the Voice of
The Communist League of Revolutionary Workers–Internationalist
“The emancipation of the working class will only be achieved by the working class itself.”
— Karl Marx
the Voice of
The Communist League of Revolutionary Workers–Internationalist
“The emancipation of the working class will only be achieved by the working class itself.”
— Karl Marx
Dec 5, 2016
The year 2016 was great for the capitalist class, ending with a new stock market boom fed by rising corporate profits.
Those profits come out of the increased robbery of the working population by the capitalist class. Companies have been carrying out a multi-pronged offensive against workers’ jobs, wages and benefits in a real class war. They have pushed their workforce to work harder and longer, continually reducing the number of workers on the job. They have held down wages so they don’t keep up with the rising cost of living. They have slashed health benefits, while often doing away with pension benefits all together, especially for new hires. And they have outsourced more work to temp agencies and private contractors that pay starvation wages.
These attacks have brought about a real decline in workers’ living standards. Even official statistics recognize that family income is lower than it was 20 years ago.
This drop has been compounded by cuts to vital government programs for working people, along with cuts to big parts of the public sector workforce, at the federal, state and local levels. The cuts decimated public schools in working class neighborhoods and public health care facilities, not to speak of reducing Medicare, Medicaid and support for the unemployed, disabled and retirees on Social Security. Cuts in public funding meant that vital infrastructure, including roads, airports, mass transit networks, sewage and water systems, continue to crumble and decay.
The two parties of the capitalist class—Democrats and Republicans—are handing over almost entire government budgets to the big corporations, banks, real estate developers and the wealthiest people through huge tax cuts, subsidies, privatization schemes and so-called bailouts.
The new Trump administration has already shown it intends to continue these attacks—before it even takes office. All those promises that Trump made during his campaign to drain the Washington swamp of Wall Street influence went out the window as soon as he was elected. Look who he put in top positions in his cabinet: Wall Street billionaires. His promises to protect government programs for seniors and the poor, like Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid, were torn up with appointments of avowed enemies of public education, Medicare and Medicaid.
In other words, Trump will build on and intensify the attacks on working people that have been carried out under the previous administrations of Obama, Bush and Clinton.
What is most dangerous for the working class is the fact that Trump is following through with the virulent racist, sexist and anti-immigrant rhetoric that he spewed during the campaign. Trump has appointed avowed racists and white supremacists to top positions in the White House, as well as to run the Justice Department. Trump can do no greater service for the capitalist class than to weaken the working class by setting workers against each other, chopping the working class into small bits, even as the government itself carries out new witch hunts and persecutions.
That’s the situation the working class faces going into 2017.
But all that can change—when workers begin to organize and fight back, whether it’s on the shop floor, in the schools or in the streets. Workers in this country have not fought back in a massive way for close to four decades, not since the big coal miners’ wildcats and national strikes at the end of the 1970s.
But that doesn’t mean that workers won’t do it again. The capitalists are going to wage war on the working class, pushing us into a corner—until we begin to fight.
It’s that simple.
Who will begin the fight? No one knows. Just like no one knew, beforehand, that a strike of coal haulers in Minneapolis in February 1934 would be only the beginning of an avalanche of general strikes, urban insurrections and factory occupations in the following years. And no one knew beforehand that a week-long bus boycott in Baton Rouge, Louisiana in 1953 would be only the beginning of the black movement that would sweep through the South, as well as most of the major cities in the entire country—changing the country forever.
Fights might seem impossible—before they begin. But once those fights developed into powerful movements, they seemed inevitable.
When the working class organizes and fights in the future it will seem natural and inevitable.
Dec 5, 2016
Over the last ten years, Illinois cops confiscated more than 319 million dollars worth of property. Federal policing agencies seized another 404 million dollars from people in Illinois. The police can take this property without proving a crime has taken place. They can confiscate property without a conviction, a charge, or even an arrest. And once they’ve taken your property, you have to prove that it wasn’t used in a crime, rather than the other way around, through a very complicated and expensive legal process.
In one case, a 70-year-old woman let her grandson use her SUV. When he was arrested on charges of driving with a suspended license, the cops seized her vehicle, saying it had been used in the commission of a crime. When the woman tried to get her SUV back, the judge ridiculed her for not hiring an expensive lawyer.
Even if you do get your property back through a legal process heavily tilted in favor of the cops, you can’t get your court costs or legal fees reimbursed. If your property gets sold, which usually happens, the local prosecutor takes a cut off the top.
And the police department that seizes the property gets to keep the money. This gives police a huge incentive to take as much as they can. In fact, the Chicago Police Department and many other police departments around the state and the country write this into their budgets.
Whose property gets seized? Not the banks who used their massive wealth to rip off the whole country. Not the big companies that break safety laws, environmental laws, and tax laws every day. No, a huge share of the property is seized from people in poor and working class neighborhoods, disproportionately from black people.
Illinois is one of the worst states for taking people’s property, but it’s not alone. This practice, called “civil asset forfeiture,” took off as part of the “war on drugs” in the 1980s and 1990s and expanded greatly under both Reagan and Clinton. It was justified as a way to seize money and property from drug dealers. But in fact it’s always been used to allow the police to steal from vulnerable people.
This system is set up perfectly–to legally turn the police into a gang of thieves.
Dec 5, 2016
In January of 2017, a lot of single adult food stamp recipients are going to be cut off from getting help in four Michigan counties: Oakland, Washtenaw, Kent and Ottawa counties.
According to the Federal Government, the official unemployment rate is “too low” in these four counties. This triggered benefits to be slashed.
Some of Michigan’s most vulnerable working people will be hit. Census data shows that up to 60 percent of the folks who will lose their food stamps have jobs! Their pay is just too low. Or their hours have been slashed—so they qualify for food stamps. Or at least they used to qualify for food stamps, before the January changes.
Dec 5, 2016
Two state employees who work in DHHS (Department of Health and Human Services) were criminally charged on November 14 by the Wayne County Prosecutor’s Office.
The charges stem from a situation where a child died. It is catastrophic for a child to die.
According to news reports, there was little food in the child’s home when the protective services worker went out to investigate.
There is much more to this story. If they trust you, child protective services workers—all across Michigan—will tell you that when a worker goes out to a home to investigate, about half of the time there is little or no food!
To understand a little background, it is necessary to know about “Leo’s Law”–passed by the Legislature in 2011 and signed by Governor Snyder. This law made it much harder for police or protective services to remove a child from a home.
This law certainly reduced costs for the State of Michigan. Slashing social welfare costs has been the priority for far too long.
In a department where employees work unpaid overtime and feel abused themselves–coworkers were in tears when they heard about these charges. This job was already nearly impossible. Turnover was high. Workers are now leaving the department as fast as they can.
Nothing is done to the politicians who demolish the social safety net. Nothing is done to the politicians who poisoned Flint. Workers will need to come together in solidarity. It will take a fight to protect ourselves and Michigan’s children.
Dec 5, 2016
Last week, the Los Angeles City Council, with a 12 to 0 vote, approved the plans to build a $1.2-billion massive housing, hotel, and retail project with a skyscraper on a parking lot in South L.A., at the corner of Washington Boulevard and Broadway. The Reef project is just blocks from a Metro Blue Line station. The city has similar projects to develop areas near the rail stations, like the one at the corner near the La Cienega Expo Line station.
The Reef Project could lead to the displacement of 43,000 working class residents.
What the City Council is doing is clear cut: first the city develops rail lines with our taxes like Measure M. Then it helps large businesses develop areas around the rail lines, pushing working class residents out. City Officials are working for the rich.
Dec 5, 2016
Last month, the Southern California Air Quality Management District (SCAQMD) announced that it had found chromium 6 at 350 times normal levels in the air in the city of Paramount near Los Angeles. Chromium 6 is well-known as a highly toxic substance.
The announcement of SCAQMD was no news to the people who live in the working-class neighborhoods of Paramount. For many years, they have been notifying government agencies about burning metallic odors in the air, which have been causing all kinds of ailments. One elementary school teacher alone has filed dozens of complaints since 2009. And the SCAQMD itself admits that, in the last five years alone, it has received 350 complaints in Paramount—more than 60 percent of them in relation to the metal processing plants in the area.
After years of complaints, in 2014 the agency finally named one company, Carlton Forge Works, for releasing chromium 6 and another toxic metal, cadmium, into the air—although everybody in Paramount knew that many more companies had been poisoning the air for years.
So did the SCAQMD at least shut down this one company, Carlton, until it cleaned up its emissions? Did it order Carlton to pay for the treatment of the people sickened by its poisonous emissions?
No, none of that. The agency just told Carlton to submit an “inventory of its emissions.” IT DID NOTHING, in other words. And that’s exactly what this agency, and other regulatory agencies, have done for years about massive contamination in other working-class communities nearby—such as in Vernon, caused by battery recycler Exide, and in South L.A., caused by oil field operator Allenco.
The massive poisoning of the air, soil and water in working-class neighborhoods located near industrial areas continues, and gets even worse.
In this capitalist society, companies put profit above everything, including human life. And officials leading government agencies see it as their job to help big companies maximize their profits. The working-class people living in these areas know this by experience. Many also know that any improvement, even small, has and will come from their own organized struggle against the companies.
Dec 5, 2016
According to a recent report prepared for the upcoming Maryland state assembly, 3,500 rape kits have gone untested. If a person reports a sexual assault or rape in Maryland, by law, a kit must be collected with blood, hair and other material that could have DNA traces of the attacker. But Maryland does not require the testing of the kits collected.
What is the point of collecting all this evidence only to have it sit untested on some shelf in an evidence locker collecting dust and mold? The process of collecting a rape kit is often traumatic, humiliating and physically painful. A woman is raped. Then, after reporting the crime, she is interrogated, poked, prodded, and photographed. On top of all that is the added insult of going through this process and having the rape kit go untested.
One way the police justify not spending the $1,000 for each test is when the woman knows her attacker. But in fact, by not testing, the police cannot collect a database which could show previous rapes by the attacker.
The police and courts have historically been unsympathetic to rape victims, often treating them like the criminals. It wasn’t that long ago when the police would ask the victim questions like: What were you wearing? Why were you there? Suggesting that somehow the woman was asking for it or deserved it. This is totally a reflection of how women are viewed in this society.
The cops may pretend they are doing something about rape by collecting evidence. But, by not testing, they show they do not take seriously sexual assault and rape. And that only serves to reinforce the violence against women.
Dec 5, 2016
This is translated from an article in the December 2nd Lutte Ouvrière (Workers Struggle), the paper of the revolutionary workers group of that name active in France.
Fidel Castro, the main leader of the Cuban revolution, died on November 25th, ten years after he handed over power to his brother Raúl. Neither Barack Obama nor French President François Hollande attended the funeral services, but the leaders of Latin American and African countries were there. Even after Castro’s death, the imperialist powers cannot bring themselves to commemorate a man who stood up to them for so long! Nonetheless, in Cuba, the population continues to render homage to Castro.
The Cuban revolution overthrew the dictatorship of Fulgencio Batista on January 1st, 1959. Batista was a military man who had dominated the country since 1933 and had carried out a coup d’état in 1952 to formally seize power. He was supported by the U.S. government, whose aim was for U.S. businesses to control the Cuban economy, including its oil refineries and sugar industry.
A lawyer and son of a landowner, Castro was twenty-six years old at the time of Batista’s coup. In 1953, he and a group of companions attacked the Moncada Barracks in Santiago, hoping to set off an uprising of military officers against Batista. When he was arrested, tried, and sentenced to prison for this action, Castro transformed his trial into a denunciation of the dictator with his declaration, History Will Absolve Me.
Castro was released from prison and left for Mexico, but he returned in November 1956 aboard the yacht Granma with 82 men, including his brother Raúl and Ernesto (Che) Guevara. Most of these men were massacred by the army, but twelve of the survivors regrouped in the Sierra Maestra mountains. It was their luck to find support from local peasants for whom the guerrilla army was a way to put a stop to the confiscation of their land by U.S. companies. Guevara would later say: “the agrarian reform was a demand imposed by the peasants on our revolution.” The ferocity of Batista’s dictatorship would push many people to become fighters for the guerrilla movement.
Castro did find support among the moderate bourgeoisie of the cities weary of the dictator, but for him, the countryside had to come before the city. This is because, as Guevara explained: “In these rural areas, the construction of a future state apparatus begins. The guerrilla army possesses an organization, a new structure, all the characteristics of a miniature government.” The corruption of Batista’s regime pushed the movement towards a quick success, since Batista was also the man of the mafia. Havana was the brothel of the Americas, with gambling dens, casinos, and nightclubs. Batista’s fall set off a real celebration among the population and had a global impact.
A provisional government was established with the mission of organizing new elections, and it included a pro-U.S. corporate lawyer as Prime Minister, as well as various rivals of Batista within the military and anti-communists, while the Castro brothers and Che Guevara had no official government position. However, for the population, Castro was the architect of victory, the only possible mediator between the different political forces, and the real leader of the situation. The supporters of Castro wanted to see an end to despotism and corruption, an improvement in the lives of the poor masses, and true political independence from the United States.
Castro traveled to the United States in April 1959 in the hope of establishing friendly relations with Washington, but the U.S. government refused to talk with him. On May 17th, Castro launched a moderate agrarian reform, identical to the one that Batista had carried out in 1940. The reform only applied to uncultivated lands, the owners of which were to be gradually compensated. The United States demanded a higher level of compensation, to be paid immediately. Castro didn’t back down. The Cuban Army seized the land of U.S. companies.
In April 1960, when U.S. refineries in Cuba refused to refine Russian oil, Castro seized them. The U.S. Senate responded by ending its agreement with Cuba to buy sugar. Castro nationalized a portion of U.S. property on the island and accelerated the agrarian reform.
In October 1960, with Castro refusing to bow down, the U.S. government declared an embargo on Cuban exports. The Cuban government seized more companies. Cuban capitalists, executives, mafia men, and those around them left for Miami, Florida. The people who have been celebrating the death of Castro in recent days are often the children or grandchildren of this group.
These nationalizations were far from being part of a long-developed socialist project. They were the pragmatic response of a leadership determined to defend Cuban national sovereignty in the face of intransigent U.S. imperialism.
On January 3rd, 1961, the United States severed diplomatic relations with Cuba. On April 17th, the U.S. government tried to impose its will by force. This was the Bay of Pigs invasion, a total fiasco for anti-Castro Cubans and their U.S. advisors. The population mobilized to defend the island against these invaders, showing the level of popular support existing for the new regime.
A general embargo against Cuba began on February 3rd, 1962, with the goal of provoking the Castro regime’s rapid fall by depriving the island of food and medicine. So Castro and the Cuban leaders looked to the Soviet Union for help. Castro had already proclaimed the socialist character of the Cuban revolution on April 16th, 1961. This began a thirty-year period of economic aid from the Soviet Union, which assured a certain level of prosperity for Cuba until the beginning of the 1990’s, and the Cuban government aligned itself with Moscow. It was the hostility of the United States towards the Cuban Revolution that eventually pushed the Cuban government into the arms of the Soviet Union.
The United States’ greatest fear was that the success of the Cuban Revolution would serve as an example to others all across Latin America. And it did awaken enthusiasm in an entire generation struggling against the dictatorships that ruled under Washington’s command. The Cuban Revolution inspired those who wanted to put an end to the economic pillage that the imperial power of the north carried out against the working classes and the peasants.
In 1967, Che Guevara died in the jungles of Bolivia. Che, who in his own way had wanted to extend the revolution, failed, while Castro succeeded in preserving the Cuban state. The Cuban government was nevertheless isolated and at the mercy of pressure and support from abroad.
This national limit of the Cuban revolution was also, in fact, the political limit of its leaders. Although they were always conscious of the need to maintain their popular support in order to resist the grasp of the United States, they were in no way revolutionaries of the working class aiming to lead the struggle to overthrow the system of imperialist domination.
The Cuban state has remained isolated but stable, even without any democratic functioning, because it guaranteed a high level of social protection for the population, most notably in terms of health and education. These gains are rare enough in Latin America and elsewhere to promote the reputation of the regime born out of the revolution of 1959. But they will not hold off the pressure of the imperialist world in the long term, at the risk of seeing the return of all the old garbage from the time of Batista.
It isn’t certain whether history will absolve Castro or not, but what is clear is that he knew how to stand fast against the pressures of imperialism, with the support of his people. This will remain as a testimony to the force that a revolution can give. And this is the fundamental reason for the hatred that the Cuban Revolution still continues to incite, almost 60 years later, in the hearts of the ruling classes.
Dec 5, 2016
Since November 28th, the media have devoted a lot of space to Fidel Castro’s death, highlighting the celebrations in Miami. They spouted a flood of hateful prejudice, lies and stupidities.
Thus Castro was only “a bloody dictator,” and Cuba “a prison.” The media widely quoted well-known oppositionists and supposed specialists capable of repeating for fifty years anti-Castro propaganda.
What the media ignored was the United Nations’ ranking of countries’ human development. If it had done so, it would have had to admit that Cuba, a small underdeveloped country which was led by gangsters up to 1959, today ranks 67 out of 188 countries in the world, despite the U.S. embargo since the revolution, despite the end of the aid furnished by the Soviet Union. Cuba is even 33rd in life expectancy and 30th in education. It would have been more honest, but too much for the partisan media, to show the large crowds turning out to see Fidel Castro’s ashes pass by. They didn’t show up because there was a rifle pointed at their backs.
This is not to deny that there is a dictatorial regime in Cuba, but we should know what yardstick to use to measure it. Haiti, the island neighbor of Cuba, is called a democracy by the same people who call Castro a dictator. In Haiti, the workers suffer from hunger; hurricanes are transformed into catastrophes by a decaying state apparatus; and cholera, which is unknown in Cuba, follows floods. In Haiti, a president has just been elected. Three fourths of the population didn’t bother to turn out, and the results are in fact disputed by the powerful. But the U.S. government and the pretended international community shows this operation in a democratic light, because the capitalists are free to exploit Haiti.
And it’s a fact that they haven’t been able to do the same thing in Cuba for decades, during which time, Cuba was a thorn in the side of the powerful and their hired journalists.
Dec 5, 2016
As the last presidential election clearly showed to everybody, people in the U.S. do not elect a president. They only elect the electoral college, according to the U.S. election laws and system. Then, the electoral college elects the president. One may wonder: Who are these people U.S. voters elect, without knowing it?
These people forming the electoral college are handpicked by the political parties, but do not appear in name on the ballots we cast. For example, in California, among the electors are Janine Bera, the wife of Rep. Ami Bera of Elk Grove; Christine Pelosi, the daughter of House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi and chairwoman of the state party’s women’s caucus; Eileen Feinstein Mariano, granddaughter of Sen. Dianne Feinstein; and Olivia Reyes-Becerra, daughter of Rep. Xavier Becerra of Los Angeles.
So, the electors are nothing but significant others, children, or grand-children of the party big-wigs. Apparently the U.S. is electing, not a president, but a royal family.
Dec 5, 2016
Last December, a San Bernardino County worker and his wife shot up a holiday party, killing 14 county workers and wounding 22. The spokesman for the county said that caring for those affected by the attack was a top priority for the county.
But in fact those 22 victims have been left high and dry by California’s workers’ compensation system–a system set up to protect employers, not to provide health care.
The husband of one victim, Hanan Megalla, who was shot four times, said “her doctors keep asking for physical therapy, they keep asking for medication, each time the doctor writes a prescription... they shoot it down.” After a fight, he got some medications approved, but “they keep telling you it’s only approved for one time only. Which means every month we have to go through this refill drama again. It’s unbearable.”
Another victim, Valerie Kallis-Weber, has a paralyzed left hand, bone and bullet fragments in her pelvis, a fist-sized gouge in her thigh, and psychological trauma. “I can’t type, I can’t put a bra on, I can’t cut a steak, I can’t drive, I can’t do laundry... I can’t do much walking or standing or sitting,” she explained. But the workers’ comp system reduced visits from her health aide. They cut off her occupational therapy. They stopped her physical therapy. They withdrew approval to pay for her anti-depressant drugs.
Amanda Gaspard was shot in her leg and her forearm, shattering bone and tissue. She lost half her blood. “I have literally hundreds of pieces of shrapnel in me. The word ‘painful’ doesn’t do it justice.” But workers compensation will not pay for her physical therapy. Doctors’ requests for therapeutic exercise sessions with a trainer have been denied. The county has made only two payments for the psychological appointments she’s gone to every week since last January.
Sally Cardinale, another victim, said, “I don’t feel like they have had any compassion for us. We were victims when it was convenient for them.” Yes, the disgusting politicians used these victims for their own ends, invoking their suffering when it was useful, but failing to provide the most basic human level of care.
The county workers shot in San Bernardino are just the most outrageous victims of a system designed to shift ever more wealth to employers, at the expense of workers everywhere.
Dec 5, 2016
This year, at least two million Americans will have infections caused by antibiotic-resistant bacteria, and more than 23,000 will die.
Bacteria, like other life forms, continuously evolve to survive. When the bacteria are attacked by a new antibiotic, they start to change their biological structure, adapt to their new environment, and over time become successful in evading the antibiotic. “And now we’re beginning to get reports of bacteria that are resistant to virtually every antibiotic we have,” explains the Food and Drug Administration (FDA). Once the bacteria becomes antibiotic-resistant, a new antibiotic needs to be developed to combat it.
And yet research into new antibiotics is stalled. Between the time penicillin was discovered in 1928 and the 1970s, 270 antibiotics were approved. But since then, research into new antibiotics has dramatically declined. Today, only five of the top 50 big drug companies are developing new antibiotics. A new antibiotic might be worth about 100 million dollars; a new drug to treat a disease like arthritis could be worth one billion dollars or more, according to AARP. So, these “big companies” are after “bigger profits,” but not for having better healthcare for the public.
Dec 5, 2016
The first antibiotic, penicillin, was developed by surgeon Alexander Fleming in 1928. But, Dr. Fleming did not patent his discovery of one of the most critical drugs in human history, because he thought that all humanity should benefit from this discovery. Instead, he published his results so that other human beings could learn from him how to treat infections.
But no company wanted to produce penicillin, since it was not patented and, for this reason, its manufacture would not bring a company profits to make its owners rich. The British and U.S. governments later developed this first antibiotic during World War II, to treat wounds. Since then, this first antibiotic has saved millions of lives.
Companies need huge profits to develop drugs that treat our diseases. But we don’t need these companies to develop these drugs. Like the development of the first antibiotic proves, we can collectively develop antibiotics to improve our health.
Dec 5, 2016
Blue Cross Blue Shield of Michigan (BCBSM) retirees are being put through the ringer. With little time left in 2016, and December deadlines to select new, individual insurance packages, retirees are fighting back and fighting for each other.
The retirees affected January 1st of 2017 are not alone in this fight. Union retirees have been involved at their side. While Blue Cross sold a load of crap to the public by pretending it is just a change in the delivery mode for the same health benefits, Blue Cross workers and retirees know better. After all, it is the workers and retirees that built the Blues Empire and understand benefits inside out. And using the oldest divide and rule tactic in the book, saying that union retirees and current union workers have a chance for better, hasn’t tricked workers into believing it.
The Blues has made it difficult-to-impossible for retirees to understand the extent of the cuts. Retirees still cannot get written explanations of the benefit packages they are forced to choose between. There are no written communications regarding how whatever reimbursement received from the Blues must be applied for, and retirees are told they will have to pay initial costs for premiums, etc, out of their own pockets until reimbursement can be made.
Retirees under age 65 are being quoted extremely high monthly premiums that the yearly stipend from the employer won’t even cover. While the charges differ based on age, illness, sex and area, some come to over a thousand dollars per month.
Out of state retirees who have no Blues plans in their state are being directed to the public marketplace with total confusion over how reimbursement works with non-Blues products! And Canadian retirees, who cannot participate in Health Savings Accounts by law, have no answers either.
Very ill and the catastrophically ill retirees have no way to calculate how many thousands of dollars in premiums and drug costs they will be responsible for beginning in January and throughout the year. Some are faced with bills of thousands of dollars per month for drugs alone.
Retirees have been helping each other to demand answers from Blue Cross and their vendor OneExchange. What is obviously true is that Blue Cross gave no thought to how all the problems of conversion would play out. Their “kissing cousins” in OneExchange promised to “handle it,” but they don’t. Blues employees could untangle the web of benefit complications that BCBSM has put in place over the years, but the contractor arrangement precludes it.
Clearly, this carrier’s job is to take apart a rich defined benefit package using “smoke and mirrors” to replace it with a lemon, so they are making up answers as they go.
While the fight seems almost impossible, and sick retirees are not in a good position to do it, they are fortified by their experience fighting BCBSM in the past and in servicing customers and groups for decades.
With the holidays fast approaching, there may be a lull in activity. But you can believe that the retirees continue to think, strategize and wait for any opportunity to arise to hit back at this massive attack. With any luck, BCBSM retirees will find a way to lock into the anger and frustration of larger groups of retirees—like the 200,000 Medigap recipients, who are also being robbed of their entitlements by Blue Cross Blue Shield.
Dec 5, 2016
Three young women in Ferndale, Michigan got together with friends to organize a march of all who felt threatened or fearful after the election. After the divisions of Donald Trump’s venomous presidential campaign, they felt they had to speak up. They hoped for a few dozen people, but over a thousand showed up!
Before the march, when Trump supporters pressured the organizers to cancel their “hate” march, they renamed it the “love” march. They invited Trump supporters to attend–if in agreement with the march’s message of human solidarity.
Even though organizers changed the original march route so workers trying to get to their jobs would not be late because of a bus detour, the march started on time. Many homemade signs spoke out against racism, sexism, attacks on immigrants and homophobia.
At a gathering concluding the march, an energetic high school senior addressed the crowd. “Growing up in a biracial multi-cultural household has giving me perspective....My mom always taught me to have candid strength when voicing my opinions....and to never let anyone try to shut you up....We are standing together as one. When we do that, we are unstoppable.”
Dec 5, 2016
Ford recently announced that it would not be moving a small amount of production of the Lincoln MKC to Mexico, like it had previously planned. Donald Trump took credit for that change. Ford said that the change in plans was due to sales. We don’t know who is telling the truth and who is lying.
But it certainly is true that the issue of trade and jobs going to Mexico or elsewhere was a big issue in the election. Trump, Clinton, Sanders and many candidates, Republican and Democrat, campaigned about it. The media talked about it. It is an issue that many top union leaders have harped on for many years.
But what impact does free trade and trade agreements like NAFTA have on jobs? Certainly there is some impact. Any trade agreement is written for the benefit of the corporations and banks, and not for the benefit of workers.
But there are other factors that affect jobs, too. A study that was done at Ball State University said that 5.6 million manufacturing jobs were lost in the U.S. from 2000 to 2010, and that only 13% of the jobs lost were due to trade. The study said 87% of the lost jobs were due to other reasons.
Many jobs were lost due to speed-up: one person being forced to do the job of two people. Jobs were lost due to automation. Companies could use automation to keep everyone working and make everyone’s job easier, but instead companies use automation to eliminate jobs. And many jobs in places like the auto industry are outsourced to low wage companies inside the U.S. The jobs are still here, but they pay half or less of the wages.
So why is it that politicians and the media and the top union leaders always want to talk about the 13% of jobs lost and never talk about the 87%? Why do they blame all the loss of jobs on trade when that is a smaller part of the problem and not the main problem?
They want to pit us against workers in other countries and not talk about what the corporations are doing right here at home, taking away our jobs and lowering our wages. When the politicians and the media and the top union leaders want us to believe that trade is the problem, they are just covering up for the corporations and doing their dirty work.
Dec 5, 2016
During his election campaign, Donald Trump promised to end Wall Street’s influence in Washington. Before the Iowa caucuses, Trump said, “I’m not going to let Wall Street get away with murder. Wall Street has caused tremendous problems for us.”
He later spoke of Wall Street’s ties to Washington insider politicians, saying, “I know the guys at Goldman Sachs. They have total, total control over Ted Cruz. Just like they have total control over Hillary Clinton.”
So who is Trump choosing for his cabinet? Wall Street insiders!
He chose Steven Mnuchin, a former Goldman Sachs executive and hedge fund manager, to be Treasury Secretary. Wilbur Ross, a billionaire private equity investor, is his choice for Commerce secretary. He selected Elaine Chao, a former banker, as Transportation Secretary, and billionaire Betsy DeVos as Secretary of Education. He’s also been meeting with Goldman Sachs President Gary Cohn and is reportedly considering him for Budget Director.
Apparently Wall Street doesn’t seem too worried that Trump’s choices will “limit” its power in Washington. Goldman Sachs shares recently set a new high on the stock market.
Go figure. When Trump said he won’t let Wall Street get away with murder, he meant he’d simply give them the whole store without having to face any resistance at all!
Dec 5, 2016
Donald Trump declared victory in convincing Carrier to keep about 800 out of the 2,000 jobs at a plant in Indiana that had been slated to move to Mexico. Trump claimed that he had played tough with the company: “Corporate America is going to have to understand that we have to take care of our workers also.” Surprise, surprise: that is a big fat lie.
In fact, Trump just stole a page from Obama’s book. He “saved” these Carrier jobs the same way that Obama “saved” the U.S. auto industry: by handing corporations taxpayer cash, and forcing the workers to take concessions.
The deal gives Carrier about 7 million dollars in state subsidies, on top of the tens of millions they already get. According to its own press release, this is what led the company to keep the jobs here. That is workers’ tax money, that’s supposed to go to schools, roads, and services, not giant, profitable corporations!
And who knows what those 800 jobs will be like? Brenda Battle, a 24-year worker with Carrier, explained that: “As of yet we don’t know what kind of concessions we’re going to have to put up with to keep our jobs. I smell a rat.”
That’s Trump: a rat, who’s only looking out for corporate interests at workers’ expense!