Trust me Miriam, if you heard my daily rants you would be able to
understand just how involved I become when hearing the tragic events
going on around me. But nonetheless, living in today's world is a
most amazing time to be alive.
As for being an optimist, I like the words of my old history
professor, "I'm an optimistic pessimist".
He most certainly was...and so am I.
Carl Jarvis
On 6/15/20, Miriam Vieni <miriamvieni@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
You, Carl, are a true optimist. You summarize it all by saying that it's an
interesting ride. But you can only say that if you feel emotionally detached
from it. I, on the other hand, who am not an optimist for all kinds of
reasons, become truly upset at each new report of each new terrible thing
that is happening. Example: I didn't listen to the news over the weekend so
I didn't know until when I listened to Democracy Now this morning that
another black man had been killed on Friday by the police. I didn't know
about the young woman, beaten and sworn at by the police in New York.
And when I think of how little people know, how completely ignorant they are
when they vote, it just seems hopeless. Melanie and I received our absentee
ballots for the Democratic primary vote the other day. There were 3 people
running for congressperson, the incumbent, and 2 unknown people. The
incumbent is a typical centrist Democrat. I asked her to look up the two
alternatives on her phone, something it would have never occurred to her to
do. The man was a Jewish lawyer who had a disgusting statement about
Palestinian terrorists. The third was a woman with a lovely statement of her
views and a list of organizations that supported her. Melanie said, "I don't
know what any of these are", and then she began reading them to me, and they
were all progressive, left of center organizations whom I immediately
recognized from having read about them and from podcasts. So I voted for
her. There were seven delegates for Sanders listed and a statement which
said, "vote for any seven". Melany didn't understand that, that meant one
should check all seven names. So I told her how to mark my ballot and if she
agrees with my ideas about whom to vote for, which she most likely does,
she'll know how to mark her ballot. But she would not have known what to do
with it if she hadn't had to do mine for me. Just think about how many
people vote, not understanding how to vote or who they're actually voting
for.
Yes I know, it's all meaningless in the end. But it's the best I can do
under the circumstances.
There's a book called, The Jakarta Method, which I learned about on Robert
Scheer's podcast and which I downloaded from Bookshare. It's about the kinds
of things that the US did in the 60's and perhaps at other points, to
arrange for the overthrow of governments that it thought challenged its
domination of the world. All this stuff is out there, in detail for anyone
to read, if they choose to know the truth about our country.
Miriam
-----Original Message-----
From: blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
<blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> On Behalf Of Carl Jarvis
Sent: Monday, June 15, 2020 3:37 PM
To: blind-democracy@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [blind-democracy] Re: [blind-democracy] RE: [blind-democracy] Re:
[blind-democracy] “Everything that was impossible, unimaginable,
unthinkable, inconceivable yesterday is on the order of the day
Miriam,
What I see might be best described as "the beginning of the end of the
Empire". The Ruling Class is showing signs of exhaustion. The angry Masses
are rising up on several fronts. What we call "The Left"is bursting out
over several issues, in frustration.
The "Far Right" is gathering strength, trying to force conservatism further
to the right. Meanwhile, the Masses push this way and that way, often miss
informed and confused.
But under it all we have not changed, so far as our hostile nature is
concerned. When we're not fighting Indians over fishing rights, we're
battling Latinos over those highly desirable crop picking jobs. We curse
the Jews when the Market drops, and curse the Blacks when our taxes
increase, and we're told it's for the support of the Poor. We hated the
Nazis and the Japs during the Second World War, and then the Koreans and the
Chinese. The South still hates the North 150 years following the Civil War,
and the North still feels superior to the Hick South. The Protestants hate
the Catholics, and the Catholics Know that they are the only True Church.
Men still feel superior to women, and the women resent the smart ass men.
It goes on, but you get the picture. We've always had someone or something
to kick around. Of course we Left Handed fellows don't have it so good,
either. I left out the Commies, being the son of one, as well as being
branded Marxist...a sign of just how dumb the accusers were.
But my point is that nothing has changed. And in saying that, I fear we are
doomed as a species. Our good nature, our positive side is so covered over
by the hate and suspicion that we probably will never dig our way out.
But it's one Hell of an interesting ride.
Carl Jarvis
On 6/15/20, Miriam Vieni <miriamvieni@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
You know, one of my wayward thoughts has been that perhaps all of the
racism is even more obviously virulent than it used to be because we
had a Black President. I think that drove some of the white racists
over the edge. It pushed the Republican party to even more of an extreme
than it had been.
Remember Romey saying that 47% of the population didn't pay taxes?
The Republicans refused to confirm the moderate supreme court judge
whom Obama had nominated. The Koch Brothers got more power in 2012 and
the Tea Party was formed. They kept representing Obama as a left wing
extremist. Would they have been able to do that to Hillary if she'd won
the election in 2008?
Of course I do remember them misrepresenting the Clintons as both far
left liberals and also dishonest. But actually, they were dishonest.
Miriam
-----Original Message-----
From: blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
<blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> On Behalf Of Carl Jarvis
Sent: Monday, June 15, 2020 12:51 PM
To: blind-democracy@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [blind-democracy] Re: [blind-democracy] “Everything that was
impossible, unimaginable, unthinkable, inconceivable yesterday is on
the order of the day
General Mattis, Said it all..."Donald Trump is the first president in
my lifetime who does not try to unite the American people does not
even pretend to try."
Carl Jarvis
On 6/15/20, Roger Loran Bailey <dmarc-noreply@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
???Everything that was impossible, unimaginable, unthinkable,
inconceivable yesterday is on the order of the day today???
https://socialistaction.org/2020/06/14/everything-that-was-impossible
-
unimaginable-unthinkable-inconceivable-yesterday-is-on-the-order-of-t
h
e-day-today/
June 14, 2020
U.S. Fight Against Racism and Repression Reaches New Heights By JEFF
MACKLER
For three weeks now, in 1,000 cities and towns across the country,
unprecedented, massive, multi-racial, daily mobilizations against the
ingrained institutional racism that permeates every aspect U.S.
society have exploded in scope and intensity.
In Washington, D.C., the world witnessed the spectacle of united
Black, white and Latinx working people, youth and clergy being
brutally attacked by clubbing police, the National Guard, and
low-flying helicopters, ordered by the Pentagon to intimidate and
scatter protestors with a maneuver called a ???show of force.???
The peaceful demonstrators, including an array of the nation???s
corporate media reporters bearing witness, were subjected to
concussion explosives and noxious gases aimed at clearing a path for
the posturing, chin up egomaniac President Trump to walk across
Lafayette Park to St. John???s Episcopal Church for a one-minute, now
widely condemned photo op, where he brandished an upside-down bible.
Trump was accompanied by an entourage of top military and civilian
officials including Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General
Mark A. Milley and Secretary of Defense Mark T. Esper, who soon after
went to great lengths to disassociate themselves from the
president???s militaristic rhetoric. As if to imply that his threats
to bring ???law and order??? were akin to a declaration of martial
law, Trump designated Gen. Milley, the nation???s top military
official, ???in charge??? of the response to the protests.
And all this in the context of the looming specter of the deadly
dangerous COVID-19 pandemic that has taken the lives of 117,000
people to date and infected two million more. Just one month ago,
workers???
consciousness was rising based on a fully justified skepticism of
ruling class demands to prematurely abandon the necessary
shelter-at-home strictures and return to work to bolster capitalist
profits. After working people saw the video of George Floyd???s
murder, the nearly instant nationwide movement???s dramatic
transition from quarantining against COVID-19 to risk-filled, often
close-quartered mass street protests, has strikingly demonstrated the
best traditions of American working class radicalism. Everything that
was impossible, unimaginable, unthinkable, inconceivable yesterday is
on the order of the day today.
Top generals challenge Trump
The public schism wherein the top leadership of the most powerful
military on earth denounced President Trump???s call to arms to put
down the ever-widening and overwhelmingly peaceful rebellious
protests, is equally unprecedented.?? The same generals who
dramatically broke with the racist bigot President Trump have never
hesitated to rain down death and destruction, if not genocidal wars,
on poor and oppressed nations in the Middle East, Latin America,
Africa, Asia and indeed, around the world. But sending in troops to
beat back the uniting and highly visible anti-racist millions in the
streets today is quite another matter.
Trump had amassed 1,600 active-duty soldiers on the outskirts of
Washington, D.C., presumably ready for action. Days later he was
compelled to send them back to their bases, claiming that the
threatening protests has subsided, when in fact their size and
breadth had dramatically increased.
Gen. Milley made his disassociation from Trump absolutely clear when
wrote a message to all top military commanders stating that ???every
member of the armed forces swears an oath to support and defend the
Constitution,??? which ???gives Americans the right to freedom of
speech and
peaceful assembly.??? Forty percent of the U.S. armed forces are
people of color. No doubt the general was dead set against bringing
thousands of multi-racial working class U.S. troops, all victims of
the economic draft, to fight against their civilian counterparts, who
are demanding Black Lives Matter and ???No Justice, No Peace!???
louder than ever.
Former Defense Secretary and retired Marine Corps General James
Mattis similarly offered a withering denunciation of Trump???s photo
op two-block march from the heavily barricaded White House to
Lafayette Square???s St.
John???s Episcopal Church. Hours earlier the fearful bragging bigot
Trump and his family had to be hastily escorted by his security
forces to the White House???s underground bunkers lest the unarmed
peaceful protestors outside break through the might of all of
Washington???s repressive forces to capture the frightened coward,
who ordered the lights turned off before he descended. The
prevaricating president later told the media that he was merely
???inspecting??? the bunker.
The next day, Washington, D.C.???s Black mayor, Muriel Bowser,
ordered that the street leading directly to the White House be
painted in huge block letters, ???Black Lives Matter.??? Bowser got
the funds for this instant project from the city???s mural painting
budget. Not impressed with by this act from a Democratic mayor who
has enacted massive increases in the police budget and routinely
supports cops against the victims of police brutality, protesters
painted ???Defund The Police??? next
to it in the same yellow letters.
Said General Mattis, ???Donald Trump is the first president in my
lifetime who does not try to unite the American people ??? does not
even pretend to try.??? Nicknamed ???Mad Dog??? Mattis, the war hawk
general, who was Secretary of Defense for Trump???s first two years
in office and previously attacked Trump for ordering the withdrawal
of some U.S.
troops from Syria, added, ???Instead he tries to divide us. We are
witnessing the consequences of three years of this deliberate effort.
We are witnessing the consequences of three years without mature
leadership.???
Defense Secretary Mark T. Esper, who marched to St. John???s along
with Trump, later falsely claimed that he didn???t know where they
were going.
Esper similarly broke with Trump stating that, ???The option to use
active duty forces in a law enforcement role should only be used as a
matter of last resort???We are not in one of those situations now.???
The New York Times summed-up ruling class sentiment as ???Active-duty
military troops should not be sent to control the wave of protests in
American cities, at least for now.??? At least for now!
Admiral Sandy Winnefeld joined the growing chorus of military dissent
stating, ???We are at the most dangerous time for civil-military
relations I???ve seen in my lifetime.??? Winnefeld, a retired former
vice chairman of
the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told the Times. ???It is especially
important to reserve the use of federal forces for only the most dire
circumstances that actually threaten the survival of the nation. Our
senior-most military leaders need to ensure that their political
chain of command understands these things.???
What could Winnefeld have meant by these remarks other than to imply
that the nation???s top generals should ignore any Trump orders to
deploy Pentagon forces to crush peaceful protestors? The risk to be
perceived ???
that is, a fraternization between the masses in the streets and the
masses of soldiers and National Guard forces sent to crush them ???
defined the duty to be obeyed. The potential of thousands of
multi-racial troops ???taking the knee??? along with their civilian
counterparts, these commanders calculated, for now at least, was not
to be risked. They cautioned RETREAT!
Pentagon fears National Guard/US Military radicalization
Pentagon officials noted that the military is trained in using lethal
power against foreign adversaries, not in law enforcement. One
commentator noted, ???What is appropriate in Fallujah is not in
Farragut Square,??? the latter a reference to Washington???s D.C.???s
bustling shopping district a few blocks from the White House. In
Fallujah, Iraq, U.S.
troops, accompanied by unchallenged U.S. air power, leveled the city
and slaughtered its inhabitants.
Esper and the other top Pentagon officials are fearful that the
military would be seen as participating in an unprecedented
nationwide move toward martial law. With notes of rebellious
sentiments in the air, these equivocating generals implied that there
are no limits to the repressive forces that U.S. capitalism might
unleash to safeguard their predatory system, but not now.
For the first time in a lifetime, however, a glimmer of the forces
that are an absolute necessity in challenging and defeating
capitalist control and repression in all its myriad forms has
appeared. In the streets, facing off against local and state police
power backed by a hesitant National Guard, we are witnessing a
generation of youthful, multi-racial working class fighters,
bristling with hatred of racist injustice.
The Washington, D.C. National Guard was far from unanimous in using
mass force against the peaceful demonstrators. An insightful account
in Politico, based on interviews with 10 Guard members on the scene,
not only refuted Trump???s assertion of violent protestors but
indicated political support and kinship with the protestors.
???A Washington, D.C. National Guardsman,??? according to Politico,
???said he was worried that a lot of the goodwill that the Guard has
built up with local Washingtonians because of their coronavirus
response and annual Fourth of July celebrations was in jeopardy.
Within the span of 30 to 40 minutes, all of that washed away because
of political stuff,??? he said.???
Torrie Osterholm, the D.C. National Guard???s director of
psychological health reported, ???The Guardsmen were ill-prepared for
the hate directed at them by the protesters, which was reminiscent of
the anti-military sentiment during the Vietnam War. The shift from
being viewed as heroes during the coronavirus pandemic to villains
suppressing citizens??? right to protest happened overnight,??? she
said.
Politico continued with an account of a soldier who spoke on
condition of anonymity, ??????As a military officer, what I saw was
more or less really fucked up.??? The official line from the White
House that the protesters had turned violent, he said, is false.???
???We have a lot of National Guardsmen who are struggling with this,
because unlike in combat when you have an enemy, these are our
neighbors, our friends, our family,??? another Guard officer stated.
More than 60 percent of Washington, D.C. National Guards are people
of color. One Guard soldier told The New York Times that ???he and
some fellow troops were so ashamed in taking part against the
protests that they have kept it from family members.???
Politico???s account records similar sentiments in cities across the
country. The massive and rising anti-racist and anti-repression mood
that today manifests itself everywhere, has undoubtedly permeated the
consciousness of the National Guard and, without doubt, rank-and-file
soldiers, many of whom joined the armed forces in a vain effort to
escape the increasingly hopeless prospects before them only to find
themselves confronted with the prospect of going to battle with their
own people, that is, the most oppressed communities as well as
working class America.
Similarly motivated by capitalism???s repeated incapacity to
effectively deal with one crisis after another ??? real
unemployment-underemployment rates of close to 50 percent, the
COVID-19 pandemic, the impending global warming-climate catastrophe,
endless imperialist wars across the globe, mass evictions and
foreclosures, increasing levels of poverty and hunger, multi-trillion
dollar bailouts for the super rich and ever-declining health care ???
American workers are questioning capitalist prerogatives as never
before.
Mass support for anti-racist protests
A new Monmouth University poll indicated that 76 percent of Americans
???
including 71 percent of white people ??? called U.S. racism ???a big
problem.??? That???s a 26-percentage-point spike since 2015.
Fifty-seven percent of Americans said demonstrators??? anger was
fully justified, and another 21 percent called it somewhat justified.
Among respondents age
35 and under in a recent Washington Post/Ipsos poll of
African-Americans, nine out of ten did not trust the police to treat
people of all races equally ??? higher than in any other age group.
On June 8, CNN reported that their survey showed an unprecedented 84
percent of the population supported the mass protests against police
brutality and repression.
Similarly, Trump???s repeated allegations that the protestors were
essentially ???looters, anarchists, antifa [short for anti-fascists]
and violent outside agitators??? have been roundly rejected by
ever-increasing majorities. Even the corporate media has felt
compelled to largely refrain from characterizing the protests as
anything other than expressions of mass outrage against deep social
inequities. Trumps spurious charge that their protests were largely
the actions of disaffected and violent looters have been discarded
with contempt.
???Black people in the U.S., as well as Latinx, Native Americans and
immigrants have been enslaved, exploited and looted for centuries and
to this day??? has become the pointed reply.?? The Black Lives Matter
spokesperson at George Floyd???s Minneapolis memorial meeting
blithely stated, and to cheers of approval, ???White people have been
looting Africa and African-Americans for centuries. Pay-back is long
over-due.???
No one winced.
There has been little condemnation of the handfuls of desperate and
outraged individuals who break storefront windows; nor has there been
condemnation of those who massed to burn to the ground the Third
Precinct police station in Minneapolis.
Indeed, face to face in the Oval Office with his boss Donald Trump,
during a heated discussion over whether to invoke the 1807
Insurrection Act to deploy federal troops into the streets, General
Milley, according to The New York Times, ???argued that the scattered
fires and looting in some places were dwarfed by peaceful protests.???
Milley???s remarks notwithstanding, documents recently obtained by
The Intercept???s Glenn Greenwald through the Freedom of Information
Act, revealed that the Pentagon has planned its response to possible
future acts of mass rebellion led by members of ???Generation Z,???
which could be
expected to meet with the full force of U.S. military repression.
Greenwald???s revelation pointed to a Pentagon war game, called the
???2018
Joint Land, Air and Sea Strategic Special Program (JLASS),??? which
offered a scenario in which members of ???Generation Z, driven by
malaise and discontent, launch a Zbellion in America in the
mid-2020s.??? No doubt, today???s ???Gen Zbellion??? is not driven by
anything resembling ???malaise??? but by everything indicating mass
hatred at the horrors inflicted on working people in the course of
capitalism???s ongoing degeneration.
Minneapolis City Council pledges Police Department abolition
That the impossible can appear as the order of the day briefly
appeared, then disappeared before the nation when nine members ??? a
claimed veto-proof majority ??? of the Minneapolis City Council
announced before an assembled crowd of 500 on Sunday, June 7 their
intention to dismantle the city???s police department. The city???s
present system, they stated, could not be reformed. Citing the
city???s own figures, they had the facts to prove it.
A 2018 report stated, ???About 20 percent of Minneapolis???s
population of
430,000 is Black. But when the police get physical ??? with kicks,
neck holds, punches, shoves, takedowns, Mace, Tasers or other forms
of muscle ??? nearly 60 percent of the time the person subject to
that force is Black.??? About 63 percent of those shot and killed by
police in Minneapolis between 2000 and 2017 ??? 19 people ??? were
Black, while only
17 percent ??? or 5 people ??? were white.
Democracy Now???s Amy Goodman reported on a recent protest outside
the home of Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey. Protest leader Kandace
Montgomery asked the mayor: ???Jacob Frey, we have a yes-or-no
question for you: Yes or no, will you commit to defunding Minneapolis
Police Department????
Echoed by the crowd of protesters, Montgomery told the mayor ???We
don???t want no more police. It???s that clear. We don???t want
people with guns toting around in our community, shooting us down. Do
you have an answer?
It is a yes or a no. Will you defund the Minneapolis Police
Department????
When Mayor Frey said no, Montgomery responded: ???All right, fine!
You???re
wasting our time! Get the [bleep] out of here! Get the [bleep] out!???
The crowd of thousands chanted ???Go home Jacob, go home! Go home
Jacob, go home!??? followed by ???Shame!??? as the humiliated mayor
left, walking slowly through the crowd.
Goodman interviewed Minneapolis city council person, Jeremiah
Ellison, son of the state???s attorney general, Keith Ellison, a
former congressman who has also been Deputy Chair of the Democratic
National Committee.Despite Jeremiah Ellison???s ???veto proof??? city
council majority over Mayor Frey???s anticipated veto, he made clear
that neither he nor his council associates had any intention of
defunding or abolishing the city???s police department. The
equivocating Democratic Party politician stated, ???We???re going to
engage the community for a year to develop a new
system of public safety. You???ve got to understand, the police
department has been around for 150 years. At least the Minneapolis
Police Department has been around for over 150 years. And police
departments all around the country have been around a lot longer than
that. I think that we owe it to the city of Minneapolis, to our
residents, to develop a plan that moves forward intelligently, that
moves forward in a way that works.???
Democrats and Republicans seek ???police reforms???
Meanwhile, a group of Minneapolis residents, one armed, began their
own patrols of the Black community, likely as a symbolic gesture of
future intentions. Absent organized mass forces in the communities of
the oppressed today, demands for Black and Brown Control of Black and
Brown Communities, as opposed to the present white racist cop
control, remain in the earliest stages of discussion and debate.
Increasingly, we are hearing important demands aimed at sharpening
this discussion, including the three D???s: ???Disarm, Defund and Disband
the Police.???
In past years, often following public and videotaped police murders
of unarmed Black people, Democratic Party establishment politicians,
in tandem with corporate-funded NGOs, have moved to orchestrate a
well-planned series of paper concessions to assuage community outrage.
These always include retaining the basic institutions of racist
police violence intact while introducing a number of ???reforms???
including the election or appointment of ???more sensitive??? Black
police chiefs.
The ???wash, rinse, repeat cycle???
This ritual window dressing was aptly described by Jody David Armour,
a law professor at the University of Southern California who studies
racial justice and who estimates that the current widespread outrage
over economic and racial injustices may give the new movement a
greater durability.
???There was a wash, rinse, repeat cycle, a standard script,??? said
David Armour, ???Convene a commission, hold some hearings, have
community members vent and testify, and here come some policymakers
saying, ???Here???s a fix.?????? The result, he said: ???Look where
we are.???
This ???wash, rinse, repeat cycle??? is in full operation today, with
the posturing ???veto-proof??? Democrats on the Minneapolis City
Council planning on a yearlong ???discussion with the community???
before taking any
action, while their congressional counterparts rush to introduce a
myriad of police reform legislation ???full of sound and fury,
signifying nothing.??? With Trump???s polls numbers in free fall ???
10 to 12 percent in nearly every category ??? not be outdone,
Congressional Republicans are drafting their own ???reform package.???
Democrat Joseph Biden, took to the airwaves decrying some police
violence and likewise calling for ???reform??? while his campaign
spokesman
Andrew Bates, according to the June 9 NYT, made clear that ???Mr.
Biden was opposed to cutting police funding and believed that more
spending was necessary to help improve law enforcement and community
policing.???
The following day, Biden wrote an op-ed in USA Today calling for an
additional $300 million for the police, no doubt in the name of
???reform.??? The previous week the posturing Biden, ever in search
of a campaign gimmick, asserted that if elected president, he would
immediately set up a ???national police oversight commission.???
There is no
end to capitalist politicians??? bluster, bluff and bullshit! These
aside, the end product, as their system degenerates, is more repression.
The ???wash, rinse, repeat cycle??? has no objective other than to
defuse the present mass outrage against the system of
institutionalized racist force and violence that pervades every
police department in the country.
Whether the media savvy mayors of New York and Los Angeles today
promise to cut police spending or their Democratic Party partners in
Washington whistle another tune, the result is the same. Capitalism,
and especially a capitalism in dire crisis, requires ever-deepening
repressive infringements on basic democratic rights and civil
liberties, whether with regard to outright police violence, or voting
restrictions, or all pervasive government spying or prohibitions on
the right to march and rally, not to mention the ???right??? to
conduct endless overt and covert wars against the poor and oppressed
nations of the world.
Here, we note the present restrictive laws on the books in virtually
every city in the nation that severely limit or prohibit marches and
rallies. In the face of today???s mass protests, they have gone
largely, if not totally unenforced. Experienced organizers are well
aware of the myriad laws in every city fundamentally restricting the
right to peaceful assembly ??? the laws requiring large fees and
permits, the laws requiring protestors to stand behind police
barricades or to submit to cement wall enclosures, the laws allowing
police to charge for their ???monitoring services??? and the laws
restricting large parts of cities from any protests at all. The
announced curfews imposed across the country have been largely
ignored and eventually withdrawn as ineffective. Increasingly, many
of those arrested ??? and there have been thousands to date ??? have
been released, with officials pledging that curfew violation charges
would be dropped. Mass trials, not to mention punishment of
anti-racist activists, is a spectacle that the more ???intelligent???
elements among the ruling rich want to avoid, at least for
now.
The NYT struck a note of caution concerning the present impasse faced
by the elite. ???Because the protests are not only about the death of
Mr.
Floyd but a broader system of racial inequality, officials cannot
simply defuse concerns by pressing charges against police officers,
as they did in Baltimore after the death of Freddie Gray.???
???And the next day!???
One recent afternoon in Washington, D.C., one person among hundreds
of demonstrators shouted that they would all be coming back the
following day. Another person added, ???and the next day.??? The
phrase caught fire, and the crowd started chanting, ???And the next
day! And the next day!???
Today???s unprecedented mobilizations began with the police murder of
George Floyd. But their depth and staying power is equally a
reflection of the mass anger and frustration stemming from all the
insults to one???s being that capitalism has inflicted on working
class America, and especially the nation???s Black, Brown and Native
American communities.
There is outrage on the job front, with millions relegated to low
wage, ???gig economy??? jobs, if they have a job at all. There is
outrage against
the racist ???school-to-prison??? pipeline and mass racist
incarceration, against the Blue plague of police oppression and the
plague of racist discrimination, against the impending global warming
climate catastrophe, against the endless wars against working people
at home and abroad, and against the system of capitalist exploitation
more generally.
Today, we hear voices raised louder than ever proclaiming ???No
Justice, No Peace??? and Black Lives Matter??? and ???They Say Cut
Back; We Say Fightback!??? They will soon be joined by voices also
demanding ???Unions Now! Organize the Unorganized!??? And not too far
away, we will hear ???Break with the Two-Party Capitalist Duopoly!
For Workers Power!??? as working people struggle for a fighting labor
party based on powerful and democratic trade unions in alliance with
all the oppressed and exploited! Yesterday???s impossible,
unthinkable, unimaginable idea of building a world of justice and
freedom for all is on the agenda today!
Join us! Join Socialist Action!
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communities across the country who are rising up in protest against
racist police violence.
Defend Black Lives! No Police State! No Military Dictatorship!
Release all arrestees! No more attacks on anti-racist protesters!
--
___
Carl Sagan
???Every aspect of Nature reveals a deep mystery and touches our
sense of wonder and awe. Those afraid of the universe as it really
is, those who pretend to nonexistent knowledge and envision a Cosmos
centered on human beings will prefer the fleeting comforts of
superstition. They avoid rather than confront the world. But those
with the courage to explore the weave and structure of the Cosmos,
even where it differs profoundly from their wishes and prejudices,
will penetrate its deepest mysteries.???
??? Carl Sagan, Cosmos
