We Are The Majority; We Must Turn That Into Power

By Kevin Zeese and Margaret Flowers, PopularResistance.org

Over the last decade, a national consensus has developed for a progressive left agenda on the economy, social services, the climate crisis and ending wars but the movement has not yet built the power to make that a reality. The next decade will be ripe with opportunities for transformational change due to a combination of expanding popular movements as well as escalating crisis situations.
Positive change will only occur if these movements evolve into an organized popular movement that truly represents the people’s interests against the elites. The movement must protect the planet at this critical time of climate crisis against the profiteering of the planet-plundering capitalist class. We must stand against continued militarism, bloated and wasteful weapons spending, military conflict and regime change imperialism.

The movement must be clear about which side we are on, the people’s side, put forward a vision of a future that draws the masses — including members of the power structure — and be organized to fight for our vision.

People have the power; protest in Ferguson City Hall in 2014.

We Have Built National Consensus

Since the Occupy-era of 2011, the movement has grown, not disappeared as many in the media would lead you to believe. People have been working more deeply on multiple fronts of struggle building national consensus.  Below we review some key issues where consensus has been achieved but where we still need to build the power to enact change.

Reducing Inequality

The Occupy Movement highlighted the 99 percent vs. the 1 percent. It was a class war, out in the open, with the people fighting back for the first time in decades. The US has become one of the most unequal societies in history resulting in movements against inequality growing. There is now support for taxing the wealthy with Gallup data showing that 62 percent of people in the US say “upper-income people” pay too little in taxes. Further, 69 percent say that corporations are paying too little in taxes. Other polling shows that over three-quarters of US workers believe that CEOs make too much and that about the same percentage of all people (74 percent) say that CEOs are overpaid.

The support for progressive policies confronting inequality is expressed not only in the campaigns of Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren but even Joe Biden, a corporate centrist Democrat, has had to at least rhetorically agree, saying: “Economic inequality is pulling this country apart. We need stronger labor laws and a tax code that rewards a middle class that’s been cut out of decades of economic growth — not just the wealthy, who have gotten too many tax breaks for too long.” And, Donald Trump won the election in part by playing to the economic insecurity of working people, unfair corporate trade and against the elites in DC.

Despite this, over the last decade, the wealthy have benefitted under Democrats and Republicans, while the workers have struggled. Donald Trump and the Republicans have put in place the most regressive tax policy in US history. Last year, ninety-one Fortune 500 Companies paid $0.00 in federal income taxes.  Over the last decade, the 400 wealthiest people’s fortunes doubled while tax rates dropped. This has led to the unjust reality that the 400 richest US families paid a lower tax rate than working people. When looked at through a racial prism, inequality is worse than it was in 1979, when it was already a crisis. This is not just Trump, the wealthiest have not paid their fair share in decades. For workers, a so-called booming economy has meant more bad jobs and a faster race to the bottom.

In the last year, the world’s 500 richest people gained $1.2 trillion in wealth.  Sam Pizzigati writes if we confronted inequality and put in place policies like Japan, the third wealthiest country in the world, the median net worth of people in the US “would triple, from $66,000 to $199,000.” We need to build political power to create a more fair economy. The Next Systems project highlights some of the places where that is happening.

Nurses, doctors, and medical students demonstrated outside the annual meeting of the American Medical Association in Chicago on Saturday, demanding the group “get out of the way” in the fight for a Medicare for All program. (Photo: National Nurses United/Twitter)

Putting in Place Improved Medicare for All

Another issue that has popular political support and is a top concern of people is the crisis in US healthcare. National Improved Medicare for all has transformative potential that will shrink inequality and cut poverty by 20 percent while providing high-quality healthcare to everyone.

The scam of the Affordable Care Act formalized an unequal health system, giving names to inequality — platinum, gold, silver, and bronze plans — while giving hundreds of billions of dollars in subsidies to the corrupt insurance industry and allowing pharmaceuticals and hospitals to charge exorbitant prices. Although the power structure has tried to confuse the issue, polls show majority support for ‘Medicare for All’ even when they say it will replace private plans. No poll accurately describes improved Medicare for all as cutting healthcare costs for people or says that people will never lose their healthcare again, instead, the media and bi-partisan insurance-funded politicians spew false information. Improved Medicare for all has gone from a pipe dream to mainstream as the movement has made the issue a litmus test for their presidential nomination with 84 percent of Democratic voters saying it is a priority issue.

No matter who is elected, the improved Medicare for all movement will need to continue to build its power. The insurance industry and others who profit from the status quo are resisting change in a classic battle of corporate money vs. the people. The single-payer movement has a strategy to win and has successfully turned attacks against those who oppose us. If we continue to organize, Medicare for all has the potential to become an unstoppable political issue.

WASHINGTON, DC – JUNE 1: A replica of a clock is seen at Lafayette Square as people gathered to protest President Trump announcement that U.S. will pull out of the Paris climate agreement on Thursday, June 1, 2017 in Washington, D.C. (Photo by Salwan Georges/The Washington Post via Getty Images)

Confronting the Climate Crisis

The last decade was the Earth’s hottest ever, marked by extreme storms, and deadly wildfires.  Thousands of scientists have been issuing emergency warnings about irreversible changes as they see tipping points are approaching with frightening prospects, especially for those who are young and will live through escalating storms, floods, droughts, fires and more.  Youth rank responding to the climate crisis as the most vital issue of our times.

Despite this, the staggering failure of political leadership continues as we saw at the most recent UN climate meeting. The crisis emanates from the US where two-thirds of new oil and gas is produced. Failed bi-partisan US leadership on the climate crisis makes resistance imperative. People have been responding in the US and globally with escalating protests including days of action involving the largest protests ever involving more than six million people. Now we need to move from protest to power.

Responding to the climate crisis requires major transformations in the US economy as multiple sectors — energy, transportation, housing, manufacturing, agriculture, banking, among others — will have to transition. There is a growing understanding of what needs to be done with the most detailed plan coming from Green candidate, Howie Hawkins’ ecosocialist Green New Deal. Last week, Stanford researchers put forward Green New Deal plans for 143 countries. Here are ten immediate steps for the next president.

We need to defeat the illusion that corporations and corporate governance can solve the climate crisis. Once again, it is a battle of the people vs. corporate power. To save the planet we must overcome the ruling elites.



Ending Militarism

US militarism is exacerbating the climate crisis. While we can’t confront climate change while lavishly funding the Pentagon that is not the only reason to end US militarism.  The recent release of the Afghan Papers showed us that the longest war in US history, Afghanistan, has been a lie. Pentagon spending, now over 60 percent of discretionary spending, has been escalating for decades and most recently a record bi-partisan Pentagon budget was passed while the people were distracted with impeachment.

The US military is planning a war with China. NATO is looking for new enemies to justify its existence and the US is expanding its weapons race to outer space. While human needs go unmet and underfunded, the military is given a blank check despite failing its only financial audit.

It is not only wars and militarism that must be dismantled, but the US foreign policy of domination and empire must come to an end. This includes regime change campaigns as currently being attempted in Venezuela, Iran, and Bolivia, and recent years in Nicaragua, Ukraine, and Syria. The illegal use of unilateral coercive measures, which the US calls sanctions but which are another form of war, kill tens of thousands annually.

US empire is failing. It has resulted in militarized police and led to racist police killings. The movement to end war is growing and having victories like stopping the Trump military parade but we need to put forward a vision for a peace economy that ends the era of global military bases. A better jobs program than the military is putting in place a Green New Deal, building urgently needed housing, remaking infrastructure and providing for human needs. The era of wasteful spending on a bloated and unnecessary military must come to an end.



An Era of Transformation is Upon Us

These are just some of the issues where consensus is being achieved and where change is urgently needed. Crises are resulting in movement building over the resurgence of racism, racist mass incarceration and drug wars as well as police violence in black and brown communities, the mistreatment of workers leading to record days on strike, the crises in homelessness, poverty and housing, deep student debt, environmental degradation beyond the climate crisis, and the crisis in US democracy, are some others.

One could look at today and be depressed at seeing no opportunity for change. In reality, these crises are opportunities for transformational changes to build a better world for ourselves and future generations. This contradiction is highlighted in a recent dialogue between long-time activist George Lakey and a young organizer Yotam Marom. Marom had a hard time accepting Lakey’s claim that “There’s no other time I’d rather be alive.” Lakey explains why we are in a better position than movements were in the 60s and 70s to make deeper transformational change. He sees current polarization as an opportunity, as well as the issues discussed in this article, the state of the movement, training available to activists and how crises will force change. Of course, there is no guarantee regarding our success but there is potential — potential we can realize.

We are building toward being a movement that can make transformational changes over the next decade. There are opportunities to organize in our communities, connect with others throughout the country and around the world. The potential of a movement of movements linking issues that seem unrelated is being realized. We are building solidarity from person-to-person across movements and across borders. Together we can build the power to create a new world.

Jazz Activism

As somebody who both studies revolution, and as somebody who went to school for jazz performance, the interplay between spontaneity and organization is particularly of interest to me.

Leaders exist whether or not we call them leaders.  Events at occupy wall street were organized by teams of people, and did not happen spontaneously, but required days, sometimes weeks, of nonstop planning and organization.

The model of “consensus” is not a particularly anarchist or socialist model of running meetings, it originated in the quaker church and was adopted by utopian idealists in the 1960s.  It’s hung around as a way to run meetings because that’s what people know.  It didn’t spontaneously come about, it was an extant operating system and was deliberately put in place by leadership who felt it was a good system for running meetings. Whether or not it actually is, is another matter that can be debated.

Seemingly spontaneous moments will occur, but the consciousness of those moments will be varied, depending on the level of self-education of those engaging the moment.

There is a difference between stopping a single pipeline and stopping the economic system that keeps building these pipelines.

Jazz uses improvisation, but it also requires structure.  Some tunes, like standards provide a structural foundation with given chords and rhythms that one improvises over. But there is also free jazz, which starts with very little material and is collaboratively created through the interaction between all the musicians participating. The less structure and the less material one starts with, the more intensely studied one needs to be in music theory, the greater the depth of knowledge one needs to have of harmony, rhythm, and melody in order to make it work. Otherwise you’ll just end up playing the same things that you already know over and over. 

There is a difference between camping out on wall street and actually dismantling capitalism and the capitalist state.  If we get too close to actually threatening the functioning of the system, the system will use violence to crush our resistance, as we saw during the eviction of OWS and destruction of our camps on the day that we planned to actually occupy the floor of the NYSE.

In the years ahead the conflicts will be greater and greater, and our ability to resist the violence of the state will need to grow exponentially.  If we’re going to do this, it won’t happen by accident, and it will require extremely thoughtful and organized planning, and the discussion of tactics that we will use, and tactics that we will not use, in any given moment, depending on the strength of our forces.  If we are serious about overthrowing capitalism and the state, we can’t just protest for the sake of protesting, nor can we just throw bricks through a starbucks window for the sake of destroying property.  If we are serious about winning, we need to be cautious about inviting excuses for the capitalist state to crush us using violence, and be serious about building our forces, and building the level of education of the general population.

Spontaneous moments will happen.  Our role as Socialists is to prepare for them.

The Limits of Identity as a Lens to Understand the World

So referring to members of organizations who are part of an oppressed identity group as "token members" as a way to insult the organization is messed up. It assumes that those individuals have no self-agency, no control over their own thoughts, and that they didn't come to their politics on their own terms, informed by their own experiences and self-education.

Lately, I've seen the accusation of people being "tokens" done by people who disagree with Marxism and the politics of intersectionality and solidarity, who use identity as their primary lens for understanding the world, and believe that identity is sufficient to inform political and organizational strategy.

It instead highlights the failure of identity to explain the world, and the political conclusions reached by individuals of oppressed identities that are not in lock step with members of identitarian cliques. People in various identity groups often believe and act contrary to the way that they are expected to. This incongruence between believe and action, and identity is often explained away by identitarians saying that these individuals are not actually members of that oppressed identity, and is invalidating of that persons experience and identity as a member of that oppressed identity.

This sort of illogical and insulting conclusion leads to white activists shouting down black people as being anti-black racists, or shouting down trans people as being transphobic.  And the reason for this isn't because there is any substance to these accusations-- it's because there is a strategic or political difference, which is being elided.

Now it's entirely possible that black people have internalized anti-black prejudices, or that trans people have internalized anti-trans prejudices-- and the identitarians shouting people down have to agree in order to engage in this sort of behavior.  But to agree that identity doesn't coincide with politics invalidates the foundational premise of identity politics-- that identity is sufficient to inform your political worldview and strategies for change.

Now identity politics is problematic itself for a host of other reasons. Using identity to explain why people should have a certain set of politics is reductive (the opposite of intersectional), and members of oppressed identity groups who do not fall lock-step in with a clique are cast as being "self-hating", or as being guilty of upholding and defending other oppressions.

This is all done as a way to hide political disagreements and cast the person in question as being "bad" rather than actually having out debate around areas where disagreements lay, with the goal of winning people to a point of view. It attacks the person and not the argument (ad homeniem), which is toxic and destructive behavior.

Intersectionality, as it was originally conceived by Kimberle Crenshaw is not about how many oppressions you as an individual can tick a box next to on a list. It's about how identities and oppressions interact and cannot be (and should not be) used to reduce any individual to any one monolithic set of experiences. It was an argument against both identity-based reductionism and class based reductionism, but has been taken by those who perhaps have not read the source materials to mean something entirely the opposite, and they instead argue that identity CAN be used to reduce an individual to a monolithic identity.

Intersectionality, as originally conceived, is an argument in favor of Solidarity politics, because nobody can be reduced to monolithic identities, and all our struggles intersect and overlap with one another.  Just as black women have a different lived experience from black men because of gender, and also have a different lived experience than white women because of race, there is no monolithic "black female experience" either.  The black lesbian experience is different from the black female experience.  Ultimately, everybody's experience is different, and identity shapes people's oppressions, and these oppressions are different from person to person, but the conclusion that must be drawn is either that each of us are too unique in our own oppressions to come together and fight in solidarity, or our oppressions are linked and intersect in ways that require us to come together and fight in solidarity.

One of these strategies will destroy the left, and the other will build the left into a force that can take on all systems of oppression and defeat them.  I'm going to throw my lot in with the politics of solidarity, and fight to end all oppressions, even ones that I don't experience directly.

If the Illuminati are real, I want to join

There's two options: The illuminati are either real or they are not.

If they are real, I want to join; and if they aren't-- I want to start them up. Having god-powers to control all the major events in world history for our own nefarious ends sounds like a sweet deal. But wait, what are our nefarious ends?

Gaining control of everything? That can't be true-- The illuminati have *always* been in control of everything, including the weather. There's literally no way to stop us, so like, why even bother thinking about it?

We, the Illuminati, offer you something that you desire: a sense of purpose in a cruel, random, and unforgiving universe. We give you a story about why bad things happen to good people. We provide the illusion of order in a random chaotic universe.

So long as you have us in charge, you don't have to think about how totally terrifying it is that nobody is actually in charge of this chaotic nonsensical shitshow we call life.

Not convinced? Just imagine a world without the Illuminati, and you'll see why you need us.

Shootings would happen not because it's a false flag operation, but because some random asshole has a gun!!! Yikes! If that were the case, mass shootings would happen like, every year! What if the nearly 100 people who die of gun violence every day in America, die for no reason, other than some other asshole has a gun? Wouldn't you rather it instead be part of our plan to slowly eradicate the human race in accordance to the Georgia Guide Stones? Because, if it wasn't our doing, that would mean that nearly 100 people die every day for no reason! That's really scary and upsetting!

Or what about extreme weather events!? If it wasn't for HAARP controlling the weather, extreme weather would be caused by naturally occurring meteorological forces that we've got no control over! Do you really want to feel powerless like that? I mean, it sounds really stupid to ascribe human motives like anger or malice to uncaring, unconscious weather systems that are literally not alive, and are just the product of a confluence of natural physical forces. If it wasn't for the Illuminati, weather systems would destroy people's homes for no reason! How terrifying! It's almost like it could happen to anybody! And for no reason! And it's not just the result of a kind of primitive thinking, like how the Vikings ascribed bad weather to the anger of Freya or Thor-- the Illuminati aren't actually gods. They are people who use their science powers, and their reverse engineered alien tech, and their special Jewish powers that only Jewish people get, to amass incredible amounts of wealth and power so that they can control the fabric of reality like gods. Which is why science is bad, and anything beyond your capacity to understand should be destroyed. That's so much more rational, don't you think?

If we got the illuminati out of controlling medicine, we'd have single payer healthcare by now (but no pharmaceuticals, because drugs are chemicals and are therefore bad-- unless that drug is marijuana, which has lots of chemicals that cure literally EVERYTHING).  Or the opposite of Single Payer, because big government is bad, and we could all just retreat into our fallout bunkers and we'll just eat hydroponically grown kale and never die of anything because when you live underground, you can't get poisoned by chemtrails.

It goes without saying that the government is controlled by the illuminati, but what if it wasn't?  That would mean that the ruling class instituted a sham democracy so that they could exploit the working class! That sounds like something Karl Marx would say!  And we all know, Karl Marx was Illuminati, because he was ethnically Jewish, and used his special Jewish Powers to create communism-- which is not a form of democratic control of the workplace and society-- it's a ploy by the Illuminati! Why?  We're not sure.  We did that one just for fun, I guess.

If the illuminati didn't control financial sector? It'd be chaos!  Stock prices would rise and fall with the anarchic forces of the market! And what then?! Why, we'd just have a bunch of greedy rich people fighting with one another to be the ones who are best able to enrich themselves at the expense of the working class and the environment! That sounds like boring old capitalism.  There's no magic there.  No thanks.  Give me that zazzle, zing, pow-- give me that Illuminati!  Capitalism could totally work if it wasn't for the Illuminati!

((psych!  The whole "capitalism would work if it wasn't for the illuminati is actually a double-fake, by us, the illuminati!  We use Capitalism to maintain our control over everything!  That's how good we are!  I put this part in double parenthesis so that way only people who are in the illuminati initiation program with me can read this part, otherwise the secret will get out that the illuminati aren't real and that it's just capitalism, the ruling class, and a complex tapestry of social forces and competing ideologies. Shh! Don't tell anyone!))

Our logo is super creepy looking, right?

Clearly The illuminati are real though, and thank goodness. How do you explain David Rockefeller dying on the first day of the Pagan year? It was a ritual sacrifice! DUH!  There's no way a really old guy with a ton of money (that you ascribe a bunch of weird values from your internalized anti-pagan sentiment that is quite literally a holdover from the Roman Empire's conquest of Europe) could have randomly died on a day that coincides with an arbitrary position of the Earth around the Sun!  And if that is the case, it's quite frankly boring.  Let's give his death magical powers instead!

The trilateral commission! New World Order? That's not internal competition between various sectors of the ruling class! It's us! All us!

Bra-burning feminists and the destruction of the family?  That's not a result of thousands of years of patriarchy, unequal pay, and downward pressure on wages by the ruling class, that's the illuminati. You see, women don't actually want equal rights or equal pay.  Naturally, they are very comfortable with their inferior station in life, and are docile like deer eating alfalfa pellets in a petting zoo. This is because genetically they are just less good than men.  They actually have no agency over their own thoughts and are incapable of thinking for themselves or forming their own opinions. So what's up with all this feminism?! We'll that's just an illuminati thought-program that we poisoned their mind with using mind-control implant chips (you may know them as IUDs) that beam thoughts into their brains using RFID tech. 

((We call them RFIUDs... Shh!)).

Clearly, it's much better to have the Illuminati around. We make bad things happen so you have someone to blame, so you can sleep at night knowing that somebody is in control, so you don't have to be constantly be in a state of existential crisis about the cruel uncaring universe. We provide order to the chaos.

If some alt-right dumbfuck tells you "the civil war wasn't about slavery" show them this

"Our new government is founded upon exactly the opposite idea; its foundations are laid, its corner- stone rests, upon the great truth that the negro is not equal to the white man; that slavery, subordination to the superior race is his natural and normal condition. This, our new government, is the first, in the history of the world, based upon this great physical, philosophical, and moral truth." - Alexander Stephens, vice president of the CSA, March 1861

"The recent declaration of the candidate and leaders of the Black Republican Party must suffice to convince many who have formerly doubted the purpose to attack the institution of slavery in the states. The undying opposition to slavery in the United States means war upon it, where it is, not where it is not." - Jefferson Davis 1860

"But an increasing hostility on the part of the non-slaveholding States to the institution of slavery, has led to a disregard of their obligations, and the laws of the General Government have ceased to effect the objects of the Constitution. The States of Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, Massachusetts, Connecticut, Rhode Island, New York, Pennsylvania, Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, Wisconsin and Iowa, have enacted laws which either nullify the Acts of Congress or render useless any attempt to execute them. In many of these States the fugitive is discharged from service or labor claimed, and in none of them has the State Government complied with the stipulation made in the Constitution. The State of New Jersey, at an early day, passed a law in conformity with her constitutional obligation; but the current of anti-slavery feeling has led her more recently to enact laws which render inoperative the remedies provided by her own law and by the laws of Congress. In the State of New York even the right of transit for a slave has been denied by her tribunals; and the States of Ohio and Iowa have refused to surrender to justice fugitives charged with murder, and with inciting servile insurrection in the State of Virginia. Thus the constituted compact has been deliberately broken and disregarded by the non-slaveholding States, and the consequence follows that South Carolina is released from her obligation." - South Carolina's "Declaration of the Immediate Causes" for secession

"Our position is thoroughly identified with the institution of slavery-- the greatest material interest of the world. Its labor supplies the product which constitutes by far the largest and most important portions of commerce of the earth. These products are peculiar to the climate verging on the tropical regions, and by an imperious law of nature, none but the black race can bear exposure to the tropical sun. These products have become necessities of the world, and a blow at slavery is a blow at commerce and civilization. That blow has been long aimed at the institution, and was at the point of reaching its consummation. There was no choice left us but submission to the mandates of abolition, or a dissolution of the Union, whose principles had been subverted to work out our ruin." - second paragraph, A Declaration of the Immediate Causes which Induce and Justify the Secession of the State of Mississippi from the Federal Union, Jan. 1861

"Whereas, the election of Abraham Lincoln and Hannibal Hamlin to the offices of president and vice-president of the United States of America, by a sectional party, avowedly hostile to the domestic institutions and to the peace and security of the people of the State of Alabama, preceded by many and dangerous infractions of the constitution of the United States by many of the States and people of the Northern section, is a political wrong of so insulting and manacing a character as to justify the people of the State of Alabama in the adoption of prompt and decided measures for their future peace and security, therefore:" - Alabama's Ordinance of Secession, Jan 1861

"The people of Georgia having dissolved their political connection with the Government of the United States of America, present to their confederates and the world the causes which have led to the separation. For the last ten years we have had numerous and serious causes of complaint against our non-slave-holding confederate States with reference to the subject of African slavery. They have endeavored to weaken our security, to disturb our domestic peace and tranquility, and persistently refused to comply with their express constitutional obligations to us in reference to that property, and by the use of their power in the Federal Government have striven to deprive us of an equal enjoyment of the common Territories of the Republic." - opening lines of Georgia's secession, Jan 1861

"We hold as undeniable truths that the governments of the various States, and of the confederacy itself, were established exclusively by the white race, for themselves and their posterity; that the African race had no agency in their establishment; that they were rightfully held and regarded as an inferior and dependent race, and in that condition only could their existence in this country be rendered beneficial and tolerable." - A Declaration of the Causes which Impel the State of Texas to Secede from the Federal Union, Feb 1861

Obama's Silence on Standing Rock

by Caitrin Smith

Democrats and socialists have fundamentally different ideas of how American democracy works, how change comes about, and who makes that change happen. Democrats seem to understand it as an interplay of policies, laws, treaties, and courts that come together to form what many agree is an American democracy.

Socialists argue, that "American democracy" is really unfettered capitalism, oligarchy, and a system which bends all those polices, laws, treaties, and courts to benefit the ruling class (those with capital/and those protecting it). It will be challenging for us to come to an agreement on Obama's response (or lack thereof) to Standing Rock if we have fundamentally different understandings on how the system operates. They argue that the bureaucratic process is "how our system is designed to work" and that change comes from "courts and congress."

What we argue, through a careful look at history, political theory, and practical experience in struggle, is that sweeping social movements are what pressure and make those laws pass, not the slow process of Democrat sanctioned reform.

To compliment the suggestion that working class solidarity/struggle pushes change, we argue that capital is the opposing force that makes these same laws bend. What we see at Standing Rock is a dance between oppressor and oppressed; the protectors of water push the laws in our favor and the protectors of capital push them back against us. In other words, there are two things that pressure our government: the working class's ability to organize and capital; our task is to make the former more powerful than the latter.

Standing Rock will continue to mount this pressure. Obama's complacency is an admission of allegiance to the protectors of capital rather than the protectors of water. If you are interested in exploring the effectiveness of reforming capitalism/the democratic party, to read Lance Selfa's "The Democrats: A Critical History" and Howard Zinn's "A People's History."

Selfa lays out, quite convincingly, the faults of the Democratic Party as being a pro capitalist, neoliberal, reformist party that has actually been detrimental for working people who have dedicated their lives to the black freedom struggle, LGBTQ rights, immigration reform, native american sovereignty, the list goes on.

Zinn argues that social change in these areas has not come from Democrats and the "bureaucratic process" but pressure of mass movements in the street and pressure from the people. Those who continue to have faith in the system (and the elected leaders who protect that system at our expense) that created and spawned the conditions for something like standing rock to occur, are digging their own graves: history teaches us to look elsewhere for real, social change.

That being said, it is not mutually exclusive to understand the working class as the agent for social change AND argue for the president of our country to at least offer a statement of support or admit that native american's are treated like absolute garbage historically and currently in the US. He hasn't done that, and they deserve that. They deserve something beyond, "We will get to addressing your oppression later, when the courts and congress and the bureaucratic process allows it."

Native American women are more likely to be sexually assaulted than any other race (and not by Native American men- mind you), Native American men are more likely to be murdered by police than any other race. Native Americans have some of the worst healthcare, highest poverty rates, and hardest living conditions than any other subgroup in the US. They demand to be heard and they should be.

Its deplorable that Obama hasn't even bothered to acknowledge this reality and they are only asking for clean drinking water. "I'll get around to it when the system allows" is an inexcusable response to oppression that will only worsen in his complacency.

I am not a Democrat, I have no faith in the two parties of capitalism. I am a socialist, which means I doubt the Democrats will agree with us; they wont until they see our system through a similar lens.

As Lenin once stated, "...'Full freedom' means election of officials and other office-holders who administer public and state affairs. 'Full freedom' means the complete abolition of a state administration that is not wholly and exclusively responsible to the people, that is not elected by, accountable to, and subject to recall by, the people. 'Full freedom' means that it is not the people who should be subordinated to officials, but the officials who should be subordinated to the people."

Preliminary thoughts on the disarray in Trump's transition camp:

via Owen Hill:

1. The disarray at the moment is not primarily being driven by protests in the street but instead by the arrogance and overreach of a triumphant Trump. They have axed a section of their ruling class supporters in an effort to settle scores and punish those that they deemed insufficiently loyal.

2. This has two effects: first of narrowing their base of support within the ruling class, second of energizing their far right populist base--since they are proving their "anti-establishment" credentials.

3. While the discord is being driven from within the administration, the ongoing protests have made it clear that there is a political price to be paid for compliance. Sanders and Deblasio seem to be the most prominent Democrats who have broken ranks so far from the Democratic Party line of "unity" for "an orderly transition". The early breaks widen our opening to assert a politics of mass resistance to the Trump regime. Simultaneously the continued protests are making it less likely that other establishment politicians will easily forgive and forget the scorn of the moment, which is how they would like to proceed.

4. Two dangers confront us: first that we assume that the rulers who break ranks and turn against Trump are really on our side. They are making a political calculation based on our mobilizations. End the mobilizations and the political calculus changes. Second, that we miss the way in which the discord at the top will actually energize Trump's base. The hardest of the hardcore elements will become more determined to fight as a result of the fighting at the top and they will have a broader appeal as well. This heights the need for self-defense and for a readiness to defend those being attacked. Moreover it puts a premium on confronting the far right as they begin to organize: their demonstrations, organizing meetings and organizing networks must be exposed and challenged. Meetings of the Klan must be broken up when they emerge. Keep them atomized and on the run.

Bernie Was Wrong to Endorse Hillary

There's nothing admirable about selling out the movement you built to back a candidate who worked with party operatives to sabotage your campaign and oppose everything you campaigned on.

Sanders ended his campaign exactly wrong, and has completely disoriented the movement he built and funnelled it into a bourgeois political party that sabotaged him from day one-- and he will extract nothing from the DNC in return for it-- neither for his personal gain, nor for his movement. What he will get in return, is a candidate who campaigned in 2008 on using nuclear weapons against Iran, who lobbied in Haiti to suppress the minimum wage at the behest of sweatshops, who used the state department to back a right-wing military coup in Honduras and then deported the refugees back to die, who lobbied for fracking around the world as Sec of State, who voted repeatedly as Senator to authorize and fund Bush's illegal wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, who called the TPP "the gold standard in trade deals", who supported NAFTA as first lady, who lobbied for racist drug laws, who opposed gay marriage (and continues to privately), who calls Chelsea Manning and Edward Snowden traitors who should be put to death, who backs the Keystone XL, and who is backed by all the same banks who are backing the DAPL pipeline going through Standing Rock (which is why she's silent-- she will complete the pipeline when she is president).

People said that Bernie could be like the "Ron Paul of the left wing" and move the right-wing DNC to the left. Yet, at the end of it, Bernie has proven himself a political coward. Ron Paul ended his campaign by refusing to endorse the GOP nominee, and endorsed the Libertarian Party candidate for president, and gave birth to the Tea Party, which has shifted both the DNC and GOP to the right wing. Bernie could have done the same by backing Jill Stein.

Bernie forfeited his chance to build a serious left wing challenge, when he endorsed Hillary. His "our Revolution" is neither revolutionary, nor ours, it is just another liberal nonprofit in a long line of failed liberal nonprofits formed in the attempt to reform an unreformable Wall Street political party. The Tea Party sought to make a far-right party more right wing. It succeeded. If Bernie's movement is an attempt to reform a center-right political party and make it leftist, it is doomed to fail.

What's needed is for the American left to say Goodbye DNC and work to build a politically independent party that runs it's own candidates, which remains independent of corporate money. Jill Stein is doing that work. I back her, and I back the Green Party. Because with the atmosphere over 400ppm CO2, the future of the planet quite literally depends on it.

Are you worried about Trump Winning?

People are worried that everything is going to go to shit if Trump wins. But things have already gone to shit. People are presently dying at the hands of this horrible system, from racist police, from not having access to healthcare, from homelessness, from hunger, from bombs being dropped on them... And we have Democrats in charge. It doesn't do any good. The problem is that we spend the bulk of our life having our labor exploited, and no real democracy at all.

Democrats on city council are the ones cutting General Assistance, shutting down health clinics, and giving away money through tax breaks to corporations.

Democrats are the ones who introduced workfare, which gutted the welfare system.

No matter who wins, they will be in charge of the state which makes sure that housing is for profit, that food is for profit, that wars are for profit, and that empire keeps expanding for profit.

Besides that, Trump doesn't scare me, his supporters do. And they don't go away if you vote for Hillary. They'll still be around, just like they are around right now. We can't vote them out of existence, we need to develop organizations that have the philosophical grounding to undercut Trumps false populism while critiquing the status quo.

Hillary is the Status Quo. She doesn't want any radical reforms. People know that the system isn't working. Trump's rhetoric is filled with answers-- wrong answers. Racist answers. Misogynistic answers. But answers.

And the American left is more than happy to brow beat one another into shutting up about how horrible Clinton is, which leaves the vast majority of people who are looking for answers as to why everything sucks so badly, to look to Trump for a critique of the situation.

Lesser evilism voting, and the vote-shaming and stifling of dissent that comes with it, actually weakens the left, and makes it more difficult for us advance our agenda because it allows the only critique of the status quo to come from right-wing demagogs like Trump.

We must build a leftist party that can take on both the Democrats and Republicans. I think the Green Party can be that party, but maybe not. Something has to change though. If we don't, things will just continue to get worse and worse and the lesser evil will get more and more evil- and the greater evil will grow in response.

Fight back.

Clinton's Lackeys Are Ramping Up Smears Against Jill Stein

I was scrolling through facebook today and found this from Kevin Zeese:

"Please share widely. There is a smear campaign going on against Jill Stein by Clinton-Democrats. Below is an example of how it is done from Robert Naiman who claims to be a peace activist but is supporting the war hawk, Hillary Clinton, and smearing the only real peace candidate, Jill Stein. Here is the email he is sending out to people urging them to slander Jill with statements he knows are false. As I said -- please share this widely so Naiman and the Clinton campaign are exposed. - Kevin Zeese

From: Robert Naiman
If you have a lot of Facebook friends, you may have recently noticed a high level of activity on your Facebook feed by Jill Stein acolytes.
If so, you may find the following links useful to throw them off their game. No warranty, express or implied. You don't have to prove that Jill Stein is an anti-science conspiracy theorist. You just have to say, "There are unanswered questions about whether Jill Stein is an anti-science conspiracy theorist."

There's Nothing Green About Jill Stein's Vaccine Stance
http://www.forbes.com/…/theres-nothing-green-about-jill-s…/…
Jill Stein on vaccines: People have ‘real questions’
https://www.washingtonpost.com/…/jill-stein-on-vaccines-pe…/
Jill Stein Promotes Homeopathy, Panders On Vaccines http://www.patheos.com/…/jill-stein-promotes-homeopathy-pa…/
Jill Stein Worries Wi-Fi Is Dangerous For Kids
http://www.patheos.com/…/jill-stein-worries-wi-fi-is-dange…/
===
Robert Naiman
Policy Director
Just Foreign Policy
www.justforeignpolicy.org
naiman@justforeignpolicy.org

"

This is just gross. These are a bunch of bullshit lies and smears, that have already been addressed by Jill Stein and put to rest as just that-- lies.



But the Clinton lackeys in the nonprofit industrial complex are continuing with the smears, they don't care about the facts, as demonstrated by the email above. It is just like the Karl Rove swift-boat attacks, which didn't need to prove that Kerry didn't serve in Vietnam or whatever bullshit, but just created the question about whether or not he did. Or how the fossil fuel industry has fed questions about climate change in the face of incontrovertible evidence that climate change is very much real, not with the goal of proving that climate change is a hoax, but with the goal of making the incontrovertible evidence seem weak, to delay any regulatory actions on fossil fuels for as long as possible.

What's the best way to fight back? Donate $27 to the Jill Stein campaign. That's what I just did.

Musicians Are Not Capitalists, So Stop Shitting on Kathleen Hanna (Or Any Other Musician) For Selling Their Labor

I just saw The Julie Ruin in Portsmouth NH, and it was amazing. This is the first time I've ever seen Kathleen and crew live in person, and it was the closest thing to a religious experience I've had in a long time. Kathleen has been a huge inspiration for me politically and musically since I was in high school 17 years ago.

One thing that struck me though, was that Kathleen was saying that she'd been getting shit from people for making money selling her music and saying she's a capitalist and therefore "out of the feminist club."

That's really shitty that people are sniping her for paying her bills, and really shitty politics.

Kathleen was like, "well guess what, we live in a capitalist country" and went on to talk about how she is justified to make money creating and selling music.

Every musician who makes a living performing and recording is totally is justified in making money, but making money and being able to pay your bills doesn't make you a capitalist. There is no contradiction between being anti-capitalist and selling your labor to survive. In fact, the two go together quite often.

Capitalists are capitalists because they don't make their money through their own labor.
They make their money by owning and controlling and exploiting the labor of other people.

Musicians are directly involved with the creation of their art, and their labor is the thing they sell when they get on stage, just like every other working class person, just like people who sell their labor working for minimum wage at McDonalds. When musicians make money doing their craft, that's not making money exploiting the labor of another person, they are laborers. It's not being a capitalist, it's being a worker.

Now hardcore marxists might to say that musicians aren't really working class, because they aren't really exploited by the ruling class capitalists in the same way as factory workers or service workers are, and that because musicians are full owners of their own labor, they are more like artisans or petite bourgeois. I think that confuses the issue for no good purpose. They are laborers. To me, they are in the working class.

Those who trash talk Kathleen for surviving under capitalism (and spreading her ideas while she's at it) don't even understand what capitalism is. To say that a person is "selling out" for making money is totally messed up and moralistic-- as though a single mother working at McDonald's to support herself and her child is somehow immoral because she's working for an evil corporation to survive a system that would readily put her on the street without batting an eye?

Nope. That's bullshit. There is no such thing as "ethical capitalism," and people absolutely have a right to make money to survive --by any means necessary, until capitalism is overthrown and things like food and housing are human rights. Moralizing people for the way they choose to survive their way through capitalism is just totally backwards and destructive to working class solidarity. We need to lift one another up, and recognize our shared solidarity as workers, not tear one another down.

It's only when people don't do any of the work and survive entirely by exploiting the labor of other people that they become capitalists.

So rock on. And if you happen to pay your rent while doing so, more power to you. It doesn't make you a capitalist or anti-feminist.

Green Party Candidate Dr Margaret Flowers Removed from Candidate Forum

Anonymous launches #OpJillStein

Anonymous #OpJillStein urges Americans to “spread everything they can
find” about Stein

A video purporting to be from Anonymous says the collective supports the
launch of #OpJillStein regarding Green Party presidential candidate Jill
Stein. However, Anonymous released no personal information on Stein as it
has on Republican Donald Trump.

Instead, Anonymous said, “We have seen many ops to expose corruption of US
presidential candidates in the interest of creating an informed voting
public. We have seen #OpTrump, #OpHillary, #OpCruz and #OpSanders. Sanders
supporters have accused us of showing bias by ignoring US presidential
candidate Dr. Jill Stein and we agree. This candidate has not only been
censored and ignored by the mainstream media, by Google and by Twitter, she
was even arrested and held in a black site during the 2012 election for
trying to attend a debate. In the interest of avoiding mainstream media’s
bias against third party candidates, we endorse the suggestion for an
#OpJillStein. We encourage everyone to do all they can to spread everything
they can find about Dr. Jill Stein and all of her policies to all political
hashtags and forums and insist she has a voice in future debates and media
coverage.”

Hillary vs Jill Stein infographic

Shit Bernie Supporters Say

Me: Bernie is making a mistake by running as a Democrat

Bernie Supporter: No he isn't! It's the only way he has a chance to win!

Me: No, the DNC will fight his candidacy every step of the way. The Democratic Party is actually less democratic than the GOP, when it comes to how they nominate their presidential nominee. They've been through this before, in 1968, in the 1980s, etc. They've developed an immune response to people like Bernie. The DNC is a wholly owned subsidiary of Wall Street. The Corporate Media will collaborate with the DNC and Wall Street to squish his campaign before it becomes a threat.

Bernie Supporter: That's a bad attitude! You're the reason he won't win! We just need enough people to vote for him, and he'll win!

Me: Hey look at that, the DNC just limited the number of debates.

Bernie Supporter: ARRGHH! Damn you Debbie Wasserman Schultz!

Me: DWS is only doing her job. Anybody else who could become DNC chair would have done the same thing. Oh look at that, Howard Dean, the Governor of VT who bragged about Single Payer, is a lobbyist for the private health insurance industry now.

Bernie Supporter: We need Debbie Wasserman Schultz to resign!

Me: No, you need a new political party. Oops, looks like they just took away his access to NGP/VAN.

Bernie Supporter: ARGH! Darn you Debbie Wasserman Schultz!!!!

Me: No, seriously, it's not her. It is the DNC. They are an appendage of Wall Street. Anybody that they replace her with will do the same thing. Oh hey look, Bernie went into Iowa blind because he didn't have access to his NGP/VAN data, but he came close. Lost by some coin flips. Ooh, and now he's won in NH, but Hillary still gets the same number of delegates, because of the Superdelegate system.

Bernie Supporter: What are superdelegates?

Me: One of the reasons that I'm saying that Bernie is making a mistake by running as a Democrat. The Democratic Party instituted the system of superdelegates in the 1980s because they didn't want the unwashed masses picking the nominee of their party.

Bernie Supporter: But running as a Democrat is the only way that he can get media coverage!

Me: The media is blacking him out right now tho.

Bernie Supporter: ARGH! Darn you MSNBC! Why have you forsaken me!?

Me: Because they were never on your side. It's okay though. Just blacking him out isn't so bad. They'll eventually start running a bunch of negative stories against him to try to assassinate his char--

Bernie Supporter: ARGH! Darn you Washington Times! Why have you forsaken me!?

Me: Seriously, calm the fuck down. This is clearly your first real exposure to the way things really are. The big media companies are all owned by and run by the ruling class. The DNC is funded by and run by the ruling class. As Karl Marx said, elections are the time where the working class picks which member of the bourgeoisie will exploit them.

Bernie Supporter: Bernie should run as an independent!

Me: Bernie waited too long for that. Ballot access laws in the various states make it impossible to run as an independent candidate for President in all 50 states unless you plan to do so by mid-March. It's now too late to get on the ballot in Maine, Oklahoma...

Bernie Supporter: Can you believe what just happened in Arizona!?!?

Me: What, that the DNC is complicit in Election fraud? Like how they were complicit in election fraud in 2000 by blaming the election results on Nader -- despite Jeb Bush and Katherine Harris being the real reason -- because they illegally barred over 1 million black voters from voting with false criminal charges?

Bernie Supporter: Nader was a spoiler!

Me: No. Jeb Bush and Katherine Harris committed election fraud, and a million black people were illegally barred from voting. And the Democrats made it all about the couple thousand of votes that Nader got instead of prosecuting the election fraud.

Bernie Supporter: Well, we're going to protest the election results!

Me: Ok. So you're going to ask the ruling class nicely to do what you want them to? What is needed is a long term sustained effort over a number of years to keep the same level of activity up even when Bernie is not running for president. Which is why I'm a member of the Green Party. There are other groups you could join like Socialist Alternative or the ISO as well, which are outside the two party system.

Bernie Supporter: The Green Party is weak! We need a new party of our own!

Me: Well, Jill Stein was polling at 8% before Bernie entered the race. Bernie was polling at 3% when he entered the race. A lot can happen in a couple months. And again, it's really hard to build a political party because of the restrictive ballot access laws. The Green Party has worked for 32 years to get where it is today, and it's been a constant uphill battle in terms of organizing and legal battles.

Bernie Supporter: ARRRGHHHH! I'm going to write his name in!

Me: Well... you can do that, if you want to totally throw your vote away.  Write-in votes are generally not even counted, unless you go through an elaborate registration process.  You can thank the Democrats and Republicans for making ballot access difficult.

Bernie Supporter: Voting Green is a wasted vote!

Me: No. Writing in Bernie's name is a wasted vote, because it literally will not be counted.  Jill Stein will have a better shot at the presidency than Bernie will -- because Jill Stein will be on the ballot in enough states to win the presidency.  Bernie won't even have that.  Because he ran as a Democrat instead of as a Green or Independent.

Bernie Supporter: *gasping for air*

Me: There there. There there.

Amazing Anti-Fascist Action today in Anaheim, CA

Anti-Fascists gathered to tell the KKK to go home.  This anti-fascist was stabbed by a Klansman.

This is the fucker who stabbed him.  He stabbed other people too.

This guy doing the kicking here, also got stabbed.  He wasn't too happy about it.

The police arrested him for kicking the Klansman.  You can see the blood on his shirt from the stab wound in his chest.

Here's the fucker marching, clearly holding the assault weapon.

Clearly holding the assault weapon.

Clearly holding the assault weapon, in the left of the frame. The police aren't after him though. Clearly it's the hispanic guy who committed the crime.

They're after the stab victim instead at the moment.  The man in grey walking up to clarify the situation and assist the victim, was also arrested.

The weapon was retrieved after the fucker was finally arrested for stabbing a bunch of people.

You want to dress in military fatigues, stab the people in our neighborhood, and then just walk away?  Not happening.

Beautiful.

'F*ck You!' Indianapolis Workers Told Their Jobs Are Moving To Mexico

from RawNews:

In a video uploaded to YouTube, a gathering of workers at an Indianapolis air conditioning manufacturing plant are stunned and enraged when told they’ll soon be out of work because the company is moving their jobs to Mexico.

The large crowd of employees of a Carrier Air Conditioner manufacturing plant in Indianapolis can be seen milling around as a speaker — dressed in a suit and standing on a stage — addresses them and gives them the bad news.

“The best way to stay competitive and protect the business for long-term is to move production from our facility in Indianapolis to Monterrey, Mexico,” the man can be heard explaining.

The crowd reacts with shouts of outrage, including one man who can be heard yelling, “F*ck you.”

Following that bombshell, he adds that the local distribution center will also be closed, putting more people out of work.

After attempting to calm the crowd down saying he had important information that employees will want to know for the future he explains that the move is being made to “ensure high levels of [manufacturing] quality.”

He goes on to provide them with the cold comfort that “It is important that you understand that there will be no impact on jobs today.”

According to Fox News, the closures will put over 1,400 people out of work.

"This is just a business decision."

LOL. Reminds me of a video I did a while back:



"It's just business y'know?"

Jill Stein on The Young Turks

[music] Song for All My Dead Friends

[music] Birds