I’m going to make a dogmatic – but true – statement: the only thing that will make any difference in developing an equitable society is organizing the working class, with priority given to the black and Latinx communities. Electoral politics are relevant only to the extent that they foster or inhibit such efforts at organization. This is why it’s critical to support Bernie, regardless of any disagreements you might have with this or that of his policies. The most effective strategy in organizing the working class and maximizing our power has been the united front. The Democratic Party is the […]
Tear down all the walls!
It’s likely the spineless democrats are going to cave on the wall. The deal will be 800,000 dreamers for the wall. Democrats should draw a line at the wall. But they won’t. Maybe the best we can hope for is a commission to study the wall which we can defund once we take back Congress in November. We need to tear down all the walls. Not just those between countries, but those between us as individual humans. It’s the same struggle, the same wall against the “other,” when there is no other. Us is all there is. Instead of a […]
In Defense of Men
Men are dogs. We are. We have been so indoctrinated with sexism that we can’t see straight, we just think with our dicks. Don’t tell me you don’t, because I won’t believe you. What’s the first question? Boy or girl. With just a faint hint of a brighter smile if the answer is male. Men are more valuable than women in our society. Why? Because the capitalists need us to defend the empire. We are raised to kill or be killed. If you’re raised to kill or be killed, it’s important that you have as few feelings as possible, and […]
Organizing Black People
We don’t have one working class in the U. S. We have two: one white and one black/Latinx. As long as white family wealth is 13 times black family wealth, class unity isn’t likely. Nor is it even desirable for black people. A united working class as Bernie envisions it in this period would led by whites and benefit whites more than it would blacks. Cuba is a good example. If we are sincere in wanting a society where caring replaces greed, where cooperation beats competition, black people are leading that struggle. The cutting edge of that struggle is in […]
Class struggle
The history of all hitherto existing society is the history of class struggles. The ruling capitalist class, internationally, sees the writing on the wall. The elites’ attempts to establish something like fascism are acts of desperation. The tax bill is a reflection of the current weakness of the working class, a chance for the owners to get it while they can. It’s not just greed. They need this money to negotiate their survival once the working class gets it together to fight back. Consider the advances of working class power in the twentieth century. The Russian Revolution in 1917. The New […]
We Own Time
Talk about End Time. The Koch Brothers are buying Time Magazine. I would hope every self-respecting subscriber will cancel their subscription. Henry Luce was no prize but he was a flaming liberal compared to the Charles and David Koch-suckers. [Luce also owned Life, but it died, lol]. Neither Luce, nor Turner, nor Warner, nor the Kochs own Time. We own time. But, something I’ve been puzzling at for some time now: What is time? I’ve been obsessed with death lately. Maybe it’s because I’m getting old. It’s not a bad thing: I want to fucking understand it, okay? Is that […]
Ending Sexism
TO MY BROTHERS: MEN! CUT THAT SHIT OUT! We need to own our sexism, to take responsibility for it, and to rip it out of our brains. We know this, our rulers plant sexism in our mother’s milk (or Nestle formula) because it keeps us divided. I include myself. Even though I consider myself a feminist, and even as I strive to nurture equality in my home and in our society, there remains a section of my brain devoted to sexism. I don’t think I’m alone in this, but when I walk down the street I evaluate – crudely – […]
Thanksgiving Fake News
From Richard Greener in the Huffpost Blog: ‘The idea of the American Thanksgiving feast is a fairly recent fiction. The idyllic partnership of 17th Century European Pilgrims and New England Indians sharing a celebratory meal appears to be less than 120 years-old. And it was only after the First World War that a version of such a Puritan-Indian partnership took hold in elementary schools across the American landscape. We can thank the invention of textbooks and their mass purchase by public schools for embedding this “Thanksgiving” image in our modern minds. It was, of course, a complete invention, a cleverly created slice […]
How do we get from capitalism to socialism?
Ever since the October Revolution 100 years ago today, socialists have spoken as if revolution – the seizure of state power from the capitalists by violent or nonviolent means – has been the be all and end all. Yet capitalism emerged gradually within the belly of the beast, as it were. It could be argued that capitalism emerged in the process of feudal societies trading with each other. While feudal societies taxed their peasants so that the aristocratic elites could enjoy the fruits of surplus, it was the merchants involved in trade that were able to accumulate sufficient capital to […]
The Rise of Classes
One of Lanchester’s points in his New Yorker article, “The Case Against Civilization” that I wrote about in my last blog is that it took 4000 years for hunter-gatherer societies to settle down and adopt an agricultural system. They were reluctant because hunting and gathering worked just fine for them, thank you very much. He doesn’t say it, but one can surmise that ultimately force was involved, because once agriculture predominates, you also get taxation, writing – originally developed to keep track of taxes – and the State, with the development of classes, one of the oppressor and one of […]