WW News Service Digest #236
1) That can-do spirit
by "WW" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
2) NATO occupiers let KLA step up terror attacks
by "WW" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
3) WWP's Larry Holmes: Don't vote for a system of enslavement
by "WW" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
4) The workers' struggle has no borders
by "WW" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
5) Mumia: Florida, a code word for racism
by "WW" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
-------------------------
Via Workers World News Service
Reprinted from the March 1, 2001
issue of Workers World newspaper
-------------------------
EDITORIAL: THAT CAN-DO SPIRIT
hat can human imagination, ingenuity, organization and
effort achieve, and what is just impossible?
The Bush administration tells us that a shield can be built
around the United States to keep any missiles anywhere in
the world from reaching this territory. It will take a few
hundred billion dollars, at least, but hey, it's only money.
Isn't the U.S. the most powerful country on earth? The
technology doesn't exist yet, but throw enough big bucks at
the military-scientific establishment and they'll figure out
how to do it.
That's the Amurrican can-do spirit. Don't let any obstacle
get in your way. Be all that you can be. Never say die. Look
to the stars--or even better, the star wars.
So why is it that when the subject of global warming comes
up, the same energetic, optimistic types who are determined
to give us the National Missile Defense pull long faces? Oh,
we can't do anything about that, say the guys in charge. We
don't know yet if global warming is scientifically proven
(it is) or how soon it will take effect (it's started
already).
The United States is just one country, they say, even if it
is responsible for half the carbon dioxide emissions
blanketing the earth. What about the other countries? Will
China do its share? They may produce a small fraction of the
world's greenhouse gases, but they've got a lot of people.
Maybe some day they'll all be driving cars, like us. We
can't agree to cut back our emissions until they cut back
theirs.
Suddenly the technological giant that is eager to rule space
becomes a sniveling crybaby complaining about being picked
on by the whole world. And the possibility of any
international agreement on global warming is torpedoed once
again by Washington.
Global warming is very, very serious. The latest report of
the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change shows
that glaciers and snowfields are melting all over the globe.
The icecap on top of Mount Kilimanjaro is expected to be
gone in less than 15 years. Glaciers in Peru and Tibet are
also disappearing. Polar ice is melting at an alarming rate.
The sea is rising and severe weather is getting more
frequent. As the climate changes, deserts grow and species
disappear.
Much of the human race is concentrated in the low-lying
coastal areas of the continents. Floods and storms are
already exacting a high price there, and can only get worse.
What will it take for the countries with the greatest
scientific and technological development to reverse their
veritable war on nature? What will it take to ensure that
our planet continues to be a haven of life in the vast cold
ocean of space?
It will take leadership, organization and resources. That
leadership will not come from the capitalist establishment,
which has enshrined private property while building a vast
and interconnected global economy. It will come from the
class with nothing to lose and everything to gain from a
revolutionary reorganization of society.
Can it be done? Of course. One way or the other, human
society will have to change or it, too, would disappear. But
the history of our species shows enormous adaptability to
new conditions. This adaptation is not just physical but
social. When life was much more difficult than today, people
survived under the harshest conditions by sharing. The greed
and possessiveness of modern-day capitalism was unthinkable.
The social structures encouraged cooperation and working
together to solve problems.
Such cooperation is possible again. It's called
international working class solidarity and it is the
capitalists' worst nightmare.
A young and idealistic movement against capitalism is now
spreading around the world. Much of the impetus for it comes
from outrage over the destruction and ugliness that this
profit system is inflicting on the earth. The new militants
are not sitting home and moaning over the earth's demise.
They are literally throwing themselves at the
representatives of the giant corporations and banks.
Combine the can-do spirit of this new movement with the
strength, organization and will to survive of the working
class--whether in south Korea or South Africa or France or
Colombia or the United States--and the outlines of the new
revolutionary force for world socialism begin to appear.
-------------------------
Via Workers World News Service
Reprinted from the March 1, 2001
issue of Workers World newspaper
-------------------------
WEST'S WAR CRIMINAL PROTESTED IN BELGRADE:
NATO OCCUPIERS LET KLA STEP UP TERROR ATTACKS
By John Catalinotto
Despite serious concessions from the new regime in Belgrade,
Yugoslavia, the U.S./NATO powers have kept up pressure on
the government there for a complete capitulation. They have
also done nothing to stop the heavily armed "Kosovo
Liberation Army" from terrorizing the remaining Serb and
Roma population in the province or from attacking Serb
forces over the provincial border.
Over the 20 months of NATO occupation of Kosovo, KLA terror
attacks have driven 200,000 Serbs and tens of thousands of
Roma and other peoples out of the province. The remaining
Serb and Roma people, and even many people in the Albanian
community, consider the KLA to be a right-wing gang.
U.S. and German imperialism armed and supported the KLA for
years as a weapon against Yugoslavia and to create a pretext
for their own military intervention.
In their latest attack, on Feb. 18 KLA-backed commandos blew
up a Serbian police car over the Kosovo border in Serbia,
killing three people.
Just two days before that, KLA forces carried out a
terrorist attack on a bus in a convoy carrying Serb
civilians to grave sites in Kosovo. A 220-pound bomb
demolished the bus, killing at least seven people and
wounding another 40. The blast did not touch the tanks from
the NATO occupation forces known as K-FOR that were leading
the convoy.
According to a report in the Feb. 19 Time Magazine, this
attack "required a high level of technical sophistication
and organization" and was meant as a warning to K-FOR that
they too are vulnerable to KLA terror. K-FOR is the
occupation force in Kosovo, mostly from NATO countries.
These imperialist powers in Kosovo have tried to give
Belgrade the impression they might play a neutral role
between the KLA and the new Serb regime. Up to now, however,
they have done nothing to stop their KLA clients from
carrying out terror against the Serb and Roma population.
Both Washington and Berlin backed the Oct. 5 coup against
the government led by the Socialist Party of Serbia whose
leader is Slobodan Milosevic. But they are not giving the
new regime a free ride.
They want it to turn SPS leaders over to them for
imperialist war-crimes trials in the Hague. According to a
Feb. 10 report in the Montenegran newspaper Podgorica
Vijesti, at a Feb. 9 meeting in the Federation Palace in
Belgrade top federal and Serbian officials discussed
Yugoslavia's cooperation with the Hague war crimes tribunal
and "an agreement was reached" on extraditing Milosevic.
This attempt at blatant imperialist takeover has begun to
awaken resistance in the war-weary population.
PROTESTS GREET EX-NATO HEAD
European Union Foreign Minister Javier Solana might have
thought his former role directing NATO during its 78-day
aggression against Yugoslavia would be ignored on his visit
to Belgrade Feb. 8. But some 2,000 World War II veterans and
members and supporters of the Socialist Party of Serbia and
Radical Party showed him that memories of such crimes are
still alive.
The Union of Yugoslav World War II Partisans said they
"strongly protested" Solana's visit. Perisa Simonivic of the
SPS called the visit a "shame" for the new Belgrade
administration and an "utmost expression of cynicism by the
European Union."
Tomislav Nikolic of the Radical Party said the visit by "one
of the biggest living war criminals is a huge tragedy for
our people. Solana's visit is the same as if Adolf Hitler
was alive after World War II and came to Belgrade after it
ended."
Police arrested left Radical Party leader Sinisa Vucinic in
front of the Palace of the Federation in Belgrade.
When Milosevic was president, an arrest of a demonstration
leader would result in headlines and angry editorials in the
Western press. This arrest was hardly mentioned.
The demonstration showed that the struggle against NATO,
while on the defensive in Yugoslavia, is still living. On
the issue of defending Yugoslav sovereignty against the
United States, NATO and the EU, the left is still able to
come out on the streets.
The new Belgrade regime' s capitulation to U.S./EU
imperialism will soon be apparent to the population. This
new coalition regime's most right-wing, pro-NATO forces--
under the leadership of the new Serbian Prime Minister Zoran
Djindjic--are trying to take police measures to suppress the
SPS and the nationalist Radical Party before these leftist
groups regain popular support.
Serb prosecutors already brought charges against the former
general director of Radio-Television of Serbia, Dragoljub
Milanovic. They charged him with failing to evacuate the TV
building although he knew NATO had targeted it.
The Pentagon launched the missiles that killed 16 television
workers there. Yet Milanovic, an SPS leader and Milosevic
supporter, was charged.
There have been at least four protest demonstrations since
Milanovic's arrest. The charges against him were first made
by Hague Tribunal head Carla del Ponte when she visited
Belgrade last month. They give credence to the reports Feb.
3 in a Budapest newspaper, Nepszabadsag, that the new
Belgrade government had made a deal to bring Milosevic to
trial. In return, NATO is supposed to assist in stopping KLA-
type attacks on villages in Serbia near the Kosovo border.
'IN THE BEGINNING WAS THE BIG LIE'
Meanwhile, some of the major media in Germany have finally
begun to expose lies German officials told to justify the
German armed forces' role in the war against Yugoslavia.
The most important of these exposes came in early February
on a news magazine program called "Monitor" on the major
German television network ARD. Reporters presented the
statements of top government spokespeople, especially
Defense Minister Rudolph Scharping, and one by one exposed
them as outright lies and exaggerations.
Since the aggression against Yugoslavia was the first German
foreign war since World War II, the government had tried to
convince the population that a "humanitarian disaster" was
taking place in Kosovo--a "genocide." Scharping, Foreign
Minister Joseph Fischer and Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder
pulled out all stops in making these claims.
The ARD broadcast in February showed how allegations about a
Jan. 15, 1999, "massacre" in the town of Racak in Kosovo
were completely manufactured by the KLA working with U.S.
agent William Walker, who was directing the Observer Mission
in Kosovo at the time.
Even U.S. diplomat Norma Brown, an aide to Walker at the
time, told ARD "there was no humanitarian crisis [in Kosovo]
until NATO began to bomb. ... Everyone knew that a
humanitarian crisis would arise if NATO started to bomb."
It was not just the German officials who told and broadcast
the lies to justify the war. So did all the heads of NATO
countries, including former top officials of the U.S.
government--President Bill Clinton, Secretary of State
Madeleine Albright and Secretary of Defense William Cohen.
Sixty Minutes and "20-20" still have not presented the truth
to the U.S. public about these lies.
The ARD program showed that it is not Milosevic who should
be brought before a war crimes tribunal, but the heads of
the NATO powers.
-------------------------
Via Workers World News Service
Reprinted from the March 1, 2001
issue of Workers World newspaper
-------------------------
WWP LEADER SPEAKS AT WEST COAST MEETINGS:
IN THE WORDS OF MALCOLM X, DON'T VOTE FOR A SYSTEM OF ENSLAVEMENT
By Gloria La Riva
San Francisco
Larry Holmes, a national leader of Workers World Party and
an initiator of Millions for Mumia, spoke at several Black
History Month events on the West Coast sponsored by WWP in
mid-February.
In San Francisco on Feb. 10 and in Los Angeles and San
Diego, Holmes focused on the ongoing struggle against the
brutal racism of the U.S. prison-industrial complex, and the
suppression of the African American people's civil rights in
the recent U.S. presidential election.
He opened up talking about the execution of Wanda Jean
Allen, "the first Black woman who was executed in 50 years
in the U.S. "
"The day after the execution you could hardly find a word
about it in the national media. It got maybe two lines in
the Oklahoma newspapers. Here it is, the first Black woman
legally lynched, it was a big outrage.
"You know why it wasn't covered? Let's talk about the
obvious reason. It was a few days before the inauguration
and they didn't want people to be thinking about execution,
because you have Bush as president who is associated with
more executions than anyone else.
"It is hard," said Holmes, "to celebrate Black History Month
with more than 2 million people in U.S. prisons, 35 percent
of them African American, with more than 3,600 people on
death row, more than 50 percent of them African American or
Latino, with Mumia Abu-Jamal, our revolutionary brother
still facing death.
"And so this important month that came about as a result of
the struggle against racism and cultural genocide must be an
opportunity to plan the militant struggles that will
liberate all oppressed people," Holmes said.
Holmes gave tribute to the heroic prisoners who engaged in
the biggest prison rebellion in U.S. history, 30 years ago
this year, the Attica rebellion of Sept. 4-9, 1971.
1964 AND 2000
He also compared the 2000 presidential elections to 1964 and
the searing commentary given by revolutionary leader Malcolm
X in his famous 1964 speech, "The Ballot or the Bullet."
Holmes said, "What happened in Florida makes me think about
Malcolm X's words. His speech was a polemic against what
happened during the 1964 election. It was in his view a big
effort to scare Black people into voting for Lyndon Johnson
out of fear of [Sen. Barry] Goldwater."
Holmes reminded the audience of Goldwater's blatant
rightwing, racist, warmongering program, and how the
Democrats tried to contrast Johnson. "Malcolm went over who
Johnson was, a downright racist, descendant of slave
masters.
"Malcolm basically said, 'If you vote for him ... then you
vote for a system that perpetuates your enslavement, and you
shouldn't be surprised after you cast your vote, if your
relative is next to get lynched. Voting for Tweedle Dum and
Tweedle Dee is not going to free you.'"
Just days after the Israeli election of Ariel Sharon, Holmes
saluted the Palestinian people who maintain their struggle
in the face of such brutal repression, before and after the
elections there.
"It was good to see the demonstrations in Gaza and West Bank
the day after the elections, where they had both Sharon and
Barak's pictures in a kind of equal sign, like they're both
the same."
Holmes' talk was the basis for much discussion afterwards.
He pointed to the many ways that the Black struggle
continues, against racism, poverty, prisons and the system.
Most heartening was his call for dedicating Black History
Month to Black women in prison, "in fact," he said, "to all
women in prison."
Autumm Beard, a college student and lifelong resident of
Bayview Hunter's Point in the city, emceed the Feb. 10 Black
History Month forum in San Francisco. Beard told the
audience that it was the Black historian, Carter Godwin
Woodson, who put Black history on the map with his
designation of "Negro History Week" in 1926.
Born to former slaves and a coal miner himself in Kentucky,
Woodson was not able to enter high school until he was 20
years old.
After working in the coal mines and pursuing his educational
dreams, he became Harvard University's second Black doctoral
recipient. Later his organization, the Association for the
Struggle of Negro Life in History successfully got Black
History Month official recognition in 1976.
Beard said, "Before his work, this field of vital history of
African Americans had been largely neglected or distorted
under the control of bourgeois capitalist historians."
Willie Ratcliff, publisher of San Francisco Bay View
newspaper, a prominent African American weekly in the city,
also spoke at the meeting. Ratcliff said that it is
impossible to talk of just racial justice, without also
talking of economic justice, of the right to housing, the
right to a job, food and education.
Significant audiences also attended the public WWP forums in
Los Angeles and San Diego.
-------------------------
Via Workers World News Service
Reprinted from the March 1, 2001
issue of Workers World newspaper
-------------------------
"THE WORKERS' STRUGGLE HAS NO BORDERS"
By Anne Pruden
Brooklyn, N.Y.
On Feb. 18, a freezing cold Sunday, with most workers off
for the day, residents of Brooklyn's Williamsburg and
Bushwick neighborhoods showed support for protesters who
marched through.
Several Latino organizations led 1,000 people on a two-hour
march against exploitation of and discrimination against
immigrant workers and their families. A major demand was for
amnesty for undocumented workers.
Brian Barraza of the Association of Mexican American Workers
explained, "All workers have rights, no matter their
status."
The protest passed through housing projects and by community
stores and near hated sweatshops. The spirited bilingual
chants of protest denounced "ghost" bosses who hire
immigrants at their factories and pay less than minimum wage
without overtime pay or any other benefits. These bosses
also often suddenly disappear without paying the workers.
At a street meeting after the march, speakers attacked the
racism and brutality of Brooklyn's police. The cops, they
said, continue to side with sweatshop bosses by harassing
day laborers who are forced to stand on street corners to
seek work.
Workers' rights to decent housing, education, health care
and union organizing were on each speaker's agenda.
Members of several local churches joined the protest. "La
lucha obrera no tiene fronteras!" shouted protesters before
ending the rally. The workers' struggle has no borders.
They then met at the nearby office of the Latin American
Workers Project to plan more rallies and protests. Sponsors
of the Feb. 18 rally included the Latin Workers Project,
Workers in Action, Garment Workers Solidarity Committee,
Coalition for the Rights of Immigrants, Filipino Workers
Center and the Global Sweatshop Coalition.
- END -
(Copyright Workers World Service: Everyone is permitted to
copy and distribute verbatim copies of this document, but
changing it is not allowed. For more information contact
Workers World, 55 W. 17 St., NY, NY 10011; via e-mail:
[EMAIL PROTECTED] For subscription info send message to:
[EMAIL PROTECTED] Web: http://www.workers.org)
From: "WW" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Date: tiistai 27. helmikuu 2001 21:28
Subject: [WW] Mumia: Florida, a code word for racism
-------------------------
Via Workers World News Service
Reprinted from the March 1, 2001
issue of Workers World newspaper
-------------------------
MUMIA FROM DEATH ROW: "FLORIDA" A CODE WORD FOR RACISM
By Mumia Abu-Jamal
[The faces and the tactics of the leaders may change every
four years, or two, or one, but the people go on forever.
The people--beaten down today, yet rising tomorrow ... . The
people are the real guardians of our hopes and dreams.
--Paul Robeson (1952)]
For perhaps millions of African-Americans, "Florida" has
become a kind of code word for many of the wrongs that
continue to mar life in America.
The mere mention of "Florida" evokes the ugly imagery of
armed agents of the state, stopping, harassing, and
intimidating hundreds (if not thousands) of earnest, would-
be voters, with the express intent of blocking people from
voting; of thousands of people being turned away from their
voting centers, often for spurious reasons like insufficient
I.D., the address was reportedly changed, an absentee ballot
was previously filed (unbeknownst to the actual voter), and
they were therefore listed as one who already voted, and
assorted illegalities.
But what perhaps rankles more, to legions of Blacks across
the nation, is the deafening cacophony of silence from
leading (err-white) Democrats to these repeated instances of
naked disenfranchisement. Recall, if you will, the poorly
cast populist, Al Gore, screaming at the top of his tobacco-
bred lungs, "I will fight for you!!"
When Florida showed the vile emptiness of American
democracy, the Yankee brand of vote-stealing, the man who
swore to "fight for you" had laryngitis. Not only didn't he
"fight for you" (especially if you were African-American or
Haitian-American), but he didn't really fight for his damn
self!
In a record 40-yard-dash to the bedroom of bipartisanship,
neither he nor his fellow leading Democrats could wait to
yell "uncle." The angry dispossessed were left to rage
virtually alone in the streets. Who fought for them?
For the political elite and the majoritarian media, it was
as if the disenfranchisement of thousands in Florida either
didn't happen, or worse, was unimportant. The corporate
media began the incessant drumbeat for "bipartisanship" and
"healing."
How can one heal when the injury has been ignored? By
"healing" the powers-that-be meant "be quiet" or "be calm"--
accept the injustice. Hush. Take it.
The 18th century English poet, Alexander Pope, once defined
partisanship (in his words "Party-spirit") as "the madness
of many for the gain of a few."
Who fought? Who didn't? Why? Why not? Who was betrayed? Why?
Text (c) copyright 2001 by Mumia Abu-Jamal.
All rights reserved. Reprinted by permission
of the author.
