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
Oct 24, 2022
There is no big political party of the working class. There are only two big parties, and both serve the capitalist class and its chase after profit. But working people can build a party based on our class, one that will represent and fight for the common interests of everyone in the world of work.
An election won’t change our fate. But every vote this year for candidates of Working Class Party is a down payment on the party working people will build.
Top Row; Jim Walkowicz, Andrea L. Kirby, Gary Walkowicz, Simone R. Coleman
Middle Row: Larry D. Betts, Mary Anne Hering, Lou Palus, Liz Hakola
Front Row: Linda Rayburn, Kathy Goodwin, Kimberly Givens.
Ed Hershey.
Cathy White and David Harding.
Photos were taken from the independent website: workingclassfight.com
Oct 24, 2022
United Auto Workers (UAW) union members are receiving mail-in ballots to cast their votes for the union president and the other top leaders of the International union. This is the first time that UAW members, active and retired, will be directly voting for the top leadership. Up until now, this leadership had been elected by delegates at a UAW Convention.
The UAW was organized during a time period when militant strikes by autoworkers pushed back the corporations. There was a period when the militant workers who led these strikes and had the confidence of their fellow workers were elected as delegates to a UAW Convention. When these delegates from around the country came together at conventions they debated and decided upon the direction of the union and elected the top leadership. Certainly this was a time when there was real democracy in the union. The change to direct elections today does not make the UAW more democratic. It makes it less so.
The change to direct elections by the union members came about due to the intervention of the federal government. The government came into the UAW, allegedly to investigate some top leaders who had used their positions to financially benefit from union dues and company-union joint funds. The government indicted and jailed those leaders. But the government also imposed a consent decree upon the UAW, where a federal monitor now has some control over the functioning of the union. This monitor even has veto power over who can run for the top leadership positions.
As part of the consent decree, the UAW was also required to have a referendum where the members voted on whether to continue to elect top leadership at conventions or by a direct vote of the members. Participation in the referendum was very low (14%) and the majority of those who voted decided for the direct voting method.
Those UAW members who vote in this current election will be deciding between the candidates of the Administrative Caucus, who currently run the union, or opposition candidates, including one slate and other individual candidates. Those opposition candidates say that the current leadership is responsible for the concessions imposed upon autoworkers. These concessions include two-tier wages and benefits. Autoworkers hired since 2007 have no retiree pensions. Current retirees get their health care from a VEBA, which is not guaranteed. All autoworkers lost yearly raises and cost-of-living raises.
These concessions were not imposed easily. Some autoworkers organized and many voted against the concessions, including big “No” votes at Ford and Chrysler/Stellantis. Finally, however, the majority of workers accepted sacrifices for themselves, and especially, to impose a severe 2-tier system on new hires.
Today, some UAW members hope that by voting directly for the leadership and perhaps electing a different leadership, workers can gain back what has been lost.
But that is going to take more than voting, more than electing a different leadership. The working class can only defend its interests when it makes a fight. That is what it takes. The corporations are not going to give workers what they owe them, unless and until workers are ready to fight. The history of the working class shows that. The history of the UAW shows that.
The current UAW leadership only proposes to continue their same policy, which has been a policy of “partnership” with the corporations, a policy that led to concessions. There are opposition candidates who say they want to reverse the concessions.
But whoever gets elected as the top UAW leadership today, it will not change the fact that it is going to take a fight by the workers to change their situation. In the past, when the workers engaged in a fight, they were able to bring forth a leadership that was ready and able to lead that fight. That kind of leadership is what workers today will need to find when they begin their own fights.
Oct 24, 2022
The Biden administration announced that, in less than a week, more than 22 million people applied to have their federal student loan debt reduced. That’s more than half the number of people in the U.S. who have outstanding debt on student loans.
It’s hardly a surprise that so many people applied so fast. For those eligible, the $10,000 or $20,000 Biden promises will certainly make a difference—especially at a time when millions of working-class families in this country are struggling to pay their bills and put food on the table. And yes, it is cynical of Republican politicians to call student loan aid “unaffordable” and challenge it in the courts, when the federal government spends billions upon billions of dollars on war.
But Biden’s program is in no way a solution to the enormous problem student loan debt has become for the U.S. working class. This program forgives $10,000 or $20,000 off federal loans, when the average student loan debt in the U.S. is $37,000. Just compare that with the billions of dollars in PPP (Paycheck Protection Program) loans given to big companies during the pandemic, 100% of which were forgiven! Then, at the end of September, the Biden administration disqualified more than 700,000 student debt holders from any aid, when it announced that borrowers with privately-held federal student loans would no longer qualify for relief.
The real problem is that such programs don’t even address the real question, which is: How can any working-class family be expected to pay tens of thousands of dollars a year for college? That’s why so many college students are forced to take out big loans and are indebted practically for life—and in many cases, their parents end up paying the debt!
But for colleges, student loans have been a bonanza. These student loans basically guaranteed colleges exorbitant tuitions which they would otherwise not be able to collect from many students. Like sharks smelling blood, all kinds of predatory colleges, including some outright scams, sprang up to fill their coffers, while the diplomas they issued did not even help graduates to get a job.
Every human being needs an education—it should be a human right, and free. But like everything else, education under capitalism has become a scheme for capitalists to make a profit. It means the working class is not only deprived of an education, but is also forced to pay for the loot of scam artists posing as “educators.”
Oct 24, 2022
Anyone driving to work or for work has been hating the oil companies for months. Their profits are out of sight. Meanwhile, paychecks have shrunk.
But wait, only two weeks left until the elections, so both big parties are beating the drums louder. The Republicans blame the Democrats for inflation. Mr. Biden begs Mr. Oil Man not to raise prices. And both parties found another figure to blame: Yes, it’s Mr. Putin. Even though oil in the United States does not come from Russia, it’s all Mr. Putin’s fault.
The blame game just might be called Elections-As-Usual. The only thing that would be different is if working people demand paychecks go up just as much as the oil man and the grocer and the landlord raise their prices!
Oct 24, 2022
In October 2021, a secret recording was made of a closed-door meeting among three L.A. City Council members: Nury Martinez, Kevin de León and Gil Cedillo, and a top union official, Los Angeles County Federation of Labor president Ron Herrera. One year later, the recording was leaked to the news media. This provoked such a public firestorm that even President Biden weighed in.
But while most of the news media simply condemned the racist insults, xenophobia and homophobia, what went largely ignored was how these officials were using prejudice and ethnic identity in order to amass more power for themselves … at the expense of their own constituents.
The subject of the closed-door meeting was to form a “Latino” bloc to control the redistricting of the 15-member city council that takes place every 10 years. The city council has final say over its own redistricting, and the stakes of who gets what are very high. Ambitious politicians climbing the government ladder need plenty of access to the rich and powerful. And that’s what they get when their district includes major business hubs and other so-called “assets,” like real estate developments, airports, harbors and sports arenas.
Nury Martinez, for example, who was president of the city council during this latest redistricting, made sure that “you’re not just going to create poor Latino districts with nothing,” as she said on the recording. Instead, Martinez redrew her district so it includes a large airport for private planes, said to be worth over two billion dollars, along with a large recreation area slated for development into an important venue for the 2028 Olympics.
These Latino politicians, who came up through L.A.’s union apparatuses and immigrant rights organizations, advertise themselves as being “progressive,” pro-worker, pro-immigrant and anti-racist. But, in reality, they loyally serve the capitalist class, giving the capitalists free rein to plunder the city and the people. They fork over big tax breaks and zoning changes to help the capitalists make super-profits out of the construction boom of big luxury apartment and commercial complexes and hotels, a construction boom that destroys poor and working-class neighborhoods all over the city, displacing tens of thousands of people.
This gentrification is one big reason that Los Angeles has become unlivable for big parts of the population. Rent is so high that most families have to spend more than half their income on it. And workers get lodging that is so horrible, Los Angeles is rated as the most overcrowded city in the country.
After the recording was leaked, the president of the Los Angeles Federation of Labor was forced to resign almost immediately, not just because he joined in on all the racist and prejudiced diatribes that insulted his own members, but because the recording exposed the real role of the Federation of Labor. The Federation of Labor is always called “powerful,” because it boasts 345 affiliates with more than 800,000 members. But what they mean by “power” doesn’t include the organization of the workers to fight and protect their own interests. Instead, the union apparatuses are used to help fund and organize support for their favorite candidates in the Democratic Party. In other words, the union machines are completely integrated into the Democratic Party, which itself is a puppet of the same capitalists who exploit the workers.
In fact, all the scandal revealed is just how rotten big city politics is from top to bottom. As former Los Angeles councilmember and former police chief Bernard Parks said, “I suspect you had very similar conversations in 2012 [10 years before], it’s just nobody taped them.”
Oct 24, 2022
Soon after Roe v. Wade was overturned, Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot signed an executive order which prevented city agencies from assisting investigations against people seeking abortions from other states. She said, “I am taking yet another step to help to safeguard all those who come to our city for reproductive healthcare.” While this ensures a legal protection, no one should be fooled that Chicago is about to provide adequate healthcare for working class women. Like everywhere else, income and class determine the level of care that someone receives.
A lack of regular medical care means that death from cervical cancer is much more likely for women living in low income neighborhoods. One study compared death rates in two adjacent Chicago neighborhoods. It concluded that a woman living in Washington Park, a working class and majority black neighborhood, is 85 times more likely to die of cervical cancer than a woman living in the wealthy neighborhood of Hyde Park.
And unlike other types of cancer, it can be almost entirely preventable because it is not hereditary. This requires getting a series of vaccines that greatly lower the chances of getting HPV, which is the virus that can cause cervical cancer. Regular screenings and Pap smears are also necessary in order to catch it early. No woman should die from something that could be prevented this easily.
Breast cancer also requires early detection in order to increase the chances of survival. This means getting regular mammograms. If diagnosed, the treatments involve countless appointments, which means regularly going to hospitals, which takes up a lot of time. Chemotherapy and radiation take a huge toll on the body and can make everyday tasks very difficult. Yet, many women can’t afford to stay home and not work throughout treatment.
Death during pregnancy and childbirth is another reproductive health issue that overwhelmingly affects working class women. A study done by the Chicago Department of Public Health revealed that “women covered by Medicaid were nearly three times more likely to experience a pregnancy-associated death than women with private insurance.” Regular check-ups and prenatal care are necessary to ensure a healthy pregnancy and safe delivery. Chronic conditions such as obesity, hypertension, and diabetes increase the risk of complications.
Many of these issues can be managed with regular medical care. But this requires consistent health insurance and access to doctors. The distribution of hospitals throughout the city is more dense in high income neighborhoods. This means that even working class women living in Chicago often have to travel far to go to these hospitals where the level of care tends to be better. These hardships hit the Black and Latino populations of Chicago even harder.
While some places like Chicago are calling themselves sanctuaries for women’s reproductive health, it is clear that’s not true. Women with money can access the care that they need, while working class women receive much less care that is much worse. And even though legal protections to get an abortion exist in Illinois right now, it does not mean that every woman has equal access.
Oct 24, 2022
In California, gas prices skyrocketed. In October, the average gas price surged to $6.43 from $5.06 in August, while crude oil prices dropped worldwide. As if to win a competition, one Chevron station in Los Angeles set its gas price at $8.35 per gallon, a new U.S. record. Today, Californians pay about 70% more for gas than the U.S. average. How is this possible?
In California, five refinery companies, Chevron, Marathon Petroleum, PBF Energy, Phillips 66, and Valero, produce more than 97% of the state’s gasoline. And the companies that own the refineries have deliberately restricted gasoline production. In 1982, California had 43 refineries. Today, there are only 15 refineries. Gasoline production capacity also dropped. California’s total crude oil processing capacity reached more than 2.5 million barrels in 1982. Today, forty years later, it is less than 1.8 million barrels.
An internal Chevron memo from the 1990s very clearly explained this strategy: “A senior energy analyst at the recent API [American Petroleum Institute] convention warned that if the U.S. petroleum industry doesn’t reduce its refining capacity, it will never see any substantial increase in refinery margins [i.e., profits].”
As a result, production is usually so tight, when a refinery goes off line, it immediately creates a shortage, which the refineries then use as an excuse to raise prices. And that’s exactly what happened in September. Except it wasn’t just one refinery that went off line, but four refineries. Suddenly, the oil refineries created a major shortage, which they used as an excuse to jack up prices to record levels.
These are multinational companies that operate on a global scale. No doubt, the profits from their refining operations in California will contribute greatly to their ongoing profit boom.
Their business strategy? Artificially decrease gas supply, use gas shortages as an excuse to jack up gas prices, and rake in mind-boggling profits at the expense of the working class. This is pure capitalism!
Oct 24, 2022
Forty-six people bought new condominiums near the Anacostia metro station in Washington, D.C. in 2017 through a city program for low-income first-time homebuyers. For many, it seemed like the realization of a dream.
But the foundation of the condominiums had been defectively built, and the building began to shift, cracking floors and busting pipes. Leaks and mold spread. It’s so bad that an engineer declared the property unsafe, and the residents had to move out. Yet out of 28 who filed claims with their homeowners insurance, only one claim was approved.
Now the residents have to decide whether to repair each unit or tear down and rebuild the entire building themselves—millions of dollars, either way. But in the meantime they still have to pay their mortgages!
As for the city, officials approved the shoddy construction. They gave loans of two and then six million dollars from a city fund for affordable housing to the politically-connected developers. Three city agencies and the courts have done nothing to help the homeowners fix these problems. The homeowners even have to pay back the developer’s city loans!
Capitalist greed has made their American dream an American nightmare.
Oct 24, 2022
This article is translated from the October 20th issue, #2829 of Lutte Ouvrière (Workers Struggle), the paper of the revolutionary workers’ group of that name active in France.
Tens of thousands of workers expressed their solidarity with the striking refinery workers, as well as raising their own wage demands. Sectors not very present during the earlier strike day of September 29, such as railway workers, were numerous. Teachers were mobilized against the reform of vocational education.
In the towns affected, refinery workers were in the lead, cheered on by fellow protesters. In all the processions, the satisfaction of having struck the blow was there, along with the idea it will take more to roll back big business and government, and the hope this day will be the start of a larger movement of working people.
This editorial appeared on the front of all workplace newsletters of Lutte Ouvrière during the week of October 19, 2022.
On Tuesday, October 18, tens of thousands of workers demonstrated across the country, for wage increases and in solidarity with striking refinery workers. Calls to strike have multiplied, while discontent over wages has been expressed in many companies for weeks. This is true in nuclear power plants and in companies like Dassault, Stellantis, Renault Trucks, Monoprix, Carrefour... But the refinery strike has made pay raises a national issue.
Like railway workers, garbage collectors or teachers, the strikers have been accused of taking the population hostage. But the holdup lies with the management of TotalEnergies. They are deaf to a basic demand: that of increasing wages at the same rate as prices. And given that group’s profits—18.8 billion in the first half of 2022, three times more than last year—refusing this wage catch-up is a scandal .…
So, if there are extremists, they are the big businesses which shower shareholders with profits like never before. They are the CEOs who grant themselves millions in annual salaries, 6 million for that of TotalEnergies, an increase of 52%. They are profit extremists, and they can’t get enough!
This propaganda can only backfire, especially since what is happening at TotalEnergies is happening in all companies. Everywhere, profits and dividends come before wages and working conditions.
Big business always has the word “negotiation” on their lips. And they are ready to organize hours, days and nights of chatting. They discussed crumbs, and that is enough for some union leaders to feel important.
But it is through struggle, not through this caricature of bargaining, that workers can win. Because it has become a matter of principle for some bosses: wages must be held down.
The struggle of the refinery workers shows it: collective action and strikes are the only means to be heard.
The fight between workers and big business is not easy and it never has been. The fight is not conducted on equal terms, since in addition to having money and power, big business can count on the State and the government, with its court orders, its forces of repression and its laws.
And, faced with the crisis and its uncertainties, the capitalists are determined not to let go. They want to reap all possible profits. Hand in hand with the government, they are ready to set us back a generation on wages, unemployment rights and pensions.
For the workers, the struggle is necessarily difficult, but the life that government and employers have in store for us will also be increasingly difficult. So, we must prepare and face it with the determination of those who are convinced that we are fighting a just fight.
In these times of soaring prices, the gap between prices and wages continues to widen. And the workers do not have to accept becoming poorer! We must increase salaries by 300, 400 euros per month and index them to the real inflation rate, and not the one sold to us by the government. This basic demand is a thousand times legitimate, and it must become that of the entire working class.
The mobilization on wages must become everyone’s business. Let’s take advantage of the slightest meeting or walkout to discuss our demands. Not proposals from employers, but what we lack to live decently. And let’s discuss the means of directing our struggle ourselves, so that it is not sold off by such and such trade union leaders.
Some think it is impossible to reverse the balance of power with big business. But as soon as the movement threatens to become more general, what was impossible becomes possible.
So let’s all take advantage of the fuel provided by the refinery strike to get us moving!
Oct 24, 2022
In France, refinery workers at several different companies have been out on strike since the end of September. This has impacted the economy and has lifted the hopes of workers across the country, inspiring two days of national strikes and demonstrations.
The government has recently responded with threats and attempts at intimidation.
What follows are two articles are translated from the October 20th issue, #2829 of Lutte Ouvrière (Workers Struggle), the paper of the revolutionary workers’ group of that name active in France.
“Unacceptable”, “illegitimate”, “unbearable for our compatriots”: this is how Minister Bruno Le Maire described the continuation of the strike by refinery employees.
“The time for negotiation has passed. There was a negotiation, there was an agreement, that means that force must remain with the majority vote,” he added. But what negotiation, what agreement, what majority voice should the strikers respect? On October 14, in the cozy offices of TotalEnergies in Paris-La Défense, the representatives of the labor unions, CFDT and the CFE-CGC, only signed a draft agreement providing for a 5 percent salary increase for workers. This is in addition to 2 percent individual increases—so by definition at the discretion of management—and a bonus of one month’s salary.
This is far from what the strikers are demanding, a 10 percent increase in the monthly salary, to compensate for punishing inflation each month. The few bonuses dropped by the bosses, deductible from their profits in the eyes of the taxman, are ephemeral in the budget of a working family. It is totally legitimate to demand a real salary increase. Faced with a capitalist who brags about his 18 billion in profit in six months, who increases the dividends paid to shareholders by 50 percent, who himself increases his salary by 52 percent, it is legitimate for those who produce this wealth to demand a real catch-up in purchasing power. They have the weapon of the strike in their hands, they would be very wrong to drop it before having won.
Le Maire relies on the disgusting agreement signed, against the manifest will of the striking workers, between the boss Pouyanné and certain union leaders who had never called a strike. The pretext is that these signatories would be representative of a majority of the workforce—of whom they did not ask their opinion—and that the agreement would therefore be valid, under who knows what law. It’s a scam. As for the few crumbs that the leaders of TotalEnergies have agreed to cut from their cake, and which the negotiators are taking advantage of, it is the strikers who have torn them loose! They are precisely the proof that the strike is legitimate.
Le Maire’s chin taps, the evocation of a "need for firmness and authority", of a "return to order" give the true measure of the kinds of "negotiations" employers and the government love. The scandalous requisitions that the latter has ordered show how much he is at the service of his capitalist masters.
After three weeks of strike and the agreements signed between the bosses and non-striking unions, the government ordered the requisition of strikers—that is, they ordered them to return to work—to the Normandy refinery of Port-Jérôme-Gravenchon, the Mardyck depot (Dunkirk) and that of Feyzin (Rhone).
The requisition is a well-known reality of caregivers, the administration never worrying so much about having the necessary staff as on the days when it goes on strike. Requisitions had also already taken place in the oil sector in 2010, during the movement against the Sarkozy-Fillon pension reform. A large part of the workers at the Grandpuits refinery had notably been requisitioned and three demonstrators injured by the intervention of the gendarmes, the national police force.
From Thursday, October 13, the gendarmes went to the homes of the strikers designated by the management of Exxon and Total to order them to go to work, under penalty of six months in prison and a fine of 10,000 euros. Not warned beforehand, a striker described his children upset by the sight of the soldiers who had come to speak to their father.
About twenty strikers have thus been ordered to return to work: a limited number, but it shows the government’s desire to put pressure on the workers, since it can no longer content itself with minimizing the impact of their mobilization. The State, which has obviously never considered requisitioning profits to finance the requested salary increases, hopes to put an end to this situation which underlines the need to impose general increases, at the height of inflation and profits made. It shows which camp it’s in: that of employers against the strikers, and against the entire world of work.
The last word remains with the workers, since the State is not able to put a policeman behind each worker. The renewal of the strike voted by the workers of the refineries after the announcement of the requisitions is the best response to the government.
Oct 24, 2022
The following translation is an account of a September 28 strike at a Stellantis-PSA factory in Mulhouse, France.
This article is translated from the October 6th issue, #2827 of Lutte Ouvrière (Workers Struggle), the paper of the revolutionary workers’ group of that name active in France.
It has been a long time since employees at the PSA site in Mulhouse, France had such a big walkout: 1,300 on September 28. For months, the rise in prices had been talked about. Militants around the CGT union addressed co-workers during breaks, by giving speeches, or during bus rides. Few workers, at first, believed that wages would be raised.
The solutions put forward for running out of money at the end-of-month were freezing prices, the reduction of taxes, and receiving a one-time bonus. Many wondered why insist on asking for pay raises that the boss had been refusing for years?
But even if workers didn’t believe it, the idea was still gaining ground. After the announcement of profits of eight billion euros for the first half of 2022, many expected ... the icing on the cake in the form of a wage increase. Companies less wealthy than Stellantis had given raises to their employees.
On September 27th, negotiations with management on purchasing power gave birth to a tiny 1,000 euros bonus, with zero euros of permanent wage increase. This proposal led to incomprehension and disgust .…
After a rally in the morning, at the initiative of the CGT union, a hundred workers from one department, including a majority of temporary workers, (who would get even less than 1,000 euros) and about 50 workers from another department, decided to strike on the afternoon shift. They were soon joined by workers from another department. Many were employees not used to going out during walkouts: it made everyone say that something was really happening. A hundred paraded through the workplace, and decided to meet to plan for the next day.
Unions like FO or the CFDT also sensed that something was happening, and joined the CGT. With a strike call from several unions, workers could more easily take the plunge. Thus, on the next day, the 28th, a whole big group of workers and skilled trades left their tools or their keys, saying, "Tavares has gone too far, he has spat in our faces—so much effort for crumbs!" Even unions that refused to call a strike, such as the CFTC or the CFE-CGC, could not oppose the participation of their members.
The workers who experienced the seven-week renewable strike in 1989 could not believe their eyes, and everyone else was surprised to see so many people out.
When you lose all the time, you don’t imagine winning. To achieve real wage increases, workers will have to be at least as determined as the workers of 1989. These rallies, these walkouts, are steps where workers learn to rely on each other to better organize. For years, some have spread division. Today and tomorrow, the workers in the factory will have to build unity.
Oct 24, 2022
Protests continue against the leaders of the Islamic Republic in Iran more than five weeks after the death of Mahsa Amini at the hands of the government’s “morality police.” At least 185 protesters have been killed and many more arrested. Police have fired on demonstrators, and many of those arrested have suffered beatings in police stations and prisons. Yet the movement is ongoing.
Men and women, some without head coverings, often very young, take to the streets shouting, "Death to the dictator" or "Khameini, we will bury you."
In attacking religious leaders who preach morality, but who themselves are billionaires, corrupt and depraved, the demonstrators are finding support of a large portion of the population. In recent weeks, parts of the working class have begun to join in. These include workers from the South Pars natural gas complex in the Persian Gulf near southern Iran, workers from several petrochemical companies and oil refineries, a steel complex in the Persian Gulf, and a sugar cane complex in southwestern Iran.
These strikes by Iranian workers may be limited thus far, but these workers represent a force, by their numbers and concentration in sectors that provide the main economic resources of the country. This has not been lost on the regime. Police arrested at least 100 of the striking petrochemical workers at Asalouyeh, and many have been threatened with being fired or replaced if they refuse to break their strike.
The government has blocked internet access to stop the posting of videos of the strikes on social media. It also attempts to portray the strikes as being solely economic, but strikers have stated their opposition to the government’s heavy-handed tactics against demonstrators.
It remains to be seen how widely these strikes by Iranian workers will spread, but it is their fight that offers the possibility for real change. That will require the working class to organize in its own name, and not be dragged behind any of the politicians already waiting to jump to the front to derail the workers’ movement.
Oct 24, 2022
The U.S. media has been airing news about Russia’s use of Iranian drones to attack Ukraine’s power grid and municipal heating systems in cities like Kiev.
The headlines bang the war drums: the New York Times front page blares "Deadly Message Sent by Drones: It’s Russia and Iran vs. the West." They yell about Iran, casting the country as a villain, an intruder into the war. But let us not forget who the biggest arms dealer in the world is! That would be the United States, which is up to its ears in this war overseas. The U.S. has provided much more money, and far more sophisticated weapons to Ukraine.
So why is the U.S. media making such a big deal about some dozens of Iranian drones? Maybe they think that bundling Iran, a Muslim country and a long-time opponent of U.S. imperialism, together with Russia can help them prepare the U.S. population for war. Having vilified Iran for decades, they now find it useful to play on racist stereotypes as a way to set Americans against Russians.
Oct 24, 2022
This article is translated from the October 20th issue, #2829 of Lutte Ouvrière (Workers Struggle), the paper of the revolutionary workers’ group of that name active in France.
The French Ministry of Defense is going to bring 2,000 Ukrainian soldiers to France, to train them in general, and in particular to use the weapons that France delivers to Ukraine. The officials hope, of course, that the Ukrainian government and general staff will return the favor by ordering ever more weapons from French firms.
When French President Macron declares that, "The war will last" in Ukraine, it is an observation: that the increasing arms deliveries of the great powers to the Ukrainian regime will continue. It is also a thinly disguised wish because, over the months of fighting, the order books of industrialists of death around the world have continued to swell. To the point that they are no longer able, it is said, to satisfy “demand.”
Thus, Macron can congratulate himself on having received a tweet from the Romanian president thanking him, in French, for having delivered to him a dozen Leclerc tanks and as many armored infantry vehicle. The Romanian president claim they had “strengthened the French military presence in Romania,” a country bordering Ukraine and a member of NATO where Paris has already installed several hundred of its soldiers.
The war in Ukraine and the very real risks it entails—for example the intensifying Ukrainian missile strikes on the border regions of Russia, including Crimea—offer a perfect opportunity for Western states to expand their military clientele in the region. In addition, it allows them to position themselves for the “after.” Because with all the destruction of buildings, equipment, factories, ports, energy infrastructures (in Ukraine, more than a third of them have been affected in recent days), those who are salivating in advance are no longer only large arms groups but also companies in construction, logistics, industrial equipment manufacturers and a host of others in Western Europe and America.
Meanwhile, among Western allies, the trade war to take the biggest slice of the “aid” pie from Ukraine rages on—which in fact is mostly aid to their own capitalists.
Thus, Washington has just announced that it has released 725 million dollars, the first part of the additional aid voted by Congress in September. It includes 23,000 shells, 5,000 guided anti-tank mines, 200 military transport vehicles, with Humvees and air-to-ground missile batteries to follow. According to the head of American diplomacy, the White House has allocated 18.3 billion dollars to Ukraine since Biden’s election in January 2021, more than a year before Putin attacked Ukraine. Indeed, military aid of all kinds, with the supply of arms, equipment, advisers and instructors, from the United States to the Ukrainian State is not new. It dates back to early 2014, with the installation of a pro-Western power in Kyiv, and has continued to intensify since. The same is true, on a smaller scale, for other Western powers.
A newcomer to this macabre dance is Saudi Arabia. It is paying Ukraine 400 million dollars in “humanitarian aid,” without specifying whether it prefers to keep its weapons, provided by France, Great Britain and the United States, to massacre Yemenis or use against its own people.
This Western escalation of arms supplies to Ukraine does not prevent the leaders of the major powers from declaring, as did the French Minister of Defense, that they respect the international standards of non-belligerence, since their troops do not physically intervene in the fighting. It is completely hypocritical, but cynically correct: the imperialist West confronts Russia through Ukraine—which means, concretely, using Ukrainian civilians and soldiers as cannon fodder.
It is estimated that around 65,000 soldiers are already dead on each side and that the wounded number in the hundreds of thousands. As for the civilians killed and wounded, no one providing any figures on this subject, one imagines that they too are very numerous.
So, when the French, British, American, German and other arms manufacturers publish their annual results, we can try to divide this monstrous total by the estimated number of victims to get an idea of how much profit a human life brings to the capitalists.
Oct 24, 2022
That party does not exist today. Instead there are two big parties, both serving the capitalist class and its chase after profit. But working people can build our own party, one that refuses to let the bosses set us against each other, a party that works to organize all our forces in a common fight for what we all need.
This year, in Chicago, Maryland and Michigan, there are parties on the ballot who stand for this. Each runs on a program based on the needs of the working class and its power to overcome capitalist society and its disasters.
By voting Working Class Party in Michigan, Maryland or Chicago, you can say you agree with this program.
To catch up with what we’ve lost to inflation: Everyone’s wages must be increased—NOW. Minimum wage should be enough to support a family comfortably. There’s wealth enough in this society to pay everyone a decent wage, including youth just starting out.
To keep pace with inflation: When prices go up, wages should go up an equal amount—and IMMEDIATELY. Pensions and Social Security should also go up—IMMEDIATELY.
To get rid of all the unemployment, obvious and hidden: Share out the work among everyone who wants to work. We could all work fewer hours, and everyone could be paid a full, weekly check. The wealth our labor creates will more than pay for this.
To provide the services the population needs: Public money should be spent on systems serving everyone: schools, roads, bridges, public health and sanitation, water, sewers, transit, dams, parks, recreation centers, etc. The money is there, wasted today, propping up corporate profit, burned up in war. It must be taken back, made to benefit everyone.
To determine what kind of life we will have: We have to find the wealth the bosses steal from our labor. We have to put our hands on the public money that is wasted. We can do that. We are in every company, every public service, every school—in the very center of the economy. Not only do workers make the economy run. As a class, we can decide how it should be run. The working class will make it run for the common good.
Oct 24, 2022
Movie: Till, 2022. In local theaters. Directed by Chinonye Chukwu, starring Danielle Deadwyler and Jalyn Hall
The movie Till just opened across the country. It is about the murder of the 14-year-old Emmett Till in Mississippi in 1955 and its aftermath. More than anything, the film focuses on Emmett’s mother, Mamie, and how she responded and changed as a result of her loving and loved son’s murder: from a doting mother, to grieving devastation, and finally, gradually, to a warrior who helped change the world. In today’s age of mass incarceration of mostly black men, almost daily murders of people like George Floyd, and the rise of white supremacy, the film shows how a courageous stand can shake the world.
Book: A Man’s Place (French: La Place), A Woman’s Story and The Years by Annie Ernaux
Annie Ernaux, a French woman, just received the 2022 Nobel Prize for Literature for her entire body of work. The above three titles are a great introduction to her. A Man’s Place is a short work which describes her father in non-sentimental, stark terms. Through him, we see the working class in France of that time between the wars: bitterly poor, hard working, all at the mercy of deadly diseases and hardship. A Woman’s Story presents her mother, with the added complication of Alzheimer’s. The Years is a personal narrative of the period 1941 to 2006. Her beautifully simple yet bold writing shows the consequences of the class divisions, the changes over the decades, the resilient human spirit, and the price we pay for these divisions.
Oct 24, 2022
This article is translated from the September 23 issue #2825 of Lutte Ouvrière (Workers’ Struggle), the newspaper of the revolutionary workers’ group of that name active in France.
TotalEnergies, the French oil company, plans to exploit an oil field on the shores of Lake Albert in Uganda. The plans include building what will be the largest heated petroleum pipeline in the world, running over 900 miles through Uganda and Tanzania. The European Parliament has expressed its concern.
They criticized what activist groups have denounced for years. One hundred thousand people are at risk of being displaced. Expropriated farmers have been pressured to sign documents thrust on them by Total representatives. The parliament denounced human rights violations, arrests, and acts of judicial harassment against activists and NGOs. The parliament demanded that those arrested be released and expropriated farmers be properly compensated—they have waited months for this.
The parliament also warned of threats to the environment and to water resources, as oil spills are inevitable. Beginning this December, 400 oil wells will be drilled, including 132 in an environmentally protected area. The project could emit up to 34 million tons of CO2 per year, 30 times the current emissions of Uganda and Tanzania combined.
Despite these serious accusations, the parliament’s resolution is “non-binding.” It only asked Total to postpone the start of construction for a year, in order to study whether another pipeline route is possible.
This will hardly convince Total to abandon such a lucrative project, especially since it has the support of French President Emmanuel Macron, the French and Ugandan armies, and Uganda’s oil police. All these powers work hand in hand with Total’s own security forces. The fight against global warming is good for electoral speeches, but that’s all.
Oct 24, 2022
Complaints from outraged parents forced school officials to close Jana Elementary School in Florissant, Missouri due to reports of radioactive waste in the school and its playground. A recent report from the Boston Chemical Data Corporation disclosed that the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers discovered radioactive waste near the school in 2018, and again in 2019, 2020, and 2021. Dust and soil samples from the school, including the library and the playground, contained high levels of radioactive lead. The kindergarten play area showed levels of radiation “22 times the expected background.”
It just so happens that Jana Elementary was built near Coldwater Creek, a tributary of the Missouri River that passes near sites used in the development of nuclear weapons as part of the Manhattan Project during World War II. These sites included radioactive waste storage piles. The school sits on a Coldwater Creek flood plain.
In a letter to school district officials after yet another round of testing this past January, the Army Corps of Engineers said "the contamination did not pose an immediate risk to human health or the environment because the contamination was below ground surface." Really? Since when does dirt stop radiation? And little kids never play in the dirt on playgrounds, right?
Parents of current students at the school are understandably angry, and they forced school officials to close the school and "pivot to online learning." Parents want the district to find safe alternative schools for their children, while some rightly worry about their kids being scattered to the wind from the area where they live. In the meantime, these young students will suffer from the detrimental effects of “virtual learning” experienced by so many throughout the Covid pandemic.
What has received barely a mention is what will be done to follow up on the possible exposure to radiation by students who have attended the school, not to mention anyone who has lived near the area in the nearly 80 years since radioactive waste was left near Coldwater Creek. And why did it take the U.S. government this long to discover the high levels of radiation? Apparently the government was not anxious to advertise its culpability for poisoning the population in the areas where it conducted nuclear weapons research.
Oct 24, 2022
Air pollution at the two ports of Los Angeles increased by huge amounts during the Covid pandemic, according to a report released by port officials.
Nitrogen oxides, an indicator of smog, rose by 54% at the Port of Los Angeles, and by 35% at the neighboring Port of Long Beach, from 2020 to 2021. Sulfur oxides, which damage lungs, increased by 145% and 38%, respectively. Particles spewed by diesel engines, which cause cancer, went up by 56% at the L.A. port, and by 42% at the Long Beach port.
In other words, as the coronavirus took thousands of lives in the Los Angeles area, additional lives were being lost to increased air pollution. And like the victims of the virus, the victims of the pollution were working-class families—families that live near the ports and inhale the poisonous air, because they can’t afford to move to healthier neighborhoods.
The increase in pollution is not a surprise. Like companies in other sectors, companies operating at the ports reduced their work force at the beginning of the pandemic. But when, in 2021, transportation picked up again, the shortage of workers caused a big logjam at the ports. In November 2021, 114 ships were sitting off L.A.’s two ports, spewing pollution into the air, because there were not enough workers at the ports to unload the ships, and not enough workers at the warehouses and distribution centers where the unloaded goods go.
Already before the pandemic, the pollution was so bad near the ports that doctors had dubbed the surrounding communities “diesel death zones,” and now the pollution is even deadlier. It’s a result of the capitalist system, which is set up so as to make workers pay for the big companies’ endless greed for more profit. In this case with their lives.