The Worker Workers of the World Unite
Party of Communists USA I BLOOD LIES N Book Review: S I Debunking the Myth D and challenging the E lies about the USSR
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I N S I D E
Fall/Winter 2014
continuing the tradition of the Daily Worker, founded 1924
POSTAL WORKERS Sharpening The Class Struggle
Celebrating 97 years of the Bolshevik Revolution
John Dennie, Retired Mail Handler (U.S. Postal Service) pictured with banner below Does government have a role in providing essential services for the public good or should maximum profits be extracted by the private sector? Concerning our Postal Service this debate did not start in 2008 when the current recession, coupled with the onerous requirement Congress imposed on the USPS to prefund retiree health benefits, began to cause the huge deficits being trumpeted by the privateers and their mouthpieces in the media. The back and forth between a postal service operated for the public good and profit-driven “entrepreneurs” charging what the traffic will bear goes back to at least the early 19th Century with the fights over the private carriage statutes which gave the post office a monopoly over the delivery of letter mail; — to the debates waged over parcel post and postal banking in the early 20th century;— to the conclusions of the Johnson administration’s Kappel Commission that America’s postal service should be placed on a ”business-like” basis;—to Ronald Reagan’s Grace Commission which advocated for a fully privatized postal system in 1984. From the beginning, the Post Office had a monopoly on the delivery of letter mail. There were many challenges to the private express statutes by private carriers, particularly by Wells Fargo which operated a private postal service in the western states for many years, in flagrant violation of the law.
Private express companies like Wells Fargo continued with package delivery, charging whatever the traffic would bear, especially in rural areas. To provide citizens with an affordable package delivery service the Post Office initiated Parcel Post in 1913. Tension has existed ever since between the USPS and the private carriers. Both UPS and FedEx spend big bucks lobbying Congress to constrict USPS ability to compete for a share of the parcel and express mail business. And Fred Smith, chairman of FedEx, sits on the board of ALEC. (American Legislative Exchange Council, an ultra-conservative advocate for business) In 1971, with the passage of the Postal Reorganization Act, the Postal Service became a government-owned corporation. The Nixon administration used the findings of the Kappel Commission as a template for the reorganization. Privatization has been occurring on a piecemeal basis ever since. Large private mailing houses get huge discounts for pre-sorting mail. Discounts so huge they bring the revenue received for the presort mail down below what it costs to process it. These pre-sort houses (Pitney Bowes is the largest) are for the most part schlock operations with low paid workers with no benefits, in contrast to the unionized postal workers. Transportation has also undergone more and more privatization since the ‘80’s with postal drivers being replaced by non-union freight haulers like J.B. Hunt. In January of 2013, a “White Paper” funded by Pitney Bowes came out calling for full privatization of all postal operations except for “lastmile” delivery. As we speak we are witnessing the implementation of the privatization called for in the White Paper with the program now underway at 82 Staples stores to provide full postal services. A pure and simple unionbusting move to replace postal clerks with low paid Staples associates. And the postal service continues to close and consolidate its network of processing facilities causing our customer base to seek alternate methods of delivery. The Postal Service is a thriving PCUSA International Chair Joe Hancock attends Congress, story inside (page 2) enterprise if the unfair retirees health care pre-funding is taken off our backs. Just in the first quarter of 2014 we would have shown a $765 million profit without the pre-funding. Lenin called “… the post office an example of the socialist system.” He thought that “… the mechanism of social management is already here to hand.” The reader is encouraged to consult Chapter 3, Section 3 of State and Revolution (the two concluding paragraphs) to read Lenin’s analysis of the post office as a paradigm for socialism in full context.
PCUSA ATTENDS MEXICAN PARTY OF COMMUNISTS CONGRESS
INTERNATIONAL
The Worker / fall/winter 2014 / page 2
PCUSA ATTENDS MEXICAN PARTY CONGRESS Report from V Congress of the Partido Comunista de Mexico (PCM)
Joe Hancock(left) - International Commission PCUSA
On September 13, 14, and 15 the Fifth Congress of the Communist Party of Mexico (PCM) met in the city of Oaxaca. The Congress was made up of delegates elected in primary party organizations, and was joined by delegations from the Communist Party of Greece (KKE), the Brazilian Communist Party (PCB), the Communist Party of the Peoples of Spain (PCPE), the Sudanese Communist Party, the Communist Party of El Salvador, the Party of Communists USA (PCUSA), and the electronic magazine, Marxism-Leninism today. In addition, the greetings of 40 communist and workers parties, movements and antiimperialist revolutionary forces were received.
Comrade Hancock presents The Worker at the Congress in Oaxaca, Mexico
From Mexico, the Mexican Communist Movement, the Popular Socialist Party, the Socialist People’s Party of Mexico, the Socialist People’s Congress (NPC) Party and the Broad Front of Popular Struggle flocked as fraternal delegates to greet the Fifth congress. They also brought greetings from the Revolutionary Left Front, the Teachers Revolutionary Group, the Federation of Independent Workers and the Communist youth, the Federation of Young Communists. To conduct its work, the fifth Congress appointed a Presidium committee composed of comrades Marco Vinicio Dávila, Gustavo Adolfo López Ortega, and Jasmine Padilla. The congress paid tribute to comrades fallen since the previous Congress, the Forth, many of whom were killed by the repressive forces of monopoly power. In the course of the congress, with complete transparency and openness according to the proper functioning of democratic centralism, the main political report by PCM First Secretary Pavel Blanco Cabrera along with the new agenda and theses were approved, and the party rules were reformed. The approval of these documents was the result of nearly six months of discussion among the membership and a year of preparation by the outgoing Central Committee.
Each of the representatives of the invited parties at the Congress made brief remarks to the assembled delegates, including Joseph Hancock, representing the Party of Communists USA. Comrade Hancock told the assembled delegates why it was necessary to form a new communist party in the United States, spoke briefly about our new newspaper, The Worker, and told how the U.S. is suffering the effects of neo-liberal policies that plagued many of the countries of Latin America in the 1970’s beginning in Chile. He pointed out the high rate of unemployment, the export of manufacturing jobs outside the U.S., the increased racism, austerity measures and cuts to public sector services, cuts to Social Security and other programs, raids of the pension funds of workers, and the militarization of the police. “The working class of the USA needs a vanguard party and we want to learn as much as we can from our Mexican comrades,” he said. On behalf of the PCUSA, comrade Hancock presented the PCM with its organizational banner which was hung in the hall for the duration of the Congress. In the last item on its agenda, the Congress elected a new Central Committee, combining experience and youth. At the plenary session of
the Central Committee, comrades Pavel Blanco Cabrera was elected as First Secretary and Diego Torres as Second Secretary. It chose as full members of the Politburo Gustavo Adolfo López Ortega, Marco Vinicio Dávila, Julio Cota, Jasmine Padilla, and Omar Cota. Comrades Fernanda Larráinzar and Kimberly ruiz were elected as alternate Politburo members. The fifth Congress of the PCM worked with efficiency and decorum thanks to the enthusiastic preparation of Oaxaca’s J.V. Stalin State Regional Committee. It should be noted that on September 15, while the monopoly power represented by Peña Nieto and the social democratic populism represented by López Obrador “commemorated” the 1810 uprising for independence, pledging to continue capitalism, the Communists in Oaxaca hoisted the flag of social emancipation, and in the context of the capital / labor contradiction, called for sharpening the class struggle to strengthen the tide of revolution. Red flags of the PCM are flying high everywhere!
The Worker / fall/winter 2014 / page 3
LABOR
The Necessity of Industrial Concentration
Bill Connolly - Labor Commission PCUSA
Industrial concentration is the Party’s policy of concentrating its efforts to develop cadres in the “basic industries”—the strategic sectors of production, transportation, and power generation that can shut the capitalist system down during a general strike. The Party seeks to build shop units in the basic industries, i.e., those without which the entire economic system as a whole cannot operate. Basic industries center on enterprises that produce material essential for further industrial production (such as steel, mining, oil, chemicals), that transport material to sites of consumption or further production (such as railroads, trucking, shipping), or that generate power to keep industry running (such as electric power plants, hydroelectric plants). These industries are the nerve centers of this country. Large numbers of workers are concentrated in basic industries. These workers are trained and disciplined by large-scale production. The greater training and discipline of workers in basic industries and their life experience-based understanding of large-scale economic EQUALITY
organization and its worldwide ramifications makes them influential among workers in smaller shops. Their large concentrations in major enterprises would give their potential strength greater power to influence and lead the entire working class if they were fully aware of and used it. When their potential strength is unleashed against the capitalist class, these workers are the revolutionary proletariat. The Party makes an assessment of which industries hold strategic importance in the capitalist economic system of this country, with the view of concentrating its energy to build the Party in these industries. The Party strives to make our class concentrated in the basic industries fully aware of its potential strength, which we seek to mobilize for the socialist revolution. For further information about the relevance of industrial concentration to our Party’s work, please consult J. Peters, The Communist Party Manual on Organization, especially pages 40 and 43 in the edition available from Red Star Publishers.
Ferguson and the Myth of a “Post-Racial” Society
George Greene - Commission on National Oppression PCUSA
Since Obama’s first election in 2008, much of the capitalist ruling class has been claiming that the U.S. is now a “post-racial” society. But most African-Americans, even if they still support Obama, have seen enough of “Black faces in high places” to know that this is a myth. Obama’s election did not change the fact that the Black family’s average income is less than 60% of the income for white families, and that the unemployment rate for the Black population is twice the rate for the white population. The murder last August of Michael Brown, an unarmed AfricanAmerican teenager shot by a white cop, has once again exposed the continuing racism of the U.S. state apparatus. Not only was Brown shot with his hands up, but the government used all the forces at its disposal, from armored trucks, helicopters, tear gas and the National Guard, to try to put down the justified rebellion of the people in Ferguson and their supporters from other parts of the country, which lasted for weeks. And while the protests were going on, the police killed another young Black man, Kajieme Powell, on August 19, in north St. Louis. In New York, there are continuing protests over the killing of Eric Garner, who was put in a chokehold by a cop in violation of “police procedures.” At least another half dozen cops just stood around as Garner repeatedly gasped: “I can’t breathe.” This should be enough to expose the theory of a few “rotten apples.” If most of the cops were there to serve the community, the government would want to severely punish the few “bad cops.” But these police murderers almost always go unpunished, or at the most get a slap on the wrist. The U.S. capitalist system developed and got rich off the labor of the kidnapped African slaves. The police forces in the South actually grew INTERNATIONAL
out of the patrols used to hunt for runaway slaves. After the Civil War and the defeat of Reconstruction, the South experiences another 100 years of Jim Crow apartheid and sharecropping. The police and Klan both carried out lynchings of African-Americans, and the cops enforced the system of debt peonage by returning those people trying to escape from debt to the plantation. For the last 50 years, African-Americans in the South and throughout the country have mainly been part of the lowest paid sector of the working class. In large cities such as New York, the great majority of low-paid service workers fighting for a $15 an hour minimum wage are Black and Latino. White workers are the majority of low-paid workers in those areas of the country where there are few Blacks and Latinos to super-exploit. Latinos are also subject to special police violence. This September 14 in Sunset Park, a Latino section of Brooklyn, a cop kicked Jonathan Daza, a vendor at a street fair, while he was handcuffed and lying on the ground for not packing up her goods quickly enough. And on September 20, police kicked a pregnant woman, Sandra Amezquita, also in Sunset Park, for protesting the fact that they were beating her teenage son. Clearly an imperialist country like the United States, which superexploits much of Asia, Africa and Latin America, will not refrain from oppressing Blacks, Latinos and Asians at home. Justice for Michael Brown, Eric Garner and all victims of police brutality! Self-determination for all oppressed nations and peoples at home and abroad!
PCUSA Solidarity with the Cuban 5
Joe Hancock - International Department PCUSA What started out as a small project has turned into a regular event where Angelinos can visit live via Skype with students in Havana, Cuba. The project was started to honor the 5 Cuban national heroes held in U.S. Prisons for protecting their homeland (and the United States) from terrorism. Two of the 5 have served their sentences and are now on our phone conferences explaining to young Americans the exact nature of their case, while 3 remain in prison. Our first conference was held in August at the Harriet Tubman Justice Center in Los Angeles. While there have been problems with the transmission because of interference by the United States government, the message is getting through. People who have never heard of the case of the Cuban 5 are hearing about it for the first time. On September 13, an event was held at the Liberation Art Gallery in South Central Los Angeles. The event was well attended, food and drinks were served and the hook up with students at the local Havana University was made. It was a tremendous success. Following this, PCUSA representatives Mike Martinez and Joe Hancock were invited to
the Maya Angelou High School to make a presentation about the 5 and to connect the high school students here with the students and dignitaries in Havana. "We will be holding there events until all of the 5 are free," Martinez said. One interesting note. The Party of Communists USA is the only party engaged in this people to people exchange to free the Cuban 5.
Mike Martinez speaking via Skype with Cuban students about the 5
The Worker / fall/winter 2014 / page 4
The October Revolution: 97 Years of Socialist Experience
Editorial
What the Example of the Soviet Union Shows The writer traveled to the Soviet Union in April 1985, while the U.S.S.R. was still socialist. Moscow and Leningrad were visited with a two-week friendship society tour. It was like a pilgrimage for me—a trip to a land where the working class really was the ruling class.
other essentials were a human right unlike in the U.S. and the other capitalist countries. Protecting this all against the predatory capitalists of foreign nations (in particular the U.S.) who wanted to take it all away from the people was the mighty Red Army.
Here was a country where the capitalists weren’t in charge. They had been expelled from power, driven out from government and the bureaucracy along with their stooges and hangers on. Their wealth, flowing from the ownership of factories and farms, had been seized. It was now the people’s property, administered by the socialist state, which used central planning to ensure that everyone’s needs were met.
The Soviet Union generously and selflessly budgeted each year a significant portion of its own national income to fund other socialist and socialist-oriented countries in need of economic assistance. And it did so entirely in the spirit of mutual assistance, not because it took advantage of other nations economically, as imperialist countries do. It stood at the vanguard of the socialist countries, the national liberation movements, and the revolutionary working class of the entire world, because its deeds matched its words.
Food, clothing, shelter—no one was wanting. Everyone was guaranteed a job. A job was a right. And if they couldn’t for whatever reason work, the government made sure people got an income. There were no landlords: Housing was made available to all. Paid vacations, relatively early retirements for both men and women, free education from kindergarten through graduate and professional school, it was in fact a veritable paradise for working people. Brand-new apartment buildings lined spotless boulevards on the outskirts of town. Bookstores were packed with people who had ample free time to develop themselves intellectually, unimpeded by the insecurity that exists throughout the capitalist countries of not knowing whether you will lose your job and with that the money needed to survive. There was no fear of losing your job. There were no money worries because food, housing, utilities, and
World Stewardship
This society, a great socialist society, actually existed in the Soviet Union. Many of us alive today remember it, whether we personally went there or not. Its example serves as a beacon, like a lighthouse whose powerful illumination of clarifying theory and practice still guides the Communist parties of the world as they navigate around the shoals of the class struggle, charting paths to the revolution that will free us once and for all from the capitalists. Bill Connolly for the Editorial Board October 2014
SOCIALISM
Environmental stewardship requires class consciousness. Every class matures as it defines it’s interests and the strategies for furthering the hegemony of those interests. In the epoch of bourgeois hegemony, environment is defined as those physical features of the real world that are exploited for profit. In the feudal society, occupying the epoch immediately preceding the bourgeois, environment was defined as the physical features of the world that could be claimed as wholly owned real property or chattel. In the epoch of workers hegemony, initiated by the USSR, environment is defined as the physical features of the world required to support life. This is a revolutionary break from the foundations of bourgeois thinking that fundamentally separates life sustaining characteristics from any working definition of an environment. Just as feudal class interests conceived of environment as itself representing value through the process of forcible control; so the bourgeois conceives of environment as the raw material of profit, exponentially increasing it’s productive capacity through exploitation of workers to enrich the bourgeois class endlessly. Therefore environmental stewardship for the bourgeois claims interests only in resource consumption, ergo the insatiable appetite for ever widening spheres of material processing and the despoiling of great swathes of those resources in the service of its own enrichment. Having learned from capitalist discipline how to maximize production, the working class harnesses this energy to serve its interest, enriching life sustaining characteristics of the environment to the members of its class. The discipline it practices defines environment to include society itself. The result is the organized effort developing the perennial nature of the earth, exploiting human talents to augment synergies of the biosphere toward a mature and sustainable environment. In the twentieth century the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics ushered in a workers concept of environment that set the foundation for the development of a permanent culture of earthly survival. With the establishment of a truly socialist state the interests of the great masses of humanity and the natural world could coincide, the foundation of an authentic stewardship of the earth was laid. The tools required to weld together the peoples of the world for the purpose of protecting, nurturing
and sustainably occupying earth—organized working people developing a socialist state— was produced and matured. The green revolution was and is the socialist revolution. The USSR and the soviet people who built and sustained her continue to be the shining example that an earthly permaculture is possible. Workers of the world unite, you have nothing to lose but your chains! Stephen Paulmier Editor
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Superb analysis and demolition of the claims in Timothy Snyder’s book Bloodlands BLOOD LIES: The Evidence that Every Accusation against Joseph Stalin and the Soviet Union in Timothy Snyder's ‘Bloodlands’ Is False. PLUS: What Really Happened in: the Famine of 1932-33; the "Polish Operation"; the "Great Terror"; the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact; the "Soviet invasion of Poland"; the "Katyn Massacre"; the Warsaw Uprising; and "Stalin's Anti-Semitism" (ISBN: 978-0-692-20099-5) by Grover Furr By William Podmore - October 1, 2014 In this extraordinary book, Professor Grover Furr analyses Bloodlands: Europe between Hitler and Stalin, by Timothy Snyder, a professor of Eastern European history at Yale University. Furr points out, “From its inception as an academic discipline the primary function of Soviet studies has been to provide a fount of anticommunist propaganda propped up by scholarship or the appearance of it.” He proves that Snyder’s book is indeed anti-communist propaganda propped up by the appearance of scholarship. He shows how Snyder misuses his sources, often citing sources that say nothing about what he claims they support. Over and again, Furr punctures myths about Soviet history, myths that Snyder repeats. For example, Furr notes that the Russian state has allowed nobody to read the transcript of the 1937 trial of Tukhachevsky and seven other generals since Colonel Viktor Alksnis read it in 1991. Until Alksnis read it, he believed the generals had been framed. After he read it, he concluded that they were guilty. On the purges of 1937-38, Snyder repeats the claim that the Soviet government was responsible. But Furr cites the conclusion drawn by V.N. Khaustov, an anti-communist historian: “Stalin made his decisions on the basis of confessions that were the result of the inventions of certain employees of the organs of state security. Stalin’s reactions attest to the fact that he took these confessions completely seriously.” Furr comments, “Khaustov admits the existence of a major conspiracy by Ezhov and concedes that Stalin was deceived by him. Ezhov admits as much in the confessions of his that we now have. Khaustov admits that Stalin acted in good faith on the basis of evidence presented to him by Ezhov, much of which must have been false.” Furr notes, “no one holds a government morally responsible for illegal crimes and atrocities committed by government officials unless the government discovers those crimes and yet refuses to punish the perpetrators. The Stalin government did vigorously pursue, investigate, prosecute, and punish Ezhov and the NKVD men under him who were responsible for these atrocities.” On the vexed issue of the Soviet non-aggression pact with Germany, Snyder repeats the Nazi lie that the Soviet Union and Nazi Germany allied to attack Poland. Furr points out that the pact would have preserved an independent Polish state if the Polish government had not abandoned the country and its inhabitants to the Nazis. All through the 1930s, the Polish government rejected collective security, yet it also rejected Hitler’s demands. It lost the war in two weeks, then fled Poland, and, uniquely in World War Two, appointed no successor government, leaving the Polish people defenceless. When Soviet forces occupied Eastern Poland from 17 September 1939, the Polish government did not declare war on the Soviet Union. (It had declared war on Germany when it invaded on 1 September.) The Polish Supreme Commander Rydz-Smigly ordered his troops not to fight the Soviet forces, but ordered them to continue to fight the German invaders. Romania and France both had military treaties with Poland, but neither declared war on the Soviet Union. The League of Nations did not determine that the Soviet Union had invaded a member state. Article 16 of the League’s Covenant required members to take sanctions against
The Worker / fall/winter 2014 / page 5 CULTURE any member who ‘resorted to war’. But no country took sanctions against the Soviet Union, none broke off diplomatic relations. All countries, including Poland’s allies Britain and France, agreed that the Soviet Union was neutral. Snyder assumes Soviet guilt for the killings at Katyn. Furr observes, “German shell casings were found in these mass graves. The official German report contains photographs of the shell casings. In a telling omission, these photographs are side views of these casings. There are no photographs of the ‘head-stamps’ or ends where the percussion cap and identifying marks are located. Most German bullets of the era had date stamps, just as most of those found at Volodymyr-Volyns’kiy did. If any of those had been stamped 1940 or earlier the Germans would surely have photographed them, since they would have been excellent proof of Soviet guilt. The fact that they did not suggests that the head-stamps contained numbers or codes indicating manufacture in 1941. This is consistent with the other circumstantial evidence now available that points strongly to German, not Soviet, guilt.” He sums up the debate on Katyn: “all the evidence we now have suggests that the Germans and Ukrainian Nationalists, not the Soviets, shot the Polish officers whose corpses the Germans exhumed at Katyn in April-June 1943.” Again, Snyder assumes that Stalin was paranoid when he acted against a doctors’ plot. Furr points out that a doctors’ plot did indeed kill Politburo member Andrei Zhdanov. Zhdanov’s doctor, V. N. Vinogradov, wrote, “it must be admitted that A. A. Zhdanov did have a heart attack and the denial of this fact by myself, professors Vasilenko and Egorov, and doctors Maiorov and Karpai was a mistake on our part.“ He acknowledged, “I made a mistake in diagnosis which led to serious consequences and then to his death.” Furr comments, “If medical doctors in the United States today were to make such an admission they would certainly be stripped of their licenses to practice medicine and face criminal prosecution and civil lawsuits.” Snyder tries to prove that Stalin was an anti-Semite. But to do this, he has to misquote Stalin as saying, “Every Jew is a nationalist and an agent of American intelligence” when Stalin actually said, “Every Jewish nationalist is an agent of American intelligence.” Furr cites Benjamin Pinkus, Professor of Jewish History at the Ben-Gurion University in Israel, who wrote of the Soviet government’s anticosmopolitanism campaign in the early 1950s, “It is important to emphasise that in these attacks there was no anti-Jewish tone, either explicitly or implicitly.” Furr sums up, “Not one of the crimes alleged by Snyder against Stalin and the Soviet leadership is genuine. All are fabrications. Snyder was unable to find a single example – not even one – of a ‘crime’ that really was committed by Stalin and/or the Soviet leadership. The implications of this fact should be considered. … the fact that the combined efforts of all the anticommunist, anti-Stalinist researchers in the world over a period of more than 70 years – ‘all the King’s horses and all the King’s men’ – and with the facilities of all the world’s best libraries and archives, have not been able to come up with a single, genuine ‘crime of Stalin’ of the period 1932-1945 – this is a fact that is worthy of attention. It is strong evidence in support of the negative conclusion: that there were no such ‘crimes of Stalin’. For if there were any such crimes, surely these highly motivated and well-provisioned anticommunist researchers, with unprecedented and privileged access to the archives, would have found them by now.” Furr notes the war crimes committed by US forces in Korea and Vietnam, and concludes, “The list of horrors committed by Western anticommunist nations could be greatly lengthened. One can understand why, therefore, it is important that enemies of the communist movement – who are at the same time defenders of Western imperialism and its crimes – find it so important to fabricate ‘crimes of Stalinism’.”
The Worker / fall/winter 2014 / page 6
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UNITY
The Worker / fall/winter 2014 / page 7
The Red Flag Flies Again in the Streets of New York
George Greene- Unity Commission On Wednesday, October 8, a small but important demonstration was held in New York City. Called a March Against Capitalism, it was held to coincide with the World Business Forum, in which leaders of some of the largest U.S. monopoly capitalists gathered to discuss how to step up the exploitation of workers in the U.S. and to consolidate and expand their share of the natural resources, markets and cheap labor of much of the rest of the world. The march was organized by FIST (Fight Imperialism, Stand Together) and endorsed by other groups including our Party of Communists, USA. It was one of the few times in recent years in which demonstrators proudly carried red flags, and these were greeted warmly by a good number of people in the course of the march. Our First Secretary, Angelo d’Angelo, was one of the speakers at the opening rally, held in front of the statue of the arch-colonialist Christopher Columbus, who opened up the Western Hemisphere to the genocide and slavery of world capitalism. Comrade Angelo spoke as an Italian-American, and said that our heroes are not Columbus, but Vito Marcantonio (a left-wing member of Congress from East Harlem from the 1930s to 1950, and the only member who voted against appropriations for the Korean War) and Pete Cacchione (a Communist member of the City Council from Brooklyn from 1941 to 1947). He also LETTERS
proudly mentioned his trip to the Soviet Union in the 1970s, where he saw a society run by workers, without bosses. One of the stops on the march was in front of a Staples office supply store. Our comrade John Dennie, a retired postal worker, condemned the ongoing privatization of the U.S. Postal Service. The Postal Service is placing fullservice postal centers in dozens of Staples stores throughout the country, where mail will be handled by non-union, low-wage service workers instead of decently-paid union postal workers. John called for a boycott of Staples until this union-busting maneuver is ended. Other stops on the march included by statues of 19th century Latin American liberators Jose Marti and Simon Bolivar, at a Chase bank and in front of Fox “News” studios. At each stop the microphone was open to any participant who wanted to speak. The march ended in front of the meeting of the World Business Forum, where another rally called by the Peoples Power Assembly was held. It is good for the working class to come out in the open with its own red flag. We want to see this take place in many rallies in the future.
A letter: End the war on Syria Now
by Kelly McConnell, Peace Commission, PCUSA As the U.S. and “allies” daily bomb Syrian targets what is it all about and who is ISIS or the Islamic state?What is the madness that shifted the Obama administration from “peacemaker” to bomb the hell out of them? Now it is quite apparent to many that there is a continuation of unending warfare and not only in Syria but also Iraq (where ISIS started among Sunis). Now it is evident ISIS has its eyes on Iran. As the number of “insurgents” seems to be only a few thousand it is now our biggest terror ever due their ferocity and inhumane treatment of innocents and those that oppose them.And,where did all of those Toyota pickups come from?
I suppose this article must seem like just another antiwar rant and it is. I see a very dark future developing out of all of this turmoil and displacement. In fact, I believe this is Washington drawing up their own imperialist boundaries, not content with those placed by the former British Empire. Where will it lead and when is world domination unprofitable and a hindrance for the empire itself?
The mass media would have us believe that the crisis in the Ukraine seems to have diminished, the Russian Federation, long time trade partners with Syria has also been targeted by Washington as interfering in “NATO’s sphere of influence.” Poland and NATO partner Turkey have become hotbeds of intrigue and concern for Washington. The Kurds have been the main ground based source of defense against the Islamic State fundamentalists.
In the end, Rome could not support it’s empire and under capitalism we are running out of resources for the ruling class to exploit while we spoil our nest. More alarming is the rise of dangerous threats of war and holocaust all over the globe, once again from cold war jingoism to invading more countries out right.
I keep asking myself why is this whole region of Eurasia seem to be exploding? Could it be that there are people in the world that don’t want to be tied to Washington’s influence? An influence that only brings about endless war and poverty (including fundamentalist terror). An influence that always seems to have created the way for the terrorists. How convenient that they can openly bomb Syria without any interference? Already the talk of ground troops are in the offing and when and how long will this take? Could not ISIS (or ISL) be any more convenient for Washington to settle in another Islamic nation and stay for how long? Syria was winning the civil war against Washington’s supported “freedom fighters” and now we seem to have overlooked this latest terror that’s even more” scarier” than ever..How did we come to rely so much on the Kurds that were so impotent against Al Queda but now seems to be the only ones capable of opposing the threat on the ground.
Obviously I should be happy that we are able to use our new toys like the F-22’s because other than fleets of Toyota trucks that’s kind of what we produce the most of these days. As drones are on the horizon of taking over the battlefield just whom and what are we defending? How arbitrary it has become and now there are robotics building robots with less workers than ever. Don’t forget the profit motive in all of this as it was lately announced that we spent two trillion in the Iraqi War and one trillion in Afghanistan and the profits going to the U.S. ruling elites of course. These developments are also apparent in the recent volatility of the stock market. And how arbitrary has the market really become to the working class. More profits than ever and more poverty as well. What must be done by us as a people and by our party (PCUSA)? We need a new peace movement that will work for peace while building a movement for all of the needs of the working class, such as jobs,housing, services for the disabled and seniors, education and the necessary social production for this society. No to more imperialist wars and convert defense spending to peace spending now!
GENDER JUSTICE
The Worker / fall/winter 2014 / page 8
Article: What's behind this war on women? The following is an effort to examine the critical issue of familial abuse in the pages of this workers newspaper. The author of the article and the editor have decided to publish their dialogue about the article to give the readers an opportunity to digest and contribute to our collective struggle about this matter. The text of the author, Fiona Fairchild; Organizing Secretary and Women’s Commission member, PCUSA, appears in bold and the text of the editor; Stephen Paulmier, appears in italics. (the fonts are 10 point to allow the full text of the piece to appear, we apologize for any difficulty this causes) Please let us know what you think about this dialogue about this issue. We dedicate this practice to socialist transparency and party integrity. Workers experience is the root of our intelligence. FF-So many things in this world have contributed to, and still propagate the disrespect and abuse of women. Religion and patriarchal societies are two that most readily come to mind. But it is capitalism that supports and perpetuates this abuse, and until capitalism is eradicated, the abuse will not stop, even if progress is made in other areas. SP-OK, disrespect and abuse of women is an important issue. What is a scientific approach to parsing that issue? Our science, Marxism/Leninism studies every phenomenon from a perspective that recognizes competing interests as essential for understanding and analyzing causal agents and embedded struggle. Identifying religion and patriarchal societies as important contributors to the oppression of women has a place, it is also important to acknowledge the interests that are served and therefore create the incentive for these groups to act in the way they do. To claim that the eradication of capitalism is the precursor to the prevention of these scourges unfairly discounts struggle and an analysis about how these behaviors form and are encouraged. What’s to be done? Follow the competing interests. FF-Many employers see their female employees as unstable and temporary. Women, generally being the primary caregivers to their families, may leave their jobs to give birth and look after sick children and spouses. Husbands generally continue working through these events. So men are seen as more stable and are usually hired first and paid more for the same work than women at the same jobs. Raising families and maintaining a home are labor intensive occupations, but not highly valued unless outside paid help is required, in which case it becomes more obvious that stay-at-home moms are doing important and valuable work. Whether looking after families or working at jobs outside, or both, women are working hard. SP-Several good points made here and I must ask is it important to excuse the activities of women where their interests diverge from those of the capitalist? Do we identify the job of giving birth in relation to the profit interests of the capitalist to produce (the “job” a woman “leaves” to do the Job of building working class interests, i.e. family value…. the second part of this paragraph starts to make this point… it has to work against the direction the first part of the paragraph takes) FF-The ‘60’s and ‘70’s Women’s Liberation movement helped raise consciousness a little, and it finally became acceptable for women to have careers and work, but unfortunately the end result was that most American women went to work all day, then picked up the kids, drove them all over for sports and music lessons, made dinner, helped with homework, bathed the kids and cleaned the house, while their husbands simply went to work, came home, ate dinner, watched TV and then went to bed. SP-These are legitimate points, all based on the class struggle, the built in animosities provoked and nurtured by bourgeois ideology serve interests diametrically opposed to working class values! This wedge driving tactic is classic bourgeois practice…. working people fight it at every turn, the best cinematic example I’ve ever seen is “Salt of the Earth.” FF-Meanwhile, as corporations enjoyed reduction of regulations, the proportional cost of housing, healthcare and food went up, the quality of education went down, and there was now the expectation that the standard, regulation American family home life requires two incomes, two cars and multiple cellphones on the Family Plan. Not only did the American cult of excessive consumerism grow out of control, but goods produced in the USA were cheap
and it cost more to repair them when they broke than to toss them out and buy new ones. Women as well as men began to find it difficult to pay their rent or mortgage payments. And now? Two incomes together can barely maintain a family. And it doesn’t matter anymore who is looking after the kids. Stick them in daycare, let the daycare providers teach them to behave and how to count to 10, the parents don’t have time off from their minimum-wage jobs! When the kids are old enough to go to school, let the schools teach them and discipline them, nobody else has time, there are bills to pay! Teachers In schools are overworked, underpaid and not truly valued. They hardly have time to teach as most of their time is spent trying to keep order in the schools and teach decent behavior to the kids whose parents haven’t got time to do that. SP-What isn’t valued is what teachers do teach! UNION!! Solidarity, unity and collective strategies are the only lessons worth anything to the working class, reading, writing, science and math are only decorative dressing on the real social and intellectual growth that occurs in the learning environment. These topics are taboo in bourgeois education. The abuse young women and men suffer as a result of the sanction placed on working class values sets up the context for the emotional and physical abuse that the genders are pushed to engage in as a result. FF-The result is that several generations have grown up to become overworked, poorly educated, harried parents trying desperately to avoid foreclosure on their cars and homes, raising increasingly neglected, emotionally scarred, ignorant kids who in turn become angry, abusive adults. What kinds of spouses and parents will they be? SP-Too negative, this is the story they be telling US! The truth is more that these negatives collected, in spite of these challenges, women and men have built serious links of unity to struggle together advancing the cause of social justice. Led by the civil rights movement the gender politic embedded in the revolution can be articulated as the single biggest accomplishment of socialist activism. This is the story the purveyors of the “abuse” hype are seeking to cover up. Its not that inter gender or generational abuse is not an important issue, its that in contrast to the abuse of working people for the expansion of profit the the interpersonal abuse incidents play as an accompanying harmony. The argument is that those incidents are infact the direct result of the profit mongering. FF-Media coverage of domestic abuse cases focuses on celebrity and scandal and distracts people from seeing beyond the flashy clothes and faces to the money-grubbing industries behind them. The “rape culture” and double-standards which originated from religions centuries ago have not only survived, but blossomed. Rapists are not always held completely accountable for their own behavior, and the victims are blamed for “provoking” the attacks by wearing revealing clothing, while Madison Avenue, TV, films and the fashion industry still emphasize that women are valued only for their youth and sex appeal. The mass media is the tool of capitalist propaganda. Corporations don’t care if their efforts create a dangerous environment for the working class. In fact, they cleverly pit men and women against each other in a never-ending game where both always lose. But just to keep up good public relations, corporations sometimes make a few feeble, half-hearted attempts to pretend to care (remember those Dove commercials?). But those thin little voices get lost in the loud chorus of criticisms about less-than perfect female bodies:
“Get liposuction! Do you have cellulitis? Have unwanted facial hair? Have a tummy tuck and a lap band surgery! Wear a push-up bra! Wear this makeup! Get Botox! Shave here, there and everywhere! Go to this spa! Look like a toothpick! Read this magazine! Take this quiz! Are you sexy enough? He will never love you unless you look like this!” Men are led to believe that competition-”fighting your way to the top” -is healthy and masculine. If boys don’t find thrills and the meaning of life in competitive sports (war games disguised as play) there’s “something wrong” with them. Rugged individualism, the rat-race ,the dog-eat-dog world, American exceptionalism and healthy competition are the mantras of capitalist thinking and doing and all red-blooded American boys, especially white, red-blooded American boys, are taught by history books, word and deed in public schools and church to admire and emulate those capitalists who have exemplified these “ideals”. Keeping these citizens ready to climb up the backs of others, stepping on toes and heads, reach the top and then mouth sweet words about “trickle down “economics, while subjugating their mothers, sisters, wives, girlfriends and daughters is a fine way to keep the sexes fighting and distract us all from noticing who is behind it all. The job of mesmerizing kids into passive blobs of inactivity is easily accomplished by providing readily available and entertainment in the forms of films and games that reinforce the spirit of competition while numbing hearts and minds. SP-OK, these are your best points! And here again one can make the same wisdom work from the class interest perspective. I get that you expose the interest of capital, how is our working class interest engaging these patterns, myths if you will? Women are the ones raising the flag of unity constantly. Its the tenacious struggle of the modern female movement that has pushed the limits imposed by the bourgeois system and united with the oppressed of all stripes to demand justice. Particularly on the socialist issue: To each according to their work. This is the fight for “equal” pay for the same work. This is a communist analysis, keeping the focus on the class struggle and the class interest. FF-This, and the endless barrage of subversive and outright advertising designed to convince us all that women are only of value if they are attractive and sexy, is an invisible war against women and men that makes millions and millions of dollars for corporations. This war devalues women, and hurts men too! How does it end? It doesn’t, unless the support structure is removed. A huge pillar in that support system in capitalism. Let’s smash that pillar. SP-This is another excellent point, I believe to identify the capitalist, profit centric support structure is paramount for attacking bourgeois interests and promoting working class interests.
Picketline from the film Salt of the Earth
The Worker / fall/winter 2014 / page 9
UNITY! EIGHT POINTS ANCHORING THE PARTY OF COMMUNISTS USA Points of Marxist-Leninist Unity 1). Marxism-Leninism We apply the science of Marxism-Leninism as the means to achieve supremacy of the working class. 2). Vanguard Role – Cadre Party We hold that the role of the party, as laid out by the Bolshevik example, is that of a Vanguard workers’ Party, which opposes and organizes against the Bourgeois state and its surrogate parties. Such a party acts as the general staff of the working class, educating, organizing and leading the Proletariat in its struggle for liberation. To that end, the Party must develop and train strong cadres to lead the struggle. 3). Dictatorship of Proletariat We support, as Marx and Lenin wrote, that organizing a class conscious working class is the only way to achieve liberation from the Bourgeoisie – and that due to the inevitability of the class struggle and the nature of the state as the tool of suppression of one class upon another – only the overthrow of the Bourgeois State by the proletariat, and the active suppression of the bourgeoisie by the dictatorship of the proletariat, may consolidate power for working class interests and bring about a Socialist State. 4.) Democratic Centralism The governing principle of the PCUSA is known as Democratic Centralism, which is what distinguishes us from the bourgeois parties. Decisions made at the level of the PCUSA Central Committee are based on discussions that have taken place within the basic units and districts of the party. Clubs, also referred to as cells or fractions, are the basic unit of the party upon which democratic centralism is anchored. The fundamental principle for building and organizing the work of the Party, Democratic Centralism combines the full initiative, right, and duty of Party organizations to decide on questions within their scope of responsibility, with their accountability and regular reporting of activities to higher Party bodies, and the subordination of the minority to the majority and strict discipline once a decision has been made. Underestimation or rejection of democratic centralism is typical of revisionists, testifying to their non-scientific approach and the influence of bourgeois and petty-bourgeois ideology. 5). Proletarian Internationalism We support the international working class, and the struggle of oppressed groups for liberation from Imperialist domination and exploitation, both within this county and around the world, and oppose all forms of Imperialism which oppress worldwide, fighting especially against the mechanisms of Imperialism created and maintained by the current Bourgeois regime in our own country, and will actively oppose and work to end its wars of Imperialist adventurism around the globe. 6). Support for real existing socialism of the 20th Century We support and uphold the legacy and lessons of the Socialist revolutionary movements of the 20th century, and the contributions of Lenin, Stalin and other leading Marxist-Leninist revolutionaries. We will defend that legacy against defamation by Revisionists, Capitalists, Trotskyites, social democrats, anarchists, cold war liberal bourgeoisie and pettybourgeois ultra-left radicals who undermine the revolutionary history and struggle of Marxist-Leninist theory and practice. We reject the so-called “21st Century Socialism” and euro-communism as revisionist attempts to promote reformism and “market socialism” over true revolutionary struggle and Socialist collectivization. 7). Continuing Lenin’s opposition to Right Opportunism and Revisionism inside the world communist movement We oppose all forms of Right Opportunism and Revisionism to supplant Marxist Leninist ideology in the world communist movement, historically and especially found in the CPUSA, We identify this revisionism as an intrusion of bourgeois ideology that weakens and distorts our theory and purpose, leading to class-collaboration and counter-revolution. 8). Revolution is the sole means of establishing the dictatorship of the proletariat and a scientific socialist society. We hold that class conscious struggle through revolution is the only means of achieving liberation for the working class. Further, that any measure of reformism, collaboration, or conciliation with the bourgeoisie serves only to undermine and prolong the workers struggle, leading to the further consolidation of Capitalist power and dominance. “The immediate aim of the Communists is the same as that of all the other proletarian parties: formation of the proletariat into a class, overthrow of the bourgeois supremacy, conquest of political power by the proletariat.” [Communist Manifesto, Chapter II, paragraph 7]
El Obrero / otoño/invierno 2014 página 2
OCHO PUNTOS DE UNIDAD PARA ANCLAR EL PARTIDO DE LOS COMUNISTAS EE.UU. Puntos de unidad marxista-leninista 1. Marxismo-leninismo Aplicamos la ciencia del marxismo-leninismo como el medio para alcanzar la supremacía de la clase trabajadora. 2. Rol de vanguardia – partido de cuadros Sostenemos que el rol del partido, como ejemplificado por los bolcheviques, es el de un partido de Vanguardia de los obreros que se opone y organiza en contra del estado burgués y sus partidos. Tal partido se comporta como la dirección de la clase obrera, educando, organizando y dirigiendo al Proletariado en su lucha por la liberación. Hacia ese fin, el Partido debe desarrollar y adiestrar cuadros fuertes para dirigir la lucha. 3. La dictadura del proletariado Apoyamos, como escribieron Marx y Lenin, que organizar a una clase obrera consciente de sí misma, es la única manera de lograr que se libere de la burguesía – y que debido a la inevitabilidad de la lucha de clase y la naturaleza del estado como la herramienta para oprimir a una clase por otra – solo el derrocamiento del estado burgués por el proletariado, y la supresión activa de la burguesía por el proletariado, podrá consolidar el poder para los intereses de la clase obrera y conducirnos a un estado socialista. 4. Centralismo democrático El principio de gobernabilidad del PCUSA es conocido como el centralismo democrático, y es lo que nos distingue de los partidos burgueses. Las decisiones que se toman al nivel del Comité Central del PCUSA se basan sobre consultas que se han tomado dentro de las unidades y distritos del partido. Los clubes, a los cuales también se les refiere como células y fracciones, son las unidades básicas del partido sobre cual se ancla el centralismo democrático. El principio fundamental sobre el cual se construye y organiza el trabajo del partido, el centralismo democrático, combina la plena iniciativa, derecho y responsabilidad, con sus explicaciones e informes sobre las actividades a los órganos superiores del partido, y la subordinación de la minoría a la mayoría y una disciplina estricta una vez se haya tomado una decisión. La subestimación o el rechazo al centralismo democrático es típico de los revisionistas, y un testimonio a su manera de trabajar no-científica y de la influencia de la ideología burguesa y pequeña burguesa. 5). Internacionalismo proletario Respaldamos a la clase trabajadora internacional, y la lucha por los grupos oprimidos por su liberación de la dominación imperialista, la cual oprime a nivel global. Lucharemos especialmente en contra de los mecanismos del Imperialismo que ha sido creado y sostenido por el régimen burgués en nuestra nación, y nos opondremos de manera activa y trabajaremos para poner fin a sus guerras aventuristas Imperialistas alrededor del planeta. 6). Respaldo al socialismo realmente existente del Siglo 20 Respaldamos y sostenemos el legado y lecciones de los movimientos Socialistas y revolucionarios del Siglo 20, y las contribuciones de Lenin, Stalin y otros revolucionarios destacados marxistas-leninistas. Defenderemos ese legado en contra de la difamación por revisionistas, capitalistas, trotskistas, socialdemócratas, anarquistas liberales burgueses de la guerra fría y radicales ultra izquierdistas pequeñoburgueses los cuales perjudican la historia y lucha revolucionaria de la teoría y práctica marxistaleninista. Rechazamos el llamado “Socialismo del Siglo 21” y el eurocomunismo como esfuerzos revisionistas por promover el reformismo y el “socialismo de mercado” sobre la verdadera lucha revolucionaria y la colectivización Socialista. 7). Continuar la oposición de Lenin al oportunismo de derecha y el revisionismo al interior del movimiento comunista internacional Nos oponemos a todas formas de oportunismo y revisionismo de derecha que intentan suplantar la ideología marxista-leninista en el movimiento comunista internacional, históricamente y especialmente presente en el CPUSA. Identificamos a este revisionismo como una intrusión de la ideología burguesa que debilita y distorsiona nuestra ideología y propósito, conduciéndonos a la colaboración de clases y la contra-revolución. 8). La Revolución es el único medio para establecer la Dictadura del Proletariado y una sociedad socialista científica. Sostenemos que la lucha basada en la conciencia de clase por medio de la revolución es el único medio para obtener la liberación de la clase trabajadora. Además, que cualquier medida de reformismo, colaboración, o conciliación con la burguesía solo sirve para perjudicar y prolongar la lucha de los trabajadores, y resultando en una mayor consolidación del poder y dominio capitalista. “El objetivo inmediato de los Comunistas es el mismo que el de todos los otros partidos proletarios: organizar al proletariado en una clase, derrocar la supremacía de la burguesía, conquistar el poder político por el proletariado”. [Manifiesto Comunista, Capítulo ll, párrafo 7]
El Obrero / otoño/invierno 2014 página 3
Servicio postal: ¿empresa comercial o del pública?
John Dennie trabajador retirado del servicio postal de EEUU sostiene el banner comunista ¿Tiene el gobierno el rol de proveer servicios esenciales para el bien común o debe el sector privado extraer las ganancias máximas? En cuanto a nuestro Servicio de Correo este debate no comenzó en el 2008, cuando la actual recesión, unida al requisito oneroso que el congreso le impuso al USPS (servicio de correo de EEUU) de presupuestar por adelantado los beneficios de salud a los empleados retirados, medida que causó déficits enormes y que los sectores defensores de la privatización y sus medios, comenzaron a resaltar. El tira-y-jala entre los que defienden que el servicio postal funcione para el bien común y los empresarios que defienden que se convierta en un negocio de lucro cobrando lo máximo posible, se remonta por lo menos al principio del Siglo 19 y las luchas sobre los estatutos que regían a los coches que transportaban las cartas y que terminó concediéndole un monopolio sobre la entrega de cartas al servicio del correo. Luego se dieron debates sobre la relación entre los bancos y el servicio postal, el cual también ofrecía servicios bancarios al principio del Siglo 20. Y luego la Comisión Kappel de la administración del Presidente Johnson concluye que el servicio postal de los EEUU debería funcionar al modelo de la empresa privada. Y eventualmente en 1984 la Comisión Grace del Presidente Reagan aboga para que el servicio postal sea totalmente privatizado. Desde el comienzo, el servicio postal poseyó el monopolio sobre la entrega de cartas. Hubieron muchos desafíos a los estatutos sobre la entrega de correos expreso por transportistas privados, en particular por la Wells Fargo la cual operó un servicio de correo privado en estados del oeste por muchos años, en flagrante violación a la ley. Empresas privadas de entrega expreso como la Wells Fargo continuaron entregando paquetes, cobrando lo que el mercado podía soportar, especialmente en áreas rurales. Con el propósito de proveerle al público la entrega de paquetes a precios económicos, el Servicio Postal estableció el Parcel Post en el 1913. Desde entonces, ha existido una tensión entre el Servicio Postal y las empresas de entrega de paquetes privadas. La UPS y la FEDEX gastan grandes cantidades de dinero cabildeando con el propósito de convencer al Congreso de que debiera reducir la capacidad que tiene el Servicio Postal para competir con el sector privado en la entrega de paquetes y correo expreso. El presidente de FEDEX, Fred
Smith pertenece a la junta de ALEC (American Legislative Exchange Council, una organización ultraconservadora y defensora del sector empresarial). Con la aprobación de la Ley para la Reorganización del Servicio Postal, el servicio postal se convirtió en una corporación perteneciente al gobierno. La administración del Presidente Nixon usaron los hallazgos de la Comisión Kappel como base para la reorganización. Desde entonces, la privatización se ha estado implementando de manera gradual. Las grandes empresas que se dedican a la preclasificación del correo reciben grandes descuentos del Servicio Postal. Son descuentos tan grandes que los ingresos que reciben por la clasificación del correo es mayor que lo que les cuesta procesar el trabajo. Estas empresas de clasificación (la más grande es Pitney Bowes) por lo general son lugares de explotación laboral ya que los trabajadores no reciben beneficios, a diferencia de los trabajadores del Servicio Postal. El transporte también ha sido privatizado desde los 1980s a medida que los empleados del Servicio Postal son sustituidos por choferes no sindicalizados como los de la compañía J.B. Hunt. En enero 2013, un “Informe” auspiciado por Pitney Bowes se declaró a favor de la privatización de todas las operaciones postales a excepción de las entrega de cartas en la “última milla”. Al momento, estamos viendo la implementación de la privatización que se propone en el “Informe” y con la participación de 82 tiendas Staples que proveen servicios postales completos. Esta es una medida descarada para sustituir a los trabajadores postales con trabajadores mal pagados de Staples. Y el Servicio Postal continúa cerrando y consolidando su red de facilidades postales lo cual causa que el público busque medios alternos para sus necesidades postales. El Servicio Postal sería una empresa próspera si se eliminaría la ley que obliga a tener presupuestado muy por adelantado los servicios de salud de sus empleados. El Servicio Postal hubiera tenido ganancias de $765 millones en los primeros tres meses del 2014 sin esa cláusula. Lenin declaró que el “Servicio Postal era un ejemplo del sistema socialista”. El consideró que “…el mecanismo de administración social ya está presente”. Le sugerimos al lector que lea el capítulo 3, sección3 de El estado y la revolución (los dos últimos párrafos), que se lea el análisis de Lenin del Servicio Postal como un paradigma para el socialismo en su contexto completo.
La necesidad de la concentración industrial
Bill Connolly -Comision del Trabajo PCUSA
La concentración industrial es la política del Partido dirigida a concentrar sus esfuerzos para desarrollar cuadros en las “industrias básicas” – los sectores estratégicos de la producción, transportación y la producción de energía que pueden paralizar al sistema capitalista durante una huelga general. El Partido aspira a crear unidades en los talleres de las industrias básicas, esas sin las cuales el sistema económico no puede funcionar. Las industrias básicas se basan en las empresas que producen material que es esencial para una producción industrial mayor (como el acero, minería, petróleo, químicos), que transportan los materiales a los puntos de consumo o mayor elaboración (como rieles, camiones, transporte marítimo), o que generan energía para mantener la industria activa (como plantas eléctricas y plantas hidroeléctricas). Estas industrias son los puntos neurálgicos de este país. Un número alto de trabajadores están concentrados en las industrias básicas. Estos trabajadores son adiestrados y disciplinados por la producción a grande escala. La mayor capacitación y disciplina de trabajadores en las industrias básicas y sus experiencias basadas en una comprensión de la
organización de la economía a grande escala y sus ramificaciones a nivel mundial les otorga una mayor influencia sobre los trabajadores de talleres pequeños. Su gran concentración en las empresas más importantes les concede a su fuerza potencial un poder mayor para ejercer una influencia y dirigir a toda la clase trabajadora si estuviesen conscientes de ese poder y como utilizarlo. Cuando se desencadena su fuerza potencial sobre la clase capitalista, estos trabajadores se convierten en el proletariado revolucionario. El Partido hace una evaluación de cuales industrias tienen una importancia estratégica en el sistema capitalista de este país, con el propósito de concentrar su energía en la creación del Partido en esas industrias. El Partido aspira a concentrar nuestra clase en las industrias básicas con plena consciencia de su fuerza potencial, la cual deseamos movilizar para la revolución socialista. Para una mayor información sobre la importancia de la concentración industrial al trabajo de nuestro Partido, por favor consulte a J. Peters, El Manual del Partido Comunista sobre la Organización, especialmente las páginas 40 y 43 en la edición en inglés de Red Star Publishers.
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Continuando la tradición del Daily Worker, fundado en 1924
Informe del V Congreso del
Celebrando 97 años de la Revolución Bolchevique
Partido Comunista de México El 13, 14 y 15 de septiembre, el V Congreso del Partido Comunista de México (PCM) se reunió en la Ciudad de Oaxaca. El Congreso se compone de delegados elegidos en las organizaciones partidarias primarias, y acompañados por las delegaciones del Partido Comunista de Grecia (KKE), el Partido Comunista Brasileño (PCB), el Partido Comunista de los Pueblos de España (PCPE), el Partido Comunista Sudanés, el Partido Comunista de El Salvador, el Partido de los Comunistas EE.UU. (PCUSA), y la revista electrónica, Marxismo-Leninismo Hoy. Además, se recibieron los saludos de 40 partidos comunistas y obreros, movimientos y fuerzas revolucionarias antiimperialistas. De México, el Movimiento Comunista Mexicano, el Partido Popular Socialista, el Partido Popular Socialista de México, el Congreso Socialista Popular (APN) y el Frente Amplio de Lucha Popular acudieron como delegados fraternales para saludar el V Congreso. También se mandaron saludos desde el Frente de Izquierda Revolucionaria, el Grupo Magisterial Revolucionario, la Federación de Trabajadores Independientes y la juventud comunista, la Federación de Jóvenes Comunistas. Para dirigir sus trabajos, el V Congreso eligió un Presídium integrado por los camaradas Marco Vinicio Dávila, Gustavo Adolfo López Ortega, y Jasmine Padilla. El Congreso rindió homenaje a los camaradas caídos desde el pasado IV Congreso, muchos de ellos asesinados por las fuerzas represivas del poder de los monopolios.
En el transcurso del congreso, con total transparencia y apertura de acuerdo con el buen funcionamiento del centralismo democrático, se aprobaron el Informe político del Primer Secretario del PCM Pavel Blanco Cabrera, junto con el Nuevo Programa y las Tesis, y los Estatutos del Partido se reformaron. La aprobación de estos documentos fue el resultado de casi seis meses de discusión entre la militancia y un año de preparación del pasado Comité Central. Cada uno de los representantes de los partidos invitados al Congreso hicieron breves presentaciones a los delegados reunidos, incluyendo a Joseph Hancock, el representante del Partido de los Comunistas EE.UU. Camarada Hancock dijo a los delegados reunidos, por qué era necesario formar un nuevo partido comunista en los Estados Unidos. El habló brevemente acerca de nuestro nuevo periódico, El Obrero, y contó cómo los EE.UU. están sufriendo los efectos de las políticas neoliberales que plagaron muchos de los países de América Latina en la década de 1970 comenzando con Chile. Señaló la alta tasa de desempleo, la exportación de puestos de trabajo de fabricación fuera de los EE.UU., el aumento del racismo, las medidas de austeridad y los recortes a los servicios del sector público, los recortes a la Seguridad Social y otros programas, robos de los fondos de pensiones de los trabajadores, y la militarización de la policía. “La clase obrera de los EE.UU. necesita un partido de vanguardia y queremos aprender todo lo que podamos de nuestros camaradas mexicanos”, dijo él. En nombre del PCUSA, camarada Hancock presentó al PCM con su bandera de la organización que fue colgada en la sala durante la duración del Congreso. Como el último punto de su orden del día, el Congreso eligió un nuevo Comité Central, que combina experiencia y juventud. En la sesión plenaria del Comité Central, camaradas Pavel Blanco Cabrera fue elegido como Primer Secretario y Diego Torres como Segundo Secretario. Se eligió como miembros plenos del Buró Político Gustavo Adolfo López Ortega, Marco Vinicio Dávila, Julio Cota, Jazmín Padilla, y Omar Cota. Camaradas Fernanda Larráinzar y Kimberly Ruiz fueron elegidos como suplentes del Buró Político. El V Congreso del PCM funcionó con eficiencia y decoro gracias a la entusiasta preparación del Comité Regional J.V. Stalin del Estado de Oaxaca. Es de destacar que el 15 de septiembre, mientras el poder de los monopolios representado por Peña Nieto y el populismo socialdemócrata representado por López Obrador “conmemoraban” el levantamiento por la independencia de 1810, comprometiéndose a dar continuidad al capitalismo, en Oaxaca los comunistas levantaban la bandera de la emancipación social, y en el marco de la contradicción capital/trabajo, llamaban a reforzar el antagonismo socioclasista para fortalecer el torrente de la revolución.¡Las banderas rojas del PCM están volando alto en todas partes!