Carl,
I think that the government did support labor after FDR was elected. I suspect
that what you mean is that it didn't solely support labor.
Miriam
-----Original Message-----
From: blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
<blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> On Behalf Of Carl Jarvis
Sent: Tuesday, March 10, 2020 2:27 PM
To: blind-democracy@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [blind-democracy] Re: [blind-democracy] ‘We need our own party, a
labor party’
Despite the whining of conservatives, our nation has never had a government
supportive of labor. Not even in the FDR days. Americans have always been
under the thumb of our Corporate Masters. And yes, we do need a strong labor
party. But in order to have Labor at the helm, it will take a revolution.
Carl Jarvis
On 3/10/20, Roger Loran Bailey <dmarc-noreply@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
https://themilitant.com/2020/03/07/we-need-our-own-party-a-labor-party
/ ‘We need our own party, a labor party’
article
BY BERNIE SENTER
Vol. 84/No. 10
March 16, 2020
MILITANT/DEBORAH LIATOS Retiree Ernest Williams, left, in North Long
Beach Feb. 27, tells SWP candidate for vice president Malcolm Jarrett,
right, and campaigner Bernie Senter that half his pension goes for
medical expenses. SWP calls for government-guaranteed cradle-to-grave
health care, Jarrett said.
figure
Retiree Ernest Williams, left, in North Long Beach Feb. 27, tells SWP
candidate for vice president Malcolm Jarrett, right, and campaigner
Bernie Senter that half his pension goes for medical expenses. SWP
calls for government-guaranteed cradle-to-grave health care, Jarrett
said.
MILITANT/DEBORAH LIATOS Retiree Ernest Williams, left, in North Long
Beach Feb. 27, tells SWP candidate for vice president Malcolm Jarrett,
right, and campaigner Bernie Senter that half his pension goes for
medical expenses. SWP calls for government-guaranteed cradle-to-grave
health care, Jarrett said.
figure end
LOS ANGELES — The Socialist Workers Party candidates for president and
vice president, Alyson Kennedy and Malcolm Jarrett, campaigned among
workers at the Farmer John pork processing plant here Feb. 28 during
shift change.
“It’s good you’re here in the community and I can meet and talk with
you,” said Roberta Young, one of dozens of workers who stopped to talk
with them.
Kennedy works as a cashier at Walmart and Jarrett is a commercial cook
in Pittsburgh.
“The rich and their parties — the Democrats and Republicans — think
they know what’s best for working people,” Jarrett told her. “The
bosses they serve say they can’t afford to pay higher wages and then
just want us to work harder.”
MILITANT/DEBORAH LIATOS Pedro Albarran (with hard hat), Farmer John
worker and union leader there, introduces SWP presidential candidate
Alyson Kennedy to co-workers during plant gate campaigning Feb. 28. He
told them that Kennedy and running mate Malcolm Jarrett “are workers
like you and me.”
figure
Pedro Albarran (with hard hat), Farmer John worker and union leader
there, introduces SWP presidential candidate Alyson Kennedy to
co-workers during plant gate campaigning Feb. 28. He told them that
Kennedy and running mate Malcolm Jarrett “are workers like you and
me.”
MILITANT/DEBORAH LIATOS Pedro Albarran (with hard hat), Farmer John
worker and union leader there, introduces SWP presidential candidate
Alyson Kennedy to co-workers during plant gate campaigning Feb. 28. He
told them that Kennedy and running mate Malcolm Jarrett “are workers
like you and me.”
figure end
“I work in the bacon department and make $12.83 an hour,” Young said,
and that isn’t a wage you can live on.
“I just got back from Arizona where 1,700 copper workers have been on
strike against Asarco for five months,” Kennedy said. “After going
without a raise for 10 years plus facing the bosses’ demand for
another four-year wage freeze and doubling or tripling of health care
costs, they said, ‘No more.’ It’s an example of what workers need to
do.”
While speaking with Josue Rodriguez, Kennedy noted that the way the
government is dealing with coronavirus shows how capitalism not only
can’t solve humanity’s problems, but makes them worse. She pointed to
the lack of accurate information, inadequate testing and medical care,
the bureaucratically imposed lockdowns, all implemented by the
capitalist rulers the world over, which leave people on their own.
Kennedy contrasted health care under capitalism — where it is a
commodity, sold to those who can afford it, to maximize profits — and
Cuba where it is guaranteed to everyone.
Rodriguez knew about Cuba’s health care system. “Cuba is not scared of
the coronavirus because they have a system that takes care of people,”
he said.
“But in Mexico, the way they treat people there is the same as here.
The problem is the system. They exploit people.”
Pedro Albarran, a union leader at the processing plant, joined the
candidates and introduced them to his co-workers. “As workers we don’t
have representation in government,” he told Zenaida Lagunas. “They are
workers like you and me. They are part of the fights for better
conditions on the job, health care and fair wages.”
Lagunas said her health care insurance doesn’t cover medicine or
anything serious.
“The capitalist system can’t be fixed. It will take a movement of
millions to get rid of it,” Kennedy said.
“People need to stand up for themselves and become confident,” Lagunas
said.
Victor Jarman was skeptical about the campaign. “Politics is just
another hustle. People in Congress and the Senate are some of the
richest people there are,” he told Kennedy. “What specifically do you
people want to do?”
“The two-party system is a trap,” Kennedy replied. “They try to make
us think we can make change by picking the least bad of candidates
they put forward.
It’s a scam.” The Socialist Workers Party 2020 platform says workers
need a labor party based on the unions, a party that organizes working
people to fight all year round for the interests of all the oppressed
and exploited.
Workers need to begin organizing in defense of their own interests.
“Workers need to bring solidarity to fights like the Asarco copper
miners on strike in Arizona and Texas,” Kennedy told him. “And the
ongoing fight in Florida for the right of the formerly incarcerated to
vote. A referendum there to do this passed by over 60% in 2018 but the
state government is trying to gut it.”
Workers they met at the plant gate bought two books by SWP leaders, 14
copies of the Militant and two subscriptions, and contributed $30.
Talking to workers on their doorstep
Jarrett met Ernest Williams while campaigning in North Long Beach Feb.
27. “I worked for the City of Long Beach,” Williams said. “Now that
I’m retired I’ll have to pay half my pension, $1,200 a month, to have
health care.”
Jarrett pointed to the campaign plank in the Militant that says,
“Health care for all. Fight for universal government-guaranteed
cradle-to-grave health care, and retirement income for all.”
The SWP candidate told Williams that he had just returned from
participating in the Havana International Book Fair in Cuba. “I met
doctors who traveled to Africa to help eradicate the scourge of Ebola.
It’s an example of the revolution’s internationalism,” Jarrett said.
Their attitude is similar to that of Malcolm X, he said, showing
Williams the book Malcolm X, Black Liberation, and the Road to Workers
Power
by SWP National Secretary Jack Barnes. “Malcolm X said you don’t
have to wake people up to their oppression but to their worth,” said Jarrett.
Williams
bought the book and one other, along with a Militant subscription.
Kennedy and Jarrett also spoke at a Militant Labor Forum Feb. 29.
“Cubans are very honest about the problems and challenges they face,”
Jarrett said, coming
back to his experiences in Cuba. “They have blackouts sometimes and a
shortage of gasoline, results of the U.S. rulers’ economic war on Cuba.
“But you see a determination to defend their revolution,” Jarrett said.
“One soldier told me, ‘We’ve faced this embargo for 60 years. We’ve
had to ride bicycles in the past because of lack of gas. They’re not
going to beat us.’
“The Cuban Revolution is an example for working people in the U.S. to
emulate,” he said.
Those at the meeting kicked in $2,381 toward the $25,000 campaign fund.
Deborah Liatos contributed to this article.
See directory
to contact party campaign office nearest you.
article end
list of 4 items
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