I think that theoretically, the article is on target. But while the young,
dedicaated faithful may choose to work for a future dream in which the
Capitalist system has been replaced by a totally new system based on very
different economic and social assumptions, I tend to be more pragmatic by which
I mean that I'll support anything that will make actual improvements here and
now, even if that means that the system remains as it is, but better regulated.
That's what Sanders and Stein are both talking about. It's really ridiculous to
argue over whether or not either of them is promoting the correct course for
our country because the power elite won't permit either of them to win. Money
and military might have always won. Look back at our history. Our important
historical figures have been men of means. Our foreign policy has always been
wedded to the needs of business. It's more blatant and obvious now but people
who write as if we're suddenly in a whole new phase, just aren't taking our
history into account. And part of our history has always been democratic
movements who worked to change the trajectory of our history. They have won
battles along the way, but never the war. I suppose one could look at same sex
marriage as a win. We'll see. But even that win is related to the social class
and financial capabilities of the people who fought the battle. They've always
been among the elite. It's just that people pretended that they weren't there.
Miriam
-----Original Message-----
From: blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
[mailto:blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of Carl Jarvis
Sent: Saturday, July 04, 2015 11:31 AM
To: blind-democracy@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [blind-democracy] Re: [blind-democracy] Jill Stein: ‘A Green New Deal’
It will be interesting to see how many Sanders supporters throw in with
Clinton, should Sanders lose out in the Primary. That will say a great deal
about the level of understanding of Sanders base.
Stein or Sanders. This article is on target in its contention that neither
candidate is free of the Corporate Capitalist System. Stein does need to turn
to the Labor Unions for support, as well as advocating their importance in
shaping a more equitable future for the Working Class. Sanders needs to cut
the cord that holds him tethered to the Military/Industrial Complex. Frankly,
his vow to make major social changes will crash and burn if he does not take on
the huge military budget, and denounce the widespread murder the Empire is
going forward with.
But only speaking for myself, I'll still go through the Primary with Bernie
Sanders, and then, if Hillary Clinton is the Puppet of Choice, I'll switch to
Jill Stein. But again, the writer makes a good point.
We need a Working Class Party, steeped in socialism.
Carl Jarvis
On 7/4/15, Roger Loran Bailey <dmarc-noreply@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
http://socialistaction.org/jill-stein-a-green-new-deal/
Jill Stein: ‘A Green New Deal’
Published July 3, 2015. | By Socialist Action.
July 2015 Jill Stein 2
By JOE AUCIELLO
As Bernie Sanders’ presidential campaign gains increasing public
support and respectful media attention, physician and Green Party
activist Dr. Jill Stein has announced her own candidacy for president.
Speaking on “Democracy Now” on June 26, Stein, the Green Party
candidate in 2012, vowed to run on a “Power to the People” platform
that would sharply oppose the policies of the leading Democratic and
Republican contenders.
As in the past presidential election, Stein is proposing a “Green New
Deal,” a comprehensive program of social and political reform. Her
platform emphasizes a national shift in resources from fossil fuels to
renewable energy by 2030 and a jobs-creation program to make such
change possible. Stein favors cancelling student college debts today
and providing free college education tomorrow. The Green Party
candidate also supports the $15 minimum wage and single-payer health care.
Stein’s reference to a “Green New Deal,” is an obvious allusion to
Franklin D. Roosevelt’s Democratic Party “New Deal,” which was aimed
at saving capitalism in the face of the emerging labor-based mass
struggles of the 1930s. In truth, past Green Party presidential
campaigns centered on offering reforms of capitalism on the one hand
while not acting as “spoilers” for the Democrats’ chances in contests
where the outcome was expected to be close. That is, “Vote Green!”
only in states where it won’t usher in a Republican.
Stein concedes that her program shares “many similarities” with the
campaign of Sanders, the “leftist” candidate in the Democratic Party
primaries, though there are differences in regard to foreign relations.
Stein forthrightly denounces the prime minister of Israel as “a war
criminal” and, unlike Sanders, would not sell weapons to the Israeli
regime. Such distinctions aside, however, the overall likeness to the
Sanders program is very much to the point.
The Green Party strategy anticipates that after the power of Wall
Street ensures a Hillary Clinton victory in the primaries, Bernie
Sanders will shepherd his flock into the Clinton campaign.
Disappointed followers of Sanders, so this logic goes, will then
become the enthusiastic supporters of Jill Stein. Further, her
campaign would hope to turn these sympathizers into a new generation
of Green Party recruits—that is, a grouping still in search of an
electoral, as opposed to class-struggle, formula to attract voters to the
project of reforming capitalism.
In the parched political desert that is America’s electoral landscape,
the Stein campaign would appear to present a small but refreshing oasis.
Instead, it is a mirage!
This can be seen in Stein’s statement on “Democracy Now” that her
platform is “focused on reforming the financial system—not only
breaking up the big banks but actually establishing public banks” as
well as “nationalizing the Fed” (the Federal Reserve System). To speak
of reform of a financial system based on the rule of the corporate
capitalist elite (the “one percent”), rather than abolishing it, tells
us that her program, no matter how “radical” it might sound, amounts
to acceptance of the system in its fundamentals.
The Greens proudly state that their campaign does not accept corporate
funding, yet their campaign does accept the rule of corporate power.
Stein’s campaign platform differs little from that of the “successful”
reformist Green Parties around the world that regularly participate in
coalition capitalist governments and support their anti-labor policies.
Indeed, the Green Party in the U.S. is little more than an electoral
association of mainly middle-class reformers with no roots in
working-class organizations or mass social struggles. The Greens have
no perspectives, long or short term, of rebuilding today’s trade
unions into fighting working class-based institutions that operate in
the economic and political arena independently of and against the twin
parties of U.S. capitalism.
“Their government is not our government!” Stein exclaims. But if this
idea is more than an applause line, a mere rhetorical flourish, then
it means not only a change in party—a Green Party victory in place of
a Democrat or Republican Party victory—it means building the kind of
organizations capable of leading a challenge for power.
Yes, their government is not our government because it is a tool for
the capitalist class to ensure its wealth and privilege, to guarantee,
as far as possible, the continued existence of their rule and our
exploitation.
The way forward goes far beyond the Green Party’s platform of “New Deal”
reformism. It begins with a class break from all capitalist and
pro-capitalist parties, the Green Party included. The road ahead will
likely include the formation of a trade-union-based Labor Party, based
on fighting unions in alliance with all the oppressed and exploited.
Obtaining a real and lasting victory for workers and oppressed people
in the United States will also require the construction of a mass
revolutionary socialist party aimed at the abolition of capitalism.
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Posted in Elections, Environment. | Tagged Green Party, Greens, Jill Stein.
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