http://themilitant.com/2018/8220/822004.html
The Militant (logo)
Vol. 82/No. 20 May 21, 2018
(front page)
SWP, books, ‘Militant’ spark interest among
working people
BY DAN FEIN
When teachers and other school workers went on strike May 7 in Pueblo,
Colorado, Walmart worker Helen Meyers and a team of other Socialist
Workers Party members and supporters were there to join in solidarity
and introduce the party, its paper the Militant and books by party leaders.
They got into a discussion at a noontime rally with Tina Gurule, a
school counselor, about the need to unify the working class and others
in struggle to build a strong working-class movement to organize
independently of the Democrats and Republicans, the parties of the bosses.
Gurule agreed. If the teachers could deepen their struggle alongside
those fighting against police brutality, in defense of immigrants and
the rights of women and gay people, “we can make a change,” she said.
Gurule got a copy of Are They Rich Because They’re Smart? by SWP
National Secretary Jack Barnes, along with a subscription to the Militant.
The strike in Pueblo is just the latest manifestation of the uprising of
teachers and other school workers that is shaking up class politics in
the U.S. — from Arizona to West Virginia, Kentucky, Colorado, North
Carolina and elsewhere. It reflects the fact that the propertied rulers’
relentless attacks on working people, as they try to prop up profit
rates on the backs of workers, is getting a response. And that generates
greater interest in the SWP, its publications and the fund drive party
members are organizing for the Militant.
The party is asking workers to join them in building and attending a big
statewide rally May 16 in Raleigh, North Carolina, called by the
teachers’ union there. If you can go, contact the party branch nearest you.
Knocking on workers’ doors in Pueblo that evening, team members met
warehouse worker Rudy Romero, and his 9 year old son. “I want this paper
because I need to know what’s going on in the world,” Romero said, as he
got a subscription.
The party is on an eight-week drive to win 1,400 new readers to the
Militant and to sell an equal number of five campaign books. (See ad
below). The subscription drive, now in its seventh week, is ahead of
schedule, partly because of the response of workers to the teachers’
battles. The Militant Fighting Fund is seeking to raise $112,000 for the
ongoing publication of the paper. The party is appealing for workers and
youth to join in the drive, which ends May 22.
“I appreciate getting the analysis and the coverage through the
socialist lens,” Adam Bailey told SWP member George Chalmers at the May
1 rally for immigrant rights at City Hall in Philadelphia. Bailey picked
up a subscription along with Malcolm X, Black Liberation, and the Road
to Workers Power. Party members got a similar response at May Day
actions across the country.
“I’m not interested in politics,” Magdalena Halliday, a housekeeper and
member of Local 1199SEIU, told SWP members Terry Evans and Seth Galinsky
when they knocked on her door on the Lower East Side in New York May 4.
“It’s bad that Trump is trying to get rid of immigrants,” she said.
“He doesn’t want to deport all the immigrants. Like Obama and Bush
before him, he’s trying to scapegoat and drive them down as a way of
deepening divisions in the working class,” Galinsky replied. “The bosses
need immigration, but they want workers who live in fear of deportation.
That’s why the SWP fights for the unions to organize all workers,
against deportations and for amnesty for workers without U.S. documents.”
After further discussion on the history of the class struggle in the
U.S., Halliday purchased Malcolm X, Black Liberation, and the Road to
Workers Power and a subscription.
In West New York, New Jersey, Lea Sherman and Róger Calero met Seferina
Santana May 7. She invited them in to her home to discuss the ongoing
fight by teachers around the country, and the need to build and use
industrial unions to defend workers everywhere.
“It has to begin somewhere,” said Santana, commenting both about what
the teachers are doing and the work of the SWP to expand the party’s
reach. “We need to have a voice. The politicians in government are doing
what they want,” she said. Like millions of workers, Santana supports
President Trump because she’s attracted to his call to “drain the swamp”
of capitalist politicians in government. “They’re all scoundrels,”
Santana said. She said she used to be a supporter of Hillary Clinton,
but she looks down on the workers.
Originally from the Dominican Republic, Santana works part time as a
home health aide worker. “I need the medical insurance,” she said. “If I
don’t have food, I can scrape something together from a relative or
friend, but if I can’t buy my medicine, I can’t get it anywhere else.”
“Everywhere people are going out in the streets to protest because
they’re fed up,” she said, talking about what workers face worldwide.
Santana got a subscription to the Militant, saying she looks forward to
hearing about the Socialist Workers Party election campaign in New
Jersey, and to introduce us to her son, who is also interested in social
and political issues.
Join in the SWP’s efforts to win more readers to the Militant and its
books, and give a contribution to help the Militant get around!
Related articles:
Campaign to expand reach of ‘Militant,’ books, fund
Volunteers expand reach of revolutionary books
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