The crowd reached its height around 2:30 p.m. when it extended from the Memorial along each side of the long Reflecting Pool to the end. The attendance was not as large as the Aug. 28 right wing "non-political" religious manifestation organized by TV personality Glen Beck, but the two events were so different in character that comparing size determines nothing.
The historic rally and its feeder marches in Washington Oct. 2 had several pluses accompanied by minuses, the most important being these two:
• The unity achieved at the rally between the working class, people of color and progressives in various social advocacy groups is very important in terms of the political struggle for needed progressive social change in the United States.
However, the rally's singular purpose was to increase the popular vote for Democratic candidates in the Nov. 2 Congressional election and local offices, not to build an independent liberal/progressive/left coalition to agitate for needed programs that go beyond the limited possibilities of the Obama Administration's center/center right political agenda.
• Rally speakers supported a number of relatively progressive policy initiatives, including a massive and comprehensive jobs program, advancement of civil rights and liberties, immigration reform, education reform, and union rights to mention a few. This was a major liberal event and were it the actual intention of the Obama Administration to fight for such initiatives it would be transformational.
However, not one of the speakers criticized the Obama Administration's failure to seriously embrace many such programs or to mount the political fight required to attain even watered down versions, blaming everything on "The Party of No." Even the Blue Dog conservative Democrats in Congress were off the hook.
Clearly, the administration's weak jobs program has fallen far short of making a significant dent in unemployment, which remains around 10% officially and 17% unofficially. Its anti-foreclosure efforts have failed. Civil liberties are being eroded because of White House decisions. Immigration reform is piecemeal. Education reform, based on President Obama's $4.35 billion "Race to the Top" initiative, is actually opposed by the two teacher unions that so strongly support the Democrats. The labor movement's main legislative goal —Employee Free Choice Act — can't even be introduced in Congress, in part because of conservative Democrat opposition.
One of the reasons the Democratic Party may lose a more than usual number of House and Senate seats in the midterm contest is that a number of 2008 Obama voters are disappointed that the Democrats didn't fight harder and compromise less for "the change they believe in." (For a full background, see the article "Democrats Face Tough Election," the first story in the Oct. 1 Activist Newsletter below.)
It appeared that President Obama's massive escalation of the Afghan war, extending the fighting into western Pakistan and Yemen, and continuing the occupation of Iraq would also be unchallenged by the speakers — despite the fact that the majority of Democratic voters are against the war — until Harry Belafonte shattered the silence.
Charging that "the wars that we wage today in far away lands are immoral, unconscionable and unwinnable," the famous musician, social activist and civil rights leader delivered a stunning denunciation of a top Obama Administration priority. The crowd seemed momentarily taken aback by this sharp criticism of Obama's wars (though the president's name was not mentioned) and the reception was somewhat muted, though at the finish, just after he said "let us put an end to war," he received prolonged applause.
Could it be that rally leaders were unaware Belafonte intended to deliver a strong antiwar message? His speech, the text of which we reproduce below this article, was the highlight of the afternoon as far the peace movement and left were concerned.
The only other reference to the military — aside from some patriotic comments to the troops — was Jesse Jackson's call to "Cut the military budget," but even Defense Secretary Gates says that. The rest of Rev. Jackson's talk was essentially "vote Democratic" in November because "The president can’t bear this cross alone."
One of the more moving presentations was by outspoken progressive Marian Wright Edelman, founder/president of the Children's Defense Fund, who sharply criticized politicians that promote "massive tax giveaways to the rich when 50% of our children are living in poverty," and called for increased education funding.
Van Jones, a well known environmental and civil rights activist and an expert on "Green Jobs," noted that “We can empower America by looking up for our sources of energy instead of looking down,” referring to wind and solar power. Rev. Al Sharpton earned applause when he declared: “We bailed out the banks. We bailed out the insurance companies. Now it’s time to bail out the American people.”
The only Congressman to speak was Chicago immigrant rights advocate Democratic Rep. Luis Gutierrez, who declared: "The Latino and immigrant struggle is a continuation of the civil rights struggle in this nation. There would be no Cesar Chavez without Dr. Martin Luther King, no Sonia Sotomayor without Thurgood Marshal and no Roberto Clemente without Jackie Robinson.”
The absence of Democratic Party leaders and office holders on the podium as endorsers or rally officials was intentional. Rally leaders did not wish to convey the impression that One Nation Working Together was simply organizing a campaign event to elect a fairly unimpressive collection of center/center right office holders and a small minority of liberals.
The Democrats are worried that independent voters, young voters and liberal supporters who voted Democratic in 2008 are not going to come out in large enough number to prevent the Republicans from making major gains in the House and Senate. A good proportion of these voters are disappointed in the Obama Administration's performance over the past two years, including some union workers who voted for the Democrats in the last election.
One Nation has positioned itself as independently promoting a relatively liberal agenda and is asking Democrats — who are told that the only obstacle to real progress is the GOP and the dreaded Tea Party — to vote in sufficient number to make it possible for the Democratic members of Congress to score major victories in the next two years. The disinclination of many of these politicians to consider aligning with center/center left progressive programs is notorious.
This event cost the union movement plenty. Most of the buses allowed union members — and in some cases the general public — to travel free. Our New York State United Teachers-sponsored bus from New Paltz cost a paltry $20 to D.C. and back for non-union riders, in return for which we received a bagged breakfast, dinner snack, a blue and orange AFT jersey proclaiming One Nation Working Together plus a $5 roundtrip metro fare to and from the Lincoln Memorial.
Charter buses began arriving in the huge parking lot of RFK Stadium starting around 9 a.m. on what turned out to be a day of blue skies, sunshine and comfortable temperatures. Up to 700 buses were said to be coming from New York State alone. According to local union sources buses brought perhaps 1,000 demonstrators from the Upper Hudson Valley cities and towns of Albany, Amsterdam, Latham, Schenectady, Saratoga and Troy and 500 from Mid-Hudson Valley communities of Kingston, New Paltz, Middletown, Newburgh, Poughkeepsie, Fishkill and Beacon. An unknown number took other transportation.
Thousands more probably would have attended the Washington event but there were serious bus problems in Boston, Buffalo, Rochester, Syracuse and on Long Island. Through a mix-up, some scheduled buses never arrived to pick up passengers, and some got to the nation's capital just about in time to return home.
Many buses, including ours, arrived too late to attend the scheduled 11 a.m. antiwar feeder march from 14th St. and Constitution Ave., where there were two speaking platforms, one organized by United for Peace and Justice and the other by the United National Antiwar Conference. After a while both groups agreed to use the same stage. In addition there was a Socialist Contingent nearby. When the three groups marched together to the Memorial there were about 500-600 people, we're told.
Some Union contingents, each wearing their own colored t-shirts, marched in separate feeder marches.
A number of peace and left wing groups attended the rally but not all marched, including several socialist and communist organizations which carried their own signs in the crowd and distributed leaflets and free publications. The ANSWER antiwar coalition (Act Now to Stop War and End Racism) handed out a great many large yellow and black peace posters on sticks with a photo of Martin Luther King that predominated in a large part of the rally where we were situated, and hundreds of demonstrators took them home on buses that evening. The Party for Socialism and Liberation decided to charge a donation for their paper, Liberation, an sold 1,200 copies.
This was a positive aspect of the way the One Nation event was organized. Antiwar and socialist or communist groups were welcomed to join the rally just like every other group, to arrange feeder marches of their own, to set up tables, distribute literature, and to become one of the hundreds of endorsers if they wished.
The Communist Party USA, Democratic Socialists of America and the International Socialist Organization were among the endorsers, though most left organizations did not wish to be associated at that level. It has not always been this way in union or liberal dominated events, when the left has often been discouraged from attending or excluded. Hopefully it's a new trend. Of course, the left was not invited to speak at the main rally, and didn't expect to be.
Right wing websites and blogs howled with red-baiting denunciations about the presence of the left Oct. 2, which was actually quite small — but since they already call Obama a "socialist" and believe the Democratic Party is a front for a Bolshevik conspiracy it's not a big deal.
To sum up: The various liberal groups that gathered in Washington for the One Nation rally are a positive factor on the political landscape, mainly because of their working class, multinational and progressive orientation.
Unfortunately their heightened political consciousness remains to be developed vis-à-vis (1) the inherent political limitations of the Democratic Party to which they are presently wedded; (2) their acceptance of a restrictive, closed circuit two-party system extending from the center to the far right without a mass left entity; and (3) their adherence to "lesser evil" politics that insures that "evil" in one guise or another is the only result.
Lastly, the notion of "one nation" sounds good, even inspiring, and entirely useful in the present situation. But most of us know that in reality the U.S. remains, in effect, two nations: one representing the interests of the minority — the big corporations, big banks, big stockholders, and big money that tend to rule; and the other the interests of the great majority — the working class, middle class and lower class that tend to be ruled.
The real issue is which "nation" does one support, and out of that support help to create one real nation, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.
Monday, March 3, 2008
HUDSON VALLEY ACTIVIST NEWSLETTER
Feb. 6, 2008 Supplement
Email jacdon@earthlink.net
—————————————————————————
CLINTON, OBAMA, AND
THE POLITICS OF CHANGE
By Jack A. Smith, editor
Democrats who supported centrist candidates Sen. Hillary Clinton or Sen. Barack Obama in the Tuesday (Feb. 5) primaries are happy today. Both did well, with 845 and 765 delegates respectively, and the final winner may not be known for months.
Most progressives who supported drop-outs John Edwards, who ran as a center-populist, or Rep. Dennis Kucinich, who represents the party’s marginalized center-left, accommodated themselves to reality and backed the two frontrunners. Some still voted for their preferences, whose names remained on the ballot in New York, as a symbolic remembrance that a tiny trace of liberalism survives in FDR’s old party.
Fiercely pro-war perennial hopeful Sen. John McCain seems prepared to gallop to victory in the Republican race for the nomination, a tribute to the party’s desperation after two terms of Bush-Cheney lunacy. Mitt Romney — an opportunist of the center-right who metamorphosed overnight into a hard-line right winger and then criticized McCain for not being conservative enough — came in a distant second.
The GOP’s large faction of Christian Right social-conservatives went for Mike Huckabee in the South but they probably will come around in November. Of course, this being America, all the leading candidates in both ruling parties describe themselves as devoutly religious Christians with well-thumbed prayer books always at the ready.
Five years after the start of the bipartisan war against Iraq, and years since it became apparent that a majority of the American people wanted peace, there were only two certified antiwar candidates in all the primary balloting — Kucinich for the Democrats and Rep. Ron Paul, the Texas Republican. Paul did fairly well for a minor candidate in several states, but his extreme conservatism puts him far beyond the progressive pale.
The hard-fought campaign between Democrats Clinton and Obama, and its reflection in the passionate commitment of many of their supporters, is most interesting because it does not appear to be based upon political positions — which are, in theory, the principal criteria for evaluating candidates.
In the past few days in New York’s Hudson Valley we’ve heard from a few local progressives — opponents of war, corporate greed and poverty — now heaping praise upon one or the other of these candidates, as though Clinton or Obama were about to champion their causes.
Both candidates are virtually identical in their domestic and foreign policies, differing a bit here, a bit there. And a victory for the female candidate or the African American candidate will constitute an historic social breakthrough benefiting the struggles of both women and blacks. So there is no real contest in terms of politics or gender/racial considerations. What’s left to account for the enthusiasm of their liberal backers?
Change! Change? Obama and Clinton have positioned themselves first and foremost as the harbingers of significant change in America. As Obama said last night in Chicago with swelling emotion, “Our time has come, our movement is real, and change is coming to America.” He frequently appeals to youth to “dare to change the system.” Clinton often inspires her audiences by shouting, “Are you ready for change?” and then suggests she is the true agency for social change in this election.
Obviously, the political pollsters and party strategists have told them that the American people are hugely dissatisfied. They are unhappy about the direction the country is taking; about the war, the economy, the growing gap between the great riches of the few and the declining fortunes of the many, about the paucity of good jobs, about poverty, and so on.
Clinton and Obama rarely specify the changes they seek, and when they do they even more rarely articulate a program to implement such a change.
Both candidates say they will end the war in Iraq, but their real program is a gradual, prolonged and partial withdrawal of U.S. troops that will keep the Pentagon engaged in the country for many more years. They both supported the latest appropriations to continue the war through October this year. They will both support the next Defense Dept. budget. They have talked about mitigating poverty, especially after Edwards departed the campaign, but they have put forward no program to accomplish this objective. They have no program for creating good jobs ($17 an hour with benefits), or for reducing disproportionate poverty among African Americans and Latinos.
That’s just the beginning of what they are not going to change. And the notion that either Clinton or Obama will change the “system” prevailing in America and its fundamental policies — including hegemony and war abroad, and catering to wealth and corporations at home at the expense of the working class, lower middle class and poor — is preposterous.
As we said in our Jan. 24 newsletter article “Lesser Evil or Greater Good,” the two Democratic frontrunners are “better than any of their Republican counterparts.” But this is because rightists McCain, Romney and Huckabee repose at the very bottom of the progressive political barometer, not that centrists Clinton and Obama are anywhere near the top.
———————————————————
CHECK IT OUT:
THE COST OF WAR: We urge you to view, then pass on to others, a brief video on the cost of war, produced by the American Friends Service Committee. It is located at http://www.afsc.org/cost/. The same website offers you an opportunity to sign a petition “to defund the war, and refund human needs today.”
CLINTON VS. OBAMA ON HEALTHCARE: The political positions of the two Democratic frontrunners are quite similar, but sometimes there are differences. Each has a health care plan, neither of which single payer universal. But according to Paul Krugman, the liberal columnist for the New York Times, “there really is a big difference between the candidates’ approaches.” His Feb. 4 column is at: http://www.nytimes.com/2008/02/04/opinion/04krugman.html?em&ex=1202274000&en=15e3ef55ea8cce37&ei=5087%0A.
Feb. 6, 2008 Supplement
Email jacdon@earthlink.net
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CLINTON, OBAMA, AND
THE POLITICS OF CHANGE
By Jack A. Smith, editor
Democrats who supported centrist candidates Sen. Hillary Clinton or Sen. Barack Obama in the Tuesday (Feb. 5) primaries are happy today. Both did well, with 845 and 765 delegates respectively, and the final winner may not be known for months.
Most progressives who supported drop-outs John Edwards, who ran as a center-populist, or Rep. Dennis Kucinich, who represents the party’s marginalized center-left, accommodated themselves to reality and backed the two frontrunners. Some still voted for their preferences, whose names remained on the ballot in New York, as a symbolic remembrance that a tiny trace of liberalism survives in FDR’s old party.
Fiercely pro-war perennial hopeful Sen. John McCain seems prepared to gallop to victory in the Republican race for the nomination, a tribute to the party’s desperation after two terms of Bush-Cheney lunacy. Mitt Romney — an opportunist of the center-right who metamorphosed overnight into a hard-line right winger and then criticized McCain for not being conservative enough — came in a distant second.
The GOP’s large faction of Christian Right social-conservatives went for Mike Huckabee in the South but they probably will come around in November. Of course, this being America, all the leading candidates in both ruling parties describe themselves as devoutly religious Christians with well-thumbed prayer books always at the ready.
Five years after the start of the bipartisan war against Iraq, and years since it became apparent that a majority of the American people wanted peace, there were only two certified antiwar candidates in all the primary balloting — Kucinich for the Democrats and Rep. Ron Paul, the Texas Republican. Paul did fairly well for a minor candidate in several states, but his extreme conservatism puts him far beyond the progressive pale.
The hard-fought campaign between Democrats Clinton and Obama, and its reflection in the passionate commitment of many of their supporters, is most interesting because it does not appear to be based upon political positions — which are, in theory, the principal criteria for evaluating candidates.
In the past few days in New York’s Hudson Valley we’ve heard from a few local progressives — opponents of war, corporate greed and poverty — now heaping praise upon one or the other of these candidates, as though Clinton or Obama were about to champion their causes.
Both candidates are virtually identical in their domestic and foreign policies, differing a bit here, a bit there. And a victory for the female candidate or the African American candidate will constitute an historic social breakthrough benefiting the struggles of both women and blacks. So there is no real contest in terms of politics or gender/racial considerations. What’s left to account for the enthusiasm of their liberal backers?
Change! Change? Obama and Clinton have positioned themselves first and foremost as the harbingers of significant change in America. As Obama said last night in Chicago with swelling emotion, “Our time has come, our movement is real, and change is coming to America.” He frequently appeals to youth to “dare to change the system.” Clinton often inspires her audiences by shouting, “Are you ready for change?” and then suggests she is the true agency for social change in this election.
Obviously, the political pollsters and party strategists have told them that the American people are hugely dissatisfied. They are unhappy about the direction the country is taking; about the war, the economy, the growing gap between the great riches of the few and the declining fortunes of the many, about the paucity of good jobs, about poverty, and so on.
Clinton and Obama rarely specify the changes they seek, and when they do they even more rarely articulate a program to implement such a change.
Both candidates say they will end the war in Iraq, but their real program is a gradual, prolonged and partial withdrawal of U.S. troops that will keep the Pentagon engaged in the country for many more years. They both supported the latest appropriations to continue the war through October this year. They will both support the next Defense Dept. budget. They have talked about mitigating poverty, especially after Edwards departed the campaign, but they have put forward no program to accomplish this objective. They have no program for creating good jobs ($17 an hour with benefits), or for reducing disproportionate poverty among African Americans and Latinos.
That’s just the beginning of what they are not going to change. And the notion that either Clinton or Obama will change the “system” prevailing in America and its fundamental policies — including hegemony and war abroad, and catering to wealth and corporations at home at the expense of the working class, lower middle class and poor — is preposterous.
As we said in our Jan. 24 newsletter article “Lesser Evil or Greater Good,” the two Democratic frontrunners are “better than any of their Republican counterparts.” But this is because rightists McCain, Romney and Huckabee repose at the very bottom of the progressive political barometer, not that centrists Clinton and Obama are anywhere near the top.
———————————————————
CHECK IT OUT:
THE COST OF WAR: We urge you to view, then pass on to others, a brief video on the cost of war, produced by the American Friends Service Committee. It is located at http://www.afsc.org/cost/. The same website offers you an opportunity to sign a petition “to defund the war, and refund human needs today.”
CLINTON VS. OBAMA ON HEALTHCARE: The political positions of the two Democratic frontrunners are quite similar, but sometimes there are differences. Each has a health care plan, neither of which single payer universal. But according to Paul Krugman, the liberal columnist for the New York Times, “there really is a big difference between the candidates’ approaches.” His Feb. 4 column is at: http://www.nytimes.com/2008/02/04/opinion/04krugman.html?em&ex=1202274000&en=15e3ef55ea8cce37&ei=5087%0A.
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