Challenge, Oct. 1, 1997

Editorial: Big U. S. Bosses ‘Fast Track’: Road To War and Fascism

Nurse Who Exposed NYPD Torturer Attacked by pro-Cop Nurses

Bosses’ Weakness Causes Police Terror

Nothing’s All Right About Fascist Albright

NYPD Beat Up Worker In Upper Manhattan: Cops Can’t Stop What’s Natural With The Job

Mark Fuhrman Award: Memphis Cop Meant to Kill Black Youth

Italian Bosses Fight Each Other: Workers Should Not Support Rulers’ Flag

Community Fights to Oust Fascist Principal in Newark

LETTERS

Capitalist ‘Logic’: Kill worker, then pay out

Rulers’ factions fight for minds of students

Jesse Jr. warns of civil warDiscussion about church leads to class understanding of the world

Burn the Bosses!

Fundamentalism, Imperialism, Oil Behind Massacres in Algeria

Thousands of Women used as Guinea Pigs in AIDS Testing

Crossing the Bosses’ Killer Borders to Attend PLP Cadre School

The current dispute among U. S. bosses over so-called "fast track" trade has become the eye of a growing storm. The Rockefeller-controlled wing of the ruling class wants desperately to stop the weakening of its hold on the world’s markets. As Challenge (10/24) pointed out, sharpening international competition has seriously eroded the U. S. world market share in such vital industries as computers, autos, steel, aircraft, and agriculture. Particularly galling to Rockefeller & Co. are the losses they have taken in Latin America, which until recently had been a private U. S. poaching ground.

Basically, the "fast track" legislation Clinton is pushing would enable the president to bypass Congress in enacting trade deals. Stripped of its legal gobbledygook, the plan would give the biggest U. S. capitalists a free hand to expand their foreign exports and investments, while at the same time swatting down the smaller U. S. capitalists who don’t have the economic clout to export. So in order to compete internationally, Rockefeller is forced to sharpen the battle already raging within the U. S. ruling class. In other words, the strategic strength of U. S. imperialism is eroding every day, both internally and internationally. Clinton’s 1993 NAFTA free trade deal, which was supposed to ensure U. S. commercial dominance from the North Pole to Tierra del Fuego in Southern Chile, is proving a hollow joke.

The U. S. market may still be the world’s biggest, but real wages are declining, and workers here can only absorb so many of the world’s commodities. Imperialism constantly needs new markets to maximize its profits. All imperialists operate with this understanding. This means that export is the name of the game. The bigger the business, the more it has to export. The largest 50 U. S. exporters, which include General Motors and Boeing, account for about 30 % of all U. S. exports. But as the West Coast bosses’ mouthpiece Investor’s Business Daily points out: "…exporting is now considered a weak spot for the U. S. economy. America’s foreign trade deficit surged in 1996 to $114. 2 billion; its worst performance since 1988. The widening gap stemmed, in part, from a slowing of export growth" (2/26/97, emphasis ours—Ed).

The U. S. decline in Latin America is a nightmare for Rockefeller’s group, because it reflects gains by their European and Japanese rivals. The rulers of Argentina and Brazil have formed a regional trading bloc, called Mercosur. It includes Paraguay and Uruguay. These bosses don’t necessarily believe in dancing to the Rockefeller-wing’s tune. They want the best deal they can get. They’re getting it more and more from Europe. In 1996, total trade between Mercosur and the European Union was greater than trade between Mercosur and the U. S. According to a European trade official: "It can all be summed up quite simply. We are stomping over "the U. S. ’s backyard just as they have done over ours for the past 50 years" (Wall Street Journal, 9/18/97).

Imperialists Fight for Latin America Market

In the relative sense, U. S. business still dominates many Latin American industries, and U. S. trade with Mercosur is also growing fast. However, European trade is growing faster—62% to the U. S. 51% between 1993 and 1996.

The Japanese aren’t far behind. They have production investment in every major Latin American country. Their exports are increasing dramatically as well. For example, the July 1997 export of Japanese cars, trucks, and busses to Latin America was 61% greater in July 1997 than July 1996. It’s interesting to note that the overall U. S. trade deficit with Mexico and Ca nada has grown to $39 billion—75% of it in cars—since 1993.

Even European and Mercosur bosses want to formalize the profiteering. They’re planning their own free trade agreement by 1999. Others are getting into the act. Nelson Mandela’s South Africa wants a crack at squeezing profits out of South African and Latin American workers at the same time. The Wall Street Journal (9/12) points to mining, automobile components, and telecommunications as "the most obvious sectors for increased trade and investment between South Africa and Mercosur. "

The non-U. S. controlled trade orgy is spreading within Latin America itself. Mexico and Nicaragua signed a bilateral deal on September 18^th, and Mexico also has agreements with Chile and Bolivia. The European Union and Mexico announced plans for a possible free trade among them by the year 1999 (NYC’s El Diario-La Prensa, NYC, 9/22).

Not All U. S. Bosses Love ‘Fast Track’

The Rockefeller bunch is desperate to counter these measures. They need streamlined rules and a centralized command post. That’s the point of "fast track. " There’s a wrinkle, however. Not all U. S. bosses have the clout to export. They produce essentially for the domestic market. Exports threaten their survival, and they will fight to stop "fast track. " Take agriculture. The big California farm-owners favor "fast track. " No wonder: California is the top exporter of agricultural products ($5. 5 billion in 1993; $7. 3 billion in 1996). It’s a different story in Florida, where the Fruit and Vegetable Association opposes it. The reason: "fast track" would leave Florida fruit and vegetable bosses open to competition from low priced imports. The big pork producers say that if they don’t get "fast track," "U. S. agriculture will lose billions of dollars" (PR Newswire, 9/17). Bob Dole co-authored a recent New York Times op-ed piece calling "fast track" essential. Well, Dole has always backed the Eastern Establishment’s wishes when push came to shove. He voted for NAFTA and for Clinton’s $40 billion bailout of the Mexican peso. More to the point, although Dole has ties to the New Money Oil Patch gang that opposes "fast track," he is essentially controlled by the giant agribusiness.

All big U. S. manufacturers favor "fast track," except textile. U. S. textile bosses export some to Latin America, but they produce primarily for the U. S. market and face low cost Asian competition. Chinese rulers can undercut North Carolina’s textile prices to a degree that Japanese auto and steel bosses can only dream about.

The union lackeys also oppose "fast track. " They have no choice. Even though they are strategically in the rulers’ pockets, "fast track" would mean more layoffs and therefore the loss of dues money. Backed by Democratic politicians like Missouri’s Gephardt, these hacks are mobilizing resistance to Clinton in the name of the working class. So is the open fascist Pat Buchanan, who really represents the interests of North Carolina textile billionaire Milliken.

Workers must avoid falling for the lies of any side in this bosses’ dogfight. The so-called "isolationists" push the U. S. market über alles in order to get us to work harder and for less. The main Rockefeller wing wants us to salute the flag for their foreign interests—even if it means a pink slip. But don’t worry: Rockefeller has plans for the workers whom "fast track" will lay off, particularly young workers who may never get a job. The fight for an international market share requires a huge military machine with a massive infantry. The sharpening trade wars with European, Japanese, Chinese and even Latin American bosses will ultimately be resolved at gunpoint.

"Fast track" is also a major step in the development of U. S. fascism. Among the reasons the bosses need fascism is to impose self-discipline within their own class. Gone are the days when the Rockefeller & Co. could throw a few crumbs to their domestic rivals. U. S. imperialism’s situation is growing too desperate to allow the rulers to tolerate significant dissension within their ranks. The battle over "fast track" will heat up and could become violent before too long.

The process of U. S. imperialist decline and internal fighting exposes the bosses’ fundamental strategic weakness. Despite all the advantages they hold over us, they are truly "giants with clay feet. " Eventually, they can and will be taken!

The patient basebuilding and organizing for communist revolution carried out by our Party has already borne some fruit. It will bear more as we improve our efforts. The day will come when capitalism’s only "fast track" will be its road to the grave.

New York—The Abner Louima case, the torture of a black worker by the NYPD terrorists in blue, exposed clearly to millions the fascist role of cops. The U. S. bosses need fascism, not only to discipline its own ranks (See Editorial, p. 2), but also to make workers pay for the crisis of capitalism and their plans for war. Fascism against the working class comes in the form of terror—building fear and passivity—and economic attacks. Capitalism exists by robbing workers of the surplus wealth created by workers but taken by the bosses. In a period of fascism the bosses need even more of our wealth as they attempt to escape their crisis. They grab it back from workers when they make wage cuts, layoffs, and slave labor schemes like workfare and welfare reform, as well as cuts in the social service from mass transit to public parks. . For the last 20 years, we have seen many aspects of this growing fascist redistribution of wealth. Anger of Masses GrowThese vicious attacks have also created more anger among workers and youth, particularly black and Latin workers. . Therefore, the bosses absolutely need a consistent level of terror to repress this anger. In the U. S. the most consistent arm of terror is the police. The consequences of the Abner Louima scandal are illustrative. The torture and racist contempt of the 70th precinct cops towards workers is not new. This case got publicity because the victim, despite the cops efforts, lived. Then, when he arrived at the hospital a nurse called the NYPD Internal Affairs to report the abuse. She followed up by telling the family. The family then went to a local cable TV station. While each of these efforts were suppressed at the time, it must have become clear that the case would have to be revealed. So the daily newspapers finally broke the story.

Now it appears that the courageous nurse, Magalie Laurent, who spoke the truth has been assaulted at work, Coney Island Hospital in Brooklyn, by other nurses who are married to, or dating, cops from the 70th precinct. " ‘I was set up,’ Mrs. Laurent said, adding that she suspected the scuffle was an attempt to get her dismissed from the hospital. "(NY Times, 9/24). Terror persists. On the other hand, terror creates contradictory responses. While it does make workers fearful, and we cannot underestimate that, it also makes them angry. Mrs. Laurent’s willingness to fight back grew as a result of the NYPD terror. Similarly, the two major demonstrations, and many smaller ones, that brought masses of workers into the streets against the police since the revelations reflect the potential of growing working class anger. It is because of this, that the liberal bosses try to build illusions about the cops. While admitting some cops are bad (like in the movie Copland), they tried to portray this as an aberration. "Most cops are good" they tell us.

PLP members must seize the anger of the masses as an opportunity to convince workers that fascism is capitalism, and that only organizing workers to fight for communism will defeat it. When our young comrades take to the streets in LA (See accompanying article) they provide such leadership. When communists members in MUNI transit in the Bay area win their co-workers to stop scab buses (See Challenge 9/24), they provide such leadership. When PLP hospital workers unite with patients to fight racist medical cutbacks and to defend courageous anti-racist fighters like nurse Laurent, they provide such leadership. This leadership in practice, both through our own rallies and in our participation in many mass organizations, must be followed up with political struggle. Communists must win the millions who hate cops and fascist terror to understand that all cops serve to protect the bosses and their state. We must win masses to fight for workers’ power. We must transform the confidence we gain in our struggles against fascism into confidence that workers can run our communist society. This advances our Party, at the head of the working class, on the road to revolution.

LOS ANGELES, Sept. 20—"Police brutality against Abner Louima in New York City is not an isolated incident! To get rid of racist police terror, we have to get rid of capitalism!" These were the chants of students and teachers in South Central LA at a rally against police terror. With the cops finding whatever excuse they can to terrorize and kill workers and youth in Los Angeles, workers’ response to our rally was overwhelming. In little more than an hour, 15 of us distributed 140 Challenges and hundreds of leaflets. When the cops saw the response to our flyer, they began to harass us. Sometimes they let us alone and sometimes they harass us for selling Challenge from the center divider of this busy street. This time, the cops decided that it was illegal to be in the center divider or to step off the curb to distribute our literature. The police harassment just made us angrier and more people supported us. People gave us their names and donations. One person gave us $20. Capitalist racist inequality and crisis requires police terror—but that is also its weakness. People are enraged at the terror of the police. It is our job to transform and organize that rage into a potent force for revolution

BRONX, NYC, Sept. 16 —On Oct. 1st Madeleine Albright, Clinton’s Secretary of State, will be coming to Bronx High School of Science. How will she be received? Albright was invited by a student organization, Famous Speakers Forum, which is led to believe that anyone should be allowed the opportunity to speak. Members and friends of Progressive Labor Party have been distributing leaflets calling Albright, and the Rockefeller-backed President she works for, fascists. PLP is rallying students to openly oppose Albright and refuse to let her step foot into Bronx Science. Madeleine Albright has been a loyal mouthpiece for the fascist anti-working class policies of the U. S. government for many years. Some of which were:

• in 1991, she supported the Gulf War, which slaughtered over 500, 000 Iraqi workers, and sickened thousands of U. S. troops;
• as an envoy to the UN, she demanded that the U. S. prolong its invasion of Somalia even after GI’s, and Somalian workers, had been killed there; • when the U. S. bosses were debating whether or not to send troops to Bosnia, she demanded, "what good is the world’s best military, if we can’t use it?"

• and in 1993 when the U. S. rained Tomahawk missiles on Baghdad, she defended the attack as a retaliation for the "so-called" attempted assassination of then President George Bush.

Members and friends of Progressive Labor Party have been in the lead in attacking fascism in all its forms. Earlier this semester we distributed a leaflet denouncing the torture of Abner Louima as an example of fascist terror in the U. S. As soon as we heard of the Albright event we were alert to the need to expose this aspect of growing fascism. That led us to distribute 600 leaflets and more than 150 Challenges against her. As a result, students have been discussing whether Albright is a fascist and whether we should allow her to speak.

The Student Organization for Social Justice (SOSJ), an organization at the school, in which PLP is active, has become joined in this debate. SOSJ set up a meeting to plan what they were going to do. When the principal of the school caught wind of this he warned the group that there should be "no trouble. " So much for the illusion of free speech and the open debate of ideas ; as soon as that leads to opposition, the bosses crush it. Students are organizing to demonstrate because they will be the canon fodder in a U. S. war for oil and profits. . It is our obligation to raise these issues now in order to mobilize our class to oppose all imperialist wars.

New York - A few weeks after the NYPD beat and tortured Abner Louima, and thousands of workers, including members of PLP, demonstrated against police brutality. (See photo above), New York cops beat up a Dominican worker. Norman Batista, a restaurant worker from the Dominican Republic, who lives in Upper Manhattan, was brutalized by the cops of the 33rd precinct on Thursday, Sept. 18th. . Batista was at his friend’s apartment when the cops broke in. The cops immediately began to beat Batista, breaking seven of his ribs, injuring his left ear, and cutting and bruising his face. He is in critical condition at the hospital.

On July 24th, 17-year-old Rodie Gossett and a friend were driving in Millington, a city 20 miles North of Memphis. Cop Peter Nickelson started to follow Gossett for what Nickelson claimed to be a routine traffic violation.

Last December Gossett was charged with unauthorized use of a vehicle. He was in the custody of his mother just before the shooting. Nickelson called for back up when Gossett tried to run. The cops cornered Gossett and his blue Oldsmobile in a gas station, however Gossett was able to escape. Gossett and his friend were soon trapped at another station in Memphis, and minutes later Rodie Gossett was shot in the head and died on the spot. Several witnesses to the shooting said that Gossett and his friend Miller had their hands up in the air when Gossett was shot.

The lie that Nickelson and the Sheriff’s department stands by is that there was a scuffle and in the scuffle Nickelson accidentally hit Gossett on the shoulder and his gun went off. The Tennessee Bureau of Investigation tests showed that the shot that killed Gossett was fired from 7-10 inches away and that his . 40-caliber Glock semiautomatic does not discharge unless the user has his finger on the trigger. The autopsy report also shows that Gossett had several contusions on his face.

The family of Rodie Gossett are happy that Cop Nickelson has recently been indicted for second-degree murder. This charge is used for "unjustified intentional killing" that does not involve premeditation. PLP strongly disagrees. The role of the cops is intentional and premeditated terror against the working class. Cop Nickelson this one’s for you! Racism and brutality come with the badge, but some cops are so vicious they deserve the Mark Fuhrman award. If you have a candidate for the award, send it to Challenge.

ITALY, Sept. 20 — Over one million people, mostly workers, marched today in Venice and Milan "for the unity of Italy. "

The demonstrations were organized by the three main union federations (CGT, CISL and UIL) to defend the "national flag. " They were in reaction to a statement by the head of the separatist Northern League, Umberto Bossi, that the national flag belongs in the garbage. Bossi’s group is a racist, separatist organization which wants to separate Northern Italy from the rest of the country, claiming that the South is draining resources from the North. Bossi wants independence for Padania, a creation of the Northern League which will include a large part of Northern Italy. He is calling for elections on October 26th to form a Padanian parliament.

The worldwide crisis of capitalism is sharpening the dogfight among bosses, not only of different countries, but within the same country. Bosses are using nationalism and separatism to try to win workers to support their schemes to fight their enemies and win the biggest share of the capitalist pie. The million workers, youth and retirees who marched in Milan and Venice, the center of the so-called Padania Republic, are making a big mistake supporting the Italian bosses who are fighting the Northern League. (RAI, the government-owned TV network, broadcast the marches live. )

Nationalism and support of one set of bosses against another are deadly for workers. The same bosses who are imposing massive cutbacks on social services against workers are now convincing these same workers to support them. These workers need an internationalist, revolutionary communist party to take advantage of the rulers’ dogfight to unite with workers worldwide to fight for the smashing of all bosses. Also, workers must break with the old fake leftists of the Party of Democratic Socialism and the Refounded "Communist" Party, which controls many of the unions marching against the Northern League. The only flag workers should support is the red flag of communism!

NEWARK, NJ, Sept. 19 — Last night witnessed an impressive show of working class solidarity. Almost 200 people, including teachers, school staff, parents, students and community residents attended a community meeting that ended up calling for the ouster of Mt. Vernon School principal, Frank Perez.

An important role was played by the Ivy Hill Neighbors Association, which has been active in this community for many years. Progressive Labor Party members are active in the schools and in the community. We participate in these struggles to share our communist ideas and our communist concept of organizing with the working class.

A key communist idea is the notion of classes in society. Bosses like Perez are front-line administrators for the capitalist class, which uses the schools to perpetuate their rule. Communists are fighters for the concept of organizing all workers as one class to fight for our interests. This includes actions like the mass turnout to oppose the activities of principal Perez. According to speakers in the meeting, Perez had created, "a fascist climate of fear, intimidation, racial division and chaos that is hostile to the needs of our children and this community. " These complaints stem from Perez doing the dirty work of his bosses downtown.

Despite parent, teacher and community protests about overcrowded classrooms, top school administrators took no steps to begin addressing the problem over the Summer. Following the bosses’ approach, Perez proceeded to reduce class size, not by expanding the school space, but by abolishing the industrial arts and home economics classes, establishing three "team-teaching" classrooms crammed with almost 50 students each, evicting a Special Ed class, dropping a kindergarten class and switching teacher’s classrooms and grade levels during the first week of class.

Many workers are aware that the conditions at Mt. Vernon School derive from the deliberate policy of the state to maintain a racist system of inferior education for the working class children of Newark. The ruling class, not Perez, is responsible for that policy. This reflects their racist contempt for the workers of this community.

Capitalists make their profits by paying labor less than it is worth. They benefit from mass unemployment to ensure their profits through competition among workers for jobs. Boss Perez creates an atmosphere of dog-eat-dog competition within the school, that reflects the ideology of the system as a whole. Workers are not so easily fooled, however.

Communists spread working class consciousness by showing the connections between racist divisions under capitalism in general and situations like that at Mt. Vernon School. We are spreading the notion of workers’ power. If workers fall into fighting among ourselves, Perez and the Newark school bosses will get away with their vicious cutbacks and attacks on schools just as they get away with all exploitation under capitalism.

When workers begin to embrace the ideas of PLP and make them their own, and when they begin to spread them all over town through massive hand-to-hand distribution of Challenge, then the working class will be firmly on the road to revolution. That’s the main idea of our Party’s work in the mass organizations on the job, in the schools, and where we live. (More on this struggle in next week’s paper. )

Dear Challenge:

A friend of mine lost his wife because of the penny-pinching policies of the Chicago Transit Authority (CTA). While working on the tracks, she was hit by a train. He was staying strong about the whole thing, but was definitely angry at the CTA for killing his wife. She had been assigned (for the first time) as the lone flagger on a dangerous curve for a paint crew. Regulations call for three people on that curve: one at each end and one in the middle to coordinate activities.

My friend is suing the CTA to the hilt. He says if they’re forced to pay out a lot of money, it will set a precedent. Logically, instead of budgeting money to pay for lawsuits, the CTA should budget that money to do the right thing in the first place. I asked my friend, "Could the CTA, which is in serious financial crisis, afford to operate any other way?" He thought probably not. In the 1960’s workers forced the CTA to assign a crew to inspect work set-ups; trains were stopped in both directions if a set-up was unsafe. Now, with capitalism in a deeper crisis, if foremen stopped trains for every safety violation (in an agency that is losing riders every year), that foreman wouldn’t be around for long. Similarly, in the Post Office where my friend and I work, supervisors are always giving us impossible assignments in an effort to push the most mail possible, "for budgetary reasons. " These supervisors are assholes, but if they didn’t do exactly that, they’d be out of there.

The result is the same, causing breakdowns, stress, heart attacks, people going postal, etc. The law affecting such lawsuits now has a cap on payments, leveling at the victim’s base pay excluding bonuses and overtime. These companies must operate as cold-hearted, moneymaking machines, and the bosses’ laws will find a way to help them survive. So yeah, the stuff they do is illogical, but this is what Marx called "the anarchy of capitalism. " It’s the only way they can operate in this period of capitalist crisis. Is war logical? Not for workers, but it’s what capitalism needs to survive.

That’s why the CTA would rather kill a worker and possibly pay later in a lawsuit rather than preventing that death in the first place. A lawsuit is one tactic to fight the CTA, but what workers need is a strategy for revolution to overthrow the capitalist system. I asked my friend to keep me informed; he said he would, along with many other CTA workers at the Howard station and also other postal workers who had asked the same of him.

Chicago postal worke

Dear Challenge:

The article "Teaching Communist Science" (9/24) was a useful description of one teacher’s preliminary attempts to popularize the science of communism. All PL teachers should be trying to make communist ideas into mass ideas among students. We need to see these issues in a broader political context, however.

More than "individualism" shapes students’ attitudes toward standardized tests, for example. New testing programs in New York, Chicago and elsewhere reflect the nationwide struggle between competing factions of the U. S. ruling class. They are fighting for the hearts and minds of working-class youth. This underlies the controversy over Clinton’s planned "national standards," accepted by the Senate, rejected by the House.

The Clinton forces build on a decade of research financed by Old Money outfits like the Carnegie Foundation. They plan to use standardized tests to standardize the curriculum by making teachers "teach to the tests. " This means tighter ideological control over the youth. They also hope to build political loyalty, especially among black and latin workers. Their lie is that "standards" will guarantee equal education for all children.

The American Federation of Teachers actively promotes this fascist program. Clinton’s New Money opponents complain that the feds are trying to take control away from city and state school boards. They’re right about that. Fascism means the rulers tightening their net around capitalist smaller-fry and rivals, as well as around the working class.

Meanwhile, the Libertarian Party and other New Money fronts run "stealth" candidates for local school boards. When they get control of a district, they impose their own version of fascist "standards. " This fight among fascists is already changing the daily experiences of teachers and students. It will increasingly limit our ability to teach communism in the science or social studies classroom. Our Party’s line on this situation comes from our application of dialectical materialism to the present crisis of capitalism. I’m sure the comrade science teacher will find a way to bring this to his students.

Chicago Teacher

Dear Challenge:

Yesterday I heard a speech by Chicago Congressman Jesse Jackson, Jr. His main point was that the North vs. the South has replaced Democrats vs. Republicans as the main division in government.

He compared what’s happening today to what went on during the Civil War. He said that eight of the ten points of the Gingrich "Contract" were also part of the Confederate Constitution. He reeled off a list of government officials, from Clinton to Helms, who are from states that seceded from the Union. He attacked the withdrawal of government services from Northern, urban areas.

Challenge, as regular readers know, is way ahead of him. We’ve been arguing for many months that the ruling class is splitting along the lines of Old Money (Eastern Establishment) vs. New Money (Southern domestic oil producers and others. ) We’ve also predicted that the intensity of this split could reach the level of another Civil War. Jackson’s solution was predictably pro-capitalist. He said we should follow the example of Abraham Lincoln, who told Union troops that the war was mainly about "saving the union" not ending slavery.

Jackson said that instead of opposing Proposition 209, (California’s anti-affirmative action law), based on anti-racism, we should oppose it based on opposition to "states rights. " "If California can pass Proposition 209, what’s to stop North Carolina from passing a law reversing the penalties against the Tobacco Industry?" he implored.

Well, this was quite a contrast to what PLP says. The Party says the rulers are fighting among themselves and we should take advantage of this by uniting our class to overthrow them and set up a system run by and for the working class, communism. Jackson says the rulers are fighting among themselves and we should side with the dominant group on the basis of "saving the union. "

The ruling class appeals to workers to be on their side in many ways. What they never say is the truth, "Side with me so I can make a lot of money. " They say "Side with me because I’m for multi-culturalism" or "Side with me because I’m against abortion. " Now here’s a new one, "Be on my side so the country won’t be divided by Civil War. " We need a Civil War all right: A revolutionary war that pits the working class, led by PLP, against the capitalists old and new.

No Fan of Jesse (Jr. or Sr. )

Dear Challenge:

Some mass organizations, like the Church, appear divorced from the class struggle. The clergy says their concern is primarily with things spiritual, not mundane. If they are involved in social issues at all, they claim they are doing "good works. "This brings me to a discussion I’ve had with a friend at work. His church was just rocked by a scandal at the highest levels involving—you guessed it—sex and money.

I raised with him that it seemed Old and New Money forces were waging a struggle for the soul of nearly every major religious organization in the States. From the National Council of Churches to the Christian Coalition, from the National Baptists to the Southern Baptists, from the mainstream Protestant denominations to the Promise Keepers to splits in the Catholic Church, Old and New Money were duking it out. "

Most theological arguments are now really about power," said a lay preacher I know. I asked my work-mate if he thought this scandal had anything to do with the fight between the bosses. One thing led to another. We ended up talking about Ron Brown, Clinton’s deceased ex-Secretary of Commerce. "He was cleared months ago of any financial impropriety, so we shouldn’t even be talking about him," he said. "It’s not the illegal things and the scandals I’m most concerned with, it’s the legal things that I worry about. " I answered.

"Now you’ve peaked my interest," said my friend. "I’m going to look deeper into this scandal in my church. "My friend now sees his church in a more material way—not as divorced from the class struggle, but as part of it.

We need to win more workers like him to a political understanding of the Church in an era of rising fascism and war. This political understanding opens up the possibility of mass work among these church members, some of whom work where I do. In short, either you become an agent for Old Money, an agent for New Money or you build the Progressive Labor Party for communist revolution.

Comradely,Industrial worker

Dear Challenge:

On Sept. 20th I received a letter from my family from Guatemala, in which my family relates the story of two young men who were burned alive in the plaza of the town for "stealing. " They tell me that a lot of workers participated in the lynching.

I became very angry upon reading these lines, particularly since I knew the two young men. I began to wonder how it is possible that these damn bosses fool so many people? We have to burn them! The bosses are to blame for the misery of workers’ lives. They are the ones who steal everything that we produce. What could these two youngsters have "stolen" in this poor village? Chickens, wood, a little corn? In places like this, there are no jobs; misery and hunger are two more members of the family that never leave home.

The bosses are responsible for these events, they don’t want the workers to rebel and they take advantage of every little thing to distract our discontent, and instead of blaming capitalism for this situation, we blame other workers. This is fascism! We shouldn’t fall into the trap of blaming other workers! On the contrary we should unite and struggle against the real thieves and killers— the bosses!

Here in Los Angeles, the bosses divide us and blame immigrants for "stealing" jobs. That’s why our struggle to organize immigrant workers as well as citizen workers is vital in the building of the fight for communism, which will end the lynchings and the bosses’ deportations.

Friend of PLP

Dear Challenge:

The massacres in Algeria of working class men, women and children are getting more and more horrendous. Dozens are savagely murdered, by cutting their throats, each week. The government blames "terrorists," but the murders are being carried out by cops and death squads representing different factions of the ruling class of Algeria.

The members of the ruling class faction which oppose talks with the Islamic Fundamentalists who are against the government seem to be behind the massacres. They want to wipe out the Fundamentalists, instead of dealing with them. When Abassi Madami, head of the FIS (Islamic Salvation Front), was freed from jail a few months ago by the faction in favor of the talks; he was placed under house arrest by the anti-talks’ faction.

Behind all of this is the billions that Algeria produces in oil and gas. The oil and gas industry has not been affected at all by this civil war. Each capitalist faction wants to control this wealth. Also, France and the U. S. are fighting for political control of this important northern Africa country. France has been very supportive of the government. The U. S. has supported some of the Islamic Fundamentalists.

All of this has caused over 60,000 deaths since the civil war began in 1992 when a military coup overthrew the civilian government. What is happening in Algeria is a microcosm of what is happening all over the world in this age of intense international rivalry and competition among the capitalists and imperialists. The only solution for workers and their allies is to organize for communism to put an end to this murderous hell.

Al Tahjad

When it comes to medical fascism, it is hard to beat the U. S.

Half a century too late, Clinton "apologized" to the survivors of the Tuskegee study. This experiment, sponsored by the U. S. Public Health Service, lasted from 1932 to 1972 and involved 412 poor black men with syphilis. They were never informed they were not being treated, to be compared with 204 men free of the disease, to determine the natural course of syphilis. The research continued way after penicillin became widely available and highly effective against this disease.

The experiment was ended only when front-page articles in newspapers like the NY Times forced the then Nixon administration to halt it. Obviously, the publicity of this case was part of the attack that Old Money and their mouthpieces waged to dump Nixon who represented New Money bosses (he was forced to resign a few months after the "exposure" of the Tuskegee experiments).

Last week, the New England Journal of Medicine revealed a similar experiment involving thousands of pregnant women with the AIDS virus in Thailand, Africa and the Dominican Republic. The experiment, sponsored by the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) and the National Institutes of Health (NIH), involved deceiving these women who believed they were getting the regular AZT treatment for AIDS, when they either just got placebos or a small dose of AZT.

The liberal critics of these experiments say that they aren’t "ethical," that they violate many international research treaties, such as the Declaration of Helsinki which requires control groups to receive the "best current treatment," not the local one. The CDC and NIH justified their experiments saying that local medical conditions in the poorer countries of the world are very different from those of the imperialist countries. They are also saying that many of the women in the experiments could not afford the $1,000 AZT treatment cost.

But ethics is a class question. Capitalism doesn’t have any when it comes to racism and fascist exploitation of workers. The search for an effective anti-AIDS drug is based on how much profit the big pharmaceutical companies can make. The CDC and NIH represent the interests of these companies, not those of working people.

They are just like Dr. Mengele, the Angel of Death, who used concentration camp victims to conduct the vilest and cruelest experiments; or the fascist Japanese army medical unit who did similar experiments on hundreds of thousands of Chinese during WWII. These experiments were done to find cures for the diseases the Nazi and Imperial army soldiers could catch.

We live in a period of war and fascism. The capitalists who rule the U. S. and the entire world are outdoing the Nazis as they prepare to fight it out for the control of the world’s markets and cheap labor. Their medical experiments will get crueler and crueler not only to help drug companies make huge profits, but also to help their armies wage war. To demand apologies from these Angels of Death is useless. We must avenge the millions capitalism has killed and continues to kill with their medical "experiments in the name of science," by organizing for communist revolution as the way to cure this fatal capitalist disease.

Dear Challenge:

I had always wanted to attend a PLP Cadre School in the U. S. , to get together and discuss how to make an international communist revolution with comrades from many countries. I was invited to attend the Cadre School held in September in NYC. I tried to get a visa with the help of some comrades in Chicago, but I couldn’t. So I had to travel as a "wetback. "I had illusions of it being an adventurous trip.

The first day I arrived in Tecun Unam, Guatemala, with the coyote (smuggler) who was bringing me to the North. I was placed in a cockroach-infested hotel along with 35 Salvadoran workers who were also making the trip in search of jobs. The next day we traveled by boat to the city of Hidalgo, Mexico, and later in a small bus to Tapachula. At dawn we were awakened and put on a bus, but to our surprise they took out the seats and the floor and we were told to go into a space 13 inches high. Some of the 26 men and women making the trip did not want to do it, but there wasn’t any choice. We traveled for eight long hours without being able to move. One woman urinated twice and a man vomited along the way. Some felt like they were dying because of the lack of air. Five days later we were taken on a 14-hour bus trip from Oaxaca to Mexico City (some of us had tickets and seats, others were hidden under the bus).

Four days after arriving in Mexico City we took a plane used by the smuggling ring to the city of Guaymas in Hermosillo, and from there we went by bus to Agua Prieta. The following day we were taken to the desert, where a "guide" waited for us. He told us to run to reach the border. After an hour of jogging, three masked men armed with pistols and rifles encountered us. They took everything of value: money, rings, watches. Men and women were forced to undress to make sure we were not hiding any valuables. We all felt violated and mad seeing the thieves and the smuggler laughing. One thief gave the smuggler a tip. The thieves then had the nerve to wish us a nice trip and to tell us to keep an eye out for the INS cops.

Two hours later, we were extremely tired as we passed through all kinds of inhospitable terrain, without shirts or blouses, so not to be detected by the INS. After four hours, two women fainted and we had to carry them. Two hours later, a woman and I got cramps. Others had to drag us until we finally crossed the border. At that same border crossing, three days earlier, ten undocumented workers died running away from the INS Border Patrol. They fell in a mud hole and drowned. I damned capitalism and U. S. imperialism right there for the thousands who have died because of their racist policies.

Finally, 19 days after I began my trip, I arrived at my destination with my comrades. The trip showed me clearly the need to make a revolution to smash all borders and wage slavery, and to build a society where what we produce is shared according to our need.

My stay in the U.S. showed me that the "American Dream" is a nightmare for millions of unemployed, homeless, victims of racist terror, etc. The fight for communism and the dictatorship of the proletariat is a need for workers across all borders. The viciousness of capitalism has emboldened my revolutionary zeal. The cadre school gave me more ideological strength to build PLP as the weapon to destroy capitalism .

Comrade From El Salvador