People Before Profit blog

Letters

Fri, 25 Jun 2004 05:35:00 +0000

Shame at Abu Ghraib

Over a thousand people have been released from the Abu Ghraib prison. If these prisoners were guilty, then why were they set free? If they were innocent, then why were they detained in the first place?

No prisoner, whether civilian or soldier, foreign or American, should be subjected to torture and sexual abuse.

Chuck MannGreensboro NC

‘Deadline’

I am an opponent of the death penalty in the U.S. and work for a UK-based organization called “LifeLines,” which provides friendship and support for those on death row in the States. I would be extremely interested to know how I could obtain or view the documentary ‘Deadline’ here in the UK. (“New documentary indicts death penalty,” by Emile Schepers, PWW 6/19-25.)

Apologies for such a vague request, but I would be very grateful if you could let me know if there is anyone I may contact who might be able to help.

Elizabeth PeppiattVia e-mail, United Kingdom

Author’s reply: This is the link to contact the film folks, which contains valuable action connections, including with the Center for Wrongful Convictions at Northwestern University. http://www.dead linethemovie.com/news/take_action.php.

Thanks

I work for Working America in St. Louis, and was glad to see a mention of the organization in the World. (I took my copy into the office and the page was copied and handed out to the workers.) Thanks again.

Glenn BurleighSt. Louis MO

No faith in Bush

It’s difficult to have any faith in President Bush’s timetable for holding Iraqi elections a mere six months from now. We mustn’t forget that, despite having U.S. troops there for nearly three years, boldly predicted elections in Afghanistan have yet to materialize and were recently postponed again due to nationwide anarchy. The prospect for Iraqi electoral stability appears to be even more daunting. And just how can the Bush administration hope to determine that a vengeful, anti-American leadership won’t emerge from any truly free Iraqi elections?

It can’t. Thus, the desperate installation as interim prime minister of Iyad Allawi, the CIA-tied Iraqi exile who’s now charged with arranging the ground for elections in January. But, the Kurds are already threatening to break away from his quisling government and Shiites are becoming disillusioned with a growing US reliance on former Baathists, like Allawi. Given how hapless the U.S. occupation has already proven to be, it’s probable that it won’t be long before Allawi and his associates are once again living in London and Iraqi elections are deferred due to a shortage of “credible” candidates.

Cord MacGuireBoulder CO

Okay Ashcroft, where are they?

Why haven’t even five out of the hundreds of detainees, after long periods of secret incarceration following 9/11, given press interviews about their prison treatment while held in the U.S.? “Where are they?” should be the question now asked by the press.

It could cause a scandal in the U.S. if human rights groups, countries and American citizens were to ask Bush and Ashcroft for a list of the detainees Ashcroft claims to have “sent home” last year after being held incommunicado on U.S. soil.

Americans should consider if the Bush government is involved in the torturing and beating to death of Iraqi prisoners now, what will happen to U.S. citizens in the future when arrested in the U.S. in the name of “national security” if the U.S. Supreme Court rules this month that U.S. citizens can be arrested and detained forever, without charges ever being filed when the government deems someone to be a “national security threat.”

R. Striker Via e-mail

A vote for electronic voting

Those who are creating chaos about electronic voting machines are sabotaging themselves if their goal is to elect John Kerry. In November, most people will be voting on the same machines they did on 2000. The less technologically advanced the machine is, the higher the error rate. This is bad news for poor and minority voters, who are most apt to live in jurisdictions that use old machines and whose votes are crucial to a Kerry win.

Your efforts to scare people about electronic voting machines (which would accurately count and effectively enfranchise poor and minority voters) have hampered the purchases of new equipment and turned attention away from reforms of a higher priority. In the next few months, please focus your efforts on realistic solutions and problems. A paper trail does nothing to enfranchise voters and is not possible by November.

Your continued hysteria will force another election with historically disenfranchised voters using old, unreliable voting equipment. And another election where millions of votes weren’t counted.

Lucille HibbardVia e-mail

A good source of news

This might surprise you but I am a moderate-right Republican that loyally reads your newspaper. I do so because your paper is a good source of news that can’t be found anywhere else.

You cover labor and political campaign issues that one never reads about in other newspapers. You are up-front on your opinions and how others can support your causes. And above all, you are true to your beliefs on the topics you cover. I look forward to reading next week’s issue.

John E. ArmstrongVia e-mail

Editorials

Fri, 25 Jun 2004 05:17:00 +0000

Solidarity with federal workers

About 1,000 American Federation of Government Employees (AFGE) leaders are gathering in Pittsburgh June 25-27 for a “Victory in ’04” conference to mobilize the union’s 600,000 members to defeat George W. Bush in the Nov. 2 election.

After 9/11, President Bush praised “first responders,” who gave their lives in the terrorist attack. Virtually all were members of public employee unions. But a few months later he threatened to veto the Homeland Security Act if it recognized union rights for 170,000 Homeland Security workers, arguing they would be a threat to “national security.”

The union has fought back. Vigorous AFGE mobilization, backed up by the AFL-CIO, would have forced the Department of Defense (DoD) to postpone changes that would strip 200,000 civilian workers of their right in the grievance procedure. Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld seeks to substitute “pay for performance” for the long-standing General Service Schedule and Wage Grade system in which DoD workers’ salaries are based on years of service. This would create a new “patronage” system in which pay increases are doled out to cronies. It would eliminate annual cost-of-living increases. AFGE asked Congress for a 3.5-percent increase for federal workers but Bush offered 1.5 percent.

AFGE is also fighting against privatization of 430,000 federal jobs. Halliburton, the firm once headed by Vice President Dick Cheney, was recently caught delivering rotten food to U.S. soldiers in Iraq under a no-bid private contract. Once those meals would have been delivered by the Quartermaster Corps.

AFGE is fighting a Bush administration scheme to force veterans to pay $3.7 billion more in out-of-pocket expenses at VA hospitals.

In many ways, these federal workers are on the front lines of the battle against the union-busting, anti-people policies of the Bush administration. They deserve the full solidarity of the labor movement and the American people.

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Women v. Wal-Mart

The largest class action suit in history got the green light June 22. The world’s leading retailer, Wal-Mart Stores Inc., is accused of systematically discriminating against 1.6 million current and former women employees by denying them equal pay and promotion opportunities. Six women workers filed the suit in June 2001. The plaintiffs argue Wal-Mart perpetuates a corporate culture of gender stereotypes and unequal pay. Women workers earn 5 to 15 percent less than their male co-workers doing the same job.

Wal-Mart’s profits topped $9 billion last year. The prospect of paying even a modest settlement of $5,000 per worker would come to $8 billion before lawyers’ fees. Not surprisingly, the lawsuit has shaken Wall Street, and the company’s stock has taken a hit.

In the modern-day capitalist economy, Wal-Mart is the Goliath and its workers and the communities it “serves” are the collective David. Wal-Mart negatively affects a broad swath of the population: men and women, Black, Latino, white, Asian, American Indian, immigrant, young and old, rural and urban.

In Inglewood, Calif., and Chicago, among other places, labor and community groups have battled the “Wal-Mart economy.” Paying low wages and driving out small businesses and jobs, Wal-Mart becomes the monopoly retailer, leading a “race to the bottom.”

Wal-Mart has locked its workers in overnight and has used the Department of Homeland Security to raid its stores, intimidating and harassing workers. The company wages war against any employee who dares to exercise his or her right to organize or join a union. Its anti-union stance threatens all workers. “Competition” from Wal-Mart is the excuse other retail giants use to bust unions, driving wages and benefits down.

Through unity and struggle, this retail monster can be stopped. It’s definitely time for an all-out campaign to pass the Employee Free Choice Act, strengthening workers’ right to unionize. That would give a major boost to the worker-community David as it battles this retail Goliath in the courts and on the streets.

Liar, liar

Fri, 25 Jun 2004 04:54:00 +0000

In a devastating blow to George W. Bush’s most powerful rationale for the invasion of Iraq, the bipartisan September 11th commission found no link between Saddam Hussein and the 9/11 attacks, and no evidence of collaboration between Hussein and Al Qaeda.

“We have no credible evidence that Iraq and Al Qaeda cooperated on attacks against the United States,” the commission’s interim report said.

Bob McIlvaine, whose 26-year-old son was killed at the World Trade Center, responded emotionally. “It’s all lies. Bush should be impeached because he lied,” he told the World.

“It upsets me that so much attention has been paid to Iraq. From the very beginning, I knew there was no connection,” McIlvain said.

No one explored the Saudi Arabia and Pakistan connection, although much information was available, said McIlvain, who attended every commission hearing. “Everyone seems to forget this was a terrible failure,” he said. “Terror has increased because of the war on Iraq.”

Widening exposures of U.S. torture and abuse at Abu Ghraib and throughout the region shredded another element of the administration’s three-pronged Iraq war rationale – its claim of bringing freedom and human rights to Iraq. A flood of testimony implicated the White House, and Bush himself, in authorizing torture by discarding international and U.S. laws which require humane treatment of detainees. In an effort to stem the hemorrhage, the administration released a February 2002 Bush memo that talked of treating detainees humanely, but even that memo asserted the president’s right to “suspend” the Geneva Conventions on treatment of detainees when deemed militarily necessary. A flurry of White House damage control efforts failed to quiet the unfolding controversy.

The third justification for the war was Iraq’s purported possession of weapons of mass destruction that supposedly posed an imminent threat to the U.S. That claim was demolished earlier this year, and WMDs have disappeared from the vocabulary of Bush officials.

The nation’s largest union, the 1.6-million-member Service Employees, issued a stinging condemnation of the Iraq war and Bush administration lies. Some 4,000 delegates at the union’s convention in San Francisco unanimously called for ending the U.S. occupation of Iraq and bringing the troops home. (See next week’s issue for a complete report.)

The commission report, released June 16, directly contradicted numerous statements by President Bush, Vice President Dick Cheney and other top officials over the past two and a half years, in which they repeatedly tied the Iraq war to 9/11 and terrorism. The commission found that there had never been a “collaborative relationship” between Osama Bin Laden and Saddam Hussein.

After the commission report was released, Bush and Cheney and other top Republicans went into linguistic overdrive, twisting everyday words like “relationship” and “contacts” in an all-out effort to maintain the discredited Iraq war justification. Bush insisted that his administration “never said that the 9/11 attacks were orchestrated between Saddam and Al-Qaeda. We did say there were numerous contacts between Saddam Hussein and Al-Qaeda.” However, Cheney continued to speak of “overwhelming” evidence of an Iraq-Qaeda axis.

In a stinging editorial, The New York Times pointed to “the depth and ferocity of the administration’s capacity for denial.” The Times charged that Bush and Cheney “not only brushed aside the panel’s findings and questioned its expertise, but they are also trying to rewrite history.”

“Mr. Bush said the 9/11 panel had actually confirmed his contention that there were ‘ties’ between Iraq and Al Qaeda. He said his administration had never connected Saddam Hussein to 9/11. Both statements are wrong,” The Times declared.

Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry said the commission’s findings showed that the “administration misled America and … reached too far.”

“They did not tell the truth to Americans,” he said.

Former Vice President Al Gore charged the Bush administration is intentionally misleading the American people by continuing to falsely connect Saddam Hussein and Al Qaeda. Bush and Cheney have “institutionalized dishonesty as an essential element of their policy process,” he said.

A 36-page report issued in March by Rep. Henry A. Waxman (D-Calif.) documents “237 specific misleading statements about the threat posed by Iraq” made by Bush, Cheney, Defense Secretary Rumsfeld, Secretary of State Powell, and National Security Advisor Rice between 2002 and 2004. Of those “misleading statements,” the report identifies 61 about the Iraq-Al Qaeda connection.

For example, Bush said in September 2002, “The war on terror, you can’t distinguish between Al Qaeda and Saddam when you talk about the war on terror.” In his infamous “mission accomplished” speech, May 1, 2003, calling the Iraq war “a crucial advance in the campaign against terror,” he declared, “We’ve removed an ally of Al Qaeda, and cut off a source of terrorist funding.” The 9/11 commission debunked these claims.

The author can be reached at suewebb@pww.org.

Letters

Fri, 18 Jun 2004 04:39:00 +0000

It’s a necessity

This morning I had another experience that reinforced my conviction that multilingualism is a practical necessity for the survival of democracy in our country. Anxious to find out about a demonstration against immigration raids in the Inland Empire June 13, I went to the L.A. Times and found nothing. Next I went to the Times’ sister subsidiary of the Tribune, La Opinion, and the demonstration was the top story with up to 10,000 demonstrators reported as participating.

Institutional racism in the media is practiced by commission and omission. The editing in of racism is often very subtle, the editing out of antiracism is deafening. Frank Del Olmo and Ruben Salazar must be turning in their graves.

Rosalio MuñozLos Angeles CA

Pharmacist violates ethics

Allowing pharmacists to refuse to fill prescriptions because they personally oppose birth control, and not due to concerns involving drug interactions or the patient’s health, violates the ethical obligation the pharmacist has to the patient and interferes with the patient/doctor relationship. Pharmacist Neil Noesen from Menomonee, Wis., refused to refill a patient’s birth control prescription and disregarded what was in the patient’s best interest and ignored a doctor’s prescribed medical treatment because he personally opposes birth control. Pharmacists have an ethical obligation according to the Wisconsin Administrative Code to refrain from “engaging in any pharmacy practice which constitutes a danger to the health, welfare, or safety of patient or public, including, but not limited to, practicing in a manner which substantially departs from the standard of care.” (Wisconsin Administrative Code, Standards of unprofessional conduct, PHR 10.03).

The use of oral contraceptives is most certainly a standard of care for a women wanting to prevent pregnancy – 85 percent of sexually active women take, or have taken, oral contraceptives. Clearly, Noesen placed the woman’s health and well-being in danger, not to mention a pregnancy that could occur and abort, if the woman isn’t in good reproductive health.

Charlotte SiverlingCadott WI

Practice what you preach

Health insurance should be a right. People work all their damn life and the meager savings they’ve put together is gone. How can you sit in the front pew in church and claim to be a good Christian and you don’t give a damn whether people have health care or not? I’ve been giving this a lot of thought, and I want to know, why can’t we have a national health care system like they have in Canada?

Jack LoveSavannah GA The author is business manager of Local 188 Steamfitters, Plumbers and Pipefitters Union.

The Day After Tomorrow

Carolyn Rummel’s review of “The Day After Tomorrow” (PWW, 6/5-11) is right on target. The only thing I would add is that the Bush administration’s refusal to go along with the rest of the world and sign the Kyoto protocol, thereby accepting U.S. responsibility for reducing its share of greenhouse gas emissions, adds one more reason to the many others for defeating George W. Bush in November. This is the reason MoveOn.org is promoting nationwide informative visits to movie theaters and engaging viewers of “The Day After Tomorrow” in conversations about the political implications of the film. This is a movie that the administration would rather viewers not see.

John PappademosFerguson MO

Mobilizing the vote

I can really appreciate the words of [Coalition of Black Trade Unionists President] Bill Lucy (“CBTU: Mobilize the vote” by Scott Marshall and Jim Wilkerson, PWW, 6/5-11). Rhetoric such as his is what we need to get rid of Bush and the Republican majority in the House and Senate. Let’s stop worrying about getting the 4 or 6 percent of the undecided voters and mobilize the 50 percent that just don’t bother to vote. It takes the words of leaders like Lucy and Jesse Jackson to fire up the majority of the U.S. voters and to get then out to vote. This must be our top priority for the next five months. PWW has it right! Now we must get the rest of the nation on your front page.

Jim DienerVia e-mail

The deserts of Juarez and the siren song of capitalism

In the ticker tape news a flash of words announces that another compañera in Juarez, Mexico, has fallen victim to patriarchy, globalization and poverty. This border city (across the river from El Paso, Texas) has seen the murder of over 350 compañeras.

Many have been young maquiladora workers lured to this megapolis by the promises of NAFTA: exploitation and $4-a-day jobs in multinational assembly plants. Living at the periphery of Juarez in the shantytowns, the compañeras use an unregulated system of mass transit to get to their jobs in the maquilas. Their days start at the pre-dawn hours in areas with no municipal services or lighting and end in late night return after grueling 12-14 hour shifts at the assembly plants. These unsafe commutes have often been suspected of being places where the desaparecidas have met the elusive killer/killers.

In a world where women often fall victim to violence, the fate of the compañeras has barely gotten a response from the Mexican authorities. Despite a grassroots effort to stop the violence, women continue to die. The siren song of capitalism lures the compañeras into a city where they remain anonymous, to a work place where they are disposable and to the hands of a killer that knows this too well.

Todo el poder al pueblo!

Raul CanoFrom Texas via e-mail

Editorials

Fri, 18 Jun 2004 04:25:00 +0000

Bush’s budget plans

Gerald McEntee, president of the American Federation of State, County, and Municipal Employees, spoke for millions when he called George W. Bush’s money plan for fiscal year 2005 a “budget of mass destruction.” It would lock in $2.2 trillion in tax cuts for millionaires, giving each an average annual break of $107,000, while slashing funding for Medicaid and grants for local government.

McEntee told the recent “Take Back America” conference that Bush wants to spend hundreds of billions to “build a city on Mars, but he hasn’t got a dime for the city of Philadelphia.”

The budget includes $444 billion for defense with boondoggles for Lockheed Martin and other military corporations, not counting the $200 billion price tag for the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.

The Bush budget is stalled in the Senate with four Republicans joining solid Democratic opposition. Meanwhile, a secret White House memo has surfaced revealing that Bush plans huge budget cuts in domestic programs if he steals a second term. The memo from the White House Office of Management and Budget, first obtained by the Washington Post, reveals that starting in 2006, the administration would slash school funding by $1.5 billion, Veterans Affairs by $910 million, National Institutes of Health by $600 million, Women, Infant and Children nutrition programs by $122 million, and Head Start by $177 million. It would cut the Office of Domestic Preparedness’ First Responder Program by 18 percent.

Bush and Cheney are asking people to vote for them based on the very programs they plan to gut if they manage to trick their way back into the White House. What brazen liars and cheats they are. No wonder the “Take Back America” crowd cheered when McEntee said Bush should be defeated Nov. 2 and then sent as the first unelected mayor of Mars City.

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Remember Chaney, Goodman & Schwerner

James Chaney. Andrew Goodman. Michael Schwerner. They will be remembered forever for giving their lives in the struggle for voting rights and racial equality. The three young men – Chaney, African American, and Schwerner and Goodman, both white and of Jewish background – were lynched by Klansmen just outside Philadelphia, Miss., the night of June 21, 1964.

They were civil rights volunteers in a hard-fought struggle to register African Americans to vote across Mississippi. That battle led to passage a year later of the 1965 Voting Rights Act.

Ben Chaney is commemorating the 40th anniversary of his brother’s death by organizing a two-week caravan through the South to register people to vote in the Nov. 2, 2004, election. The busload of 40 volunteers will make stops in Atlanta and Greensboro, N.C., and will participate in a memorial service in Mississippi to honor the three martyrs. The caravan will wind up in Washington June 25.

Some remember that Ronald Reagan launched his 1980 presidential campaign in Philadelphia, Miss., proclaiming, “I believe in states’ rights.” He made no mention of Chaney, Goodman and Schwerner, and his speech was seen as an open appeal for support from the racist elements who violently opposed voting rights for African Americans. The murderers may even have been present in Reagan’s lily-white crowd that day. Later, seven members of the Klan were convicted of “violating the civil rights” of the three, and served prison terms of six years or less.

George W. Bush, Dick Cheney, and Attorney General John Ashcroft are fanatical adherents to that same states’ rights doctrine – when it suits their purposes. They are working feverishly with Florida Gov. Jeb Bush and other ultra-rightists to suppress the Black vote in Florida and elsewhere even if it means running roughshod over the Voting Rights Act. The best memorial we can build to Chaney, Goodman and Schwerner is to register millions of new voters to oust Bush-Cheney Nov. 2

CPUSA delegation visits socialist Cuba

Fri, 18 Jun 2004 03:43:00 +0000

The Cuban media is giving considerable coverage to the visit to that country by CPUSA National Chairman Sam Webb, People’s Weekly World Editor Terrie Albano and Northern California District Chair Juan Lopez, who arrived in Havana June 8 on invitation of the Communist Party of Cuba.

Granma highlighted the delegation’s meeting with relatives of the Cuban Five – Gerardo Hernández, René González, Antonio Guerrero, Ramon Labañino and Fernando González – now serving long prison sentences in the U.S. under extremely harsh conditions for seeking to blow the whistle on anti-Cuban terrorist activities being hatched from U.S. soil.

“We really need to have the same combative spirit as those five heroes,” Webb said. “It is ironic that these men should be fighting against terrorism and find themselves imprisoned in the ‘age of combating terrorism.’”

Family members of the five recounted the grueling ordeal they have suffered as the U.S. administration has prevented them from visiting their loved ones. “I would like for us to meet under different circumstances,” Webb told the family members. “We share the pain you feel as a result of the injustice being done to your loved ones, and we also share your sadness.” Webb said it was an honor to talk with people who have so much courage and spirit. On returning home, he added, the delegation will step up work to publicize the case. “We believe this battle can be won,” he said. “We assure you that we will do everything possible to free your loved ones.”

In a meeting with Pedro Saez, Communist Party first secretary in Havana, Webb emphasized the defeat of George W. Bush in November as the CPUSA’s immediate challenge, according to Radio Rebelde and Radio Havana Cuba. He added that the CPUSA will do everything possible to eliminate the U.S. economic, trade and financial blockade imposed against Cuba.

Webb also praised the Cuban revolution’s humanism after learning about some of the social programs Cuba has undertaken to enhance specialized attention to children, adolescents, the elderly and disabled people.

Saez highlighted the transformations now underway in education and public health, and emphasized that despite more than 40 years of blockade, Cuba has overcome material difficulties to a great extent. He described the challenges facing the party organization in Havana, and the “battle of ideas” to promote culture and social consciousness among the people.

Webb said the Cuban people’s overwhelming achievements despite the blockade are an inspiring example to the people of the United States, and called the struggle to end the embargo the highest expression of internationalism.

Citing George W. Bush’s repeated verbal attacks against the island nation, Webb said Cuba occupies a real moral high ground compared to the hypocrisy and lies emanating from Washington.

Letters

Fri, 11 Jun 2004 04:22:00 +0000

History’s path

We have evolved through eons of time from slavery, feudalism, capitalism – now into socialism.

Ownership of land gave us power over others in feudalism. Money, gold, silver, paper was the “power-house” over the industrial capitalist system.

The key to the supremely advanced socialist society is knowledge, wisdom and love for brothers and sisters, the environment, and appreciation for life.

During the 1930s Depression, there was a celestial, popular, classical song: “Ah sweet mystery of life, at last I have found thee! ’Tis love and love alone – the secret answer to it all!”

Harry F. BillingsSalem OR

Media ‘programming’ on Haiti

Does it bother anyone else that in this Land which is allegedly Your Land and My Land, where the media proclaims itself “free” and “independent,” virtually all news networks just happen to be conducting a simultaneous blackout on Haiti?

Could it be that in the aftermath of the Bush regime- and CIA-staged coup, which ousted President Jean-Bertrand Aristide, the show is not proceeding as its stage writers and directors in Washington intended? Has Haiti been reduced to a bloodbath of warring factions? Or are U.S. troops amassed there in sufficient numbers to maintain a Pax Americana under high-tech steel fists, poised to strike? And if so, for how long?

We don’t know, and may never know, because in this Land, which the economic elite has taken to be Their Land, where carefully crafted distraction is employed to shift our consciousness quickly off verboten subjects and inquiries (hopefully before we can even discover they are off-limits – banned, from us), hard facts take a back seat to “entertainment news.” “Freedom of the press” is actually the freedom of corporate news network owners and sponsors to conceal, distort and disinform at will – all while conditioning us to believe that the “diversity” of rumors, distortions and distractions they promulgate in place of the truth indicates that we live in an “open” society.

But I’ve used up the space allotted for this contraband public service announcement. It’s time to return to our regularly scheduled “programming.”

Eric RayTampa, FL

Thanks for ‘The Jungle’ review

This is just a note to say thanks very much for Al Olson’s useful and perceptive review of “The Jungle: The Uncensored Original Edition.”

You might be interested to know that your review is, to the best of my knowledge, the first to appear in any leftist newspaper or magazine in the country.

Chaz Bufe Publisher, See Sharp Press Via e-mail

Blame U.S. companies, not China

I agree 100 percent with Scott Marshall’s article on China (“China-bashing: an election-year mistake,” PWW, 5/1-7). Another thing people should be careful about is not to bash China for human rights abuses in the workplace. I understand that people working for the state have good working conditions, whereas poor working conditions are found in the private corporations, probably mostly American corporations. Our American imperialist corporations in China should be bashed, not China herself.

Betty KalloSan Francisco CA

It’s a different kind of war

The mainstream media have made much of the president’s graduation oration at the Air Force Academy this past week, highlighting his comparison between the campaign in Iraq and World War II. But to make such a favorable metaphor needs some selective amnesia. At this writing, over 800 occupying troops have been killed in Iraq since Mr. Bush’s declaration of victory a year ago, that number climbing daily. However, after VE Day in May of 1945 that ended the war in Europe, not a single Allied soldier was killed out of conflict activities. Nary a one.

This tells us that we have all again been deluded by the Bush cabal as to the true state of that crusade and more, that the very nature of it does not allow for such a comparison. In WWII, there was a well-defined enemy, a constitutional congressional declaration of war and massive public support. Now, the exact opposites are true. The enemy is as vague and ill defined as can be, without nationality or geography. The Congress made no such declaration as constitutionally required and finally, the public swells against the Bush policies are mounting daily.

And lest we forget, the president in 1945 had been given an unprecedented four-term blessing by his grateful people. This president is sinking in the polls and will hopefully pay the price in November after a single ill-begotten term.

Don Sloan, M.D. New York NY

On the Kerry campaign

I agree strongly with Bruce Bostick’s important and intelligent letter (PWW, 5/29-6/4) warning against those in the Democratic Party who are advising John Kerry to run a “cautious” campaign. If Kerry fails to mobilize his core constituencies – organized labor, minorities, progressive-oriented voters generally – Bush can still use his money and power to remain in office. The way this election is shaping up, it looks like New York City socialists in the early 20th century, who had to win a solid victory to make sure that the Tammany Hall machine would not steal the election. It will take a solid victory this time to make sure that Bush will not steal the election again and it will take energized working-class voters to produce a solid victory.

Norman MarkowitzNew Brunswick NJ

Unique coverage

Excellent paper, which has given me unobtainable news from Venezuela, India, Cyprus – not in commercial sources.

Carl HoecknerHemet CA

Editorials

Fri, 11 Jun 2004 04:13:00 +0000

The truth about Reagan

The media cannot wash away the truth about Ronald Reagan even with a torrent of sickening sentimentality since his death.

On Aug. 6, 1981, Reagan fired 12,000 PATCO air traffic controllers for daring to strike to protect their own health and the safety of airline passengers. It marked him forever as a union-buster and labor-baiter.

Actually, Reagan got his start in politics as an FBI informer against progressive trade unionists and others. He was a “friendly witness” or stoolpigeon before the infamous House Un-American Activities Committee in 1947, ratting out fellow actors and screenwriters whose careers were destroyed by the Hollywood blacklist.

He was the president of the Screen Actors Guild in 1959 when the union’s members walked out on strike. Reagan’s treachery forced the workers to settle in an agreement known ever since as the “Great Giveaway.” Reagan was forced to step down before his term was up, but he had played his role in corporate America’s drive to smash organized labor after labor spearheaded the victory over fascism in World War II.

Reagan’s election as president in 1980 opened the way for ultra-right Republicans to seize control of the federal government. It was during the Reagan administration that the CIA armed and trained thousands of anti-Soviet terrorist mujahideen in Afghanistan, including Osama Bin Laden. The Iran-Contra conspiracy exposed a secret cabal in the White House basement where Oliver North and his cohorts plotted the sale of Pentagon weaponry to Iran, diverting the profits through Swiss banks to bankroll CIA mercenary killers in Central America. Many thousands of innocent people died. John Poindexter, Elliott Abrams, John Negroponte, and other Iran-Contra criminals serve today in the George W. Bush administration. It proves that Reagan’s “off the shelf, covert capacity” for terrorism (his CIA director, William Casey, wrote the handbook on the subject) is alive and well in the Bush White House.

Reagan’s legacy is one more compelling reason to end right-wing domination of our government and turn the nation in a different direction.

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Remembering D-Day

George W. Bush spoke at Colleville-sur-Mer on the coast of France, Memorial Day, to commemorate the 60th anniversary of the D-Day landing June 6, 1944, in which 9,000 American soldiers died.

His speech made no mention of the Grand Alliance, which united the democracies of the world, including the Soviet Union, to defeat fascism. He didn’t mention the long struggle for the “Second Front” to relieve the heroic Red Army on the Eastern Front.

Strangely, according to the official White House transcript, Bush praised American soldiers who died in the current war in Afghanistan, but he made no mention of U.S. troops who have died in Iraq.

The entire scene in Normandy dramatized the isolation of the United States, the worldwide opposition to the Bush Doctrine and the abhorrence of the U.S. occupation of Iraq since disclosure of the Abu Ghraib prison atrocities. What a contrast to D-Day, when so many American soldiers gave the ultimate sacrifice and were hailed as liberators around the world.

At the request of Gen. Dwight Eisenhower, and at considerable cost, the Soviets launched an offensive just a few days before D-Day to prevent the Germans from shifting troops from the Eastern Front to repel the amphibious landing.

Victory over fascism sent an enormous liberating wave around the world. Colonialism on every continent faced a massive popular uprising and the colonial occupiers were thrown out. Here at home, it spurred the struggle to end the system of racial segregation. The UN was born and a worldwide peace movement struggled to end the scourge of war.

Now the main threat to these gains for humanity are ensconced in the White House and the Pentagon. A fitting memorial to the many soldiers who died storming the beaches of Normandy would be the defeat of George W. Bush Nov. 2.

Venezuelan unionists champion democracy

Fri, 11 Jun 2004 03:17:00 +0000

NEW YORK – New York’s Transport Workers Union Local 100 (TWU) hosted a panel discussion of Venezuelan labor leaders here May 26. The delegation included leading members of the Venezuelan Transport Workers, Public Service Workers, Grain and Food Workers, Health Care Workers and Teachers unions, all affiliates of the National Union of Workers (UNT).

The delegation explained that the unions that formed the UNT in August 2003 broke away from the old corrupt Confederation of Venezuelan Workers (CTV). They said that workers were fed up with the corruption and continued sellouts of the CTV leadership and its abandonment of a class-struggle approach.

The CTV was also involved in the April 2002 coup attempt against democratically-elected government of President Hugo Chavez and is still involved in anti-government activities and economic sabotage. Disgusted with these policies, all the major unions have affiliated with the UNT.

The panelists explained their roles in the UNT and gave overviews of their own unions and the work they are doing to advance the interests of their members. One panelist described an incident in which Venezuelan workers turned corporate corruption to their advantage. Certain companies had taken public money, supposedly to help streamline production and hire more workers. Instead the money was used to fight the unions. Ultimately, the companies were closed down by the government; however, this enabled the workers to take over and run some of them.

Among the main tasks of the UNT is to build trust and confidence with workers and to debunk the distortions coming from the right-wing-controlled Venezuelan mass media. This is a formidable job, considering the unions are autonomous from the government and have no media access. They rely on grassroots organizing. The CTV, on the other hand, enjoys the use of four company-and boss-owned major television networks and many radio stations. This is why the UNT leaders are going around the world, presenting the workers’ side of the story.

Despite the difficulties, the labor leaders said that the people – women, students, workers and indigenous groups – have never been more united.

A small group of the wealthy elite – the traditional oligarchy – is behind an effort to recall pro-union President Chavez. The decision to go forward with the recall vote has been decided by the Venezuelan election commission. The recall is part of an effort by anti-union forces encouraged, supported and directed by the extreme right-wing Bush administration to destabilize Venezuela.

Francisco Torealba, national coordinator of the UNT, summarized the position of the UNT and the workers it represents: “We will defend the constitution of Venezuela. We are against coups, against sellouts, against givebacks. We will not let a tiny elite overturn the recent gains and progress. We will not accept blackmail or foreign pressure to change any legal decision.”

Originally the deputy mayor of Caracas, Gustavo Rosario, was part of the delegation. However, U.S. immigration officials denied him entry into the country. In a breach of standard diplomatic practice, Rosario was detained at the airport for over 24 hours and sent back to Venezuela.

The deputy mayor’s sole purpose for visiting the U.S. was to solicit medical equipment for a much-needed medical program for the very poor, inner-city “Barrio Adentro” neighborhoods. Rosario is also a known supporter of President Chavez. The panelists denounced the detention and expulsion of Rosario as an insult to the Venezuelan people.

In closing, the unionists appealed to union members in the U.S. for solidarity.

The author can be reached at gfalsetta@pww.org. Gary Bono contributed to this article.

Vernon Jarrett: a partisan journalistic giant

Fri, 04 Jun 2004 04:53:00 +0000

Opinion

Readers like me can be extremely selective of the journalists we read habitually. We do not have to agree with every word or be humored by diversionary jokes and meaningless anecdotes. We want simplicity that unravels complexity in one swoop. We want to be invigorated and learn something from a passion that is real and irrepressible. We want anecdotes that elucidate and inspire. We do not read your stuff just because you write it. We are selective about the journalists to whom we become insatiably addicted, and once hooked we develop a constructive love affair without the romance.

The love affair thrives on the partisan knowledge of the writer, which is captured and freely shared through the skillful development of the craft and then directed with personal passionate affinity toward the reader. The affair becomes addictive: they write, we read; it’s as simple as that. Every day we want more, curious as to their take on this or that issue whether we agree with their point of view or not. Such was my experience with Vernon Jarrett, an African American journalist in Chicago who died at the age of 86 on May 23. I became a Vernon Jarrett addict, and I am proud of it!

Vernon Jarrett’s career as a journalist in Chicago began and ended at the Chicago Defender, the African American daily paper. In between, he was the first Black journalist at the Chicago Tribune, and I first began to read his articles during his tenure at the Chicago Sun-Times

Jarrett’s claim to fame is that he was a partisan of the cause of African Americans in the broad democratic tradition of Paul Robeson and W.E.B. DuBois. Through his articles, he often lectured fondly on the contributions and sacrifices of Robeson and DuBois as well as Frederick Douglass and others. Vernon Jarrett would not let up; he would always try to produce an angle of analysis that had some relationship to the African American experience. His persona was that of an ordinary man who became extraordinary because of a passionate partisanship to the struggles of his people. He exuded a love and caring for Black people, Black Chicagoans in particular, that was tangible through his activity. I was a humble witness of his profoundness.

He was a southerner from Paris, Tenn., and always told stories of his learning to love Negro history and culture under the tutelage of his proud Black teachers in their humble surroundings. He promoted race consciousness, pride, dignity, and responsibility.

He also promoted an aspiration toward academic excellence in African American youth, and he hammered adults about the need to remember the gems of the ocean, as August Wilson would say. That is a reference to the history of struggle of Black people beginning with the torturous passage over from Africa.

Jarrett was fanatical about African Americans registering and voting in mass for socially conscious candidates. He championed Harold Washington like a great warrior, and this March, from his hospital bed, wrote an article appealing to Black Chicago to turn out to vote for Barack Obama in the Illinois primaries. Obama astounded everyone with an incredible landslide victory as the progressive, Black candidate for the Democratic Party nomination for the U.S. Senate seat from Illinois. From his sickbed, Vernon Jarrett issued a clarion call, and the people responded.

I think Black Chicago was passionately in love with Vernon Jarrett. He talked the talk and walked the walk. We wallowed in the joy of his being through reading his articles. His unrelenting drive kept us reminded of a sense of purpose and helped to instill the courage of our convictions in struggle as a people. We will forever be indebted; we will never forget.

Dee Myles is a Chicago activist and chair of the education commission of the Communist Party USA. She can be reached at pww@pww.org.

Letters

Fri, 04 Jun 2004 04:43:00 +0000

A billion here, a billion there

The title to this little verse was borrowed from an excellent leaflet that was distributed at a recent demonstration. I owe a debt of gratitude to them and the demonstration.

A billion here, a billion there, Each a thousand times a millionaire! And now, the trillions Loudly resound from the press and air. When will we stop this robbery That is imposed … on you and me? Stand up, Stand up, Stand up! Speak out, Speak out, Speak out!

Norm RothNorthlake IL

Hi-tech jobloss

Regarding “Jobs report not so rosy” (PWW 4/10-16), up here in Massachusetts and New Hampshire a lot of us have been laid off from high tech software jobs. I was a software engineer and graduated from Northeastern University in 1994 with about $50,000 in debt. I worked in high tech until I got laid off in 2001. Since then I have not found permanent employment in my field or any other field and now I’m quickly loosing any experience in my line of work.

Since being laid off I took the H&R Block tax course and worked for them for one season for $7.50 an hour and only got to work at most 6-12 hours a week.

This year I went back to school to study Linux. I also got a job as a math and computer science tutor making $8.50 an hour but can’t seem to get more than 8-10 hours a week. Friends of mine who also had degrees in hardware, networking, mathematics and software now are lucky if they can find work at Home Depot.

Where are these jobs that the Bush administration keeps hyping about? I’m afraid with all the offshoring and outsourcing we’ll never recover. We’ll just get pretty good at not working, which is not my choice.

Thanks for letting me rant a bit.

JeanneDerry NH

Saludos compañero

I was very pleased to read about the meeting held and issues discussed at the “Boricua Roundtable” in the Bronx, N.Y. (“Puerto Ricans chart progressive agenda” by Jose A. Cruz, PWW 5/29-6/4). In particular I embrace the idea to start “Encuenro eMag,” and N.Y. Rep. Nydia Velazquez’ motion to move John Kerry to embrace the Puerto Rican agenda as well as placing a Puerto Rican or Latino as deputy.

I look forward to continued information concerning the movement of Puertorriqueños making a difference in the political arena.

Lil DeConsueloQuebradillas, Puerto Rico

Letter from Africa

Rwanda is a beautiful country – it boasts to be the most beautiful country in Africa – and according to all the folks I’ve talked to so far this is true. Rwanda is in the process of reconciling and facilitating peace ten years after the genocide. The stories of the folks here are intense, emotional and inspiring because from all of the pain and hate many are finding love as the only vehicle for healing.

We have a lot to learn from the model of justice and reconciliation used here on the continent. The young revolutionary leaders, who are challenging the colonial past and the globalized-imperialized present, are inspiring and unique. I am learning so much about the value of life, love and organizing.

The land and air are unbelievable. I am staying on a vast lake that mimics an endless ocean with clear blue waters. Lush green islands jut out of the lake offering a pallette of thick green and blue bliss that is undeveloped and organic. The stars are thick and the sky is black at night – no need for blankets because the warmth of the air is comforting. The plants and creatures that inhabit the area are free and we have a mutual respect and understanding that space and the earth are to be shared not conquered.

Anita WheelerVia e-mail

At last

On Memorial Day I was pleased to watch on TV the dedication of the World War II memorial in Washington. It came almost 60 years late but it signified a change in the political climate.

World War II was the largest war in the history of the world. It absorbed the attention and activity of our country completely. A grand alliance of all the freedom-loving people of the world was formed to defeat fascism. It was the last war that was justifiable.

There was no memorial dedicated to our troops when the war ended. Instead our government set about destroying the coalition that had saved the world. The Cold War was started. It cost many times what was spent on WW II. It was directed not only against the Soviet Union but also against the FDR economic reforms.

I have not yet seen the new WW II memorial, and I assume that it minimizes the role of our allies, especially the USSR. Nevertheless I think we should welcome the change in the political climate that has reminded people of another day when the world was on a progressive track and our government led the world into the United Nations.

It is especially encouraging that a new coalition is emerging in our country that promises to reverse the ultra-right policies of our government.

George EdwardsPittsburgh PA The author is a World War II veteran.

Editorials

Fri, 04 Jun 2004 04:32:00 +0000

A recovery in profits, not wages

The Bush administration must be thinking the U.S. is a nation of ingrates. The economy is humming along so nicely, they say. Why then has George W. Bush’s approval rating plummeted to only 41 percent? And 65 percent believe the nation is on the “wrong track.”

Maybe the people interviewed in those polls have just taken out a second mortgage to gas up the family car. Maybe they are struggling with an 11 percent increase in their children’s college tuition, or double digit inflation in health care and prescription drugs.

Millions remain in the ranks of the long-term unemployed and many of the newly employed have been forced to accept a low-wage job with meager benefits. The polls show a deep worry that this Bush “recovery” might be sunk by rising inflation and vanishing purchasing power.

A report by the Economic Policy Institute released May 27 points out that corporate profits skyrocketed 62.2 percent since the recovery began but wages are up a pitiful 2.8 percent, less than the increased cost of living.

“This is the fastest rate of profit growth in a recovery since World War II,” the report states. “(T)he growth in profits combined with a drop in wages and salary income suggest that the recovery has a narrow base with most American consumers only able to increase their purchasing power through debt. Wage growth is not just fair, it is also necessary for a more sustainable recovery.”

But you will never convince Bush of that. His so-called economic recovery is fueled by a huge transfer of income from the pockets of working people to the coffers of corporations and the super-rich.

Recent strikes by grocery workers and SBC telephone workers prove that working people are ready to fight for jobs, living wages, pensions and health care. They are fighting with one hand tied behind their back as long as Bush is in the White House.

* * * * *

Victory for women and reproductive freedom

Federal District Court Judge Phyllis Hamilton ruled June 1 that the so-called Partial Birth Abortion Ban is unconstitutional and cannot be enforced. In her ruling, Hamilton wrote that the “act poses an undue burden on a woman’s right to choose an abortion,” a point that women’s groups and civil liberties advocates had made from the beginning.

On March 29 three federal courts began hearing legal challenges to the ban, which Congress passed in October 2003 and President Bush signed in November. The law defines the term “partial-birth abortion” so broadly that it would prohibit a wide range of abortions performed in the second trimester. It fails to safeguard women because it does not contain an exception to protect their health.

This law is not about abortions performed late in pregnancy. Supporters of the law used misleading rhetoric to mask the fact that the law bans safe and medically-appropriate abortions as early as 12 to 15 weeks and is part of the Bush administration’s larger agenda to outlaw all abortions. In fact, Hamilton, in her strongly worded opinion, accused Congress of having done just that – misrepresenting scientific facts in order to ramrod this first-ever federal ban on abortion.

“Judge Hamilton’s decision reaffirms a woman’s right to choose and a doctor’s right to practice medicine,” said Gloria Feldt, president of Planned Parenthood, one of the plaintiffs in the suit.

However, the fight against the ban is not over. Two more cases are pending in U.S. district courts. Those rulings are expected later this summer. Judge Hamilton’s ruling gives women reason to be hopeful but as we’ve seen over and over again, the Bush administration will stop at nothing to push through its agenda.

It’s important to remember this ruling comes after the historic women’s march, where over 1 million people turned out to support reproductive freedom. With unity and struggle, victories are possible.