All those people who are talking about a political revolution, including
Bernie, are just talking about a change in the Democratic party. People want it
to represent the interest of low and middle income people. They want it to go
back to a social welfare state similar to what they remember in the 40's and
50's. Bernie would like that social welfare state to include the kinds of
social programs found in western european countries. He's talking about
regulated capitalism or social democracy. And that is what most of his
supporters want. They are not really looking for a socialist state or
revolution. But they do want change. Whether or not that is possible, remains
to be seen. But again, all these labels, these words being used
indiscriminately, are very confusing.
Miriam
-----Original Message-----
From: blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
[mailto:blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of Roger Loran Bailey ;
(Redacted sender "rogerbailey81" for DMARC)
Sent: Friday, May 13, 2016 3:24 PM
To: blind-democracy@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [blind-democracy] Re: Sanders, socialism and the U.S. left in crisis
And that is especially not going to happen even if Bernie is elected president
because he has no perspective for abolishing capitalism at all. That is what
makes him a fake socialist.
On 5/13/2016 12:42 PM, Carl Jarvis wrote:
Fact: Any candidate, regardless of Party affiliation, will not,
repeat, WILL NOT head up a political revolution, if elected president.
Reason: The USA is not a Republic. It is not a Democracy. The USA is
a Corporate Capitalist Empire. An Oligarchy.
Second Fact: Revolutions do not start at the top.
Reason: A revolution is, "an overthrow or repudiation and the thorough
replacement of an established government or political system by the
people governed".
Although a revolution might begin from within, by the uprising of the
military or a coup by a strongman and his supporters, usually
military, nonetheless, we normally think of a revolution as a people's
uprising. And that ain't going to happen, even if Bernie were
elected. Capitalism is the bugaboo. As long as Capitalism reigns,
there can be no compromise.
So I am back to why I will vote for Sanders in the primary, and Stein
in the general election. My reasoning, such as it is, goes like this:
I am a spectator. The "team", the American Corporate Capitalist
Empire, is on the field of play. The old quarterback is tiring and
there needs to be a replacement. Several quarterbacks are trotted out
in front of the Fans, who are expected to cheer for the one they like
best. The winner of the popular cheering is sent into the game. But
nothing about the game changes. The game goes on as usual, and if
that quarterback can't move the ball, he is replaced with the next, in
hopes that he will turn the tide. But none of the quarterbacks will
dare try something out of left field. They have all been thoroughly
schooled in the fundamentals of the game. They know all of the rules.
I can either cheer for my favorite quarterback or I can go off and
start my own team. Sure, there are other struggling little teams
around. But they will never be allowed to play on the Center Field.
I know full well that no matter what I do, I will not own a piece of
this team. But if I want to be a fan, I'll pause long enough to cheer
for one quarterback or another.
Meanwhile, I can make a difference down here in the trenches. I can
do my best to help folks understand that unless they are among the 1%,
they do not have a team in this fight. When enough of us understand
that we have no representation, and the "Law of the Land" is not on
the books for us, then perhaps we can begin talking about putting our
own team on Center Field.
"Preacher" Carl Jarvis
On 5/13/16, Roger Loran Bailey <dmarc-noreply@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
https://socialistaction.org/2016/05/12/may-2016-sanderssanders-sociam
ay-2016-sanderslism-and-the-u-s-left-in-crisis/
Sanders, socialism and the U.S. left in crisis
/ 18 hours ago
May 2016 Sanders
By JEFF MACKLER
U.S. primary election math pundits are now calculating that Bernie
Sanders cannot win the Democratic Party presidential primary contest.
His impending demise, and indeed his Democratic Party candidacy
itself, has sparked a wide-ranging discussion and debate in the U.S.
socialist movement, and in broader circles, that reveals an
extraordinary level of confusion and disarray. The spectacle of most
U.S. socialist organizations’ supporting, in one form or another, an
open Democrat is a sure sign of a left in crisis.
Including 53.5 percent that he won on May 3 in Indiana and his 51.4
percent in West Virginia, in which he actually lost ground in his
race with Hillary Clinton, Sanders now needs more than 65 percent of
all remaining pledged delegates for a pledged convention majority and
82 percent of all remaining delegates—including super-delegates. The
latter have been handpicked by the Democratic Party hierarchy and
pledged long ago to vote for Clinton. Any illusion that these
lifelong professional ruling-class politicians will accede to the
“popular will” and shift to Sanders is absurd. But promoting this
illusion is Sanders’ current bait-and-switch tactic.
It is not the math of the matter, however, that motivates Sanders to
“fight on.” He clearly explained his views in a recent KQED National
Public Radio (NPR) interview: “I think we are perpetuating the
political revolution by significantly increasing the level of
political activity that we’re seeing in this country. I think it is
good for the United States of America and good for the Democratic
Party to have a vigorous debate, to engage people in the political process”
(emphasis added).
NPR reported that by staying in the race, Sanders believes he is
“energizing voters” and, therefore, “boosting the Democratic Party to
victory in November.” He contended that Democrats do well and
Republicans do poorly when turnout is high. “So I’m going to do
everything I can to stimulate political discourse in this country and
get young people, working people, involved in the political process.”
Following four primary contest losses to Hillary Clinton in late
April, Sanders insisted that even if he lost the nomination he would
fight for his delegates to have substantial convention representation
on the Democratic Party’s “Platform Committee,” where party leaders
supposedly would hammer out the program to be implemented should
Clinton win. Only the most naïve in politics believe that
ruling-class policies are decided by a handful of delegates
cloistered in the backrooms of party conventions. Sadly, however,
most of the U.S. socialist left believe that the Sanders campaign represents
some sort of “political revolution”
that merits their support—in one form or another. We shall review
this almost bewildering phenomenon shortly.
Sanders, despite his protestations to the contrary, has been a
welcome addition to the periodically orchestrated “lesser evil” sham
employed by ruling-class leaders and their ever calculating and
sophisticated think tanks. They know full well that capitalist
elections are essential to maintaining the myth of democracy, on the
one hand, and to dissipating the anger and hatred at its inherently
anti-working class, racist, and sexist policies into safe electoral
channels, on the other.
Well before Sanders proclaimed his “democratic socialism,” national
polls—the Pew polls of three years ago, for example—indicated that
socialism was on the minds of millions. In a recent Pew poll, 49
percent of youth 30 years old and under preferred socialism over capitalism.
Three years ago, the figure was 46 percent who preferred capitalism
over socialism. The figures for the Black population as a whole were
higher, with a significant majority, 55 percent, preferring
socialism—in their view a more egalitarian and less predatory
society, in which human solidarity and social welfare trump the greed of the
elite one percent.
Sanders is undoubtedly correct in recognizing his role in the past
year as attempting to bolster the credibility of the Democratic
Party. He has consciously taken the assignment of demonstrating that
“dissident”
ideas, or perhaps better, “dissident” rhetoric—as with his frequently
touted expression, “political revolution”—is acceptable terminology
inside this tried and true ruling-class institution, the nation’s
infamous “graveyard of social movements.”
Hillary Clinton and her advisers understand shell game politics just
as well, as demonstrated by their efforts to remake one of
capitalism’s most heinous warmongers and racist apologists into the
feminist, humanist, anti-racist, and environmentally concerned
politician they are projecting as Clinton’s campaign image today. As
we go to press [May 11] a nervous Clinton has moved another step to
the “left,” according to the New York Times, by embracing in part
Sanders’ single-payer “Medicare for all” proposal.
Political discontent rising in U.S. population
In due time, we will all “feel the Bern,” or better, witness the
“fizzle,” when Sanders, as promised, stumps the nation hustling votes
on Clinton’s behalf to save the nation from the “greater evil”—Donald
Trump. Step one in the current two-stage “lesser-evil” game was Sanders’
shepherding growing and undeniable anti-capitalist sentiments back
into the Democratic Party. Step two now includes Sanders’ making
every effort to do the same with those who have been hornswoggled
into his orbit but might yet decide to quit the electoral shell game
in disgust with the thought of voting for Clinton.
The fact that capitalism’s media pundits felt compelled to lend an
air of legitimacy to Sanders’ fake socialism is an indication of the
questioning nature of our times and the deep discontent that is
percolating in the consciousness of working people.
A New York Times/CBS News poll last November indicated that some 56
percent of registered Democrats who were questioned said they felt
positive about socialism as a governing philosophy. Twenty-nine
percent had a negative view. This, in itself, goes a long way in
explaining why Clinton, and in fact, most Republican Party
candidates, largely refrained from the red-baiting tirades that have
been the usual stock-in-trade of capitalist politics. Attacking
Sanders as a socialist might well have the effect of advancing his
credibility, not to mention socialism’s!
In time, when the inevitable and broad-ranging fightback takes shape
in forms truly independent of and against the twin parties of capital
and its liberal “third-party” middle-class-based variants like the
Green Party, working people will find genuine political avenues and
mass organizations of struggle to express their disgust at capitalist
austerity and social regression. This combination of renewed and
massive mobilizations in the streets, in reinvigorated and
democratically led union fightbacks, and in anti-racist, anti-sexist,
anti-homophobic, and pro-environment struggles will undoubtedly find
an expression in the political arena.
But this magnificent and longed for “music of the future,” based on
the deeply felt rejection of the system of two capitalist parties, to
be effective—to mark a clean and qualitative break with the endless
variations of “lesser evilism” that are consciously presented by the
most sophisticated practitioners of capitalist politics—can only be
grounded on the foundation of working-class independence. The desire
for political “independence,” however vague this term might be, is
today gaining ground in the United States. A full 43 percent of the
electorate, according to a recent Gallop Poll, is registered as
Independent, with Democratic Party registration at 32 percent, and
Republican Party registered voters at 23 percent.
These facts alone explain why in states like New York, where
registered independents are excluded in the primary process, Hillary
Clinton’s margin of victory over Sanders was quite significant. In
states with an “open primary,” that is, where “independent” voters
can participate, Sanders is expected to win a substantial, but still
insufficient majority, as in the June 7 California primary.
Of course, none of these registered voter statistics tell the full
story since some 51 million voters, about 25 percent of the eligible
electorate, are not registered. Further, the actual percentage of all
eligible voters who vote stands at 55 percent! The vast majority of
non-voters are Black, Latino, and youth more generally, many of whom
are consciously excluded due to reactionary legislation or are
disillusioned with the entire electoral charade.
U.S. left collapses before Sanders
There is no doubt that Sanders’ “political revolution” and
“anti-establishment” rhetoric, not to mention his self-proclaimed
“democratic socialism,” has captured the imagination of and spiked
interest in the current primary contests as well as in socialist
ideas more generally. Indeed, this is precisely and, again, the
consciously orchestrated Sanders project; the U.S. ruling class and
its pundits are more than capable of appealing to the best instincts
and highest aspirations of working people for a better life for all
in order to once again lure them into their life-extinguishing
anaconda-like institutional clutches.
Tragically, many of those who claim to know better—those who
seriously consider themselves socialists—have been active partisans,
if not enthusiastic advocates, of today’s ruling-class-promoted
Bernie Sanders brand of lesser-evilism.
Among these socialists, and perhaps the most prominent, is Sanders’
supporter in the primary contests, Kshama Sawant, and her Socialist
Alternative party. Sawant is a two-time winner in recent Seattle
city-council election contests, where she ran as an open socialist
and against the Democratic Party machine. Socialist Action hailed
Socialist Alternative’s Seattle campaigns, and the associated
Socialist Alternative city council run by Ty Moore in Minneapolis.
Socialist Action enthusiastically participated in these campaigns,
contributed financially, organized public fund-raising forums, went
door-to-door, and otherwise widely publicized this inspiring socialist
effort.
This is not to say that we were not aware that Socialist Alternative
originally sought, unsuccessfully, to organize these campaigns as
joint efforts with the pro-capitalist Green Party. But Green Party
leaders rejected these overtures, leaving Socialist Alternative with
a critical decision as to how to proceed. To their credit, they took
the high road in working-class politics and ran as socialists, but
their penchant for the middle-class Green Party was never far from their
perspectives.
Today, that high road, the road to independent socialist
working-class politics against the Democratic Party, has been
abandoned, with Socialist Alternative and Sawant actually campaigning
for Sanders in all the Democratic Party primary contests.
In an article published in the May 4 issue of CounterPunch, Sawant
gives an explanation for phase two of their electoral strategy. She writes:
“To endorse Hillary, even with a more progressive platform, would be
the opposite of political revolution and would abandon all the vital
energy and momentum we have built over this historic past year. We
simply can’t afford to make this mistake. That’s why I have launched
a petition calling on Bernie Sanders to run all the way to November
as an independent, and to use his campaign as a launch pad for a new
political party of the 99%.”
Sawant immediately continues: “If Bernie’s only concern is that
running independently could open the door to a President Trump, then
why could he not at least campaign in the 40+ states where it’s
generally clear the Democratic or Republican candidate will win? Even
in this way, while not putting his name on the ballot in the 5-10
closely contested ‘swing states,’ he could still run an historic
campaign if linked to building a new party” (emphasis in original).
But Sawant’s “new party” in this case is, again, the middle-class,
pro-capitalist Green Party, which has regularly urged its supporters
to vote Democrat in “swing states” or simply declined to seek ballot
status in these “contested states.” Sawant’s petition calls on
Sanders to run on the same ticket as the Green Party’s presumptive
presidential candidate, Jill Stein—perhaps to replace Stein on the ballot
with Sanders.
Here it is important to remind readers that the terms “independent”
and “third party” are not always clear. There are several “third parties”
today, ranging from extreme right-wing expressions of capitalist
politics like the Libertarians and the Constitutional Party to
liberal, reformist Democratic Party-oriented outfits like the Working
Families Party, to the pro-capitalist Green Party.
In the case of the Green Party, let me remind readers that Green
Party presidential candidate Ralph Nader achieved ballot status in
six states via heinous agreements with Patrick Buchanan’s incipient
fascist Reform Party. Nader ran on the Reform Party’s ballot line in
return for making reactionary statements limiting the right of women
to abortion and restricting immigrants from entering the country.
(See Nader’s June 21, 2004, interview with Patrick Buchanan in the
American Conservative.)
None of these “third parties” are independent of and against the
fundamental capitalist politics of the Democrats and Republicans. Or,
to be precise, none seek to organize the working class to replace the
capitalist system with a socialist one—in which the private ownership
and control of the nation’s banks, corporations, and wealth is ended,
and the vast majority, the 99 percent, act to reorganize society for
the common good. None are based on, financed, and controlled by
working-class organizations like trade unions or other democratic
mass working-class organizations. None, as a matter of class
principle, reject voting for capitalist parties. Indeed, in local
elections, as well as national, Greens routinely endorse
“progressive” Democrats, and in races where the Republican is a bit
too overtly reactionary, “not so progressive Democrats.”
Asking Bernie Sanders, a lifelong capitalist politician with a 98
percent Democratic Party voting record, to run as a candidate
independent of and against the party he has assiduously supported for
his entire career is like asking the proverbial leopard to change its
spots. Or better, it’s akin to yet again playing politics in the
ruling class’ institutional party ballpark.
Today, much of the socialist left has made this choice; some, like
the Communist Party and Democratic Socialists of America, have
habitually supported Democrats for many decades. The CP today
supports Clinton, while the DSA supports Sanders—that is, until Sanders
drops out.
Solidarity and the International Socialist Organization call on
Sanders to run for the presidency as an “independent” or as the Green
Party candidate. The Workers International League also speaks
favorably of an “independent” campaign by Sanders. Workers World
Party and the Party for Socialism and Liberation, both of which have
called for votes for left-sounding Democrats in the past, including
Jesse Jackson, are fielding their own presidential candidates this
time around, but nevertheless have called for Democratic Party primary votes
for Sanders.
Keenly aware of the rapidly growing interest in socialist ideas
generated by capitalism’s deepening crises and sparked by the Sanders
campaign, Socialist Action branches across the country have sponsored
a series of well-attended public debates where most of the above
socialist organizations, as well as representatives from the Labor
for Bennie campaign, shared the platform for fruitful exchanges.
While the “lesser evil” syndrome was undoubtedly at work in the
presentations of these socialist groups, we were heartened to see
that the Marxist-grounded revolutionary socialist ideas of Socialist
Action were well received and that our proud party, a consistent
participant and advocate of independent mass-action united-front
mobilizations against all aspects of capitalist racism and plunder,
won new members to the cause of socialist revolution.
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May 12, 2016 in Elections, Uncategorized. Tags: Democrats, Kshama
Sawant, Sanders
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