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NEWS & LETTERS,
January-February 2002
Readers' View
THE WAR ON FREEDOM It's important to always refer
to the so-called "war on terrorism" as that of Bush and the Democrats.
The same is true of the "war on freedom." The duplicitous Democrats
may soon begin to curry favor with voters fed up with attacks on our civil
liberties. Then it may be too late to assign blame for the latest installment of
imperialist war at the doorsteps of the Democrats as well as of Bush and John
"Southern Patriot" Ashcroft. Supporter The deaths of thousands of
civilians in the Middle East, both from direct military action and the resulting
refugee crisis, is nothing short of state-sponsored terrorism. It is not the way
to find justice for the 3,000 who died at the hands of terrorists on September
11. Activist Giving careful consideration to
how our foreign policy affects other peoples would do more than the destruction
of war to rid the world of terrorism. D.T. I was glad to hear that Clayton
Lee Waagner was apprehended for sending hundreds of anthrax threats to women's
health clinics and that Ashcroft was forced to describe him as a domestic
terrorist. But Waagner and men like him don't act alone. Why isn't the Army of
God he's allied with treated as a terrorist organization by the Department of
Justice? The FBI has been notoriously absent from any fight against anti-choice
terrorism, even when the Army of God distributes a manual that gives detailed
instructions for attacking abortion clinics, manufacturing bombs, and cutting
off the hands of abortion doctors! Women's Liberationist During this month when we are
celebrating the life of Martin Luther King Jr. and worried about protecting our
civil rights today, it might be good to remember the campaign of spying and
vilification waged on King by Hoover's FBI. I recall a statement by Mumia Abu-
Jamal that called King a political prisoner, even when not in prison, of the
same government he fought and died to save. Abu-Jamal supporter AN AMERICAN TALIBAN? I read an article recently that
asked what Bush was going to do—now that he was taking on religious
persecution in Afghanistan—about religious persecution at home. And how about
in all the other Islamic fundamentalist states? It turned into a report about
the beheading by the Saudis, in the week between Christmas and New Year's, of
three men because they had allegedly engaged in homosexual acts. Then the
article asked why, since we wouldn't ever do anything like that, do we still
have 122-year-old sodomy laws on the books in 16 states, including Texas, where
two Houston men were arrested recently and hauled to jail for having sex
together in their own apartment. The answer is the same reason
Saudi Arabia chops off homosexuals' heads—because some religious fanatics have
made their beliefs the law of the land. The article was talking about the
Christian Coalition, the 700 Club, and the Catholic cardinals who constitute a
real American Taliban. Our own religious Right is the inspiration for the
fanatics who bomb abortion clinics and kill gays on the streets of America. When
is Bush going to take on that Taliban? Angry and alarmed CANADA'S NEW 'SECURITY' Things are not good here. The
British Columbia provincial elections a few months ago elected a very right-wing
government. Civil service is about to be slashed by 33%. The minimum wage will
be kept at $8 but they have introduced a "beginner wage" of $5, which
can be worked off after 500 hours. Since virtually all so employed will be
part–timers, 500 hours must seem a lifetime. Privatization is the mantra of
the day. Subscriber I'm sure you are aware of our
dictatorial new "security" legislation here, drastically curtailing
the democratic freedoms of all Canadians. In some respects, I understand that
our new laws are even more restrictive than yours in the U.S. In the quest to
save our "democracy" we are heading toward a corporate, military,
fascist dictatorship. Stupid me, I thought I had left this behind me in Europe
when I left in the 1950s. Here we go, starting all this again, under different
slogans, fighting terror and terrorists, while millions are starving and
freezing to death throughout the world. Still a dissident ISRAELI SOLDIERS say 'no' A large ad in today's HA'ARETZ
(Jan. 25), signed by 53 combat soldiers and officers in the Israeli army,
announces: "We hereby declare that we shall continue to serve the Israel
Defenses Forces in any mission that serves the defense of the State of Israel.
The mission of occupation and repression does not serve this goal and we refuse
to participate in it." This is an unprecedented call
by Israeli soldiers to other Israeli soldiers not to serve in the army of
occupation. It is an incredibly courageous act to announce that they will no
longer continue fighting in the territories "for the purposes of
domination, expulsion, starvation, and humiliation of an entire people." It
is in the rich moral tradition of Yesh Gvul and New Profile, two organizations
that have consistently advocated this position, but in unprecedented numbers.
May their numbers multiply! Gila Svirsky SICKENING HEALTH POLICY One of Tony Blair's closest
advisors runs a private healthcare company that is making millions from acute
National Health Service shortages. Lord Sawyer, the former Labour Party
general-secretary and public sector union chief, is now chairman of Reed Health
Group, whose own publicity material states that it aims to profit from the
structural deficiencies of the NHS, the continuing shortage of nurses and an
aging population. Karen Jennings, head of nursing at the public sector union
Unison, said the situation was nothing short of a scandal: "The more
desperate the hospital is, the more these firms charge." Dr. Evan Harris,
the Liberal Democrats health spokesman, said, "I have lost count of the
number of so-called progressive Labour politicians who leave their principles
behind them to make money from the private sector." Sick Nurse ARGENTINA'S CRISIS There is a big difference
between how Latin Americans and people in the U.S. view the crisis in Argentina.
A lot of people in the anti-globalization movement here in the States are acting
as if the Argentine crisis is a great thing since it exposes the fragility of
global capital. But that's not how folks are reading it back home. They view it
as a disaster and are worried whether they will ever see decent living
conditions again. Exiled Latin American When I look at the Argentine
collapse, I wonder whether what we're seeing is a harbinger of new revolts
against global capital, or a repeat of Russia's economic collapse—which didn't
lead to any revolutionary beginnings. P.M. Interesting that Castro sent a
message of support to then-President of Argentina, Adolfo Rodriguez Saa, at the
very moment workers and the unemplpoyed were marching against the state of siege
he had imposed. He had more understanding for the beleaguered rulers of
Argentina than for the masses. Observer THE POWER OF NEGATIVITY—IN
HEGEL, IN MARX, IN MARXIST-HUMANISM The excerpts from the
Introduction to THE POWER OF NEGATIVITY (December 2001 N&L) refer to Hegel's
assertion that the Absolute Idea is the unity of theory and practice. This is in
fact the central point of Hegel's failure: he did not unify theory and practice,
but rather theory and his abstract idea of practice. While it was no doubt his
intention to break out of his closed system, he in fact did not do so. Reader Dunayevskaya says we faced a
"new divide" in Marxism when Lenin returned to Marx's philosophic
roots in the Hegelian dialectic—but that we now face a new divide in which the
return to those roots cannot be kept in private notes but has to be developed
"openly, publicly, and collectively." Here it seems to me is a
fundamental difference between her way of proceeding and Lenin's. Learning the
lessons from the past is what gives an opportunity to avoid the same mistakes. Activist/scholar I'm impressed with your
steadfastness of carrying the banner of "the power of negativity in today's
freedom struggles" as you entitled your Perspectives thesis for 2001-2002.
While I guess I understand about 70-80% of the practical struggles, I'm afraid I
will go to my grave not fully understanding the philosophic meaning of absolute
negativity. Musician Printing part of the
Introduction to THE POWER OF NEGATIVITY in the December issue has helped me to
better understand the concepts of "dialectic" and
"negativity." I am now reading the book in hopes of better
understanding where we are as a human race and where we need to go to survive
these dangerous times when our unelected president tries to drag us down into an
abject totalitarianism. Sustaining subscriber It is not at all clear to me
from reading your last issue why all this fuss is being made about Hegel's
Absolutes. One can surely appreciate the importance of Hegelian concepts like
the "negation of the negation" without bothering with his concept of
"Absolute Knowledge," which is a residue of metaphysical speculation. Teacher THE POWER OF NEGATIVITY will be
a great help in the process of delving into the thinking of Marx and Hegel and
will be a great stimulus I am sure for revolutionary thinking today. I am
reading Marx's doctoral dissertation of 1839-41 at the same time. Worker/student AN URGENT APPEAL FROM IRAN Akbar and Manoochehr Mohammadi
are brothers who have been held in prison in Iran since the pro-democracy
demonstrations at Tehran University in July 1999, under the harshest of prison
conditions, including beatings and other tortures. They are in serious need of
medical attention but have consistently been denied removal to a medical
facility or even the one-day furlough some other prisoners had been given. In a
letter from the notorious Evin Prison they described what they were told when
they asked the reasons behind this discriminatory policy: "The authorities replied:
'You are arrogant and have rejected the opportunity to ask for amnesty. Rest
assured that as long as you do not ask for amnesty, we will not free you.' We
replied, 'An appeal for amnesty for a crime we have not committed would be a
confirmation of the charges against us. You should rest assured we will not make
such an appeal.'" They went on a hunger strike
shortly after that letter was sent out. The International Alliance of Iranian
Students report that their fate is unclear. They are demanding the unconditional
and immediate release of all imprisoned students and political activists. More information is available
from their web address: www.daneshjooyan.org. ANTI-WAR STRUGGLE: WHAT NOW? The theme of a piece in the
December N&L asking "Whatever happened to the anti-war movement?"
was about perishing movements and persisting left tendencies. That's what has
happened from the Gulf War to today's war where, in both cases, the live subject
gets lost, whether the Kurds fighting Sadaam or the RAWA women fighting both the
Taliban and U.S.'s Northern Alliance allies. That happens when the opposition to
war is not based on the human being's immanent drive for wholeness, seen in the
struggles of women, workers, Blacks and other national minorities. Movements
perish because theory has become an external script to be followed and is not
based on this drive to be whole. But the left tendencies themselves persist. The
war today is popular not because people don't recognize problems with
capitalism, especially in their everyday activity, but because they want an
answer beyond economism and the Left's opposition to U.S. imperialism. Bay Area Hegelian What does it mean when supposed
revolutionary forces in the U.S. don't refute bin Ladenism and terrorism? It
raises the question of what is our basis for being "anti-imperialist."
In Iran the so-called anti-imperialist forces such as Khomeini tried to
eliminate the entire Left. Bush learned from Khomeini who said you are either
for us or against us. Then Khomeini started killing Marxists, accusing them of
being under American influence. Haven't we lost enough comrades in Iran and
Afghanistan over the last 30 years to exclaim loud and clear that these are
reactionary forces. People like Jerry Falwell and Pat Robertson stand in
opposition to rulers in the U.S. Does that make them revolutionaries? Iranian revolutionary Two previous anti-war events I
attended here were silent processions, but the one in December was a political
march with slogans, banners, speakers. The politics were dismal and only
bearable because I had HOBGOBLIN, our British Marxist-Humanist journal, to work
with. None of the speakers seriously addressed the real danger posed by Al Qaeda,
or the oppression of women (and men) under the Taliban. Blair, Bush and the
bombing were condemned but there was no attempt at an objective analysis of the
impact of the war on Afghanistan. No one expressed support for the "Other
Afghanistan" or called for secular democracy, let alone social revolution.
The best speaker was a young Black American who argued that a real "war
against terror" would take on the KKK, the militias, and the CIA. R. Bunting There was a section in the May
2001 N&L on "Globalization and Dialectics" that speaks to the
question N&L has recently raised concerning "What happened to the
anti-war movement?" In an article called "We ignore ideas at our own
risk" the writer went through his own history in the movement and how he
kept hearing that we have to organize around the immediate issues. He said his
goal was a new society and the choice was between human power or capital power.
He saw philosophy as a question of life and death. That's the same question I
think needs to be posed to today's yet-another-anti-war movement. Women's liberationist MUMIA ABU-JAMAL The first year of the new
millennium ended with good news for me when I read on the Dec. 19 front page of
the Battle Creek Enquirer (the local version of the National Inquirer) that the
death sentence of Mumia Abu-Jamal had been thrown out! Retired postal worker Editor's Note: On Jan. 17 attorneys for Mumia Abu-Jamal filed an appeal of his murder conviction. Prosecutors have also appealed the ruling of Judge William Yohn who found errors in the sentencing phase of the original trial and ordered Abu-Jamal to be resentenced within 180 days or face life imprisonment. The appeals will likely take years to resolve, freezing Yohn's order and continuing the case which has been a touchstone in the international debate over the death penalty. LIFE AT GROUND ZERO The economic impact of
September 11 ripples out in tidal waves. As recovery workers continue to dig
through the devastation and the city puts up viewing platforms for the tourists,
more and more people are losing their jobs. Over 100,000 were lost in the last
three months. Concern for the victims is
giving way to criticism about the disparate treatment of the rich and poor who
suffered losses on September 11. Marriott World Trade Center Hotel employees who
were promised replacement jobs still do not have them. They held a demonstration
in Times Square on Jan. 16. On Jan. 17 over 500 relatives of the dead held a
protest rally against the federal compensation plan. THE NEW YORK TIMES ran a
story about anonymous undocumented workers pointing out that no one will ever
know all the people who died that day because some employers didn't even know
their workers' names. With the passage of four months
questions are also being asked about whether so many lives had to be lost. Was
the building construction faulty? Should police and firemen have been stopped
from rushing into buildings that were going to collapse? Meanwhile the debate
about whether it is safe to breathe the air in that part of the city continues,
while those of us who work or live there just keep on breathing it. Manhattanite The events of September 11
claimed the lives of 73 employees of Windows on the World, most of whom were
members of Hotel Employees and Restaurant Employees Union (HERE), Local 100.
Many who worked as cooks, servers, bussers, runners, stewards and housekeepers
were the sole breadwinners and the families left behind are largely headed by
immigrant women with young children. For the undocumented the hardship is even
greater as they are ineligible for most government assistance. Beside the lost
lives, over 240 Windows workers were displaced from their jobs and are
struggling to find work to support their families. The HERE New York Assistance
Fund was established to directly aid all these victims and is administered by
Judson Memorial Church. Donations will go directly to families and displaced
workers and the needs of undocumented workers will receive special attention.
Donations should be sent to: HERE A CALL FOR DISCUSSION In the December N&L, Peter
Hudis added his voice to the growing chorus on the Left calling for "a
projection of the kind of new human society we are for." Unfortunately,
while there have been many exhortations, there has been none of the detailed
sorting out of issues and discussion which is required. What is needed is for
left journals to devote a few pages regularly working through the obvious
questions and calling for participants to extend the discussion. Two basic
groups of issues are: 1) How would a world devoted to producing use values
rather than for exchange value plan production and exchange in a democratic,
ecologically and environmentally sound manner? 2) What decisions must be taken
at what level (production unit, locality, wider region, and so on) if the system
is to be genuinely democratic? R.F.P. HAITI TURNS 198 Happy birthday, Haiti! Bonne
Fete, Cheri! The 198 years from Jan. 1, 1804 to Jan. 1, 2002 is not a long time
for a nation's life. But when you have a sibling like Uncle Sam, the fact that
you have lived two years is amazing to me. Yes, Haiti, you helped the 13
colonies in the U.S. revolutionary war against Great Britain, the United Kingdom
"where the sun never set." And after the 1779 battle of Savannah the
sun started to set for them all over the place. What was your reward, Haiti,
for helping the U.S.? Nearly 60 years of non-recognition as an independent
nation and an embargo for the same length of time. So when I wish you happy
198th birthday this year, I would like to wish you more years, but with a
brother like Uncle Sam, who can say how many more years you will be allowed to
have? Nouveau Toussaint SAVING ROE V. WADE This January marked the 29th
anniversary of Roe v. Wade, the U.S. Supreme Court decision that legalized
abortion nationwide. If we don't act quickly to save it, it could be the last
year we will be able to celebrate the landmark decision, since legal abortion
hangs by a razor-thin 5-to-4 margin in the Supreme Court and at least one
Justice is likely to retire in 2002. It means that President Bush could—and
who doubts that he would?—appoint enough anti-abortion Justices to overturn
our rights to have a choice and the days of back alley abortions would be back!
You can find out what you can do to help save our rights by checking into
www.Million4Roe.com. One of the millions Chicago WHO READS N&L? Thanks for the years of
enjoyment and understanding of what's going on in this country. We have to push
to make this paper more widespread. I wish you would print at the bottom of each
page "Please do not throw this paper away. Share it with someone." We
have to keep Marxism and freedom alive. Prisoner The news you bring out of the
problems among human beings around the globe has made such an impact on me that
I have started looking into the traditions of all cultures and writing on
"civil society." Please thank the donors who make N&L available to
me. Philosophy teacher |
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