Bosses parties offer workers no answer for today’s crises
https://themilitant.com/2020/08/22/bosses-parties-offer-workers-no-answer-for-todays-crises/
BY TERRY EVANS
Vol. 84/No. 34
August 31, 2020
With less than three months until the November elections, both the
Democrats and Republicans are focused on how horrible the other party
is, rather than on concrete measures working people need as the
economic, social and moral crisis of capitalist production and
for-profit health care bears down on us.
The Democrats hope the economic crisis continues and the pandemic drags
on to make Trump look bad. Trump says things are really OK, just give
him four more years, and the main problem is the “radical left” running
Joe Biden’s campaign. Neither of the candidates of the bosses main
parties are running on a program that offers working people a way
forward in the face of mass unemployment, wage cuts and unsafe conditions.
Only the Socialist Workers Party presidential ticket of Alyson Kennedy
and Malcolm Jarrett starts from the capacities of working people to
fight together against the bosses and their government.
The SWP campaign says workers need a union movement in every workplace.
We need our own party, a labor party, to organize working people in
their millions and to take political power into our own hands. Workers
need to fight to take control of production and safety on the job and
for jobs for the unemployed.
Democrats’ ‘virtual’ convention
The Democratic Party organized a “virtual” national convention August
17-20, nominating Biden and Kamala Harris as its presidential ticket. It
featured talks by politicians of various stripes — from Bernie Sanders
to Never-Trump Republicans like former Ohio Gov. John Kasich and Colin
Powell. The single theme is all out to get rid of Trump.
Virtually every middle-class radical group in the country has signed on
to the Biden campaign.
Democrats hope putting Harris on their ticket will garner votes based on
her skin color and her sex. But her claim to fame is serving as district
attorney in San Francisco and attorney general in California — in charge
of the capitalist rulers’ criminal “justice” system. She helped railroad
workers to prison and defended the prison system from challenges against
solitary confinement and brutality.
The liberals that control the party and their media allies have spent
the last four years trying to use an FBI witch hunt to get rid of Trump.
The last thing they want now is to debate with the president.
Debates should only be scheduled, Jennifer Rubin wrote in the Washington
Post, if they are limited to “coronavirus, one on the economy and one on
racial justice,” and there are no opening and closing remarks. And she
says they should be monitored by a “real-time fact checker” ready to
censor any lie Trump may utter.
Never far from the surface is liberals’ scorn for working people, who
they consider responsible for Trump’s election in 2016 and fear they
will do so again this fall. Hillary Clinton called working people
“deplorables.”
Biden declared in June that some 15% of the population are just “not
very good people,” but if he is elected he will hold their worst
instincts in check.
What they really fear is that workers will organize ourselves and mount
a challenge to the system of capitalist exploitation and oppression that
these politicians have dedicated their lives to upholding.
Republicans up next
The Republican convention is set for Aug. 24-27, mostly virtual as well.
Donald Trump will give his acceptance speech from Washington, D.C. No
Democrats are scheduled to speak, neither is former President George W.
Bush.
When Trump ran for president in 2016, he campaigned as an outsider,
saying his goal was to “drain the swamp” of Washington politicians who
don’t give a damn about working people. And he pointed to workers’ need
for jobs as a key priority, saying he would create an infrastructure
program to solve that.
But he’s been in Washington for four years now. He never did organize a
serious jobs program, and doesn’t propose to do so if reelected.
He does explain that the relentless effort by the Democrats to drive him
from office has created obstacles to what he could accomplish. And this
gets a real response from many workers.
Trump gave a preview of the convention at a rally in Oshkosh, Wisconsin,
held the same day as the opening of the Democrats’ virtual gathering. He
said the 2020 campaign was “a fight for the survival of our nation and
civilization itself.” The rest was to tout the accomplishments of his
administration.
The fact is, millions more today are without jobs and face growing
insecurity about the future. Neither of the capitalist rulers’ two
parties have a program to offer working people. Whether Biden or Trump
is in the White House for the next four years they will act as every
president has done — to defend the propertied rulers, to maximize their
profits and to defend U.S. imperialism’s political and military
interests abroad.
Front Page Articles
Israel-UAE pact is a step forward in Middle East
For recognition of Israel and of a Palestinian state!
Bosses parties offer workers no answer for today’s crises
Protests shake Belarus after rigged vote, brutal assaults
‘Workers need a union in every workplace, and a labor party!’
Fight to overturn Florida prison officials’ ‘Militant’ impoundment
Feature Articles
Quebec longshore strikers carry out ‘fight for safety’
Also In This Issue
Nurses protest across UK demanding higher wages
Sedalia, Missouri: ‘Prosecute cop who killed Hannah Fizer’
Chicago looting is blow to fight against police brutality
Strikes over jobs, wages, safety as workers resist bosses’ attacks
New Orleans ‘hoppers’ fight for wages, conditions
SWP candidate on ballot for D.C. Delegate to Congress
Books of the Month
Russian Revolution proved workers can take power
25, 50 and 75 years ago
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Carl Sagan
“Every aspect of Nature reveals a deep mystery and touches our sense of wonder
and awe. Those afraid of the universe as it really is, those who pretend to
nonexistent knowledge and envision a Cosmos centered on human beings will
prefer the fleeting comforts of superstition. They avoid rather than confront
the world. But those with the courage to explore the weave and structure of the
Cosmos, even where it differs profoundly from their wishes and prejudices, will
penetrate its deepest mysteries.”
― Carl Sagan, Cosmos