Letters of January 15

Strike Against Racist Police Terror
This is an excerpt from a speech read at the latest demonstration for Kyam Livingston. She was a black woman who was left to die in prison by the New York Police Department and the city’s prison guards.
We come from St. Mary’s Church in Harlem. We are in support. Support of the Family of Kyam Livingston. Support for the friends of Kyam Livingston. And support for EVERY family that could be victimized by Racist Police Terror!
Our own daughter could wind up dumped in a jail cell. Our own son could be dragged behind bars there. For hours and hours in sickening filth. Waiting, stuffed in with other prisoners. While “the papers get lost.” Hoping not to get sick! Not to DIE. While the racist guards ignore, threaten and disrespect them. All while you are dying! DYING!
Who could this Not happen to. You!? You! You!
It could happen to any of us. It’s so True!! At St. Mary’s we know about dying.
We counted and we discovered the average age when brothers and sisters die is forty-eight years old. This is from a system of racist health care  and from the fascist denial of healthcare, that murdered our sister Kyam.
Who is going to fight this? New Mayors? New police chiefs? We will hear promises; we have heard thousand of promises.
Promises from mayor-elect Bill DeBlasio who just promised “I can’t be at war with Wall street. Wall street is our Hometown industry.” Promises from Bill Bratton who arrests workers who have to beg for a sandwich and coffee. Who fires rubber bullets at demonstrators? Bill and Bill. We’re going to make you Pay UP Your Bill!
Because we know who we can trust!
Our sister Kyam could only trust her fellow workers. Sisters who cleared a bench for her, sisters who smoother back her hair, fellow workers who tenderly tended her. Sisters who saw her seizures begin. Working-class sisters who confronted the fascist guards and demanded HELP! Kyam Livingston could rely only on her fellow workers standing up to fascist terror. And so can we.
The barons of Wall Street are paying for fascist terror to protect their staggering system of exploitation and death. Here and worldwide.
They are losing in the profit squeeze struggle with their rival thugs around the world. They must make the U.S. workers ready for their new plans for oppression. And for their new plans for war.
That is why they pay these killer kkkops. They are paid to intimidate us. They are paid to murder us. They are paid to control us! But sisters and brothers we can pay too. We must pay too. We must pay them back. We must push them back!
Since November two years ago police have murdered at least eleven of our sisters and brothers throughout our region. We must act, and act together.
We must continue the struggle for justice for each of our fallen workmates, and for their families. But we must sharpen our message.
We must take our message into every school, into every congregation, into every workplace, into every community and into the hearts and minds of everyone we know.
And we must stir our anger into action. More and more into action.
Protest. Yes. Picket Lines Yes. Marches. Yes
But we must urge and plan walk outs. We must organize strikes. With every racist murder we must hit them harder and harder the only place Wall street cares about: their money. What they steal from us we will deny to them.
Only by going on the labor and student strikes offensive can we push back racist police terror. Many lives depend on this. Our lives in fact!
So as we say at St. Mary’s, Let us join together and fight the good fight.
Comrade
Capitalist Devastation in the Philippines
Recently one of the biggest typhoons in history devastated the residents of Tacloban and surrounding areas in the Philippines. Thousands have been killed and injured. Hundreds of thousands are homeless. Capitalism created the poverty that condemned thousands to be the victims of Typhoon Yolanda. Most Filipino workers barely survive on two dollars a day!
In a communist society, the working class would mobilize to build safe buildings and have a concrete plan to evacuate workers. We have hints of what can be done now. Cuba has a plan to evacuate workers in the event of hurricanes. The China of 40 years ago had far more concern for workers’ lives. When an upcoming earthquake was detected, thousands were evacuated.
In 1989, the city of Baguio in the Northern Philippines suffered a 7.8 earthquake. Like the recent typhoon, capitalism was responsible for many deaths and injuries.
Six months before the earthquake my wife and friends had vacationed in Baguio’s Hyatt Hotel. Speaking of capitalism, when the earthquake hit, the hotel went to the ground and 400 people were killed. What happened to the steel for a stronger structure, which would have saved many lies?
The money “rested” in capitalist pockets! In comparison, my wife’s parents’ house, nearby, had steel supports anchored in cement. The house shook and shook, but didn’t go down.
The lessons of capitalism, especially in places like the Philippines, prone to natural disasters, will continue to be deadly. The only answer to this is a communist revolution and a workers’ society which values equality and our well-being.
Stockton California Comrade