The Spark

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

Issue no. 1036 — June 19 - July 17, 2017

EDITORIAL
Trump or No Trump, Capitalists Aim at the Working Class

Jun 19, 2017

The Trump administration might be mired in multiple investigations. A special prosecutor appointed by Trump’s own Department of Justice might be investigating Trump himself. The U.S. news media might obsess over Trump’s every rant on Twitter. Top business executives might decry Washington "gridlock," that is, the inability of the Republican-controlled Congress to pass even one "reform" that would hand over trillions of more taxpayer dollars to the biggest companies, in the form of supposed "health care reform," not to speak of massive tax breaks, infrastructure giveaways and other capitalist scams.

But in the real world, the wheels of the U.S. government and its massive state apparatus continue to grind. For example, in mid-June, Defense Secretary Jim Mattis told Congress that the Pentagon was developing a plan to send thousands more troops to Afghanistan with Trump’s blessing. Never mind that the war in Afghanistan has already lasted more than 16 years, the longest war in U.S. history. Never mind that there are already 10,000 U.S. troops stationed there, along with tens of thousands more U.S.-paid mercenaries and U.S. allies, patrolling, bombing and strafing, leaving this extremely poor, war-ravaged country in ashes. That is not enough for U.S. policy makers. No price is too high for peasants, workers and the poor in Afghanistan to pay in order to maintain the U.S. imperial order, that is, the profits, wealth and domination of the U.S. oil companies, banks and military contractors.

That war is only one of many that the U.S. military is carrying out in countries such as Syria, Iraq, Yemen, Somalia. And even as U.S. officials decry Russian meddling in the U.S. election, the U.S. military and CIA are fueling the ongoing civil war in Ukraine and the Crimea, on Russia’s doorstep.

Certainly, the U.S. working class pays for these wars. It is our sons and daughters who the U.S. ruling class sends to fight and die or often come back partially broken in mind and body. And it is the working class’s tax dollars that pay for everything from the bullets to bombs and missiles.

Meanwhile, here at home, more budget cuts for vital programs for working people are on the way. Sure, both Democrats and Republicans alike denounced Trump’s original budget proposals that came out in early May for decimating every single social program and even minimal regulatory protection, proposals that made a mockery of Trump’s campaign promises to protect the poor and the vulnerable. But that doesn’t mean that the final budget won’t go in the same direction, as ever more U.S. tax dollars that were supposed to pay for education, health, retirement pensions, disability payments and infrastructure will be swallowed up by the capitalist class in the form of rich contracts and subsidies, thus pushing down working people’s living standards ever more.

Of course, to force people to accept this decline, the Trump administration is also boosting the repressive state apparatus here at home. For example, that repression is aimed at the millions of immigrants, whose only supposed "crime" is to live and breathe without full documentation. The government is hiring more prison guards to staff more detention centers, run by private prison companies–one of the few "growth" industries in a rotten, declining economy.

The U.S. capitalist class would like nothing better than for U.S. workers to get sucked into all of the Trump melodrama. But what is it really all about? Nothing but a fight over which politician will be the public face of a government and economy built on the backs of the working class in this country and all over the world.

No, for the workers, the real question is how to organize together in order to fight to defend our own interests against a capitalist class and its government that will never, ever stop attacking us. And workers can begin that fight, no matter what politician happens to be at the top of the heap.

Pages 2-3

High Cost of Drugs due to Profit

Jun 19, 2017

Prescription drugs are a growing cost in the U.S.; more than a thousand dollars a year is spent, on average, for every man, woman and child. Congress–heavily lobbied by the drug manufacturing industry–refuses to put a limit on what drug companies can charge.

But Congress says it is not legal to purchase drugs from such lower-cost companies as those in Canada or Europe, which charge vastly less for the exact same drugs. Those governments DO put a limit on what the drug companies can charge.

Valeant, a drug company, was in the news for charging $1,472 for a single dose of Isuprel, which was already priced at an outrageous $180 per dose. A drug called Cuprimine, whose patent is owned by Valeant, went from $8.88 to $262.00 per capsule. At another drug company, a course of medicine for hepatitis C currently costs $8,400 for three months; yes, $8,400. That is not a misprint for $84.00.

The drug companies claim they have to charge a lot because it is so expensive to research drugs and carry out many years of required clinical trials. According to Consumer Reports, 38% of all basic science research is tax-payer-funded research done by government agencies. In fact, on average, pharmaceutical companies spend only 16 percent of their expenses on research. Their real expenses lie in advertising and sales: Johnson & Johnson spends twice as much on advertising, marketing and administration as they spend on research, for example.

Generic drugs are supposed to be very similar to brand-name drugs, and sell at a small fraction of the price. But the Food and Drug Administration, charged with checking every drug and clinical trial, is short of funding to hire the needed scientists, which was true even before the new administration came in. The FDA has a ridiculous backlog on generic drugs–4,300 applications. So generics don’t make it to market.

Drug companies also made a great arrangement for their bottom line: keep a drug under patent for 20 years, meaning no other company can make that particular drug, nor can a company make a similar generic version, in order to bring down the price. Then drug companies play their next card, all perfectly legal, which they call "tweaking" the formula. They can make a small change to a drug, for example changing it from a pill to an injection, and keep the patent going for another ten years!

Congress clearly doesn’t want to get in the way of the pharmaceutical industry’s gigantic profits. But the profits come at a cost to us–not just in money, but in our health.

Chaldeans the Latest Victims of ICE Attacks

Jun 19, 2017

U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents arrested more than 100 Chaldeans in the Detroit area, threatening them with deportation to Iraq because of past criminal convictions.

Chaldeans are Iraqi-American Christians. They likely face persecution, perhaps including torture or death, if sent back to Iraq, now the scene of violence between various sects within the largely Muslim majority population.

The Chaldean community in Detroit is large, and many have lived and worked in the U.S. for decades.

Chaldeans are not the only group recently singled out for the threat of deportation in ICE’s latest ramped up campaign against immigrants. In the Nashville, Tennessee area, members of the Kurdish community have spoken out about the recent harassment of dozens of Kurds by ICE officials, with six people being detained.

These detentions look like ICE’s attempt to appear "equal opportunity" in its attacks. It is using the pretext of detainees’ past criminal convictions to justify the deportations to the American public. But many of the convictions against the detainees are very old, and those arrested had paid their debts to society long ago.

Whether the attacks by the politicians and the immigration agencies they use are carried out against Christians, Kurds, Muslims or any other community, they are being conducted as a way of dividing the working class. It’s simply a way to convince us to see immigrants and people in other countries as our enemies.

Our true enemies are the politicians themselves leading the charge, and the wealthy class that stands behind them.

Protesting an Outrageous Verdict

Jun 19, 2017

Thousands of people have been protesting the acquittal of Jeronimo Yanez, the cop who shot and killed Philando Castile last July in a suburb of St. Paul, Minnesota. Yanez’s lawyer said in court that on the day of the shooting, Yanez pulled Castile over because he believed he matched the description of a robbery suspect and had a faulty brake light. Castile was carrying a gun, which he had a legal permit to do. He told Yanez he had a weapon in the car. But seconds later, Yanez fired into the car several times. Castile’s girlfriend, Diamond Reynolds, was next to him and her 4-year-old daughter was in the backseat. Castile’s arm was practically shot off, and he was killed. Reynolds used a cell phone to video and live-stream this horrific attack, so that it was witnessed live by millions.

Now, with this despicable verdict, thousands have returned to the streets in protest. They raised their fists and carried signs saying: "Unite for Philando" and "Corrupt systems only corrupt."

Castile was one of 963 people who police fatally shot last year, according to a Washington Post database tracking such shootings. The cop was charged because of Diamond Reynolds’ dramatic broadcast seen world-wide and because of subsequent protests.

Police are seldom charged for on-duty shootings. And convictions are even more rare. Something or someones have to force the issue.

This was another show trial in the wake of other show trials. Trials to calm people’s outrage, not trials to change the way things are. In Baltimore, six police officers charged in the aftermath of civil unrest were acquitted, charges dropped. Mistrials were declared last year in two other high profile police shootings that, like Castile’s death, followed traffic stops and included recordings widely shared. In South Carolina, jurors deadlocked in the case of Michael Slager, a former police officer who fatally shot Walter Scott in the back.

People are right to be in the streets. If there is a hope of the population changing things, it will take this kind of reaction immediately to every transgression the police bring.

Flint Water Whitewash

Jun 19, 2017

The poisoning of the Flint, Michigan water system made national news again on June 14. Michigan Attorney General Bill Schuette brought felony charges against five top public officials in a Legionnaires’ disease death traced back to the Flint Water Crisis.

The head of Michigan’s Dept. of Health and Human Services was charged with involuntary manslaughter for knowing about the Legionnaires’ disease problem for a year before alerting the public. In all, 12 deaths and 79 illnesses resulted from the outbreak.

In Michigan, 15 officials face 51 charges related to the water crisis. No one has been convicted.

Every time someone new faces legal charges, politicians of both parties parade before the cameras saying, "The system works."

But the system doesn’t work if the goal is safe, clean water. Court cases do not stop business as usual in capitalist society.

The water coming out of many taps in Flint, Michigan still smells bad and is discolored. And the water coming out of taps all over the United States has problems. According to an investigation by USA Today, excessive lead levels exist in all 50 states and four million Americans may drink toxic water.

Flint is a symptom of a larger problem. The U.S. water system infrastructure needs massive public spending. Bringing legal charges against a few public officials in Michigan is a side-show. It’s a show that costs a lot less money than taking on the profit-driven system that is destroying water systems all over the U.S.

Explosive Cargoes Still Traverse Baltimore

Jun 19, 2017

Just one year ago, in June 2016, 13 cars of a 124-car CSX freight train derailed at the entrance to an old railroad tunnel that runs under downtown Baltimore. No fire resulted and all but one of the derailed cars were empty. However, that one car contained acetone, a highly flammable chemical used in nail polish remover and paint thinner. Other cars carried phenol, butane, liquefied petroleum gas and acid–all very dangerous materials to be railroading thru the city.

In July 2001, another derailment in this same tunnel had terrible results: 11 cars of a 60-car train derailed. One containing tripropylene caught fire almost immediately. The fire spread to cars containing paper and wood products. A tank car ruptured, spilling more than 2,500 gallons of highly corrosive hydrochloric acid. The extreme heat in the tunnel caused a 40-inch water main above it to rupture, eventually releasing about 14 million gallons of water. 1,200 buildings lost electricity.

The fire burned for more than five days. Toxic fumes and smoke poured out of both ends of the tunnel, sickening thousands of people in downtown and midtown areas of the city. Fifteen streets and many businesses had to close. 23 city bus lines had to be rerouted. Light rail service through the city was shut down for over 7 weeks as was one of the busiest downtown intersections.

Yet today, 16 years after this disaster in the city, and one year after the wake-up call derailment last year, shipments of highly flammable and very toxic materials continue through the city. About 165,000 people live in what is considered the potential blast zone running along either side of the tracks through the city. Tens of thousands more work in this endangered area.

The people who have been demanding more information about these shipments and an end to this threat to the health and lives of hundreds if not thousands in Baltimore are correct to not shut up and to continue to raise hell about the situation.

Pages 4-5

The Revolution or the War!

Jun 19, 2017

This article continues our series on the Russian Revolution, taken from the words of participants.

In June 1917, the military offensive launched by Kerensky’s government provoked numerous discussions about peace and the foreign policy of the revolution. On this question, Lenin wanted to address the exploited in every country, whether they were from the West or whether they were among the nationalities oppressed by czarism. He did this in order to make them allies of the Russian workers and peasants. He expressed this in several articles in Pravda.

On June 7th (June 20th by our calendar), Lenin wrote an article in which he asked: "Is There a Way to a Just Peace?" and responded: "There is: through a workers’ revolution against the capitalists of the world. … Only after the transfer of power to the oppressed classes could Russia approach the oppressed classes of other countries, not with empty words, not with mere appeals, but calling their attention to her example, and immediately and explicitly proposing clear-cut terms for universal peace.

‘Comrade workers and toilers of the world,‘ she would say in the proposal for an immediate peace. ‘Enough of the bloodshed. Peace is possible. A just peace means peace without annexations, without seizures. Let the German capitalist robbers and their crowned robber Wilhelm know that we shall not come to terms with them, that we regard as robbery on their part not only what they have grabbed since the war, but also Alsace and Lorraine, and the Danish and Polish areas of Prussia.

‘We also consider that Poland, Finland, the Ukraine, and other non-Great-Russian lands were seized by the Russian czars and capitalists.

‘We consider that all colonies, Ireland, and so on, were seized by the British, French, and other capitalists.

‘We Russian workers and peasants shall not hold any of the non-Great-Russian lands or colonies (such as Turkestan, Mongolia, or Persia) by force. Down with war for the division of colonies, for the division of annexed (seized) lands, for the division of capitalist spoils!‘

The example of the Russian workers will be followed inevitably, perhaps not tomorrow (revolutions are not made to order), but inevitably all the same by the workers and all the working people of at least two great countries, Germany and France.

For both are perishing, the first of hunger, the second of depopulation. Both will conclude peace on our terms, which are just, in defiance of their capitalist governments.

The road to peace lies before us.

Should the capitalists of England, Japan and America try to resist this peace, the oppressed classes of Russia and other countries will not shrink from a revolutionary war against the capitalists."

On June 15th (June 28th by our calendar), after the adoption of a "Universal Act" by the delegates from the Ukrainian regiments, Lenin wrote: "They demand autonomy without denying the need for the supreme authority of the ‘All-Russia Parliament.‘ No democrat, let alone a socialist, will venture to deny … the Ukraine’s right to freely secede from Russia. Only unqualified recognition of this right, and this alone, makes it possible to advocate a free union of the Ukrainians and the Great Russians, a voluntary association of the two peoples in one state. Only unqualified recognition of this right can actually break completely and irrevocably with the accursed czarist past, when everything was done to bring about a mutual estrangement of the two peoples so close to each other in language, territory, character, and history. Accursed czarism made the Great Russians executioners of the Ukrainian people, and fomented in them a hatred for those who even forbade Ukrainian children to speak and study in their native tongue.

Russia’s revolutionary democrats, if they want to be truly revolutionary and truly democratic, must break with that past, must regain for themselves, for the workers and peasants of Russia, the brotherly trust of the Ukrainian workers and peasants. This cannot be done without full recognition of the Ukraine’s rights, including the right to free secession.

We do not favor the existence of small states. We stand for the closest union of the workers of the world against ‘their own’ capitalists and those of all other countries. But for this union to be voluntary, the Russian worker, who does not for a moment trust the Russian or the Ukrainian bourgeoisie in anything, now stands for the right of the Ukrainians to secede, without imposing his friendship upon them, but striving to win their friendship by treating them as an equal, as allies and as brothers in the struggle for socialism."

Long Live the Strike of the Banana Workers!

Jun 19, 2017

The following article was translated from a leaflet put out by Combat Ouvrier, the revolutionary workers group of that name active on the Caribbean islands of Guadeloupe and Martinique which are still run by France.

The Reasons for their Anger

The banana workers have been on strike in more than 17 plantations around the districts of Capesterre-Belle-Eau and Saint Claude on Guadeloupe. The strike began on May 18. A mobilization this big hasn’t been seen in more than 30 years. The victory of the strike at the plantation "Bois Debout" inspired the workers on the other plantations to strike as well. The workers at this plantation won between 10,000 and 20,000 euros each after a long trial and many strikes. The last finally forced the boss to carry out the decision of the court. The money won by the strikers was just part of the money the boss had stolen from them in a variety of ways.

Their strike picket line at the entrance to the plantation blocked or slowed the movement of cars on the national road to Capesterre. This brought the local governor around to oppose the béké bosses at the head of the banana lobby. Békés are the white plantation owners, descended from the old slave masters.

Right now, the workers at Bois Debout are not on strike, but they are supporting their comrades at other plantations. Those banana workers’ demands include: sick pay, respect for the monthly minimum wage (SMIC), the payment of bonuses for seniority and for transportation, the immediate application of the law of 1978 that outlaws piece work, and the application of the conclusions of a report of an expert committee of hygiene, safety, and conditions of work on all the plantations.

Conditions of Work Almost Like Slavery

A "chayè" is someone who carries the bananas, between six and seven tons every day, between 132 and 150 bunches on their shoulders. The workers who put on the "polys," the plastic that covers the bananas to protect them, walk 24 km (15 miles) in a day’s work. And on top of that, they go up enough steps to climb the Eiffel Tower and come back down. The worker who cuts the bunches lifts the equivalent of 24 to 28 tons every day. And all this for salaries of 1000 to 1100 euros take-home per month.

These conditions of work cause pain, physical deformations, and arthritis. Workers are exposed to pesticides that cause long term sickness and premature death. Accidents at work regularly kill and maim people. At Bois Debout alone, 10 workers died in the last 25 years.

Gangster Bosses

The békés like Dormoy (the family that owns Bois Debout) and others enriched themselves since the days of slavery on sugar cane and now on bananas by exploiting slave and now wage-worker blood. Their political leaders, the richest békés on Martinique, do the same in exploiting our brother farm workers on our sister island. Tino Dambas, a black planter who acts as a front for the békés, is no better.

The Strike

On May 18th, the farm workers decided to go on strike for 48 hours. And finally, because of the determination of the 30 per cent of the workers who went on strike, they prolonged the strike to Monday, May 22, then Tuesday, May 23rd, and then made it an unlimited strike, renewable each day.

Saturday, May 20, 200 workers met in front of the town hall of Capesterre-Belle-Eau. Many workers from different plantations spoke about their terrible working conditions. Haitian immigrant workers, brothers in the struggle of our comrades from Guadeloupe, spoke as well. They moved the audience with the details they gave about the hellish working conditions they have endured for years.

Many others spoke: A committee set up to resist expulsions from a neighborhood; comrades from Combat Ouvrier; young high school students grouped around the newspaper Rebelle. Jean-Marie Nomertin, leader of the strike (secretary general of the CGTG, a union federation) made the concluding remarks. He called on all the workers to mobilize Monday, May 22 at 5:00 in the morning all around the plantations that line the national highway.

On that Monday, the police were in place to stop the workers from blocking the road. But 200 banana strikers (out of 800) were there.

Thursday, May 25, the strikers demanded a place to meet from the mayor of Capeterre Belle-Eau. At first he refused, but they demonstrated in the streets and got a hall for the first meeting of the strike committee.

Friday, May 26, more than 200 strikers demonstrated in the streets of Point-à-Pitre (the capital). Then they organized a press conference at the offices of the CGTG.

Monday the 29th, they demonstrated in Sainte Marie, on the national highway. The president of the region, Ary Chalus, met with the planters. They pretended to ignore the strike and said they didn’t want to negotiate. But they started to feel the pressure of the strike: the containers weren’t filled with bananas. The container trucks were sometimes forced to return to their starting points, once they caught sight of the strikers.

The Strike Committee

The workers elected a strike committee to lead the strike. Four workers per plantation were elected to the leadership of the committee. The committee directed the strike, but the continuation of the strike was voted every day by a general assembly of all the strikers. The committee brought every major decision about the conduct of the strike to the general assembly.

Huge Subsidies for the Planters!

For years the planters have gotten enormous and regular subsidies from the European Union: 31.4 million euros each year from a program called POSEI (Program of Specific Options for the Distant Islands), and other subsidies regularly in case of damage (wind, cyclones, etc.). The region is also committed to giving 4,646,000 euros every year until 2022. When we speak of the profits taken from the direct exploitation of the workers, we must note that the planters could raise the wages, could pay what the workers demand: paid holidays, the end of unpaid overtime, and the long series of other embezzlements by the bosses. Retired banana workers get just 500 euros a month, one more sign of the level of exploitation.

The Banana Strike, an Example for All the Workers!

In every company, the workers are inspired by the example of Bois Debout and the other plantations. The strikers at Bois Debout proved that they could get back part of their money. In every way, this is a good time to push for raises. Only the growth of the strike, a general movement, a general strike, can force the big bosses to raise wages. For example, why not 100 euros a month raise for everyone right away, in every company?

Pages 6-7

Public Friendly to State Workers!

Jun 19, 2017

Lines are horrible at Michigan Secretary of State Offices (SOS), where folks go for driver’s licenses and vehicle registrations. Why? There are 25 percent fewer state workers servicing customers as compared to recent years.

State workers needed a morale boost for themselves and their customers. They organized a protest at the Livonia, Michigan SOS office on Saturday, June 3.

About 300 people were in line before the office opened at 9am and there were still close to 100 in line at the noon closing time.

SOS fees that everyone pays have gone up. The public was outraged to learn—from state workers talking with them at the protest—that NONE of the higher fee money is being used to hire more state workers to improve their customer experience.

Management was so concerned about state employees talking with the public that they had sent extra staff and extra managers to the branch that day, hoping to get the lines to move faster. It didn’t work!

Customers so enjoyed their conversations with protestors that they also had friendly chats at the counter with SOS workers, slowing down business as usual!

State workers linking arms with fellow workers who ARE the general public is a beginning step. Solidarity is the right road—fighting together for what the working class needs.

State of Michigan Attacks Teacher Pensions

Jun 19, 2017

The State of Michigan took another step toward gutting school employees’ retirement funds.

The state’s legislatures voted to shift the school employee retirement plan, the MPSERS, from a "hybrid" mix of pension and 401(k)-type plan to a complete 401(k) for all new public school employees.

Not officially, though–they’re sneakier than that. No, instead of outright forcing the change on employees, they’re strongly "encouraging" new employees to make the choice of 401(k)–by making the hybrid more expensive, and sweetening the pot for the 401(k) with greater employer contributions. And, just for good measure, all new employees will automatically be placed into the 401(k) system; if they want to choose the hybrid system, they have to actively seek to change their enrollment.

AND–if the hybrid system’s funding falls below 85 percent for two straight years, that system WILL be closed to any new employees. That funding can fluctuate a LOT since it’s based on stock prices which can rise and fall very quickly. So, what they’re presenting as a choice right now, they are virtually guaranteeing will become mandatory in just a couple years’ time.

The excuse the legislators give for this change is that the pension system has become too expensive, with an unfunded liability of more than 26 billion dollars and a funding ratio of just over 60 percent. BUT pointing to the unfunded liability is just an excuse–for a couple reasons.

First, everyone in the legislature knows that the unfunded liability grew by leaps and bounds after the stock market collapsed in 2008-2009. Before then, it was 5.7 billion dollars, for an 88.7 percent ratio. But the state lost lots of money in that stock market collapse, just like all states did. Why? Because they don’t keep the workers’ money tucked safely away. No, they take it and give it away to banks and corporations, in multi-billion-dollar give-aways. And in fact, investing that money in the stock market is one way to give that money to Wall Street brokers. The brokers make their money from those investments, no matter what happens to the stock price. So, the banks and corporations got paid; the state coffers got drained; and taxpayers got stuck with the debt.

The other thing that makes the unfunded liability a smokescreen is what’s been happening to public school funding in the past ten years. With the explosion of charter schools in the state, more and more money has been drained away from local public school systems as more and more money has gone into the charter schools. Charters don’t pay into the MPSERS; and local school districts are left with far less money and can’t make up their portion of the funds–because even though it’s a state-wide public school retirement system, it is paid into by the state and the local districts. And even though Michigan has a supposedly state-wide funding system, it is not at all equally funded from district to district. And since there are many more charters in poor and working class districts than in wealthy ones, the poor and working class districts are far more underfunded than the wealthy ones–and so are their retirement funds.

And now, the state uses that debt to say that the pension system is unworkable and needs to be cut. They want to shift everyone to a 401(k) system–a system that workers themselves have to pay much more into, in order to get anything out; and a system that is a LOT less stable. As anyone who lost huge amounts of their retirement savings after 2008 knows very well!

So, the underfunding in the pension programs has been caused by the banks, by the corporations, and by the state government that has looked out for their interests above all else. And it’s used to take more and more from working people, and to make workers pay for a crisis that we did not create.

Crisis between Qatar and Saudi Arabia

Jun 19, 2017

On June 5, Saudi Arabia and its allies, the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Egypt, and Yemen, announced that they were breaking off relations with Qatar. In closing their borders and blocking Qatar’s access to their airspace and territorial waters, they have imposed a real economic blockade, with powerful effects since Saudi Arabia provides Qatar with its only access to land routes.

This diplomatic crisis started after the summit in Riyadh on May 21, where Donald Trump called on the Arab countries to make a common front against Iran and ISIS. A few days later, Saudi Arabia accused the Emir of Qatar of having criticized the inflexibility of Saudi policy toward Iran.

The Saudis also accused Qatar of supporting Islamic terrorism. The Qatari monarchy has financed and supported the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt, Hamas in Palestine, and jihadist militias in Syria. But on the other hand, Saudi Arabia promotes a version of Islam as fundamentalist as that of ISIS, and also supports, overtly or not, jihadist militias in Syria and elsewhere.

In reality, this crisis is one episode in the long history of rivalries that regularly erupt between the powers of this region. Because of its oil wealth, Qatar has the financial means to carry out an independent policy and seek allies against its powerful Saudi neighbor.

So in the current conflict Qatar has the support of the Iranian state, which has sent it food aid and has opened its airspace. The Qataris have also benefitted from the support of the Turkish president Erdogan, who announced his intention to defend the "brothers and sisters in Qatar," a declaration accompanying the symbolic deployment of Turkish troops to Qatari territory. Turkey has found in this way the means of returning to the diplomatic game, at a moment when it is looking to find a cover for its military operations in Syria.

The United States seems embarrassed at the moment by this crisis which sets two of its allies against each other. The U.S. Secretary of State, Rex Tillerson, called on Saudi Arabia and other Gulf countries to lighten the blockade they’ve imposed on Qatar, and affirmed that it is helping with the fight against ISIS. The U.S. military has its most important military base in the Near East in Qatar at al-Udeid, from which the U.S. projects power over the Middle East and intervenes in Iraq and Syria.

The U.S. acts like the policeman of the world. Being the major imperialist power in the region requires it to deal with the very rivalries that it has helped create and nourish in pursuit of its short term interests.

Page 8

Chicago:
Youth without Options

Jun 19, 2017

In 2015, 90,000 young people in Cook County ages 16-24 were neither working nor in school. That is almost 20% of the population in that age group. And the situation has not changed between 2015 and today.

Add to this all the young people who are just taking one or two classes at a community college or toward a GED, and all those who have a part time job when they want a full time job, and the picture is much worse. According to a researcher who found these numbers, "This is a generation of people that are experiencing something unlike any prior generation."

The problem is concentrated in some neighborhoods more than others. The jobs that exist are downtown, on the north side, or in the suburbs. On the mostly-black south side and south suburbs, there are few jobs and little reliable public transportation. So almost 35 percent of black youth are without work and are not in school.

And, no surprise–those neighborhoods with the highest percentage of young people out of work and not in school are also those neighborhoods with the most violence. Is it any wonder that young people get caught up in crime and violence when there are no jobs, little education, and few prospects?

The future held out by capitalism is here and present in Chicago: a glittering downtown for the wealthy classes and a working class youth left behind with fewer possibilities than ever.

Profit Claims Lives in London Blaze

Jun 19, 2017

At least 58 people are confirmed dead from the fire at the Grenfell Tower apartments in London. Hundreds of local residents protested British Prime Minister Theresa May when she visited the area, and marched to the town hall demanding justice.

This catastrophe could have been avoided. Long before the fire, local residents voiced concerns about unsafe conditions. They complained of piled-up garbage near the building’s entrance, vehicles parked in emergency access areas, and unmaintained firefighting equipment. Survivors complained that some fire alarms failed to go off.

The fire also spread more quickly because of building materials used in its construction. The exterior "cladding" was changed during a renovation in 2016, and the construction company used a less fire-resistant material than others available. It used a cheaper cladding made of an aluminum composite with a flammable plastic core. The material used saved them a few dollars per square meter.

A few dollars per square meter; that’s the value capitalism places on at least 58 lives, not to mention all the injuries and other losses suffered by those who survived, and the families of the victims!

Book Review:
The Color of Law

Jun 19, 2017

The Color of Law, a new book by Richard Rothstein, explains how the U.S. federal government—since the 1880s—repeatedly used the U.S. legal system to promote residential segregation in the North, and everywhere else in the U.S.

The book explains that black and white people living in separate neighborhoods in the U.S. did not happen "naturally" because of ordinary people’s prejudices.

The author calls it, "A forgotten history of how our government segregated America." The book outlines the history of laws and bureaucracies that made it nearly impossible for black and white people to live side-by-side.

One glaring example of the federal government separating black and white people happened in 1913. Then President Wilson ordered black and white federal office workers to stop working together. He ordered separate offices, bathrooms, cafeterias, etc.

Around this time, an advisory council—that included future president Franklin D. Roosevelt—was set up to promote segregation in housing. A wave of black migration was hitting northern cities from the south. The council put together a guidebook on how to use zoning laws to keep black people living in all black neighborhoods.

In conjunction, the National Board of Realtors created a "code of ethics." It said the only "ethical" thing to do was to keep the races separate!

The author explains that this was followed by a federal policy decision to promote home ownership. It was implemented in racist ways—time and again—for decades to come. "Terrified by the 1917 Russian revolution, government officials came to believe that communism could be defeated in the United States by getting as many white Americans as possible to become homeowners—the idea being that those who owned property would be invested in the capitalist system."

Through many different means that are detailed in the book, integrated neighborhoods that already existed were broken up over time. Sometimes "vigilante" mob violence was used to reinforce segregation. The authorities never prosecuted the perpetrators. By not punishing, the government sanctioned these activities.

Government-backed segregation reached its peak with the massive growth of suburbs that followed World War II. Suburbs were only able to be constructed because of bank loans insured by the Federal Housing Authority (FHA) and the Veterans Administration (VA). Since both agencies required that loans could only be guaranteed if housing was 100 percent segregated, the role of the federal government in promoting segregation becomes obvious.

The book does an excellent job of explaining how segregation flowed from federal policy and how this history continues to be "hidden."

The author concludes that the U.S. government needs to be forced to follow its own constitution and bill of rights to solve the problem of racist federal policies. But in fact, racism is so integral to the U.S. capitalist economy, it’s not going to be eradicated except by revolution—as this book itself shows.

This is a powerful book that everyone should read.

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