Challenge, Volume 35, No. 31, March 31, 1999

The U.S.-controlled NATO is bombing Yugoslavia, particularly the Yugoslavian army in Kosovo. Supposedly, the aim of the bombing is to "decapitate the army" of Slobodan Milosevic (the ruler of Yugoslavia), and to "protect ethnic Albanians in Kosovo from being massacred" by his troops.

Clinton and Tony Blair, representing both U.S. and British bosses want us to believe the bombing is for "humanitarian" reasons to "save" Albanian lives. When it comes to imperialism, particularly the U.S. and Britain brand which will do most of the bombing, we can rule out humanitarian reasons. Otherwise, they would be attacking the fascist rulers of Turkey for massacring thousands of Kurds. (The weekend before the planned bombing of Serbia, the Turkish government arrested 4,000 Kurds for daring to celebrate the Kurdish New Year. But these fascist Turkish rulers are friends of U.S. and Britain.)

The main reason behind the bombing is the control of the land and sea routes that lead to oil. The Balkans (Yugoslavia and Southeast Europe) are strategically located between Central Europe and the Middle East. Control of the Balkans is key to controlling Middle East oil. This is the fight being waged there between all the imperialists.

This could escalate to a wider war. After all, military experts agree that bombing by itself doesn’t work. Bombing hasn’t worked with Iraq, whose army and air defenses are much weaker than the Yugoslavian army. So, what could follow? An invasion of Kosovo and Serbia by NATO troops and a protracted war that could spread to other parts of Europe.

Not all the imperialists are 100% gung-ho for the bombing because some believe that it would give the U. S. rulers a military edge. The rulers of Russia and China downright oppose it. Russian Prime Minister Primakov turned his plane around in mid-air while in route to Washington to protest the bombing. France has a lot of misgivings. So this bombing is going to sharpen the contradictions among the different imperialists. (Let us not forget that World War I began in this region when the archduke of the Austrian-Hungarian Empire was murdered in Sarajevo in 1914.)

As far as workers, soldiers and students are concerned, we must oppose this next round of imperialist war since it means that our brothers and sisters will be used as cannon fodder for the interests of the different imperialists and local nationalists. We must organize to smash the system, which at the moment is producing 100 wars of all sizes all over the world, murdering millions. March on May Day with the communist PLP to organize that movement.

Editorial #1: To End Police Terror Abolish Wage Slavery

NEW YORK CITY, March 22 ž The parade of highly publicized "arrests" of liberal politicians in front of NYC’s police headquarters serves two purposes. The liberals fear the mounting anger of NYC’s black and Latin workers and youth, and worry that Giuliani’s wave of mass racist police terror will lead to rebellion. Led by former FBI-snitch Rev. Al Sharpton, they are demanding the arrest of the four-man NYPD death squad that murdered Amadou Diallo in cold blood.

The list of those arrested includes Congressman Charles Rangel of Harlem, former Congressman and current NAACP head Kweisi Mfune, former NYC Mayor David Dinkins, Percy Sutton and Basil Patterson. (Even former Mayor Ed Koch wants in on the act.)

Rangel voted to put 100,000 new killer cops on the streets, and will help Clinton make good on his promise to add 50,000 more. None of the politicians at NYC Police Plaza protested this.

During Dinkins’ term as mayor, the NYPD death squads were active, social services budgets were slashed, and billions in tax and debt-service revenues were channeled to the big banks. Ed Koch’s eight years in City Hall were an orgy of unrelenting racism. Koch fanned the flames of hatred between Jews and blacks, while his cops committed a long list of racist atrocities. The most prominent was the murder of Eleanor Bumpurs, the black grandmother "evicted" from her public housing apartment by an NYPD shotgun blast, for the "crime" of falling behind in her rent.

"Community policing" (where neighborhood residents act as cops to help the police departments carry out their terror) is an attempt to fool workers into welcoming their own repression, with many more black and Latin cops, dressed up as friends of the working class, sent into schools, churches, unions, neighborhood organizations, etc. The cops are the hired guns of the racist ruling class. The bosses need cops to protect their profits and their institutions. They can’t be reformed, no matter how many black and Latin faces are added, or how many "sensitivity" classes they attend. A cop is a cop is a cop!

Our fight is for communism. One day, the demonstrations outside police headquarters will be a mass of red flags held by workers fighting for communism. One day, the main struggle for power will not be a fight between greedy profiteers, but between them and the working class as to who rules society. Now, the next step is to insure bigger and better May Day Marches.

Giuliani’s Ties To Citibank Don’t Please Rocky Inc.

New York City is becoming more and more economically polarized. On the one side are the big bosses and bankers, supported by a new "labor aristocracy" of well-paid workers in the financial district and related industries. Wall St. has replaced the garment center as home for 400,000 workers. The average two-bedroom coop apartment in Manhattan sells for over $500,000. Many NYC workers won’t earn that much in their entire lifetimes.

On the other hand, millions of workers barely eke out an existence. Over a million manufacturing jobs have disappeared in the last decade or so. The rulers’ response has been racist police terror and slave labor Workfare. The Diallo shooting reflects capitalism’s growing need to rule with open fascist brutality.

But it has also brought out the contradictions among the different bosses and their flunkeys about how to exploit and oppress workers. Mayor Giuliani is mainly loyal to an Eastern Establishment faction that has somewhat different interests from the Rockefellers. His key think-tank is the Manhattan Institute, whose trustees comprise big shots from Citibank (a Rockefeller competitor) and various Wall St. investment houses, none of which includes Rockefeller’s Chase, Merrill Lynch, or Goldman Sachs.

The liberals and Giuliani agree completely about the essential role of the police as the rulers’ first line of defense against the working class. However, the Rockefeller group, with Jackson, Sharpton, Dinkins, and Rangel, are afraid that Giuliani’s approach will blow up in their faces. They want to turn a section of the working class into mass support for their drive to retake City Hall and NY Governorship and Senate seats from the Giuliani-Citibank drew. They also want to push "community policing." Sharpton carved out a political career as "spokesman"for victims of racist terror, and was recruited by the Rockefeller forces several years ago. He now works with Jesse Jackson’s Wal St./Rainbow/PUSH Coalition, which is mainly pushed by Rockefeller & Co. forces.

Giuliani is content to hire a large number of mostly white, racist cops and give them shoot-to-kill orders. The Diallo incident has forced him to recruit some more black and Latin cops, but his approach is still all stick and no carrot.

"Community policing" is a much more thorough plan to establish a police state, and is completely consistent with Rockefeller’s plans to mobilize the U.S. working class for the wars of the 2lst century. Our class interests are totally hostile to those of all bosses.

Editorial #2: Plp Confronts U.S. Military Invasion Of Oakland

OAKLAND, CA, March 21 — Approximately 6,700 Sailors and Marines invaded Oakland last week, practicing war games in "Operation Urban Warrior." The Navy had three warships, helicopters, landing craft, military vehicles and the latest electronic equipment. The Marines occupied the abandoned Oak Knoll Naval Hospital and ran a four-day-long mock political/military exercise using actors as civilians, "terrorists" and insurgents.

U.S. rulers are trying to grapple with a world that is beginning to slip from their grasp. The military brass admit that the future for workers is bleak (see last week’s Challenge for details). This is preparation to seize control of U.S. cities when rebellions break out. Coordination with the police, controlling food/ water supplies and the media outlets, rounding up dissidents and how to shoot those who resist is now being tested.

PLP used this event to deepen our understanding about how war and fascism are developing here in the U.S. We organized a plan to fight back and build the Party. We raised the issue in the mass organization People United for a Better Oakland (PUEBLO), saying this military invasion showed that the ruler’s police brutality was just the beginning. We said the military is showing how they would escalate attacks on workers as people fought back against the capitalists’ society. No one on the anti-police brutality committee disagreed. Our resolution passed unanimously, calling for a PUEBLO demonstration on Saturday, March 20^th in Jack London Square, where the military planned weapons displays to try to recruit workers.

Our leaflets championed class unity among soldiers, sailors, workers and students against capitalism and for communism. Some of our forces stayed within the PUEBLO demonstration, some distributed PLP literature, some mixed with the soldiers and sailors. In conversations with enlisted soldiers and the crowd, the reaction was mostly friendly but neutral. We got some literature aboard one ship. We involved some of our new friends in the demonstration which opened new relations with them.

Our discussions with our friends and neighbors will help us better approach our political differences with them. Our understanding of splits in the ruling class grew as we saw how the local politicians dealt with the contradiction of bringing in the military.

However, the "neutral" reaction of most people shows that the ruling class is winning many into accepting a fascist police state. People say, "We need to be protected from ‘terrorists.’ Even though I don’t necessarily like the military taking over, who else is going to protect me?" Many even see fascism developing, but don’t know what to do. Without a mass communist Party to organize resistance, many people will surrender and hope fascism doesn’t claim them as victims. They forget the lesson learned by the German minister of a church: "When the Nazis came for the communists, I said nothing because I wasn’t a communist; when they came for the Jews, I said nothing because I wasn’t Jewish; when they came for the unionists, I said nothing because I wasn’t in a union; when they finally came for me, there was no one left to speak for me."

Although the ruling class is strategically weak, it is tactically strong. It can use its control over the media to build pro-fascist sentiment. PLP, on the other hand, is politically strong because it has an understanding of current events, but our ability to influence groups of workers is limited. We are struggling to turn this situation around. We used this opportunity to build our May Day March in San Francisco on May 1st. We made advances by taking the offensive. As fascism continues to develop, our line of working class unity to fight for communism is definitely the key to victory. Progress is difficult, but we’re advancing under fire.

PLP Brings Communist Politics To Fighting Workers:

Ecuador: The New Domino In The World Capitalist Crisis

Ecuador has become the latest domino to fall because of capitalism’s international economic crisis. The fall of the price of oil, caused by this crisis of overproduction as well as the corruption of the rulers here, means the existence of huge budget deficit. In addition, the sucre (the local currency) sunk to its lowest level since the depression of the 1930’s. The crisis is so profound that the banks were closed for many days to prevent workers from taking their money out. The government of President Jamil Mahuad tried to solve the crisis by raising taxes, doubling the price of gasoline and cutting the public subsidies for domestic gas and electricity.

Workers refused to pay for the bosses’ crisis and organized mass strikes and other struggles, like the blockade of major highways by the Indigenous people who stopped all traffic for several days. Some bourgeois groups who oppose the current rulers tried to take advantage of the situation to support their own interests. The country was on the verge of a civil war, so the different capitalist factions reached a deal, and the government cut back on some of the most drastic austerity measures. But this deal is temporary, and the situation is sharpening. As the following report about the teachers’ strike shows, the small PLP group is doing its best to provide the missing ingredient in all of this—communist leadership.

QUITO — Over 200,000 teachers have been on strike for a month and a half, demanding that the government grant wage hikes approved by Congress during the previous administration of President Alarcón. The rulers today refuse to grant the raises saying there is no money in the budget. In addition, the government has used the police and the Army to attack the striking workers including the teachers. But the anger of the workers cannot be broken with bullets and bombs, and the struggle continues.

Meanwhile, the teachers’ union leadership, led by the fake-leftist Democratic People’s Movement (MPD), do their best to maintain the struggle to limited reform demands, instead of using it to increase the workers’ understanding of the need to smash the capitalist system.

This is where PLP role is important. We have been active in all the teachers’ activities and protests, with the aim of raising their class-consciousness with communist politics. Desafío-Challenge and our communist flyers have been distributed widely, and we are winning many new friends among the strikers. Some strikers have contributed to help pay for the cost of publishing PLP literature. PLP has openly declared that these strikes are not enough, that we must use them to build the revolutionary movement. We have called on these workers to join PLP to strengthen our struggle. As Lenin said, "A fist hits harder than five fingers."

We are aware of the fact that the growth of PLP in Ecuador has been slow, but it has been qualitative because we now feel responsible for making the working class act as a revolutionary force. We ask workers and youth to join our Party and turn the current wave of struggles into a massive school for communism. Each worker and youth in struggle today can make a difference, if we act as a revolutionary fist and insure that the bosses stop making us pay for their crisis. Our aim is to fight for a society where workers rule and everything we produce can be shared according to our needs, without any bosses, imperialists or sellouts.

Philly Hospital Workers Organize Against Slave Labor Workfare And Build For May Day

PHILADELPHIA, March 23 — "Come one, come all—1199C and Workfare workers unite!" declared Jane. "That’s how the petition should begin." As small groups of workers meet, a campaign against fascist Workfare is developing among the workers at Jefferson Hospital. The next phase is a petition drive to spread the campaign among the workers. In the middle of this campaign are the May Day organizers that PLP plans to develop to make this year’s May Day March a mass event.

Welfare is cutting thousands from its rolls here. The first Workfare slave labor workers in Philadelphia are at Jefferson Hospital. The huge Tenet Hospital chain, which took over the bankrupt Allegheny chain, continues to lay off hundreds and plans to subcontract hundreds of union jobs in housekeeping, dietary, and maintenance. It also wants to re-open the union contract to get wage give-backs.

Meanwhile, the Hospital of the University Of Pennsylvania (HUP) recently undermined an 1199C organizing drive by various legal tricks. The Local, of course, has based its case on capitalist legalities and is reduced to crying in the press about how "unfair" the bosses are. With these events, it is especially urgent and relevant that PLP organizes for May Day.

This has three main points:

• Broaden and deepen our work in the union, particularly developing the fight against Workfare.

• Focus on people in the union and the Workfare fight who can be organizers and themselves bring groups of people to the March.

• "Let go," that is, let the organizers build the March as they see fit.

As one worker-organizer asked, "Should we invite everybody or just certain people?" The example set by more veteran comrades all too often is the "just-certain-people" model. But this method will not build a mass May Day. On the other hand, our organizing on the job must consider the bosses’ hatred of us and our security. Our solution? Continue political discussions with the May Day organizers while depending on their judgment about building a more mass May Day.

We are also producing more Party flyers in which we make May Day primary. Meetings with the May Day worker-organizers are more frequent; several are anxious to meet weekly. Never before has our on-the-job organizing had such potential to make May Day a mass event.

Upper Manhattan, NY: May Day Dinner Sparks Enthusiasm And Collectivity

NEW YORK CITY, March 22 — More than 60 workers, youth and children filled an apartment last Saturday for a May Day organizing dinner in Upper Manhattan. "I want to help." "What can I do?" A spirit of enthusiasm and collectivity marked the evening.

Thirteen young people and a teacher arrived early to set-up and decorate. The adorned the walls with signs they had made for a protest they attended in the Bronx against the murder of Diallo by the cops, as well as march on May Day signs and red balloons. As people came they watched the PLP video of the 1998 May Day March.

After a delicious meal everyone prepared and served, the program began. Having arranged their chairs in front of the group, the youth took the lead. One young woman read an eloquent statement she had written (See box). "Cops are a distraction with their guns in the school," followed another young woman. "They shouldn’t be there at all." "We have to fight racism." "We won’t just do nothing," pledged several others. "This is why we’re going to May Day."

Using a map of the world, another speaker took us on a tour explaining how capitalism exploits, starves and kills the working class and our families from the Caribbean to Africa to Kosovo to the Middle East. "The PLP is organizing for communist revolution. When the working class holds power, as the dictatorship of the proletariat, we’ll destroy the wage system, racism and war. The working class will produce what we need and distribute according to need. That system is communism."

A factory worker who has organized for many May Days said that the group of 60 this evening could multiply to hundreds and then thousands more until we reach our goals. To enthusiastic applause a young worker described the victorious end of the "Garfield 6" case in Chicago. "But the real victory will be when we can make revolution to destroy fascism," he concluded.

The event ended with more comments as workers and youth took Challenges, tickets and May Day stickers. Four new youth expressed interest in attending our youth club. Three workers asked to be invited to the next meeting. As people drifted out, three children cleaned the living room. The evening was a tantalizing taste of what the working class can do. Onward to May Day, 1999, to new members and new leaders of PLP!

The following is a speech made by a high school student at the May Day Dinner in Upper Manhattan:

Why Should People March on May

The reason why we think people should march on May Day is to show police that we will not give up without a fight and to show them that everybody deserves to be treated equally. The way we could get people to march on May Day is to participate more in the streets and let people know more about fighting racism. I also think we should concentrate a little bit more on racism (like the Amadou Diallo shooting) and its consequences.

Painting The Crimson Red: Communists At Harvard Expose Liberal Fascist Warmaker

CAMBRIDGE, MA, Feb. 22 ž Former Secretary of Labor and former Harvard Professor Robert Reich was greeted with a PLP leaflet exposing him as an enemy of the working class.

Reich spoke this evening at a "No Sweat" forum given at Harvard University sponsored by the Progressive Student Labor Movement (PSLM), a student group like others across the country, aimed at ending the manufacture of university apparel in sweatshops.

Reich’s liberal agenda helps the dominant Rockefeller section of the U.S. ruling class to mobilize students and workers for war. Reich is one of the founders of the Economic Policy Institute (EPI), which along with the Brookings Institution, receives funding from the Rockefeller foundation. In 1992, Brookings published a blueprint for war and fascism, entitled "Changing Our Ways". This document calls for state capitalism, winning workers to the idea of keeping America number one, and war preparations "against a major hostile power...in Europe or Asia." Indeed it states: "The U.S. is the world’s leading military power. We must keep it that way. No nation should be able to threaten the world the way the Soviet Union did." (pg. 56)

PLP members who meet with PSLM have been there to raise communist politics. During a PSLM forum planning meeting, the issue of openly distributing a communist leaflet at the forum was debated.

One student organizer said "if we are going to sell out, we might as well sell out early," in reaction to the view that a communist perspective is not appropriate at an event where a U.S. government official was speaking. However, the distribution of the leaflet exposing the hypocrisy of ruling class liberals like Reich did not cause any open negative reaction from the many students who came.

Nearly everyone who attended received a copy of our leaflet. Many were clearly reading it with keen interest including the AFL-CIO and UNITE speakers. Even Reich took a leaflet, and when a local Harvard cop asked Reich if he should remove the PLP member passing out our leaflet, from Harvard yard, Reich said no. Part of Reich’s "pro-student/pro-worker" image must include tolerating political attacks from revolutionary communists.

At the forum, a PLP Harvard student demanded that Reich justify his claim he was a friend of workers and students while being allied with an outfit that aims to win workers and students ideologically to plans for imperialist war. Reich's only response was to defend his connections to the EPI, what he called the only influential "left-wing" institution in Washington.

But as our leaflet pointed out, Reich has been behind many policies that have increased fascist terror against workers. In particular, we noted that with the assistance of government policies like NAFTA and Operation Gatekeeper (the U.S. fascist, crackdown on illegal immigration), both implemented during Reich’s term. NAFTA has made moving production to Mexico much easier for garment companies such as Guess, Levi, and Ralph Lauren (Polo). Half the garment district in LA has been closed as the bosses move their factories south of the border where they can pay workers $3 a day.

Recently, the liberal mainstream media have praised the student anti-sweatshop movement. The U.S. bosses worry that extreme individualism and deep cynicism hamper winning students and workers to fight for the "greater good of the nation" in the interests of U.S. capitalists. Their worry is behind the recent media support for student activism, even as they promote proposals for restoring the draft. As recently explained on Talk of the Nation (2/17, NPR radio program), these proposals revolve around having students at elite universities such as Georgetown, Duke or Harvard serve in the U.S. armed forces. In theory, these students would be more ideologically committed to U.S. imperialism.

Two PLP members continue to meet with the PSLM and have attended other PSLM activities. We continue to struggle to turn the fight to hold Harvard accountable for the actions of the manufacturers of Harvard clothing into a broader struggle around what is happening to capitalism today and why we need to end a system based on exploitation and oppression. In the long term, we will continue our discussions with individual PSLM members and participate in future struggles. At Harvard, PLP is again leading the fight to smash capitalism with communist revolution and once again painting the crimson red.

‘Pop’ Big Business, Not Transit Riders And Drivers

SAN FRANCISCO, March 23 — "Hitler was a fascist but he wasn’t the whole fascist system...These corporate pigs need every dime for profits and if they can pay less to support transit, they will. These downtown CEO' s want the riding public to pay more by increasing the fare and establishing "POP." Then they will blame the drivers for the fare increases. We will be next on the chopping block when our contract is up." Said a PLP MUNI driver to a co-worker after a management-union meeting.

"POP" (Proof of Payment) means that passengers can enter any door of a train or bus. The driver no longer collects the fare or issues transfers to passengers. MUNI plans to replace the driver job in the second car of two-car trains with fare inspectors. These "fare police" write $76 tickets to anyone who cannot prove they paid to enter. MUNI plans to create a whole new department with 80 plus employees for fare enforcement and a new security force of 250. They claim "POP" will eliminate delays caused by fare collection, make boarding more efficient, and increase drivers’ productivity.

TWU Local 250a is fighting to stop the spread of "POP." Management was caught trying to implement the program without having the proper equipment, and indefinitely postponed expanding it when we drivers refused to sign up on these runs. What looked like a simple reform of saving jobs has actually led to many discussions about the crisis of capitalism and the growth of fascism. It has helped organizing for our May Day March.

One Challenge reader said, "Amazing to think about how the ruling class can come up with so many ways, time and time again, to pull the rug from under us... It’s like they are putting the pieces of a puzzle in place. When they need it they put them all together."

One driver told us we should "Leave the ‘Hitler’ remarks out along with the other political stuff…To a lot of folks, the political things don’t have any relevance." But another said, "This program sounds like it will help fill up more jails…It does sound like Hitler."

‘Pop’ Is More Than $$$$

At first many drivers felt that MUNI was implementing "POP" for straight-up economic reasons; saving the cost of paying the driver on the second car. We now feel that the main aspect is to attack the riding public and create a fare enforcement apparatus. MUNI claims that "fare evasion" is becoming a major economic problem. Mayor Brown’s new transit funding proposal calls for getting 36% of operating costs from the fare box, up from the present 29%. This will require continual fare increases and heavy intimidation to insure that all fares are collected. Focusing on the fare takes the heat off of Big Business.

Put in the larger context of a system in crisis, this fare enforcement apparatus becomes one more part of an offensive against the whole working class. So that when the necessity for crushing workers arises, the needed mechanisms exist. As our coworker said, the pieces of the puzzle can be assembled when they are needed. We are in the class struggle to raise revolutionary politics. It’s good that "POP" has been delayed. But more than that, we need a contingent of drivers, riders, friends, and family at May Day. This will be a test of our political influence among drivers.

Strike The War Industry In 1999! Build A Mass Plp! March On May Day!

The heart of the batting order of the U.S. working class is soon coming up to bat. The contracts for the steel industry expire August 15th; Boeing on September 1st; GM, Ford, and DaimlerChrysler on September 15th. These one million workers are at the front lines of the worldwide capitalist crisis of over production. We are the heart of the U.S. profit system of wage slavery. And we are the war machine of U.S. imperialism, which is spreading its deadly wings from Iraq to Kosovo, from Bogotá to the Congo. What we do, or don’t do, will directly affect the future of the entire working class, here and around the world. We have a big fight on our hands, and a bigger responsibility to our class.

As we step up to the plate, the union leadership of the UAW, the USW and the IAM is giving us the "take sign." They want us to take:

• Mass layoffs in steel and the spread of non-union mini-mills,

• GM’s spinoff of Delphi into a second tier of wages and benefits, and plant closings,

• The explosion at the Ford Rouge power plant,

• Drastic cuts in DaimlerChrysler profit sharing checks and a wave of terror against high seniority workers.

Three Toadies Don’t Make A Bullfrog

This is the first time in memory that contracts in auto, steel and aerospace expire at the same time. Why now? In part, it’s related to the planned merger of the three unions in the year 2000. This merger, which the business union leaders can’t seem to agree on, is patterned after the metal workers unions around the world. It is also a result of the massive jobs cuts in these industries, and the declining power of the unions. To keep their lavish salaries and expense accounts in the face of declining membership, a merger makes good business sense. The USW gobbled up the United Rubber Workers union. The UAW is "organizing" doctors, nurses, writers, state workers, and anyone who can get dues check-off, while more than 50% of the auto industry is non-union! If you think they’re merging so we can wage class war against the bosses, forget it.

But more than that, the bosses are all for the merger. This is a calculated risk on their part. They’re betting that the union leaders can guarantee labor peace in basic industry, as the bosses fight for survival during the world’s capitalist crisis, and prepare for war. They are trashing work rules, increasing productivity, and destroying health and safety with "joint labor/management committees" that make grievances obsolete. They want us to identify with the bosses at work and at war. It doesn’t matter if the enemy is Airbus, Russian steel imports, or Iraqi oil bosses. They will use the merger, and the coming contracts, to bring fascism to the workplace.

They are also betting that they can get us to sell out our children. Over the next 6 years, about 75% of the current auto workforce will retire. The same is true in steel. Some plants and mills are hiring for the first time in a generation. They will soon hire hundreds of thousands of young workers, who have never been on strike, and didn’t live through the Vietnam War and Civil Rights movements. They want to cut their wages and benefits, and force them to do twice the work.

Workers Of The World, Unite!

But if last Summer’s GM strikes in Flint and at LaSalle Steel in Hammond, are any indication, workers are not ready to roll over for fascism. The factories and mills are powder kegs. Industrial workers around the world, from Mexico to Brazil, from Russia to Korea, are waging strikes, marches, and general strikes against the deepening capitalist crisis. But without the development of mass revolutionary consciousness, and a mass PLP, we will gain nothing from these struggles.

The capitalist crisis will inevitably lead to fascism and war. We must ignore the "take sign" of the union leaders, and swing away. Not for a home run, but to start a rally. A rally of working class internationalism. A rally for the one billion unemployed around the world. A rally for our youth, who are the main victims of racist police terror. A rally for communist revolution and workers’ power!

To prepare for the coming contract battles, PLP is uniting auto, steel and Boeing workers, to STRIKE THE WAR INDUSTRY! We are building international solidarity with autoworkers in Mexico and Germany, steel workers in Germany and Russia and aerospace workers in Europe. We need auto, steel, and Boeing workers to march on May Day, Saturday, May 1st! That will open the door to more industrial workers joining and leading a mass PLP. That will put our class in scoring position.

Under Capitalism, Fascism Is The Daily Bread

SAN SALVADOR ž On February 23rd, thousands of state workers went on strike to protest the government’s plans to eliminate 100,000 jobs and to privatize public services. Hospital and health workers, along with pensioners, rallied in front of a government office and were viciously attacked by the anti-riot cops, who said the demonstration was illegal. But workers replied that what was illegal was the mass job cuts and they refused to back down. Some workers made the mistake of trying to convince the riot cops that they also come from the working class and should stop attacking workers. Cops, no matter what their class origin is, serve and protect the bosses against workers.

The cops reacted as anti-working class terrorists and attacked the demonstrators with pepper gas and billy clubs, even beating up 70-year-old pensioners.

Several members of PLP participated in this protest and brought communist ideas to the workers. We distributed 200 Challenges and 500 leaflets, issuing the call to not vote on March 7, 1999. Workers must not participate in electing the imperialists’ hangmen, whether they’re called "leftist" or "rightists." A speech by a PLP member was well received by the workers.

After the speech, a woman who reads Challenge and is a union activist said, "Congratulations. It’s been years since I’ve heard a revolutionary speech like yours that motivates people so much. Your words give me the strength to continue forward. I knew that you were with PLP, but I had never heard you give such a speech. Everything for the revolution," she said.

"Everything for communism," he said.

This protest was followed by a five-mile march through the center of San Salvador ending at the Civil Service Court, where workers chanted against the bourgeois parties and their bourgeois democracy. Workers are fed up with being attacked and beaten up by "democratic" cops and "democratic" rulers just as they were in the past under the military regimes.

PLP is bringing workers the idea that capitalism is their enemy, no matter what it calls itself, and that the only solution is to fight for workers’ power, communism.

Turn Your Guns Around And Kick The Bosses In The Ass!

Dear Challenge:

I distributed leaflets to Marines participating in the Urban Warriors Exercise on Saturday, March 20th in Oakland, CA. Several Marines who took the leaflet said they were in the Drum and Bugle Corps and didn’t participate in the military stuff (although the Brass wanted them to), but there was another Marine who took the leaflet. He stood there and read the whole thing. When he had finished, I asked him what he thought. He said, "I don’t want to get into an argument." I said, "Neither do I, but I am interested in what you think." So we started to talk. He said he didn’t see the connection between the problems of capitalism and the Urban Warriors. I tried to explain the connection as best as I could. We talked for a while and then he left. He seemed pretty open to our ideas.

Later on a group of Marines came by, and when I offered them the leaflet, one asked if it was the one with the poem. I said it was. Here is the poem they were talking about:

Urban Warrior, Urban Warrior Yes you have the power to
Turn the Guns Around! You soldiers were trained to kick some ass!
We say
"POWER TO THE WORKING CLASS!"
The Capitalists’ game...
Racism, Fascism and War!
Soldiers have the power to say,
"NO MORE!"
So turn your guns on the Brass...
And kick the Bosses in the Ass!
The profits sure don’t go to you and me...
So smash Capitalism and set workers free!
Bay Area Red

Red Flag Fly At Oscars

LOS ANGELES, March 21 — About 600 people came to the Oscars to demonstrate against Elia Kazan receiving a "lifetime achievement" Oscar. PLP organized our base to expose this fascist fink and keep the red flag flying.

During the U.S. government anti-Communist orgy of the 1950’s, "Ratzan" (whose films include On the Waterfront and Viva Zapata) turned in fellow members of the Communist Party to the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC) to save his slimy career, ruining the careers of many. He helped the U.S. bosses launch the Cold War, to try to crush the Soviet Union and bury communism

The police separated most of the demonstrators from the leaders of the liberal Committee Against Silence and the blacklisted who were demonstrating in front of the Awards. Some PLP members participated with this Committee, making new friends, young and old.

This demonstration was very polite, chanting "Don’t Stand for Kazan"; with signs saying, "Don’t Whitewash the Blacklist". The goal was to capture the attention of the media and the stars, which they got.

The other demonstration across the street was more raucous. This is where PLP and our base participated. Many protesters here came to oppose fascism.

A blacklisted screenwriter spoke of being proud to have been a communist. She had said earlier that communists had fought the Nazis and fought racism here. The daughter of Michael Wilson, who wrote "Salt of the Earth" spoke. Others who had been blacklisted from unions spoke about the wave of anti-communism and how it affected them.

The workers and youth that gathered here were forced to be on the same block with a group of Jewish Defense League, Voices of Citizen Together (VCT) and fascist Ayn Rand Committee members, who used their bullhorn to yell anti-Communist and racist insults and defend Kazan.

PLP proudly waved a banner that said "Long Live Communism" and another that said "March on May Day." We distributed leaflets and sold Challenges. We said that the fight for communism, to get rid of racist police terror, fascism and war and the wage system, continues today.

The rally was interrupted by loud chants from the fascists’ bullhorn. The security group from the Committee Against Silence refused to stop the fascists from advancing toward the rally against the blacklist. Their goal was to prevent the fascists from being attacked, no matter how much they attacked the crowd.

Many people were getting disgusted with the fascists’ filth and wanted it to stop. A group led by PLP went over the fascists’ rally and began chanting "Death to the Fascists, Power to the Workers." We wanted to win the crowd to help push them back or silence them.

Some 50 people joined in chanting against the right wingers. When JDL’er Irv Rubin took a swing at a member of PLP, he got socked in the face, making him stagger backwards into the group of fellow Nazis. Someone got the fascists’ bullhorn and threw it to the ground, smashing it.

Many people said, "Right On," and came to support the anti-fascist action. The Security team and a small group of its supporters yelled at us to stop attacking the fascists. The police began marching in formation, as about 30 demonstrators tried to protect some youth from arrest. But the police arrested a PLP youth, as demonstrators chanted "Let him go."

Then a leader of the coalition took the bullhorn to condemn the violence. A PLP youth said, "We cannot be silent in the face of fascism. Had more people stood up in Nazi Germany, less would have been killed by the Nazis." Another praised the action and asked the crowd to contribute to bail for the comrade who was arrested. People quickly took out money and we collected $200 from those in the immediate area. This action cleared the corner of the fascists and the rally and chanting continued.

This action caused a sharp struggle within the crowd. Many people defended and thanked us for leading the drive to silence the fascists. Others put forward that violence is always bad—even to defend yourself!

PLP youth and supporters were inspired by this action. A friend of the Party who is a teacher came to the protest and led a discussion the following day in his classes about violence and how it is a class question. Workers’ violence against fascism is good. Bosses’ violence against workers is bad. Students from Washington High School who came to the demonstration told their friends that it was great and many others wished they had come. This struggle will help us prepare for the May Day March in San Francisco.

Proud Of PLP Leadership To Smash Fascists

Dear Challenge:

I participated in the demonstration against Kazan’s award. I was leading chants in front of the fascist demonstration (see article). After the fascists’ bullhorn was taken away and smashed, we were chased by the LAPD, who proceeded to arrest a comrade. A member of the crowd, who helped chant "Let him go", said to me, "What we did was right and very courageous." He said that he had been afraid to confront the fascists, but he was glad that we led the way with the chants. He said they had to be stopped. "I was very inspired by the support we received in fighting against the fascists," he said. Many people took up the chants with enthusiasm and militancy. I was especially proud to be in PLP today.

A Comrade

Tinseltown’s War Role

The future of Hollywood was obvious as John Glenn was honored and Colin Powell presented a segment on war movies. Rockefeller & Co., the liberal rulers, have made the film industry its war propaganda machine as it has done in the past. Most people who see movies are under 25 years old. As the U.S. sends troops to Kosovo, Bosnia, and other places around the world, they need their film industry to push patriotism and portray fighting for the U.S. bosses as good.

The media adopted the Kazan protest, on the narrow grounds that Kazan snitched on his friends, with plenty of disclaimers like "of course Stalinism was bad." At the Oscars, three-fourths of the audience (according to some of those inside) refused to stand for Rat Kazan. The liberals continue to push anti-communism and prepare Hollywood to play its role in pushing racist, pro-war propaganda, while they appear "progressive." This struggle has led to a greater understanding of how the movie industry carries out the bosses’ plans, especially those of the liberals, the biggest racists and warmongers.

LETTERS

Garfield Six Case Was A Victory

Dear Challenge:

Some friends have asked whether it isn’t too strong to call the plea agreement in the Garfield Park case (210 felonies reduced to 6 misdemeanors) a "victory."

Once you’re arrested, "winning" is a relative thing. Even if charges are dropped or you’re acquitted, you’ve lost time and money and probably sleep over it. "Winning" any battle is relative to the limits of the situation. Thousands died to end chattel slavery, only to endure sharecropping and wage-slavery. Even victorious communist revolution will come at a stiff price to the working class. But ending slavery was a victory, and ending wage-slavery will be a bigger one.

The Garfield Park case was a much smaller victory, but a victory nonetheless.

Some comrades think that "victory" can only mean the Party growing stronger. True, we evaluate struggles mainly by political developments. The Challenge article "Victory Over Fascist Attack" focused mainly on the inner-Party struggle against passivity. It showed how discussion around the Garfield Park case helped to redirect our line of work, and how this affected the workers around us.

But changing our work also made a difference in how things turned out. It would not have been a victory if people went to jail or lost their jobs due to felony convictions, even if we grew. It might have been "they won a battle, but we’re stronger for the next one." If the state’s "divide and conquer" strategy had succeeded, we would have emerged weaker.

Communists serve the people. It matters to us whether people go to jail. Just as it matters if factories and hospitals close. If fired workers don’t get their jobs back. If kids learn to read or write.

When people are hungry, they need food as well as Challenge. When people are sick, we don’t just tell them, "Under communism, we’ll all have decent health." When we take up guns, the outcome of each engagement will matter.

We can’t hide behind the fake-red flag of "Only communist revolution matters." This is the same very dangerous form of liberalism and right-opportunism we have been struggling against. Of course, if we don’t build the Party, that too is right opportunism. But that danger is present in everything we do, or don’t do.

You can lose a battle and win the war. You can win a battle and lose the war. But it’s hard to win a war without winning any battles at all. And you have to know whether you’re winning or losing.

As the article said, we won’t win all of them. The State didn’t come after us full bore this time. We aren’t that much of a threat—yet. They didn’t shoot us dead in our beds the way they did Black Panther Party leaders. They didn’t execute us like the Rosenbergs. Those weren’t victories for the working class, even though millions worldwide mobilized around the Rosenbergs.

Fall 1997 was a turning-point in the Garfield Park case. We linked it to the movement against police-brutality around the beating of Jeremiah Mearday. This case was exposing cracks in the "blue wall" (e.g. black cops vs. white cops). At the same time our lawyer demanded records of the cops who attacked and accused us. This upped the ante for the State. They wanted to "get us" to avenge the cops injured in the police riot against our march, but now this would be hard to do without exposing these same cops as racists, brutes, and crooks.

We couldn’t have done any of this without mass support, and now we stood to gain even more politically. That’s a big part of the reason the State became willing to settle.

The point is, we’re in this to win. Serving the people means fighting battles seriously, the big ones and the small ones. Fighting for communism in the thick of the battle, not from the sidelines. And, yes, recognizing a victory when we’ve got one.

Chicago Comrades

What Is Victory?

Dear Challenge:

The headline (subhead) of last week’s Challenge: "210 Felony Counts Reduced To 6 Misdemeanors…Victory Over Fascist Attack" is misleading. The fight we made against the police attack would have been a victory even if the bosses had decided to send some of us to jail. The victory was political; it’s a mistake to characterize it mainly as a reform victory.

The political victory, as the article indicates, was that workers and students were mobilized to fight around this case. The Party was able to overcome our initial mistake of not building a fight and not taking advantage of the opportunities this case gave us to strengthen the fight for communism. We always judge victory in terms of how much closer the struggle brought us to revolution. How many more people were won to the Party or became closer to the Party? How many were motivated to support the Party, to understand and agree with the Party’s ideas, and most importantly to be involved in a fight against the ruling class? We don’t judge victory on the outcome of the reform.

Even looked at in terms of what we "won," we should be a little less elated. After all, six comrades have to give the bosses 22 days each of slave labor ("community service") and had to plead guilty to one misdemeanor each. We don’t consider it a victory when the union leaders tell us we won a 30˘ pay cut instead of having to take the $1 cut the boss wanted.

Also the article was one-sided in discussing why the charges were dropped and reduced. Obviously, what we did made a big difference. Our presence in the courtroom put pressure on the judge. A more aggressive legal strategy was a must. But on the other side, they changed the states’ attorneys and their side didn’t put up much of a fight. Had they been more determined to put us in jail or convict us of felonies, they could have done so. The courts are stacked against the working class—that’s one reason we need a revolution! Let’s not mislead people into thinking that if we just fight back hard enough we can beat them in their courts.

Chicago Reader Who Is Very Happy Our Comrades Are Not Going To Jail But That’s Not The Point

Challenge Responds:

The letter is correct in saying this was a political victory, but all too easily glosses over the most essential aspect. The capitalists have state power and we only have control over how we struggle and not the outcome of any reform struggle. We are still not enough of a threat to the bosses, we are fighting to change that, and that is what this struggle is all about.

It was not just that "the Party was able to overcome our initial mistake of not building a fight and not taking advantage of the opportunities this case gave us to strengthen the fight for communism." It was a victory precisely because a long and fierce struggle was initiated and won against right opportunist leadership.

In Chicago, we had been giving the wrong leadership in the Garfield Park case, but not only on this issue. With few exceptions, we were fighting less on any issue, had virtually suspended class struggle activity, and had abandoned the work in mass organizations, thereby putting the Party in jeopardy. We were on the road to reducing ourselves to chanting "Fight for Communism" from the sidelines. This was the right-wing trend in the whole Party.

That was the quality of the victory-from right opportunism (not fighting for anything) to its opposite; fighting for communism. This is to the credit of leaders and members in Chicago and elsewhere who played a pivotal role in this internal struggle.

From a world view, the loss or lack of fight against this kind of right wing leadership for the working class, destroyed the international communist movement. In capsule form, the defeat of right opportunism in this case decided the very existence and direction of the Chicago PLP as a revolutionary communist organization, and absolutely strengthened putting forward the fight for communism as the dominant aspect of our line in the whole Party. Forms of opportunism will continually arise. So will our opposition to it.

Brooklyn Victory Party Advances Party’s Line

Dear Challenge,

The letter from Chicago about celebrating the victory in the Garfield Park case raises some important points. I agree with the author that we must acknowledge and celebrate our victories as part of advancing our party building.

Here in Brooklyn we held a victory party for the court settlement in the case of Mary Lonergan, who was fired from her teaching job for taking students to May Day. Mary was reinstated, and granted tenure, as a result of the major class struggle led by the party around her case. The most public aspect of the struggle was the federal lawsuit, so the timing of the celebration was around the court settlement, but it would be a serious mistake to see the process as one that builds illusions in workers just because it involves using the bosses’ forums.

In fact, our experience was that teachers completely reject that notion. Over 60 teachers from Brooklyn schools attended the event. Ten from Prospect Heights, the school where she was fired, came brimming with a sense of celebration. The overwhelming tone of the evening was excitement that we can fight and win.

All these teachers have disagreed with us at various points in the 21/2 year struggle. The main aspect of the disagreements was not whether some avenue of struggle (pickets, publicity, courts) was more or less revolutionary. The main struggle was the fear and passivity that makes so many workers today convinced that our class can never win. The main disagreement was over their reluctance to fight at all.

When Mary left school on her last day those 10 teachers were convinced she had made the worst mistake of her life by leading students and fighting back. What illusions would we have built if we had left the matter there? After all, every type of struggle involves using the bosses’ reform methods. Every teacher at the party admitted that they couldn’t imagine we could ever win, and that they were reluctant to join us for fear that they too would be hopelessly attacked.

"You remember," commented one former colleague of Mary’s, "How teachers used to stick together when you were there? Well that’s all gone now. Its terrible." The talk at the party was about how much worse the schools have gotten. Given that, and the realization that there is no where else to turn, these teachers have gained respect for the PLP and communism. Isn’t that the essence of moving the working class closer to communism?

We must be careful not to be too narrow in our outlook. We must use every available avenue for as long as it is open to us in the process of organizing for revolution. To do any less is building the worst illusion of all.

Brooklyn teacher

Need More Evidence To Say U.S. Capitalism Is Weak

Dear Challenge:

In a half-page article by "Midwest Red" in a recent Challenge, an attack is made on two writers in the capitalist press claiming that U.S. capitalism is booming.

I must say I did not get any guidance from this article. To disprove one writer, the article says there are a lot of layoffs today. Since unemployment is currently much lower than usual, this statement is not convincing.

This other writer, who discusses mergers, is attacked with the idea that mergers are a sign of weakness. Again, I see no real proof given. One key idea is presented with no proof, as follows: "Two of the largest policy trends of the past decade, deregulation and privatization, free up capital as companies are forced to operate more efficiently. This is good for the bosses and bad for the working class. It means escalating racism, lost jobs, more fascism, and leads to fascist Workfare and prison labor."

The links to these bad results are not demonstrated. Further, if something is "good for the bosses" and there is no successful fight against it, it DOES mean that it strengthens capitalism.

The article finally recognizes this by saying, "One reason capitalism appears to be strong is because the bosses are getting away with murder worldwide on a massive scale. This is due to the fact that there is not a strong communist movement to lead workers to destroy capitalism." Yes, as long as this is true, and profits stay high, capitalism is relatively strong.

There is nothing wrong with writing articles which take the line: Capitalism appears strong today but under the surface there are contradictions which will in the future undermine profits, cause war, and which will be fatal IF communists can mount an attack. Or, articles taking the world’s workers as a whole, showing that even at a time of relative strength, multinational capitalism condemn billions of workers to dire misery, and deserves to be overthrown. But if you want to say the U.S. capitalism weak right now, I think you need more evidence than was shown in this article. I don’t see how anyone’s understanding was supposed to helped by it.

Aged Red

White Workers Can Be Won To Oppose Racist Cop Terror

Dear Challenge:

This letter is to congratulate and criticize Challenge. My criticism is that sometimes the headlines in the front page are not too clear or useful. For example, I found very unclear the March 17th front page headline "Zero Tolerance for Rulers’ Fascist System." On the other hand, I had the opposite reaction to the March 24th headline "Racist Cop Terror Is Attack on All Workers."

This was a very much-needed headline, along with the editorial on how the problem of the police murder of Amadou Diallo in NYC and Ricardo Close in East LA were brought to a Boeing union meeting by a PLP member. Besides bringing a very political issue to key industrial workers, it also shows the connections between the attacks suffered by the mostly white Boeing workforce (downsizing, etc.) and the rampant racist terror suffered by black, Latin and immigrant workers and youth. All these attacks are part of the growing fascism of the U.S. bosses against all workers.

The headline and the Boeing article were also important because one idea pushed by bosses and black and Latin nationalists is that white workers don’t care about racist police terror and even support it. It takes PLP to disprove this among a key section of the working class—Boeing workers. It shows that when communists fight political ideas showing the unity among all workers, it can have an electrifying effect (as the editorial said) on workers. White workers can be won away from the rotten divisive ideas the rulers and their agents push.

John Red

Ex-FMLN Fighters Move Closer To PLP

Dear Challenge:

"I think that the FMLN will disappear soon, because people are being pressured by the economic measures of the ARENA party and its government and they don’t see a solution in the FMLN," said Remigio, an ex-fighter, who spent the whole war in the mountains of Morazan, fighitng the fascists beasts of the government’s army. He was fighting for a new society where the workers will be the priority. At least that’s what he and his friends thought they were fighting for. Osmar, another ex-fighter said that "the way the FMLN is going, they can’t even win elections, because of the division between rich and poor that exists within the FMLN." Saqueo, an old member of the FMLN and supporter of Facundo Guardado, said that the leadership group is having a sharp internal struggle.

Many of these ex-fighters see the need to reorganize and build a Red Army which responds to the needs of the working class. The discussion has gotten more interesting. Some months ago, the majority of these comrades looked at the ideas of PLP with distrust, and thought that there was no other possibility except the FMLN.

We’ve carried out a sharp ideological struggle through meetings, and reading Challenge with these ex-guerilla fighters to help answer their question: what will happen now in El Salvador? We’ve explained that we communists think that as long as there is no struggle for workers’ power, struggle to strengthen a party like PLP, there will not be a solution for our class.

We said that we were clear about one thing: we will fight imperialism, wherever it comes from, until the end of our lives. That’s why we are organizing our base to come to the May Day March on Saturday, May 1^st to have a demonstration of the strength and unity of the working class on this glorious day.

A PLP Comrade From the Mountains of Morazan