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
May 28, 2018
The Memorial Day weekend has come and gone, filled with patriotic displays by the President and military officials, praising soldiers here and gone and glorifying past and present American wars.
Meanwhile, the political ping-pong match with North Korean leader Kim Jong-un continues. From calling him “Little Rocket Man,” Trump has switched to calling him a “good man” when he appears to be yielding to pressure. Threats of nuclear war are replaced with talk of a Nobel Peace prize and then back to threats of war again.
Insanity? Theatrics? If only the “reality show” we are witnessing was the doing of one man, Trump! Surely, he is erratic, crude, vicious in his tirades and off-hand remarks. But in fact, the policies he supports, the hateful, warlike countenance he displays to the world, are truly representative of the face of U.S. imperialism across the globe.
Will he end the Korean War? It is obvious that this is a political victory he would love to snatch for himself—to be the “only president” in 63 years to resolve a war that was provoked and kept in play by U.S. imperialism itself. What complete nonsense! The war was followed by U.S. embargoes which left the Korean peninsula mangled, divided and with North Korea isolated and starving.
He could be the president who announces a temporary reunification, but this means nothing for the Korean people who will remain under U.S. imperialism’s thumb in order to serve its interests in the region.
In the background, out of the spotlight, other U.S. wars without end continue. In Iraq, in Syria, in Afghanistan, in Libya, in Somalia, in Yemen, in Niger, U.S. troops are engaged and/or U.S. air strikes are ongoing. The U.S. is at war in seven countries, and is involved directly in covert actions in at least seven more. In one way or another, the U.S. military carries out operations in 78 countries—39 percent of the countries in the world!
And for what? Not for the U.S. population. Not to protect peace, obviously. But to pursue and protect U.S. capitalism’s interests—in oil, in trade, in raw materials, in financial wheeling and dealing.
President Trump himself says that seven trillion dollars have been spent on the Middle East conflagration. The price tag for “the war on terror” was estimated at five and one half trillion dollars at the end of 2017 by academics. Seven hundred billion dollars was just passed by both parties as the budget for war this year, no doubt underestimated.
This money that is lining the pockets of the war industry billionaires is money that is desperately needed by the U.S. population; this is money that should be used to pay for jobs, homes, infrastructure repair, schools.
The real cost of the wars? Immeasurable. Whole populations killed and displaced, from Korea to Iraq to Afghanistan to Syria. Civilizations destroyed; cities with no water or electricity—where there are buildings left standing.
The U.S. population has escaped the worst ravages of the wars imposed by this government and military, so far. But still, the cost in human life itself, multiplied by the shattered lives of those soldiers who survived physical and emotional damage, is devastating.
Worst of all, it leaves us in a place of where parts of the working class accept a completely immoral situation.
We have no interest in celebrating or fighting their wars. We have no interest in making millionaires into billionaires and petty tyrants into bigger ones. They have their heels on our necks, too, and use the police and military when necessary to control us.
The working class can turn away from support for this policy of war. The working class has the forces to fight for peace and prosperity in the U.S.—but must lead a fight against war and exploitation of people outside of the U.S. as well. It can start with the fight for jobs, housing and health care. And it can build in strength to challenge and replace this corrupt system that feeds on war.
May 28, 2018
Donald Trump instructed Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross to “investigate” whether auto imports represent a “national security threat,” and hinted he would protect “the great American autoworker” by putting tariffs on imported cars and car parts.
A Trump administration official said the move was aimed at forcing Canada and Mexico to give up concessions in talks over NAFTA. But that’s baloney.
Trump has no actual intention of upsetting the multinational supply chain that his fellow parasites and profiteers in the auto industry depend on.
By making headlines in this spectacular way, Trump only aims to rally working class voters to his side–voters he is expected to deliver to the Republicans in the next election.
Trump is trying to take advantage of an old lie, told for years to U.S. workers: the lie that we are losing jobs to other countries, because workers in other countries will work for less.
This is only a small much-exaggerated part of a far larger hushed-up problem. The big job cuts are made right here in the USA. Bosses right here are forcing workers to work harder, longer, and faster. One worker does what three or four used to do.
Auto production in the U.S. has actually increased, while companies get that high output using fewer and fewer workers. In 2005, about 16 million vehicles were built in the U.S. In 2014, after the deep recession, production again reached 16 million–but with 100,000 fewer workers employed!
Trump can hope for some success in using his lie, because for decades, Republican and Democratic politicians alike, as well as the main leaders of U.S. unions, have pushed that same big lie. Even Democrat Bernie Sanders, who claims to be a socialist, made the same kind of anti-free trade appeal as Trump in his last campaign. And UAW President Dennis Williams came out in support of Trump following the announcement, saying “The American workers have been handed a short stick for a long time.”
Now that part is the truth. American workers have been handed the short end of the stick, for a long time. But it’s because of the bosses right here who exploit us, overwork us, underpay us, and then lie to us about why it is happening. And if workers’ leaders repeat that lie, they are standing in our way.
May 28, 2018
Real estate developers have been lining up to build permanent housing for the homeless in Los Angeles. But they are not doing this out of “charity.” No, they are looking to get their hands on the tax money that’s supposed to help the homeless.
Los Angeles gives enormous subsidies and valuable land to developers of construction projects supposedly aimed at homelessness. The developers then treat the land and subsidies as “seed money,” which they use to get special tax credits from the federal government. The developers then sell these tax credits to banks, in return for a share of ownership in the buildings.
On top of all that, the state of California often provides “cap and trade” money ... in the name of “energy conservation.” And once the project is completed, the federal government pays the rent of the homeless people through programs like Section Eight.
Not surprisingly, not much housing is actually going to get built. In fact, less than two weeks after city officials had announced that about 10,000 units would be built over the next decade, they were already reducing those estimates down to 6,000 ... supposedly because of increased “costs.”
Six thousand is a drop in the bucket compared to the dire homelessness crisis. Official estimates are that 58,000 people are homeless in Los Angeles County at any one time. And it’s growing every year.
The real estate developers and banks, that are sucking out the money that’s supposed to help the homeless, are the same ones that helped create the homeless crisis in the first place, through gentrification and the destruction of affordable housing. They are now making even more money from the misery that they created.
May 28, 2018
Maryland, Virginia, Washington, D.C., and the federal government agreed in March to provide 500 million dollars a year for construction, upgrades, and repairs for three years to Metro. Metro runs the subway and most buses in Washington, D.C. and its suburbs. Fares hardly cover half of Metro’s operating expenses, so since its founding it has had to beg these governments for money every year.
The catch was that legislators wrote a provision in the funding that prevents Metro workers from getting any raises for three years. And new hires will get no pension, just a 401(k)-style savings plan. Current workers have pensions, so this creates two tiers of workers at Metro.
Legislators did not object to the general manager earning $400,000 per year, and 10 other managers earning over $200,000.
This attack is aimed at the drivers, mechanics, and janitors earning only a fraction of that.
May 28, 2018
A recent report in the Baltimore Sun pointed out that eight years ago, the city had 16,800 vacant houses. This year there were 16,500 vacant houses.
Why is there no progress? First, different organizations count the number of vacant houses differently. One organization claims there are 40,000 vacant units in Baltimore.
Second, the city has spent millions of dollars to tear down 4,000 houses over the past several years, and to put up some new units. But the number of people who have lost their homes has also been in the thousands, whether by death, disaster, or lack of income.
The new units that have gone up in Baltimore have prices above $300,000. Right now, the median value of houses in Baltimore is $108,000.
It is not really a lack of affordable housing: it is the lack of sufficient income to buy one.
No matter which programs try to bring down the cost of housing, to make money available for mortgages, the real problem is thousands of people with no jobs or with low-wage jobs and a real estate market built for profit.
May 28, 2018
On April 25, federal Housing and Urban Development (HUD) Secretary Ben Carson announced that the rent paid by residents of subsidized public housing units all over the country will increase from being 30 percent of a resident’s adjusted income today to 35 percent of their gross income, if approved by Congress. The minimum rent the poorest would pay would go up from $50 per month now to $150 under this proposal. The average rent increase for all public housing residents would be $117 per month.
Carson also wants to add work requirements to qualify for public housing. But about 90 percent of residents are exempt from work requirements because they are elderly, disabled or sole care givers for others. A work requirement would only be an excuse to harass the roughly 10 percent of residents able to work, but who already have work requirements under other aid programs they qualify for.
Carson is proposing a budget for HUD that also would slash funding for many private and public housing programs–including public housing maintenance. All of this to help pay for the huge tax cuts for the rich recently approved by both Republicans and Democrats in Congress!
May 28, 2018
On May 25, President Trump signed three executive orders reducing the rights of at least two million federal workers.
The first order shortens the time that a worker has to demonstrate improvement, if management claims they are a poor performer. It was 120 days, and will now be only 30 days. It also will make performance a more important factor than seniority when agencies have layoffs, thus throwing seniority out the window.
The second executive order directs federal agencies to negotiate contracts with employee unions that will allow the agencies to stop paying for union representatives in grievance appeal hearings.
The third order will limit union shop stewards or other lower level union representatives from spending more than 25 percent of their work time helping workers file grievances. This, of course, is to discourage grievances.
Trump’s executive orders are just one of the latest attacks his administration has made on workers and the unions.
We can hope that he waffles or changes this policy, as he has in many cases. But since he worries about losing political support, federal workers have good reason to shout out and make that happen!
May 28, 2018
Trump said of many immigrants coming to this country: “these aren’t people, these are animals.” A few days later, he added that unaccompanied child migrants “look so innocent. They’re not innocent.” All this was to justify the policy of treating immigrant children as criminals.
The same day he made this second speech, the ACLU and the University of Chicago released a report detailing extensive child abuse at detention centers for immigrants. This abuse included denying children permission to stand or move for days and threatening them with solitary confinement if they didn’t comply. It included forcibly spreading the legs of a 16-year-old girl and grabbing her private parts, denying a pregnant minor medical attention while she was in labor, threatening a child with sexual abuse by an adult male detainee, running over a 17-year-old with a patrol vehicle and then repeatedly punching him, and many other abuses.
All of this is alleged to have taken place during the Obama administration. It has surely not gotten any better since Trump took office.
These children are fleeing poverty and violence that was created by decades of U.S. policies in Latin America supporting brutal dictatorships, terrorists, and criminals, all to keep the populations of these countries under the thumb of U.S. corporations and their local allies. The real criminals, the real “animals” are those, Democrat and Republican, who have directed this policy of destruction towards the poor countries of the world, and added abuse upon abuse when their child victims try to flee to this country.
May 28, 2018
Puerto Rico’s governor, Ric Roselló, just signed onto a plan to close 283 of the islands’ 1100 schools. This wave of school closings comes in the wake of hurricanes Irma and Maria, which devastated Puerto Rico last summer.
The plan follows 173 school closings carried out already last year. In fact, Puerto Rico already suffered a storm. . . a storm of financial debt, forced on taxpayers by hedge funds and big banks over the course of the last decade, to the tune of over 73 billion dollars. The resulting financial indebtedness has meant cuts in every service, and a deep, job killing recession, driving thousands out of Puerto Rico to try their luck on the U.S. mainland.
Wall Street and its politicians are using the destruction of the hurricanes as another opportunity to cut public services, and to open up education to privatization. The plan proposes to hand 10% of the island’s schools to private charter operators, and to give 3% of the students on the island school vouchers. Both initiatives will take even more students out of the public schools–providing an excuse to starve them of even more funding. Wall Street banks will use New Orleans’ playbook from Hurricane Katrina. There, after the hurricane, ALL public schools were converted to charters.
Up until now, the unions in Puerto Rico have fought, through strikes and protests, to prevent charter schools from taking root there. And after the hurricane, teachers themselves worked with their communities to clean up and repair schools. They acted both to get the schools open to educate students, but also to try to pre-empt their closure by the government.
“They think that because our island is vulnerable, because it doesn’t have electricity, that we’re going to let them privatize our schools and fire our teachers,” said Mercedes Martinez, the president of one teacher union.
The bourgeoisie is coming for working class schools everywhere in this country: in Puerto Rico, but also in big cities like Chicago and Detroit and all around the country. But of course, in states like West Virginia, Kentucky and Arizona, teachers have fought back, both for pay and to bring back some of the funding that has been cut.
May 28, 2018
Nicolas Maduro, Hugo Chavez’s successor, was re-elected president of Venezuela on May 20th, defeating Henri Falcon, the candidate of a right-wing party who was initially predicted to win.
The rest of the right-wing parties boycotted the election. Voter turnout was low, with only 46% of the potential 20.5 million voters participating in the election, ten percent less than the ruling party hoped. This is much less than previous turnouts: 63.4 percent in 1998, the first time Chavez was elected; 74.7 percent in 2006; and 80.5 percent in 2012. In the first presidential election after Chavez’s death, in 2013, about 80 percent voted again, and Maduro got 7.5 million votes.
This time, he got just 5.8 million votes, against 1.8 million for his main opponent. That is, he won only 28 percent of the total potential electorate. Maduro paid at the polls for the difficulties the population has faced since the steep fall in the price of oil, Venezuela’s main source of income, plus the effects of the embargo imposed by the U.S.
The commentators in the media here reflect the point of view of the local right wing, and behind it, the Latin American and U.S. capitalist classes that are behind all the Venezuelan right’s maneuvers. They all hope that Maduro will face the same fate recently suffered by Lula in Brazil.
Some commentators deplore the authoritarian character of the regime and also the situation of the population. The sharp decline in the price of oil has made it difficult if not impossible to find many basic products and medicines. In reality, though, these commentators mock the situation faced by the Venezuelan population.
Since Chavez took power, the local right wing, the Venezuelan bosses, and Washington have all had one goal: to remove Chavez and his party from power. They have tried many ways of doing this, including two coups that failed, and a series of electoral referendums that Chavez could win when the price of oil allowed him to distribute some of Venezuela’s income to the poorer parts of the population.
The Venezuelan right, the bosses, and Washington want to take back the power to grab all the wealth of the country. The accusations of incompetence leveled against Chavez’s followers can only lead in one direction: to reinstate the old order of things, when the capitalists and petty bourgeoisie divided up the country’s oil income among themselves.
The most narrow-minded commentators also want to see in Venezuela the umpteenth failure of socialism. But the followers of Hugo Chavez are no more socialists than was Obama when he pretended to put in place a system of universal health care. Socialism doesn’t just consist of a few policies favorable to the population, as precious as these might be. It means that the workers exercise power directly. They overthrow private property in the means of production, and the power of the capitalists. These are things the followers of Chavez have not done. In trying to find a path between local capital and the multinationals, they have chosen to play this society’s game, rather than seeking to overthrow it.
The Venezuelan right, the bosses, and Washington remain on the offensive. The U.S. has declared that it is going to make the embargo even stiffer. But the elections of May 20 showed that many ordinary people distrust these demagogues and continue to support Maduro.
May 28, 2018
On May 14th, the Israeli Army fired live ammunition at unarmed residents of the Gaza Strip who were protesting the transfer of the U.S. embassy to Jerusalem. The Israelis killed at least 59 Palestinians, 8 of whom were children under 16 years old, and wounded more than 2,400 people.
At least 40,000 Palestinians were gathered at different points along the Israeli border fence, for the seventh week of the March of Return organized to commemorate the Nakba (“catastrophe” in Arabic). This is the name given to the exodus of more than 700,000 Palestinians driven from their homes and their land when Israel was created in 1948.
The demonstrations also denounce the blockade that has been imposed for more than 10 years on the Gaza Strip, which condemns more than two-thirds of its inhabitants to live off of humanitarian aid.
The Israeli government added a new provocation on May 12 when it decided to close the only point where merchandise could pass to Gaza, aggravating the already desperate situation of the people in Gaza.
The inauguration of the new U.S. embassy in Jerusalem gave another reason for the Palestinians to express their anger. Conquered in 1967 at the end of the Six-Day War, the eastern part of Jerusalem, with a big majority Palestinian population, was officially annexed by Israel in 1980. Since that time, the Israeli authorities have consistently carried out a policy of colonization aimed at expelling the Palestinians. A recent report by the European Union said that between 1967 and 2016, Israel carried out a “policy of silent deportation” in Jerusalem, notably by revoking the residency permits of thousands of Palestinians, with the goal of preserving a “substantial Jewish majority.” In deciding last December to move the U.S. embassy to Jerusalem, Trump gave his open support to this Israeli policy.
Since the creation of Israel, U.S. leaders have given the Israeli state unshakeable support. It is a privileged ally, policeman of the imperialist order in the region. But, in order to avoid causing too much trouble for its Arab allies with their own populations, the U.S. has also tried to give itself the image of mediator between the Israelis and Palestinians.
Since he took power, with his declarations and the positions he has taken, Trump has not taken the trouble to maintain this image, and he has encouraged the current Israeli government, one of the most right-wing in the country’s history, to pursue its policy of colonization in an even more brutal and arrogant fashion towards the Palestinians.
Since the first gatherings on the border between Israel and Gaza on March 30, Israeli forces have killed at least 107 Palestinians and wounded about 12,000 people. This repression is fundamental to the politics of the Israeli government, a criminal and bloody policy that has fed the legitimate revolt of the Palestinians for 70 years. It also condemns the Israeli population to live on a permanent war footing, transforming them into prison guards or executioners, as is continuing to be the case with the massacres on the border with Gaza.
May 28, 2018
In a new discrimination lawsuit filed by two black Tesla autoworkers, Owen Diaz and his son Demetric say that “they were regularly subject to racist epithets by co-workers and supervisors.” Along with slurs, co-workers told Owen to “go back to Africa” and drew racist caricatures in bathroom stalls and on bales of cardboard.
Tesla contractors terminated Demetric and demoted Owen, who then quit.
In 2017, Tesla’s black autoworkers filed three previous discrimination lawsuits. The Tesla management ignored, rebuffed, or did not investigate these black workers’ complaints about discrimination.
Last year, a contractor fired one of the workers suing the compay, Marcus Vaughn, for “not having a positive attitude.” Marcus had written to the human resources department to complain about the racist harassment.
Tesla also aimed to silence DeWitt Lambert, a black worker who is also suing Tesla for racial discrimination. Tesla’s lawyer wrote to DeWitt’s lawyer that “We are willing to pay Mr. Lambert, but only if we are to resolve this matter before there is media attention.”
In May 2017, Tesla’s Chief Executive Elon Musk wrote to employees: “Part of not being a huge jerk is considering how someone might feel who is part of a historically less represented group. Sometimes these things happen unintentionally, in which case you should apologize. In fairness, if someone is a jerk to you, but sincerely apologizes, it is important to be thick-skinned and accept that apology.”
So as long as the racists apologize, black workers are supposed to take it? Musk presents himself as a futuristic “entrepreneur,” but his racial attitudes are from the last century... or maybe the one before that.
May 28, 2018
The NFL came out with a new policy regarding players’ protests during the pre-game playing of the national anthem. It ruled players who are on the field will be fined if they refuse to stand during the anthem. It says they can stay in the locker room if they so choose.
The protests began when San Francisco 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick first sat and later knelt on one knee during the anthem in protest against police brutality. His teammate Eric Reid and others around the league took up Kaepernick’s example. San Francisco dropped both Kaepernick and Reid from its roster and both remain out of the league. There are clearly quarterbacks in the league vastly inferior to Kaepernick, who has courageously remained steadfast in his convictions. Both he and Reid filed collusion grievances with their union, but they thus far remain unresolved.
The league claims it is responding to fans upset because they view the players’s protests as disrespectful to the national anthem, the flag and to military veterans and this has caused the league to lose TV viewership.
Says who? How do they know people haven’t stopped watching because they are upset with the league and the owners treatment of the players?
There clearly are some soldiers who find the players’ protest disrespectful. Donald Trump seized on the NFL announcement to make another disgusting, reactionary comment that “You have to stand for the national anthem, or you shouldn’t be playing. ... Maybe you shouldn’t be in the country.”
Clearly, however, not all veterans share such views. A recent poll of 8,000 service members and veterans from the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan found 62 percent supported NFL players’ right to peacefully protest during games.
The league’s claim to stand on patriotism rings hollow. As ESPN’s Stephen A. Smith pointed out,“Until 2009, no NFL player stood for the national anthem because players actually stayed in the locker room as the anthem played. The players were moved to the field during the national anthem because it was seen as a marketing strategy to make the athletes look more patriotic.”
That changed when the Department of Defense began paying the NFL for “paid tributes” like on-field color guards and full-field flag details. The NFL received 12 million dollars from 2011 to 2015 from the DOD.
The players have every right to protest, however they choose. They will have to decide how to respond to the new NFL directive. They stand in a long line of athletes who have spoken out politically.
Workers, including veterans, have every reason to support their fight. We should remember, borders serve the interests of the wealthy ruling class, who send us to fight other poor and working class people from other countries for their benefit, not ours.
May 28, 2018
When she went on “sabbatical” from tennis 16 months ago to become a mother, Serena Williams had just won the Australian Open and was ranked number one in the world.
But when she came back to tennis after giving birth to her daughter Olympia, the French Open refused to give her a tournament seed. That means that she could have to face some of the top competitors in the world right away—instead of facing lower-ranked opponents, as she has earned with her 23 major titles!
Players returning from pregnancy to tennis are given the same “special ranking” as players who get injured. This is an old rule, dating from when it was assumed that only young women would be athletes, and that they would retire when they wanted children.
But pregnancy is not an injury. And as other champion mothers like Kim Clijsters and Victoria Azarenka have proved, women can have children and play sports at the highest possible level. Serena Williams has more than earned the right to a good tournament seed, child and all!
May 28, 2018
The Los Angeles school board has hired Austin Beutner, a former investment banker, as superintendent of L.A. schools.
Beutner is no newcomer to the district. Last year, the district appointed Beutner to lead a task force to “look into the district’s financial problems,” claiming that “rising pension costs” were out of control. (Never mind that the district itself reported an ending balance of 685 million dollars last year, and projected a surplus of 373 million dollars at the end of this school year!)
Among the recommendations of Beutner’s task force was to look into “getting more money out of the district’s real estate holdings”—not a surprise, given Beutner’s stint with the Blackstone Group, a private equity firm specializing in “leveraged buyouts” of big companies and then selling off their assets!
Beutner’s appointment suggests that the district will continue its ongoing, open attack on workers’ pay and benefits—in particular, pensions and retiree health benefits. But the fact that the last superintendent, Michelle King, was a former teacher and school administrator did not change that policy—in fact, Beutner’s “advisory task force” had King’s blessing and support.
For many years now, big business has used the multi-billion-dollar budget of the L.A. school district as one big honey pot—as district officials laid off school workers, increased class sizes and neglected maintenance, in order to funnel millions of dollars to corporate coffers.
May 28, 2018
Starbucks had a new incident of racism after a Latino worker discovered a racial slur written on his coffee order. The worker ordered two iced coffee drinks, a few weeks ago, at a Starbucks in La Cañada Flintridge, a northeastern city in Los Angeles County. When asked by a Starbucks employee, the Latino worker identified himself as Pedro. But, both drinks came with the word “beaner” written on the cups.
“It’s an offensive word used towards Latinos,” said Pedro to the news reporters. The manager of the Starbucks store later went to where Pedro works, offering free coffee and $50 gift cards. He refused them, explaining “I didn’t accept it because it’s like an insult overall.”
This racist insult happened just over a month after two black men were arrested for only sitting at a Starbucks store in Philadelphia, waiting for a business meeting. In response to this previous racist incident, Starbucks declared a day of nationwide racial bias training, planning to close more than 8,000 locations on May 29 for employees to receive racial bias education.
But, as the recent coffee-cup slur indicates, such declarations and plans did not prevent a new racist behavior from showing its ugly head again within a very short time.
May 28, 2018
This is the speech Juan Rey gave on May 20 at a campaign meeting in North Hollywood. Rey works as a train mechanic for L.A. Metro and also serves as a union steward. He is running as an independent candidate in the June 5th primary for U.S. Congress in the northeast San Fernando Valley.
We started our campaign to vote for a worker for Congress by asking District 29 residents to sign a petition to allow my name to get on the ballot. We turned in 4,082 signatures and 2,387 signatures were verified as registered voters by the Los Angeles County Registrar’s Office. This meant we did not have to pay the filing fee, not one dollar.
During the petitioning and now the campaign, many people jumped at the idea of a working class party. They signed their name to the petition. And they agreed that elections are not enough for the working class, that in order for us to gain any benefits in this society we are going to have to fight together.
To see what it means when working people organize, we can already look to the teachers in West Virginia who organized themselves and all the school staff throughout the state. They also organized with the parents to run day care centers for the children while teachers were on strike. They took to the streets demanding better pay and funding of their pensions and schools.
This strike spread to other states, where teachers have won partial victories. And they did this often without recognized union bargaining rights. They did this in states where strikes are against the law, and where the governments are dominated by Republicans, who openly swear to be the enemies of labor. This shows that it is possible to fight, and that workers don’t need anyone’s permission to fight. And when workers do fight, it opens up possibilities.
Of course, teachers by themselves are not able to resolve the problems they face. No groups of working people can do this alone. The workers and their families need to join the fight with the teachers and add their own demands. The fights have to spread and become bigger. It is the only way that we have a chance to get even a small part of the wealth we produce, to meet our needs.
In addition to the teachers’ strikes, we can also look to a lot of other fights that people have made against the violence of this society. Ever since the murders of Trayvon Martin and Michael Brown, there have been mobilizations against the murder of black people by the police. The criminalizing of productive workers gave birth to immigrants’ rights movements. But now these workers and their families are bargaining chips for politicians. The movement by high school students against gun violence continues, while gun makers continue to push any kind of weapon they can sell. The #MeToo movement against the abuse of women has just begun. Fights against the poisoning of working class communities by polluters like Exide Battery continue.
The two big parties try to control and capitalize on these movements for electoral purposes. Instead, these movements can be brought together under a working class banner in order to make the struggle much more powerful for the benefit of all workers.
Along with these fights, workers need to also come together and stand against the wars that the United States government continues to engage in for the interest of big corporations. The human and social cost is unbearable. This is certainly true in those countries. But in this country we can also tie part of the homelessness to war veterans going back to the Vietnam war. The workers pay with joblessness and cuts to social programs that workers benefit from.
The need for the working class to build its own party is ever more necessary.
I think workers do the most important things in the real economy. Yet workers know that life is getting more difficult. We produce all the wealth and basically run society. What is the whole point of working? Why produce so much profit to only give it to a few?
Why not work so that the wealth we create goes to improve our neighborhoods, schools, create more parks, bring culture to all the schools and neighborhoods?
And why do we have to kill ourselves working huge amounts of overtime just to pay our bills, while other workers struggle to find work, have to work little jobs here and there, or have to work under the table because there are no jobs out there?
In fact, the list is endless of all the things that we need, that allow people to have a decent life, such as decent, affordable housing. Why is that so hard? What are we short of? Nothing. And there are plenty of people who could be doing the work too.
The technology and wealth is here. We know because we produce it. But in order to get those things we are going to have to fight for it. And in making that fight, we can also build our own party, a working class party, with our own demands.
Democrats and Republicans monopolize the elections. No matter who wins, all workers lose. From farm labor to doctors, from cooks to engineers, from transportation workers to factory workers, from scientists to health care workers. All workers lose.
This campaign’s message is that all workers have to politically stick together. We have to fight together. Our collective strength is that we do the most important work, we run society. It is at the work place where we produce value and profit and where our strength lies.
The one percent will not give up a nickel much less a dime.
Let’s send a message to all workers that we are ready to organize a Working Class Party.
Let’s prepare for the big showdown between workers and the bosses so that workers can get what we rightfully deserve.
Vote for Juan Rey for Congress.