a href="#Oil War Not In Workers’ Interest">"il War Not In Workers’ Interest

a href="#Bosses’ Agenda: Imperialist Slaughter Abroad, Fascism at Home">"osses’ Agenda: Imperialist Slaughter Abroad, Fascism at Home

Blowback: Afghan Holy Warriors Turn Against CIA Paymaster

• Former CIA Operatives Turned Against the U.S.

Build Fight-Back Vs. Warmaking Strike Breakers

a href="#‘Homeland Security’ Provides None For Workers">‘H"meland Security’ Provides None For Workers

No Partner With Boeing: Strike Against Mass Layoffs

a href="#‘No More Class Struggle On The Cheap’">‘N" More Class Struggle On The Cheap’

a href="#Don’t Be Led Down A Primrose Path">"on’t Be Led Down A Primrose Path

"The Big Picture"

a href="#PLP’ers Lead Confrontation With Nazi Vermin">"LP’ers Lead Confrontation With Nazi Vermin

Boston Janitors Threaten Strike; Union Cozies with Mayor

a href="#NYPD Cops Do Real Racist ‘Wilding’">NY"D Cops Do Real Racist ‘Wilding’

a href="#Protest Racist Boston Cops’ Murder of 2 Black Workers">"rotest Racist Boston Cops’ Murder of 2 Black Workers

Voting A Dead-End For LA Workers Battling Health Cuts

a href="#‘Who Knew?’">‘W"o Knew?’

Black Workers Pay Higher Price for War Economy

a href="#Terrorism Won’t Free Workers Of Capitalist Oppression">"errorism Won’t Free Workers Of Capitalist Oppression

Why Communists Who Led Working Class in Middle East Failed

Who Sold Saddam Biowarfare Agents? The U.S. of Course

Cops Step Up Racist Terror in Minneapolis

Letters

a href="#Teachers Back PL’er, Rip Red-baiter">"eachers Back PL’er, Rip Red-baiter

Church Members Confront Politician on Iraq War

Steelworkers Attack Bush But Must Oppose Dems, Too

a href="#Don’t Fight Exxon’s War — Fight the Bosses">Don’" Fight Exxon’s War — Fight the Bosses

Nationalism is no way to fight oppression

Red Eye On The News

---

September 11, 2001:

In addition to those who died at the Twin Towers
On That Day and every day because of imperialism:
Children’s death toll from starvation worldwide: 35,615
Special TV programs on this holocaust: Zero
Messages of consolation from President and Pope: Zero

a name="Oil War Not In Workers’ Interest">">"il War Not In Workers’ Interest

In the weeks following the 9/11 attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, Bush told the world, "You’re either with us, or against us." It’s now becoming clear that much of the U.S. ruling class, and the world, are against him. Before they can launch a war on Baghdad, they will have to fight the war in Washington.

The open fight within the ruling class is over how to rule the world, control oil, make war and terrorize workers. Workers must never back one gang of bosses and their political stooges over another. There is no "lesser evil." Capitalism makes war and fascism inevitable. Only communist revolution through a mass PLP and workers’ power can break this vicious circle.

The Bush-Cheney-Rumsfeld-Rice camp believes that as the world’s only superpower, the U.S. can act unilaterally to establish its empire for the 21st century. Their rush to invade may have more to do with opening Iraq to smaller domestic U.S. oil companies — who have their most influence in the Bush-Cheney camp — than to "weapons of mass destruction." This "go-it-alone" arrogance has isolated U.S. imperialism from its "allies," and has provoked increased resistance and the rage of millions worldwide.

The upcoming German elections will be decided by which party can most distance itself from U.S. foreign policy. French president Jacques Chirac told the New York Times (9/9), "It’s not Schroder and I on one side, and Bush and Blair on the other; it’s Bush and Blair on one side and all the others on the other side."

The Bush gang has come under tremendous pressure from the main wing of the ruling class, the "liberal" Rockefeller-led Eastern Establishment, especially Exxon Mobil. These "internationalists" believe the U.S. can rule the world while still maintaining alliances. They’re willing to cut a deal with France, Russia and China to share the spoils in Iraq. They want a serious campaign to win popular support for war, nationally and internationally. They’re dragging Bush, kicking and screaming, before the UN and the U.S. Congress. They’re joined by a host of war criminals and generals, from Scowcroft to Shwarzkopf to Zinni. They’re not so much concerned with Iraqi military might as with the willingness of workers and soldiers to back a long-term occupation of Iraq.

In past weeks, former President Jimmy Carter, Senate Majority leader and Democratic Presidential hopeful Tom Daschle, and Senate Foreign Relations Committee chairman Carl Levin (D-MI) all publicly opposed any invasion of Iraq. Their view is that Saddam has been contained over the past decade, his army has been cut in half and poses no immediate threat, and removing him will cause more problems than it’s worth.

Workers, soldiers, students and youth should not be confused by this three-ring circus. The rulers are always on both sides of all questions. They want to lead the march to war while they stake out their position to lead any anti-war movement that arises. U.S. imperialism is extending its claws over a wide horizon. U.S. troops are now in the former Soviet Republics of Georgia, Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikstan. This is "part of a ring of new and expanded military bases established at 13 locations and in nine countries near Afghanistan since Sept. 11." (LA Times, 2/28). They are in the Philippines and "closely watching" Somalia, Yemen and Indonesia. All these locations reflect the presence of oil or a strategic location along the oil transport route.

U.S. bosses will do whatever it takes to control the world’s oil supply. The liberals will champion oil wars in Iraq and more police state terror at home. They will tell us the Big Lie that it’s all in "our" interest. A successful Communist revolution is the only strategy that can smash oil wars and fascist terror. The process will be long and hard, but eventually we will win. We must oppose all the bosses and build a mass, international PLP, our class’s only hope for the future.

a name="Bosses’ Agenda: Imperialist Slaughter Abroad, Fascism at Home">">"osses’ Agenda: Imperialist Slaughter Abroad, Fascism at Home

U.S. bosses have taken important steps to further their agenda for world domination and mass domestic terror In the year since 9/11. Imperialist oil wars abroad and a growing police state at home have set the policy for decades to come.

• A record number of adults — one in 32 — are now either behind bars, on probation or parole. Nearly half of the two million adults in prison are black workers, who account for only about 10% of the total population. More than 600 immigrants have been jailed and subjected to secret hearings.

• Many of the immigrants are Arab and have been deported, even though they have no connection to terrorism. Ultimately, the rulers will use the anti-Arab witch-hunt against anyone and everyone who disagrees with, or resists, the imperialists, especially revolutionary communists who fight to overthrow the system. We must prepare for this inevitability.

• Last October 7, the Bush gang invaded Afghanistan, promising to make quick work of al Qaeda and the Taliban. Last week’s assassination attempt against U.S. puppet Afghan "President" Karzai proved the job is far from finished (see article below). According to British journalist Robert Fisk, "The Americans are being attacked almost every night." (The Independent, 8/14)

•In the first three months of the Afghanistan invasion, U.S. forces murdered about 6,000 civilians, twice the number killed on 9/11. This doesn’t include people killed when air strikes cut off access to food, electricity or medical care. Nor does it account for bomb victims who later died of their wounds.

• Civilian slaughter is old hat for U.S. imperialism, which slaughtered over three million in the Vietnam War. Hundreds of thousands more were murdered in Desert Storm and in the 11 years since — especially Iraqi children — due to U.S.-imposed sactions. In the former Yugoslavia, a three-month Clinton-NATO reign of aerial terror poisoned the water supply of millions with bombs made of depleted uranium.

• At home recent corporate "scandals" have given the rulers an excuse to discipline capitalists who put individual profit ahead of the overall worldwide imperialist agenda. In the process, a massive consolidation of capital is taking place in favor of the Eastern Establishment, led by Exxon Mobil and the House of Rockefeller.

The answer to this capitalist hell is to organize the working class based on the revolutionary communist ideas in CHALLENGE.

Blowback 1: Afghan Holy Warriors Turn Against CIA Paymaster

Despite being the world’s only superpower, every imperialist invasion U.S. rulers launch sets off new unforeseen consequences. They claimed to have finished off the Taliban and Al Qaeda in Afghanistan, but don’t look now; it’s far from over there. In fact, the murderous bombings and killing of civilians in that country (see above) has become the basis there for a new "jihad to boot out foreign troops." (Asian Times, 9/6)

A movement to resist U.S. forces and its puppet Karzai government in all Pashtun provinces (the largest ethnic group in Afghanistan) has been formed "by local leaders who have little or nothing to do with the Taliban or Al Qaeda….Widespread hatred of U.S. forces has reportedly been exacerbated by indiscriminately belligerent behavior of U.S. troops," such as the July 1 bombing of the wedding party in Oruzgan. (Stratfor.com, 8/29)

The "widespread hatred of U.S. forces" includes a reaction to the mass murder by Northern Alliance troops of Taliban prisoners of war late last year at Mazar-E Sharif. Having been assured decent treatment before surrendering, hundreds of prisoners — with the full knowledge of U.S. commanders — were packed into air-tight containers and shipped to a prison 200 miles away. Most of them had suffocated to death before reaching the prison and then dumped into a mass grave around Mazar-e-Sharif — a feat worthy of Hitler’s Nazis. Investigators from the Boston-based Physicians for Human Rights found hundreds of skulls and bones. (As reported by CNN and Newsweek.)

Now a re-grouped Taliban and Al Qaeda apparently have launched a series of assaults on U.S. and puppet forces, including the near-miss assassination of Karzai and a bomb explosion in the center of Kabul. They are allied with the forces of warlord G. Hekmatyar.

Stratfor.com has reported that "U.S. forces…are under constant attack,…taking more casualties than are officially admitted." This includes an Aug. 4 ambush of U.S. troops in Paktia province and an Aug. 28 rocket attack on a U.S. air base at Jalalabad airport. "Sources in Russia and Indian intelligence separately estimate the U.S. military has suffered between 300 and 400 killed in Afghanistan, with an unknown number wounded….The next phase is a protracted war of attrition, with U.S. troops venturing from garrisons to face ambushes on the highways, in villages and in the mountains." (Stratfor.com, 8/29).

Now, with the U.S. planning wide use of its Special Forces in Iraq, it would have to withdraw some of them from Afghanistan just when the guerrilla movement there is heating up.

Former CIA Operatives Turned Against the U.S.

These reactionary anti-U.S. guerrillas were the same cut-throats (Osama bin Laden, Hekmatyar, et al) trained by the CIA to fight the Russian army in the 1980s. Hekmatyar received the biggest share of the billions handed out by the CIA and Saudi-Pakistani intelligence services to wage "holy war" against the Russians. When the pro-Russian nationalists were overthrown, Hekmatyar and other holy warriors took power and began fighting each other, bombing Kabul and killing tens of thousands in the process. Later, he joined the anti-Taliban-bin Laden U.S. crusade. Now he has turned against his former CIA allies.

Every action taken by the imperialists is backfiring. That’s the essence of a profit system which makes war inevitable.

Build Fight-Back Vs. Warmaking Strike Breakers

The U.S. war juggernaut could have a big problem on its hands. In the wake of corporate scandals and increasing attacks on the workers, there is a growing restlessness and threat of strikes. The New York Times (9/8) editorialized, "The mood of sacrifice is fading, the window of opportunity for bottling the patriotism generated by Sept. 11 [is] slowly closing."

Over 10,500 West Coast dockworkers are working without a contract under Bush’s threatened use of troops as strikebreakers. A walkout shutting 29 Coast ports could halt half of U.S. trade.

About 25,000 Boeing workers were about to reject the company’s "final and best" offer when their ballots were sealed for 30 days and their union leaders ordered to federal mediation in Washington. With hundreds of unused aircraft parked in the desert, Boeing is prepared to sit out a short strike. A new vote is scheduled for Sept. 13.

The double whammy of recession and 9/11 unleashed a wave of mass layoffs. The airlines industry took advantage of the crisis to demand more give-backs. United Airlines is threatening bankruptcy unless its three unions grant major concessions. They claim this is necessary to qualify for a $1.8 billion federal bailout, available to airlines hurt by last September’s attacks. So far, the pilots’ union has rejected acceptance of a 10% pay-cut; Machinists say the company already owes them $500 million in back pay; and the flight attendants’ union says cuts from its lower-paid workers can’t possibly balance United’s books.

US Airways has filed for bankruptcy and American announced up to 7,000 layoffs. Delta, Continental, and Northwest have all announced cuts in their fall flights.

About 10,000 Boston janitors and 7,500 Chicago hotel workers also threatened strikes. The hotel workers were on their way to disrupting Labor Day tourism and a huge business convention, but were kept working until a settlement was reached a week after the old contract had expired.

Public sector and government workers face fierce budget cuts. State workers are being laid off in Ohio, Minnesota, Iowa and Nebraska. In Illinois and Michigan, budget cuts will close several mental-health hospitals. Cook County workers in and around Chicago have held one-day strikes to fight county cuts. Part-time teachers at the City Colleges are threatening to strike.

If not for the pro-capitalist, pro-Democratic Party union leadership, over 35,000 longshoremen and aerospace workers could be striking simultaneously, many in the same cities.But, this is not the recipe for carrying out a new imperialist oil war. So the U.S. bosses’ call on their "labor lieutenants" who are loyal to the profit system. They wrap themselves and our struggles in the bosses’ flag. If strikes can’t be avoided, they must be kept "within the law," and under pro-capitalist leadership.

Such sharpening contradictions are the inevitable result of inter-imperialist rivalry and the drive towards war. Strikes and other rebellions are the spontaneous result of the struggle between bosses and workers, but they do not spontaneously lead workers to draw revolutionary conclusions. A revolutionary communist party must bring communist politics into these struggles. The mood of the workers is changing. PLP’s work is cut out for us.

a name="‘Homeland Security’ Provides None For Workers"></">‘H"meland Security’ Provides None For Workers

The bill to create the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) allows the President to strip all collective bargaining rights and Title 5 civil service protections from 170,000 workers. On January 7, a Presidential executive order scrapped collective bargaining "rights" of almost 1,000 Justice Department workers. A spokesman for the Heritage Foundation think-tank stated, "Asserting managerial rights over unions, ensuring no race or gender hiring targets are allowed and preventing attempts to apply prevailing wage laws will be a large part of the debate." (Houston Chronicle, 6/20)

The Aviation and Transportation Security Act prohibits non-citizens from holding airport-screening jobs. Almost 6,000 immigrants could be fired by November, most with permanent legal status and many years of experience.

In August, the Washington State Labor Council Convention adopted a resolution calling for the repeal of the USA PATRIOT Act, opposing FBI spying on political and union activists, INS harassment of Arab and other immigrants, and demanding the immediate release of the hundreds of immigrants still being detained. It urged other unions to oppose the government’s "war on terrorism."

The National Association of Letter Carriers and the Utility Workers of America announced they would not cooperate with the Justice Department’s Operation TIPS, a plan to force one million workers to "report suspicious activity." The California Federation of Labor compared the plan to Nazi Germany. The Justice Department backed off of using postal and utility workers in TIPS.

No Partner With Boeing: Strike Against Mass Layoffs

The week before the first strike vote (August 29) had a familiar ring to it. Rolling Thunder — banging every hour, hammer on steel — grew louder. Bosses scurried around trying to locate the homemade foghorns that mysteriously signaled the beginning of every hour. Only a fool would be caught without ear protection when "Big Ben" struck. "Strike! Strike! Strike!" reverberated from the rafters as workers marched from one building to the next. But the familiarity was superficial. It hid important differences from past contracts.

This became painfully clear when Machinists’ International President Buffenbarger sealed the strike vote, refusing to count it, to accommodate the federal mediator. Since the federal mediation yielded nothing — as could be expected— a new vote has been scheduled for September 13. "We used to be called the ‘fighting machinists,’" said one member. "How did we turn into the ‘call-the-federal-mediator,-I-want-to-work-without-a-contract machinists?’"

a name="‘No More Class Struggle On The Cheap’"></">‘N" More Class Struggle On The Cheap’

"No more class struggle on the cheap," was the way one machinist viewed it. "There wasn’t the bravado of ’95," concluded a shop steward, referring to that contract vote and strike. Rank and filers, with significant aid and leadership from the Party, started the pre-contract mobilizations that year, which soon became a tradition. Since then the union has organized these demonstrations, tightly controlling them to further its own goals.

But this year even the union had to admit that some marches would not have occurred were it not for the presence of the Party. We mobilized our political base to guarantee them in some areas. Although we marched through the factory with union sanction, we made it clear we were traveling a different road. This was marked by the absence of U.S. flags and the presence of CHALLENGE and 2,000 communist leaflets, which were distributed inside and outside the plants during the preceding weeks.

Only a network of CHALLENGE readers and sellers made this possible. It reflects a certain revolutionary political understanding that is needed to mount even the most modest class struggle. Rebuilding these networks, hurt by tens of thousands of layoffs, is one of our prime objectives.

We would abdicate our responsibility to the working class if we left the impression that there is any kind of alliance between the union leaders and us. The misleaders made that perfectly clear. At a rally outside negotiations, union officials picked our literature out from the many different leaflets being distributed. "You guys always flood our events with communist literature," complained the union goons. "We can’t allow this to continue." But workers took leaflets from the surrounded young comrades and boldly distributed them right in front of the thugs.

a name="Don’t Be Led Down A Primrose Path">">"on’t Be Led Down A Primrose Path

"The government is preparing to invade Iraq," said a Vietnam vet, trying to make sense out of the confusion on the day the strike vote was nullified. "I don’t know all the ins and outs, but I know they are not going to let us small people upset their plans."

Our union invited the Feds into the contract negotiations because it wasn’t prepared to lead the kind of fight these times require. The politics of "partnership," nationalism and reliance on the government have left us unprepared for the escalating attacks since 9/11. The labor movement has been based on the fantasy that we can reach an accommodation with our "own" bosses. The demoralizing confusion of the past two weeks is the price we pay.

But this chaotic period has shown that out of confusion can come greater wisdom, that we can learn to reject those who would blunt our ability to fight for our class. We can learn that the federal government is never a neutral mediator of class struggle, but rather the servant of the biggest corporations. We can learn to recognize suicidal appeals for accommodation and compromise with the bosses, especially when they are wrapped in the flag. Slowly, but inevitably, our class will learn to reject the primrose path laid out by treacherous trade union misleaders. We can then start the journey down the more difficult but ultimately only realistic path for our class: the road to revolution.

"The Big Picture"

Last week, every manager — from the lowly line supervisor to the divisional head — was on the shop floor trying to head off a strike. Since they couldn’t sell this take-away contract on its merits, they tried to instill fear and doubt. "Now’s not the time to strike," they warned. "Think of the big picture."

So just what is the big picture? Since 9/11, the bosses have launched a full-scale offensive against the working class, with the federal government usually leading the charge! The federal mediator’s call for a 30-day "cooling-off period" on the day of our strike vote spread demoralization and confusion.

The airline industry is using bankruptcy courts and the Air Transportation Stabilization Board (created after 9/11) to renounce their collective bargaining agreements and demand billion$ in concessions. They’re out to beat back wages and benefits, while gutting work-rules and laying off thousands. IAM members at United and US Airways face cuts of 20% or more.

The West Coast dockworkers’ contract expired in May. Negotiations have broken down. Bush, in consultation with the Homeland Security Department, has threatened to send federal troops to bust any possible longshore strike.

The bosses and their government are not limiting their attacks to U.S. workers. The government is using 9/11 to build for an invasion of Iraq. Their bombs and sanctions have already killed a million Iraqi workers. Millions more will be slaughtered so U.S. oil giants can maintain their stranglehold on the world’s oil supply. The bosses and their government have turned the "war on terrorism" into an international war for oil and a domestic war on workers’ jobs, wages and standard of living.

a name="PLP’ers Lead Confrontation With Nazi Vermin">">"LP’ers Lead Confrontation With Nazi Vermin

WASHINGTON, D.C., August 26 — Snipers on the rooftops! Helicopters hovering overhead! Mounted police, K-9 units, riot police in Darth Vader uniforms — 1,000 cops in all. What’s happening? A U.S. presidential visit to Latin America? No, just the U.S. ruling class, protecting hundreds of fascists in the bosses’ capital. Bush’s war on terrorism doesn’t apply to these racist terrorists.

But despite the Nazis-in-blue, PLP-led forces did deal some sharp blows to these scum. The crowd cheered when one man shouted, "Bush is nothing but a Nazi!"

The National Alliance and other fascist allies organized what was billed as the largest fascist rally here since World War II. And if you don’t count the racists in the U.S. Congress, Judiciary, and Executive branches, they were right.

The National Alliance is no joke. This was their fifth march in this area, each one bigger than the last. With a $4 million budget, 21 full-time organizers and chapters throughout the U.S., they may succeed in building a serious fascist movement where David Duke, Tom Metzger, Frank Collins and a host of other Nazis and KKK’ers failed. They have big money behind them (about $2.5 million comes from "donors"), and are making some inroads among youth. They inspired Timothy McVeigh to blow up the Federal Building in Oklahoma City and two fascist Marines to gun down a black couple in Georgia a few years ago. Despite the positive anti-fascist opposition, the Nazis still made a clear statement of their growing strength.

We had launched a summer project against fascism to win other workers and students throughout the region to seriously resist the rise of this fascist movement. Before the event, a dozen young comrades from New York, Boston, New Jersey, and Chicago joined local PLP’ers in distributing over 10,000 flyers and holding rallies in working class Anacostia, University of the District of Columbia, and Howard University. Two local unions — a government local and the Metro workers Local 689 endorsed the counter-demonstration. Amid struggles against police brutality, racial health disparities, the AIDS epidemic, imperialist war in Palestine, Afghanistan and soon in Iraq, we called on our brothers and sisters to crush these racist foot soldiers of capitalism.

In previous anti-Nazi activities, the symbolic protests of the liberals and revisionists held sway because of the low level of mass mobilization and our own internal weaknesses. But this time, our militant approach proved more in line with the needs and aspirations of millions more. The positive response from workers and youth to our week of intense political activity strengthened our confidence to play the leading role in the rally of over 400 counter-demonstrators.

Hundreds attempted to block the street where the Nazis were to march and pursued them to the Capitol, but were kept at a distance by a phalanx of cops. One Nazi staggered as a well-aimed rock opened his cheek. Three others were beaten to the ground by a group of anti-racist workers.

With the Capitol gleaming behind them, the fascists paraded behind a stone wall, two rows of temporary fences and several rows of riot-equipped cops. The crowd chanted, "Death, Death, Death to the Nazis, Power, Power, Power to the Workers," as well as, "Fascism Outside, Fascism Inside [the Capitol], Smash All Bosses!" A few protesters objected, calling for love for everyone. The angry response was, "To love the people, we must hate the Nazis! Death to the Nazis!"

The Nazis marched back to Union Station chased by hundreds of angry workers. Two more Nazis lost their police escort and their "invincibility" as workers clobbered them. A vanload of Nazis was surrounded and pummeled, but the police arrived to save them from more.

There were important improvements in the Party’s work. We won more of our friends in the unions and other mass organizations to join the protest. Some helped build it and the preceding activities. Consequently, PLP emerged as a leading force at the event itself. The majority were young workers and students. We distributed 200 CHALLENGES, introducing many to PLP’s overall ideas. This was a small but important advance in building a political base within the mass movement.

Between 20-30 militant youth with the anarchist group Anti-Racist Action were arrested when they successfully engaged a large group of Nazis in Baltimore, beating up several and preventing them from joining the D.C. march. We have a lot of political disagreements with anarchism, but we welcome the struggle with these young militants over our political strategy for communism.

It was the communist-led Soviet Red Army and partisan movement which basically defeated the Nazi 3rd Reich. Again today, a mass communist movement, based among workers, soldiers, and youth, with the highest levels of unity and discipline will defeat the fascists, their billionaire masters, the strike-breakers and warmakers.

Boston Janitors Threaten Strike; Union Cozies with Mayor

BOSTON, MA., September 10 — Ten thousand janitors in SEIU Local 615 are threatening to strike against big property owners for higher wages, full-time work and healthcare benefits. Seventy-five percent of the workers are Latino; most of the rest are black. They receive the most vicious racist treatment. Their struggle against poverty wages could inspire a mass struggle against racism. Thousands of workers ready to strike are a threat to the rulers’ need to keep workers in check through a fascist police state as they prepare to launch their wars for oil. The class struggle is beginning to sharpen.

These workers join 10,500 West Coast longshoremen, 25,000 Boeing workers, thousands of airline industry workers and others in a still small but growing wave of resistance. (See page 3.) The 4,200 Enron workers and 17,000 at WorldCom left high and dry have fueled their anger.

As usual, those at the head of the march are way behind the workers. The SEIU leadership’s idea of a political strike is to wrap it in the bosses’ flag, build patriotism and deliver workers to the Democratic Party and continued wage slavery. The union leaders are stalling on calling a strike, relying on the mayor rather than on the united strength of the workers. This has demoralized some of the workers but others have exposed the union leadership and trying to counter it with rank-and-file militancy.

"Standing Up for the American Dream" is SEIU’s battle cry. This builds the idea that janitors and bosses have common interests, and that these low-paid mainly immigrant workers have a place at the bosses’ table. This leads workers to support U.S. imperialism, especially the coming oil war in Iraq. This is particularly disgusting since immigrant workers have felt the brunt of the U.S. "War on Terror," and the fascist Homeland Defense. Hundreds are still behind bars, charged with nothing. Thousands have been deported.

Rather than stand with the racist warmakers and strike-breakers, we stand with the international working class. Yes, we demand a living wage. Yes, we demand health care for our families. But more than anything, we stand for a society where workers rule and produce for the needs of their class: communism. Joining and building a mass international PLP is the most important advance workers can gain from these struggles.

a name="NYPD Cops Do Real Racist ‘Wilding’"></">NY"D Cops Do Real Racist ‘Wilding’

BROOKLYN, NY — Once more the NYPD shows its true colors, as racist killer cops. In the space of one week, Aug. 26 to Sept. 1, they shot and killed four borough residents, at least three of them black: Marcellus Graham in Flatbush, Ernest Prather in Bedford-Stuyvesant, Paul Angel in Bensonhurst and Jamil Moore in Canarsie. Bush’s "war on terror" is running rampant on the streets of Brooklyn. With all the bosses’ patriotic garbage "celebrating" 9/11 and "hero" cops, the Klan in blue continue their racist rampage to enforce the bosses’ terror against the working class. But there have been no mass demonstrations against these murders, neither by Democratic Party "militants" like Al Sharpton nor by any irate workers and youth. We cannot allow this slaughter to proceed as "business as usual." We must make our unions, churches, schools,etc. protest these racist terror acts.

On top of these murders, DNA evidence has proven that the five black and Latin youth convicted a decade ago for the so-called "wilding" rape and assault of the Central Park jogger were actually innocent. Another man, in prison for several rapes, has confessed. So all the media racist screaming about the "wilding youths" turns out to be more racist lies. For that, these youths spent seven years in prison for a crime they never committed. Truly this is a CRIMINAL justice system.

a name="Protest Racist Boston Cops’ Murder of 2 Black Workers">">"rotest Racist Boston Cops’ Murder of 2 Black Workers

BOSTON, August 7 — PLP members and friends demonstrated at the Cambridge Police Dept. today, protesting the July murders of two mentally ill workers by Boston area cops. Shooting to kill, especially minority workers, has become unwritten police policy.

Three cops entered the basement of a Mattapan home and found a woman with a knife who had recently been released from a mental hospital and had stopped taking her medication. She had just cut the throats of her two young children and injured herself. They murdered her in cold blood, pumping several bullets into her.

The children never should have been in her care. This horrible tragedy was a direct result of racist police action combined with social service cutbacks. Over 200 Boston social workers were laid off last April, doubling the caseloads of those still working.

Several weeks later Cambridge cops burst into the basement of 59-year-old Daniel Furtado, who also had stopped taking his medication, and was wielding a child’s hatchet. The cops were responding to a neighbor’s call that he had cut their cable TV wires. He had lived in the neighborhood for 20 years and was known to the police as a harmless man. The cops forbade the family to intervene and negotiate and after a three-hour standoff, they murdered Furtado in a fusillade of bullets.

Both these deaths were deemed "justifiable" by police department investigations. The cops only had to say they felt threatened by their victims.

At the rally our chants and leaflet struck a nerve with other workers. Hundreds took our flyers and CHALLENGES and several joined the picket line. We warned about the dangers of passivity and individualism within the working class and called on the many onlookers to join us in fighting back.

Voting A Dead-End For LA Workers Battling Health Cuts

LOS ANGELES, Sept. 9 — After the LA County Board of Supervisors voted to close 11 of the 18 neighborhood clinics here, there have been many meetings and rallies where angry workers protested the cuts and worse ones coming. At one recent mass meeting, a minister even blamed the government which spends billions to kill people abroad while killing people here with these cuts.

The bosses claim these cuts are necessary to cover a $668 million budget deficit, while enacting a $400 billion war budget to protect Exxon Mobil’s oil profits. But the union and community leaders organizing against the cuts are directing workers’ anger at voting certain Supervisors out of office. The County Board is sponsoring Proposition B, which would raise LA home-owners’ property taxes about $40 a year to pay for part of the healthcare deficit. This would force some workers to pay for the healthcare of poorer workers — and the bosses laugh all the way to the bank.

If California were an independent country, it’s $1.2 trillion economy would be the ninth biggest in the world. This enormous wealth is produced by the labor of some 15 million workers. It could guarantee that no one in the state go hungry, homeless or lack proper healthcare. But reality paints a different picture.

In LA County, one of the richest in the state — responsible for more than one third of the state’s economic output — one million working Angelinos do not earn enough money for basic needs, much less to pay for health insurance. The reason? Bosses of big industries like garment employing over 100,000 workers and producing almost 10% of the county’s wealth, do not guarantee the minimum wage, paid holidays or vacations, or any health coverage from the wealth they steal from workers’ labor.

No wonder 3,000,000 county residents have no healthcare and are forced to rely on the public health system for their health needs. For many this is a slaughter house. Now, with these huge cuts, an already dismal system will become genocidal. Why? Because under capitalism the bosses own the products and services produced by the working class and decide who gets how much based on profitability — all at the expense of human need.

Union and community leaders claim initiatives like Proposition B can solve the health crisis and reform capitalism. But a system based on profits for the few can’t be reformed to meet the needs of the many who produce these profits.

This is the main lesson workers must learn in this fight. The working class does not have to live under such a murderous system. We can fight for a communist revolution to smash the capitalists and their system. and build a society that will produce for workers’ need, not for bosses’ profit. Getting CHALLENGE into the hands of more county workers and those workers forced to depend on county hospitals is an important step forward in this current battle against these murderous healthcare cuts!

a name="‘Who Knew?’"></">‘W"o Knew?’

SAN LUIS OBISPO, CA. — "Who knew the stock market would be in the tank? And who knew we’d be at war in Afghanistan?" That’s how the union president answered a San Luis Obispo Transit (SLO) bus driver who asked why we now have to pay $60 a month, after taxes, in pension contributions.

As the old contract expires, it’s more than just a rumor we’ll take a hit with the new one. The company’s medical contribution leaves us short by $170 per member per month. For 15 years it’s been low-paid black and Latino workers whose healthcare has been threatened by racist cutbacks. Now higher-paid workers’ health coverage is being hit, reflecting a sharpening of the bosses’ crisis. But there’s more.

For years the union has blurred our vision with the dangerous illusion that the Democrats and a rising stock market would make our families secure. Our pension plans have us chained to the stock market as a two-year slide turns into a nosedive. The union president now admits that war figures into the equation.

During World War II, families willingly donated aluminum pots and pans to the war effort to defeat the Nazis. But the developing Mid-East wars could see us being forced to collect aluminum soda cans to cover lost wages and pension benefits. Oil giants like ExxonMobil expect the working class to sacrifice to finance the Persian Gulf oil war that is crucial to maintaining their world dominance. The Democrats and Republicans agree we should pay barrels of blood for barrels of oil!

Here at S.L.O. Transit, the $165 billion federal budget deficit means fewer tax dollars for transit workers’ wages, medical benefits and pensions. Meanwhile, the Pentagon gets nearly $400 billion but schools, public health and transit get next to nothing.

The cynical LA County health director, Dr. Thomas Garthwaite, said he intended "to balance a budget, not meet all the health needs that exist in LA County. It’s not like we’re meeting those needs already."

The new transit boss substitutes "transit needs" for "health needs" when he said, "We’re going to do more with less." He means transit workers and riders will be doing more and getting less!

The working class has made its greatest gains when we attack the capitalist system and fight for the needs of our entire class. At S.L.O. Transit there is talk of slowdowns at some operating divisions, but little news of our contract negotiations. On several sides of this city, we are patiently organizing the coming fight for our future, the fight for workers’ power.

Black Workers Pay Higher Price for War Economy

As war and a fascist police state are the order of the day, racism and inequality are intensifying. Racist inequality is a principal foundation of the system, a part of its structure. In July, the National Urban League released its annual report, The State of Black America. It details some of the most racist aspects of the U.S. political and economic system.

The stock market’s recent collapse is another example of capitalism’s instability and its inability to provide the working class in general, and black and Latino workers in particular, stable jobs and a decent standard of living.

Workers are paying the billions of dollars needed to invade Iraq and losing billions more disappearing on the stock market gambling table and open thievery of U.S. corporations. Black workers have been hit the hardest. In June, the unemployment rate for whites was 5.2%, but was more than twice that for black workers, 10.7%. (As CHALLENGE has reported, these figure are about half the actual jobless totals.) In 1998, 26% of African-Americans were poor, compared with 8% of non-Hispanic whites. There has been no gain for black workers in home ownership since before the civil rights movement. In the workplace, blacks are twice as likely to hold lower-paying service jobs. The percentage of black men between 25 and 34 whose wages are below the poverty line jumped from about 20% in 1969 to over 50% in 1991.

If black workers were at the same level as whites, there would be three million more black homeowners, three million more blacks with high school diplomas and three million more with college degrees. The average black family would see a 56% jump in annual income.

Both political parties are responsible. Under Clinton the absolute incomes of the poorest blacks declined dramatically while one million more people, mainly young black men, were imprisoned. Clinton destroyed welfare and replaced it with $1.67/hour slave labor "Workfare" jobs. Since California passed Proposition 209 in 1995 banning the consideration of "race" in college admissions, government employment and contracting, black and Latino enrollment at University of California campuses has dropped by roughly 50%.

Meanwhile, black people win Oscars, break home-run records, lead in women’s tennis and men’s golf and dominate the music world. Racist Bush is quick to point to his National Security Advisor Condelezza Rice and Secy. of State Colin Powell as playing leading roles in his administration. The rulers are trying to convince tens of millions of the most oppressed and exploited to fight in their wars for Exxon’s oil profits.

Unfortunately, the Urban League, the other civil rights organizations and the unions are in the hands of the most dominant "liberal" wing of the ruling class, which is pushing the hardest for war and a fascist police state. The working class has no stake in supporting the rulers’ efforts to convince them they can "become anything they want to be" (even CEOs). This has never been true. We must smash racism in all its forms, unite the working class during class struggle, and build a mass PLP from inside the rulers’ own mass organizations.

a name="Terrorism Won’t Free Workers Of Capitalist Oppression">">"errorism Won’t Free Workers Of Capitalist Oppression

Millions of people worldwide think terrorism is a legitimate way to fight imperialism, the biggest terrorists of modern times. It seems to be "the weapon of the weak," a means for the very oppressed to fight back. A single terrorist with a group, a bomb and willingness to die basically cannot be stopped. But individual terrorism is reactionary and anti-working class.

Many in the Middle East see terrorism as the main tactic of anti-imperialism. The reactionary ideology behind this is nationalism and religious fanaticism. While uniting with the masses in fighting U.S. and Israeli imperialism and fascist mass terror, we must also fight terrorism and its reactionary ideology which never has and never will lead the working class to power.

Terrorist politics reflects the anti-working class idea that millions of workers and their allies can’t be organized for mass violence and revolutionary political action. This expresses contempt for the working class. What’s more, terrorism usually provokes even more violence and suffering at the hands of the imperialists, without preparing workers to defend themselves.

Palestinian terrorist groups, like Hamas and Al Aqsa (linked to Arafat’s PLO) want to replace Israeli bosses with Palestinian bosses in exploiting Palestinian workers. They plan and carry out attacks on civilians while opposing the organizing of workers across all borders along class lines. Their goal is a state run by a small elite of fascist Islamic fundamentalists or nationalist bosses.

Why should workers fight and die for another form of exploitation? We should never advocate any kind of capitalist solution. Nothing less than communist revolution will end exploitation of the working class, whether in Palestine or anywhere else.

Some bourgeois anti-imperialists advocate civil disobedience rather than terrorism, like Gandhi’s tactics in India during the 1920s, or the Civil Rights Movement in the U.S. in the ’60s. But the "politics" of civil disobedience also means relying on some group of exploiters. Sometimes it means banking on "world opinion," which means counting on divisions among the imperialists, either within the Israeli ruling class or between European, Israeli and U.S. rulers.

In short, "civil disobedience" means hoping one group of rulers will support you because they find it useful to do so in their own struggle against another group of rulers.

Terrorism and "civil disobedience" are two sides of the politics of "national liberation." Neither will train the working class to take revolutionary leadership. A Palestinian state run by Palestinian bosses and cops — either secular like Arafat’s fascist Palestinian Authority, or religious, like the brutal fascist regime in Iran — holds only continued super-exploitation for the working class.

Why Communists Who Led Working Class in Middle East Failed

In workers’ hands, communist politics can be a mighty material force. We must bring communist ideas to the workers in every struggle. Just a few decades ago, the fundamentalists were relatively weak in the region and were built by U.S., Saudi and other Arab bosses to counter the communists, who led the working class, particularly the key sector of oil workers. The Iraq Communist Party, one of the largest in the region, had a multi-ethnic leadership (Arab, Kurd and Jewish). It organized a massive violent general strike which led to the toppling of the pro-British monarchy in the late 1950s. But the CP’s reformist and "lesser evil" politics (alliance with "progressive nationalist" bosses) helped prevent the working class from taking revolutionary power. The united front with "lesser evils" led to the nationalist Ba’ath Party, which murdered tens of thousands of their former allies (communists and workers in general). Saddam Hussein was a product of the Ba’ath Party’s anti-communist politics. The CIA then helped finger most of the targeted communists. Such united fronts caused the slaughter of millions more communists and other workers in Indonesia, Iran and Egypt, among others.

Fighting the ideology of terrorism, "lesser evil" bosses and three-stage revolution — national liberation, socialism (with many features of capitalism) and later communism — are essential to building a new communist movement.

Who Sold Saddam Biowarfare Agents? The U.S. of Course

The U.S. ruling class, in its drive towards war to seize Iraq’s oil fields, has painted Saddam Hussein as "worse than Hitler," especially for his attempt to develop so-called "weapons of mass destruction (WMD)." Of course, the U.S. is the world’s leading producer of WMD.

They charge Saddam with threatening to use chemical and biological weapons. And who supplied Iraq with the materials to create such a program? None other than the U.S.!

According to two reports (5/25/94 and 10/7/94) of the U.S. Senate Committee on Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs with Respect to Export Administration, a veritable witches brew of biological materials were exported to Iraq by private U.S. suppliers. This was pursuant to application and licensing by the U.S. Department of Commerce. Among the dozens of biological agents shipped to Iraq during the 1980s Iran-Iraq war were anthrax, clostridium Botulinum (a source of botulinum toxin), Histoplasma Capsulatam (which causes a disease attacking the lungs, brain, spinal cord and heart) and brucella Melitensis (a bacteria that can damage major organs), among others.

The Senate Report said, "These biological materials were not…weakened and were capable of reproduction.." Furthermore, "It was later learned that these microorganisms exported by the U.S. were identical to those United Nations inspectors found and removed from the Iraq biological warfare program."

Interestingly, a front-page article in the New York Times (8/19) that reported senior military officers revealing the Reagan administration had provided Iraq with critical battle planning assistance during decisive battles in the Iran-Iraq war, neglected to mention the U.S. supplying Iraq with these biowarfare agents. Presumably that was "news not fit to print."

So U.S. rulers use Hussein’s possession of such WMD — which he may very well no longer have — as the "reason" for their invasion of Iraq Yet it was these very same rulers who put them in Saddam’s hands. If this makes Hussein "worse than Hitler," what does that make his U.S. imperialist suppliers who now declare themselves on a path of unending war and expanding fascism?

Cops Step Up Racist Terror in Minneapolis

MINNEAPOLIS, MN August 23 — Bap-Bap-Bap-Bap! Shots from the guns of police Sgt. Bob Gretton and cop Steve Blackwell filled the air. When the shooting stopped, 11-year-old Julius Powell, had a gunshot wound the size of a quarter in his left arm and his uncle’s pit bull was dead. Angry residents in the Jordan neighborhood exploded. People started cursing and throwing bottles at the police and news crews as they arrived on the scene. Several cars and news vans were hit and one news van was torched.

It all began when several police cars and a special SWAT van came to the home of Julius’ grandmother, Shirley Powell, with a "high risk" narcotics search warrant. They leaped from their cars, guns drawn. Julius’ uncle, Tavares Powell, was holding a leashed pit bull. The police claim he let go of the leash and the dog ran towards them. Gretton and Blackwell both fired MP-5 submachine guns at the dog and say a ricocheting bullet hit Julius.

But neighbors and family members aren’t buying it. "The dog just stood there barking and the cops came up shooting," said Tony Powell. Julius’ parents said they thought the injury was caused by a direct gunshot from at least one of the cops. Inspector Tim Dolan said, " It was an accidental shooting, regardless if it was a ricochet or we hit directly."

An angry crowd grew to about 100 and the police cut their search short. They found six bags of marijuana and a handgun. Shirley Powell was arrested and charged with endangerment of a child. Yet that was never a consideration when the cops, weapons drawn, raided the house with ten children under age 14 in it.

The next day black nationalist businessman Mike Moss met with city leaders, praising them for how they handled the situation. His City Incorporated all-black security force will be used to patrol the neighborhood.

This was the third act of racist police terror this month. On August 1, 60-year-old Martha Donald, with a history of mental illness and substance abuse, was killed in a shoot-out with police in a bathroom of her housing project. Her niece called 911 because her aunt had been drinking and threatening to use her gun. One cop was also killed.

From that point on, many black workers feel that the police have reacted like, "You shot one of ours, now we’ll shoot as many of yours as we can get away with." On August 13, 19-year-old Terrelle Oliver was shot at least three times by cops who said he threatened them as he fled!

This latest round of racist terror is just a taste of what the bosses have in store for us as they inch closer to war and build a fascist police state. We will increase our CHALLENGE readership here and discuss with our co-workers how best to respond.

Workers of the World, Write!

Letters

a name="Teachers Back PL’er, Rip Red-baiter">">"eachers Back PL’er, Rip Red-baiter

As the chairperson of our school’s teachers union committee, I publish and distribute its newsletter to all staff members at school. The newsletter is three years old. It reports on city-wide union issues, organizes modest campaigns for improvements at our school and analyzes how major world developments significantly impact us.

I do this openly as a communist and proud member of PLP. Teachers have accepted and support this approach, electing and re-electing me as chairperson of the union committee. In fact, the majority of our teachers get CHALLENGE.

In February our local union president wrote me stating it’s "inappropriate" to "argue a private political cause" in the newsletter. The president was particularly critical of the newsletter’s comparison of George Bush and Osama bin Laden. The president’s anti-communist letter led to a good discussion in our elected union committee. They wrote a strong response signed by every member! The letter:

• Indicated "surprise and upset" with the president’s request for our chapter chairperson to "desist from putting forward his political views" in the newsletter;

• Cited our chapter chairperson being "elected twice by the staff with their full knowledge of his politics";

• Recalled that two years ago discussions were held regarding the appropriateness of the chapter chairperson and others expressing their political views in the newsletter and "while there was not unanimous agreement, there was a clear mandate from the vast majority of staff members" that the newsletter was "in fact, an excellent forum to present views on issues that concern us all, teachers and students";

• Approved the chapter chairperson’s attempt "to initiate a dialogue about the war, partly to counter the very dangerous sentiment that ‘you’re either for us or against us’ which the current Washington administration is proposing and which perhaps you [the union president] seems too ready to accept";

• Said the committee believes it’s wrong to criticize our chapter chairperson’s efforts to encourage wide debate among union members about war because "as educators it is our duty to engage in inquiry and debate on this and other serious issues"; and,

• Concluded that unions are political organizations and "it would be a very dangerous trend to attempt to limit the type of political views a member of the organization can hold and express within all union forums and publications." [It should be noted that PLP does not support unhindered free speech for racists or for others who organize in support of exploitation.]

Every faculty member received a copy of our letter as well as the president’s, and he backed off. In another letter, the president said our chapter chairperson is encouraged, along with "other politically committed members," to air their beliefs and "engage in debate." He said if I wished to create an "opinion section" for the newsletter, I was "free to do so."

This was an important victory. My co-workers deserve serious respect for taking a difficult but highly principled stand. The union committee accomplished something quite important. We won the right, at least for now, to have a revolutionary anti-capitalist point of view in our union’s political debate.

Midwestern Striving to be a Fish in the Sea of the People

Church Members Confront Politician on Iraq War

This summer our club — based in a church soup kitchen — has grown modestly through some political struggle and developing ties with friends, raising our commitment to the Party.

Representing the church, some of us walked through several miles of neighborhoods north of our parish, preparing for a meeting with our congressperson’s aide. Workers eagerly took our bilingual flyers decrying the deaths of children in Baghdad, Bethlehem and our own city. We sang hymns and versions of "Bella Ciao" (an Italian anti-fascist song) and the Internationale with our priest’s hearty participation.

In meeting with the congressional aide, a multi-racial group raised the representatives’ silence on the coming Iraqi war, her support for Israeli imperialism and inaction on using federal homeless funds quickly and decently to house our sisters and brothers. The aide dutifully took notes and promised answers. We will intensify our pressure and confront him early this fall. By such actions many church members, who basically think our congressperson is pretty good, will learn much more about the role of liberal politicians.

We are also hosting a program about the racist murder of hundreds of thousands of Iraqis caused by U.S. and British sanctions and military attacks. From this meeting and a sermon I will give shortly we will struggle for an even larger group to meet with staff members of one or both of our senators. They are big supporters of Israeli fascism and racist "homeland security." After the senators are more exposed as racist imperialist operatives, we hope to join with student activists in our city to sharpen the anti-war, anti-fascist work in the metropolitan region.

Our best activity this summer was our "summer camp for activists and those who want to be more active." A group of us lived out a communist life-style for five days in a friend’s barn near the Canadian border. We brought many books and articles on racism and imperialist war from a church library. Each person chose a short selection to study and report on. Many had never done this before and did well in this context of warm, comradely leadership and support. We also fished, toured the lovely farm region and relaxed.

One terrifying experience brought home the reality of intensifying U.S. fascism. We entered Canada just to look around and stayed for less than an hour. When returning, we discovered the only friend who was not yet a citizen had forgotten her green card. We were detained for two hours. Fortunately her brother was able to locate her card in her apartment, and the number matched the computer’s data. Her name had been mis-recorded. Had her name been "Fatima" rather than Frances the INS might have jailed her for deportation. As she held her small son and sobbed, I knew something of what it must have been like for a U.S. slave to be on the block and fear being sold away from her family. Our friend and her husband have been giving much more leadership to our club, both before and after this experience. Just as in fascist Italy in the 1930’s and ’40’s, the Party can grow in the jaws of fascism!

With confidence in the Working Class,

Red Churchmouse

Steelworkers Attack Bush But Must Oppose Dems, Too

On September 5, about 300 steelworkers and others protested Bush’s appearance at a Republican fund-raiser. The protest was used to support a liberal Democrat for Congress. It was a pretty tame gathering, the sole proposal being getting out the vote. We rallied in a small park across the river from where Bush was speaking.

It was a much smaller, and more passive version of the anti-globalization rally in Seattle several years ago — union members, environmentalists and a few anarchists. In Seattle there was a lot of anger over sweatshops, prison labor and the terrible conditions workers face worldwide. Since 9/11, the bosses and their agents in the unions and mass organizations have turned this hatred of the system into a more typical trade union movement.

One speaker was cheered when he called for international solidarity. Workers are hungry to understand the world we are facing. Steelworkers are working without contracts, losing health care and pensions. As the bosses move to war to prop up their system of thievery, these attacks will intensify. The better we know the workers, and the better they know the Party, and the more battles we share, the greater our influence. Developing networks of CHALLENGE readers and distributors is especially important.

Sometimes it’s hard to gauge the quantitative and qualitative effect we have in the mass movement. It’s equally hard to gauge the effect the mass movement has on us. We successfully mobilized our PLP club and some friends to attend this rally. Generally it was a good thing. We had a chance to interact with our co-workers and union members, and have more serious discussions with those who came with us. It’s another small way I am getting more involved in my union’s political action committee. We must be in the mass movement in order to build a mass base for PLP and the great prize we are fighting for — a communist society run by and for the working class.

Big Red

a name="Don’t Fight Exxon’s War — Fight the Bosses"></a>"on’t Fight Exxon’s War — Fight the Bosses

A couple of days ago I heard an early 1960’s anti-war folksong that had a bitter line that went something like, "Where have all the soldiers gone? Gone to flowers everyone." I started wondering where has all the money for public transit gone?

I’m no singer, but with the idea of starting a little struggle on the shop floor, I posted a short summary of the 2003 US defense (war) budget. Within a couple of hours, a forklift operator came to me and asked, "Did you put up those papers about the defense budget?"

Since I knew him a little, I said, "Yeah Carl, I put them up." He hesitated for a moment and I wasn’t sure where this was going. Then he said in a low voice, "You got any more copies?" I went straight to find a copy machine.

The next day someone had scrawled in big letters across the bottom "Bomb Iraq." At first I was going to write a sharp political comment underneath it. But I think I should get some feedback from Carl and a couple of others on what to do about it. It’s a chance to show Carl CHALLENGE newspaper.

This incident shows two sides of the struggle going on among the working class. Many workers buy into the imperialist "Whack Iraq" program but a ton of workers already know that the bosses plans mean that more "death and taxes" are the only "sure" things for workers under capitalism. Now the struggle begins. That’s what we’re after, a chance to put our communist ideas against the bosses’ line of exploitation and war.

Red Transit Worker

Nationalism is no way to fight oppression

There’s a large Palestinian "liberation" movement in the UK. The "Scottish Friends Of Palestine Campaign" had a march of 50,000 in London on April 13. We were invited but we declined. This is why.

They claim they’re for the defense of the Palestinians, but their speakers shout, "DIE ISRAEL DIE!" on the platform. The capitalist "left" calls for the victory of the Intifada because they feel that a victory for the Palestinian capitalist class would be beneficial to the Palestinian working class. This directly contradicts the theory of the class struggle, which states there cannot be unity between capitalist and worker, and that for workers, there’s no "national interest."

As Lenin said, a defeat for one group of imperialists will not weaken capitalism. The fall of the British Empire has not weakened capitalism one iota. The nationalism of the oppressed is no better than the nationalism of the oppressor. Nationalism is anti-working class poison and plays no progressive role in society! It’s an attempt to hide the class struggle, to unify social classes that have antagonistic interests.

Oswald Mosley (British Union Of Fascists) said everything must be subordinated to the "national interest"; strikes must be banned, and that if people want to end class struggle they should join the Fascists. It’s interesting that the British Nazi Party also calls for the victory of Palestine. So now groups openly on the bosses’ side are allied to the capitalist "left" who claim to represent our class interests. Anything the Nazis support must be very suspect indeed.

Uniting with our exploiters is a dead-end for workers. The working class should wage a war against them and their "left wing" capitalist lackeys. Workers have no stake in shedding blood in the Middle East. Smash the social-fascist lackeys of the bosses! Abolish the wage system!

"British" comrade

RED EYE ON THE NEWS

RED EYE reprints clippings from the New York Times, British Manchester Guardian Weekly, and many other well-known capitalist publications. From their own papers we collect material which communists find useful in exposing capitalist manuevers and weaknesses. Especially useful for students and others who want an "official source for important facts. Abbreviations: MG= Manchester Guardian; NYT= New York Times; MM=Multinational Monitor; LOW=Liberal Opinion Weekly; FT=Financial Times

Bush ready for big sacrifice?

When President Bush held his economic forum in Waco, Texas…Jay Leno remarked that Mr. Bush would do whatever it took to keep the economy strong — "even if he must stay on vacation for three months." (NYT, 8/22)

World is learning: votes no help

Mr. Haddadi, like many others…cares most about…the misery of cramped housing and a lack of water. Discontent is so high that nearly 70 percent of the voters in Algiers area did not cast ballots in the national elections on May 30. Asked if he voted, Mr. Haddadi shouted, "Never! It won’t change anything." (NYT, 8/11)

School $: Guess who gets most

In most states, school districts with the neediest students receive far less state and local tax money…than schools with the fewest poor children. (NYT, 8/9)

Productivity mystery solved

By cutting back the hours of workers without reducing the workload, employers pushed up the nation’s annual growth rate of productivity by 1.1 percent in the second quarter, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported yesterday. (NYT, 8/10)

Capitalists are single-minded

The hierarchies of businesses continue to contain an above-average representation of hard-nosed, ambitious individuals who want to be number one. When Gianni Agnelli, patriarch of Fiat’s founding family, was asked what made a successful company, he said: "An odd number of directors in the boardroom." Before adding, "Three is too many." (FT, 8/9)

English-teacher shortage hits 5 million immigrant students

The number of students with limited English skills, most of them Hispanic, has doubled. to five million….If [they]…were to be taught in classes of the average national size — about 17 pupils per teacher — up to 290,000 teachers would be needed. (NYT, 9/5)

US disrupts already-inadequate programs to aid world’s women

Brutality…kills and maims girls and women across much of Africa and Asia….Last month Mr. Bush cut off all $34 million in funds for the United Nations Population Fund in all 142 countries in which it operates….

[The] program in Burundi has now been canceled — along with midwife training in Algeria, a center to fight AIDS in Haiti and a maternal mortality reduction program in India….

The central issue is that 500,000 women die each year in pregnancy or childbirth; that 100 million women and girls worldwide are "missing" because they are denied adequate food or medical care, or because they are aborted or killed at birth because they are female; that 60 percent of the children kept out of elementary school are girls; that 130 million girls have undergone genital mutilation; that between one and two million girls and women are trafficked into prostitution annually….(NYT, 8/16)

(This is a 3-weeks issue of Challenge)

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A Year After September 11: U.S. Rulers At War Over Iraq War Plans

Big Bosses Need A Long Bloody War To Remain Top Dog

Federal Mediator Won’t Be Neutral at Boeing Talks

‘Meet My Wife: A Terrorist Supporter’

Patriotism Helps Strikebreaking

‘Jobless Recovery’: Workers Always Lose in Capitalism’s Periodic Crises

Liberal Pols, Union Hacks Undermine Dockworkers’ Struggle

Open Letter In Solidarity With Dockworkers From Active, Laid-Off And Retired Boeing Workers

Blame Capitalism for Murder of Ciudad Juárez Women

Mob Violence Mirrors Racist Cops

Lesser Evil Chirac Building Police State

U.S. Victory In Afghanistan Unravelling

LETTERS

Win Soldiers To Fight Sexism

Church Groups Protest Nuclear Weapons, Iraq War

UMWA Did Nothing To Help Trapped Miners

• Editorial reply

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A Year After September 11

U.S. Rulers At War Over Iraq War Plans

A funny thing happened on the way to Baghdad. The main wing of the U.S. ruling class (led by the Rockefeller’s Exxon-Mobil oil gang) and the Pentagon have opened a very public assault on Bush’s plan for invading Iraq. In July, Pentagon sources leaked two scenarios under consideration. One involves attacking Iraq from the west, north, and south with 250,000 U.S. ground troops and then fighting on to Baghdad. In the other, a smaller U.S. airborne force assaults the capital first and radiates outwards. As the criticisms mount, the Bush-Cheney-Rumsfeld plan to "go it alone" in Iraq may have them going it alone in Washington.

We should not be misled by this major tactical difference between Bush and the liberals. An invasion may be delayed, but it is far from scrapped. Both sides are committed to US world dominance and control of oil, regardless of the price in workers’ blood.

One of the main points of conflict appears to be that Bush & Co. have not "made the case" to win workers and soldiers to accept massive casualties in Iraq or in other oil wars that will follow. Liberal strategists see the Vietnam Syndrome as the biggest hurdle Bush has yet to overcome. A chorus of voices from the liberal Rockefeller-Exxon Mobil wing of the Republican Party is warning Bush that a half-baked invasion could cause U.S. imperialism more problems than it would solve.

Not surprisingly, two of the loudest voices are those of Colin Powell and Norman Schwarzkopf, two former generals who earned their stripes being defeated in Vietnam. Schwarzkopf, the butcher of Desert Storm in 1991, is preaching that the main lesson of Vietnam is never to go to war without the full support of the population. During Vietnam, workers, soldiers and youth were not politically committed to kill and die for U.S. imperialism and rebelled. The specter of Vietnam still haunts the rulers. "If the action involved ground troops and resulted in significant American casualties, a majority of 51 percent would oppose the action." (Washington Post, 8/18)

Funded by the Rockefeller Foundation and the Naval War College, Veterans Administration psychiatrist Jonathan Shay has written a new book called Odysseus in America. Shay compares the ancient Greek hero’s adventures to the travails of a traumatized modern veteran returning home. The book’s main point is that trauma and rebellion among soldiers can be avoided by improving leadership, training and camaraderie. Make the troops more loyal and they become more lethal.

Big Bosses Need A Long Bloody War To Remain Top Dog

Exxon Mobil doesn’t want a hit-and-run operation. Maintaining a stranglehold on the world’s oil supplies and shipping routes is crucial to the rulers’ strategy of preventing the emergence of a rival superpower. The main wing of the U.S. ruling class—and their politicians inside both the Republican and Democratic Parties—see that achieving this goal will take a protracted, long-term effort. Rockefeller stooge Henry Kissinger said, "Military intervention should be attempted only if we are willing to sustain such an effort for however long it is needed." (New York Times, 8/16)

The Pentagon is gearing up for a much longer conflict than anything Bush has tried to sell the public. The Navy just awarded the Maersk shipping line a five-year contract to operate vessels that will ferry tanks and ammunition from Diego Garcia in the Indian Ocean to the Persian Gulf. (Defense Department press release, 8/5) The Air Force has built a huge permanent base in Qatar, within striking range of Iraq.

Brent Scowcroft, Bush Sr.’s national security advisor warned Bush Jr., "[D]estroy[ing] Saddam’s regime...would not be a cakewalk. On the

contrary, it undoubtedly would be very expensive...and could as well be bloody…Finally, if we are to achieve our strategic objectives in Iraq, a military campaign very likely would have to be followed by a large-scale, long-term military occupation." (Wall Street Journal, 8/15)

These critics and others represent the sector of U.S. capital that has the most to lose from a misfire in Iraq. Kissinger and Scowcroft work for Kissinger Associates, a "strategic consulting group" that counts Exxon Mobil as its top client. When Scowcroft calls "global terrorism" the main threat to U.S. interests, he means that Al Qaeda and "terrorists" in Indonesia and the Philippines could threaten Exxon Mobil and shut off vital sea-lanes to their tankers.

Don’t look for anti-war sentiment among liberal ruling-class spokesmen who urge caution in Iraq. Despite their words, they will sacrifice human lives by the millions for the sake of profit. Capitalism makes murderous oil wars inevitable. Begging for peace won’t stop these imperialist butchers. Only communist revolution can smash imperialist war. This is worth fighting and dying for. Building the PLP, now and in the long, hard years ahead, will eventually lead our class to overthrow the war makers.

U.S. Bosses’ Road to Baghdad Full of Potholes

While Exxon and BP want to recoup the oil fields they lost to Iraqi nationalization in the late 1950s, the road to Baghdad is proving to be a difficult one for the U.S/British imperialists. A force of local Iraqi-Kurd mercenaries to oust Saddam Hussein and form a pro-U.S. government is not so easy to assemble. In early August, the motley crew slated to form a "Northern Alliance"-Afghan-type invasion force was invited to Washington. The leading section was the London-based Iraqi National Congress (INC), headed by Ahmad Chalabi, whose main claim to fame has been to grab and mis-use the millions they received from the U.S. government.

"Not far away in London, Saad Jabr, leader of one of the oldest opposition groups, the Free Iraq Council, says the INC ‘was created by the Americans…to dismantle the opposition.’ A London representative of the powerful Kurdistan Democratic Party thinks Mr. Chalabi has ‘never been a team player. He has alienated many people with his words and wild ideas.’ The tensions among Iraq’s opposition groups amount to a significant impediment as the Bush administration speaks more publicly about ousting Mr. Hussein." (Wall Street Journal, 8/13).

One key player missing from the Washington trip was Kurdish Democratic Party chief Massoud Barzani, the most powerful Kurdish warlord, whose father led the largest Kurdish rebellion of the last century. His absence "was a blow to the Bush administration officials who had orchestrated the meeting in part to demonstrate that Iraqi opposition forces were unified behind a new campaign to oust Saddam Hussein." (NY Times, 8/15)

Even offering Barzani a private plane and a personal visit with Bush failed to get him to Washington. Barzani is crucial because he leads tens of thousands of experienced Kurdish fighters.But Barzani has his own plans — forming a Kurdish mini-state controlling key oil resources around Kirkuk in northern Iraq. The Turkish government, a vital U.S. ally, fears this might incite its own Kurdish population to rebel. "Turkish officials have warned that they are prepared to go to war to prevent the Iraqi Kurds from declaring a kind of mini Kurdish state within Iraq." (Times).

In 1993, Barzani’s group started fighting the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK) over the lucrative oil smuggling revenues. The PUK is led by Barzani’s rival Jalal Talabani (who came to the Washington meeting). At that time Barzani called for Saddam Hussein to help crush the PUK. The Iraqi army seized the opportunity to wipe out the INC from its CIA-established headquarters in the town of Arbil in Iraqi Kurdistan.

When U.S. bosses decide to invade Iraq, all hell might break loose. There are some 60 smaller anti-Saddam Hussein groups as well as hundreds of individuals operating independently, including a notable senior military defector from Iraq, Nizar al-Khazraji, who played a role in using poison gas against Iranian soldiers in 1988. Reagan and Bush, Sr. provided aid and logistical help to Iraq, and "wasn’t so horrified by Iraq’s use of gas," according to US military officers. (New York Times, 8/18) So even if U.S. troops seize the oil fields and eliminate Hussein, the resulting conflicts might make Afghanistan look like a tea party (see page 6).

(A future article will examine what the working class of Iraq, the Persian Gulf and the world can do against this war-war-war-and-more-war hell created by the world’s imperialists.)

Big Bosses Need A Long Bloody War To Remain Top Dog

It’s been one year since the September 11th attacks on the World Trade Center in New York City and the Pentagon in Washington DC. In this time, the U.S. launched war in Afghanistan, war in the Middle-East has escalated, and millions of workers have lost their jobs in the U.S. and around the world. Capitalism around the world is failing and killing workers for the interest of profits. Now more than ever, the working class needs a revolution to get rid of this system of exploitation.

Don’t Trust the Same Government that Threatens to Bust Dockworkers’ Strike

Federal Mediator Won’t Be Neutral at Boeing Talks

SEATTLE-TACOMA, WA, August 15 — The Machinists’ union asked a federal mediator to intervene in contract talks today. The negotiators cited the wide gap in pension proposals and "job security" language. Just days before, the longshoreman held a rally at Pier 66 demanding the federal government get out of their negotiations. Is the role of the federal government sometimes positive and sometimes negative? Is it neutral, "above and beyond" the class struggle?

The government is, and always will be, the agent of class rule. Under capitalism, the government always serves the bosses. It is the power behind the bosses’ dictatorship.

The bosses and their agents in the labor movement spread the illusion that the government and its mediators can be honest brokers, even neutral. But dockworkers are seeing the real truth, that the government is an instrument of bosses’ terror.

A Fox In The Hen House

Why then would the union negotiators invite our enemy into the contract talks? The sad fact is that they believe the interests of the workers and bosses are reconcilable.

"The way we see it, there is nothing wrong with telling a corporation, ‘If your revenues are up, if your orders are up, you hire more workers, you don’t ship work overseas,’" chief negotiator Dick Schneider, told the New York Times. "But we understand that if your revenues are down then you lay people off." (Our emphasis, Ed.)

But the "State" — and all the organs of governmental oppression like the army, police, courts and laws — arose precisely because the interests of workers and bosses are irreconcilable. The bosses get out of their periodic crises of overproduction by attacking us. Their need to maximize profits is in direct contradiction with our need for a decent life. How much longer will we allow them to exploit our labor and then discard us like so much extra baggage when their profits are threatened?

‘Meet My Wife: A Terrorist Supporter’

At the Longshoremen’s demonstration, an older speaker observed, "Bush calls us terrorists. I’d like to introduce you to my wife, Edith. She’s a terrorist supporter….And my kids: more terrorist supporters!" The crowd roared with laughter. Everyone there knew that the real war was the war on workers.

Who is prosecuting this war? Who had secret meetings with Homeland Security to plan the mobilization of Army and National Guard troops to take over the docks? The same Federal Government, that’s who!

Even faced with these stark facts, the union leaders still push their faith in capitalism. "If we just spend more time and money electing ‘friends of labor,’ we can sway the government in our direction."

But the capitalists’ government has never been peacefully taken over by the working class! We can’t elect a workers’ state to serve our interests. We can’t turn the bosses’ state into an instrument of workers’ rule. We must smash it!

Mediators won’t get us jobs, let alone answer the bosses’ "Homeland-Security" attacks on our class. To get the job done, we must build a mass revolutionary communist movement to smash the bosses’ dictatorship and replace it with the dictatorship of the working class to serve our needs. Joining the Progressive Labor Party and circulating Challenge, are good first steps.

1919 Seattle Longshoremen Aided Bolshevik Revolution

(Seattle author Anna Louise Strong remembers a proud chapter in our labor history in her book, "I Change Worlds." The year was 1919. Longshoremen had discovered arms secretly being shipped to Russia to supply the 17 capitalist armies that had invaded the Soviet Union to destroy the new Bolshevik working-class revolution.) The following is an excerpt from Strong’s book:

"Seattle longshoremen led the strike against supplying arms to [the counter-revolutionary] Kolchak [forces], and it spread up and down the coast. They had just won by their wartime strength their first collective agreement with the shipping companies.…Hardly was the ink dry on the agreement when the workers discovered that arms were in the sealed cases [labeled ‘sewing machines’] that were being shipped to Kolchak. They knew what they risked when they voted to strike, thus breaking the collective agreement, which they were never again able to renew. But they knew also that British workers struck against sending arms to the intervention in Russia; that French soldiers mutinied; that workers struck in solidarity all around the world. Thus they did their part against Kolchak, their share in the world revolution."

(When 40 scabs were sent to load the arms, 400 longshoremen "met" them. Few of the scabs escaped unscathed. — PL Magazine, July 1973)

Patriotism Helps Strikebreaking

I went to the recent International Longshoremen’s and Warehousemen’s Union (ILWU) rally in Seattle. There were 500 to 1,000 workers there, about half longshoremen. The rest were organized by various other unions and mass organizations.

I was impressed with the apparent militance and class-consciousness presented by the union. On the surface this seemed to be a very good rally. But soon the essence became clearer. One thing that stood out was all the war talk. Workers carried signs saying, "No War on Workers." The speakers seemed to understand that this Bush administration attack — threatening to use federal troops to break any strike — is part of a war effort and a disciplining of the working class, but they felt the workers’ interests and "U.S. interests" were essentially the same. But "U.S. interests" are those of the ruling class, not the workers.

There was talk of fighting long and hard to protect the workers’ interests, of striking and taking to the streets. There were calls to unite dockworkers with other area workers. However, the union’s main demand is to preserve current jobs and pensions while sacrificing future jobs.(See CHALLENGE, AUG.21) This betrays a self-serving position and is not true class-consciousness. Bush was painted as the enemy along with the company. One speaker even called the CEO’s of WorldCom and Enron "the real terrorists." There is tremendous potential in these labor struggles for our Party to point to capitalism as the real enemy, one which will continue producing wars and sharpening attacks on the working class.

When Bush talks about sending federal troops to break a strike, it’s clear that workers are the enemy in the "war on terrorism," but then the union gets defensive and announces they’re "the real patriots." However, capitalism requires war and squeezing the most labor for the lowest cost from the entire working class in an unending drive to maximize profits. In wartime, which seems to be all the time nowadays, this drive intensifies When Bush said "You’re either with us or against us," he was talking to workers and he meant regardless of the costs involved.

Without revolutionary leadership the workers will lose in the long run, in any struggle. But the contradictions of capitalism become increasingly evident, as the need for greater profits impels more blatant attacks on workers requiring intensified fascism. By organizing resistance to these attacks, the Party can win by recruiting workers in the course of this struggle.

We must become more involved in the mass organizations and should attend such rallies with our co-workers. This enhances our opportunity to develop workers’ knowledge of these basic questions.

We’re planning to connect this struggle to the one at Boeing and to other work in the area.

Seattle Red

‘Jobless Recovery’: Workers Always Lose in Capitalism’s Periodic Crises

U.S. capitalism’s latest "jobless recovery" is fast degenerating into a "double dip recession," a second decline before emerging from the first one. "The beginnings of a normal recovery…seemed to grind to a halt in July." (New York Times, 8/12)

For the working class, this means more mass layoffs, speed-up and wage-cuts, enabling U.S. corporations to maintain and/or increase profits.

The bosses boast they’re increasing productivity (how much a worker produces in an hour), which is "good for the economy." Good" for whom? The Times explains that employers have become "skilled" at responding to fall-offs in demand by rapidly laying off workers and cutting overtime for those remaining so that, "Employees still on the job worked faster." The current "increased productivity" is based on speed-up, pure and simple.

Northwestern Univ. economist Robert Gordon says, "It is easy in the United States to get sharp and sudden declines in hours by laying off workers and eliminating overtime, and this contributes to healthy productivity growth in hard times." "Healthy for whom? Maybe economists keep collecting their paychecks from Wall Street investment houses and universities, but certainly not for the millions laid off nor for those remaining who are sped up unmercifully.

All this means, "Profit no longer shrinks…now that companies are quicker to cut labor costs by shedding workers and hours." (Times, 8/10) This reduces workers’ income, affecting consumer spending. Its decline leads to "another round of cost-cutting" and "widespread redundancies [layoffs]." (London Financial Times, 8/2) "Stagnant Wages Pose Added Risks to Weak Economy," headlines the Aug. 11 Times — which economists say has become the driving force for maintaining the economy.

One current drain on workers’ income is the rising cost of health insurance: "Profits are squeezed so employers have to shift more of the cost [of health insurance] to employees, and it is harder and harder to get a job, so companies don’t have to worry about employees going somewhere else." (Times, 8/11) This is an economic "recovery"?

All this confirms Karl Marx’s analysis about capitalism’s "Reserve Army of the Unemployed." The bosses’ system creates the army of unemployed that enables them to cut wages and speed up workers who fear joining that "army," enabling the bosses to slowly start increasing profits once again. Meanwhile, the working class suffers untold miseries, losing savings and homes, gong into debt and falling prey to illness and earlier deaths as well as increasing mental anguish.

"Officially" eight million are unemployed, but the real total is at least twice that. The 8,000,000 doesn’t include those who’ve given up looking for non-existent jobs, the two million in prison and those driven onto welfare or to join the military because they can’t find jobs. Black and Latin workers suffer doubly in all categories because of capitalism’s racist discrimination in hiring and firing.

Finally, "the possibility of further corporate scandals or an oil disruption in the Middle East heightens the uncertainty." (Times, 8/12) "Disruption" is a polite word for imperialist war. A U.S. invasion of Iraq could shut off supplies from Iraq and other Gulf oil producers and send the price of oil and gasoline sky-high, not to mention killing of hundreds of thousands of Iraqi workers and U.S. youths.

Capitalism’s constant drive for maximum profits insuring a planless economy always leads to overproduction, mass unemployment, speed-up and war to "solve" these crises. How to permanently break this cycle? Destroy the profit system and replace it with communism which produces for workers’ needs, eliminating bosses and profits.

Liberal Pols, Union Hacks Undermine Dockworkers’ Struggle

Long Beach, CA August 12— The ILWU sponsored rallies up and down the west coast to kick off a new round of negotiations and protest the Bush Administration’s threat to use troops as strike breakers in the event of a strike.

The union leaders have already agreed to cut 30% of the clerk’s jobs. The remaining issues deal with the threat of calling out troops against the strike as well as cuts in health care and the union’s demand that new jobs created by new technology be under union jurisdiction. A PLP leaflet attacking the use of troops against the workers, layoffs and capitalism and calling for communist revolution was distributed at one rally. Resolutions are being circulated to support the dockworkers’ fight against the threat of troops, against job cuts, and cuts in health benefits.

The 10,500 workers (it used to be many thousands more) that move over $700 billion worth of commodities or 7% of the GDP (more than twice the $300 billion we mistakenly reported last issue), have the potential power to stop the bosses’ economy. That power is being undermined and misdirected by the union leaders into relying on liberal politicians loyal to the interests of the capitalists, who use their state to attack the workers!

At the Long Beach rally, Dominic Maretti, a Los Angeles Harbor liaison for the union said port workers would never endanger national security. "During a strike, we move all military goods, troops and passengers." (LA Times. 8/13) But in the past, in 1919, communist-led dockworkers refused to load weapons being used to invade the infant Soviet Union. In Seattle, they threw the rifles into the Pacific Ocean.

About 2000 workers marched in Long Beach, some carrying signs reading, "Fight Terrorism, Not American Workers." The war on terrorism IS a war on workers, both in the Middle East and right here at home!

At the Bay Area rally, San Francisco Mayor Willie Brown and Oakland Mayor Jerry Brown attacked Bush’s threat to call in troops. Senate Majority leader Tom Daschle attacked Bush at the rally in Portland. None of these capitalist politicians attacked using automation to cut the jobs of union members. The LA City Council which never misses a chance to attack workers, voted to ask the Bush administration to "remain outside" the negotiations. (LA Times, 8/13)

There is a dispute within the ruling class over the best way to attack workers. Bush is playing hardball with the unions. The liberal politicians favor using the union leaders to try to win the workers to accept layoffs and other attacks while building patriotism and support for the bosses’ wars for oil.

Both sides are enemies of all workers. Just like Bush, the liberal Democrats won’t hesitate to use troops to bust any workers’ struggle that hurts the "national interest". Our fight, in the unions and elsewhere, is to unite the whole working class to fight for workers’ power, to smash the bosses’ state, represented by both Bush and Willy Brown!

Open Letter In Solidarity With Dockworkers From Active, Laid-Off And Retired Boeing Workers

We, the undersigned, want to express support for our Brother and Sister West Coast dockworkers in the International Longshoremen’s and Warehousemen’s Union (ILWU). We categorically condemn Federal Government’s plans to sabotage their negotiations. Secret meetings of the Homeland Security Department and others to plan the mobilization of federal troops to take over the docks will only serve to strengthen the resolve of all workers to fight back against this bosses’ offensive. Let the bosses and their servant politicians remember that Seattle was the scene of the first General Strike in U.S. history!

We, Boeing workers, are well aware of the need to fight for jobs, not only for ourselves, but also for our children and our class. Our labor has built the jets Boeing has sold and moved the goods through the docks. We made billion$ for the bosses. We categorically reject the assumption that we can be discarded, like so much extra baggage, on the altar of increased efficiency, automation and super-profits. Not one job lost! Indeed, we demand more jobs for future generations of workers.

The bosses whine that global competition forces them to eliminate our jobs. We reject any system that diverts the fruits of human progress solely into the coffers of huge corporations while throwing the very workers that build those enterprises on the streets. Who needs a system that eliminates jobs and pensions!

Blame Capitalism for Murder of Ciudad Juárez Women

Executions in Texas are nothing unusual. There are 453 inmates on the state’s death row. But the August 14 execution of Javier Suarez, a Mexican man accused of killing a Dallas cop in 1988, caused an international uproar, Mexico’s President Fox even canceling a visit to Bush’s Texas ranch. Mr. Suarez was not informed he could contact the Mexican consulate for help after his arrest, violating the 1963 Vienna Convention of Consular Relations, signed by the U.S.

But while the Mexican government turned the execution into an international incident — and although the death penalty doesn’t exist in Mexico — executions do occur there. The same day Suarez was executed, a vigil was held outside the Organization of American States in Washington, D.C. by the group "Nuestras Hijas de Regreso a Casa"(May Our Daughters Return Home). They represent more than 450 young women who have disappeared and another 284 found dead since 1993 in and around Ciudad Juarez across the border from Texas. Only 30 of the murders have been solved. The group hopes to draw international attention to the deaths, and to what they call the "incompetence and negligence" of Mexican authorities.

"Our authorities have paid no attention to us, "said Ramona Morales, whose daughter was slain in 1995. "It is important that people outside of Mexico pay attention." (TheNewsMexico.com, 8/15).

Most of the victims were young women, slim and with long dark hair. Many worked at one of Ciudad Juarez’s more than 340 maquiladoras (sweatshops which manufacture for export). In Juarez alone, 220,000 are employed in these sweatshops, 2/3 of them women. Some were raped and mutilated, others burned. "They work late at night and walk alone, and that makes them targets," said Coco Fusco, a Columbia University art professor who has studied life on the border and took part in the vigil. The crimes occur mostly in the dangerous areas outside the factories. "We want safe roads [and] lighting," said Fusco. "The companies don’t pay taxes and…make a lot of money from these women. They should contribute something."

According to some of the victims’ relatives, the Mexican authorities have ignored them and refused any thorough investigation. It’s rumored that some of the murderers might be cops or supervisors at some of the maquiladoras. In an interview conducted by filmmaker Lourdes Portillo in her documentary about the killings, "One woman, María Talamantez, points at police officers, saying that when she went to report the beating of her husband…, a group of officers at the station raped her and showed her graphic pictures of some of the murdered women as they were killed." (New York Times, 8/19)

While the relatives’ call for justice for these victims must be supported, understanding why this slaughter occurs and continues is vital to ending them. These crimes and the government and maquiladora corporations’ inaction stems from the anti-women and anti-working class nature of capitalism and its rulers. The maquiladoras super-exploit these women, treating them like simple commodities on and off the job, and then discards them, replacing them with other young women to be super-exploited. This also creates those perverts who feed on sexual depravity.

Capitalism thrives on this. Communism will organize production to satisfy workers’ needs, and advance a collective spirit of concern for others.

Mob Violence Mirrors Racist Cops

CHICAGO, IL— "Yeah, revolution! That’s exactly what we need!" That was the response of many at the annual Bud Billiken parade on Chicago’s South Side as over 1,000 leaflets and many CHALLENGES were distributed near the site where a few days earlier, two black workers were beaten to death by an angry mob. On July 30, 62-year-old Jack Moore and 49-year-old Anthony Stuckey were killed when the van they were driving jumped the curb and ran into three young women. Shani Lawrence, 26 years old, later died of her injuries. Both the victims and the mob were black.

The beating deaths were inexcusable. But the epidemic of violence in our communities is a reflection of the racism of the capitalist system we live in. And the most violent are the bosses who run it.

The entire North Kenwood-Oakland neighborhood was blanketed with cops, accompanied by a racist media frenzy. Black Police Superintendent Terry Hilliard and racist Mayor Daley ordered arrests quickly. Seven black men, ranging in age from 16 to 43, were arrested and are being held without bond. Charges range from felony murder to felony mob action. Two are relatives of Shani Lawrence.

Al Sharpton, Rev. Meeks (Jesse Jackson’s #2 man at PUSH) and local ministers all converged on the neighborhood preaching, "Stop the Violence" and cooperate with the police. This neighborhood has seen many changes recently, mainly through gentrification. As in many other parts of the city, many poor black and Latin workers are being pushed out as affordable housing disappears. Developers can’t build townhouses and condos fast enough for black and white yuppies to move back into the city.

While the mob beating generated headlines for days, the racist mob violence of the police is just business as usual. Not two miles away from the deadly beatings, four young black workers, two of them PLP members, were beaten and arrested on August 6, while moving three bags of groceries, 1 air mattress and 2 suitcases into their mother’s apartment at the Lawless Garden Apts. The Bronzeville community is also being "gentrified."

The SDI security guard became verbally abusive and words were exchanged. Off-duty Chicago cop Murphy pulled his gun and said, "I can solve all this right now." When the young comrades stepped off of the elevator, they were attacked by more than a dozen cops and arrested. They were charged with resisting arrest and assault. By the time they were taken to jail, there were eleven squad cars and over thirty cops terrorizing the scores of witnesses that had come out of their apartments.

SDI Security has a list of more than 100 names of family members of residents who are not allowed on the grounds. There is daily harassment, especially of the youth. Security guards beat one youth with a pipe. When the family retaliated, they were given a 10-day notice to move.

We plan to distribute CHALLENGE in the building and on the block to meet other victims of racist attacks. We will organize tenants to go to the next building meeting. And we will take people, CHALLENGES and leaflets to a big rally planned by the ministers around the mob killings.

Lesser Evil Chirac Building Police State

A few months ago, millions in France took to the streets to "stop fascism." Jean Marie Le Pen’s fascist National Front was second in the first round of the Presidential elections. Chirac, the candidate of the official right-wing was first and Socialist Party candidate Leonel Jospin, a distant third. "Defeating Le Pen" became the battle cry of millions, mobilized by all the anti-Le Pen forces, included the phony "left," ranging from the "Communist" Party to various Trotskyite groups. Rightist Chirac was the "lesser of two evils" according to them.

Now Chirac is imposing what many see as a police state. His Prime Minister Jean-Pierre Raffarin is putting into practice what the 19th century writer Victor Hugo (creator of Les Miserables) called "La police partout, la justice nulle part"("cops all over, justice nowhere"). Under the guise of "fighting crime," the new government has increased the police budget by $5.6 billion to hire 18,000 new cops and gendarmes in five years (4,500 more than previously planned). Meanwhile, the Justice system will get $3.65 billion more for new jails, including for 13-year-olds. Parents of children who don’t go to school will lose public assistance (affecting mainly working-class parents in the poorest neighborhoods, many from North Africa).

Nicolas Sarkozy, the new Interior Minister, will have increased powers over the cops and gendarmes, making him one of the most powerful forces in the new government. He can demand more money if he thinks it’s needed. He’s also ordering cameras to watch over "sensitive areas."

Meanwhile, the government has cut other public spending. Raffarin has refused to increase the minimum wage (although government ministers’ salaries were increased 70%). In the last year, unemployment rose from 8.1% to 9% and is still rising. So "fighting crime" looks increasingly like attacking workers and youth who might offer resistance.

There are no "lesser evil" capitalists or politicians. They’re ready to remove their "democratic" masks and become fascist monsters when their system requires it.

U.S. Victory In Afghanistan Unravelling

While U.S. rulers debate when and how to wage war on Iraq to seize its vast oil fields (second to Saudi Arabia’s), the invasion of Afghanistan is not proceeding according to plan for the U.S. military. "The upsurge in attacks on American and local forces…over the past few weeks suggests that the present U.S. strategy there — an unsatisfactory mixture of non-intervention in and manipulations of Afghan internal affairs — is crumbling," writes NY Post columnist Jonathan Foreman (8/12).

Robert Fisk, writing for the London Independent (8/14), says the backlash against U.S. forces has begun: "The Americans are being attacked almost every night. There have been three shootings in Kandahar, with an American officer wounded in the neck near the airport two weeks ago. American troops can no longer dine out in Kandahar cafés. Today, U.S. forces are under attack in Khost province.…Now guerrilla attacks are increasingly targeting Afghan forces loyal to the government or loyal to local drug dealers who are friendly with the Americans."

Even a close U.S. ally, Canada, decided to pull out many of its troops, especially after several Canadian soldiers were killed by "friendly fire" from U.S. pilots. (Many are drugged on speed — see Challenge, 8/21).

The U.S. military operation has apparently gone sour after what seemed to be an easy victory over the Taliban and Al Qaeda forces. But actually most of those forces escaped. The U.S., following its Vietnam Syndrome fear of any real ground fighting, relied on the hated Northern Alliance and other warlord mercenaries to do the fighting. Some of those mercenaries had defected from the Taliban/AQ after getting big CIA payoffs. They then took payoffs from the Taliban to let the "enemy" slip away. But the mass murder of civilians by the air bombardments has really turned the Afghan population against U.S. forces, including the massacre of 55 people at a wedding in July, when U.S. aircraft machine-gunned them "by mistake."

The U.S. has few choices left in Afghanistan. Foreman says it can: (1) occupy the whole country, putting more U.S. troops at risk; (2) install a warlord with some real base into power (unlike the present Karzai government — Karzai was an agent of the Unocal oil company before the U.S. made him president); or (3) leave Afghanistan altogether.

That last choice would be a big defeat for the U.S., leaving the country to Al Qaeda and the Taliban. But occupying Afghanistan would tie down tens of thousands or more U.S. troops needed to invade Iraq.

Whatever the choices, the U.S. imperialists are finding their military "victories" more illusory by the day. Every "solution" leads to new problems for these butchers, a contradiction inevitable under capitalism and imperialism.

LETTERS

Win Soldiers To Fight Sexism

I could not agree more with a recent letter in Challenge entitled "Sexism, Imperialist War led to Ft. Bragg Murders!" Capitalism breeds sexism, especially in the Army. The Armed Forces tries very hard to control the minds of soldiers. There is no doubt that drugs are used to prolong the strength and vitality of soldiers during strenuous missions. Imperialist war works to destroy the minds of soldiers who are given high doses of caffeine to keep them awake, and injected with drugs that affect their state of mind.

Sexism and nationalism are control methods used by the capitalists to suppress and divide the working class. Unfortunately this duo of death exists more in the Armed Forces. However, sexism and nationalism can be immediately fought against. I had a friend in the barracks that would always try to entertain me with racist and sexist jokes. Since we were roommates he would go online using his computer to surf the web for jokes. I confronted him, telling him that he would have to stop saying such trash around me. His behavior around women and treatment of his girlfriends was also sexist and disgusting. I confronted him about that too. We became good friends and within time I showed him Challenge and he eventually went to May Day. My friend stopped saying racist jokes and began to treat women with more respect. He is now married with a daughter.

As long as capitalism exists, imperialist wars will murder millions for profit. The bosses will also try to infest the Armed Forces and the whole working class with racism, sexism and nationalism. We on the other hand, must wage war against them and their capitalist ideas. We must fight to prevent the destruction of soldiers’ minds. We can look back at history to see that the Bolsheviks saw imperialist war as an opportunity to win soldiers to the side of workers’ revolution—and they eventually won. When they wage their imperialist wars, we must take advantage of the situation to fight to destroy their ideas and their system and not allow it to destroy us.

GI Joe

Church Groups Protest Nuclear Weapons, Iraq War

Fifty people, organized by a committee representing half a dozen churches commemorated Hiroshima Day with a peace march in the shopping district of our small city. Many carried posters opposing an Iraq oil war as well as the US nuclear weapons policy. A wide range of views were displayed, from religious pacifism to scientific socialism, and there was a strong sense of unity and common purpose.

The marchers were part of a larger event, involving ninety people that included poems, speeches, and letter writing to members of Congress. "Thank you so much for doing this," the organizers were told repeatedly. Even the more cynical amongst us could see the huge potential resistance to the bosses’ "war against terrorism" propaganda and intimidation.

The disagreements that emerged during the day were similar to those you would encounter anywhere. One speaker said that the U.S. rulers agreed in principle that a war with Iraq was necessary, although they disagreed on timing and tactics. He suggested that such a war was practically inevitable because control of Persian Gulf oil is crucial to U.S. imperialist strategic interests.

The next speaker countered saying that a mass popular protest movement might be enough to stop the drive toward war. But that same person pointed out that Clinton was as bad as Bush when it came to nuclear weapons. Some in the audience argued that the way to work for peace was to elect Democrats and to bombard elected officials with letters. Others were reluctant to write letters, because of the response (or lack of response) that they had gotten from politicians in the past.

Even though the peace issues were linked with racism and with the economic attacks on workers, none of the speakers identified capitalism as the root of war and injustice. Revolutionary politics seemed fairly remote from the order of the day.

Some of my friends agreed with me about the need to fight capitalism. "This is a really hard time to be trying to organize," said one. That’s true. It’s why we need to struggle collectively to figure out how to do it. But the flip side illustrated in this peace event, is that it’s a time when our efforts, however limited, can really make a difference.

A Comrade

UMWA Did Nothing To Help Trapped Miners

I was reading every article I could find about the nine trapped miners in Pennsylvania. There was one glaring absence, the UMWA. I did not see their name mentioned once in any article. I called them to ask why. They said because it was a non-union mine. It seems to me that would have been a great organizing tool (that is, if you actually wanted to take on the bosses). Maybe mention how the profit system does not see the need to keep accurate maps of the mines that would have shown how close they were to a flooded shaft.

I did hear one miner comment that he was still waiting for a phone call from the company to say how glad they were to see them alive. Maybe we will have to wait just as long for the Disney movie to reveal the hazards of the profit system.

A seasoned comrade

[Editor’s note: Thanks for your letter. An article in our last issue (8/21) headlined "Profit Drive Trapped Quecreek Miners" also exposed the UMWA’s collaboration with the mine owners in taking a payoff for agreeing to allow such non-union mines.]

1. Workers Die for Bosses' Profits
   Oil Real Reason for War Against Iraq
2. Liberals' Plan : Whack Iraq and Pacify Russian and French Oil Moguls
3. Workers' Jobs, Pensions Lost While Big Bosses Swallow Upstart Rivals
   1. `Shut up and delete this E-mail!'
4. `Trained to Kill' Afghan Women, Fort Bragg Wives
5. Pilots On Speed = `Friendly' Fire
6. `War on Terror' Comes Home, Hits West Coast Dockers
7. Boeing-Union Partnership Aids War Drive, Dumps 30,000 Workers
8. Nigerian Women Take on Big Oil
9. Pope Trips Past Pedophile Scandal:
   Religion Still `Opiate of the Masses'
10. Racism Is Alive and Well at Advocate Health Corporation
11. Profit Drive Trapped Quecreek Miners
12. A Poem by Bertolt Brecht
13. Sweeney Banks on Very Capitalism that robbed
    workers blind
14. Nazi Medicine Award for Peru's Sterilization of 200,000 Indian Women
15. LETTERS
    WORKERS OF THE WORLD, WRITE!
    1. Sexism, Imperialist War Led To Ft. Bragg Murders
    2. 1930's Great Depression Hits Argentina
16. RED EYE ON THE NEWS
    1. Churchill said it's O.K. for Brits to gas Kurds
    2. Threats of jail won't cure capitalist thievery
    3. Mao turning in grave?
    4. Mexico factories killed by cheap Asian labor
    5. Religious schools are just as segregated
    6. Welfare law may create `no-parent' households

---

Workers Die for Bosses' Profits
Oil Real Reason for War Against Iraq

The likelihood of another U.S. imperialist oil war in Iraq increases daily. The control of energy supplies remains crucial to U.S. bosses' plans for decades of world domination. Only Saudi Arabia has greater oil reserves than Iraq. The potential capture of the Iraqi prize by a rival imperialist would seriously threaten U.S. supremacy. Our Party is preparing for this war by winning workers and soldiers to fight for the long-range goal of communist revolution. Nothing less can smash imperialist slaughters for maximum profits.

We shouldn't be fooled by the bosses' debate over the timing and tactics of the oil war. Basically, it reflects the squabbles developing since 9/11 between the liberals and the Bush White House. The liberals represent the Eastern Establishment of old line, Rockefeller-dominated energy giants (Exxon Mobil, Chevron, et al.) and financial houses (J.P. Morgan Chase, Citibank, et al.). Dissatisfied with the Bush gang's performance on every front, they're trying to seize control of "homeland security" -- their name for a police state (see CHALLENGE, 7/3). They're also cleaning house on the economic front (see page 2).

Now the same liberal rulers are moving to take over foreign policy and the next phase of U.S. imperialism's permanent oil war. Invading Iraq may require a minimum of 250,000 troops and possibly heavy casualties. If Saddam Hussein is ousted, U.S. troops will likely have to dig in for a long, expensive and probably violent occupation. The liberals want to avoid a repetition of the rebellions within the military and the anti-war uprisings that occurred in the U.S. during the Vietnam War. To do this, they must win public opinion, especially among workers, soldiers and youth, to support this invasion. "There may be a compelling case to be made for war with Iraq," editorializes the New York Times (8/3), [but] the administration has not yet made it."

Two leading scholars at the Brookings Institution, a key think-tank of the liberal imperialists, urge "a much tougher inspections regime with immediate demands on Hussein to reveal his illicit weapons so we can destroy them and a clear, multilateral promise to go to war if he thwarts us even one time." [Emphasis ours -- Ed.] ("Give It One More Try Before War," Philip H. Gordon, Michael O'Hanlon, Los Angeles Times, 8/1).

In other words, find or plant a "smoking gun" anywhere in Iraq and use it as a cover to invade. The main difference between Bush and his liberal critics boils down to a choice between Big Lies.

Over the last few weeks, the Times and the Washington Post released government "leaks" about possible invasion plans. The purpose is to underscore the liberals' displeasure with Bush & Co. and to create the illusion of serious debate about the war, as well as take the power over war out of Bush's hands. Another pair of Brookings intellectuals warns Bush about acting "democratically": "Congress...has a somber constitutional responsibility not merely to debate [war with Iraq] but to go on record -- with a vote explicitly authorizing the use of force." ("No Presidential War," Ivo Daalder and James M. Lindsay, Washington Post, 7/31)

Liberals' Plan : Whack Iraq and Pacify Russian and French Oil Moguls

The liberals agree that Hussein "poses a major threat to American interests" and must go. But they also see a need to pacify Russian and French interests whose oil companies have multi-billion dollar contracts pending with Iraq. They wouldn't object to throwing their competitors some crumbs. Rockefeller's Council on Foreign Relations Senior Fellow Michael Mandelbaum says: "...The promise that their own oil companies will have the opportunity to participate in developing Iraq's reserves will increase French and Russian enthusiasm for removing Hussein." ("U.S. Must Plan post-Hussein Iraq," Newsday, 8/1)

Whether the liberals or the Bush gang win out, hundreds of thousands of Iraqi soldiers, workers and children will die. Street-to-street fighting, with many U.S. casualties may well be in the cards. Saudi Arabia -- filled with mass protests and assassination attempts unreported in the U.S. media -- could fall into civil war. The contradictions will sharpen between U.S. imperialism and all its rivals. The Chinese have a vital stake in building their own Persian Gulf oil empire. The Russians' present love-fest with Washington is purely a marriage of temporary convenience. Imperialist wars always lead to consequences the imperialists can't foresee or prevent.

The most important of these consequences should be the sustained growth of our Party internationally. Bosses' war has always given the working class an opportunity to build its own revolutionary forces. The next oil war will do the same. Exposing the deadly role of the liberals is decisive. By sharpening the class struggle, we can win workers away from them.

Workers' Jobs, Pensions Lost While Big Bosses Swallow Upstart Rivals

The liberal dominant wing of U.S. rulers is punishing the upstarts within its own class. Behind the scandal-ridden executives being carted off to prison in handcuffs, a major consolidation of wealth and assets is occurring, confirming Karl Marx's analysis that such a development is inevitable under capitalism.

The latest to benefit is billionaire investor Warren Buffet, whose Berkshire Hathaway company has tight ties to the Rockefeller interests.

A Berkshire Hathaway unit, Midway Energy Holdings, has announced plans to buy the Northern Gas Company, a 16,000-mile natural gas pipeline that once belonged to Enron. When Enron went belly-up, destroying the life savings of thousands of workers, the pipeline went originally to Dynegy for $1.5 billion. But Dynegy had its own problems and Establishment moguls like Buffett are feasting on the spoils. Buffet is paying Dynegy nearly $600 million less than Dynegy's purchase price for the pipeline.

As CHALLENGE reported (8/7), the Enron and telecom scandals are giving the biggest bosses an excuse to "aggressively seek undervalued assets owned by troubled...companies" (New York Times, 7/30). This tightens the Eastern Establishment's grip on key assets (including the banks that financed the Enrons), helps maximize profits, and consolidates the liberals' hold on economic policy.

Buffet has significant investments in Coca-Cola and the Washington Post, two of the first companies to come clean on reporting executives' stock options as an expense. Stock options have been a major aspect of the recent scandals.

Buffett also joined the Rockefellers in demanding that Bush not repeal the estate tax. This tax confiscates upstarts' wealth while giving the Establishment the incentive to funnel tax-deductible money into foundations they control which significantly influence economic and foreign policy to serve their interests.

These shenanigans are an exercise of state power, which always serves the interests of the dominant capitalists. Buffet's power play clearly demonstrates that government can never be neutral or above the class struggle. The biggest billionaires make out like bandits, the weaker ones see their loot confiscated while workers' hard-earned pensions go up in smoke.

`Shut up and delete this E-mail!'

Not only did the Enron and WorldCom bosses run away with hundreds of millions while defrauding their workers' pension funds, but these two companies' largest creditors -- CitiGroup and JPMorgan/Chase -- dumped this debt on other pension funds, with full knowledge that the stock was about to nosedive.

Senate hearings revealed that these two huge banks packaged the Enron debt as something called "credit derivatives" and sold them on to other pension funds like the California Teachers pension and the Los Angeles County Employees Retirement Association. Thus, Enron's crash wouldn't take these banks down or even damage their profits. Meanwhile these other workers' pension funds lost hundreds of millions in taking on these "credit derivatives" with the belief their pension funds would prosper based on the then "sky-high" value of Enron stock.

Citi and Chase helped devise the "prepays" (loans disguised as trades) and other devices which concealed the shape Enron and WorldCom were in. When one astonished Chase executive sent an E-mail with the message, "5 bn [billion] in prepays!!!!!!!" the answer came back, "Shut up and delete this E-mail."

So these big banks become the winners in this swindle, still another reason to dump a system that exists based on screwing workers.

[All information from Counterpunch, 8/5]

`Trained to Kill' Afghan Women, Fort Bragg Wives

Four members of the Army's elite Special Forces and Delta units -- all sergeants --murdered their wives in the space of six weeks at their home base at Fort Bragg, N.C. Three of the four were recently returned from Afghanistan where U.S. "Special" Forces were "liberating" Afghan women by killing more than 50 guests at a wedding celebration on July 1, shooting women and children as they fled the attack by helicopter gunships.

(According to the Times of London (7/29) a draft United Nations report charges that the air strike by helicopter gunships was completely unprovoked and that the U.S. has been trying to cover it up. Initially, the U.S. Command claimed its aircraft had drawn "enemy" artillery fire. But the UN "investigators found no weapons, `no corroboration' on the ground that the U.S. had been fired on." The Times report says U.S. forces "arrived on the scene very quickly after the air strikes and `cleaned the area,' removing evidence of `shrapnel, bullets and traces of blood.' Women on the scene had their hands tied behind their backs.")

A spokesman for the Army Special Forces Command said, "It would be stretching matters to link the ...killings [of the 4 wives] to service in Afghanistan." (New York Times, 7/27) But these "elite" forces are trained to an extreme degree to kill in the service of U.S. imperialism. Last June, Army Private Matt Gluckenheimer told the Ithaca (N.Y.) Journal that in "Operation Anaconda," "We were told there were no friendly forces. If there was anybody there, they were the enemy. We were told specifically, that if there were women and children to kill them."

These soldiers are entrenched "in a military life of obeying orders, masking emotion and being trained to kill....Two wives were shot in the head, one was stabbed 50 times and another strangled....[In the military] divorce rates and domestic violence are twice the national average," (New York Post, 8/4)

To say that being ordered to indiscriminately kill thousands of Afghan civilians -- and "specifically women and children" -- has no relation to murdering their wives is the real "stretch." Truly, the U.S. "war on terror" is in itself the height of savage, fascist terrorism.

Pilots On Speed = `Friendly' Fire

U.S. pilots who have been indiscriminately killing civilians (and even their own forces -- killing four Canadian infantrymen with a 500-pound laser-guided bomb) -- regularly take drugs (Dexedrine) to stay awake during their murderous missions, according to the London Independent (8/3). Commenting on the pilot who killed the Canadians, John Pike, director of a defense think-tank, said, "Better bombing through chemistry....the guy had eaten too much speed and was paranoid." Pilots who refuse the drug are banned from missions.

`War on Terror' Comes Home, Hits West Coast Dockers

The U.S. rulers "war on terror" has come home. The bosses' government is threatening to use the military to break a possible West Coast dockworkers' strike if they don't knuckle under to the shipowners' demands and were to walk out for job security and against automation-induced layoffs. This is "Homeland INsecurity" with a vengeance.

The Administration has threatened to invoke a Taft-Hartley injunction to halt a strike for 80 days. "Other options include running the ports with US Navy personnel, moving to break up the union's coastwide bargaining unit or backing legislation that would restrict the union's ability to call a strike." (LA Times, 8/5) Union officials admit they've never seen such a hardball stance before.

A Bush "Labor Department official confirmed that the options were...in the context of a job action occurring during wartime" (Our emphasis, Ed.).

"We have been very candid," the official said. "We have told them if they act in a manner that is disruptive, we will use any means necessary to make sure our troops in the field get what they need." (LA Times, 8/5). That "field" may soon become the slaughter of masses of workers in Iraq.

West coast dockworkers have been working without a contract since July 1. "We offered him [the owners' negotiator] everything he asked for," said Steve Stallone, a spokesman for the International Longshoremen's and Warehousmen's Union (ILWU), which represents 10,500 dockworkers up and down the West Coast. "He gave us nothing. Zero. Zip, zilch." (Oakland Free Press, 7/22) In fact, the union's offer was the most extensive job concession package since the 1962 agreement, which let containerization in the door.

Liberal Senators say the Bush Administration should let the parties "bargain in good faith." Bush wants to disregard the unions; the liberals want to use them to win the workers to fascism and war. But both agree on breaking any strike with the military.

Some union organizers emphasize that the shipping companies are all "foreign-owned" -- claiming that's why they're attacking the workers. But U.S. bosses attack workers here and worldwide just as hard, including strike-breaking.

The main fight is over automation, jobs and jurisdiction. The union offered proposals which would boost productivity and reduce longshore clerk jobs 30%, eliminating 600 of the 2,100 total -- all rejected by the shippers, who want to bar the door to jobs for younger and future workers with a "promise" of no layoffs for current workers.

This resembles the deal the once militant, left-led ILWU accepted many years ago when it agreed to job-cutting technology (containerization) as long as the then-working longshoremen weren't laid off. This followed years of militant dock strikes -- including the 1934 Bay Area General Strike which first established the ILWU. Longshoremen had always fought both for their own jobs and in solidarity with workers around the world (they refused to load arms to attack the then-socialist Soviet Union in 1919).

Ports from San Diego to Seattle move about $300 billion worth of goods annually, about 7% of the GDP, and support 1.4 million jobs. (LA Times, 8/5) The Los Angeles-Long Beach port complex is a cornerstone of Southern California's largest industry, international trade, involving 450,000 jobs.

"With Pacific Rim trade projected to double in the next decade, shipping lines complain that West Coast ports won't be able to keep up unless they catch up with their more automated Asian peers." (LA Times, 8/06) The bosses want to lower conditions here, not raise them in Asia. Workers need international solidarity to answer the bosses' attacks worldwide, not the pitting of workers in Asia and here against each other.

PLP urges workers and students to back the dockers' fight for jobs in defiance of the bosses' war plans. We urge sailors and soldiers not to scab. The capitalist profit system uses technology to cut jobs and lower wages. The minor tactical differences between the Bush Administration and the liberal Democrats amount to disagreements about how to shove the bosses' demands down the workers throats -- the liberals want a smile and "worker inclusion" along with a billy club. But both gangs agree profits are in the national interest -- and to hell with workers' jobs. This patriotic "national interest" is the bosses' interest!

In the current period of increasing fascism and preparations for more oil war, workers must break with the bosses' politicians, their patriotism and their laws which attack our class. Now and in the future, workers need a communist party that fights for the interests of the working class. Under communism -- without bosses and profits -- automation will make all workers' lives better.

Boeing-Union Partnership Aids War Drive, Dumps 30,000 Workers

On July 21, at the Farnborough Air Show in Britain, Boeing commercial airplane unit CEO Alan Mulally publicly said the International Association of Machinists (IAM) was "absolutely aligned and attuned" with the bosses' plan never to rehire the 30,000 workers laid off in the last 10 months. "[We have] got to help Boeing be more competitive going forward," said Mulally.

Caught with their pants down, the union howled in denial. You could expect this protest from union headquarters since "job security" was supposed to be our number one contract demand. Ironically, the union supposed "answer" was worse than Mulally's original claim. "We're looking at being partners in creating value -- or adversaries who will be fighting over an ever-shrinking pie," warned IAM strategic-resources director Steve Sleigh (Business Week, 8/08). Read: build bosses' profits.

Always a loser, collaboration with the bosses is just ridiculous during the present crisis of overproduction in commercial aerospace. Airlines have parked nearly 2,000 unneeded planes in the deserts of California and Arizona during the last year. Since producing aircraft is not profitable in this climate, the company has spent $10 billion -- of the capital we workers produced -- since 1997 buying back its own shares, in what appears to be a futile effort to inflate stock prices.

These periodic capitalist crises stem from production for profit. The only way off this treadmill is production based on the needs of the working class. But this requires a radical, permanent change in the system; it requires a communist revolution.

"A lot of people who never in their lives even considered socialism or communism will be talking about it now," predicted a friend in the company cafeteria. The Party's prime job, especially during this contract battle with its potential for heightened class struggle, is to make our friend's prediction come true. Circulating this article can help.

Workers Make The Best

Political Scientists

What caused this worker, who has only the thinnest contact with the Party, to make this prediction? Capitalism's contradictions are not concepts reserved for study by political scientists. They express themselves in concrete attacks on our class: in this case, the wholesale purging of a generation from the workplace.

Honest political scientists will tell you the need for the U.S. ruling class to maintain its worldwide dominance -- in the face of potential imperialist rivals -- is what's driving world events. The bosses' strategy to maintain this dominance is constant pre-emptive war against these rivals, and building fascist oppression to counter the inevitable resistance at home. The union's call for partnership with the bosses to preserve "American jobs" fits nicely into this bosses' strategy.

Maintaining the U.S. empire requires attacking workers here and aboard. The Pentagon recently commissioned a new Defense Science Board task force on maintaining the U.S. arms industry's competitiveness. "Competitive outsourcing could be the answer," concluded chair Philip Odeen (Aerospace Daily, 2/3/2001). So our supposed "partners" are planning to eliminate our jobs to maintain their economic and political dominance.

Communists know capitalism must make it worse for us. We must then lay the groundwork for revolutionary understanding and solutions. Aggressively building these ideas and forces while fighting worsening layoffs and massive unemployment will expose the union leaders' "partnership" hoax and offer us the alternative to the system's war and fascism: communist production for working-class need.

Nigerian Women Take on Big Oil

NIGERIA -- Last month masses of protesters, mainly women, demonstrated against Chevron Texaco demanding jobs and an end to the company's ecological destruction of the area. Chevron makes millions from the 500,000 barrels of oil it produces here daily. Not only do residents of the region get nothing in return but the company's pollution of the Niger River delta has killed all its fish.

The last few years have seen fierce battles against the oil company. Several times youth from the Ijow ethnic group have seized oil installations and kidnapped oil executives, while demanding jobs. Then, on July 9, hundreds of women from the Itsekeri ethnic group surrounded all the company gates at Escravos site (meaning slaves in Portuguese), barring anyone from entering or leaving. On July 17, Ijow women of all ages, up to 80-year-old grandmas, joined together to protest at, and then occupy, four Chevron facilities for three weeks. Chevron finally agreed to provide jobs and build hospitals and schools.

For years there have been many boss-provoked clashes between the Ijow and Itsekeri groups, but now they've united against their common enemy for the common goal of jobs and better conditions for the local population.

Other oil companies in the region, like Royal Dutch Shell, have a similar rotten record to Chevron's. For 30 years Shell refused to share its electricity with a local village of 100 people, saying it was the Nigerian government's responsibility. Shell separated its electric plant from the locals with a fence. The Nigerian rulers, mostly corrupt politicians and generals, did nothing.

Recently, a U.S. State Department delegation met with Nigerian President Olusegun Obasanjo to discuss raising Nigeria's oil production. Nigeria, the world's 7th largest oil producer, supplies 15% of U.S. oil imports. If an invasion of Iraq disrupted imports from the Persian Gulf, U.S. rulers want to guarantee plenty of oil from other sources.

Meanwhile, the Catholic Church, representing the pro-European Vatican, has denounced the U.S. oil company pillaging. The Catholic bishops of West and Central Africa met in Equatorial Guinea to denounce the disparity between oil company profits and the misery of the people. The bishops charged such profits have financed the arming of local militias in several countries, fueling civil wars.

As world imperialism gears up for more wars to control the flow and profits of oil, workers and their allies must also prepare to not only fight for jobs and against pollution but also to fight to destroy the capitalist system that produces such vultures.

Pope Trips Past Pedophile Scandal:
Religion Still `Opiate of the Masses'

The Pope's trip to Canada, Guatemala and Mexico had two main goals: one to counter the growing attacks against the Vatican because of the pedophile priests scandal, and the other to offset the influence of pro-U.S. born-again groups in Central America and Mexico.

The Pope addressed hundreds of thousands of youth in Toronto, mumbling something to the effect that it's bad to screw children physically and mentally. As CHALLENGE readers know, liberal groups in the U.S., Boston College (BC) and the New York Times-owned Boston Globe are leading the attack on pedophile priests. The man who launched the anti-Vatican push at BC was the head of the college's Board of Trustees, Geoffrey Boisi, VP of JP Morgan Chase, which is Exxon-Mobil's leading stockholder and a major force in the Eastern Establishment. This campaign is really aimed at getting the U.S. Catholic Church solidly behind the U.S. imperialist rulers' plan for endless oil wars and undermining the Vatican's pro-European imperialist tilt.

Millions turned out to see the Pope in Guatemala and Mexico, where pro-U.S. born-again Protestant groups are growing. Guatemalan President Portillo is a member of the Efrain Montt Party, led by the military strong man turned born again preacher General Montt. He ruled Guatemala in the '80s, backed by Reagan and Papa Bush. His paramilitary death squads massacred thousands of Indians. Of course, when it comes to killing Indians the Catholic Church is up there with the best of them. Millions were killed beginning with the landing of Columbus colonizers in the "New World."

The Pope sainted a Guatemalan man. Then in Mexico he made the mythical Indian religious man Juan Diego a saint. But Juan Diego never existed, as even the Jesuits have written. This demonstrates that the Church will openly lie, contradicting its own researchers, to keep Indian people accepting their exploitation and praying "for a better life to come."

The Pope beatified the two so-called Oaxaca martyrs. They were hung in the year 1700 for being stoolpigeons, telling the Catholic Inquisition that pagan activities were occurring among Zapotec Indians in Oaxaca.

"...Older Zapotecs, consider the Church's declaring these men `blessed' an offense against native peoples whom the Spanish empire stripped of their land and culture, leaving them in poverty that persists today. Members of this camp believe the true martyrs were the 15 people killed by colonial forces as punishment...Spanish soldiers beheaded the victims and placed heir heads along a road leading to San Francisco Cojonos as a warning to others. The punishment... is still a deep-seated wound for many of Oaxaca's Zapotec Indians." (TheNewsMexico.com, 8/2).

As the European and U.S. imperialist camps use religion to defend and kill for their interests, workers and youth must remember Karl Marx's maxim, "Religion is the opiate of the masses."

Racism Is Alive and Well at Advocate Health Corporation

A PCA (patient care associate) with eleven years seniority has recently been fired at Advocate Health Corporation. She is the sixth minority worker to be fired in less then a year by this same racist manager. A day after she was given an extra heavy assignment, including caring for severely ill patients in the respiratory unit, she was accused of "giving a rough bath" and summarily fired. Over eleven years of unselfish caring to her patients, her work has always been commendable, her record spotless.

Everything of value, including health care, is produced by workers' sweat and blood. The bosses need racism to keep workers under control through divide and conquer. Minority workers are paid less and discriminated against in order to make extra profits, and keep workers divided.

Why are the bosses increasing their attacks on workers? The economic underpinnings of capitalism are deteriorating. The U.S. ruling class, in a struggle against its competitors, is about to invade Iraq for control of the world's oil supply. The biggest bosses are tightening their grip by eliminating any opposition to their plans for war and fascism (police state). All pretexts of "rights" are being replaced by the rule of force and intimidation. Our job is to organize for communist revolution and end this oppressive system.

We have no union here so we must depend on each other to fight firings and injustices. When we oppose such firings, we're fighting for our class interests against our class enemy, the ruling class and its junior partners at Advocate. A united working class is a necessary step toward building a communist society.

Profit Drive Trapped Quecreek Miners

SOMERSET COUNTY, PA., August 6 -- The freeing of nine trapped miners from the flooded Quecreek mine here was cause for rejoicing by millions of workers and others. The solidarity, sharing and communal effort of both the rescue workers above-ground and the miners themselves below-ground, neither driven by the competitive profit motive, won the day. It is a microcosm of what communist ideas could accomplish for workers everywhere in a society free of bosses and profits and led by the working class.

The bosses' media and Bush hypocritically turned this event into a "feel good" saga of "what makes America strong," ready to transform that sentiment straight into backing the rulers' plan for its oil war in Iraq. But Bush, his bosses and their media avoided the actual cause of the "accident," a direct result of the Quecreek mine owners seeking maximum profits through primitive and unsafe practices.

The bosses didn't conduct either of two standard procedures that would have detected the underground water that flooded the shafts and trapped the nine miners. Either a two-dimensional seismographic study of the area or drilling probing holds would have alerted the miners that they were working only four feet from the flooded abandoned mine. And the Pennsylvania department for mine "safety" didn't require either procedure in approving the company's request to operate so close to abandoned mines. It was a disaster waiting to happen. Moreover, the company-supplied maps of the area were 50 years old! No wonder several of the freed miners vow never to return to the mines.

All this resulted from a 20-year mine-owner offensive, backed by the government, to close or break union mines and open non-union scab mines. This was their reaction to the miners defying Democratic President Jimmy Carter's Taft-Hartley injunction in the 1978 national miners' strike. In 1979, there were 6,237 working miners in Somerset County. By 1998, there were only 803. Wages fell by 25%. The proportion of young children living in poverty reached 20%.

Once the smaller, non-union mines replaced the larger, unionized ones, pockets of coal were targeted that the larger mine owners found unprofitable. These were called "dog holes" by the miners because they were among the most dangerous. Quecreek is one such mine.

The United Mine Workers (UMW) became a "trusted partner" in this bosses' offensive, agreeing to wage-cuts, mass layoffs and work-rules changes jeopardizing miners' safety to help the operators become "competitive in the new global market." Quecreek is one result of this partnership.

This class collaboration reached its height in the UMW's deal with Consolidated Coal, a top-ten mining company. The UMW "allowed" Consol to open non-union mines if it gave some jobs to union miners. In exchange, the company deducted union dues from the miners' paychecks, even though they were no longer covered by a union contract! Well, under capitalism business is business, whether for mine boss or union boss.

The example of cooperation, sharing and solidarity that the Quecreek miners and their rescuers set in this event is the kind to follow in fighting for a communist society that puts the class interests of workers first and puts the bosses six feet under.

A Poem by Bertolt Brecht

To the students of the workers'and peasants'
faculty

So there you sit. And how much blood was shed

That you might sit there. Do such

stories bore you?

Well, don't forget that others sat before you who later sat on people.

Keep your head!

Your science will be valueless, you'll find

And learning will be sterile, if inviting

Unless you pledge your intellect to

fighting

Against all enemies of all mankind.

Never forget that men like you got hurt

That you might sit here, not the other lot.

And now don't shut your eyes, and don't desert

But learn to learn, and try to learn for what.

--Bertolt Brecht

Sweeney Banks on Very Capitalism that robbed
workers blind

NEW YORK CITY, Jul 30 -- The AFL-CIO launched a "campaign" against the Enrons and WorldComs for robbing workers of their pensions and causing mass layoffs. Speaking to a demonstration on Wall Street today, chief honcho John Sweeney said he will meet with the heads of the New York Stock Exchange and investment bankers in New York and Boston, to "Align the interests of executives more closely with those of...workers." (New York Times, 7/30) Now he even canceled the demonstration at Boston's Fidelity Investments because they've "agreed to meet" with him.

In reality, Sweeney is speaking for the very bankers and brokers he appears to be condemning. As a member of Rockefeller's Council on Foreign Relations, Sweeny has been the loyal servant of the main wing of U.S. imperialism. They are using the current economic crisis to discipline their competitors and consolidate their control of the economy. Enron, WorldCom and the others are easy targets that are being used to make ExxonMobil and Citicorp look good, so we'll support their plans for war in Iraq and fascism at home, and accept mass layoffs, racism, give-backs and strike-breaking.

The AFL-CIO leadership is on the bosses' side. They defend capitalism while promising "reforms." Sweeney says he wants corporate "standards of decency." (Wall Street Journal, 7/30) But workers' and bosses' interests can never be "aligned." Bosses can never be "decent" towards workers. Our interests are diametrically opposed. The bosses steal most of the value we produce. A corporation's existence is based on squeezing as much labor out of workers as possible at the least possible cost. The tighter the squeeze, the higher the bosses' profits. The bosses who squeeze the most drive their less efficient competitors out of business.

Sweeney would disarm us with his "class alignment" and "decency" strategy, leading workers to support the rulers' oil wars against the interests of the international working class. Sweeney's campaign is "No More Business As Usual." We say, "No More Business," period.

Nazi Medicine Award for Peru's Sterilization of 200,000 Indian Women

Nazi doctor Mengele would have been proud of former Peruvian president Alberto Fujimori, the "humanitarian" U.S. Agency for International Development, the Nippon Foundation, the Army and the doctors and nurses who forcibly sterilized 200,000 people between 1996 and 2000. In those years, the now-deposed Fujimori regime engineered this criminal plan in several mountain areas. Fujimori and his sidekick, former CIA agent Vladimiro Montesino (now in jail for drug trafficking and other assorted crimes) firmly believed in the fascist idea that too many poor people are bad for capitalism, and ordered his "Health" Ministry to do this dirty work.

According to recent revelations, the plan -- called Voluntary Contraceptive Surgery -- had little to do with volunteering. For Vicentina Usca, 37, in the town of San Martín, the nightmare began when government officials knocked on her door. "I was forced to tie my tubes," she said, "under threat of not getting the birth certificate of my 6-year-old daughter. The nurse said my husband had signed the approval [later proven to be a lie]..."(El Mundo, Madrid, 8/4).

When she demanded to see her husband, the nurse yelled at her, saying the procedure had to be done immediately; otherwise Vicentina "would be screwed."

Vasectomies were also performed on men, but the main victims have been Indian women. The forced sterilization has left many of them in bad shape. Odilio Jiménez, a worker now living in one of the shantytowns surrounding Lima, Peru's capital city, said his wife "is almost crippled and cannot engage in any strenuous physical activity." She hemorrhaged soon after leaving the hospital where she was sterilized. "Before I had a healthy companion that used to help me out with my job," said the husband. "Now she must stay in bed most of the time."

Meanwhile, President Toledo, Peru's current ruler, is trying to use this scandal to distract attention from his own failure to alleviate the misery, unemployment and other ills suffered by Peru's masses. Recently tens of thousands in Arequipa and other towns rose up to protest Toledo's plan to privatize the utility companies. People are tired of this privatization that just helps imperialist bosses and local politicians become richer, while service goes from bad to worse.

Capitalism, be it led by Fujimori, Toledo or any other anti-working class politician, is deadly for workers in the cities and mountains of Peru. The only solution is to fight for a racist-free society: communism.

LETTERS
WORKERS OF THE WORLD, WRITE!

Sexism, Imperialist War Led To Ft. Bragg Murders

An aspect of the four soldiers murdering their wives at Fort Bragg, N.C. is the tremendous sexism in the military. It's an abnormal world where there are many more men than women. The soldiers' youth and the lack of a model for healthy relationships combined with lifers soliciting female recruits for sex make it extremely hard to develop good relations between men and women.

Every base in the U.S. and worldwide is surrounded by whorehouses, with the tacit and sometimes explicit support of the brass. Young wives are left alone for months at a time. The military is a concentration of all the most sexist aspects of capitalist society.

The invasion of Afghanistan has added the bloodlust of imperialism to this mix. Imperialist wars destroy the minds of soldiers. Many cannot go over there," commit mass murder and return unaffected. The Army basically says anything you do is justified because all that matters is your life. Liberal movies like "Band of Brothers" and "Black Hawk Down" have reinforced this attitude.

The Army can't deal with this situation because their biggest concern is turning young men into killers who won't ask what they're killing for. It's no coincidence that these soldiers were in the most elite units, the Special Forces and Delta Team who the media celebrate as conquering heroes. They're the most gung ho, most racist units, brag about being the biggest killers and now four of their wives have joined the list of their victims.

Former Soldier

1930's Great Depression Hits Argentina

[A friend in Argentina sent the following to a friend in the U.S.]

The crisis here is like a river of volcanic lava that devastates everything. Poverty worsens daily, reaching intolerable levels for the working class. The official unemployment rate is now 24%. In the company where I work, 100 of the 260 employees will be laid off. There will be (maybe including me) more jobless, with no possibility of finding work elsewhere. Some compare the situation to the Great Depression of the 1930s.

Now neighboring Uruguay and Brazil are on the same path. Doctor friends of mine in public hospitals tell me almost unbelievable stories -- a lack medicine and bandages; operating rooms that can't handle many patients; people sick with hard-to-cure infections from a lack of sterilization in the hospitals.

The politicians who rule here (whether Peronist, Conservatives, etc.) are only interested in winning elections, and will shit all over anyone to win. Meanwhile, millions are bartering to survive -- trading something they have for what they need. Since this doesn't generate resources or jobs, the crisis deepens.

Progressive and non-traditional candidates rate high in the polls, but have no chance of getting anywhere since the political establishment answers to multi-national corporations. The ruling class is sinking the country even more, caring nothing for workers and other oppressed people. That is the situation here in the Southern Cone. Now I see on a smaller scale in North America, you're getting your own taste of this crooked and corrupt system.

Greetings to my old friends back in the U.S. with whom I shared so many good times during my stay up North some years ago.

A friend in Buenos Aires

P.S.: The New York Times has now exposed how former President Menem (who privatized everything thing and was buddy-buddy with Clinton and Miami's Cuban right-wing exiles) took millions from the Iranian government to cover up the terrorist bombing of a Hebrew agency here in Buenos Aires several years back. He responded to this exposé by saying he was "broke," and was being supported by his wife (a former Miss Universe). Menem is one of the world's most evil people.

In reality, since 1810 Argentina has been ruled by one crook after another. Only its natural resources have kept the country afloat.

RED EYE ON THE NEWS

RED EYE reprints clippings from the New York Times, British Manchester Guardian Weekly, and many other well-known capitalist publications. From their own papers we collect material which communists find useful in exposing capitalist manuevers and weaknesses. Especially useful for students and others who want an "official source for important facts. Abbreviations: MG= Manchester Guardian; NYT= New York Times; MM=Multinational Monitor; LOW=Liberal Opinion Weekly; FT=Financial Times

Churchill said it's O.K. for Brits to gas Kurds

Saddam Hussein may not have been the first to resort to chemical weapons in Iraq. Poison gas is said by historians to have been used by British troops to quell a 1920 tribal uprising in the northern Kurdish town of Kirkuk. "I do not understand this squeamishness about the use of gas. I am strongly if favour of using poison gas against uncivilized tribes," Winston Churchill, the former British prime minister, is said to have remarked... [FT, 7/10]

Threats of jail won't cure capitalist thievery

In the last 10 years, the Securities and Exchange Commission...turned 609 of its most offensive offenders over to the Justice Department for potential criminal prosecution....Only 87 went to jail....In ten years. And most white-collar criminals land in one of those ritzy country club prisons, where inmates play tennis and make collect calls to their brokers all day.

What's more, the average sentence for even the biggest white-collar crooks is less than 36 months....

So despite the PR value of pumping up maximum sentences for corporate crimes, it's not going to make much of a dent in boardroom thievery.... [LOW, 7/29]

Rich U.S. trails other lands in maternity leave

To the Editor:

Re "Study Links Working Mothers to Slower Learning (news article, July 17):

This latest study is a clarion call to the United States to join the rest of the world in making it possible for women to spend more time with their babies without sacrificing their economic security. The United States is one of only five countries that do not have paid maternity leave...

As a result, American mothers, particularly poor mothers, have to go back to work much sooner after childbirth than mothers in other countries, leaving...American infants in nonparental care.... [NYT, 7/20]

Mao turning in grave?

Beijing has given its support to Nepal's struggle against Maoist guerrillas, labeling them terrorists.... [FT, 7/12]

Mexico factories killed by cheap Asian labor

All along the Mexican border with the United States, once-busy factories are closing. Since the end of 2000, tearful farewell parties have been held for 250,000 factory workers in Mexico. Some of the same jobs that left North Carolina textile plants and Ohio auto-parts assembly lines for Mexico in the 1980s are now moving to Asia. The reason is the same: cheaper labor....Many of the plant closings are just the globalized economy at work.... [MG, 7/17]

Religious schools are just as segregated

Religious schools are just as segregated and by some measures even more segregated than public schools.

In a study released last month, researchers at Harvard University's Civil Rights Project found that the average white student in religious schools attends schools that are about 90% white, with two-thirds of them going to classes that are between 90 to 100% white.

Conversely, the average African-American or Latino enrolled at a Catholic school attends classes that are at least two-thirds children of color... [Boston Globe, 7/15]

Welfare law may create `no-parent' households

A rising share of children, particularly black children in cities, are turning up in no-parent households, left with relatives, friends or foster families without either their mother or father.

Researchers say they cannot pinpoint the forces driving parents and children apart. But among them, they said, may be the stresses of the new welfare world -- loss of benefits, low-wage jobs at irregular hours....

Some lawmakers are pushing to make the welfare law's work requirements even stricter....

Children who do not live with their parents do significantly worse on average than those in single-parent homes, child welfare experts say, with higher rates of school failure, mental health problems and delinquency. [NYT, 7/29]

 

Workers Don’t Need a System that Destroy Jobs and Pensions

Big Bosses Use Crisis to Consolidate Power: Communist Revolution: Only Crisis Capitalism Cannot Survive

Telecommunications: Eye Of The Storm

Biggest Sharks See Market Value Rise

Capitalism Can Survive Any Crisis, Except Revolution!

Telecom Bust Follows Classic Capitalist Pattern

Clock Ticking on Gulf War II As U.S. Bosses Try to Seize Iraqi Oil Fields

PLP Brings Fight vs. Oil War To AFT Convention

Red Ideas Spur Hospital Workers To Veto Union-Boss Give-backs

Boeing Contract Battle Needs Break With ‘Partner’ Fraud

Mexico’s Farmers Clash With Attacking Cops

Workers in Iran Reject Fundamentalist Rulers

Fascism in the Mills

Inglewood: Cops, U.S. Bosses Are Biggest Terrorists

Protest Nazi Resurgence

Liberals’ Anti-Pedophile Crusade Targets Pro-Europe Pope

Imperialist Rivalry Intensifies Latin America’s Poverty

People Nix Russia’s Free-Market Capitalism

---

Workers Don’t Need a System that Destroy Jobs and Pensions

Millions of workers are losing their jobs and their pensions while the liberals wring their hands over Enron, WorldCom, Bush and Cheney’s business practices. This brutal robbery of millions of workers demands a massive fight-back. Our battle cry must be "a system that destroys jobs, pensions and needs war and racist terror to survive must be smashed."

In order to confuse and pacify the working class, the Democrats and their union hack friends have taken hypocrisy to new heights. They’re just as guilty, if not more so, of destroying our jobs and pensions. Just weeks ago, Democrat presidential wannabees Lieberman and Daschle defended the accounting "principles" that permit the present deceptive treatment of stock options.

The roots of the current crisis go back at least as far as the "Clinton boom." Between 1994 and 1999, corporations borrowed $1.22 trillion from banks. Of that, just 15.3% was used for capital expenditures; 57% ($697.4 billion) was used to buy back stock, drive up company stock prices and inflate the value of executives’ stock options. Sure these criminals belong in jail. But under this rotten system, the ones sending them there are worse than the ones (that might be) carted off.

Between 1990 and1999, the average CEO’s annual pay at 362 of the largest corporations increased more than six times, to $12.4 million. This is 475 times larger than the average pay of a factory worker. Meanwhile, about two million industrial jobs were wiped out between April 1998 and last December.

The Enron debacle and stock collapses at WorldCom and elsewhere destroyed the retirement savings of many workers. A USA TODAY/CNN/Gallup Poll says that more than one-third of adults have no retirement money saved. Many have no access to a job-related pension or retirement plan. Millions can’t afford to contribute to a 401(k) plan.

"The average…household has virtually no chance to reach an adequate retirement savings in the next 50 years," according to a retirement specialist at the Economic Policy Institute (EPI). An EPI study found that over 40% of retired workers won’t be able to match even half of their former job income, and 20% will live below the poverty line. And these are "Clinton boom" figures, between 1989 and 1998! Karen Ferguson, director of the Pension Rights Center, said it’s "inevitable…that many more millions of retirees will be without enough money to make ends meet."

While workers pay with their jobs and pensions, the big bosses take advantage of this crisis to consolidate their monopolies and get rid of the smaller bosses (see adjacent editorial). A passive working class that accepts these economic attacks, racist police terror and mass round-ups and deportations of immigrants, is ripe for the picking as the rulers build fascism and mobilize for war. Self-critically, we in PLP have not done enough to answer the bell. While the masses may not be storming the barricades, the bosses’ onslaught is not winning their allegiance. We must be "tribunes of the people" in the unions, churches and mass organizations. We can do much better in building a fighting PLP. In this very difficult period, fighting is winning!

Big Bosses Use Crisis to Consolidate Power:

Communist Revolution: Only Crisis Capitalism Cannot Survive

The present stock market nosedive provides a lesson in the political economy of the profit system. A long boom has ended in the explosion of a huge speculative bubble. A vast economic consolidation is taking place. Millions of workers are suffering the loss of jobs, pension values and benefits.

Within their own class, the old-line, liberal rulers of the Eastern Establishment are using the current Wall Street scandals to tighten their economic and political hold on all of society. They are swatting down newly-rich competitor upstarts, disciplining incompetents and furthering their murderous agenda, especially oil wars abroad and a police state at home.

Telecommunications: Eye Of The Storm

During the 1990s, greedy lenders and investors poured billions into fiber-optic and cable networks. According to the New York Times (7/22), "A glut of capacity in communications networks, a result of overzealous investment during the telecommunication boom in the late 1990’s, is a big factor in the industry’s current slump."

The telecom boom "provided too much money to too many companies to build too many competing networks" (Steven Pearlstein, Washington Post, 5/2). In some sectors, over-capacity was running as high as 98%. Less than 10% of fiber-optic wire is being used. So the telecom bosses cut prices and offered special deals to win "market share." Many had barely enough money left to pay operating expenses, much less service the enormous debt they’d incurred to finance their expansion. Then they tried to disguise their troubles with accounting and financial tricks, now being exposed by the liberal media.

Even companies like AT&T had eyes bigger than their stomachs. In the Fall of 2000, Wall Street saw that new telecom loans were being used to service debt (get new loans to pay off old ones), rather than to increase actual production. They decided to turn off the financing switch and stop this Ponzi scheme. At that moment today’s market collapse became inevitable.

This has cost workers dearly and is a painful reminder that capitalism can never provide the working class with economic security. It also whacked a number of "new money" companies and executives (WorldCom, Tyco, Qwest, PSINet, XO, Teligent, et al.) And it is having a ripple effect. "Nearly every telecommunications company…is owed money by WorldCom and will have difficulty collecting these debts…" (NYT, 7/22)) Verizon and SBC are owed $200 million each by WorldCom, who has been paying them $100 million every month to connect to their networks. BellSouth in Atlanta usually collected $80 million a month from WorldCom.

Biggest Sharks See Market Value Rise

But the biggest Eastern banks are about to make a killing. The Times reports (7/17) that the market’s collapse "may prove to be an opportunity for private firms to acquire companies and business divisions at fire-sale prices." Chief among the vultures is the Blackstone Group, which recently launched the largest private investment fund ever assembled ($6.45 billion). Blackstone is using this war chest to gobble up "distressed companies" like the debt-ridden telecom firm Qwest. Blackstone’s CEO, Steven Schwartzman gloats: "This should be a good cycle for people who have money."

WorldCom’s bankruptcy debt is about to be financed by Citigroup, J.P. Morgan and GE Capital, all pillars of the Eastern Establishment. The spoils are going into major Eastern banks.

According to the Times (7/21), by July 18 Exxon Mobil’s share of the market’s total value had increased by 52% since March 2000. The Establishment camp’s Citigroup share was up 73% increase since 2000. Meanwhile, Microsoft’s share dropped 18% in that period.

This economic consolidation has an important political aspect. The Eastern Establishment not only wants to profit from the current disarray, they want to tighten their grip on the economy of the future. Taking matters into their own hands, they’ve set up a "Commission on Public Trust and Private Enterprise" to ensure that corporations are run the way they want. Co-chairing the commission is Peter G. Peterson, chair of the Blackstone Group. Other members include the present or former heads of the pension fund giant TIAA-CREF; Intel; the Vanguard Group; the Securities and Exchange Commission (Arthur Levitt); Johnson & Johnson; and Harvard Business School Professor Lynne Paine.

Also on this commission are Paul Volcker, former chair of the Federal Reserve System and longtime Rockefeller agent, and former Senator Warren Rudman, who co-chaired the Hart-Rudman commission that laid the groundwork for the big bosses’ current drive toward a police state. Consolidating the economy, squashing upstart capitalists, and disciplining disobedient or incompetent insiders are key aspects of this plan. If the bumbling Bush White House proves unable to meet the Eastern Establishment’s expectations, they will be headed for the golf course in 2004. Liberal Republicans are already distancing themselves from their moronic commander-in-chief (See N.Y. Times, "GOP Lawmakers Bolt Bush’s Herd, " (7/20).

Capitalism Can Survive Any Crisis, Except Revolution!

At the moment, the biggest rulers are having their way, albeit with some problems. Many people are outraged when their life-savings go up in smoke. The stock market’s decline has caused great cynicism among large numbers of workers and others. While the rulers would prefer to exploit "happy" victims, for the time being they’ll settle for passive outrage and cynicism. Capitalism can survive any economic or political crisis. It will never topple itself.

A mass, international, revolutionary PLP, prepared to challenge for —and win — state power in the course of protracted armed struggle, is the only crisis from which the ruling class cannot recover. Without that, the boom-bust-imperialist war cycle can go on indefinitely. As we work toward this goal, no matter how long it takes, one of our highest priorities must remain winning workers and others away from "lesser-evil" illusions about liberal capitalists and politicians.

Telecom Bust Follows Classic Capitalist Pattern

Speculative booms and spectacular collapses have been the hallmark of the profit system since its earliest days. The railroad boom of the 1880s provides a curious mirror. Instead of fiber-optic cables, the hardware was iron railroad tracks. Investors flooded the market with so much capital to build parallel tracks when only one was needed, or so many tracks to locations that couldn’t support profitable service, that the entire industry went bankrupt. Like today’s consolidation, J.P. Morgan, the most powerful U.S. capitalist at the time, wolfed down the spoils.

Liberals Portray Their Fascist Military As A Model Of ‘Corporate Governance’

Hitler depicted himself as the "enemy of big capital," while he served the biggest German capitalists, who needed fascism to mobilize the population for World War II. He targeted those German bosses who had played a role similar to that of the crooks now vilified in the liberal press. The liberal rulers hypocritically denounce the "corporate greed" of a "few bad apples," while the biggest banks and oil companies make huge profits and war plans. The July 20 New York Times op-ed page contains an article by Robert Hemsley, a member of the Western Pulp and Paper Workers Union. Normally, the Times doesn’t run statements by union rank-and-filers. But Hemsley has a line that echoes the liberal police state/war gospel: "Contrast [the 1:592 ratio of pay between Hemsley and his boss — Ed.] with the Marine Corps, which is structured so that enlisted personnel and officers work together for a common purpose. The Marine Corps commandant…is paid…just 13 times more than…a new private in boot camp."

Clock Ticking on Gulf War II As U.S. Bosses Try to Seize Iraqi Oil Fields

Iraq, which holds the largest supply of cheap, accessible crude outside Saudi Arabia, remains the most likely target for another U.S. oil war. U.S. imperialism intends to rule the world for the foreseeable future by retaining its chokehold on the most profitable sources of oil. Exxon Mobil and other U.S. oil giants won’t allow Iraqi crude to be controlled by imperialist rivals. Saddam’s potential deals with European, Chinese, and Russian oil barons — not his ruthlessness — have made him "worse than Hitler" in the eyes of U.S. rulers.

But the U.S. has run into a few stumbling blocks on the road to Baghdad. These include Bush’s failure to put a lid on the explosive situation in the Middle East, his general ineptitude in imposing fascism in the "war against terror," foreign policy and, most recently, the economic crisis/scandals.

Despite these obstacles, the clock is ticking on the next oil war. "Military experts estimate that there are already about 200,000 U.S. soldiers in the Gulf" ("Prophesying War," London Financial Times, 7/18). The build-up is therefore in an advanced stage.

Further preparations for wars beyond Iraq are also well under way. The "largest military experiment in U.S. history" was due to begin the week of July 22, in southern California, with 13,500 troops from the Army, Air Force, Navy and Marines, who will use "the latest in military hardware in simulation of what planners believe the battlefield could look like in five years" (Associated Press, 7/18). Scenarios include "simulated weapons of mass destruction, urban warfare, the United Nations, and humanitarian relief."

Given the bosses’ plans for war without end abroad and a police state at home, "urban warfare" could well include simultaneous fighting in Baghdad and Los Angeles or New York. All this murder and mayhem will be disguised as an effort to protect "human rights" and "democracy." The PLP will never cease mobilizing workers to fight against this Big Lie and its deadly consequences.

PLP Brings Fight vs. Oil War To AFT Convention

LAS VEGAS, July 18 — "I read that already! Where’s today’s leaflet?" is how many among the 5,000 delegates greeted us on the third day of the American Federation of Teachers (AFT) convention ending today. This was the first time in years that PLP members participated actively in the convention. It won’t be the last.

The AFT is one of the largest unions in the country with over one million members, including teachers in New York City, Chicago and many other large cities. PLP members met with delegates from their hometowns, participated in committee and caucus meetings, helped organize against the leadership’s pro-war, pro-fascist resolution supporting the "war on terror" and extending it to Iraq, and held a small but excellent Party forum. We distributed over 300 CHALLENGES, more than 800 copies of our new education pamphlet, three leaflets totaling 3,800 copies and 1,000 buttons with the slogan "A War Budget Leaves Every Child Behind."

The button was everywhere. Delegates wore it constantly. It was seen on the huge TV screens as delegates spoke at the microphones. AFT Pres. Sandra Feldman is a member of Rockefeller’s Council on Foreign Relations, which develops foreign policy for the main wing of the ruling class. Still, the best majority the leadership could muster to cut off debate on their pro-war resolution was 60-40. Even in a controlled convention, they must rely on maneuvering and stopping debate to stifle the rank and file.

Another highlight was the unfurling of our banner in the convention hall during the debate, including one opposing the AFT top honchos’ support of imperialist war as an attack against all workers and their children. Most delegates saw it when entering the hall as comrades and friends held it up in the lobby. A group of teachers, young workers and students from the L.A. Summer Project were part of that activity and met many delegates as well. Their presence and seriousness impressed many.

We were also active in discussions on high-stakes testing, privatization and vouchers and racist budget cutbacks. Our main reason for attending the convention was to meet more delegates who want to organize around these issues. We will not accept a police state and racist terror. We will fight the bosses’ and union leadership’s plans to turn our students into cannon fodder for their endless wars. Over the next two years we will work to involve our friends in more struggles in our schools and locals, and bring more communist delegates to the next convention in Washington, D.C.

The following is a speech that was to be given from the floor by a PLP delegate at the AFT convention. For many reasons, including the fact that the issue came up so late, the speech was not given.

"Sisters and brothers, the issue we are now discussing is probably the most important issue facing this convention. It is a matter of life and death. Furthermore – in all likelihood – it will profoundly affect every other issue we care about, both at home and abroad.

Resolution 49 does not mention Iraq, but the unspoken reality is that an upcoming war against Iraq is the central and undeniable context of this resolution.

The magazine I am holding up is the July 8^th edition of Fortune. In this featured article about war with Iraq, the subtitle says, "IT’S NOT IF BUT WHEN"! Make no mistake. The U.S. government is preparing to launch a major war against Iraq!

Resolution 49 is long. It discusses a number of different things related to the attack on 9/11 and events since then. Some parts of the resolution are quite true. Most importantly, however, it says "We have no doubt that military action will be required more than once in the coming years and that the costs may be great." And it also says, "We support the use of the wide range of powers at the country’s disposal . . ."

I am not speaking as a pacifist. Some wars are necessary. Slavery in the United States, for example, could not have been defeated without the Civil War. As a communist, as a member of Progressive Labor Party, I am firmly convinced that the Enrons, Worldcoms, and Exxon/Mobils are the vicious exploiters of today. Like their kindred spirits – the slavemasters of old – they will not give up their power or privileges willingly. Nothing short of a revolution will allow working people to take power and create a world of true equality, sisterhood, and brotherhood.

Finally, on the question of justifiable violence, it would be perfectly fine with me – if indeed Osama bin laden is guilty – that he pay with his life for the deaths of three thousand working class sisters and brothers who died horrifically and tragically on 9/11.

But violence and war are not always the right thing. Let’s be clear. What are the real reasons propelling a U.S. attack on Iraq?

First, it’s not about terrorism. In fact, for months after 9/11, the U.S. government searched desperately for any possible way to put some of the blame on Iraq. Try as they might, there was no connection to be found.

Second, it’s not about weapons of mass destruction. Quite a few countries have more weaponry than Iraq. In fact, most such nations – like England, Pakistan, India, Israel, France, Russia, and the United States – have engaged in military operations outside their own borders to pursue economic and political domination. In this regard, Iraq is not unique, and Iraq is certainly not the worst offender.

Third, plans for war against Iraq are not based on needing oil for use here in the United States. Only a small percentage of the oil used here comes from the Middle East.

In other words, the upcoming war against Iraq is not based on terrorism, not based on weapons of mass destruction, and not based on U.S. energy needs. The real reason for the war is something else: Exxon/Mobil’s deadly quest to dominate Mid-East oil.

Whichever capitalists win the struggle to control Mideast oil achieve two things as a result: 1) Billions of dollars in profit, 2) A degree of control over their European and Asian rivals who depend on that oil. That’s what this war is all about.

Since World War II, U.S. oil companies have exercised control over Saudi Arabian oil, the world’s largest reserves. Iraq is the country with the second-largest reserves, but U.S. oil companies – in recent years – have been unable to control Iraqi oil because the Iraqi ruling class has been more favorable to deals with companies from France, China and Russia.

All of this reflects a more fundamental and powerful contradiction – the deadly rivalry between major imperialist powers for domination of all the world’s labor and natural resources, not oil alone.

In an effort to line up support for war against Iraq, the U.S. government has fostered increasing anti-Arab racism. We are now expected to accept racial profiling – if the victims are Middle Eastern – and we are expected, in an upcoming war, to accept the loss of many many civilian lives, as long as they’re not American. This is dead wrong! We must never tolerate racism of any kind!

There are three additional reasons that necessitate our strong opposition to a war against Iraq:

Resources that go into this war will significantly take away from resources available for education. Let’s not forget that the large-scale military buildup during the Carter/Reagan years took military spending from less than ¼ to more than 1/3 of the federal budget. As an inevitable consequence, we witnessed deep slashes in funding for social programs like education. A new war in the Middle East will do this again, perhaps worse.

Students whom we have just recently taught – young people we care about deeply – will be sent to kill and die.

The students and working people of Iraq – our working class sisters and brothers – may die in horrible ways and in horrendously large numbers.

Delegates, we must choose sides! Do we support Exxon/Mobil and their bloody war for profit? Or do we support students and working people here and in Iraq?

The rich and powerful are beating the drums of war for their own deadly purposes! We must follow the drumbeat of a more righteous rhythm, the rhythm of sisterhood, brotherhood, and international working class solidarity!

I urge you to vote against resolution 49!"

Red Ideas Spur Hospital Workers To Veto Union-Boss Give-backs

"I told those union leaders that I’m sick of the ‘haves’ always making the ‘have-nots’ pay the price!"

"Bill, who’s the communist here, me or you?"

That brief exchange occurred as an angry rank and file defeated the union leadership’s attempt at a major hospital to cheat workers out of four months worth of wage increases. It illustrates how PLP’s close ties with workers and participation in the class struggle enables us to raise communist ideas as the answer to the daily problems caused by capitalism.

We’re in the third year of our contract, which scheduled a 3% raise on July 1. Last spring the hospital bosses told the non-union workers that their raises would be pushed back to November. Many non-union workers then wished they were unionized.

In the last week of June, the union began calling for a membership vote on July 2 to push our raise back to November as well. They warned of mass layoffs if we didn’t give in. But a number of union delegates challenged them calling for, "No Give-backs! No Layoffs! No more cuts in patient care!"

PLP members explained how the nature of capitalism and the needs of the bosses’ oil war made it impossible for them to promise "No Layoffs." Posters with these slogans quickly covered locker-room walls. Floor captains were recruited from the rank and file to mobilize the members.

A PLP flyer urged union members to vote against giving up four months of the raise. It traced the main cause of the cuts in healthcare to the billions now being used for the bosses’ oil war and "Homeland Security" police state. Workers carried the flyer throughout the hospital. Someone posted it on a heavily used time clock. Usually workers are quick to tear down flyers they disagree with. But the PLP flyer is still hanging in some locker-rooms, an indication of mass support for our ideas.

The scared hospital and union bosses hastily called an all-day series of union meetings on July 1, at the hospital! The union business agent and the head of human resources co-chaired the meetings, and got their fill of workers’ anger.

Distrustful workers demanded that the rebellious delegates be allowed to watch the voting and ballot count to prevent any tampering. The union leaders had to agree, but this didn’t stop the union’s Executive VP from arguing with workers to "vote yes," right at the ballot box. She was challenged by one of the rebellious delegates, and workers called her a "shill" for the bosses.

The leadership’s give-back proposal was resoundingly defeated, 450 to 35. The union leaders are furious, and the bosses are meeting to figure out how they were beaten so badly.

This battle re-charged the Party’s ties with both union and non-union workers. The demands of the bosses’ oil war and their "Homeland Security" police state will mean more attacks. Building a mass communist base and leading the workers in battle will re-build a new communist movement.

Boeing Contract Battle Needs Break With ‘Partner’ Fraud

"Man, this crowd is old!" observed an International Association of Machinists (IAM) member at the July 9th strike vote against the Boeing Company on July 9. The whole crowd was considerably smaller than at past votes, with fewer black and Latino workers participating.

Some have said the company has "cut the heart" out of the union, laying off nearly half the membership during the past nine months. These layoffs have been particularly racist as many blacks and Latinos are the last hired and first fired. Fewer than 24,000 IAM members remain as the September 2 contract deadline approaches for workers in Seattle, WA, Wichita, KS, and Portland, OR. We must "put the heart back" into this contract battle, bringing laid off and retired workers back into this fight, emphasizing that the profit system is the source of the layoffs and cutbacks. That can help create the ability and desire to raise the level of class struggle to one of fighting for communism.

Accepting Capitalism Assures Defeat

Commercial aerospace is suffering form a capitalist crisis of overproduction. In 1990, Boeing delivered 285 airplanes with 43,400 IAM members. Last year, they delivered 450 airplanes with only 27,123 members. Companies throughout the world are slashing jobs as the market for the increased production has collapsed. Communist production, where all value provides for the needs of the international working class, is the only way out of these endless crises.

To maintain credibility, the union leadership is calling Contract 2002, "the fight for job security." But they began their expensive strike sanction brochure saying, "Job security does not mean the employer can never eliminate a job." Since the misleaders accept capitalism and its rules as a given, they are forced to define this issue in such a way as to assure defeat for the workers.

Their proposed contract provisions have never saved any jobs. They talk about creating work through the High Performance Work Organization (HPWO), which would force us to speed up, and even fire, our co-workers. Then the entire Washington State congressional delegation (11 U.S. senators and representatives) signed a letter to the strike sanction rally which said, "the core of the Boeing Co.’s success [is] its skilled work force." Did these "representatives" back our vote to sanction a strike? Of course not! "Nobody wants a strike," they assured us.

Two days later, leaders of the IAM and the engineers union traveled to Wall Street to convince stock market analysts that preserving our jobs was best for capitalism. The analysts’ reaction "appeared largely noncommittal." With friends like Wall Street analysts and bought-and-paid-for politicians, who needs enemies?

Ultimately, the IAM leadership calls for a "real partnership" between Boeing and the workers are ridiculous: what benefits the bosses — speed-up, layoffs, depressed wages, off-loading and reduced health care and pension coverage — can never benefit the workers. The dangerous ideology used to justify these "partnerships," racism and nationalism, spell death for the working class.

Worse Than Ridiculous

The union leadership wrapped itself in the flag, talking about "when America came together after 9/11" and criticizing Boeing for having "no loyalty to the flag." But patriotism and nationalism only dull our ability to wage the sharp struggle these hard times demand. Where is the union’s loyalty to the international working class? Where was their support for the 2,000 Airbus wildcatters in England or the 8,000 IAM wildcatters in Canada last April? The misleaders’ loyalty is to capitalism and themselves.

The political crisis we face is even more important than the economic crisis. A decade of racism and nationalism — and the piles of propaganda about national unity since 9/11 — has decimated our ranks. Calls for partnerships with the bosses, especially in these times of current and future wars, amounts to becoming social fascists, siding with the bosses of one country to slaughter workers of other countries. The bosses are all too willing to "partner" with us to help defeat their international competition. They’re all too willing to sacrifice our youth on the altar of their imperial profits. The only war workers should be fighting is the class war, to free our class from wage slavery and the oppression of capitalism.

PLP has often paraphrased the communist writer Bertolt Brecht’s famous phrase, "When the bosses talk peace, better get your helmet." In the same way, when the IAM talks partnership with Boeing, prepare for cuts and oppression.

Uniting with the capitalists provides as much job security as a pig has at a hungry BBQ. Some Boeing workers are emphasizing the need to bring laid-off and retired workers into the contract battle. The Party supports these efforts, as class struggle contains the potential to learn how to finally put an end to this job-killing system. Make no mistake about it; the only security for our class is a revolutionary movement strong enough to smash capitalism.

Mexico’s Farmers Clash With Attacking Cops

MEXICO, July 17 — More than 300 small farmers armed with machetes clashed with police while protesting the proposed construction of the new Mexico City airport on their communal lands.

The farmers said police shot at them first and about 25 officers beat one protester to death. The demonstrators then seized at least nine hostages and demanded that state officials release all 15 arrested. The hostages included five cops, three Texcoco officials and a Texcoco District Attorney. Over 400 state agents and federal police were sent to Atenco, home to many commuting industrial workers . All highways leading to the town were closed, causing miles-long traffic jams.

The farmers, from San Salvador Atenco in the State of Mexico, were heading toward a meeting that included Gov. Arturo Montiel when they encountered a police blockade. A fight broke out and hundreds of farmers threw rocks at the cops and burned cars. At least 12 were injured and 15 arrested.

Early last month, Atenco farmers took six topographers hostage for taking illegal land surveys. They were released at the steps of the Supreme Court building unharmed.

Last October the federal government chose Texcoco for the area’s new international airport. Since then farmers have staged frequent machete-wielding protests around Mexico City, claiming the money the Fox government is offering for their land is well below market value. Auto and other industrial workers fighting layoffs have joined some of these protests. The bosses are using the law and repression to eliminate the jobs of agricultural workers in the area, handing their land to the big bosses.

Behind this struggle lies a capitalist dogfight for profits; for the next Presidential election; and for the governorship of the state of Mexico, involving different sets of politicians. Gov. Montiel is a member of the Atlacomulco investors’ group, which wants to build the airport and collect huge profits from the multi-billion dollar business. Angry people ran the mayor of Anteco, a PRI member, out of town some time ago.

If the mass militant protests temporarily stop the airport, it will benefit the group of investors who want it built in Hidalgo. The Mexico City government and others have filed constitutional challenges against the project. Workers and their allies must not support any side in this dogfight. They’re all our class enemies.

The "ejidos" (community-owned land) to be destroyed by the new airport were formed as part of mass struggle by small peasants in the last century. But ejidos have not solved the basic problems of poverty and oppression suffered for centuries by these small farmers and farm workers. Only social ownership of all production will allow workers in the countryside and cities to have a decent life. We must build a mass revolutionary communist movement to serve their class needs.

Workers in Iran Reject Fundamentalist Rulers

The Islamic Fundamentalists try to present themselves as an alternative to U.S.-British imperialist plundering of the Middle East/Persian Gulf and to the corrupt local rulers serving Exxon-Mobil, Shell and BP. But in the last 20 years the workers and youth of Iran have learned that the Islamic holy rollers are as rotten as the fascist pro-U.S. Shah regime they replaced in 1979.

On July 16, tens of thousands of workers gathered in front of the Labor Ministry in Tehran to protest unemployment, lack of social security, unpaid wages and plans to make the already weak labor laws even more pro-boss. Banners of workers from different industries called for the right to strike and other demands. When the Islamic Council and Workers’ House sellouts were unable to control the angry workers as they pushed their way into the ministry building, uniformed and plain-clothed cops attacked them. Workers fought back against the cops’ tear gas, clubs and plastic bullets. Several workers were injured and many were arrested. This action was the latest, and most militant, of angry protests against the rulers by workers and youth throughout Iran.

Meanwhile, the different ayatollahs and other Islamic ruling-class forces are fighting each other over who will be top dog. Some want to "reform" the regime with some small changes, knowing they can no longer fool the masses.

Revolutionary-minded workers and youth must learn the lesson of history. Oil workers and revolutionary youth led the 1979 overthrow of the hated pro-U.S. Shah regime. The Islamic fundamentalists co-opted it, helped by fake leftists who tailed it, saying workers were "not ready" for a communist-led system. After the fundamentalists seized and consolidated their power, they turned against the workers and leftists, arresting and murdering hundreds of thousands in June 1981.

As the U.S. and British imperialists prepare for a Gulf War II to capture Iraq’s rich oil fields, the many contradictions facing the region are exploding. The militant workers and youth of the Persian Gulf must build a mass communist movement to smash the imperialist warmakers and all capitalist forces.

Fascism in the Mills

EAST CHICAGO, IN — "It’s a new day, a new industry. All this sucks but what can we really do? We can fight to make some small changes, but the old days are over." That’s how a former LTV worker with 29 years seniority described life as a new hire at International Steel Group’s Indiana Harbor Works (ISG). And he’s right.

Last December LTV Steel went out of business, wiping out thousands of jobs. Pensions and health care were cut or eliminated for over 50,000 retirees, while the top corporate jackals walked away with millions in bonuses. The union’s response was to wrap themselves in the bosses’ flag and demand steel tariffs. The union told us our best hope was that someone would take over LTV’s assets. And now it’s happened.

W. R. Ross, a corporate vulture that specializes in picking up failed or failing companies on the cheap, bought the stinking carcass of LTV Steel for peanuts and is now operating the LTV plants in Cleveland and here, where they’ve re-called about 850 former high seniority LTV workers, all as unprotected ISG new hires.

What’s it like? A worker came in ten minutes late on his second day of work — fired. Somebody missed a day after his brother’s wedding — fired. If you fail to report off — fired. Park your car in the wrong spot — fired. Millwrights at the Hot Strip finished a job, and went to the shanty for an hour — fired. A ladle cover was dropped. The bosses couldn’t figure out whom to blame, so they gave the whole crew a day off.

Conditions are vastly different from those under LTV. ISG is operating the integrated mill like a mini-mill, significantly cutting labor costs. The workforce is smaller and more "flexible," meaning workers perform many different jobs and work company-determined shifts and hours. Some are working three 12-hour shifts with four days off, followed by four 12-hour shifts and five days off. And these are not kids!

"You can’t say yes or no," said one ISG worker, who feared he’d be fired if identified. "You can’t talk back and you can’t give your opinion." "People are fed up," said another. "It’s a sweatshop. The company knows it can do whatever it wants to do and that’s so hurtful."

Some workers have become more vocal and others have talked about organizing a walkout. The union hasn’t put out one leaflet, let alone led any sort of fight-back against these new attacks. According to the Hammond Times (7/18), a Local 1011 official said the workers "are spoiled," and that any walkout would be considered an unauthorized wildcat strike. Currently, they’re negotiating a permanent contract with fewer job classifications, more company control of work rules and cuts in man-hour cost per ton of steel produced.

People are angry. Some are working and have health insurance for the first time in six months. Others who are not coming back have nothing. A millwright’s wife cannot get cancer treatments. A worker with leukemia has to skip pain medicine and treatments.

This is how profiteer Ross makes his millions. This is how the rulers and their agents who run the unions are bringing fascism to the workplace as they mobilize for war. Every steel worker in the world is feeling the blows. We can’t become cynical or demoralized by this "new fascist day." We’re in this for the long haul and will use every attack to build a mass PLP among all steel workers and the entire working class, across all borders.

Inglewood: Cops, U.S. Bosses Are Biggest Terrorists

LOS ANGELES, July 12—Chanting "No Justice, No Peace, No Racist Police," hundreds of demonstrators marched here today to denounce the racist beating of Donovan Jackson-Chavis and the jailing of Mitchell Crooks, who videotaped the beating. Without Crooks’ video, the world would never have seen the racist treatment cop Jeremy Morse has dished out to Inglewood residents for years. As payback, the Sheriffs arrested Crooks on a 3-year-old warrant.

While U.S. Representative Maxine Waters called for civilian review boards and investigations, neither will stop police terror or the system requiring it. Others carried signs saying "Inglewood, LA, U.S. cops, U.S. rulers, The #1 Terrorists in the World." Liberal politicians like Waters try to calm angry workers with the promise that the system can be fixed to end racist police terror.

Some say Morse is just a "rogue cop" (suspended WITH PAY!). But a group of cops attacked Donovan. Nationwide, thousands of cops carry out daily racist terror against black and Latino youth and workers. Over 2,000,000 people are imprisoned in the U.S., 70% black and Latino, mostly for non-violent "crimes." Many are forced to work for pennies in prison slave labor. Rather than being the work of "rogue cops," this is the systematic racist terror of U.S. capitalism.

The LA County Board of Supervisors has just voted to close 11 clinics in LA County, forcing many of LA’s poorest residents into long and deadly waits in over-crowded emergency rooms. (See CHALLENGE, 7/24) The rulers use their racist cops to terrorize us into accepting these cuts while the rulers spend over $400 billion on the "War on Terror" and Homeland Security.

U.S. rulers are pretending to fight terrorism in Afghanistan. But they’re the biggest terrorists of all. Attorney-General Ashcroft, head of the "INjustice Dept.," is "investigating" the beating of Donovan. What’s to investigate? He and the bosses’ government just want to look like our "friends" so they can trick black and Latin youth into joining the army to fight, kill and die for the control of the rulers’ oil profits and pipelines.

Less than two weeks after this racist beating, cops Morse and Darvish were indicted by a grand jury. Morse is charged with "assault under color of authority" and Darvish with "filing a false police report." While it remains doubtful they’ll be convicted, Waters applauded the indictments, saying they would "change the culture of the police department."

On the same day, former New York City Police Commissioner William Bratton applied to be LA Police Chief. The LA Police Commission fired Bernard Parks for not implementing community policing. This represents a very long struggle between the liberal Eastern Establishment and the old LA rulers over control of the city and it’s policing.

Bratton is an advocate of the "Fixing Broken Windows" strategy, involving a massive police presence and arrests for the most minor offenses. He graduated from the FBI’s National Executive Institute. As NY’s police chief he organized massive dragnets and arrests. His "community policing" tries to win local ministers, priests and other community leaders and groups to turn in all potential offenders. This is the liberal stoolpigeon program to counter Ashcroft’s "spy-on-your-neighbor" TIPS. The liberals fear TIPS is too crude, so the NY Times editorialized (7/22), "This [TIPS] ill-considered domestic spying program should be stopped before it starts."

The liberals pose as our "friends" but have a more advanced strategy to implement fascism. They are indeed the MAIN enemy. The PLP leaflet distributed at the demonstration said Morse and his racist buddies must be fired and jailed for the racist assault on Donovan and many other residents of Inglewood. To fight police terror, we should oppose the liberals’ plan to expand fascist community policing. The main job of cops is to protect and serve the racist rulers so in the long run to end police brutality we must fight for a society without bosses—communism.

Protest Nazi Resurgence

WASHINGTON, D.C., July 22 — Government workers overwhelmingly passed an Anti-Nazi resolution at our June union meeting. The resolution encouraged members to protest when the white supremacist National Alliance, a West Virginia-based group, rallies at the U.S. Capitol August 24. We’ll announce this at our next union meeting. Struggles are being waged to get workers to win their community groups and religious congregations to come out and oppose them.

Several workers discussed and collectively produced the union resolution and flyer. Many handed them out, urging their co-workers to attend the meeting and vote for it.

The Alliance has held four increasingly successful rallies here the past year at the German and Israeli embassies. A May rally drew 200 young racists and skinheads, outnumbering the counter-demonstrators and encouraging the fascists. On July 14, these neo-Nazis marched in Georgia attacking Latin immigrants.

These fascist terrorists can’t be ignored. Nazis and their followers use racism and anti-Semitism to win support and divide workers. Since the founding of the KKK, these agents of U.S. capitalism have mainly targeted black workers and anti-racists.

The U.S. "War on Terror" and "Homeland Security" are chilling echoes of Nazi Germany’s early days. U.S. rulers’ unending wars and plans for a fascist police state mean more budget cuts, police brutality, losses of pensions and jobs and the invasion of everyone’s privacy, including arrests. Rallies defending all immigrant students from racist harassment and deportations are good, but not nearly enough. We must challenge the fascists at every turn and build the movement to smash racism and fascism. That means joining and building a mass communist PLP.

We’ll mobilize workers and students to confront these racist terrorists at the Capitol and drive them out of town. We’ll spread the word at student groups, churches and with union resolutions, to stop these storm troopers because they’ll attack anyone opposing racism and attacks against all workers. We will reach many willing participants.

Liberals’ Anti-Pedophile Crusade Targets Pro-Europe Pope

Many U.S. Catholics are rightly enraged at pedophile priests and the higher-ups who shield them. But without a class-based outlook, that anger could become support for far more deadly "liberal" misleaders. The liberals championing church "reform" speak for the dominant wing of U.S. capital, which is slaughtering workers wholesale to ensure U.S. control of the world’s oil supplies and markets. U.S. forces in Afghanistan have already killed over 6,000 non-combatants, including the recent wedding massacre.

The liberals’ campaign against pedophile priests aims at separating the U.S. church from the Vatican, which serves the interests of European capitalists opposed to the U.S. bosses’ strategy. For example, French oil barons — like the Al Qaeda murderers — want to end the U.S.’s stranglehold on Saudi crude.

Cardinals Law and Egan, of Boston and New York, top the liberals’ hit list. Sure, they protected perverts. But, for U.S. rulers, their most grievous fault was preaching the pope’s pro-Europe, anti-U.S. line. When U.S. forces invaded Afghanistan shortly after Sept. 11, Law announced "military force...is always regrettable" and must "continue to be limited" (America magazine, 10/22/01). Egan said Catholics should "not harbor any thoughts of war, of any kind" (Catholic New York, 10/04/01). These words constitute heresy for the liberal U.S. establishment as it fine-tunes plans for invading Iraq. Targeting the church’s age-old dirty secret, liberal media like the Boston Globe and the New York Times are now running exposés demanding the bishops’ criminal prosecution. Boston College (BC), meanwhile, which is controlled directly by the Eastern Establishment, plays a large role in the intellectual side of the anti-Vatican movement, with help from Harvard.

On June 19, a Globe columnist proclaimed, "BC is leading the way on church reform" and continued, "For more than a decade, the Vatican has been trying to bring this country’s Catholic universities into line. Now one of those universities is starting an effort that could lead to a discussion of reform and change." The Globe didn’t say that "reform" entails backing U.S. oil wars in the short term and wider conflict later. The man who launched the anti-Vatican push at BC was Geoffrey Boisi, vice-chairman of JP Morgan Chase, Exxon Mobil’s leading stockholder. As head of BC’s board of trustees, he hand-picked William Leahy to be the school’s new president in 1996.

Leahy’s opposition to Rome matches Boisi’s loyalty to the Rockefeller banking and oil empire. As chief administrator of Marquette University, Leahy had for a decade battled the Vatican’s demands that it approve the teachings of professors in Catholic colleges. Boisi belongs to David Rockefeller’s Trilateral Commission. Boisi and Exxon Mobil’s CEO Lee Raymond were the two men most responsible for JP Morgan’s takeover by Rockefeller’s Chase Manhattan according to the Wall Street Journal (10/19/00). Boisi had earlier helped engineer Texaco’s buyout of upstart Getty.

Boisi founded and steers the Boisi Center for Religion and American Public Life at BC. Holding frequent forums on liberalizing the church, the Center focuses on winning the faithful to U.S. rulers’ war plans despite the Vatican. The Center’s first post-9/11 newsletter featured Fr. Bryan Hehir of Harvard Divinity School jesuitically advocating "the just war tradition...that seeks to place war inside the moral order." In stark contrast to Law and Egan, Boisi Center director Alan Wolfe praised "Bush’s decision to take military action" as "remarkable." Wolfe later gloated that the sex abuse furor was helping the cause. "The gap between ordinary American Catholics and the Vatican... will only widen as a result of the scandals (New York Times, 4/30/02).

To make the object of the liberals’ religious activism perfectly clear, Gary Hart himself will speak at the Boisi Center in September. He is co-chairman of the Clinton-appointed Hart-Rudman Commission. Long before 9/11, its reports laid out a blueprint for war and fascism. Hart-Rudman’s goal is to do whatever it takes, at whatever human cost, to maintain the U.S. as the world’s number one imperialist for the next quarter century. Hart & Co. call for "galvanizing society" by means of terrorist attacks on U.S. soil, for a fascist police state, and for ever-widening military action, to the point where "the American people are ready to sacrifice blood and treasure" and wage global war. Liberal Hart cloaks profit-driven carnage in noble rhetoric. His topic at BC will be "religious freedom."

We must continue to expose the liberal "clean-up" campaign for what it really is: a sweeping fascist reorganization of society that brings ever more lethal wars.

Imperialist Rivalry Intensifies Latin America’s Poverty

The collapse of the old communist movement and triumph of "free market" capitalism has led to a new Dark Ages for the world’s workers. In Latin America, the imperialists and local bosses have impoverished hundreds of millions. Their thirst for profits has led to a capitalist crisis of overproduction.

Today the unemployment rate exceeds 50% in some countries, creating poverty and unheard of death rates from malnutrition and disease. Argentina, formerly having the highest standard of living in Latin America, now has 30% jobless and a gross domestic product dropping 15% by next year. Similar fates are befalling Brazil, Peru, Uruguay, Ecuador, Mexico and Central America. Workers have staged mass demonstrations from Buenos Aires to Venezuela to Arequipa, Peru.

In the early ’90s, U.S. imperialists initiated the "new model" of globalization for its "emerging economies." Globalization, a euphemism for imperialist control of markets, labor and natural resources, includes strategies to stop rivals from joining the pillaging.

The crisis in Latin America is one more symptom of the sharpening worldwide crisis of overproduction leading to global depression. Brazil is the biggest economy with the largest debt on the continent. When Brazilian auto production was cut from 1.7 million to 1.3 million, it lowered imports from Argentina by 25%. Latin American markets are saturated and workers are suffering huge layoffs, cuts in public services and repression.

U.S. Treasury Secretary Paul O’Neil says, "No more rescues, either for Argentina, Brazil or anyone else." However, the New York Times, speaking for the dominant wing of the US ruling class, editorialized support for IMF help to prop up Argentina’s economy and prevent the spread of economic and political turmoil throughout Latin America, which could open the doors to their European rivals. U.S. imperialism is not about to let GM, Citicorp, Caterpillar, Alcoa (O’Neil’s outfit) and gas and oil companies lose their investments without a fight, including using their military. Already, the U.S. has thousands of "advisers" and troops in the region.

Latin American rulers — with the support of the European imperialists — formed the Movement of National Salvation. On June 15, 1,000 of these bosses’ agents met in Argentina. Latin America’s workers must avoid the trap of these nationalist charlatans and not exchange one exploiter for another.

(A future article will discuss the role of anti-U.S. forces, including fake leftists, which are trying to turn workers and their allies away from building a mass revolutionary Party to fight for the only real solution: a communist society where production is according to need.)

People Nix Russia’s Free-Market Capitalism

To mark the 10th anniversary of all-out capitalism in Russia, the Academy of Sciences’ Institute of Integrated Social Research summarized the results of sociological surveys conducted over that span. The results don’t say much for the profit system. Of those polled:

• Two-thirds see Russian-style democracy as mere window-dressing designed to conceal the authoritarian state beneath. ("Democratic processes are nothing but a sham. The country is in fact run by the rich and powerful.");

• The majority rated the results of "reform" as unsatisfactory;

• Eight-eight percent favor government ownership of the energy sector, 72% for machine-building plants and foundries, and 63% for housing;

• Over the 10-year period, support for private enterprise dropped 16%;

• Only 8% back the liberal economic model, having fallen from 12.5%.

The report says "social status, not age…[is] the leading factor in determining people’s attitudes." The "responses of 18-year-olds and 55-year-olds [were] nearly identical." Despite the din of media propaganda extolling free market capitalism, it seems experience has been the best teacher for the Russian people.