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NEWS & LETTERS,
August-September 2002
Readers’ ViewsResponses TO THE DRAFT FOR MARXIST-HUMANIST PERSPECTIVES, 2002-2003: PERMANENT WAR OR REVOLUTION IN PERMANENCE? I’m new to the radical Left and appreciate how the
Draft Perspectives shows that News and Letters Committees is not about providing
pat answers to social questions. That’s important because addressing
manifestations of capital is not a permanent solution. It can be helpful, but it’s
not a revolution. I didn’t understand that before. It boils down to how a
small group can’t implement a plan on people. When people do come together,
that will be a source of power. They aren’t willing to settle for pat answers.
I also liked that the Perspectives showed that Bush is driven by capital. It’s
more than that he’s a terrible person, he really is a slave to capital. --New to the movement, Tennessee A recent article I read in POLITICAL AFFAIRS called “The
Forever War: Globalization and the New World Order” documented the entrenched,
reactionary ownership by the few of our central government and their drive to
barbaric oblivion for all. It is a challenge to confront all the dead end roads
being again proposed for resolving this capitalist crisis of over-production and
declining rate of profits. The Draft Perspectives clearly describes the
objective reality and the road to a radical, revolutionary alternative. But,
despite all my attempts to understand, I still stumble on “double negation,”
“the Absolute,” and how Marx went beyond Hegel. I feel if I can ever
incorporate those concepts into my being, it would be a new awakening for me.
Can anyone write an article really clarifying these basic intellectual concepts? --Frank, Wisconsin I have a problem with the discussion of “the negation
of the negation.” It’s a type of double negation that could appear to the
uninitiated as containing serious negative connotations. Am I correct to
understand that the first negation is destruction of capitalism and the second
negation is a reversal of the destruction, i.e., building a new paradigm? It
sounds convoluted. Is it just me? Could this concept be more clearly articulated
for the masses? --M.S., Texas In Argentina, which is taken up in some detail in the
Perspectives, it really is the women who are pushing the movement forward, even
when the reports don’t say so. Neighborhood associations in Latin America mean
women doing the work. That existed in the poor communities before the bank
closures. Women may be one reason why these organizations refuse to be taken
over by the vanguardist Left. I wish we could hear more directly from the women
themselves. --Women’s Liberationist, Memphis None of the things Bush did as an oilman, which voters
passed over in the ‘90s, can be ignored now. Just think what trouble he’d be
in without September 11. The most important thing about the collapse in equity
prices is not the lies and corruption, but the fact that the falling rate of
profit has become unveiled. The so-called “investor class,” a category
pointing to the large percentage of Americans who own stock, was supposed to
make everyone identify with capitalism and make “class warfare” a thing of
the past. Now most realize they are just workers after all, and the economic
policies are for the super-rich. Further, we’re seeing a dramatic downturn in
the last pillar of this economy, consumer confidence, as this deflation in
assets hits the majority consuming class. --R.B., California I’m enclosing for you an article that appeared in a
Canadian magazine called MONEY SENSE, which is titled “Give war a chance.”
The writer sees war as still the best business and recommends investments in the
stocks of defense companies like Lockheed Martin, Raytheon, General Dynamics and
Northrop Grumman, which are expected to jump 26% against a 7% decline for the
Standard and Poors 500. Here in plain English we read about the role of war in
keeping up and making profit in the oldest most profitable “business.” The
longer and more intense the war is, the more replacements are needed for the
expended cruise missiles, bombs, ammunition, and the newest and latest systems
to deliver them. Just imagine what the military budget could do in the fight
against worldwide poverty, hunger, and AIDS. When will we finally reach a state
of sanity where war will not be the “best business” and instead of giving
war a chance we give peace a chance? --Giorgio, Canada The global corporations have made it clear that the
future they have in mind for a majority of the human race is a total lack of
material security. It has come to the point where they will destroy us or we
them. Asking corporate CEOs to be ethical is like asking a tiger to be a
vegetarian. The WTO protest in Seattle was good because it was a genuine
confrontation. But we didn’t see any follow-through. Great revolutions come
about spontaneously but an organized strategy is needed to give a direction. --New reader, Berkeley The invitation you printed to ask readers to participate
in the discussion of your Perspectives is really great because what you’re
presenting relates to all of us on the planet. The Left says the U.S. is enemy
number one and any others are smaller enemies. But men and women who are
suffering in Iran know it is not only Bush but all sorts of fundamentalists who
need to be seen as “false alternatives.” After World War II we saw
revolutions happening in the Third World, but now all these countries are
struggling for their daily lives. We are having problems right here. Germany,
Japan and the U.S. are going down simultaneously. Could there be a revolution in
a developed country like the U.S.? --Iranian exile, Fremont, California I generally agree with your viewpoints. But I disagree
with what you said in the July issue about Hindu and Jewish fundamentalism. When
has any Hindu or Jewish fundamentalist bombed a church or a mosque in Italy,
Morocco, Germany or the U.S.? When did a Jewish fundamentalist anywhere in the
world turn a mosque into a synagogue? Yet Islamic fundamentalists have been
guilty of such things. While I praise N&L for not falling into the
anti-Semitic claptrap of the rest of the leftist and “progressive” media, by
saying all fundamentalisms have a moral equivalence you are self-defeating. --J.F., Marion, Ohio In early July the Senate approved the opening of Yucca
Mountain in Nevada (western Shoshone land) as the central storage site for the
nation’s high level nuclear waste, primarily from weapons production
facilities and the 103 nuclear power plants. Catastrophic truck and rail
accidents carrying nuclear wastes across the U.S. now become a real possibility.
The approval of the facility, projected to open in ten years, now gives the
nuclear industry an excuse to build a whole new generation of nuclear power
plants and weapons. There is no safe way to dispose of nuclear waste, yet the
industry is pushing for more growth. The best solution is to store and monitor
for leakage on site, with no transporting—and to stop all future production. --Basho, Los Angeles First came Sharon’s march to Temple Mount. Then, his
deliberate incursion into Jenin and Ramallah right on the heels of the Arab
League’s peace proposal. Now we’ve seen a missile attack in a crowded
neighborhood right in the midst of ongoing cease-fire talks sponsored by
European diplomats. Let’s think. In view of all this evidence can we believe
that Sheik Shehada was the “real” target? Or is the real target what Sharon’s
government deems most dangerous to his regime? The possibility that peace might
actually break out? --Asian American, Oakland, California I have no suggestions to add to your forthcoming
Convention and discussion. But I would like to say that the publication of
N&L is invaluable in that it provides a perspective on the dissent within,
and sometimes outside, the great U.S. I am sure that many of its readers and
contributors, including myself, will never be really grounded in Raya
Dunayevskaya’s works. Bless those of you who are. Just don’t forget where
the ground is. --Longtime supporter, North Vancouver, B.C. Many youth today get stuck in a half-way house--that is,
only half way to revolution--by embodying their activism through forming more
and more co-operatives of some type. As the Draft Perspectives highlights, the
revolt in Argentina has come up with some very new and exciting forms of
organization born out of the masses’ spontaneity. I believe that youth should
take the challenge given by the Draft Perspectives in terms of what we as
revolutionaries have to offer, “in terms of ideas, concepts, perspectives that
can help answer that most difficult question of all--what happens after?” --Former anarchist, Memphis LIGHT IN BOLIVIA? In the July elections in Bolivia, for the very first
time a socialist political party got the second place with almost 22% of the
vote. The Movement to Socialism (MAS) was born in the tropical jungle of
Cochabamba in a region called Chapare, well-known because there are the biggest
coca crops of Bolivia. The leader is a cocalero union chief who has been accused
by the U.S. ambassador and DEA of being a drug and crime supporter, and now he
has a chance to reach the presidential chair. For the very first time, the
senate and house of representatives are going to have coca growers, Indian
representatives and a wide range of people from the most depressed sectors. For
the first time in many years I can see some light in the future of my country. --Carlos, Bolivia WOMEN VS. WAR The reports of four Fort Bragg military men murdering their wives made me go back to reread the June N&L article by Suzanne Rose who wrote from North Carolina about anti-war women in military families being beaten by their husbands or his friends. Women’s Liberationists have long documented how war
abroad comes home in the form of extreme violence against women. Serbian
feminists, in particular, saw their country transformed into one where soldiers,
returning from murdering civilians in Bosnia, brutalized their own wives and
children. Guns were everywhere. To me, it’s no accident that three of the four
U.S. soldiers in the recent murders had just returned from Afghanistan. The
bravery and reason of the women Suzanne Rose wrote about who had come out
against the war is starkly underscored by these murders. --Terry Moon, Memphis IS TIME RUNNING OUT? The UN has released a report predicting that time is
running out for the planet and if society continues on a “market first”
direction, the planet’s condition in 30 years will be stark: 3% of the earth’s
surface absorbed into urban sprawl, much of it slums, devastating biodiversity;
55% of humanity facing water shortages; most coastal regions clogged with
pollution; almost one third of the world’s fish stocks depleted or over
exploited; substantial degradation of farmland and destruction of forests.
Rather than take the slightest action to prevent this from happening, Bush, lord
of the world, shows that he is at the same time the slave of capital by lifting
all environmental restrictions on its activity, as much as he can get away with.
Although he imagines he is capital’s master, commanding it to go forth and
multiply, even at the expense of earth itself, he is only articulating its own
inner drive. --Environmentalist, Tennessee EMERGENCY APPEAL: STOP INDONESIA MILITARY AID! President Bush has already convinced Congress to restore
some aid to Indonesia and proposes to give millions more. An outpouring of calls
and letters to Congress is needed to try to defeat this proposal. Congress cut
off aid to Indonesia in 1999 because of its horrendous human rights abuses in
East Timor. Now the pattern of military militias that murder, rape and torture
unarmed civilians and burn their villages is being repeated in Aceh, Malukus,
West Papua and other regions that have dared to demand self-determination in the
past few years. Restoring U.S. aid will give the green light to Indonesia to
intensify its repression. One woman describes the Acehnese condition as
hopeless: “They are fighting the military not because they think they can win,
but because there is no way out of their dilemma: devastated if they fight back,
annihilated if they don’t.” Readers can help by contacting Congress and getting in
touch with NEWS & LETTERS about people-to-people solidarity work. --Anne Jaclard, New York CORRECTION Two lines from the “Draft for Marxist-Humanist
Perspectives, 2002-2003” in the July N&L were omitted. On page 8, the line
“Convention will focus on perspectives for projecting this” should have
appeared at the very bottom of the first column, and the line “other
publications will be discussed at the Convention” should have appeared at the
bottom of the second column. We regret any confusion this may have caused. —Editor LABOR STRUGGLES IN 2002 Demonstrating outside a Taco Bell with ten Immokalee
workers, we almost shut the place down--until police came when there was almost
a physical confrontation with an angry Taco Bell patron, who tried to run us
over. But we got a lot of honks for support from other motorists. It is an
amazing movement by workers to have some control over what they do. One of them
would yell, “Don’t eat at Taco Bell, it makes people poor.” It made it
concise. He would go up to the cars and talk to everyone and show the
relationship of what people were buying to what workers do in the fields. He
talked about “solidarity” in doing away with inhuman conditions. One worker
told me that despite the bad things he’s encountered in the U.S. he likes
being a migrant worker because he meets new people, sees new things, and is
looking forward to taking back what he’s learned to Guatemala. --Young activist, Tennessee I have worked for a used appliance sales and repair shop
for 12 years. I repair and deliver any and all of their appliances. The store
has been sold three times since I came to work here. I have worked for my
current boss for three and a half years. When I told him I needed two weeks off
for a vacation with my family he told me I couldn’t take the time because the
place was too busy, and if I took off I was fired and should find another
job. I couldn’t believe what he told me. Everyone needs some vacation time; my
boss takes his, but I can’t. I receive no vacation pay and get no medical
coverage, but he is going to fire me if I take two weeks without pay. It is
difficult to find a different job because my English is not good, but I am a
good worker and very knowledgeable in my trade. It makes me very angry to be
treated so badly. --Latino worker, Los Angeles Everybody could surely relate to what reporters
described as the “bitterness” the rescued coal miner, Brian Mayhugh,
expressed when he mentioned that days after the rescue, the miners had yet to
hear from the owners of the company, Black Wolf Coal Co., for which they had
been working. It makes you feel they were lucky it wasn’t the coal company but
state and national agencies that were directing the rescue, or they might still
be down there. What I related to as well was the way his wife added
sharply to his revealing comment with an immediate, “Every minute they were
down there better be paid as overtime!” The reporter--who was a woman--added
“she wasn’t joking in the least.” No kidding! --Ex-miner’s wife, Illinois THE BRITISH LABOR SCENE Where to now is the question after a massive strike by
local government workers here in Britain. I attended a rally where some 200 to
300 union workers turned up to lobby the local councillors over low pay and
their national pay campaign. Nationally the one-day strike where over a million
people walked out was the largest strike in 20 years. The mood of the strikers
was united but ironically, though a trade union official who spoke paid tribute
to the large number of women strikers (650,000 out of one million), not a single
woman had been given the mike or the platform. There were the usual handful of
socialist paper-sellers but the dead hand of official unionism made it feel that
the members were just a stage army. At one point one of the leaders asked the
strikers to come together. Like a flash, there were exchanges between the
strikers, management and the councillors. As I left, a small detachment of police marched past me
on the road. It seemed to me that the government had been preparing for this
strike, since the police had been given their pay rises and promised more of
everything. The councillors receive allowances of 20,000 pounds plus expenses
and pensions. The average wage of local authority workers is between 5,000 to
10,000 pounds, with women as usual in the lowest pay bracket. The future will
depend on the extent that activists and union members actually run the dispute.
Will we see only a cozy deal between New Labour and the trade union leaders or a
little more respect and dignity at work? --Patrick Duffy, England CRIMINAL INJUSTICE SYSTEM Today (July 31) the Inglewood police issued a warrant
for Neilson Williams. On June 23 he was beaten so badly he was unconscious for
three days and there is a witness to his beating by J. Morse—the same cop who
was seen on tape slamming Donovan Jackson’s head on the hood of a police car.
Williams was not charged with any crime until today, after he filed charges
against the Inglewood police. Now consider that today another Black man was
released from prison in St. Louis, Missouri after 18 years for a rape he did not
commit. He had been trying to get the DNA tests done for the last eight years,
but had been blocked at every turn. Someone has to answer where is the justice
for Blacks and Browns and the poor in this country? Something has to change now. --Angry, Los Angeles I enjoy reading N&L very much. I have learned a lot
about some of the problems in other countries as well as this one. It seems the
whole world is against the poor, no matter what color we are. I was poor and
white from Maine, which is not as bad as being poor and Black in the South. But
it’s close. I was picked out because we were poor, just so the cops would have
someone to beat. --Prisoner, Maine I am incarcerated at the Supermax prison at Tamms. We
are in our cells 23 hours a day, alone in a 7-by-12-foot cell. To see what we’re
going through you’d have to lock yourself in a bathroom for 12 years and see
how it affects the mind. Yet when I was reading your newspaper it made me feel
like I have some hope in getting others to see I am innocent of the crimes I was
charged with. --C.F., Tamms, Illinois LIBERATION FOR AFGHAN WOMEN? An article in the SAN FRANCISCO CHRONICLE reported that
since the “liberation” of Afghanistan from the Taliban, dozens of young
women have chosen death by self-immolation in order not to be sold by their
families to the highest bidder. One 14-year-old burned herself to death last
month after her family sold her to a 60-year-old man. The “dowries” offered
reach $10,000 to $15,000. According to “observers” women are not
self-sufficient and “agree to be married off at an early age.” I don’t
understand how much more strongly you can express your disagreement than by
taking your own life! All the recent news is testimony to how little the “liberated”
interim government, created by the U.S. and UN, actually liberated. The work of
RAWA, which recognizes women as human beings, and whose stories you have
covered, stands in sharp contrast against any military solution to the problems
of liberation. |
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