Communist Party USA

The COVID-19 pandemic and accompanied economic crisis has exposed the brutality and ineffectiveness of US capitalism and US imperialist policy. The Trump-led US Administration demonstrated a total disregard for public health. This has led to the needless death of over 200,000 people in the USA, the highest of any country. Trump first denied the existence of COVD-19. Later, Trump downplayed its significance. Then Trump blamed China with racist names, calling the pandemic the “Chinese Virus”, “Wuhan Flu,” “China Flu” and then the “Kung Flu”.Trump blamed China by saying China had “instigated a global pandemic”.

The pandemic exposed US capitalism’s poor healthcare infrastructure and lack of regard for its most vulnerable communities of color. African Americans, Latinas and Latinos, for instance, were impacted the most by COVID-19. No epidemic management plan was put forward and health professionals were disregarded and denigrated. Health facilities and supplies were inadequate. Consequently, the US became the worst affected country with over 7,0000,000COVID-19 cases and over 200,000 COVID-19 deaths.

The pandemic called for international cooperation in the interest of public health. The opposite reaction occurred; the US ramped up on verbal attacks against socialist China and other countries. The USAhoarded health equipment and potential vaccines.The Trump administration declared that it was leaving the World Health Organization in the middle of the pandemic and sidestepped health professionals. It also ramped up trade restrictions on goods from China and engaged in a one-sided technological war with China as a distraction from the mismanagement of the pandemic and in furtherance of Trump’s reelection.

US capitalism disregarded this opportunity for international collaboration and multilateral actions against the COVID-19 pandemic. The Trump administration instead tries to win reelection by unjustified China bashing.

The People’s Republic of China, under the leadership of the Communist Party of China, quickly identified and informed the world about the virus and this helped to save countless lives. China is one of the most successful countries in managing the pandemic.

The pandemic created a further global economic crisis. US capitalism took extraordinary efforts to prop up the capital markets using the power of the central bank to create money. The US created the US petrodollar, as a fiat currency, after the second world war. The dollar is no longer backed by gold reserves.

This allows the US Federal Reserve Bank (The Fed) to create “free” money to help US allied banks and the wealthy. Most wealth in the US is held in the stock market. While millions of US workers lost their jobs and many lost their homes, Fed corporate welfare actions raised stock prices to pre-pandemic levels and beyond. The US ruling class, with borrowed money, provided unprecedented amounts of government public money (fiscal stimulus in the trillions of US dollars) to stimulate the economy, with a preference for wealthy corporations.More recently, badly needed financial support for unemployed workers has been held up by conservatives in the ruling class to help Trump’s reelection in November 2020.

Not only has the pandemic exposed the underbelly of capitalism, it clearly demonstrates US imperialism’s decline and eventual demise. The decline of US imperialism worsened after the US initiatedglobal financial crisis of 2008.

While the demise of US imperialism is welcome, it becomes more dangerous. The decline of US imperialism is reflected in the declining standard of life for the US working class. This and other factors has led to a political crisis on top of the pandemic economic crisis. Millions of Americans went into the streets in 2020 to protest institutionalized racism and racial motivated police brutality, primarily used against African Americans. Racism continues to be major tool to divide the US working class and support extreme right political candidates. States across the USA continue to pass measures that make it harder for African Americans, the elderly, students and people with disabilities to exercise their right to vote. Measures include requirements for government issued photo IDs, cutting back on early voting, eliminating election day registration, new restrictions on voter registration drives and other barriers to voting. The boundaries of electoral constituencies are manipulated to dilute the African American and Latina/Latino vote (gerrymandering), favoring conservatives. US political divisions are now at its worst, especially with upcoming presidential elections in November 2020. A majority of young people in the USA now favor socialism over capitalism. US union strikes are now more common and so are struggles to increase the minimum wage. More demonstrations have taken place against government repression of unauthorized immigrants and political refugees. Trump is blaming China for the declining standard of life for US workers. The real blame is with the brutal form of finance monopoly capitalism introduced in the 1980’s, called Neoliberalism. This form of capitalism has resulted in the formation of extreme right groups in developed capitalist countries and is leading to further political crisis. The extreme right and centrist sectors of the US capitalist class are in a political conflict over a range of issues. One sector wants to rachet up the rate of exploitation in pursuit of quick profits and the other sector looks out for the long term preservation of capitalism. The November 2020 elections in the USA will be critical to reverse the gains of the extreme right, to open up space for ongoing working class struggles for economic and social equality reforms, to prevent fascism and for peace and international solidarity.

As Antonio Gramsci said while in a fascist prison, “the old world is dying and the new world struggles to be born. Now is the time of monsters.” US imperialism, under the control of the extreme right, threats world peace. It sends war ships to the South China Sea and through the Taiwan Strait. The US violates the One China policy, a cornerstone of China-US relations by sending diplomatic missions to Taiwan. US imperialism supports separatists in Tibet, Hong Kong, Xinjiang and Taiwan in order to provoke social instability in China. The US deploys THAAD ballistic missiles in the Republic of Korea (S. Korea), threatening China and the DPRK (N. Korea). US imperialism also threats the DPRK, Iran, Venezuela, Nicaragua and continues to engage in regime change in the Middle East, Latin America, Belarus and elsewhere. US imperialism continues to work through NATO to militarily encircle the Russian Federation. Recently, the US moved additional troops to Poland.During the pandemic, US imperialism sought to deny medical supplies to Cuba, Venezuela and other countries.US imperialism continuous to use economic sanctions against a range of countries, in violation of international laws, in pursuit of regime change. Trump and his son-in law continue to undermine Palestinian rights in the region.

A new world is in birth. The Communist Party USA, a Marxist-Leninist political party, is part of a broad popular front against the extreme right in the USA. We are an integral part of the multiracial and multigender US working class, and we struggle in the interest of the entire US working class. We struggle every day to bring forth a new world - socialism.We are internationalist and continue to uphold the flag of international working class solidarity.