Wall Street Journal attacks the movement to defend public education.

We have said numerous times on this blog that is very important for activists to develop the skill to read the capitalist mass media. The Wall Street Journal is the main voice of Wall Street and of US capitalism. It represents our enemy and gives us the chance to see some of the thinking of our enemy. This is very important. We cannot fight effectively without knowing the thoughts of the enemy.

The Wall Street Journal, like the class it represents, tends to be very crude and blunt in its approach. However it is also shrewd in that if it thinks a movement of opposition will benefit from its criticism rather than being damaged by its criticism it will hold back and its analysis will be voiced only in small circles. So when it launches a broad side against the March 4th movement to defend public education as it did in its major publication the Wall Street Journal on Sat/Sun March 6/7 edition, then we know that the our movement is having an effect. Capitalism is worried about the movement of March 4th and is trying to warn its class to take notice. We are making progress.

The Wall Street Journal is attacking the movement at this early stage by providing its class with a few basic smears and slanders which do not hold up for a moment but which give its members a way to respond. Unbelievably and unashamedly it condemns the movement for wanting more money for education for being a "me generation." "It has a sub heading: "In the midst of the great recession students protest in favor of themselves." It goes on to criticize the movement for replacing the "idealism of youth with the crassest self pleading." This article was written by Peter Robinson, a former writer for Ronald Reagan, and an employee at Stanford University. Just so we are clear what we are dealing with. He is a right wing well paid hack propagandist for finance capital.

Imagine what is being said. The article accuses the student movement of being a "me generation," which in any case it is not. The movement demands education and a decent life for all. But think more about what this hack of finance capital is saying. He is condemning people for demanding more money for education when his class and friends looted hundreds of billions from the US economy and taxpayers and then when they were on the verge of bringing down the entire US and world economy they rushed with the "crassest self pleading" to the US tax payer, that is us, and were bailed out to the tune of trillions. A fraction of this could solve all the problems in education.

This article in the Wall Street Journal is an admission that the rich have no serious arguments to put up against the movement to defend education. Only slanders and smears. It should be condemned and rejected. More important for our movement is the article on the front page of the Wall Street Journal on Thursday 4th, the day of the great movement itself. This stated: "US corporations are flush with cash." So then if they are flush with cash after being bailed out by the US tax payers then let us have the money from the rich and the corporations to solve the problems of education and give everybody the opportunity to have a good education. This is the solution the March 4th movement advocates. It is obviously very feasible when as the Wall Street Journal admits itself, "US corporations are flush with cash."

The article attacking the March 4th movement has some more serious comments which should be taken note of. It quotes slogans on banners on the March 4th strike and day of action to defend education. "Shut it down like '68." (San Francisco State.) "Today we strike, Today we march, Today we show solidarity with the workers." (Berkeley) "Students of color have been fighting around these issues for quite a while in the UC system......So we see this as a struggle to not only save the university, but......to make those issues of access and opportunity......visible to all." (Berkeley) The Wall Street Journal article goes on: "We have here the vocabulary of the peace movement, of the struggle for decent conditions for migrants and other exploited workers and of the civil rights movement......" The article quotes a marcher as saying:" I am hoping that students feel connected to Montgomery, to Selma, to the sit ins, to the Freedom Riders, to the farm workers struggle of the 1960's and 1970's." The movement is rooting itself in the history of struggle. This is a big step forward. The Wall Street Journal and its capitalits friends are getting a little nervous.

The Wall Street Journal and its class are especially concerned that the March 4th movement is the beginning of a new era of struggle and one which will put down deep roots in the great struggles of the past and will have the power to force US capitalism to make major concessions and even that the movement could transform itself into a force which could threaten to end US capitalism and replace it with a Democratic Socialist Society. US capitalism and the US capitalist class have brought the the country to the bring of collapse. They have forfeited the right to rule. The California capitalist class presided over some of the richest resources in the world, the agricultural land of central valley, the gold reserves, the oil reserves, one of the greates natural harbors in the world, the fishing reserves, yet in spite of all of these Californian Capitalism has brought the state to where it is today, a state of bankruptcy. Californian capitalism has forfeited the right to exist, the Californian capitalists have forfeited the right to rule.

Just take one example. The California oil industry is one of the largest in the US. Unlike just about every other major oil producing state it pays no extraction tax. It is getting away tax free. The oil industry is looting the state. At the same time the rich are to able keep down their taxes on their property partly because of the undemocratic two thirds law which demands a two thirds majority to pass revenue increases and also because of their monopoly of politics through their ownership of the Republican and Democratic parties. The California corporations just like their pals nation wide are flush with cash. The money is there to solve the education and budget crisis. But their control of the state and their addiction to profit means that the money will not be used for this purpose.

Their control of the stae and their addiction to profit lies at the root of the problem. What did Schwarzenegger do when faced with drawing up the last budget? He cut about $600 million in overall funding from the 10-campus University of California and the 23-campus California State University State System. Then the UC Regents and CSU Trustees came and reduced programs, furloughed workers and increased tuition fees by huge 32%. Schwarzenegger is trying to solve the State's budget crisis and the education systems problems on the back of the poor, the students and the workers. The March 4th movement is opposing this and saying make the rich pay. March 4th was a great step forward along these lines. Full support to develop the March 4th movement and make it a force strong enough to defeat all attacks on students, education and working people across the country and a force strong enough to make the rich and the corporations pay and a force strong enough to end the profit addicted capitalist system and replace it with a Democratic Socialist system.

Sean.