News briefs for January, 2020

News and items of interest from around the world and around the Internet for January 2020 – by IWPCHI

1) If this is true and your revolutionary socialist workers party is not growing by leaps and bounds, then you are doing something wrong:  “More than a third of millennials polled approve of communism”!

The poll that this article was based on was apparently commissioned by a US Government-created anti-communist propaganda operation called the “Victims of Communism Memorial Foundation”; the poll is conducted annually.  This foundation got its start as a bipartisan effort to spread massive disinformation about the history of the revolutionary socialist movement.  Racist Republican anticommunist scum like the late Sen. Jesse Helms laid down with Racist Democratic Party anticommunist scum like former US President Bill Clinton and gave birth to this deformed beast of an organization.  It’s planning to build one of the first museums in world history dedicated to the goal of systematic falsification of the history of revolutionary socialist working-class parties.  The “Victims of Communism Memorial Foundation” website is here. Their organization’s leadership is, of course, replete with out-and-out fascists like US Major General John K. Singlaub (Ret.), founder of the Cold War-era fascist “World Anti-Communist League”, now operating under the name of the “World League for Freedom and Democracy”.  By the way: isn’t this an interesting use of these political terms as a name for a fascist organization?

Here is the link to the poll.

This is undoubtedly the effect of the “Great Recession” when young people across the nation saw their families and the families of their friends and neighbors’ lives destroyed by the capitalist system.  They are of course also feeling the full brunt of the vast increase in college tuition and rent, with wages – until very recently – stagnant at essentially 1980s levels.  The positive attitudes towards socialism range widely among the various “generations”; interestingly even the elderly “Silent Generation” have become slightly less anti-socialist; for Boomers and Gen X ers it’s a mixed bag.  The poll is well worth reading.

I also recommend reading the 1000-plus comments on the Marketwatch article at the top of this item. Americans don’t know anything about socialism or communism; massive confusion abounds, the result of decades of US Govt propaganda and capitalist-owned news media disinformation.  There’s enough material there for at least one article, which I hope to be able to write soon.

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Just stumbled across this little gem while surfing the WHO website on some other errand; I did not know this!

2) #SocialismWorks: (2015) “World Health Organization validates elimination of mother-to-child transmission of HIV and syphilis in Cuba”

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3) Illinois joins the growing list of states who have legalized marijuana, but the high taxes are designed to ensure the continued existence of drug cartel operations and profitability, as well as keep US prisons full of people busted for illegal drug dealing and (probably, eventually) for possession of illegal drugs. #DumpTheDems #BuildAWorkersParty #FightForASocialistFuture #Re-LegalizeAllDrugs

Receipt for legal weed purchased in Illinois on first day of legalization, 1 January 2020. Photographer unknown. Source: Twitter

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4) Union of Concerned Scientists 2015 study: “Cleaner Cars from Cradle to Grave: How Electric Cars Beat Gasoline Cars on Lifetime Global Warming Emissions”

Very informative but unfortunately flawed IMO: in calculating the lifetime global warming emissions of BEVs they assume that owners will not replace the battery over the lifetime of the car.

If this assumption turns out to be wrong, the conclusions of this study may have to be significantly revised or even thrown out entirely. Source: Union of Concerned Scientists, “Cleaner Cars from Cradle to Grave – How Electric Cars Beat Gasoline Cars on Lifetime Global Warming Emissions” (2015)

As the manufacturing of Li-ion batteries is the #1 source of global warming emissions over the lifetime of the car, if this assumption turns out to be wrong, the conclusions of the study will have to be revised significantly – maybe even thrown out completely.  Early reports from Tesla owners indicate that their car batteries are often losing significant charging capacity over just a few years.  It appears to me that it is highly unlikely that owners of BEVs will wait until their car batteries lose even 30% of their charge-holding capacity before they either buy a new battery or sell the car (passing on that expense to the purchaser). We’ll soon know the answer to this question.

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5) Apropos of the previous entry: global supplies of lithium for Li-ion batteries have been the subject of much discussion, but that’s not the only material used in a lithium-ion battery. Most natural elements necessary for their production have adequate supplies for at least the short-term needs of li-ion battery manufacture… except for cobalt.  I recommend this 2018 article from Scientific American; and I highly recommend this 2017 study the Sci Am article is based upon, from the scientific journal “Joule”: “Lithium-Ion Battery Supply Chain Considerations: Analysis of Potential Bottlenecks in Critical Metals”

Source: Joule 1, 229–243, October 11, 2017

Report on NATO 3 Defendant Jared Chase’s Court Appearance 18 February 2016

DROP ALL CHARGES AGAINST JARED CHASE AND FREE HIM NOW!

At a pre-trial hearing held today (18 February, 2016), former NATO 3 defendant Jared Chase’s Cook County Public Defender Peter Benesh made an ineffectual attempt to obtain a court injunction prohibiting the shackling of Chase using a “black box” device, which causes physical injury to Chase, who suffers from Huntington’s Disease.  Chase was in court to answer to charges of “aggravated battery to a corrections officer” – a Class I offense, punishable by between 4 and 15 years in the penitentiary.  Yet Chase’s lawyer was repeatedly rebuffed by Cook County Court Judge Thaddeus Wilson for lack of preparation in not asking for this protective court order in the proper fashion.

We were informed about the hearing via the Twitter and WordPress accounts of   “Free the NATO 3”.

In our experience attending hearings like this one (since circa 1979), defendants have almost always had a legal defense campaign orchestrated by one or another revolutionary socialist party. Having had more than a century of experience defending class-war prisoners, the communists know how to run an effective defense campaign in a politically-charged case like this.  Understanding that, in political cases, legal precedent and rule of law have a tendency to fly out the window, the communists do not act as if it’s just “business as usual” defending a political activist:  they organize media campaigns to get out their side of the story in defense of the accused, make sure that their physical presence is asserted before every court hearing with a protest outside the “temple of justice” and make sure that the lawyers in the case understand the nature of how the capitalist frame-up system works in cases involving anti-capitalist political activists.  Effective tactics are employed to let the powers that be understand that the defendant does not stand alone in facing the charges; the revolutionary working class principle that “an injury to one is an injury to all” means that every worker in the USA – in fact, the revolutionary workers movement itself – is on trial, not just the defendant.  Inside the courtroom they stand in solidarity with the accused when the defendant’s name or names are called.  This always pisses off the judges – but the communists don’t mount defense campaigns for their comrades in order to have the opportunity to kiss a judge’s ass.  Communists understand that it is imperative to make it clear to both the accused person(s) and the court and spectators that THIS defendant is not fighting his or her case by themselves – he or she has a strong and militant base of supporters closely watching every development in the case.  Often times major court victories have been won only after huge national and international defense campaigns have made it politically extremely expensive for the bourgeoisie to railroad the defendant.  These class-struggle methods have worked time and time again to expose the injustice of the capitalist system to the world; they alert the working class to the vital necessity of NOT acting as if these cases are just “business as usual”.  The outrageous US government frame-up of the NATO 3  is an attempt by the capitalist state to intimidate the working class and crush political dissent.  Workers must be awakened to this fact and taught not to cower in the face of such criminal conspiracies that the capitalist class and its justice system continuously launch against worker-militants.

For activist groups who are not part of the revolutionary socialist movement, like the NATO 3 folks, these historical lessons have not been incorporated into their defense tactics.  Not having the revolutionary Marxist understanding that there is no justice for workers – especially communist or anarchist workers or trade union militants – in the capitalist courts, they tend to try to “play by the rules” of the court, allowing defense attorneys to kowtow to the judge’s every whim; they advise supporters to “keep a low profile” in and around the courtroom, often even going so far as to assert that the defense attorneys “know” this judge and know how best to “get on the good side of the judge” for a favorable ruling.  More often than not, these class-collaborationist tactics result in complete disaster, with the defendants getting the book thrown at them.  The defense attorneys then express “shock” at the “uncharacteristically severe” sentence handed out by their “friend” the judge.  Revolutionary Marxists don’t fall for this bullshit.

Having been informed by Jared Chase’s supporters’ websites that the hearing today would occur at 9AM, I made certain to arrive early so I could participate in the demonstration that would undoubtedly occur before the hearing.  But when I arrived at 8:45 AM, this is what I saw:

… not a goddamned thing! So excuse me for being disappointed.

This was not good.  When I expressed my disappointment later to a handful of his supporters in the court gallery at not having seen the slightest hint of public protest outside the courthouse, I was chastised for being so arrogant in criticising them since  they had been attending all these hearings for all these years and I had not.  As if that matters in terms of the simple expression of disappointment at seeing NO evidence of support outside the courthouse TODAY!  These poor defense tactics usually don’t obtain much sympathy from the judges, who have been instructed by the political powers in the Cook County Democratic machine to “make an example” of the defendants.

While it is entirely understandable that Chase’s supporters are depressed and dismayed at the prospect of their friend spending up to 15 years in prison if he gets the maximum sentence possible in this case, that is no excuse for failing to organize an effective defense campaign and then expressing hostility towards supporters who express their dismay when they show up at court in response to an appeal for support and find no organized support at all!

Progress cannot be achieved by the workers movement if historical lessons go unlearned and if every generation just keeps making the same avoidable mistakes over and over and over again.  Our capitalist class opponents have centuries of experience buttressing their class rule; they learn from their failures and don’t repeat the same stupidity twice!  Likewise, the communist movement has nearly 200 years of experience fighting frame-ups in the courts of the capitalist classes all over the world.  To fail to take advantage of the hard-won experience of the revolutionary communist movement is a major error on the part of any activist group that finds its comrades in a situation like Jared Chase is in.

It was no surprise in this era of mass apathy among US workers that – in Chicago, a city of 4 million – a grand total of 9 supporters of Chase (including this reporter) made the trek to the Cook County Courthouse for the hearing.  It was held in a bizarre glassed-in courtroom in which spectators are entirely sealed off from the actual courtroom, which sits behind a semicircular glass-and-metal barrier that looks like something out of the original Star Wars movie.  No photos could be taken of the courtroom because in the “free and open” court system of Crooked Crook County, the Chief Justice has banned all cell phones from the premises.  Members of the public who wish to observe the proceedings in Cook County Courthouse at 26th St. and California Avenue in Chicago must not only pass a metal detector screening before entering the courthouse, but they must also place their cell phones, chargers and any other electronic recording devices in secure lockers (provided for free by the county) before they are allowed to enter the building.  The criminals running the farcical “justice” system  in Crook County Courthouse – widely acknowledged to be one of the most corrupt in the United States of America – must keep video and audio evidence of their many blatant miscarriages of justice hidden from the eyes of the working class at all costs.

The court hearing in room 303 (which was set for 9:00 AM according to the “Free the NATO 3” website ) never actually got underway until 10:05 when the “Honorable” Judge Thaddeus L. Wilson finally graced us with his presence.  Wilson, who is black, has hung a large framed color photograph of the Rev. Martin Luther King on the door behind the bench in order to give the appearance (to the uninitiated) that in his courtroom, the respected principles of Dr. King are upheld.  King would undoubtedly not be amused to know that his portrait is being utilized in this manner in a courtroom in Cook County, where brutal racist injustice is meted out daily to hundreds of primarily black and Hispanic defendants.  Hundreds of people of color are daily shipped to this County Courthouse for “kangaroo court”-style bond hearings at which it’s “your money or the next two months of your life” while you wait in jail for your trial.   Judge Wilson’s courtroom sits directly above a filthy, overcrowded basement prison dungeon where hundreds of people are crammed into holding cells awaiting trial; this is a place completely at odds with everything Dr. Martin Luther King stood for.

On the dark, smoked glass barrier that stands between the public and the “bar of justice” are affixed a number of printed and crudely hand-lettered signs threatening the citizenry – who are supposed to be those from whom Judge Wilson derives whatever limited power he actually possesses – not to do a multiplicity of things.  “Absolutely No Food or Drinks Allowed in this Courtroom” one declares.  “DO NOT ENTER UNLESS YOUR NAME IS CALLED” screams another.  If a citizen dares to enter the courtroom he or she has paid for many times over with their taxes – what would happen?  Would the altar of justice be rendered unclean by an unindicted citizen’s presence?  Would it have to be then reconsecrated to the gods of justice, Crook County-style?   No children are allowed to cry or call out to a parent, sister or brother they see being brought into the courtroom in handcuffs and prison rags: “Children must be kept quiet or you will be asked to leave!”  Surely Martin Luther King would endorse all this! A child crying out at seeing her father for perhaps the first time in months or even years would be cast out of the room by the “honorable” Judge Wilson!  Such is justice in Crooked Crook County, USA, run for the past 100 years by the “lesser evil” Democratic Party!  Everything is crooked about this place: the huge cockroaches at the jail skitter crookedly across the floors and the walls; even the birds flying over this place seem to fly sideways.  Let’s not even mention the crooked guards!

While we waited for Jared’s case to be called an attorney emerged from the courtroom into the spectators’ seating area to converse with his client, who was seated among us.  They openly discussed their strategy right there where it could be heard by all the court employees and the judge via the intercom system connecting both rooms.  There is no private place in this courthouse for attorneys and their clients to discuss their cases!  The image of Martin Luther King gazes pensively down from the wall of Judge Wilson’s courtroom upon this farce.  If only that portrait could come to life to tell Judge Wilson what it thinks about the monstrous scenes that have played out in that courtroom under its eyes day after day after brutal day!

Finally, at around 10:32 AM, Jared Chase is led into the courtroom.  As he enters, I stand up in solidarity.  “SIT DOWN!” bellows the “Honorable” Judge Thaddeus Wilson.

Chase is a big guy; 6 feet tall, perhaps a bit more.  Thinnish but well-muscled in his brownish v-necked prison shirt and matching brown pants, he looks as healthy as can be expected – given the circumstances of his confinement in a hellhole Illinois state prison in Pontiac – to me, who has never seen him before.  But to his friends he “looks very thin and gaunt, and his health is visibly not well.”

Chase stands erect, calm and collected; his hands are not manacled but I can’t see his feet.

There is some preliminary chatter between the judge, prosecutor and Jared’s Public Defender Benesh.  Then Benesh asks the judge for a court order to prevent Chase’s being manacled with what is called a “black box”.

“Black Box” restraint. Used to attach chains from leg irons to wrist cuffs and chain waist belt.

This high-security restraint is usually only used for the most dangerous inmates: murderers and terrorists.  In spite of the fact that all of the “terrorism charges” that the government had brought against the NATO 3 were repudiated by the jury in the original trial, Chase is still being periodically subjected to this abuse by the prison screws when they transfer him to court for trial.

Benesh is asking the judge for a “court order” prohibiting the use of the “black box” on Chase.  He states that there is an existing doctors’ order that these restraints not be used on Chase due to his suffering from Huntington’s Disease, which causes sufferers to shake uncontrollably.  This shaking, combined with the harsh restraints, has been found to be causing injury to Chase, Benesh explains.  The use of harsh restraints “cuts off circulation” of blood in Chase’s hands.

“Who do you want me to order to stop using the restraints?” asks Judge Wilson?

Benesh appears to be somewhat taken aback by the question.

“Who do you want the court order to be issued to?  Eye-Doc?” asks the judge again, indicating the acronym for the Illinois Department of Corrections (IDOC), as if to prompt Benesh… who appears to fumble for an answer.

“In terms of transport…” Benesh begins to reply.  “We are asking that the least restrictive means possible should be used.”  He describes a less physically punishing type of restraint known to be used by IDOC.

Judge Wilson advises Benesh to “talk to IDOC… I am not in a position to order such a thing.  You can file a Federal lawsuit against IDOC if they are not following doctors’ recommendations.  If it’s within my authority I’ll do it.  I don’t know of any need for extra security.  But just based on oral statements  I’m not going to do anything.”

It appeared that Benesh was unprepared to properly ask Judge Wilson for a court order, having not submitted to the court any legal document for the judge to review and sign!  Not only that, but Benesh seemed uncertain who it was that he wanted the judge to order to stop using the “black box” restraint!  Unbelievably poor preparation for the hearing by Benesh – not at all atypical for the Public Defenders here in the “Land of the Free(TM)”.

It’s pretty outrageous that the Public Defender’s Office had their client dragged in chains all the way to Cook County Jail from the dungeon at Pontiac Correctional Center – a distance of 100 miles – so they could challenge the state’s use of cruel restraints used when he is transported from jail to court and back, causing physical harm to him – and then the PD wasn’t even prepared to properly ask for and obtain the court order necessary to get the chains removed!  Sadly, this kind of third-rate legal defense for the poor is common, not only in Crooked Crook County but all over the USA – and in all the “advanced” countries of the capitalist world.

Benesh then asked for a status hearing to be set for March 23rd.  He appeared not to have submitted any requests for discovery of evidence such as videos of the alleged physical altercations between Chase and prison guards that led to the present assault on a prison officer charges against Chase.

The judge agrees to set a status hearing for March 23rd at 9AM and for the trial to begin on April 11th of 2016.  Chase is dismissed and I stand up again in solidarity as he leaves; and I and all Chase’s friends and supporters leave the courtroom.

Moments later Public Defender Benesh comes out into the hallway and I introduce myself and ask him for his business card.  He says “no problem” and goes back into the courtroom to take care of some other legal business.  After a few minutes he comes back out again, accompanied by a female colleague, and I ask him a few questions.

I had heard from one of Chase’s supporters that there might be video evidence available in this case.  Is Benesh aware of any?  “Not that I’m aware of; and I don’t know if it would be helpful or not if there was” he replied.  Surprised at his answer I ask “really?  No videos at all?”  (There are cameras all over the jails).  “No I don’t know of any”.  “Have you asked if there was any such evidence through the discovery process?” “No.” he replied.

“The next hearing on March 23rd; will Jared have to appear in court again for that?” I ask.  “Yes, he’ll be appearing at all of the hearings”.  This is a real ordeal for Chase, who has to come, shackled, all the way from Pontiac to Chicago, especially considering his health.

“What is the specific offense Chase is charged with and what are the potential penalties?” I inquire.

“He is charged with ‘aggravated battery to a corrections officer’, which is a ‘Class I’ offense, punishable by 4-15 years in prison” Benesh replies.  Very serious, indeed.  (For a description of the incident as related in a letter from Chase to a supporter, click here).

I ask Benesh if he has been on the case from the beginning of the NATO 3 trial; he says: “I just got this case two weeks ago from my colleague in the Public Defender’s Office.  I had nothing to do with the earlier case; this case has nothing to do with the original one”.  But of course, this is not true at all!  This case has EVERYTHING to do with the earlier case; Chase is a political prisoner who was framed up by undercover cops in the first place!  If that frame-up hadn’t been successful, this assault case would never have occurred!

This is what we meant earlier in this article when we spoke of the danger of having inexperienced defense attorneys who do not understand the difference between a typical criminal case and one involving a political frame-up.  This lawyer appears to be unaware of the very political nature of the charges his client is facing.  “Business as usual”; just another assault case in the hideously overloaded docket of the vastly understaffed and underfunded Public Defender’s office.

It’s too bad that the crew of “Free the NATO 3” supporters didn’t bother to talk to this new defense attorney for their comrade!  They had all just walked away from the courtroom without even bothering to talk to their comrade’s new lawyer!

It was not a very impressive performance by the “Free the NATO 3” defense campaign.

Later on that evening, I checked the “Free the NATO 3” WordPress site to obtain more background information about the case and to see if they had written a report about the hearing; commendably, as we stated above, they had. Their article criticises that I stood up in solidarity with Chase as he was led into the courtroom: “While prisoner supporters have employed the tactic often to stand up when the defendant’s name is called in various cases, Judge Thadeus [sic – IWPCHI] Wilson issued an injunction in the NATO 3 case preventing supporters from doing so, and does not respond kindly to this. So please remain seated when Jay’s name is called, as protest tactics or standing up only backfires on Jay.”

This expresses quite clearly the touching faith that these so-called “anarchists” have in the “impartiality” of the US capitalist “justice” system!

The “Free the NATO 3” website operated by these folks appears to offer a decent amount of information about the case – including copies of Judge Wilson’s outrageous piece-of-shit injunction against displays of class solidarity for political prisoners who appear in “his” courtroom.  Unfortunately, the amateurishness of the anarcho-reformists reared its ugly head again when we tried to download a copy of this fine example of legal treachery; we received a “404- File Not Found” error.  We left a message on that page so the website admins could fix the problem; checking it again today a week later, we found that it has still not been corrected.  We left another message, for what it’s worth.

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This should serve as a warning to young activists trying to decide between joining a revolutionary socialist organization or a more loosely organized “anarchist” or other activist group.  It a choice between joining a party of organized, disciplined revolutionaries who will know how to avoid a cheap police entrapment scheme and defend you if you get framed up on bogus charges or joining a group that will fall right into a trap set by a pair of half-assed Police Explorers who infiltrate their organization on the first try.  In a revolutionary socialist party, youth members are taught about the history of police entrapment schemes; internal party discipline requires them to report provocations like the one launched against the NATO 3 defendants to party leaders, who know how to deal with these things properly.  It would be almost impossible for this kind of entrapment scam to ensnare a youth member of a revolutionary Trotskyist party; for amateur “activist” and “anarchist” organizations, this is not the case.  So choose wisely when you choose the revolutionary political organization you want to join.

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One last glimpse of the “justice” that takes place in the “Honorable” Judge Thaddeus L. Wilson’s judicial chamber of horrors:

A tall, well-groomed black man in a new winter jacket stands calmly before the dais upon which Judge Wilson sits.  A few feet to his  right, a middle-aged, stooped blonde white female Assistant District Attorney is trying to make this man look like Capone times ten.  She rattles off a seemingly endless number of arrests and convictions for petty offenses this man has suffered all his life for the “crime” of being a black man living in Democratic Party-run Crooked Crook County.  She chatters on: case after case, from the 1990s to the present.  Only after she has made it up to June of 2008 does the “Honorable” Judge Wilson stop her, saying tiredly: “That’s enough.  I get the picture”.

Perhaps it was a trick of the light, refracted through the smoked glass barrier of the courtroom… but we swear we saw the left hand of Dr. King move in front of his eyes; his shoulders seemed to heave spasmodically.  He appeared to be crying.

Thanks to the poor defense work today by Atty. Peter Benesh of the Crook County Public Defender’s Office, Jared Chase will once again most likely by dragged in chains – including the “black box” apparatus that is causing him physical harm – from Pontiac “Correctional” Center to Crook County Courthouse for his next status hearing on March 23; his trial is scheduled to begin on April 11.

— IWPCHI

 

 

 

 

 

Conversation with a Young US Student Considering Becoming a Wage-slaving “Whore” for a Banker-pimp

Ah, the life of a wage slave is not pleasant once you know how badly you’re getting screwed by your capitalist “friends”.   Having difficulty understanding this graph, young wage slave?  If so you are indeed stupid.  Recent Trends in WEALTH Distribution in USA, 1989-2013. Source: Federal Reserve Bulletin – Changes in US Family Finances 2010 -2013:_Survey of Consumer Finances_scf14

There are two kinds of workers in the working class in the capitalist world: wage-slaves and communist revolutionaries. Which are you?

This question is of some importance to the future – if there is to be a future – of the United States of America.  Unless the wage-slaves of the United States pull their heads out of their asses, become worker-revolutionaries and overthrow the US capitalist class that is hell-bent on murdering workers all over the world in pursuit of profits, the world will soon be forced to do to the United States what the world did to Hitler’s Germany in 1945. When we say “Capitalism Must Die so the Working Class May Live” we mean it. There is – literally – NO FUTURE for the working class under the capitalist system! We either overthrow capitalism or we’re all going to be shadows on a wall someday – sooner than most people think.

In case you forgot what the world had to do to kick the ass of the last gang of capitalist criminals that tried to rule the world by force, here’s a photo of just one city in Germany at the end of World War II: Cologne.

Cologne’s cathedral stands undamaged in a sea of total destruction, 24 April 1945. This is what USA’s big cities will look like – except that not even the cathedrals will be spared –  if US capitalist class forces the world to put an end to the US’ reign of terror the way Hitler’s Nazi capitalist regime was finally put down. Source: U.S. Signal Corps; U.S. National Archives.

Beautiful, isn’t it? If you think this can’t happen to the United States of America(TM), “The World’s Only Superpower(TM)”, we’re here to tell you: you’re wrong. If you think that the US capitalist class – your masters, representing less than 0.45% of the world’s population – have the “right” to run the entire planet as if it was their own lemonade stand… in the name of “Freedom(TM)” and “Democracy(TM)”, of course! – and can pull that off for any length of time – you’re even dumber than we think.  Fortunately for you and for the whole world, your ignorance is 100% curable. You’d better get started on your cure before it’s too late. Time is not on the side of the working class. You’ve let the capitalists run the tables for far too long, and the window of opportunity for you to take power out of their hands is rapidly closing.

In the interest of waking you, the US working class from your self-perpetuated ignorance and capitalist mass-media-induced apathy, we present the following political equivalent of a slap upside the head. Enjoy! And show it to your fellow dumb-ass wage-slaves!

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Freedom. Hah! “The Land of the Free(TM)”! Ha ha! This capitalist USA isn’t the “land of the free” it’s the land of the stupid-ass wage-slaves.

You don’t think you’re stupid, young wage-slave? That figures! You’re so dumb you don’t even KNOW you’re a wage slave living in a capitalist country! There’s a 50% chance that you believe that shameless Wall St. sock puppet Barack Obama is a socialist! You think you’re “free”, too, don’t you? Well here’s a news flash for you: you ARE stupid; you live in a capitalist country; Obama’s NOT a socialist; and you’re not free. Got that? The hell you do!

The stupid wage-slave workers of the USA don’t have any idea what “freedom” is, and there is more than a little bit of evidence proving that if there is such a thing as “freedom”, the vast majority of the 200 million active US wage-slaves don’t want to have anything to do with it. As soon as they leave high school – in many cases even before – the vast majority of them do everything possible to strip themselves of what little “freedom” they will ever possess, gleefully wrapping themselves in chains they’ll have to drag for the rest of their lives by taking on college tuition loans, home and car loans and by starting families at a young age. Doing even just one of these things – not to mention doing all of them at once as so many stupid young US wage-slaves do in this horrendous capitalist nation-state of the USA – is fatal to the pursuit of individual freedom. Apparently, for most workers, this is the easiest route and one they feel most comfortable taking, because it relieves them of any ability or necessity of making any real choices as to how they will live out their lives. Like their wage-slave, slave and peasant ancestors going back thousands of generations, they prefer the chains of slavery to the frightening unpredictability and terrifying responsibility of actual freedom. That’s why wage-slaves are so common, and communist revolutionaries are so few.

Calling the United States of America the “Land of the Free(TM)” is one of the sickest jokes ever played on a dull-witted public. And here’s another news flash for you stupid wage-slaves of the United Snakes of America: there is no nation of Earth with wage-slaves as dumb as you are!  Every other major industrialized nation in the world has a working class that has organized revolutionary workers parties that represent the interests of the working class in their state and national governments.  You are so stupid you think you don’t need to do the same; you’re all convinced that you can just settle for the political impotence of “speaking truth to power”.   You literally have no clue what you’re up against under capitalism – and what’s more – many of you just don’t care. If that’s not dangerously stupid, what is?

Going to college, young slave? Great idea! No doubt your high-school counselor showed you a list of the most sought-after job skills here in the “Land of the Free”. Let’s just put aside the fact that the list you were shown was probably out of date by at least a half-decade by the time your counselor showed it to you. If you are a “smart” wage-slave, you picked a “career” for yourself by selecting from the top of the list of the most highly desirable college degrees sought by the major corporations running this “free country” of ours. What a smart young wage-slave you are! Ha! You didn’t know it but you were fucked from that moment on! Your stupid-ass wage-slave parents couldn’t warn you because they don’t know their ass from a hole in the ground either. They fell for every lie they were ever told by the US capitalist class, and they are so far in debt they’ll never break even if they work 3 jobs for the rest of their lives. They haven’t read a non-fiction book since they left school and they think they know all they need to know – in other words, they are complete and utter dumbfuck wage-slaves, at the mercy of the greedheads that own the companies they work for and a government that is out to crush them. They – and you – will struggle your whole lives for a tiny piece of the 25% of the national wealth being fought over by 90% of the population. That is all of the national wealth not owned by those at the top 10% of the upside-down US income pyramid – the US capitalist class.

The problem is: in every high school in the land, smart young wage slaves are being shown that very same “pick-a-career” list; and a huge number of your fellow proto-wage-slaves are making the same decision you just made. So by the time you come out of college in 4 or 6 or 8 years, there’ll be so many people holding that same degree that the supply of newly trained wage slaves in your specialty will have outstripped the demand. It could take you months or even years to get a good-paying job in your chosen field – if ever. And if you think that’s sickening, realize this: the sick thing about it is that over-supplying the demand for every job is PRECISELY one of the top goals of the capitalist class – because that’s how they keep wages down and profits up! Like we said: you were fucked from the time you laid eyes on that “pick-a-career” list!

But why worry? You’re going to be a “free” citizen of the “free” world! A young, bright-eyed college grad with all the world open to you to conquer! Right? Wrong.

But here’s another little problem: thanks to the fact that you live in “The Land of the Free(TM)” – perhaps the MOST unapologetically, viciously, heartlessly “capitalist” country in the world – the education you just received here in the “land of the free” wasn’t “free” at all. You owe the university – or the bank you borrowed the money for your college tuition from – tens of thousands of dollars right now.  And that money you owe isn’t just going to sit there doing nothing while you look for a job that will enable you to pay off your huge debt. It’s growing like a cancer. In the capitalist world, loans – as you may now be dimly aware – are “interest-bearing”. Not for you, but for your banker-pimp! Oh, we forgot to tell you: did you know that you’re now a wage-slaving whore for a banker-pimp? You are, young wage-slave! Freedom? Ha! And the longer you are forced to wait to get a job, the larger your debt to your new banker-pimp becomes! Wow! Imagine that! You haven’t even started your career yet and already you are no longer “free” at all! From the moment you signed the papers on that loan, you became a whore for your banker-pimp – and, bitch, you’d better get your ass out on the street and start paying off your pimp or your credit rating is going to get shot to hell. What’s a “credit rating”? It’s how your capitalist bosses and banker-pimps keep you on your knees sucking corporate cock for the rest of your life! More on that another time.

You didn’t go to college? Aren’t you clever! Actually you’re probably actually NOT very clever or you’d have been channeled into the college-track by your school counselors long ago. For some reason, it was decided that you were not “college material” – probably because you were either dumb or a shitty student or you happened to be not white-skinned – or some combination of these things. So you are going to get your “freedom” 4, or 6 or 8 years before your fellow wage-slaves who went to college! Lucky you! Ha ha ha!

You get to immediately sell your labor-power in the capitalist marketplace. Problem is, the only thing you know how to do is read and do basic math! So you’re only qualified to work at low-wage jobs – and there are literally millions of dumb High School dropouts or barely-graduateds just like you looking for jobs too. It’s a “free market” for labor! Isn’t that fun? Actually, it isn’t at all fun, as you will soon find out. You will be working for whatever wages your future series of greedy capitalist-pimps feel like paying you, for the rest of your “life”.

Unless you join a union, that is. You don’t like unions? Ha ha! Well we hope you like poverty, dumbass! Because that’s what you’re gonna face – for the rest of your long, stupid life as a wage-slave if you can’t land a decent-paying job in a non-union factory of some kind. And those jobs are scarce and getting scarcer every day – and there are millions of stupid people like you fighting over those few jobs.

You had better re-think your opinion of unions. First of all, you could sign up for an apprenticeship program at a number of unions. There, you’ll get paid to go to school for four years, learning a trade.

“Wha- wha- whaaat? Did you say I would get PAID to go to school?”

Yes, little wage-slave! Union apprenticeships aren’t like those criminal “internships” many of your fellow wage-slaves got suckered into where they work their asses off for free. The union apprenticeships PAY YOU to go to school. And once you graduate, you will be making the most money it is possible to make in a regular job for the vast majority of wage-slaves. It’s a great deal, and beats the shit out of the “Great Capitalist College Swindle(TM)”!

“Great! Thanks for telling me about that – I’d never heard of such a thing! I’m joining a union apprenticeship program! I’m going to be making excellent money and have a good job guaranteed when I’m done with my apprenticeship, while those stupid college students are stuck with their huge debt and no job!”

Uh, wait a minute young wage-slave. No one is going to guarantee you a job under capitalism. Ever. They call this the “free world” but, as you are about to find out – nothing in it is “free” – especially wage-slaves like you. Your ability to get a full-time job at the end of your apprenticeship will depend on the vicissitudes of the capitalist economy – and your willingness to kiss your bosses ass like a good wage-slave. If you’re in a construction trade, it’s a “boom-or-bust” situation. Sometimes you’re going to work 60 hours a week for years on end; other times you’ll be out of work for years on end. But look on the “bright side”: at least you won’t have to pay off an enormous debt like the college wage-slaves.

“Great! The economy is strong right now and it probably will be when I complete my apprenticeship in 5 years. I’m going to have it made! I’m so happy I’m not going to wait 5 years – I’m going to marry my high-school sweetheart right now, buy a house, have a couple of kids and start enjoying my freedom here in the “land of the free” right away!”

Uhhhh… hold on there now, dumbass! How are you going to enjoy your “freedom” by getting married and buying a house and having kids? Every one of those things is going to increase the amount of money you’re going to have to make in order to keep your family alive. Especially buying a house! And kids! Forget about it! “Freedom” that ain’t! Under the capitalist system it’s a ball and chain for life!

“What do you mean? Buying a house is part of the “American Dream”! It’s what living in a free country is all about. You own your own house, instead of just paying rent to a landlord! Homeowners have more freedom than renters! And having kids isn’t that expensive; we’ll find a way to make it work. Everyone tells me this, so it must be true!”

Well, we must say, in the defense of honesty: nearly every worker in the United States is a stupid-ass streetwalking pimped-off wage-slave.  They believe everything their banker-pimp masters tell them to believe. The fact is that it has always – in most places and historical periods in the US – been cheaper in the long run to rent than to buy a house. And if you care at all about protecting what little “freedom” a wage-slave actually has in a “free” capitalist country, you might consider the ramifications of becoming owned by a bank through a mortgage on a house. If you rent and have to move to another town or state for a new job, you can pretty much just pack up and go; if you are “owned” by a banker-pimp through a house, you have to sell it before you move or you’ll end up paying for two homes. Selling your house could take months or even years and will quickly eat up any savings you were somehow able to accumulate – if you had any. And having kids! Did you know that for every kid you have you and your spouse will have to make approximately an additional $12,000 to $15,000 a year per child – precisely at a time when your family’s income will be cut in half because your wife is pregnant? And even if your wife doesn’t permanently lose her job when she takes her pregnancy leave and gets back to work quickly, you will now have to pay thousands of dollars a year for child care. Under the capitalist system, having kids is a great way to say “goodbye” to “freedom” for the next 20 years.

“Gee! No one ever told me that! I wonder why?”

Oh, you have much to learn, young wage-slave. But that doesn’t make you special. All of us worker-revolutionaries were dumbass wage-slaves too, once; we’d all been fed a bunch of lies by our stupid wage-slave families who all had been pimped out for decades by their banker-pimps; they all claimed that they were “free” people living in a “free” country, too. Living in a capitalist country is the opposite of “freedom” for a worker-wage-slave. You can only survive under capitalism if you have a job; and NO ONE can or ever will guarantee you that you WILL have a job. Even the most fortunate and shamelessly docile wage slaves get laid off at least once in their lives during the inevitable periodic economic crises that shake the capitalist world to its foundations.

“Yikes!  That’s scary!  I had no idea how unstable the capitalist system has been!  But how is owning a house giving up your freedom? I’ve always been told the opposite. Everyone says that you must own a car to enjoy your freedom, and that renting is slavery compared to owning your own house. You mean to tell me that those are lies?”

Yes, those are indeed lies – monstrous lies – not made any less monstrous by the fact that so many stupid-ass wage-slaves believe them to be true.
The capitalist system is a form of economic exploitation of workers for the benefit of the wealthy people who own factories and other businesses. All wealth is based upon the extraction of profits from the wage-labor of wage-slave workers like you. In order to force workers to spend their lives making the rich people richer, they dangle things like new cars and houses in front of stupid-ass wage-slaves and tell the slaves that they can only have true “freedom” if they own these things. In order to own these things they must be obedient wage-slaves willing to give the best years of their lives over to slaving in a capitalist enterprise for as many hours as the capitalist wishes to force them to work. The gullible wage-slaves are trained to believe that by working hard, they will acquire their freedom. The Nazis had this slogan over the entrance to Auschwitz: “Arbeit Mach Frei” – “Work will make you free”. It is a lie. Work under capitalism is a form of slavery in which workers are given the choice of either pimping themselves out to the highest capitalist bidder or of being homeless.

“You’re talking philosophy; how does this relate to owning a home or a car?”

When you take out a loan to buy a car, you sign a portion of your working life over to your banker-pimp, who then forces you to keep on working and turning over a large portion of your paycheck to him so his capitalist bosses can live like kings while you struggle to buy your “freedom” – something which you will never achieve in a capitalist country no matter how hard you work. Buying a new or used car with a loan makes you a whore for a banker-pimp for a few years. Buying a HOUSE, on the other hand, makes you a whore to a banker-pimp for a number of DECADES! Until you completely pay off your loans, you don’t own that car or house at all – YOUR BANKER-PIMP OWNS YOU THROUGH THAT CAR OR HOUSE! And if you don’t keep working and keep kissing your capitalist-pimp’s ass at the place where you work, you’ll be fired or laid off and, being unable to make the car payment or mortgage, the banker-pimp will take away your car or house and use them to enslave another sucker. And you’ll be homeless and as propertyless as those renters you laughed at who decided not to give up their tiny amount of “freedom” by becoming a whore for a banker-pimp like you did.

“Wow! My dad always said that “his banker” was a great guy who got him a great deal on his mortgage!”

Your dad is a typical dumb wage-slave who has been tricked into thinking that he “got a great deal” from his banker-pimp. In fact, here’s what your dad’s delusion is based on. The banker-pimp knows from dealing with your dumbass wage-slave dad that he’s such a completely housebroken, obedient and hard-working wage-slave that if the banker-pimp cuts the interest by a mere 1/4% on his home mortgage, your dad – out of slavish gratitude – will probably also come back to the banker-pimp whenever he thinks he needs to buy a new car or if he needs to take out a second mortgage on his house for some guaranteed-to-eventually-happen, unavoidable reason – like if he or your mom gets sick and needs expensive medical treatment. Plus, the banker-pimp knows your dad is taking good care of the banker-pimp’s house, keeping it in excellent physical shape with the money being lent to him at interest by the banker-pimp. So if the day ever comes that your dad can no longer make payments on the house, the banker-pimp or his successors will swoop in and take the house back and sell it to another stupid-ass wage-slave who thinks he will obtain “freedom” by “owning” a house. There are so many ways that people can get screwed out of their homes that it would take me a year to describe them all to you. The home “ownership” scam run by the banker-pimps of the capitalist world is one of the principal swindles employed by the capitalists to keep their wage-slaves docile, obedient and hard-working.

“Ow! My brain is starting to hurt! You commies are liars who try to make all the good things in life look awful!”

Well why don’t you go home and think about it in your “free time” – if you have any! Ha ha ha! We haven’t told you about the many, many lies of the capitalists who are enslaving you, young wage-slave! If you ever get sick of being a wage-slave, feel free to stop by and learn more about the phony “land of the free” bullshit sold to all wage slaves by the bought-and-paid-for propagandists of the capitalist class. And here: read this.

The Communist Manifesto by Karl Marx

“The Communist Manifesto?  I don’t know… I’ve always been told that was nothing but commie propaganda.  Frankly I’m frightened by the prospect of reading it!  And it’s so old – this is 2016! What good is something written way back in 1848?”

Well, yes it is of course “communist propaganda”.  You’re frightened to read a book?  How absurd!  Old?  The basic writings of the capitalist ideologue Adam Smith – which is “capitalist propaganda”– were written 75 years BEFORE the Manifesto!  And yet every communist has read Smith’s “Wealth of Nations”…

Read the introduction by Trotsky as well; he explains that, of course, some of the Manifesto is outdated, but most of it remains remarkably informative and useful even today.  It’s still one of the best introductions to the nature of the capitalist system and basic socialist ideas available, and it’s only about 50 pages. It’s like “Google Maps” for orienting yourself in the capitalist world you live in, young wage-slave.

“OK thanks. I’ll take a look at it. What a conversation! Next thing you know you’ll be telling me that the police are not here to “protect and serve” the workers!”

They’re not here to “protect and serve” the workers! The police were organized to protect the private property and property rights of the capitalists and to “serve” as the armed force to be used to keep the workers from rising up AGAINST their banker-pimp and capitalist masters…

“That’s enough of your propaganda! Let me go read the Manifesto and we’ll talk about that another time! This is too much for me to take in at once!”

Ha ha! We felt the same way when we first heard all this years ago when WE were young, dumbass wage slaves! Nearly everyone starts off in the same way. Almost everyone in our party – except those lucky ones whose parents had cast off their chains to become revolutionary workers – grew up as dumb wage-slaves who believed that wage-slavery was “freedom”, too. Our political education only really began when we first read the “Communist Manifesto”. We had heard all kinds of horrible lies about what the “Manifesto” contained. We were shocked to find that what it actually contained was some excellent information that exposed the reality of the place in capitalist class society that we were born into as sons and daughters of working-class parents. It shocked and awakened us to the reality of life as a wage-slave in capitalist class society and it will do the same for you. Before we read it, we felt like one of the famous blind men encountering the elephant of capitalism – we didn’t even know its name WAS “capitalism”! That’s how dumb WE were! The Manifesto made it possible for us to see the capitalist world as it truly is for the first time in our lives. It’s been great talking with you. By reading the Manifesto you are taking the first step in throwing off your chains and in becoming a revolutionary worker instead of a dumb wage-slave. We hope you enjoy the book!  When you’re done with it, we’ll talk again!

—IWPCHI

Why Revolution? Why Socialism?

Why Socialism? Why revolution?

Imagine a world where murderous, racist cops don’t exist.

Imagine a world where wars just don’t happen anymore.

Imagine a world where housing is a RIGHT, not a privilege granted by the rich landlords to the workers, and no one can be evicted from their home because they don’t have the money to pay for rent or a mortgage.

Imagine a world where food is a RIGHT and where no one can be denied access to food regardless of their ability to pay; just go to the supermarket and get what you and your family need.

Imagine a world where if you lose your job, you get paid 100% of your old salary until you get a new one.

Imagine a world where health care is free for everyone.

Imagine a world where a college education is not only free but where you get paid to go to college.

Imagine a world where women’s rights are fundamentally protected by the Constitution, not just an asterisk of an Amendment.

Imagine a world where the rights of black workers are not just an asterisk/amendment added to a slave-owner’s Constitution but incorporated into its very foundation.

Imagine a world where all the nation-states have been transformed from competitors into co-operative societies.

Imagine a world where poverty no longer exists.

Imagine a world unified into an organic whole, where cooperation instead of competition is the rule of the day – every day.

If you can imagine all this, then you are imagining a socialist world. A world without the greed factor; where profitability is no longer the sine qua non of human existence. A world dedicated to the eradication of inequality; a true meritocracy where the vast talents of the human race are finally given the opportunity to reach their full potential, no matter if you were born in Bangladesh or Berlin.

This is the future we fight for: a socialist future where the working class rules and poverty, homelessness, starvation, racism and war have become hideous exhibits in the history museums of the monstrous capitalist era.

The capitalist world is not “the best of all possible worlds”: we can and must do better if we want to live in a world that is worthy of our children and grandchildren.

Capitalism promises us a future of wars, endless wars, over food, water, land and even air.

We can build any kind of socialism we want. What kind of socialism do you want? If you, the workers of the world are willing to join forces as the sisters and brothers that you truly are, and if you are ready

to fight for a socialist future of global prosperity rather than a capitalist future of poverty, starvation and endless wars, you will surely reach that goal, because workers make up the vast majority of the world’s population and so you should call the shots – right?

Why revolution? Because it will take a revolution to overthrow the current selfish, greed-based capitalist system and replace it with an egalitarian federation of socialist workers republics.

Think about it. And then join us!

Workers of the World, Unite!

Independent Workers Party of Chicago

New York Times Censorship: Revolutionary Socialist Ideas Are “Not Fit to Print”

The flagship propaganda outlet for US imperialism, the New York Times, claims to publish “All the News Fit to Print” – which doesn’t include ideas that would lead to the overthrow of their owners in the US capitalist class – the most despotic ruling class in world history.  This is not surprising, and it isn’t “news” to veteran socialists; but it is real and it has to be brought to the attention of the working class and a major campaign by the socialist parties of the United States must be fought to smash the capitalist class’ censorship of public discussion.

The NYT publishes all kinds of pro-regime news, and only very carefully edited exposes of the most flagrant violations of bourgeois etiquette – like the mass torture of prisoners by the US military at Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo Bay and the global spying scandal revealed by Edward Snowden and the US Government claiming the “right” to assassinate US citizens – make it through their fine sieve of bourgeois propriety.  Even then, the New York Times goes out of its way to allow the United States Government to conduct pre-publication censorship of the Times’ own articles on these subjects.

The words “Communist” and “Communist Party” or even “socialist” rarely find their way into the bourgeois press unless they are being used as pejorative terms. Even in death the Times’ obituary columnists routinely “forget” to mention the fact that the deceased person(s) whose virtues they are forced to extol (due to the departed’s vast contributions to US and/or world culture) was a lifelong communist.  “Not fit to print” apparently.  Musn’t let the children know that there was ever anything good that came from the communist movement!

This amounts to nothing less than a long-running attempt to falsify the historical record.  Actually, almost everything “good” that has happened in the past 150 years (including the US civil war) came about due to the political intervention of the anarchist, socialist and communist movements: the anti-slavery movement, the 8-hour day, equal rights for women, the civil rights movement, the ban on child labor, the imposition of basic safety rules on the job and much, much more.  Nary a one of these reforms originated in the greed-addled brains of the capitalist class.  And it took years of bloody struggle by the socialist workers movement to achieve every reform we take for granted today.  The revolutionary socialist movement is now and has always been a force that looks forward and proposes new ideas that are necessary in order to continuously advance human civilization  – and to keep it from being incinerated by the capitalists in the next big inter-imperialist war.  To attempt to keep socialist ideas out of the public arena in the “Age of the Internet” is akin to the fruitless attempt by the Catholic Church to suppress heliocentrism: it is a thoroughly reactionary censorship that places itself firmly athwart the road of human progress.  This censorship must be overcome, and it will be overcome – by us, and by you, the workers of the world!

So, why would the New York Times go out of its way to deny socialists today access to their Augean “comments” section?  We say it is because their capitalist masters are so very frightened at the appearance of even the tiniest pinhole in their well-grouted pro-capitalist propaganda dikes that they are convinced that allowing the socialists regular access to the public fora they manage could bring their entire rotten, tottering capitalist system crashing to the ground in a matter of weeks.  The capitalist class, in spite of their ruthless shows of “force” enacted all over the world and their endless murderous wars for profits are actually – especially in the case of the US capitalist class – very “thin on the ground” as the saying goes.  The US capitalist class makes up only a tiny fraction of the 4.5% of the world’s population represented by the people of the United States, and they think that they have the “right” to run the whole planet as if it was their rightful possession.  The US capitalists are running scared and are always looking over their shoulders to see if one of the servants is sneaking up on them with a butchers’ cleaver or something.  They can’t sleep – and for good reason.

Like so many other socialist groups, we regularly try to add our revolutionary voices to the cacophony of “inside the box” thinking so tiresomely peddled by the New York Times’ housebroken journalists and editors – and most of their well-trained readers.  The comments section of most New York Times articles are so filled with banalities and Mobius-strip philosophizing that any one of them could be prescribed to any thinking person as a cure for insomnia.  On occasion, we manage to break through the Times’ wall of censorship of revolutionary socialist ideas, but most of the time we don’t.

So, we are going to demonstrate just how extensively the New York Times’ censorship of socialist ideas is by consistently trying to break their blockade on revolutionary ideas by posting to their comments sections of articles on subjects of national and international importance.  When our comments are deemed to be “not fit to print”, we will publish them here, so everyone can see if they think that our ideas deserve to be made part of the national and international discussion of the important topics of the day.  We encourage our readers to do likewise and take some time every day to put your 2 cents in to the discussions going on in every major local and national newspaper.  We simply must not allow the right wing blowhards and partisans of the twin parties of US imperialism: the Democrats and the Republicans – to monopolize the discussion of what must be done to prevent WWIII from happening and about what must be done to create a better future for the working people of the world and for future generations of workers all over the globe.  In Chicago this means that we must all try to post at least one short essay on the Chicago Tribune and Sun-Times newspapers, as well as on our local newspapers (Pioneer Press, etc.).  Let’s open up the left side of the political spectrum to public discussion and by doing so smash through the capitalist class’ stranglehold on political thought in the United States.

Workers of the World, Unite!IWPCHI

Conversation With a “Pro-Capitalist” Worker

“You like communism, then?” she asked, more than half incredulously.
“Yeah.  It’s a much fairer system of government, if done right.”
“I disagree.  Our Constitution is the best in the world.  Name one that’s better.”
“Well, the Bolsheviks’ Constitution created after the Russian Revolution of 1917 was way better than ours.”
“Oh, come on.  How so?”
“Well, it gave women equal rights with men.  In the US Constitution women don’t even count as citizens.  They’re not even mentioned!  And the Bolsheviks made it clear that there would be no discrimination based on race or religion, unlike the US Constitution, which was based on slavery.”
“Well ours caught up with theirs soon enough.”
“Ours still isn’t up to where theirs was.  Most rights we take for granted were only added as amendments to the Constitution, like an afterthought.  Imagine!  50% of the population had their rights added as an afterthought! Nowhere in the US Constitution and Bill of Rights does it say that women are recognized as possessing equal rights with men.  And blacks are still technically counted as being less than fully human – that language has been only modified, not stricken from the record.”
“Oh well, the men that wrote our Constitution were great men.”
“The hell you say!  They were slaveowners!  And at the time the Constitution was signed, 70% of the working people were or had been indentured servants!  The Constitution was written by and for white, male property owners – and everyone else was added later as an afterthought.”
“Well under our government you have more freedom.”
“Freedom?  What freedom? You have as much freedom as you can afford.  Homeless people have no freedom; unemployed people have no freedom.  There are tens of millions of unemployed and homeless people in the United States.  If you have no money, you have no freedom; if you have no job, you have no money.   And we are not guaranteed jobs under capitalism, so how much freedom do we really have?  The freedom to kiss your boss’ and your landlords’ ass – or else you’ll be “free” to go live under a bridge!”
“But under socialism you have no incentive to work hard.  No one should be given a home or food or clothing, you should have to work for everything.  And under socialism, where all those things are guaranteed, why would anyone bother to work?”
“And what is the incentive to work under capitalism?  The threat of being thrown into the street penniless to live like a beggar!  Capitalism is a barbaric economic system that systematically robs working people and transfers the profits created by the workers into the hands of the capitalists!  Under socialism, everyone who is physically able to work is given work according to their abilities and qualifications to do it, and in return they will get guaranteed food, clothing, housing, education (including college) and health care.  It’s a much more civilized way of life than life under capitalism where everyone is forced to work or to starve – and you’re not even guaranteed a job.”
“Look, I’d love to talk some more, but I have to get back to work or I’ll get fired.”

IWPCHI