With this issue, Challenge returns to its weekly schedule
In fact, the open Klan-lover and Clinton-hater, Georgia Representative Bob Barr, recently called it "...the Civil War all over again," and New York Times columnist Frank Rich added: "Surely his ideological opposites would agree." Some of the battle is over economic interests. Challenge has often described the strategic dogfights among oil billionaires, as well as among competing financial and manufacturing groups. Some of it is raging within the Eastern Establishment itself. When the New York Times calls for censuring Clinton and "moving on," while the Wall Street Journal wants Clinton's trial to go through for as long as it takes, you know that all is not rosy among the rulers. Some of this internal struggle has to do with dissatisfaction within Clinton's own, Rockefeller-dominated camp over his dismal domestic and foreign policy performance.
Then there's the subjective element to consider. It's not insignificant. The squabble between Democrats and Republicans and now within the Republican Party itself, is a partisan fight to control state power. That's a big prize. Finally, there's Clinton himself. A lot of politicos in Washington simply hate him, regardless of his or their stance on issues. He's not a member of the Washington club. He hasn't attempted to build a base with the insiders. And he's a bigger than average slimeball. These may not be matters of primary importance, but they all add up in the current explosive climate.
The biggest irony is that the more Clinton gets attacked by one gang or another within the ruling class, the more his popularity soars in the polls. He now has the highest approval rating of any president in history. As we've often pointed out in these pages, this is somewhat good and mainly bad. It's good, because it shows that workers haven't been fooled by the disgusting hypocrisy of the pro-impeachment forces, which include the most open fascists on the U.S. political scene. But it's dangerously bad as well, because our class's main enemies remain the liberals who parade as our friends. The Rockefeller-backed Clintons, Jesse Jacksons, "multi-culturalists," and union bosses promise to defend "democracy" and all the while lay us off, force us onto racist slave labor Workfare, and try to get us ready to kill and die for Exxon's oil profits in the next Middle East oil war.
We can't predict whether Clinton will finish his term, resign, or be run out of office. However, it's clear that the big bosses can no longer rule in the old way. U.S. imperialism's international decline has killed the coalition that basically ran the economy, the government, and foreign policy between Roosevelt's New Deal and the Bush presidency. We don't know for sure what will replace it, but all these bosses are ruthless, and they understand their profit interests. They know that U.S. imperialism can't hope to recoup its worldwide losses or mobilize for war if it doesn't first put some order in this internal chaos.
"Order" most likely means casting around for some sort of strongman knight in shining armor, who will promise apple pie and deliver fascism. The odds-on favorite to play this "savior" role for U.S. imperialism is a liberal from the Rockefeller wing. Sure, the Republicans are our enemies. They have to be smashed. But they're obvious. As the polls show, the Clinton variety of fascist is less obvious and therefore more of a menace.
The impeachment circus has brought politics to the foreground once again. This is a tremendous opportunity for our Party and our class. By putting forth our line and sharpening the class struggle on many fronts, we can show that our future lies in fighting to build the PLP and destroy all the bosses-and not in choosing sides among them while they fight over how best to rule over us and oppress us.
Editorial 2
The moment the bombs began falling, PLP'ers were on the streets with leaflets explaining our revolutionary communist view of oil war and calling on workers to take action against it. We raised our politics with workers in heavy industry, in the hospitals and schools, in the military, and among professionals. (To learn how we are doing this, see the articles in this issue). We have a long way to go before we can say that our response to imperialist genocide matches the seriousness of the situation. But we are headed in the right direction, and we can continue to improve.
The bosses, on the other hand, are headed straight for another oil war. Middle Eastern oil is more important than ever to the Rockefeller empire. The worldwide economic crisis of capitalism has glutted the market with every commodity, including oil. Prices are in a free-fall. Whoever controls the least expensive oil can dictate the market: "...Big Oil will turn inescapably to the Middle East as the last place left with huge, cheap reserves" (Ron Chernow, New York Times, 1/5).
For that reason, besides murdering more civilians, flattening an agricultural school and other schools and hospitals, destroying a large warehouse with 2,600 tons of rice in Tiskrit, and damaging the water supply for 300,000 residents of Baghdad, the U.S. and British Luftwaffes concentrated on knocking out the Iraqi oil industry: "The center of the bombing was in the oil refinery at Basra and the nearby port." (El País, 12/21/98). Iraq was preparing to send 84 million barrels of oil in accordance with the expanded UN Oil for Food program. Six million barrels were to go to Spain, 15 million barrels to Russia, and 18 million barrels to France. Exxon-Mobil will kill to guarantee that oil doesn't fall into the hands of their competitors.
Clinton's recent bombing fiasco sharpened the competition for this oil. The missiles killed hundreds, possibly thousands of Iraqi civilians but "accomplished nothing in terms of degrading Iraq's ability to continue hiding and safeguarding its weapons....Likewise, the industrial base for weapons manufacturing appears to have been affected minimally at best." (Scott Ritter, Wall Street Journal, 12/28/98). U.S. competitors France, Russia and China opposed the bombing and are "shifting toward a compromise with Saddam that would leave him a victor of sorts over American power." (Wall Street Journal, 1/4). UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan who, less than a year ago had brokered a "peace deal" that forced Clinton to back down from an earlier plan to bomb Iraq, now openly favors the Russian/Chinese line on lifting sanctions and doing business with Iraqi oil bosses. This time around, the British rulers were the only major imperialist supporters of the U.S., but Britain could well go the way of the euro and leave the U.S. sphere at some time in the years ahead. Even the Israelis are no longer a sure thing.
So the Rockefeller oil gang will have to act without international allies as it moves toward the next oil showdown. It also faces major rifts within the U.S. ruling class as well (See adjoining editorial). The small-fry domestic oil bosses oppose a foreign policy based on controlling Middle Eastern oil. Others, with interests in military industries and businesses beholden to Saudi Arabia (Citigroup, Bechtel), support a strategy relying on missiles and "smart bombs." The Rockefeller group is the main force demanding a mobilization of the U.S. working class and industry over a period of years for a land war to retake and hold the Middle East under a strengthened (i.e. fascist) presidency.
The Rockefeller line is being put forth with increasing openness in the pages of the Eastern Establishment's main mouthpiece, the New York Times. A January 3rd article by Serge Schmeman laments the U.S. public's unwillingness to face significant casualties and quotes Bernard Trainor, a retired Marine general, who is a liberal hawk with Harvard ties: "In the final analysis, if you want to radically change the behavior of your opponent, it takes boots on the ground to do it." In an earlier article from the Times-owned Boston Globe, Trainor spells out the cost: "It would be a formidable task, and it would involve a major ground operation with major casualties" (2/6/98).
As communists, we must prepare for all contingencies. Our job[[arrowhorizex]]making revolution and destroying the murderous profit system[[arrowhorizex]]remains the same regardless of shifts in the rulers' strategy or their internal struggles. We also have to make estimates about what the future holds. Right now, the most probable scenario is another eventual invasion of the Middle East, launched after sharp, possibly bloody, infighting among the bosses to centralize control of U.S. state power. In any event, we must prepare ourselves and the working class to launch mass rebellion against these wars that the rulers are sure to launch. Imperialism and war go hand-in-hand. Only communist revolution can end this vicious cycle.
"I don't know," responded our comrade. "I think it's about oil."
"Partially, it's about oil. The other part is about impeachment."
"But, the impeachment is about oil!"
"What?!"
"The domestic oil producers are panicked by the merger of Exxon and Mobil. They figure they're going to be driven out of business by the big international oil firms. They don't want to spend money to defend Big Oil in the Middle East. Look at this guy Tom Delay who's pushing impeachment. He's the Texas Congressman representing domestic oil producers. Clinton, as inept as he is, still serves Big Oil and the Rockefeller forces who control Big Oil."
"That's an interesting way to view it."
...And so it went the entire first day on the job after the bombings started. We had a few copies of a leaflet about the contract and the war that PLP distributed at the Long Beach, CA, plant the day before. Workers passed these hand-to-hand throughout the plant. They were handled by so many workers that they were reduced to tatters by the end of the day.
"That's a good leaflet," said a friend of the Party. "Let the bosses fight their own wars! You're right! Soldiers are just cannon folder."
"Yea, let's put Saddam and Clinton in a room and let them fight it out."
"And we can shoot the one who survives!" volunteered another machinist who was listening in on the conversation.
"Demand just dried up," whined the director.
"No, demand didn't just dry up. You bosses speeded-up, leaned, contracted out to low-cost labor and laid off. So don't tell us how demand just dried up!"
"No, it was good," he answered. "We took off our Boeing hat and put on our human hat."
As we walked to lunch the topic turned to the impeachment. "The right-wing Republicans have gone crazy on this impeachment thing. Pretty soon they'll be able to impeach the President for spitting on the sidewalk."
"Yea, but look at Clinton! Jesse Jackson and Sweeny are painting this butcher as anti-racist, pro-immigrant and pro-worker. Look at his record! Deportations have skyrocketed to 300,000 this year. He's led the racist attack on welfare, creating a below-poverty level work force at the expense of million of kids. Meanwhile, prison labor has reached record levels under his administration, even threatening our jobs. Not to mention the bombing! You mark my words, those workers that march against the impeachment will end up marching for war!"
"You're being a little broad there."
"You didn't think we were being too broad with Pete!"
"You probably think like the Republicans when it comes to the impeachment," interjected a third worker coming down the aisle.
"To hell with the impeachment," retorted our comrade. "We should put the bastard on trial for crimes against humanity!"
Many, if not most, workers changed their positions a number of times during the day, depending on who they were talking to or what they had last heard. The field is still wide open. It's both a danger and opportunity for the Party. Now is not the time for inaction or shyness about our politics. We will be building closer ties off the job during the holiday shutdown (the plants are closed eleven days) so when Boeing re-opens we can raise the ante on the shop floor and in the union.
PLP members and friends boarded a bus that left from the CORE office in South Central LA to go to this demonstration. On the bus and at the demonstration, we sold Challenge and raised the need for revolution to end racist murder. The young people carrying signs saying "Revolution will End Racist Terror" and "From Riverside to Iraq-Smash Racist Terror" were praised by many marchers. Many asked for Challenge. On the way back, there was a heated debate about nationalism vs. working class internationalism. Party members and friends pointed out that capitalism is a system based on racist terror and that workers of all races can and must unite to end it.
A member of PLP who also belongs to this Local called on the rank-and-file to demonstrate at the Council headquarters on December 21st, linking the interests of workers in the U.S. to workers in Iraq. This long-time delegate pointed out that the money saved by freezing U.S. workers wages and by using slave labor Workfare, paid for the bombs being used this very night to kill Iraqi men, women and children. Each year, slave labor Workfare saves the bosses $500 million in wages they would otherwise pay to workers in NYC alone. (NY Times Magazine 12/20/98) Similarly, just a one percent raise in the first year of the this five-year contract would have meant $250 million in the hands of the 300,000 city workers rather than paying for munitions for the masters of war.
On December 21st, some 40 workers from three DC 37 Locals demonstrated at the Council headquarters. A speaker pointed out the link between the attack on U.S. workers and the oil war in Iraq. He also pointed out that if the KKK attempted impose slave labor in NYC, workers would rebel against such a racist scheme. The black executive director of Council 37, Stan Hill, opened the doors to slave labor Workfare in ways the KKK never could. To those who hoped that the top leadership of AFSCMF would ride in like the cavalry to save NYC workers, he pointed out that AFSCME, strong supporters of "welfare reformer" President KKKlinton, had taken no actions to fight against the ballooning of Workfare nationwide.
The Union president opened the meeting with a moment of silence for the people who are dying in Iraq. Then a Democratic Party functionary urged the union to notify members of the anti-impeachment web site--www.chillout.com. Since we were not delegates, we couldn't speak--and since we weren't expecting it, we hadn't organized anybody else to speak to this--so it passed unanimously. Even though, we are not delegates we know many people, and we have attended Human Rights Committee (HRC) meetings.
After a loooong debate about the rights of union members who sit at desks in the district office, an HRC member raised the resolution, which we had helped to write, condemning the bombing of Iraq and the sanctions. The debate was sharp. Of six delegates who spoke, one resolutely condemned the bombing, and two, just as resolutely, took the pro-war stand of "drawing a line in the sand," supporting the "just cause" of attacking Saddam Hussein. Most interesting was the split among the pro-Democratic Party union activists. One, the head of the Women's Rights Committee, was ready to follow Clinton to war, saying it would be wrong to criticize the bombing while Clinton was under attack by the "anti-education forces." Two others who opposed Clinton's impeachment, were nevertheless unwilling to support the attack on Iraq. This included one Democratic Party organizer who was among those most active in the elections.
The debate must have looked too good for our side, so the other side called for a quorum. Since there's almost never a quorum at these meetings, there was no vote on the motion. However, we never got to bring up the boycott of the Stanford 9 device.
It's good we were there and involved in the debate about standards and school reform. But the main reality occurring in the world today--inter-imperialist rivalry and war--affects every debate, and sometimes becomes the topic of the debate itself. The main task of communist teachers is to organize students to fight fascism in the schools and the communities, and prepare them to fight on the job and in the military against the bosses' plans for war. It is also important to struggle among teachers. Part of that means attending union meetings.
We'll be back next time with a resolution calling for forums in the schools about Iraq, war, the standards and cops in the schools. We also plan to elect one PLP member delegate, so the Party can take the floor and more directly participate in the debates.
"If there were no cops, how could there be order?"
"If they put cops in charge of school security and it still doesn't work, what's next, the Army?"
"I have family members who are police officers and I don't appreciate some things being said here."
"There is no way to solve these problems under this system. The only solution is communism."
These were a few of the ideas debated by members of the Erasmus High School Student Government as they deliberated how to protest against the takeover of school security by the NYPD on December 20th. Under the new rules, "school safety officers" will become employees of the NYPD and receive training from the NYPD.
For some months now, PLP teachers have been raising the need to fight growing fascism in our schools. About 20 members of the staff and the PTA president have raised concerns about the use of handcuffs by school safety officers on kids for as little as "disregarding commands to disperse." As teachers we must all take a bold stand on the side of our students who are being criminalized. Otherwise we become cogs in the fascist wheel. Teachers must realize that only under communism will all of our youth have a future.
The Student Government wrote a petition and planned to have a rally in the cafeteria. The principal and vice-principal showed up as over 20 kids were making posters, with the help of a brave young art teacher. Questions from the administration quickly led to threats of firings and suspensions, on the pretext that a rally in the cafeteria would be a safety hazard. The cafeteria has been a safety hazard since September.
Some of the students responded militantly: "What do you mean you will suspend us. We are the ones getting handcuffed, not you!" one girl reminded the principal.
When they learned of the threatened firings, however, some key student leaders decided not to go through with the protest. On Monday all students received a letter from the principal in which she came out against the use of handcuffs in school and virtually guaranteed that no more arrests would be made on school grounds. We'll see. One "liberal" administrator cannot stem the rising tide of fascism.
A few of the Student Government members went with PLP to a march protesting the war in Iraq the following Saturday. At a club meeting we had a great discussion about why our leaflets needed to relate developments in our school to the world situation. We need a better plan on getting the leaflets out, though a couple of older youth did have a mass distribution before school.
Challenge is becoming more widely read among students, one even remarked, "What is that, the school newspaper?" After the Student Government planning meeting, a new student remarked to a PLP teacher, "This is a day I'm never going to forget. This is the day I realized we need communism."
"What the hell is it with these security guards all over the place?" a second shift service attendant asked. "Every time I go out into the yard to check on a bus, I run into a pair of armed guards." Along with Clinton's missile attacks on Iraq, and the MTA security bulletin, came pairs of armed security guards in cars and on foot.
In the security bulletin, MTA management openly allies itself with the racist LAPD and Sheriff. The bulletin urges MTA transit workers and their families to join the war effort and report any "unusual questions...activities...or visitors." It is an invitation to fascism.
Many workers laughed at the bulletin. "I read that security bulletin and thought `This is trash' and threw it away," said a mechanic in the Gateway building where the bulletins were posted on every floor. A struggle continues for him and others to see the seriousness of this pro-war bulletin. He has a young son who has completed his active duty and is receiving military benefits. "He won't be going," said the father.
"Don't be too sure" was the counter-argument. "NBC national news announced last week that this young generation is looking at the reinstitution of the draft to make up for recruitment shortfalls in the armed services. The army will need experienced GI's like your son to train and lead those new recruits to fight for Exxon's Mideast oil empire. We need him and hundreds of others to join the Party and rebel against the bosses' oil war, and fight to put an end to wars for profit."
"The MTA/Government bulletin pushes transit workers and their families toward support for ground war in the Mideast. Don't buy the pro-war BS," a PLP leaflet said to transit workers.
"Talk about terrorism[[arrowhorizex]]what about one million Iraqis dying from the bombing and sanctions? What about MTA using jail labor to clean buses and bus stops? What about MTA buses having massive overcrowding and missed rollouts? That's not terrorism against the passengers?" said a mechanic.
The conditions for another major war are already developing. The U.S. rulers recognize it. They are discussing and arguing over their different plans. They say we are a society that is "willing to accept [more] casualties" in the coming wars.
Behind the persuasion of pro-war security bulletins stands the threat of armed guards and OIS. Together with Exxon's drive toward imperialist war overseas comes fascist re-organization of the workplace on the home front.
Our plan is to demand an end to armed security patrols, jail labor and wars for oil profits at upcoming union meetings. In the face of this dangerous growth of fascist persuasion and coercion, our Party is moving to take advantage of the opportunity within the danger.
A small group met for the first time and drew up a strategy to get the union to oppose the war plans of U.S. imperialism. A driver, who had to work, agreed to develop a letter demanding the trial and imprisonment of the fascist ex-dictator of Chile, Pinochet. This followed a successful, though small forum, attended by still other drivers on the fight against fascism in Chile.
At the strategy meeting the group wanted more than just a resolution on Iraq and so they planned on building an International Committee in the union. All these activities have drawn together black, Latin and white workers. As the deadly racist rivalry among the imperialists sharpens, we can see the potential of an awakened and active working class. Like most large workplaces, the actual revolutionary experience of the workforce at AC is deep, varied and international. The job of PLP is to unite it around communist revolution. More details will follow in our next article.
This is yet another tactic, such as metal detectors, security guards, and cops that are being used in city schools to keep the students under control as the state makes more cutbacks. The connection of schools to jails was obvious to the already angry students. This was a chance to show our fellow students how this is a fascist attack. Under fascism, the ruling class is not able to rule in the old way. They must use other measures to keep the working class under control in order to increase their profits. One student recognized this very quickly comparing high schools today to Nazi Germany. "They're sweeping people out of the halls like they were sweeping people off the streets."
The Party reacted to the attack quickly. We organized many students and got into some great discussions. We decided that the next day we were going to have a sit-in front of the main office during second period. The morning of the sit-in, the principal made an announcement that if any student disrupted the school day, all the activities for December would be canceled. This intimidated a lot of people because the pep rally is in December. On top of it all, the security guards were blocking the halls and some teachers wouldn't let the kids leave classrooms to come to the protest. It ended up with about 20 students participating.
During and after the protest the principal tried to single out the leaders of the protest and other protesters from the rest of the school. After the protest, we had to meet the principal and the assistant superintendent where we were threatened with suspension. Eventually they backed down because of all the student and parent support.
We wrote up a survey that was distributed throughout the school. Behind our backs the principal tried to add a question that asked the students how we should be punished. She was unsuccessful again. The majority of students showed their support for the protest through their answers to the survey. Because of the fight-back we don't have hall sweeps anymore.
Should we look at that as the only success? No, because we aren't reformists, we are communist revolutionaries. Through this struggle, people have come much closer to us. The Party's ideas have become more widespread throughout the school. One of the main organizers for the protest isn't in the Party, but definitely came a lot closer. This proves that the Party can and will grow inside the high schools and all over. The ruling class took a step back this time, but fascism is still a daily reality. Only communism and PLP can end the horrors of capitalism. Join PLP today!
Several teachers who are not in the Party are taking much initiative in this fight. In December, we raised a boycott resolution to the union meeting for Manual Arts and surrounding schools. It passed overwhelmingly but we couldn't get it to the floor of the Union House of Representatives. We'll go back later in January to continue the fight.
In LA, schools where most students are working-class blacks and Latins, there is a big push to improve Stanford 9 scores. Teachers are being told that if their students don't score well, they may lose their jobs. Teachers are encouraged to teach to the test so that they can do better than the school next door.
Last year, the LA superintendent listed the 100 "worst" schools, based mainly on test scores. This year, 30 schools whose test scores dropped or stayed the same are on "academic probation"[[arrowhorizex]]even if they improved in other criteria including student attendance, decreased dropout rate and parent involvement. The next step will be receivership or redesignation, allowing principals to transfer teachers at will. This wholesale attack on students and teachers, including abolition of tenure rights, has the blessing of the American Federation of Teachers leadership nationwide. It has already been instituted in Chicago, New York, and San Francisco.
This test comes as part of a general push for "standards" and improved performance in the public schools. The main contradiction in the world today is inter-imperialist rivalry, moving towards war. Educational changes fit this move, in two ways. One is the increasingly fascist control over the schools: cops in the schools, getting rid of communist teachers and others who don't toe the line, stricter tardy and dress policies for students. Also through the changes they are guaranteeing that the content of education prepares youth ideologically to fight for U.S. imperialism. Also, as the bosses prepare for war, they are more aware of the need to have technically competent youth to operate the fancy war machinery.
There is a general, justified, disgust on the part of parents and teachers, over the low educational level of U.S. students. The "reforms" of the '70s, instead of opening the doors to achievement to working class and black and Latin students, have resulted in a dumbing-down of the curriculum. Parents and teachers want education to improve. Many have the illusion that better test scores mean better education and better jobs. Some changes (such as new California math and phonics standards) seem to be a response to this mass sentiment.
Some teachers say, "Give us the materials, we'll teach to the tests." Some say, "Black and Latin kids can score as well as anybody--with the end to affirmative action, they have to!" But uncritical support of the new standards overlooks the racism of these tests and can lead to passively following the bosses in building patriotism to support their war for oil profits.
Some teachers say, "Our kids can't succeed at these tests because they're too dumb!" We reject this racist line. Our youth can and must understand the world. They are the ones who will change it. But norm referenced tests are not about understanding the world. They are about competing for a ranking on a racist and arbitrary test.
Communists want better education to prepare youth, future workers and soldiers, for revolution. Within the Stanford 9 boycott campaign we are exposing the "war standards" and fighting against fascist cop terror in the schools. Our goal is to win teachers, parents and students to join and build the Progressive Labor Party. Our Party has always fought against dumbing down the working class[[arrowhorizex]]not with capitalist norm-referenced tests, but by putting forward the truth about the nature of racist capitalism and how to change it. The true test for our class are students, parents and teachers building the revolutionary movement to seize power.
She and the teacher went back and forth about the film. She told him he couldn't show it until after she "investigates" the movie. He asked her why she would come to his room, attack his judgment in choosing curriculum materials, and try to make his students turn on him. She denied knowing he was showing the film, and said if she was attacking him, he would know it. He said that attacking teachers is her style, and that many teachers in the building feel intimidated. At this point, the students had to leave the class.
Green wrote the teacher up for showing an X-rated movie in school. At the pre-disciplinary hearing, the union field representative pointed out that the movie is rated R, not X, and is recommended by the Board's own office of Language and Cultural Education. Regardless of the facts, Green gave the teacher a written reprimand.
This harassment was not about the movie, and Green was not finished. She got hold of a parent of a student who had participated in some of our activities. She told the parent some vicious anti-communist lies, attacked the communist teacher in particular, and all teachers in general. The principal said we were terrorists and used kids for terrorist activities. She said we wanted to manipulate this student because of his high IQ.
The parent and student were subjected to her anti-communist, anti-teacher ranting, for more than an hour. The student had to go to the principal's office during all his free periods, for "talks." He was given a mentor and promised a college education if he would infiltrate PLP and inform on our activities. Talk about manipulation! He and his mom wouldn't go for it. Another teacher told us that the principal is trying to fire us. Some of our friends are being warned not to hang around with us. These developments come as no surprise given the fascist nature of the school system. The schools are prisons for the students, and any teacher that doesn't go along with the program is a target. All over the city principals are using their powers to discipline teachers more harshly.
This is a life and death struggle for the loyalty of young working class students, soon to become soldiers. The fascist rulers must indoctrinate millions of young people to become willing killers in their imperialist army, or passive wage-slaves. That's the purpose of the schools! Green is playing her role in this deadly game by upholding the virtues of capitalism and imperialism. We will take our fight, as well as the fight against the standardized CASE exams (whose real purpose is to send students to prison, the army, or a factory), to all the student, parent and teacher organizations we are involved in. We must liberate ourselves from this system of imperialist war and misery.
Today, in this period of capitalist crisis of overproduction and growing competition among auto bosses for shrinking markets, they are exposing each other's dirty laundry. Workers should use these exposés to help understand the vicious nature of our exploiters and how to fight them. We must see how as long as capitalism is in existence, there will be Hitlers, Tojos, Mussolinis and Henry Fords. We need to build a massive international communist movement to make them pay for their crimes against humanity.
"I regard Henry Ford as my inspiration," Hitler told a Detroit newspaperman in 1931, two years before he became dictator of Germany.
Ford's anti-Semitism shaped and energized Hitler's. It was Ford who was the teacher, the master. Hitler was "his master's voice."
Ford's anti-Semitic tract, The International Jew, was first published in serial form in 1921 in Ford's newspaper, The Dearborn Independent. Ten million copies were distributed in the U.S. Even before Hitler's manifesto for fascism, Mein Kampf, was published in Germany in 1925, Ford's tract had prepared the way for Hitler. Hitler's genocidal views were deeply shaped by Ford's vicious literature distributed through his international network of Ford dealerships.
In Mein Kampf, Hitler pays special tribute to Ford for his "struggle against Jewish bankers." Hitler copied ideas, phrases and whole passages from Ford. Hitler put Ford's vision of the Jewish people into practice.
Ford called for the "extirpation" [annihilation] of "Jewish conspiracy and influence." He declared that, "Common sense dictates a cleaning out of the source of [this] disease."
Thus, Ford links the two key Hitler rationales for genocide: "cleaning out" and "disease." Ford showed Hitler that the only way to "extirpation" was extermination.
Baldur von Schirach, the leader of the Hitler Youth who was hanged as a war criminal at Nuremberg in 1945, testified at his trial that it had been Henry Ford's book that first converted him to Hitlerism, and that he had made good use of it in recruiting German youth.
"The younger generation looked with envy to a symbol of success and prosperity like Henry Ford, and if he said Jews were to blame, why naturally we believed him....You have no idea what a great influence this book [Ford's] had on the thinking of German youth." Ford's fascist ideas became this Nazi's defense at the Nuremberg Trials! Any wonder that Hitler put an oil painting of Ford on his office wall?
It's pretty well known now that Ford and GM and their European subsidiaries helped equip Hitler's war machine, but that's only half of it. Earhard Auer, vice-president of the Bavarian Legislature who opposed Hitler in Munich, stated: "The Bavarian Diet [its legislature] has long had the information that the Hitler movement was partly financed by...Henry Ford."
Ron Rosenbaum, in his recent book Explaining Hitler, notes that "Ford might also have been crucial to Hitler's survival and success in the 1920s when many believe Ford laundered, through his German dealerships and pro-Nazi intermediaries on his payroll, cash contributions that kept Hitler's movement alive when it had no visible means of support." (When Charles Lindbergh was delivering his pro-Hitler speeches, he was on that Ford payroll.) It was later that the German ruling class saw in Hitler their chance to save German capitalism through fascism (and French, British and U.S. bosses saw the possibility of smashing the then fledgling Soviet Union by pushing Hitler to "move East").
Hitler looked to Ford for his technique, the industrialization of killing perfected in the death camps, the mass production of death by assembly line. Was it an "accident," asks Rosenbaum, that the mechanization of murder in the concentration camps "began with the use of truck motors, with mobile vans turned into gas chambers, using the products of the internal combustion engine to `motorize' the killing of Jews [and others]? Was it an `accident' that Auschwitz was run like a hideously efficient automotive assembly line, with its highly efficient division of labor?"
"One could make the case," writes Rosenbaum, "that without Ford's inspiration and (probably) cash contributions, Hitler and his movement might not have survived to commit mass murder."
Of course, if it were not Hitler, the German ruling class would no doubt have found another avenue through which to institute fascism and save German capitalism. Just like today, war and fascism were the "solutions" the bosses of the world had to crush the competition. And in the 1930's, the bosses of the world had something else to worry about: workers revolution inspired by the example of red workers' power in the former Soviet Union.
As the bosses today ape the Nazis, workers must finish what the Red Army began: crush fascism and capitalism.
I'm a 16-year-old high-school student from Chicago who's writing to tell everybody about a really good experience I had organizing at my school.
It was the day after U.S. bombed Iraq and I decided that it was really important to get a leaflet out at school before we went on winter break. So a comrade and I sat down to write our first leaflet. The leaflet's headline read "It's Not About Weapons, It's About Oil!" In the leaflet I tried to explain in a logical, simple format what the crisis of overproduction was and how it related to the war. The leaflet also talked about how capitalism is based on profits and not people's needs, and that the bosses have no problem with killing thousands of working class people in order to protect their profits. It pointed out that all these "weapons of mass destruction" and Saddam BS weren't the real reasons behind the war. At the end I invited people to a demonstration that weekend, and to a study group we have at my house.
The next morning I printed up 200 leaflets. I gave some to friends to help distribute. I should have printed more. I got a really good response from a lot of people. Many agreed that the war was all about money, some agreed with everything except that communism is the answer. I got into many really good struggles and got the party's ideas out there. This helped me to establish better contacts at school and to recruit more people for the study group. I'm really glad I did it and I know that it will be easier to get into political discussions at school now.
I think that with war just around the corner, it is important for us to organize as much as we can. I had a very good response at my school and I encourage young comrades everywhere to organize in their schools, churches, clubs, etc. Don't be shy! The worst thing we can do is to hesitate.
Chi-Town Student
In the division of Public Transportation where I work there was a lot of anger about the recent bombings by the U.S. against Iraq. These workers don't support Saddam Hussein. They understand that this attack was carried out in order to control Middle East oil.
A few days after the beginning of the bombing, at our lunch break, a worker said, "The U.S. always looks for pretexts to invade small countries. These are wars of imperialist pillage. I know about this because I come from the Caribbean and we've seen this."
A worker from the Middle East said, "I completely agree that this attack has nothing to do with democracy, or even with Saddam, who was originally supported by the U.S. There are millions of workers around the world who know that these are wars for plunder, and the discontent at this situation is growing day by day." A Mexican worker added, "We have to be prepared, because a Third World War is coming. The world is a time bomb. The social system doesn't work for the workers and it's time for a new revolution."
An Asian worker said that he compares capitalist society with animals in the jungle. The lions-are the bosses. They only sleep and kill. The hyenas are the generals. Their only function is to kill and to eat. And the buffaloes are the workers. They're useful for many things (meat, milk and domestic work) and they're very strong, but when they are attacked, they run like crazy. If they can get together and unite, they can destroy the lions and the hyenas.
These comments gave me the opportunity to talk a little more about how this imperialist war is part of the fight to control oil profits, and about the need to organize a revolutionary movement.
I would like to say to the comrades in the Party that we must have confidence that our co-workers can be won to communist ideas. When the bosses sharpen their fascist attacks, they open up a field of opportunities where we can plant our communist ideas. If we take the offensive, it's certain that we'll win.
Red Transportation Worker
A few days ago, hundreds of workers at the duck processing plant, Woodland Farms, in Los Angeles, stopped production in protest against the terrible working conditions. The workers' anger exploded when the company went to the extreme of taking away their drinking water, saying that the workers waste too much time drinking water!
The workers immediately decided to organize a work stoppage and call a meeting with the bosses. At the meeting, the bosses tried to blame the workers themselves for lack of water. But they didn't mention anything about the miserable wages they pay, the extreme speed up, and verbal insults by the supervisors. "This place is like a concentration camp," said one worker.
Because of the pressure from the workers, the bosses accepted the formation of a "Representation Committee" to discuss problems in the factory. More than 15 workers formed the Committee, and have begun to seek ways to press for their demands. This experience has given the workers, including some friends of PLP, more confidence to struggle with their friends, to make this Committee more permanent and more political.
The most important thing is that these workers feel more united, and have seen that, speaking with one voice, their unity made the bosses tremble. Challenge has to play an important role in this struggle, showing the workers that we need a society without money or bosses. These important struggles against slave labor conditions can become training grounds for the workers to take power into our own hands.
Challenge Reader
I'm a member of "APOTE" (which stands for Abstaining from Elections, Against all Electoral Parties) of El Salvador and I send you fraternal and revolutionary greetings.
Our objective is to politicize to the greatest extent possible those citizens who do not vote, which is 61 percent of the Salvadorans who are legally qualified to vote but don't. Our goal for the election of March 7, 1999 is to raise this to 85 percent, since no politician registered in the different political parties has any solutions to the problems of the Salvadoran people. The candidate who wins will be elected by a minority of the Salvadorans and will only benefit the oligarchs of El Salvador and the functionaries of his own party or its leadership group.
We want to use these campaigns to make the workers conscious that elections are a way to fool us. I like your newspaper very much. We use it to discuss the need to fight for a society led by the working class.
A Member of APOTE
Clinton's attack on Iraq the night before the scheduled final impeachment debate was the most cynical political act I have ever witnessed--and that includes the lie of the Gulf of Tonkin resolution, which stated the Viet Cong had attacked the U.S. navy, justifying President Johnson' expanding the war of aggression against the Vietnamese This was worse.
Knowing that the country is pretty much as divided as it's going to get over his sex and lies, and knowing most people realize these lies are small potatoes, that all the politicians use their office for sexual and non-sexual payola, Clinton turned the attack to his advantage.
The demonstration a short while ago at Ohio State University, the most significant anti-imperialist protest since Vietnam, forced the government to back oft its then certain war plans. Clinton and his group of fascists knew they weren't going to so easily force the war they want and need, especiaE1y now with their world-wide economy dying from over-production and competition
So--stealing a page from Marxists--they turned a bad thing into its opposite.
Knowing impeachment is foregone and that the debate is a crass one based merely on sex (hiding the true dogfight among the billionaires in charge), Clinton ordered the invasion on the same old flimsy grounds he and his whore British Prime Minister Tony Blair, haven't been able to sell for years.
But they hinged the attack on Iraq on the impeachment hearings! The argument--and the Republican opposition is completely aware of this deception--now is: "Clinton is attacking Iraq to get people's minds off the impeachment," That's what Clinton wanted.
Because the impeachment is a foregone sideshow, there is no way to stop the steamroller now.
Instead, the Clinton forces are tying the attack to the impeachment! They're saying, "Blame us if you want, for sex or argue on our behalf for sex, But either way, the invasion is part of the debate. When liberals defend me now, they defend the invasion at the same time."
This is the tail wagging the dog. You almost have to admire the audacity of these fascist murderers.
I tried to call C-Span the night of the invasion to say, "Clinton should not be impeached for getting a blow job and lying about it. He should be sent before a firing squad for the racist Crime Bill, for murderous exploitation around the world, for the oncoming war he so desperately needs--for being a capitalist pig.
North Country Red
Some "left wingers" considered the recent election results a victory for workers. People claimed that the vote for Democrats to made a statement against the fascist religious right, which is deeply entrenched in the Republican Party. The head honchos of the AFL-CIO and Jesse Jackson encouraged people to vote Democratic, but their goal is to maintain the stranglehold that the Democrats have over workers and other oppressed groups. You don't have to be a genius to know that the Democratic Party is not going to solve the problems facing workers, women, blacks, Latins, etc. The Labor movement has been attempting for years to get a law passed that would prevent companies from utilizing scab labor, but even this modest reform has never gotten off the ground. They might as well have been throwing snowballs at the sun.
Recent articles in Challenge have discussed Post-Modernism and liberalism as being the philosophies that are keeping the masses duped and tied hook, line, and sinker to the increasingly fascist order. As a cultural worker, I have been involved in plays that have utilized aspects of Post-Modernism. Post-Modernism portrays itself as being avant-guard and against tradition. But it is really quite hollow. MTV music videos are filled with Post-Modernist influences. Even if Post-Modernism is against tradition, it has no solution to offer. It stands for nothing and is nihilistic. In a recent film, The Big Lebowski, one of the characters is described as nihilist and the film is definitely Post-Modernistic.
At the other end of the spectrum, there is the current that claims that the solution to capitalism's problems lay in returning to traditional values, as religious crackpots rant and rave against Post Modernism. In Pennsylvania, a new party called the Constitutional Party is affiliated with the US Tax Payers Party. Their candidate for governor is a fanatical right-to-lifer, and won a significant number of votes. Their platform puts forward the fascist religious-right propaganda about the family as the basic unit of society; about how Divine Providence guided the glorious founding fathers to write the Constitution; and how their party is dedicated to getting people elected whose allegiance is to God and not the "New World Order" which is against Christians and is robbing Americans of their right to life, liberty, and property.
The essence of the fascist religious right's views is that the U.S. was founded as a Christian nation and forces are destroying the fabric of this Christian nation. Of course, this is pure nonsense, as the nation was founded in the interest of wealthy merchants, slaveholders, and those who waged a genocidal war against Native Americans.
Also, even in the 1800's, labor was super-exploited. A great historical work, Where The Sun Never Shines: A History of America's Bloody Coal Industry by Priscilla Long, documents the fact the thousands of men lost their lives in the coal mines due to the horrendous working conditions. And socialist writer, Upton Sinclair, described the terrible plight of workers in the meat packing industry in, The Jungle. So, in reality, the "Back to Traditional Values" Campaign is pure hoax, as the real traditional values of this nation are white supremacy, exploitation of workers, racist apartheid in the South, lynchings, child labor, imperialist war, dropping the bomb on innocent Japanese civilians, etc.
Both liberalism with its new Post-Modernism and the fascist right are hollow and based upon nothing significant, just lies. Neither offers working people an answer. Marxism is not dead. It is still the worldview that offers people a valid explanation for their plight and gives them a way to change it. I thank Challenge for its stimulating article on Post-Modernism and other issues. Keep up the battle against capitalist-fascist ideology.
Red Rocker