People Before Profit blog

OPINION: Five bailout lessons from Katrina

Mon, 29 Dec 2008 10:42:00 +0000

The U.S. has committed nearly $3 trillion to the financial bailout so far. The Federal Reserve has made more than $2 trillion in emergency loans and another $700 billion has been pledged through congressional action. Much more money is coming.

Things better for your community? I didn't think so.

Welcome to Katrina world. Despite pledges of a hundred billion dollars, we are still in deep pain along the Gulf Coast. What happened?

Unless citizens are vigilant and demanding, the entire U.S. will be subjected to the same forces that swept through the Gulf Coast after Katrina — spending huge amounts of money and leaving a second disaster behind.

Despite promises of buckets of bucks, New Orleans still has 60,000 abandoned homes. Media reports say that 75 percent of the abandoned buildings have homeless people sleeping in them. Public health care, public education and public housing are all less available and being thoroughly privatized. Crime is sky high, though we still have 100 National Guard members patrolling our streets.

So, what lessons can be learned from Katrina world that apply to the financial bailout?

First, demand transparency. Insist on knowing how much money is being spent, by whom it is being spent, who is receiving it and for what reasons. Bloomberg News sued the Federal Reserve in November to find out who received money from the more than $2 trillion in emergency loans they have given out. The government refuses to release that basic information. Such an outrage cannot be permitted.

Second, keep a constant watch out for predators. Many interests feast on the suffering of others. When disaster hits, some see opportunity for their own private interests. What Naomi Klein calls disaster capitalism kicks in and the big bucks start flowing out and away from real needs. Those who are not already picking the bones are circling. It is up to us to force them away.

Third, people have to participate in the decisions. During and after a disaster, there is a vacuum of leadership, and those with the most resources usually rush in, declare an emergency and then go on to make decisions about what has to be done. Not surprisingly, these folks are focused on taking care of their own interests first, and often second and third. We cannot let emergencies be the excuse to avoid democratic decision-making.

Fourth, the human rights of the least powerful must be made a conscious priority. This is the exact opposite of what happens. The human right to housing, land, livelihood and freedom from discrimination must guide the response to the emergency. Liberation theology calls this the preferential option for the poor. Year-end bonuses continue while foreclosures increase? The needs of the poor must take priority over the wants of the rich.

Fifth, insist on gender equity. Experiences show a systematic violation of the rights of women in every phase of disasters. The presence, participation and value of the role of women have been seriously inadequate. Women bear a disproportionate burden of the effects of poverty. The human rights of women must be immediately respected, as their suffering and disrespect continues today.

If our citizens and organizations demand these five principles be respected and followed, there is a chance that the post-bailout environment will not end up like the post-Katrina landscape of New Orleans and the Gulf Coast. Because there is one iron rule in responding to disaster — once that money is gone, it is not coming back.

----- Bill Quigley is a human rights lawyer and law professor at Loyola University New Orleans. This article originally appeared at truthout.org

OPINION: Guns, butter, and Obama

Wed, 24 Dec 2008 01:56:00 +0000

Over the next several months there will be a battle for hearts and minds, but not in Iraq or Afghanistan. The war will be here at home, waged mostly in the halls of Congress, where grim lobbyists for one of the top 15 economies in the world are digging in to preserve their stake in the massive U.S. military budget. With the country in deep recession and resources dwindling for the new administration's programs on health care, education and the environment, the outcome of this battle may well end up defining the next four years.

But coming to grips with the issue, as one military analyst noted, is likely to resemble the worst of World War I trench warfare. 'It will be like the British Army at the Somme,' Winslow Wheeler of the Center for Defense Information (CDI) told the Boston Globe. 'You will just get mowed down by the defense industry.'

Up against the industry

For starters, there are 185,000 corporations behind those metaphorical machine guns, and a few are formidable indeed: Lockheed Martin, Boeing, Raytheon, Alliant Techsystems, United Technologies, Textron, Teledyne, General Dynamics, Northrop Grumman and Texas Instruments, just to name a few.

The World Policy Institute found that dozens of high Bush administration officials were former arms company executives, consultants or shareholders, and that this network of influence reaches deep into Congress. The combination of lobbying and PAC money that pours into election coffers every two years gives the arms industry enormous influence over the actions of the executive and legislative branches.

The reason is simple: the money at stake is staggering, although nailing down exactly what this country spends on the military is extremely difficult. 'Figures on defense spending are notoriously unreliable,' defense expert Chalmers Johnson points out. 'All numbers released by the Pentagon should be regarded as suspect.'

While the 'official' 2009 U.S. military budget is $516 billion, that figure bears little resemblance to what this country actually spends. According to CDI, if one pulls together all the various threads that make up the defense spending tapestry — including Homeland Security, secret 'black budget' items, military-related programs outside of the Defense Department, the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, and such outlays as veterans' benefits — the figure is around $862 billion for the current fiscal year. Johnson says spending is closer to $1.1 trillion.

Even these figures are misleading, since it does not project future costs. According to Nobel Prize winning economist Joseph Stiglitz, when the economic and social costs of the Iraq war are finally added up — including decades of treatment for veterans disabled by traumatic brain injury and post-traumatic stress disorder — the final bill could reach $5 trillion.

Cuts in the offing?

Given the current economic crisis, even the defense establishment recognizes that some cuts are inevitable. A recent study by a Pentagon advisory group, the Defense Business Board, says that current defense spending is 'not sustainable' and recommends scaling back or eliminating some big-ticket weapon systems.

Canceling Lockheed Martin's F-22 stealth fighter and F-35 joint strikefFighter, the Virginia Class submarine, the V-22 Osprey, the Zumwalt Class destroyer, and Boeing and Raytheon's missile defense system, combined with some judicious reductions in other budget items, would save $55 billion annually, according to Foreign Policy in Focus’s Unified Security Budget.

The problem with U.S. military spending isn't just expensive weapons, but the underlying philosophy that the use of force is a valid policy tool. And on that question, the incoming Obama administration has yet to break from the past.

While Obama has pledged to stress diplomacy over warfare, he has also promised to 'maintain the most powerful military on the planet' and to increase the armed forces by some 90,000 soldiers. According to the Congressional Budget Office, that will cost at least $50 billion over five years.

The most disturbing initiative, however, is a recent push to 'reshape' the armed forces. A recent Defense Department directive elevates 'IW' (irregular warfare) to a level 'as strategically important as traditional warfare,' arguing that for the 'foreseeable future, winning the Long War against violent extremists will the central objective of U.S. policy.'

This concept is no different than the 'hearts and minds' counterinsurgency strategy that failed so disastrously in Southeast Asia two generations ago. The directive assumes that military disasters result from impatience and poor tactics. If you're willing to fight a 'Long War,' don't kick in too many doors, lunch with the locals, and hand out lots of candy to the kids, you win.

Occupational hazards

But the key to understanding why the U.S. and NATO are losing in Afghanistan and Iraq is the word 'occupation.'

Writing almost a century ago, T.E. Lawrence laid out what he called the algebra of occupation: 'Rebellion must have an unassailable base … it must have a sophisticated alien enemy, in the form of a disciplined army of occupation too small to dominate the whole area. It must have a friendly population … sympathetic to the point of not betraying rebel movements to the enemy. Granted mobility, security … time and doctrine … victory will rest with the insurgents, for the algebraical [sic] factors are in the end decisive.'

Lawrence was writing about the British occupation of Iraq, but he might as well have been channeling the future. His conclusion should give the Obama administration pause about its plans for a 'surge' of troops into Afghanistan: 'Against them [the algebraic factors], perfections of means and spirit struggle quite in vain.'

History is replete with examples of Lawrence's formula too numerous to list. Indeed, the few examples of successful counterinsurgency — the Americans in the Philippines and the British in Malaya — were the result of unique historical factors that have never transferred well.

The occupation of Iraq and Afghanistan has been a financial and diplomatic disaster for the United States, devastated the countries we invaded, and is spreading the war to Pakistan and India. The recent terrorist assault on Mumbai was very similar to the September bombing of the Islamabad Marriott Hotel, both of them almost certainly 'blowback' from the growing involvement of Indian forces in southern and eastern Afghanistan, and the Pakistani Army in the northwest frontier and tribal territories.

Won’t adding 90,000 troops trained in counterinsurgency warfare create pressure to use those troops in places like the Sudan, Somalia, the Gulf of Guinea, Colombia, or any number of regions where U.S. interests collide with local aspirations?

In an article in the most recent Foreign Affairs, Defense Secretary Robert Gates lays out his roadmap for a new U.S. military: 'What is dubbed the war on terror is … a prolonged, worldwide irregular campaign — a struggle between the forces of violent extremism and those of moderation. Direct military force will continue to play a role in the long-term effort against the terrorists and other extremists. But over the long term, the United States cannot kill or capture its way to victory.'

Gates' strategy embodies the possibility of both hope and disaster. If the United States chooses to keep the military on its current footing — including adding more troops and focusing on the use of 'direct military force' — then future wars and occupations will almost certainly torpedo Obama's plans to deliver a more equal and humane society.

If, however, diplomacy and negotiations takes the place of F-16s and Special Forces, then there is yet hope that the world can take a step back and look for alternatives that avoid Lawrence's grim calculations.

-----

Conn Hallinan is a Foreign Policy In Focus columnist. This article is reprinted from www.fpif.org with permission of the author.

LETTERS December 20, 2008

Mon, 22 Dec 2008 22:41:00 +0000

Good luck, Mr. President-elect

Imagine coming upon a scene of rape, pillage and desecration. What to do?

That’s what the new president-elect faces as he prepares to assume the presidency after George W. Bush’s “reign of terror” — from the invasion of privacy of countless Americans on the slightest pretext to the vetoing the expansion of health insurance for children and the destruction and carnage wrought upon the people of Iraq with an invasion predicated on the false premise of “weapons of mass destruction.”

Plus he approved a radical change in how bank mergers are taxed which will deprive our treasury of $140 billion in tax revenues; squelched government scientific research concerning global warming; promoted uncontrolled oil and gas production, thereby turning critical wildlife habitat into devastating industrial zones.

He refused to sign a treaty banning the use of cluster bombs which have killed or maimed thousands of people, notwithstanding the fact that almost 100 nations did sign.

And he OK’d the torture of combatants, violating common decency, not to say criminal provisions of the Geneva Conventions on war.

And the list continues as you read this because our inane system allows “King George” to continue mucking things up, as it takes two-and-a-half months (Nov. 4, 2008 – Jan. 20, 2009) for a newly-elected president to assume office.

Hit the ground running, Mr. President-elect, and good luck.

Lawrence H. Geller

Via e-mail

Obama’s Cabinet picks

I am not aware if you have any editorials criticizing the ultra-left who are having a field day saying that Obama will disappoint everybody. What I tell them is to get the Red Army together, take over D.C. and then we can all live in Paradise forever.

Obviously Obama is not the Messiah, reports to the contrary, but he is certainly the most progressive president possible under capitalist circumstances. I would like to see the PWW deal with this question, repeatedly. Just reporting the news from a left perspective is not enough. We are on the threshold of profound changes, and it is hard to see any leadership that grasps this. Obama knows the score, but his hands are tied if he doesn’t — as he has consistently said —get any backup from the general population.

We need an ideological struggle on the front pages, badly.

Antonio Bernal

Los Angeles CA

Editor’s note: Here are a few articles for more analysis on this topic:

“Time to build a new mass movement for a peace economy” by John Bachtell, www.pww.org/article/view/14104

Editorial: “Focus on policy,” www.pww.org/article/articleview/14098/

“Obama projects massive recovery plan” by Susan Webb, www.pww.org/article/articleview/14065/

There are growing comments that President-elect Obama is surrounding himself with many of the old guard, despite his promise of change. Recall that FDR constructed the New Deal with some of the staunchest D.C. regulars, like Jim Farley, Cordell Hull and Bob Morgenthau. But he also added Henry Wallace, Harold Ickes and the great Frances Perkins and reminded us that he chose certain people for their special administrative skills. The political changes, he said, came from the top. We must hope that Obama is of that mind and he deserves that chance. Stand by.

Don Sloan

New York NY

I read with great interest the article on the Mumbai terrorist attack (“Making sense of the senseless, Mumbai and its implications,” online, pww.org).

I am very keen to know your side of the story on the nomination by Barack Obama of Hillary Clinton, Robert Gates etc. Their hands are all tainted with blood of Yugoslavians and Iraqis.

It appears Obama is already going back on his words although he promised to be different than the past Washington power brokers.

Gautam Sarkar

Bangalore, India

Teresa Albano responds: I am not bothered by who Obama has proposed for Cabinet positions. There is a necessity to have experienced people. The American people just leveled a huge blow against the most right-wing section of our ruling class which has ruled for 30 years. Now the victory has to be consolidated. Plus the most important thing is, it’s not about the individuals — it’s about policy. Obama has already signaled significant policy changes from those of Bush. Obama will lead these individuals and set policy. The American people voted for peace, to end the Iraq war and Bush’s belligerent foreign policy. Obama is quite in tune with these aspirations. But the grassroots, the people, still have to work and struggle to make this happen. Because as America’s great hero Frederick Douglass once observed: Power cedes nothing without struggle.

Topsy-turvy world

Life is valued at how we treat the lowliest of us all.

We live in a topsy-turvy world. We tell people, through deed and words, they are but cannon fodder to make a profit with. Then we expect them magically to see the good in others? How can we pay people less than what it humanly costs to live, then tell them others are to be respected, while employers do not respect them?

Do landlords reduce rents by hundreds of dollars for the disabled, the welfare families? No. Does a loaf of bread cost $1.50 instead of $4 for someone not making $70,000 a year, but minimum wage?

Yes the world is upside-down when we treat the weakest among us as fodder and expect them to respect the value of other life. We are only as strong as our weakest link. So by paying our clerks and hamburger flippers less then the cost to live, we condemn all life to be worth less than minimum wage. By failing to see the higher being or god in all humans, we act toward the lowest point of humanity. Let us instead carry out the thought, “I will not do unto others which I find hurtful if it were done to me.”

Jan Lightfoot Lane

Hinckley ME

Cheers

Here’s a huge cheer for James Parks from AFL-CIO Now blog (reprinted PWW 12/6-12) for his vital story about three unions who have joined forces to campaign for disabled performers. I really had not thought of the three, the Screen Actors Guild, the American Federation of Television and Radio Artists, and Actors Equity as “unions.” They surely are and they have shown us the power of organization and joint efforts in behalf of workers once again.

What powerful sentences: “If you aren’t seen and heard, you are invisible” and “People with disabilities are largely invisible within the arts and media landscape.”

And as actor Robert David Hall reports, the issue is not just the invisibility of actors. Like all other workers, being cut out of a job means being cut out of income. It also means discrimination of many types and harassment as well. Same old, same old story.

We should be delighted that these representatives of the entertainment industry have spoken up — and promised to correct this grievous inequity.

But I would not have known this without Parks’ article and his invitation to follow up the story at www.iampwd.org

So cheers to him and to PWW for reprinting it.

Jean Anderson

Portland OR

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EDITORIAL: The peoples train

Mon, 22 Dec 2008 13:06:00 +0000

What do Oklahoma teenager Matt Webber, the Tuskegee Airmen, Tim Robbins, Seal, Spike Lee, Elvis Costello, Susan Sarandon, Sting and the Lesbian and Gay Band Association have in common? All, along with up to 4 million other hopeful enthusiasts, will be attending Barack Obama’s inauguration on Jan. 20, in what promises to be the largest such gathering in U.S. history. To date, the biggest inaugural event was for President Lyndon Johnson in 1964 when 1.2 million turned out.

With the theme of “Restoring America’s Promise,” Obama’s swearing in ceremony is sure to be a uniting and inspiring event, as indicated by the invitations to the Tuskegee Airmen and the Lesbian and Gay Band Association, a first on both accounts.

Already a debate has emerged on the inauguration’s size, with the U.S. Park Service and other law enforcement agencies minimizing the possible turnout. Other officials, however, are preparing for humongous crowds. Since the debate over the size of the 1995 Million Man March, federal officials no longer estimate crowd size of Washington gatherings.

Underlying the controversy, however, is a vitally important political issue: the degree of Obama’s electoral mandate and along with it the extent of the Democratic landslide, both measures of the relationship of forces in coming congressional legislative battles.

In the face of an economic crisis without recent precedent, polling suggests Obama will enter office with a huge reservoir of popular support. The mass inaugural outpouring on Jan. 20 will confirm the people’s mandate for progressive change.

Clearly the new president will need all of the support he can muster. As the union-busting antics of congressional Republicans on the auto bailout already indicate, the ultra-right sections of the ruling class are gearing up for a no-holds-barred effort to inflict body blows against key sections of the labor-led people’s coalition. Even in the new Congress, these well-funded Chamber of Commerce inspired efforts are sure to continue.

Universal health care, the Employee Free Choice Act, jobs and even fulfilling the promise to end the war in Iraq are all at stake. Only the escalation, broadening and deepening of the mass movement for change begun in 2008 can insure the extreme right’s maneuvers are defeated.

Obama announced his inaugural train will stop for events in Philadelphia, Wilmington and Baltimore on its way to Washington. It’s a powerful symbol. The people’s train is about to leave the station. Everyone should get on board.

A peace policy for South Asia

Mon, 22 Dec 2008 07:52:00 +0000

A few weeks ago, terrorist attacks in the Indian city of Mumbai caught the attention of the world. What were the historical roots of these attacks?

In the 1980s, the CIA and its “sister” agency, Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI), established on Pakistani soil camps and bases for Afghani and foreign “freedom fighters” to attack and destroy Afghanistan’s Communist-led government and its Soviet allies. The blowback from this “victory” were the Al Qaeda group, the Taliban government in Afghanistan, and the eventual September 11 attacks on the U.S. After 9/11 the Bush administration provided Pakistan’s military dictatorship with billions of dollars to fight the terrorists who were the Frankenstein monsters of our Cold War policies.

The Mumbai attacks have been connected to a major Kashmir-based terrorist group with long and deep connections to Pakistan’s ISI. Although there are no “smoking guns” yet, it is very difficult to believe that Bush “anti-terrorism aid” to Pakistan did not play a role indirectly in these attacks.

Other major issues are

involved.

Pakistan, Bangladesh and India were all part of one India under the British “Raj.” After World War II, the collapsing British Empire, allied with India’s Muslim League, forced Indian leaders to accept an unworkable partition as the price of independence (encouraging Muslim majority regions to vote for a separate Muslim nation, Pakistan).

India soon became the largest “liberal democracy” in the world and a leader of the non-aligned movement, with significant socialist orientations. Pakistan, under the de-facto rule of a British-trained military, rapidly allied itself with U.S. Cold War governments in a series of South Asian and Middle East military pacts. Pakistan was virulently anti-Communist and anti-Soviet and that was more than enough for successive U.S. administrations who cared little about its oppressive policies at home and anti-Indian policies abroad.

During the Nixon administration, for example, U.S. support directly aided the Pakistani military in carrying out mass murder in its attempt to suppress an uprising in East Pakistan (today Bangladesh). In the 1980s, the Reagan administration supported the brutal tyrant General Zia, who did its dirty work against Afghanistan and intensified the oppression of the Pakistani people. Pakistani regimes also long supported forces who fomented attacks against Indian Kashmir without any serious U.S. opposition.

For successive Pakistani military regimes, Kashmir (formerly a feudal princely state with a large Muslim majority which joined India in the post-World-War-II partition) has been what the Czech Sudetenland, with its large German-speaking majority, was to Nazi Germany, that is, a region to control for both national pride and strategic position. Unlike Nazi Germany in its relationship to Czechoslovakia, Pakistan is much weaker and smaller than India. Without the U.S. blank check, it is unlikely that the Kashmir issue could have continued as it has, with tens of thousands of deaths over the decades.

What should the Obama administration do in the region? First, it must begin to disengage from the Pakistani military and pursue policies to aid both the Pakistani people and the people of the region. This means breaking nearly 60 years of military alliance. It also means making it clear to Pakistan that the U.S. opposes any annexation of Kashmir.

But it also means seeking to bring together India, Bangladesh and Pakistan in a peace process that will further the development of a regional community, economic integration and, for India and Pakistan, nuclear disarmament.

Such policies offer the only solution to the region’s poverty which feeds both terrorist groups and the military forces that support them. They may also jolt the Pakistani government into actually acting against the terrorist groups that its rulers have long aided, since it will be clear to them that the U.S. will no longer give them billions to fight a phony war against terrorism.

Such policies would also help to build a larger peace policy in the region and the world, encouraging closer relations between South Asia and China (Chinese-Indian relations have improved significantly) and defusing conflict between the U.S. and Iran (whose Shia Muslim regime is a target of Al Qaeda/Taliban forces). Most of all, such policies which improve the living standards and strengthen the civil and human rights of the people of the region, will gain for the U.S. the friendship and respect of all the people of South Asia.

Norman Markowitz is a history professor at Rutgers University.

End the auto crisis: Public ownership to save jobs and environment

Thu, 18 Dec 2008 04:34:00 +0000

The following is a statement of the Communist Party USA

Union auto workers are fighting for their lives. For us the fight to defend the United Auto Workers union (UAW) and its members is immediate. It is estimated that over three million jobs are linked to the jobs at GM, Ford and Chrysler: including workers in parts supply, dealerships, steel, rubber and many other supporting industries. Bankruptcy would have devastating effects on communities where these workers live. Whole regions rely on their purchasing power and the loss of taxes for local and state governments would cause an even bigger crisis. Bankruptcy will also destroy the pensions and healthcare for millions of retirees.

We join with labor and all its allies in demanding immediate action by the federal government to guarantee the loans needed to save these jobs. We are actively engaged in the growing fight to build solidarity and support for the burning demands of the workers and their union.

Even if/when bridge loans are given to the Big Three, the companies have announced there will be further plant closings and say they will permanently shed tens of thousands of their workforce. They do this while continuing to move production out of the country. GM has manufacturing operations in 32 countries around the world. And while the auto companies complain about competition from lower wage countries, they in turn threaten workers in Mexico, Thailand, South America and elsewhere to accept low wages as a condition of work.

Everything unions have fought for throughout our history is being challenged. Republican senators are demanding that unionized workers tear-up their union contracts and work for non-union rates. A forced bankruptcy would destroy the contracts of the UAW. Automotive jobs have been a pathway to a better life for all working people and their loss would hit African American and Latino workers particularly hard. Black workers in particular are more concentrated in auto than other industries.

To solve the economic crisis we need to put more money, not less, into the hands of working people. Republican attempts to force the UAW to take cuts will increase the wage gap; it is a continuation of Republican trickledown economics that voters rejected in the November election. These are the same economic policies that created the present economic crisis. It would lower the purchasing power of auto workers and would create a downward wage pressure on all workers

If we agree that the auto industry is too important to fail, both in terms of our nation's transportation needs and the need to move away from reliance on fossil fuels, then it is too important to be left in the hands of the CEO's.

And at the same time, given the overall economic crisis and the underlying failures of unbridled corporate greed and mismanagement, it is the time to look at more basic solutions also. Demands for public and government oversight raise the issue of democratic public ownership of the domestic auto industry.

The United States government could buy all the common shares of stock in General Motors for less than $3 billion. The worth of the companies is less than the aid they want from taxpayers. If the public provides the capital, why do decisions remain in private hands? Representatives from the unions, from engineers employed in the industry, from government, and the communities and states where the plants are located, are best able to make the key decisions. Representatives from management itself should have input but not control.

We have an economic crisis, but we also have a crisis of the environment and the two are interlinked. We face global catastrophe and the profits before nature philosophy of the auto executives is a major roadblock for building a 'green,' sustainable industry.

Cities all over the country are looking at the need for mass transit: from rail to subways, and buses. Public demand for environment friendly cars is also growing. We should demand that unemployed auto workers in Detroit and Michigan are put to work building all of the above.

Public ownership can work! From our postal service, to social security, to our public school system, Medicare, police, fire, and military, public ownership has been successful. In the early 70's the government took over a rail system in crisis, fixed it and then years later sold it to private owners at a profit.

The changes needed in our infrastructure to build and sustain the environmentally friendly cars of the future will require public money so why should the ownership of the companies remain in private hands?

In addition:

* We need to pass the Employee Free Choice Act to spur union organizing and to increase the wages and buying power of working people. * We need National Health care, pass HR 676 – health care is a human right and it should be removed as a bargaining chip. * We need an international minimum wage to stop the whipsawing of workers from one country to another. * We need a law to stop tax breaks for companies that outsourcing our jobs. * We need to get behind President-Elect Barack Obama's economic stimulus and public works jobs program.

Economic stimulus in China and the U.S. (Part 2)

Sat, 13 Dec 2008 08:03:00 +0000

(Part 2)

China has announced a 2-year, $568 billion program to deal with economic and social problems caused by the global economic crisis. The program includes investment in education and health care, environmental protection, housing, highways and rail transportation, and other infrastructure projects. China’s plan, and the ways in which it helps workers in the U.S., were discussed last week in Part I of this article.

The contrast between China’s approach and that of capitalist countries was highlighted in side-by-side articles on China and India in a recent Wall Street Journal. In India, “the credit crisis is delaying building by crimping the flow of cash for roads, ports and power plants,” the Journal reports. “Billions in infrastructure projects could be in jeopardy…. Interest rates on project financing have soared, banks are reluctant to lend, and investors are sitting on their cash. But the Indian government can’t afford to compensate with a huge infrastructure-spending program like China’s… Countries around the world are shutting down such projects…”

What accounts for the difference between China and India – and most capitalist countries? China and India are both large, populous nations that, since World War II, have been trying to emerge from a legacy of colonial and imperial domination by foreign powers. China is the product of a socialist revolution, while India has remained capitalist, fully embracing the unregulated, neoliberal model of global capitalism that came to dominate most of the world – including the United States — in the 1990s.

The economies of China and India are organized in fundamentally different ways, to serve fundamentally different interests. In all economies, factories, stores and other enterprises produce a surplus — their income from selling goods or services is greater than their expenses. In capitalist countries, most of this surplus goes as profit to the shareholders, bondholders and top executives, who use it as they see fit. But in China, which was formed by the socialist revolution, the state controls most of the surplus, and can direct it to meet human needs, including for jobs, as China’s latest stimulus package shows.

By contrast, in capitalist countries the state serves the interests of the capitalists, who control most of the surplus created by workers. The emphasis of the state and capitalists is on protecting profits, and the exploiters’ power.

Another Wall Street Journal article lays it out. “China’s banks, still largely under state ownership, will be expected to play their part in supporting the Chinese economy, rather than pulling up the drawbridge, as their foreign counter-parts have been doing... If that means earnings are pinched, few in Beijing will mind.” Contrast that with the Wall Street banks that are using bailout money to maintain investor dividends and executive salaries, instead of supporting the U.S. economy (and people) with student, consumer and business loans.

“Can China save the world?” This is the question recently posed on the cover of The Economist. The short answer is – No. But together, China and the workers of the world, our parties and unions, can “save the world,” both socially and environmentally, and we share a common interest in doing so. By contrast, the capitalists’ only interest is their profits and power, regardless of the cost to humanity.

The unfolding capitalist crisis at bottom is a crisis of “overproduction” (more, much more has been produced than the capitalists can sell at a profit) and simultaneously a crisis of unmet human needs, even for food and water. The crisis is pointing to tremendous deepening of poverty, political breakdowns and wars.

But the unity and common struggle of workers and our organizations, including the Chinese and other states formed by workers’ revolutions, Communist and workers’ parties, and trade unions internationally, can “save the world” — and bring extraordinary liberation to all of humanity.

econ4ppl@ cpusa.org

Editorial: Not this time

Sat, 13 Dec 2008 07:39:00 +0000

For too many years now the American people have been pushed around by the nation’s corporations, the banks, the insurance companies and their right-wing backers in government.

If the events of this past week, coming just one month after a historic election, are any indication, we are seeing the beginnings of a movement that just might change all of that forever.

Bosses at a Chicago factory that makes windows and doors told their workers, just weeks before Christmas, that it was closing down because Bank of America cut off the factory’s line of credit. There was no money available, the workers were told, to pay them their last week’s salary, their accrued vacation time and sick time, or the 60 days pay to which workers are entitled when a business shuts down on such short notice. It could have been just one more tragic story in the disastrous chain of events recently in an economic free-fall produced by corporate greed.

Only this time, it was different. Determined not to be 300 more victims of the economic violence perpetrated by the banks, the workers began a sit-in at their factory, refusing to leave until they got everything they were owed. Support poured in from all over the country. Workers, both union and non-union, community groups, religious organizations, small businesses, immigrant rights groups, elected officials, the city of Chicago, the state of Illinois and the president-elect were among the many who came forward to back them.

Bank of America took $31 billion in taxpayer dollars. The people of the U.S. were told Wall Street had to be bailed out so credit would continue to flow and so job losses could be avoided. The giant banks took that money and bought other profitable businesses with some of it and paid their executives lavish salaries with other parts of it. But the Republic Windows and Doors factory in Chicago didn’t get the credit line it needed and, of course, the people who toiled for it, many for 30 years, got nothing.

Bank of America’s role as the main culprit here in no way diminishes the culpability of the company. Republic was all too willing to march to the bank’s orders. Its owners are ready to move their operation to non-union auspices in Iowa in an attempt to satisfy the bank so they can continue making their money, the workers be damned.

The owners should learn from this situation that they would have done better to close ranks with their own workers and with the broad array of groups angry about what the big banks are doing to America, rather than siding with the bank. Finance capitalists have shown that they have almost as little concern for small businesses like Republic as they have for workers. Bank of America was more than willing to hang both Republic and its workers out to dry. Any credit that is extended to Republic will result from the fightback initiated by the workers, not from any action taken by the company’s cowardly management.

This time, however, the company and the bank are not getting away with their attempt to make the workers pay for the sin of corporate greed. This time, angry Americans from all walks of life and from every corner of the land are rising up and saying, “Enough!”

They said it loud and clear in the elections. They said it again when they occupied that factory in Chicago. They said it still again when they poured out into the streets of financial districts all across the land this week to demand a people’s bailout, not a Wall Street bailout.

They are saying it when they refuse to allow anything to derail their movement — including all the media attention to corruption in the Illinois governor’s office and right-wing attempts to use the scandal to try to taint the incoming Obama administration.

They will be joined by an ever-growing and continually broadening movement, we believe, until the new dawn that has already broken turns into the bright sunshine of an entirely new day.

Letters December 13 -19, 2008

Sat, 13 Dec 2008 07:35:00 +0000

Special election

The situation in Illinois with Governor Rod Blagojevich is a perfect example of why governors should not have the right to appoint people to fill the terms of politicians who leave office. If Miss America can’t fulfill her duties then the person who came in second takes over. If the winner of the Tour de France flunks a drug test then whoever came in second becomes the winner. Why is it different in politics?

I personally don’t think that the person who comes in second should take office. I believe that another election should take place so that the people get another chance to vote for their favorite candidate, or they can run for the office themselves. Politicians shouldn’t have the right to appoint people to elective office.

Chuck Mann, Greensboro NC

Change.gov

Your editorial “First YouTube president” was excellent in pointing out how Obama is using YouTube in talking to the people to mobilize them in support of a “people’s legislative agenda.”

It would be a service to your readers and to the furthering of this agenda if you would inform them about how to send Obama their opinions about issues and solutions. It is very easy to do this by going to change.gov which will access Obama’s place on the net. There one will find a different talk by Obama every week, but better yet, there is space to inform him of your views on issues.

If enough of us do this it will help him know that he has public support for progressive programs. Change is a two-way street and we must do our part.

Barry Freeman Chapel Hill NC Editor’s note: Good point. Go to: .

A specter is haunting Cleveland

A Case Western Reserve University foreclosure study may be of use to you and your comrades (blog.case.edu/msass/2008/12/09/20081209_beyond_reo_final.pdf). Speculative real estate sharks and financial parasites are buying property at sheriff’s auctions in northeast Ohio at rock-bottom prices. I am sure this same study would generally pertain to other cities, too. The study is easy to read and has useful diagrams.

Some neighborhoods in Cleveland I have recently been through while looking for a job look like some kind of “ground zero.” Yesterday in the deeply depressed areas off E. 55th and Grand Ave., I saw an excavator demolishing an abandoned home that had burned. Out in the street were three men with grocery store shopping carts ready to salvage electrical wiring and copper from the site. Two metal and wire salvage companies are within half a mile of this residential work site.

Recently the State of Ohio has taken to running a TV ad that says, “Don’t let your tombstone say: ‘I died stealing copper from an empty dwelling.’” The precious metal from catalytic converters in cars goes for about $40 locally; one person at my old job didn’t know theirs had been stolen from their car until the car failed an Environmental Protection Agency test required for license renewal.

The sunrise in this dark period is rising with Chicago’s sit down strikers, though.

Jay Rothermel Cleveland OH

Economic situation

We are in a recession and unemployment is rising. A quarter of a million workers lost their jobs in November. Third quarter reports are bringing lots of bad news.

One bit of news that may get lost in all the panic is the report that productivity is rising. The news media is reporting productivity and recession as two separate issues. But they aren’t. Productivity means fewer workers are producing greater output (in relative terms).

Business firms are organizing to make workers more productive so they can operate with fewer workers in order to maintain (something approximating) the current rate of exploitation.

The contradiction is that, while this behavior is rational at the firm level, the system-level result is that demand will continue to fall and firms will increasingly fail to realize surplus value as profit. In other words, the rate of profit will decrease across the system.

Rising productivity is always treated as good news by the corporate media and business economists. But, as you can see, it depends on which social class you’re in. Rising productivity is not always good for workers, especially in recessionary periods. The capitalists have the resources to ride out the crisis. Working people will suffer and are suffering.

There are two basic solutions to the problem. The first preserves capitalism. The state provides jobs for unemployed workers. This strategy is financed by deficit spending. The goal is to stimulate demand so firms can realize surplus value as profit and, hopefully, kick off an expansionary phase. This solution has the virtue of not having to focus so much on “freeing up” the “private” financial system (which involves transfer of taxpayer dollars to the financial corporations that helped create the mess we’re in). This is a temporary fix that may give capitalism a few more years and will help working people during the present crisis.

The second replaces capitalism with socialism by putting the economy in the hands of the worker. Here, a national bank is established, significant business firms are nationalized, and productive assets are in effect redistributed to labor so that surpluses benefit the people who produce them rather than the classes that don’t. This way, the benefits of rising productivity are enjoyed by all. The second solution is unlikely given current political realities.

But I fear the first solution won’t happen, either. So far, the emphasis has been placed on freeing up credit markets rather than shoring up the foundation of the economy, i.e. infrastructure and industry. Washington could learn a lot from history here, but so far it seems reluctant to act in a bold manner. Its reluctance tells us a lot about the power of finance capital in the present age.

Andrew Austin Green Bay WI

Shministim

Have you heard of them? I have – just now. And once I heard about them, I had to do something.

The Shministim – all about ages 16, 17, 18 and in the 12th grade – are a new breed of conscientious objectors in Israel and right now they are taking a stand. They believe in a better, more peaceful future for themselves and for Israelis and Palestinians, and they are refusing to join the Israeli army. They’re in jail, holding strong against immense pressure from family, friends and the Israeli government. They need our support and they need it today.

The Shministim have asked Jewish Voice for Peace to reach out to people like us to let the Israeli government know we are watching, and that we support their courage. They’re hoping to receive hundreds of thousands of postcards to be delivered to the Israeli Minister of Defense on Dec. 18, when they will hold a massive rally and press conference. They’re hoping to stand strong on the steps of this majestic building - and on the steps of history - representing not only the thousands of refuseniks who came before them, not only the many young people to whom they are an example of a better world, but also to represent us. They have asked you, me, and every person who strives for peace to be on those steps with them, on that day. I will be there.

Will you join me? It’s simple. Sign a letter. Click here:

Betty Smith New York NY

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Challenges and possibilities in the time of economic crisis

Sat, 13 Dec 2008 07:28:00 +0000

Given the current situation, it is apparent that the Obama administration enters the White House with huge challenges. At the same time, no president in recent memory brings to the job so much popular good will, a Congress dominated by Democrats, an election mandate for progressive change, and an energized movement that supports him.

From what he has said, Obama wants to be a people’s reformer. He has indicated he will make substantive changes in health care, housing, education, retirement security, energy, environment, urban affairs, race and gender relations, foreign relations and popular participation in public affairs. If the last thirty years was an era of people’s retrenchment, Obama envisions the years ahead as an era of substantial people’s reforms. In his view, the boundaries of democracy and reform in a capitalist social formation are elastic and thus can be expanded considerably.

From where will economic growth come?

The Obama administration’s immediate challenge will be to revive the economy. And the overarching question that it will have to answer is: Where will economic dynamism come from in the near term?

We know it won’t come from strapped U.S. consumers whose spending sustained the domestic and global economy over the past decade. We know it won’t come from corporate investment in plant and equipment; instead of expanding investment, corporations are contracting it in the face of overproduction in world commodity markets.

We know it won’t come from the Federal Reserve. The federal fund rate, a rate that governs the Fed’s lending to banks, had is at a record low and might go a little lower but rate cuts so far seem to have had little effect on bank lending and the broader economy.

We know it won’t come from foreign buyers of our exports; they are tightening their belts too. We know it won’t come from the European economies since they are slumping. We know it won’t come from the developing economies whose economic prospects are very gloomy.

Finally, we know it won’t come from speculative excesses and bubbles; that method of stimulating and sustaining aggregate demand has run its course, at least for now.

Government to step in

So to return to the question above: Where will economic dynamism come from in the near term? The answer is massive injection of large amounts of federal dollars to create jobs and stimulate economic activity. China is leading the way with its half trillion-dollar stimulus plan. Hopefully, China’s example will spread to other major economic powers. Given the nature of this crisis and the integration of the world economy, every one of them has to pony up billions and billions of dollars to reflate demand for goods and services at the national and global level.

The Bush administration doesn’t understand this, but the Obama administration does and with Congressional support it will take quick action.

We can expect, and should fully support, an administration stimulus package that includes, among other things, extension of unemployment compensation, assistance to distressed homeowners, aid to states and municipalities, food stamp extension, infrastructure construction and so forth. The only unresolved question is how large a stimulus package. In our view, it should be in the range of a trillion dollars or more.

This, along with assistance (with real strings) to the auto companies and the stabilization and regulation of financial and housing markets, including a moratorium on foreclosures for families in distress, are considered the cornerstones of the administration’s recovery plan. Whether this is enough is unknowable at this point. By January or soon thereafter, more radical measures may be necessary.

Capitalism’s challenges

However, even if these policies are pursued, there is no guarantee that a full-blooded and sustained upswing of the economy will follow. According to conventional wisdom and mainstream economists, high growth rates, near full employment, and healthy profit rates are the normal condition of a capitalist economy. Departures from this norm, it is said, are only passing moments during which capitalism removes barriers to future growth and in so doing creates the conditions for a new expansion that surpasses old peaks in production, employment and profits.

Perhaps that was the case at an earlier stage of capitalism’s development, but there is considerable evidence to question this scenario going forward. Indeed, one has to wonder what the long-run prospects of U.S. and world capitalism are. Was the “golden age” of U.S. capitalism from 1945-1973, during which economic growth rates, investment levels and living standards steadily increased, the rule or the exception to the rule? Will the last thirty years of sluggish and lopsided growth continue, but at a significantly lower level?

Is U.S. capitalism, embedded in an overcrowded and hyper-competitive world economy and restrained by an internal grouping of class and social forces (energy, military, health care, pharmaceutical, financial and other industries), capable of going over to a new and robust growth path, resting on green industry, jobs and technology, on demilitarization, and on rising living standards for working people?

Given the uncertainty of the long-term trajectory of capitalism and the likelihood that the present remedies under consideration will bring only short-term relief, structural reforms of a far-reaching nature and from the bottom up will be necessary if the U.S. economy is to have any chance of resuming a developmental path that is robust and favors the interests of the working class (broadly defined) and its allies – not to mention the planet.

Terrain of struggle

Thus, the Obama administration and the multilayered and multiclass coalition that supports him will almost inevitably have to confront these questions:

• Will the reform and restructuring process only touch the edges of corporate profits and prerogatives or will it make substantial inroads?

• Will government intervention include ownership of an anti-monopoly character or only temporary measures to stabilize turbulent markets?

• Will the counter-crisis spending measures be short term and modest or long term and of sufficient size to sustain a recovery – something that the New Deal never accomplished?

• How far will the reregulation of financial markets go?

Will union rights be marginally improved or greatly strengthened?

• Will trade agreements be renegotiated so that international working class interests are at their core?

• Will bold measures be proposed to achieve equality in conditions of life for racially and nationally oppressed people and women?

• Will public takeover of finance and energy be on the table for discussion?

• Will the reform of housing, education and healthcare be radical in nature? What about the direction of foreign policy and militarism?

• Will the occupation of Iraq be terminated and the Afghanistan conflict resolved in a political and peaceful fashion?

Will capital be rerouted from unproductive consumption (military, parasitic finance and so forth) to productive investment in a green economy and public infrastructure?

And will equitable economic arrangements between U.S. capitalism and the rest of the world be high on the administration’s agenda?

Room for socialist ideas

While this crisis shakes the foundations of capitalism and provokes a working class and people’s response, the room for radical, even socialist ideas, in the public square has grown enormously. Such ideas can be easily discussed with many people and people’s leaders. The force of economic events will compel millions more to consider ideas that in the past were dismissed out of hand. But our vision of socialism will resonate to the degree that it addresses contemporary sensibilities and challenges. It can’t be a redux of 20th century socialism.

Although we are not in the socialist stage of the revolutionary process to be sure, we are on the road, and the only road, to socialism — to a society that is egalitarian in the rough sense, eliminates exploitation of working people, brings an end to all forms of oppression and is notable for the many-layered participation of working people and their allies in the management of the economy and state.

Sam Webb is national chair of the Communist Party USA. This article is based on excerpts from his report to the Nov. 15 National Committee meeting: “A Springtime of Possibility.” To read and download the full report go to: .

Check out the latest from the Communist Party:

“A Landslide Mandate For Change” by Joelle Fishman

“A Springtime of Possibility” by Sam Webb

Time to build a new mass movement for a peace economy

Sat, 06 Dec 2008 09:06:00 +0000

It’s hard to overestimate the change Nov. 4 has brought in its wake. We have entered a new era, with a new political dynamic calling for new tactics to advance the agenda shaped in the course of the campaign to elect Barack Obama.

The election of Obama was, among other things, a massive demonstration for peace and an end to the Iraq occupation. For those in the organized peace movement who were part of this victory, what role will they now play? Some peace activists who were not part of the broad Obama-led coalition for change ironically are now saying they feel betrayed by some of his Cabinet appointments. But regardless of the personalities, the new Obama administration cannot be “Clinton’s third term.” Times have changed and the job of the peace movement is to seize the new opportunities.

New tactics needed for new realities

In any case, rushing to gloom-and-doom conclusions about Obama’s nominees ignores new political realities.

First, the elections were an expression of a huge shift in public opinion. Voters rejected the neo-con policy of a new “American Century” that sought to reverse eroding U.S. influence at the barrel of a gun. They desire a new type of foreign policy. The new administration was elected with this mandate.

Second, it ignores new global realities — declining U.S. power and emergence of a multipolar world. Military aggression is not a sustainable foreign policy in these circumstances. A sizeable section of U.S. monopoly capital recognizes this.

Third, the United States is in a profound economic crisis affecting its ability to conduct costly new military missions or even sustain its military might at present levels.

Fourth, the Bush administration’s “war on terror,” an ultra-right ideological prop which exploited the public’s real fears of terrorism and fueled a massive military buildup, has lost its effectiveness.

Finally, the powerful movement to change domestic and foreign policy is putting its stamp on the course of events. Every elected official must acknowledge it; many are products of it, were elected by it and interact with it.

Funding a progressive agenda means cutting Pentagon spending

The incoming Obama administration is launching an ambitious agenda including a massive economic recovery program, creation of millions of jobs to “green” the economy, universal health care and more funding for cities and public education. These policies are popular and will be tremendously costly. But with the economic crisis and its severe budgetary constraints, everyone is asking: how will they be paid for?

Aside from continued deficit spending and taxing the rich, the obvious answer is the military budget. And the Nov. 4 victory created new opportunities for a change in policy here.

Rep. Barney Frank (D-Mass.) unleashed a firestorm before the election by calling for a 25 percent cut in military spending — about $150 billion annually.

“If we are going to get the deficit under control without slashing every domestic program, [cutting the military budget] is a necessity,” declared Frank. “The Pentagon is probably the most wasteful organization in the federal government and people have given it a pass for years.”

The U.S. spends more on the military than the rest of the world combined. U.S. military spending is $1 trillion a year — $825 billion in direct expenses, including on the Iraq and Afghanistan occupations, and $230 billion to pay interest on past borrowing for military expenditures. This accounts for an astonishing 57 percent of federal discretionary spending, doubling since 2000.

This is clearly unsustainable. Even leading military strategists recognize there will be a paring of expensive weapons systems and other cutbacks. The Congressional Progressive Caucus, among others, is planning a new campaign on this issue.

Mass grassroots campaign needed

There are new possibilities to build a majority “bottom up” movement to demilitarize the economy. Such a movement will require broad, flexible tactics and will need to embrace mainstream political forces, including moderate Democrats and Republicans and elements of the military itself. Unity will be needed to defeat a powerful military industrial complex, a support base of the ultra-right. This should be seen as a central task of this new era and will fit with the expansive reform agenda Obama has signaled he will initiate.

A first step to building broad unity is maintaining and broadening the peace majority to make sure we end our occupation of Iraq and help Iraq get back on its feet. A second initial step could be to press for the elimination of expensive weapons systems carried over from the Cold War that many agree are unnecessary boondoggles. Obama has indicated he wants to increase troop strength but also wants to review weaponry.

Peace activists need to keep in mind that the public holds contradictory attitudes toward military spending. A 2005 Program on International Policy Attitudes survey showed 65 percent of Americans were open to cutting the Pentagon’s budget. When the full extent of military spending is understood, they are willing to cut deeply. Large majorities support scrapping space-based and nuclear weapons altogether. Seventy percent desire a new non-confrontational, multilateral foreign policy that promotes action through international institutions and economic assistance.

On the other hand, a majority supports a strong, internationally engaged military, which maintains bases overseas especially on the soil of U.S. allies. This majority needs to be convinced that cuts will not sacrifice the nation’s security.

People can be won when the full waste, corruption and profiteering of the military budget is exposed. A 2008 General Accounting Office audit documented the enormous and scandalous waste involved in every advanced weapons system, with hundreds of billions in mushrooming cost overruns, aggravated by Bush’s privatization policy.

The Institute for Policy Studies has crafted an alternative military budget of $213 billion that eliminates needless weapons systems and mountains of waste, corruption and super-profiteering by military contractors. Such a military budget is defense-oriented instead of offense-oriented, based on a foreign policy that emphasizes diplomacy and multilateralism.

Military spending hurts the economy

The public is more supportive of military spending cuts when the money is redirected to social needs. This could be effectively tied to jobs creation demands for funding specific local infrastructure projects. Broad alliances can be built with states and municipalities who are drowning in debt, delaying needed construction projects and cutting essential services.

And military spending on non-productive weapons retards economic development. A 2007 Center for Economic and Policy Research report shows in the long run, higher military spending has a negative effect on economic growth, and fuels inflation and higher interest rates.

“It is often believed that wars and military spending increases are good for the economy,” said Dean Baker, an author of the study. “In fact, most economic models show that military spending diverts resources from productive uses, such as consumption and investment, and ultimately slows economic growth and reduces employment.”

Military spending supports roughly 5 million jobs. Therefore well-planned conversion to non-military-related jobs will need to take place in areas that depend on military spending, as the fight on domestic base closings showed. A 2007 study by Robert Pollin and Heidi Garrett-Peltier at the University of Massachusetts showed more jobs are created with $1 billion spent on health care (+50 percent), education (+106 percent), mass transit (+131 percent), construction (+49 percent) and even tax cuts (+26 percent) compared to the same $1 billion spent on the military.

Create political backing for the administration to move

A campaign for a new type of foreign policy and to slash the military budget will inevitably confront the same powerful military industrial complex and ultra-right forces that drove the Iraq war policy, military buildup and aggression. These forces will place tremendous pressure on the Obama administration and Congress. Public opinion must be mobilized to create the political climate necessary for the new administration and Congress to carry out new policies.

The peace movement was a major factor in changing public opinion on the Iraq war and must play the same role if we are to convert to a peace economy. Only a majority united movement for demilitarization will make it happen.

John Bachtell (jbachtell@cpusa.org) is district organizer of the Communist Party in Illinois and active in the peace movement there.

EDITORIAL: Hope, change for Iraq and beyond

Sat, 06 Dec 2008 08:17:00 +0000

In spite of himself, George W. Bush has been forced to start extricating the U.S. from the Iraq war nightmare, a process President-elect Obama has promised to complete. A total U.S. withdrawal from Iraq can mark the first step in the Obama administration’s turn away from perpetual war and toward diplomacy and cooperation in U.S. foreign policy.

The Iraq-U.S. security agreements ratified by Iraq’s Parliament Nov. 27 feature a first-ever timetable for all combat forces to leave Iraq’s cities and villages by the end of June, and for all U.S. forces to leave Iraq by the end of 2011. The pullout can be speeded up by either side.

The Iraqi government now has a major say in how U.S. forces function in their remaining time in Iraq. A joint Iraqi-U.S. committee must approve U.S. military operations, use of bases and other facilities and detention of Iraqis by U.S. forces, and can even okay legal action against U.S. troops accused of grave offenses off duty and off base. U.S. troops can’t search Iraqi homes without Iraqi court warrants. The U.S. can’t use Iraqi territory as a springboard for attacks on other countries.

Some 170,000 civilian contractors are also losing their legal immunity.

While the pact has loopholes and omissions, Iraqi political forces across the board see it as the best path now to end the occupation.

For the new Obama administration to move to broaden the pact’s provisions so that troops, contractors and bases are all removed as quickly as possible and steps are taken to improve the Iraqi people’s living conditions, would be welcomed with open arms by most Americans and all Iraqis.

The next step, of course, is to reverse course in Afghanistan, ending the war, withdrawing troops and working with the United Nations to help that country overcome the devastation wrought by three decades of conflict.

Such actions would be a great start on the road to reversing the Bush administration’s disastrous drive toward perpetual wars and turning toward a new foreign policy based on diplomacy, cooperation and sharing resources to benefit all humanity.

Making sense of the senseless, Mumbai and its implications

Tue, 02 Dec 2008 09:14:00 +0000

Voraciously reading through Indian news sites (The Hindu, Times of India, The Hindustan), political and social sites, especially Twitter, I’m trying to makes sense of the seemingly senseless invasion of India’s financial and cultural capital, Mumbai. The world has responded with condolences for the families of the victims, the residents of Mumbai and the condemnation of the attack. This website included.

There were many heroes and heroines during the scary days of November in Mumbai. Many have rightly praised the bravery of the commandos and security forces. But what has not gotten as much attention is the heroism of the ordinary person, in particular the hotel workers on the scene. (Or the nanny who ran out with a two-year-old child covered in blood, whose parents were killed at the siege in Nariman House.) So many stories of these workers ushering guests out of harms way and to safety, they are really unsung heroes. (See some harrowing accounts and workers who helped: )

I have never been to the city that gave the world Bollywood, but I have been to India twice for a total of five weeks. Both times hosted by the Communist Party of India and Communist Party of India-Marxist, which to me is the best way to see and understand this incredible country, through the context of their working class/oppressed/farmers and struggles for rights and economic security.

So here are the initial facts and insights I could gather and interpret that could help make sense out of this senseless violence.

What happened in Mumbai

At least 10 men arrived by boats along the coast of Mumbai on Nov. 26. They made their way to the train station and seven other public places, shooting dozens of people at these sites. The state’s anti-terrorist chief, Hemant Karkare, and others were killed after responding to the attack on a hospital. The attackers then made their way to and holed up in three places in the southern end of the city: the iconic Taj Mahal hotel, Oberoi-Trident Hotel and the Nariman House, a Chabad-Lubavitch hostel and religious center run by a New York-based ultra-Orthodox Jewish sect.

Chaos ensued for hours. As of now 188 are confirmed dead and 313 injured, most of the casualties are Indian, although the victims included 28 foreigners, who hailed from countries including Israel, Germany, Japan, United States, Canada, Britain, Australia, France, Italy, Singapore and Japan.

Nine of the ten terrorists were killed and one is in police custody. Earlier reports said there were 25 gunmen and seven were in custody, apparently some were arrested that had nothing to do with the attack. There is no evidence to suggest any local cooperation by Mumbai residents or that terrorists were among the guests at the hotels.

Who backed the attack?

Early on it was clear that to land 10 heavily armed men who moved with proficiency to positions in Mumbai required lots of planning, training and support. So, who gave such support? A previously unknown group called the Deccan Mujahideen claimed responsibility. Deccan refers to the plains in central and southern India. It seems the e-mail making the claim originated in Pakistan. Indian officials early on suggested there was help from some quarters in Pakistan.

Now evidence is mounting that implicates a Pakistan-based group, Lashkar-e-Taiba. Lashkar or LeT got its start in the late 1980s-early 1990s. Its stated objective is to end “Indian rule” in the disputed Indian state of Kashmir and to make Islam the religion of South Asia and China.

Kashmir is in northern India and there is a section administered by Pakistan. It has been a center of conflict since the British partition of India into three parts: Pakistan, India and Bangladesh (formerly East Pakistan). Kashmir is a majority Muslim state with sizeable Hindu population and history of Hindu leaders. But some forces in Pakistan (and Kashmir) demand that it be part of Pakistan, there are others that insist Kashmir be an “independent” country. The Indian left supports the Indian Constitution which sets a special status and autonomy for Kashmir within India.

LeT has carried out terrorist and military attacks on India and continues to operate in Pakistan’s borders, despite the attempts of civilian governments to get rid of and outlaw such groups. Pakistan’s army and intelligence service, ISI, from which LeT gets support, are deeply entrenched in the politics and economy of the country, severely limiting democratic rule.

Billions of U.S. taxpayer dollars have propped up the army and ISI in Pakistan for years. The United States with Pakistan aided and abetted the formation of extremist military and political groups in the 1980s and 90s to fight the left/progressive government in Afghanistan and the Soviet army, which invaded Afghanistan to try to prevent an extremist takeover of a country on its borders. Now these forces have taken on lives of their own.

Initial fallout focuses on security

It took about 60 hours or two days and a half for the Indian forces to get control of the situation. There is a lot of anger toward the state and national governments for taking so long and for lack of political leadership through the crisis. Each state has its own security and intelligence apparatus and the national government – or Center – also operates its own. Criticism also extends to the political leadership for failing to prevent the attack since there were many “red flags” beforehand indicating a possible attack on Mumbai was eminent.

The Congress Party government was blamed for the lapses. 'There is rage,' wrote a Mumbai resident in a blog published in the Indian Express. 'A simmering against our so-called leaders. A simmering against the unpreparedness for this attack.'

According to The Times of India (http://tinyurl.com/62v3fe), it took the highly-regarded commando strike force nine-and-a-half hours to arrive on the scene. By the time the force got the orders 90 minutes had passed. Then it took four hours for the plane to arrive in Delhi and pick up the troops and another three hours to fly and land in Mumbai, plus time for buses and briefing, they started their operation at 7 a.m.

Security expert Praveen Swami reported in The Hindu (http://tinyurl.com/65fn3j) that there was credible intelligence of an imminent assault. The intelligence was credible enough to push the state police to meet with top corporate security heads to convince them of “the need to invest in defending their facilities,” this included the hotels. However, Swami writes, “nothing was done.”

In the wake of the credible intelligence, Swami said, security upgrades had been ordered for ports and “soft targets,” including more police, but the funding never came through. “People contrast the United States’ post-9/11 successes with our failures,” a Maharashtra police officer told him, “but they should also be contrasting the billions spent by that country with the peanuts we have invested in our own security.”

Security costs

India – an industrially developing country – does not have the same kind of widespread infrastructure, for security or anything else that “richer” countries have. In the wake of this attack, the government is positioning itself to beef up security by having separate commando groups nearer large population centers and other reforms.

Newspapers have warned against passing authoritarian laws, like the Indian version of the Patriot Act called Prevention of Terrorism Act (POTA), pushed by the BJP after the December 2001 attacks on Parliament. “The United Progressive Alliance government would do well not to lurch towards the legal route, seeking to introduce draconian provisions drawn from the repealed and discredited POTA that lend themselves to easy abuse against the innocent and would hardly deter fidayeen attacks,” The Hindu editorialized.

Some 70 percent of India’s more than 1 billion people live in deep poverty. Add to that the deep global economic crisis and the United States needing to change budget priorities investing more in people’s needs like health care instead of wasteful wars and unnecessary military projects. In other words, security challenges have to be answered in a framework that really puts people’s needs – safety, economic and political – first.

Political and economic fallout for India

It’s too early to gage the full geo-political and economic fallout from the Mumbai attacks for South Asia but it could be considerable. Perhaps that is what the goal of the terrorist operation was.

India’s home minister resigned and the finance minister took over his post. This seems to indicate the government’s concern on how hard of an economic hit India is going to take. Investment could easily dry up as fear undermines confidence. “People will hesitate to do business with India,” said Jasmeet Kaur, a 25-year-old student in New Delhi. “Tourism will be affected, as people will not come to a country where there is no security.”

India’s economic growth is second in the world only to China. However, the Congress Party has adopted Indian-style “neo-liberal” or “trickle down” economic policies that have created great wealth at the top and a sizeable middle class but deeper poverty among the majority of the people. The Congress may suffer in the national elections due in spring because of people’s anger towards them from the Mumbai attacks to the economic problems.

The main opposition is led by the far-right Hindu chauvinist political party BJP. Their leaders are already attacking the Congress and saber-rattling towards Pakistan. The BJP seeks to overturn India’s secular state and make the country into a “Hindu nation.” India has ancient roots in welcoming all religions. Secularism is one of its chief principles in the founding of independent India. (There are four pillars in the founding of India: secularism, universal suffrage, independent foreign policy and public ownership of the economy’s “commanding heights.”)

Many have decried the Hindu nationalist BJP for seeking electoral advantage with a full-page newspaper advertisement before the Nov. 29 Delhi elections: 'Brutal terror strikes at will. Weak government. Unwilling and incapable. Fight terror – Vote BJP.'

The BJP and related groups are well-known for its anti-Muslim rhetoric and policies which have led to the organizing and instigating attacks on the Muslim minorities in India (and in some cases Christian minorities). It was during the BJP-led government that relations with Pakistan deteriorated so much that the world felt it was on the brink of a possible nuclear war between the nations.

Left parties respond

The Left parties, which include CPI and CPI-M, condemned the Mumbai attacks and called for a united stance against terrorism. They also called for systemic change and accountability for the security lapses. “Changing faces will not solve the problems. What the government should do now is to immediately take effective steps to revamp and strengthen the intelligence and security set-up,” said Communist Party of India (Marxist) politburo member S. Ramachandra Pillai. Communist Party of India National Secretary D. Raja called for “introspection” by the government. They also called for a full investigation of who is behind the attack. The CPI-M said the government should investigate the terror attacks and afterwards “when the evidence of the links in Pakistan of the persons who committed this terrorist outrage is established, the government should take up the matter with the United Nations Security Council.”

The Left had supported the Congress in Parliament to prevent the BJP from taking power, but they withdrew their support in July over the signing of the U.S.-India nuclear deal. They are forging an electoral alternative to Congress and the far-right BJP that they call a “non Congress, anti-BJP” formation. Their criticisms are not limited to the handling of the Mumbai and other recent terrorist attacks and the pro-Bush foreign policy orientation. It is centered in the economic policies of Congress. But deeply concerned about communal and sectarian violence, the Left does not want to give any quarter for the right-wing to win any electoral advantage. Disgusted by both the Congress and the BJP, voters may turn to the Left parties for leadership in these troubled times, some Indian political analysts say.

India-Pakistan relations

At the geo-political center of these attacks is the relationship between India and Pakistan. For more than 60 years, Hindu/Muslim distrust, hostility, animosity and even war have been stoked by British colonial forces, the Cold War and geo-political maneuvers, especially stemming from the U.S. staunch anti-communist, anti-Soviet policies, as well as religious extremism (both Hindu and Muslim), far-right politics and class antagonisms. Territorial disputes in Kashmir, terrorist attacks on India launched from Pakistani soil and anti-Muslim pogroms in India all contribute to hostile relations. Current U.S. military operations in Afghanistan and the recent U.S.-India nuclear deal have complicated the region’s stability.

What will India do in the wake of these attacks looms large. Pakistan President Asif Ali Zadari denied any involvement in the attacks. Pakistan could not 'gain anything' for such attacks and its democratic government did not believe 'in such tactics,' Zardari said Nov. 29. He said the 'roots of the current situation lay in the efforts of some countries to militarily defeat the Soviet forces in Afghanistan without an exit strategy” and the 'germs of terrorist elements were not produced in security agencies' labs in Pakistan but were created overseas and transferred to this region.'

Zadari condemned the attacks and said he had spoken to Congress Party chief Sonia Gandhi and Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh by phone to offer Pakistan's assistance in the investigations. Pakistan's new democratic government has repeatedly vowed to work with India to combat terrorism in the region. They have shifted troops to fight criminal and terrorist organizations operating along its border with Afghanistan. But it appears the civilian government is not in total control of the army or ISI. Hours after Pak’s prime minister, Yousuf Raza Gilani, agreed to Singh’s demand that the ISI’s director-general fly to India, the Pakistani’s did a U-turn and said the director-general would not go.

According to reports, the Indian government is now considering a range of responses, including suspending its five-year peace process with Pakistan, closing their border, stopping direct flights and sending troops to the frontier.

Afghanistan in the mix

Pakistan’s government, meanwhile, has made it clear that if India again masses troops on the border, Pakistani forces would be diverted away from the Pak-Afghan border. “The next 48 hours are critical in determining how things unfold,” a top Pakistani security official told reporters. “We will not leave a single troop on the western border if we are threatened by India.”

According to the UK-based Times such a warning highlights “the international implications of the Mumbai attacks, was clearly designed to encourage the United States and its allies to temper India’s response. The United States has forged a new strategic partnership with India since 2004, but has closer and older ties to Pakistan, a key Muslim partner in the War on Terror.”

But India has resisted so far sending troops to the border of Pakistan. “The Army is not mobilizing troops on the border with Pakistan in the wake of Mumbai terror strikes,” a senior Army official told Press Trust of India Dec. 1. “We have not received any orders from the government for moving our troops to the borders and there will be no [2001] Operation Parakram-like mobilization,” the official said referring to the military operations after the Parliament attack in December 2001. The official also said the border ceasefire was well in place.

There are some experts, however, who speculate that the terror strike on Mumbai may have been aimed at taking the pressure off Pakistan on its Afghan front, where it is getting a battering from U.S. predators and causing a civilian uprising on its border. Moving troops out of there would allow Pakistan to return to its traditional hostile posture against India on its eastern front.

The Left parties in India and counterparts in Pakistan urge the governments not to let the Mumbai attacks undermine the ongoing peace process. The left and progressive forces in Pakistan condemned the attacks and vowed to “expose and organize against right-wing forces, both inside and outside the Pakistan military” opposed to good relations between Pakistan and India. The left in both countries say that terrorists and other extremists use religion and caste to carry out their anti-people agendas.

U.S. role

One analyst described the attacks as a “pre-emptive strike” against President-elect Barack Obama’s strategy to put Pakistan and Afghanistan at the center of U.S. foreign policy. Obama has promised to withdraw troops from Iraq and put more in Afghanistan to “finish the job” against Osama bin Laden, al Qaeda and the Taliban. There are high expectations that the Obama administration will end the two wars sooner rather than later or never.

However, ongoing U.S. and NATO military operations are enraging the Afghans and tribal people in Pakistan and pushing them into the arms of these criminal gangs. Large numbers of civilians have been killed by U.S. airstrikes.

Even U.S.-compliant Afghan President Hamid Karzai called for a timetable of withdrawal of troops from Afghanistan. He has denounced the bombings and house raids that have caused civilian casualties and “undermined popular support for the war that routed the Taliban in late 2001,” reported The New York Times. The Bush administration – in a dress rehearsal for the invasion of Iraq – invaded and occupied Afghanistan in October 2001 right after the 9/11 attacks.

It seems clear that after seven years of war and occupation in Afghanistan and five years of the same in Iraq, that military power is not the answer to ending terrorism. And the Bush administration concept of a never-ending “war on terror” is a failure. Diplomacy, sustainable economic development, equality in state-to-state relations, international cooperation are all necessary components to isolate and end terrorism.

The incoming president has signaled that the U.S. should help negotiate an agreement on Kashmir, a long-standing dispute between India and Pakistan. However, India’s position is that Kashmir is a bi-lateral issue and no third party should intervene. (I don’t know Pakistan’s policy and I don’t know if that is designed to keep Kashmiri independence off the table.)

Two other major actors in the area are China and Russia. U.S. policies designed to encircle, provoke and isolate these powers through proxies, be it Afghanistan, Georgia, Pakistan or India should be abandoned.

U.S. corporate drive for oil, geo-political dominance and economic rule on the world has a domino affect. Knocking down the USSR and Afghanistan more than 20 years ago has created numerous players and events that have figured into today’s tragedy in Mumbai. The U.S. people and new administration have to be aware of all these moving parts and pursue pro-peace and pro-people policies.

Teresa Albano (talbano @pww.org) is the editor of People's Weekly World.