RED EYE ON THE NEWS . . . February 1, 2023

KKKops doing what they’re hired to do: attack workers The Guardian, 1/6 –U.S. law enforcement killed at least 1,176 people in 2022, making it the deadliest year on record for police violence...Police across the country killed an average of more than three people a day, or nearly 100 people every month last year according to Mapping Police Violence. The racial disparities have also persisted: Black people were 24% of those killed last year, while making up only 13% of the population. From 2013 to 2022, Black residents were three times more likely to be killed by U.S. police than white people. The inequality is particularly severe in some cities, including Minneapolis where police have killed Black residents at a rate 28 times higher than white residents, and Chicago, where the rate was 25 times higher.

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LETTERS ... February 1, 2023

Down with slumlords and kkkops, up up with community ties PLers continue to base build with the Rodwell Spivey family as they grapple with another capitalist-borne crisis —an electrical fire to their home. The Rodwell Spivey brothers were harassed, stopped, and frisked by undercover Newark police officers in June 2021 and faced continued harassment for up to two years. Inspired by their ferocious fightback against police terror, PL stood with the brothers and family and continues to stand by their side. As their family felt like they were just starting to get their lives back on track, ready to celebrate Christmas together, a vicious slumlord left the family in their home without heat for days. Like many workers, they thought a quick and harmless fix would be plugging in a space heater.

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Führers Biden & Adams: Workers face liberal fascism, need communist revolution

The recent wave of racist attacks on immigrant and homeless workers is exposing the U.S. bosses’ drive toward liberal fascism. As the world economy shrinks (imf.org, 7/22), the international crisis of capitalism is nearing a breaking point. As the U.S. loses ground to imperialist arch-rival China, and the war in Ukraine brings tensions with Russia to a boil, U.S. rulers will be forced to ditch their mask of liberal democracy and its charade of “human rights.” They will have no choice. To protect their profits and prepare for World War III, the liberal finance capital bosses must crush their capitalist competition—the openly racist, “America First” isolationists fronted by the likes of Donald Trump and Ron DeSantis.

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KCC: ANTIRACIST STUDENTS’ DEFIANCE EXPOSES LIBERAL FASCIST DANGER

BROOKLYN, NY, January 3—After weeks of discussing the politics and history of sit-ins and occupations, more than 20 students marched to the administrative building today to occupy the office of the “Director of Student Engagement and Community Standards.” The attempted occupation was in protest of the ongoing racist charges made by the campus and signed by this director against four Kingsborough Community College (KCC) students. When we surrounded the office we discovered it had closed as KCC’s administrators were working remotely, but this disappointment was only temporary.

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Forty years of communist struggle in public health

Communists in the Progressive Labor Party (PLP) have been organizing in the American Public Health Association (APHA) for over 40 years in order to expose how capitalism and racism decimate health and health care in the U.S., especially for Black and poor workers. We have drawn inspiration from early communists in struggles for public health, exemplified by “red 48er” Rudolph Virchow who in 1848 showed that the deaths in the typhus epidemic in Germany were related to poverty and living conditions and then joined the Revolution of 1848 against the German aristocracy. In that spirit, we have put forward the need for a communist revolution while presenting CHALLENGE, holding annual PLP-led breakfasts or forums, writing and distributing annual analyses of capitalism and health, and participating in many sections and caucuses.

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Reds at the Blackboard: Working-class fightback keeps students safe

Newark, NJ - Over the last few weeks, workers and students, along with members from the Progressive Labor Party (PLP), have shown sparks of fury against the racist liberal bosses at Barringer High School and the Newark School District, for firing a Latin, antiracist teacher over attending a rally with his students in New York City (NYC). The rally was in solidarity with the mother of Raymond Chaluisant, a young man murdered by the police last July. When teachers are punished for encouraging their students to be militant in the face of racism, that is a dangerous sign for our class.

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Reds vs Eviction, Part 6: Brown Squire, a “solid-red” communist

The following is part six of a seven-part series reprinted and lightly edited from the communist newspaper Daily Worker in September-October, 1932, written by famous communist Mike Gold. The series was titled, “Negro Reds of Chicago.”   Workers here are referred to as Black instead of the original “Negro” to reflect our antiracist principles as well as the linguistic shifts that occurred over decades of antiracist class struggle.   Communists have a long history of fighting against racist attacks on our class. One such fight was against landlords and evictions.

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NYT strike uncovers a newspaper unfit for workers

New York City—For the first time in over 40 years, over 1,100 New York Times journalists and staff walked off the job in a one-day strike for a major labor dispute. more than 1,100 unionized Times employees walked off the job today in a 24-hour strike. The NYT Guild represents journalists, editors, advertising sales, business staff and security guards who have been without a new contract since March 2021 (NYT, 12/7). The workers struck against the biggest liberal mouthpiece for the main wing of the U.S. ruling class.

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RED EYE ON THE NEWS . . . January 18, 2023

Racism in medicine has long history New England Journal of Medicine, 9/8/22–On May 23, 1968, Howard Goldman, director of the New York Bureau of X-Ray Technology, acknowledged that x-ray technicians routinely exposed Black patients to doses of radiation that were higher than those [w]hite patients received…as x-ray technology developed in the early 20th century, false beliefs about biologic differences between Black and [w]hite people affected how doctors used this technology.

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Letters ... January 18, 2023

In ‘class’ struggle: Unpacking “Violence” I teach social studies to high school students and I have learned that before we teach historical content it is important to have a conversation with students about violence. The very first unit that I taught covered the French Revolution, and when we discussed the Reign of Terror I asked my students whether or not they believed that these policies were justified. The majority of the class responded “no” emphatically citing the violence of the Jacobin government.

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