NEWARK, NJ, January 4 — On the cold, rainy, dark evening after Obama announced his expansion of the war in Afghanistan, 50 people, including PLP members, joined in a rally outside the Gateway Center offices of New Jersey Senators Lautenberg and Menendez. In spite of the lousy weather, we could have distributed hundreds more leaflets than we had. The support we received from commuters returning from New York City and drivers passing by was amazing. And people were eager to join in our chants, including “Bush, Obama. Different name, same game,” “Soldiers, sailors and marines. Resist the bloody war machine,” and “Lautenberg, Menendez. Stop the funding for the killing.”
By the beginning of 2008, the U.S. ruling class as a whole knew that it was in big trouble. The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan were not going as planned, the house-of-cards economy was beginning to crumble and large sections of the working class, including students and those who consider themselves “progressives,” were rapidly growing into a disaffected force bemoaning the direction of the country. But all was not lost for the ruling class. The old money section found its knight in shining armor: a young black man with a charming wife and adorable children, who spoke in terms reminiscent of their earlier “heroes,” Martin Luther King and the Kennedy brothers. And it worked, at least for a while. Students, members of black and Latino communities and aging activists from the 60’s believed, and rallied in numbers with enthusiasm not seen in decades.
But those of us in the Progressive Labor Party, and our friends, saw immediately that this was yet another cruel hoax being perpetrated on the working class, for whom there is no truly “kinder face” of capitalism. Whether the titular head of the government is Democrat or Republican, liberal or conservative, black or white, the message for the working class is clear — the ruling class will use whatever means it feels necessary to maintain its place on the world stage, including driving the working class further and further into the hole of unemployment, insecurity and endless wars.
So what has the working class seen from Obama during his first year in office? An official unemployment rate currently at 10%, with a real rate over 20%, and even higher in many working-class communities. Billions upon billions of dollars pumped into the banks and big business, with little to nothing being done to help people save their homes and get jobs. A retreat from promises to close Guantanamo and stop Bush administration policies such as rendition. A healthcare “reform” program which ultimately will do nothing more than pump billions more into insurance and pharmaceutical companies while forcing working-class families to privately pay for policies with no meaningful restrictions on cost. And while Obama was somewhat truthful about his plans for Afghanistan, he never admitted that when done, he would put more troops in that country than Bush ever did and expand U.S. attacks to Pakistan and Yemen.
Many workers support this latest version of the ruling class’s “knight in shining armor.” Many of them believed that they could get universal health care by just demonstrating and lobbying for it. Even more believed that Obama was just making his “more-troops-to-Afghanistan” statements solely in order to get elected, that he’d never “really” do that. When Obama came to the new sports arena in Newark, several days before the November gubernatorial election, thousands of people, overwhelmingly black, stood in line for hours, young children in tow, in order to see and hear him.
Four members of local chapters of two anti-war groups went down to the arena with 400 leaflets calling for the immediate withdrawal of all troops from Iraq and Afghanistan. We were stunned at the response, with many people practically grabbing the leaflets from our hands. We gave out all 400 within a half hour, and could have distributed several thousand more.
This period is certainly one fraught with danger for the working class, as the ruling class attacks on us became increasingly vicious. But it is also a time of great opportunity, as our brothers and sisters learn first-hand the painful lesson that capitalism offers nothing but more suffering. Only a communist revolution will provide us with what we need, a society in which we are able to develop our full potential and enjoy the fruits of our labor.