President John Sweeney, (he is head of the US trade Union movement but most Union members and workers as a whole would never know it) sent out a note after the elections. He claims that "the political pendulum is swinging back toward sanity."
Perhaps he is talking of the sanity that Clinton introduced, NAFTA and the throwing of working class poor off of welfare or the bombing of Serbia, or even Sudanese drug factories that made life-saving drugs. Oops, sorry we made a mistake there. Maybe he's talking about the sanity the Democrats showed helping the Republicans repeal the Glass Steagall act or those that gave the Savings and Loans industry the freedom to hand the US taxpayer a $300 billion tab. Henry Waxman, heading the commission inquiring in to the present crisis and pointing blame here and there was part of that fiasco.
Perhaps he is talking of the sanity of Al Gore who in a Business Week interview headed "Getting Smaller with Al" which was in response to the Republican victories in 1995, wanted to prove to the business community that the Democrats were better than Republicans when it came to laying off public sector workers and cutting social services under the guise of government restructuring.
"We've been doing it for two years. He (Gingrich) wants me to talk to Republicans about how best to do it, and I look forward to that. In the past-- including 12 years of Republican Administrations--there was lots of talk about reducing the size of government, but it increased. This is the first Administration (Clinton) that has actually cut the size of government."
The interviewer suggests the Democrats are not cutting government employees like the Republicans. But Al assures him:
"Cabinet departments don't get created by accident. Below that level, there are many agencies that we have eliminated. In one year, we downsized by 100,000 employees. We have locked in place plans to eliminate another 200,000 workers. That's a bold start."
Perhaps Sweeney is talking about the good old days in the eighties when Rengel of Philly attacked AFSCME workers there or perhaps of the sanity of Governor Perpich of Minnesota who smashed the Hormel meatpacker's strike by calling out the national guard.
Maybe the sanity of the Carter years when the Tafty Hartley was used against the miners by this deeply religious Democrat who lusted in is heart.
Now Barak Obama is the Labor leader's hope for the future, a wall street candidate in a capitalist party surrounded by the likes of Paul Volcker, Robert Rubin and other elite representatives of the US capitalist class.
While I was moved myself by the moment and the emotion on the faces of black folks last night, especially older black folks who have every reason to be thrilled at such a historic event for them, it is likely that as the Democrats and President Obama carry out the policies of US capitalism it will be the poorest Americans who suffer most and this will mean a lot of African Americans.
Obama made it clear in his victory speech, preparing the ground for the let down. The road is going to be "long" "steep". We "may not get there in one year or one term" he says. But we will get there. But with the Democrats majority why should there be a problem? Why would it not take a few wekks to provide for workers; it only took three weeks to come up with 800 billion dollars for bankers and this was with a supposedly divided Congress. (Divided by an aisle only, not by ideology)
Obama calls for a "New spirit of service" a "New spirit of sacrifice and patriotism"
All of these terms are to prepare us for the attacks to come. The bail out has to be paid for and it will not be paid for by Donald Trump. The President of the US represents all Americans, but represents them differently for sure.
We all have to pitch in, Obama says. Are US workers not sacrificing enough? Are the poor not sacrificing enough? We work some two months a year longer than workers in other industrialized countries and we have worst benefits and social services. And health care?
The movement around Obama's election was the closest thing to a movement without being one. He has 4 million volunteers. He has three million in his data base. These people, black people, youth, they have high expectations that in the main will be dashed. Where will they go? Even if only 10% of them come out of this looking for an alternative this is almost a half million people.
Activists must recognize that a new period has opened up. The market has lost some of its allure, its credibility. It no longer has all the answers in the minds of all those people under 40 who have never known anything but lazze faire. As we have said on this blog, as the crisis deepens it is likely the Democrats will be forced to introduce some new deal type reforms but the policies of capitalism will be carried out and this will mean job losses and cuts in social spending as well as increased taxes.
We can provide an alternative and fight to build a movement based on direct action and independent community/labor groups like these hands of our homes and jobs committees that can defend our interests and through which and independent mass worker's party can be built.
A more favorable objective situation has opened up for socialists and other anti-capitalists.
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