The Rebate Scam; More Betting Advice

How are you going to spend your $600? The poorest: the unemployed, those who don’t make enough to file, those on Social Security as well as certain veterans won’t get anything. The really poor will get $300, individuals $600 and couples $1200 with $300 per dependent. Piddly, even if it weren’t a scam.

The aim, and this is always their “solution” to economic crises, is to give tax money to capitalists. This time it will go through the circuitous path of your checking account…briefly. Three hundred dollars is, at best, a couple of trips to the grocery store for a family or a single credit card payment. Or maybe a fun night on the town with your friends, but not much more than that.

A lot of people I know already have that money spent whether in bills or rent. They’re relying on it in these tough times, so it will hardly count as disposable spending money as the government hopes. People are too in the hole to save it. The hope is that everyone will fill up the tank and go to the mall with it. Some will do just that since it’s hardly enough to be real debt relief for folks. The hole everyone is in will get no shallower.

Yeah, that’s the solution. Give everybody a little money to buy more shit they don’t need feeding the problem in the first place; the same old falling rate of profit and overcapacity endemic in a system based on commodity production. The crisis in banking and the finance sector in general adds depth to this crisis. Workers the world over are getting it from all sides these days.

Boom, bust, boom, bust, boom, bust. We’ve been here before. For some people that’s exactly what this little money will be in their pockets; a brief boom followed by a bust. A sugar rush of spending infusion into the economy. For many people it’s already gone to pay down bills, part of the rent, their taxes or the booze they’re going to buy so they can get smashed for a month straight (and who doesn’t need to with all these worries?).

Mine is going to rent. In the meantime my debt gets bigger and my income gets smaller. The economic crisis is based on bigger contradictions than these fools know. The UN putting down food riots (because of prices, not scarcity) in Haiti is the shape of things to come.

“You’re hungry and so are your children. You may even starve to death, but don’t touch that food, it’s private property!” That’s capitalism for hungry people; it throws you in jail for feeding yourself when you have no money. If any more proof was needed that the United Nations’ main role is the defense of the wretched status quo of the imperialist system then Haiti should answer it. If not, write me and I’ll give you several thousands more examples.

The government hopes this will shock the country out of recession. Don’t use your check to bet on it.

Ireland United by 2016? I’ll Take That Bet!

This April saw the tenth anniversary of the so-called Good Friday Agreement that ended the armed conflict between between the Provisional IRA and the Brits. It did a lot more than that (and a lot less). Ten years on and what do socialists say about it? Are the Irish people on the march, as Gerry Adams insists, to a United Ireland by the 100th anniversary of the Easter Rising in 2016? He might have done better for himself if he put it off a bit, say until the 300th anniversary of the United Irishmen rising in 2098.

Sinn Fein has recently had “open” meetings all around the North to calm nerves and prop up the faithful over the last couple of weeks. I’m not normally a betting man, but I’ll take Gerry’s challenge. If you would like to enter the pool write me. Provo spin not withstanding the odds are now running at about 3,000,000 to 1. Here at the Rustbelt Radical we will entertain all wagers; any true believers in the Provo promise out there who would like to make a potential bundle write me and I’ll tell you where to send the money. A more likely bet, though one I wouldn’t make, is rather that the South of Ireland will be back in the Commonwealth by then.

Here’s John McAnulty some months ago in England giving a broad overview of how the situation arrived at where we are now. John is a leading member of Ireland’s Socialist Democracy from Belfast.

It may be a depressing scenario after thirty years of war, but it is the scenario confronting Irish revolutionaries. It is interesting the number of parallels one could draw from the general line of what John says about Ireland to similar movements in South Africa, Palestine, Nicaragua, etc. Though the Provo defeat seems more thorough, more total.

In the second video John answers some questions, including why Britain feels it has to remain in Ireland.

Reflections on Zimbabwe

I am still recovering after being laid low. I hope to be back on my feet in a day or two. In the meantime here is another guest post. This one by Detroit’s own Brad D. on the crisis in Zimbabwe and reactions on the left, particularly the black left. RBR

Some reflections on Zimbabwe (and the left)

Brad D. Detroit

I’ve been pretty wrapped up in what’s happening in Zimbabwe, I know a lot of you have been too. I want to chance to put down some of what I’ve been thinking.

It needs to be said that this issue is the business of the left because in years past he was one of ours. This is how some of our movements turn out and we should learn from that and be involved in changing it. These days there is a split on the international left about Mugabe and the last few years of crisis. It’s been difficult for many of us to really come out against him, as Bill Fletcher remarks in his defense of an open letter that he contributed to. I would really like to draw comrade’s attention to this open letter that is addressed to Mugabe, signed and co-written by a number of Black progressives in the U.S. It’s widely available online, including Z Magazine’s site. It plainly states that the letter was written by long time supporters of the liberation war and many subsequent years of ZANU-PF rule. In fact the letter only criticizes the recent years, so it’s definitely written by some true blue supporters. But the letter is forthright and unequivocal in its grave concern for the situation in Zimbabwe and its opposition to Mugabe’s rule of late. It’s a protest letter author by outraged former sympathizers and it brings up many key points.

What is really telling is one of the reasons cited for the grave concern is the authors ongoing connections to trade unions, women’s groups, and other social change institutions on the ground in Zimbabwe. Our friends are telling us that your rule is making it impossible to operate, the letter explains. Also quite damning is the fact that, along with the slew of other injustices mentioned, landlessness is still a major problem. This plainly deflates the rumor on the left that Mugabe undertook a serious effort to carry out land reform in the late 1990’s/early 2000’s. It’s pretty obvious to me that his brief land reform efforts came twenty years after they should have, were horribly planned, and not very thorough anyway. Of course not pursuing much needed land reform right off the bat in the early 1980’s was an important concession ZANU leadership made. A meaningful redistribution of land and wealth that truly breaks with the colonial pattern is still needed. The letter frankly states that land reform as it has existed has not been about tackling poverty but rather nepotism. They spell out how the blame for botched, belated land reform, deadly hunger, and food distribution in general lays at the feet of Mugabe and ZUNA-PF.

The letter also states that its signers “represent a long tradition of opposition to unjust laws “. Another pretty cutting point, considering Mugabe’s use of painstakingly legislated authoritarism. The letter also points to the fact that the government has done precious little to combat AIDS, which you should not be surprised is another major social catastrophe.

The letter also makes sure to mention that there is indeed a vibrant struggle against oppression in Zimbabwe. As the letter states again and again, this is faced with raw police brutality. Nevertheless, the letters authors state their belief that there can be a peaceful solution to the crisis. They also say that the result of the peaceful end to the crisis needs to be the removal of Robert Mugabe and his replacement with a “more broadly supported government upholding the democratic rights of all”. I think some of this is fairly naïve. I don’t doubt that a popular mobilization can defeat Mugabe, so we agree there. But it’s hard for me take seriously the plea that Mugabe “find a way to work with others in and outside of your government to create an effective process for a transition”. I don’t think Bob’s going out like that. We all saw Morgan Tsvangirai’s bloody head last year, and that was before the election. I think more violence is in store before he leaves. I think the authors know that, too. Check out more commentary on the letter on The Black Commentator website, which is always packed with great essays and news.

Another thing that has sometimes prevented me from coming down hard on Mugabe in the past—and I think this goes for a lot of leftists, too—is the political unsavoryness of major parts of the main opposition groups platform. The Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) is a somewhat pluralistic party that favors freedom of speech and is supported by trade unions. That’s the good news. It’s also a neoliberal party that is generally in favor of limited privatization. As far as them getting Western backing as Mugabe constantly points out, it’s true. This is simply not the party socialists would prefer to be rooting for, to say the least. Critically, then came out against land reform. This was not a good move politically at the time and many potential supporters were hesitant to support them for a long time because of this.

With all of those reservations I am damn pleased that the MDC has taken the parliament and—intentional delay aside—seems to have taken the presidency. ZANU-PF is an entrenched clique and with an autocratic president that needs to be dislodged after 28 years in power. MDC is the only force able to make that happen right now. As a modest bright side, there are socialists in the MDC as barely influential as they are. The International Socialist Tendency (anchored by the British Socialist Workers Party) has a number of comrades on the ground and has fielded candidates on a MDC ticket in the past. Needless to say they are operating underground now.

It is pretty widely believed that the 2000 election was stolen (sound familiar?). It is in the eight years since then that the MDC has really been in a fight for survival, essentially because it is a viable threat to the state. The police state tactics I have mentioned have been ramped up and let us not forget the urban clearance of a few years back. MDC’s base is mostly urban and quite obviously Mugabe’s campaign to ‘beautify Harare’ by bulldozing entire neighborhoods of makeshift city housing and market stalls was aimed at ‘softening up’ the part of the population with a history of challenging him. It’s classic state intimidation, creating social fragmentation as an organizing deterrent. In recent years the discontent with Mugabe has spread to the countryside. This was writing on the wall, loyal to Mugabe as the rural base has been. But the hunger is just too much. With the exception of a shrinking chunk of rural people and war veterans, there’s not really a sector that Mugabe can thoroughly depend on anymore.

Back to the split on the left. There of course is the ‘enemy of my enemy of my friend’ approach. This tendency is epitomized by Workers World Party, but frankly it is fairly widespread on the international left. For Kim Jong Il to contemporary Iran or Sudan, do not expect a word of criticism. Of course we are Marxists and considerably more honest about what we can plainly see. In addition to being defended on simple defencist grounds, Mugabe and ZANU-PF are also defended based on a series of myths.

First there are the romantics that cannot see past the 1970’s. Sure what’s not to like about old school Mugabe? But for them it end there. Somewhat related to that camp are the nationalist romantics, the same comrades who would never dare criticize Sekou Toure or Ethiopia’s Megitsu either. Again, stuck thirty years ago. For the younger generation there is the myth of the recent land reform attempts. I’ve already made known my feeling towards this dashed promise, but not everyone makes the same appraisal. Of course as socialists and anti-imperialists we know damn well why farms need to be taken out of nearly exclusive white hands and collectivized. This was always supposed to be a part of the Zimbabwean Revolution, going back to its earliest incarnations. For some it’s symbolic importance and historic necessity make any effort worth exalting. Any revolutionary has a knee-jerk approval of colonized people freeing the land. But we have to recognize the dissonance between what we wanted and what we got. Part of why people can still love Mugabe is they are not interested in sorting out these contradictions.

Then of course there are the lefties who remember his anti-imperialist rigor and determination, not to mention his professed socialist politics. He was basically like Che with a better strategy. But let us remind ourselves, for example, of Mugabe’s past dealings with the IMF. Let us look at some of the unbearable social ‘belt-tightening’ that his regime has undertaken. He has not been any recognizable variety of leftist in ages. But his credentials from past eras are good enough to maintain our good will, some of our fellow socialists maintain.

For example I will draw comrades attention to a small but active Black nationalist group based in Brooklyn called December 12^th Movement. Politically they are a pretty interesting group, promoting a socialist-tinged version of classic 20^th century Black nationalism. They wear the Red, Black, and Green. They are involved with reparations activism, against police brutality, and definitely stress Pan-African solidarity. They are typical of many of Mugabe’s contemporary defenders, although with more enthusiasm than most. For them Mugabe is not just a defendable president, but really a vibrant symbol for what the African Diaspora really needs (miraculously they had supporters visit Zimbabwe recently, returning with glowing reviews). It is a mirage, we know, but to them it is potent. We are going to talk to people in our daily lives who look at Zimbabwe this way and we should understand the reasoning and be prepared to talk.

For me, Robert Mugabe is kind of like Elvis. There are the early years spent making headlines for shaking up the system. The rebel that changed history. Then there are the awkward middle years featuring a couple of hits (68 Comeback Special, attempts at land reform) and lots of disappointments. Then comes the late years: embarrassing long-time fans, in a sad spiral downward. Then there are the late, late years spent dying on a toilet.

Here’s to hoping the Zimbabwean people kick the corpse off the thrown.

War in the House of Labor

This guest post is from Susan Rosenthal on the dispute between the CNA and the SEIU. Susan is part of the International Health Care Workers for People over Profit pictured below at the Labor Notes Conference a couple of weeks ago.

War in the House of Labor

by Susan Rosenthal

The American medical system ruins people’s lives for profit. Fortunately, union organizing drives in the medical industry are enjoying a higher-than-average rate of success. Unfortunately, two major health workers’ unions, the California Nurses Association (CNA) and the Service Employees International Union (SEIU), are at war – a term used by both sides. CNA accuses SEIU of making deals with management that hurt workers, and SEIU accuses CNA of sabotaging its union drives.

This is a real battle. The CNA website posts a sign on its home page, “Had it with SEIU? Work for a REAL union.” To protest the CNA, hundreds of SEIU members physically stormed the Labor Notes conference in Detroit on April 12.

Cynics view this war as reason to dismiss all unions. That’s a huge mistake. Workers need unions to counter the relentless greed of business. Employers, politicians and the mainstream media consistently attack unions because even the worst ones block bosses from having complete control of the workplace.

Statistics show that unionized workers are more likely to have medical coverage, pension benefits and protection from sexual harassment and wrongful dismissal. Areas with more unions enjoy higher wages, longer life spans, lower infant death rates, better education and less poverty.

The Issues

American unions were so powerful in the 1930s that employers needed Washington’s help to crush them. Today, after decades of union busting, fewer than eight percent of private-sector workers are in unions, the lowest rate in over a century. Moreover, the remaining unions have been transformed from fighting organizations controlled by workers to bureaucratic organizations dominated by middle-class professionals. For most Americans, the result has been a steady decline in working and living standards.

The battle between SEIU and CNA arose in the context of renewed efforts to defend workers’ rights and centers on three disputes over how to organize:

Should medical facilities be organized wall-to-wall (SEIU includes all health workers) or by trade (nurses in one union and support staff in another)? Wall-to-wall or industrial unions have more power to fight management than craft-based unions. However, in practice, workers organize as best they can in the particular circumstances they face.

Another concern is whether management should be involved in the process of union certification. Labor-management collaboration is generally opposed because it favors management. However, every union contract is a form of labor-management collaboration. SEIU and CNA differ in where to draw the line between acceptable and unacceptable degrees of collaboration.

The third issue is the extent to which unions should be controlled from the top-down or the bottom-up. A rank-and-file rebellion inside SEIU, United Health Workers-West (UHW) is pushing for more democracy through one-member-one-vote. CNA is using this split to press its case that SEIU is a business union that doesn’t represent workers’ interests. However, UHW also condemns CNA for its top-down sabotage of SEIU union drives.

Instead of debating these three issues in a way that would benefit all workers, the leaders of SEIU and CNA are conducting a divisive turf war that is hurting them both.

Taking Sides

In any conflict, there is pressure to take sides. Supporters of CNA insist that it is a more progressive and democratic union than SEIU. The leaders of CNA talk left and have taken a public role in fighting for national medicare. However, in Ohio and on other occasions, CNA leaders have gone over the heads of SEIU rank-and-file workers to dictate what should happen in a particular workplace. That’s not democratic.

Those who favor SEIU point to its proud history of organizing immigrant workers (Janitors for Justice) and supporting social reforms. However, top leaders in SEIU have also functioned undemocratically. The split inside SEIU was provoked when head office moved to silence debate within the union.

Recent labor coverage has favored CNA, especially after busloads of SEIU members stormed the recent Labor Notes conference. A good example is Steve Early’s article in Counterpunch . Early begins by calling SEIU protestors a “rowdy, punch-throwing, rent-a-mob.”

I was inside (and later outside) the Labor Notes banquet hall when SEIU members tried to break through the doors. Such tactics must be condemned. However, this was no “rent-a-mob.” Most were ordinary union members, including families with small children, most looking poor and many of them Black. I am certain they boarded those buses to defend their union. If they knew they were going to be in a fight, they would have left the kids at home. One SEIU member died of a heart attack, and another union militant suffered a head wound.

This tragedy was created by the leaders of both unions, who are pitting their members against one another.

I attended several meetings at Labor Notes, where activists from SEIU and CNA expressed their grievances against each other’s unions. I concluded that both sides have legitimate concerns. At the end of his article, Early acknowledges the same, by favorably quoting a member of UHW,

Many participants, who can fairly be described as members of the labor left and generally suspicious of top union leaders, were actually very sympathetic to the SEIU’s grievance against CNA surrounding the events in Ohio.

Sadly, Early concludes by returning to his condemnation of SEIU as the moral loser of the latest round in a continuing battle. This is not helpful. Those who cheer for either side only fuel a war that is hurting both sides. So, what’s the solution?

Rank-and-File Unity

In any union, leaders should be supported ONLY so far as they represent the interests of the rank-and-file. By this measure, the leaders of SEIU and CNA both fail because, if this war is not stopped, one or both unions will be ruined. As it is, bitterness and resentment have already crippled organizing efforts at several sites, to the benefit of management. To advance the interests of workers in both unions, we must distinguish union bureaucrats from rank-and-file workers.

Modern labor unions are cross-class organizations, being both working-class organizations of self-defense and part of the management system of capitalism. Most union members are working-class (the rank and file), while most union officials are salaried professionals who negotiate with employers to set the terms of exploitation. Turf wars for union recognition arise from this class conflict.

Because most unions are run like businesses, from the top down, more members means more money and more power for union bureaucrats. They want this power to gain more leverage at the negotiating table. That’s why leaders of different unions compete to represent a workplace or group of workers instead of pooling resources and cooperating. Inter-union rivalry is usually justified by claims that one union is better at representing workers than the other. However, divisions between unions only weaken the ability of all workers to stand up to management.

Over the past few decades, rank-and-file workers in different industries have pushed for more militant and democratic unions controlled by members, from the bottom up. Such worker self-organization is opposed by bureaucrats because their power to negotiate with management rests on their ability to control the ranks.

Struggles for rank-and-file control of unions offer a different kind of power, one that rests on the ability of workers to stop production. Because all workers have similar concerns, worker-controlled organizations have the potential to unite workers across divisions of union, workplace and industry and do what bureaucrats have never been able to achieve: build a labor movement strong enough to reverse decades of defeats and concessions.

During the Labor Notes conference, as accusations flew between CNA and SEIU, Patricia Campbell of the Independent Workers Union of Ireland (IWE) stated. “You must stop fighting among each other and unite. You need to kick out the bureaucrats in both your unions. That’s the only way you can advance your struggle for patients’ and workers’ rights.”

She is right. In each workplace, rank-and-file workers must decide how they organize: whether in wall-to-wall groupings or by trade; and the extent to which they collaborate with management and with other unions. Free and full debate must be encouraged, with votes binding on all. Such self-organization is critical to build workers’ confidence and create unions powerful enough to win real gains.

Of course, people make mistakes in any process. That is no reason to deny them the right to decide what happens at work and in their lives.

Right or wrong, and regardless of their intentions, no union official has the right to IMPOSE policy on rank-and-file workers without their consent. This is just as true for CNA as it is for SEIU. To move forward, workers in SEIU and CNA must build on-the-ground unity, based on common class concerns.

Susan Rosenthal is the author of POWER and Powerlessness (2006), and Class, Health and Health Care (2008). She belongs to the National Writers Union and is a founding member of International Health Workers for People Over Profit. She can be reached through her web site

Foster in Sydney

This is the summation of John Bellamy Foster’s speech “Capitalism and Climate Change” at the Climate Change and Social Change conference in Sydney earlier this month. It’s from Links Magazine. The full speech can be seen here.

Pope On Tour

To celebrate the arrival of Papa to these shores I bring you one of Cincinnati’s original punks…. SS-20 with Pope On Tour. I am glad to know they are still alive and well. I came of age at some of these shows in the eighties and the reunions of the early nineties.

The photos above are from the legendary Jockey Club in Newport, KY (right across the river from the ‘Nati, where they sell until 2 am) in 1985 and were taken by Elizabeth Stevens.

If you notice nobody looks of age. I think they used one of those amusement park height guides for roller coasters to let kids in. There was a party store near where I went to school called Dee’s, if you could see over the counter you could get served. Seriously, you used to be able to get in the JC with an adult library card.

The singer Jughead, who taught “socialist studies” at public schools, was always throwing out left-wing challenges to the crowd. This brought SS-20 into a rather direct confrontation with some of those more disposed to the Racial Holy War within the punk scene. I’ve seen Jughead, albeit in his younger days and juiced up on well drinks, kick Nazis in the face from the stage. And Pedro on guitar!

The ISO was the left group in town and at that time most of them were young and in the scene in Cincinnati. I probably still have a couple of old Socialist Workers I bought outside of shows on Short Vine in the 80’s. Those were my first introduction to Marxism.

Thanks to Jay out in the Bay for sending this to me. He and I, both now exiles from our hometown, saw a lot of shows together. We used to shout out at SS-20 for the song “Right Wing Death Squad” mainly because it rocked but also because the politics were good. I think Jughead thought we were fascists for a while and didn’t know that the song was against the death squads then running wild in Latin America.

I can still feel the square punches to my face; Jay do you still have a hangover?

SS-20 everyone.