WfJftNEftS '11"'(Jllft' 2seNo. 453 20 May 1988

u. .~~DruuWar":License for lobal Terror

CIA Is World's Biggest Drug-Runner

u.s. top cop Edwin Meese unleashes narcs on Bolivian peasants.

In the name of waging "war ondrugs," the Democratic Congress andRepublican White House are declaringwar on the world, including the Ameri­can people.

In early May the House approved ameasure, with only 23 votes opposed,which would allow the Secretary ofDefense to "seal off" U.S. borders andpermit the military to engage in "hotpursuit" and arrest of suspects insideAmerican territory. Then, on May 13,the Senate voted overwhelmingly toauthorize the president to deploy themilitary "to detect, locate, pursue,search and seize" vessels and aircraft ininternational waters and airspace and tourge governors to mobilize the NationalGuard for domestic drug patrols.

The Democrats posed as devotees ofconstitutional government over OllieNorth and the "cabal" running out ofthe White House basement. But here isCongress trying to bolster its "tough ondrugs" image for the '88 elections bylegislating military police powers athome and blatant piracy and kidnap­ping abroad. What's next-MP road­blocks on the streets? Boarding Sovietfreighters on the high seas to search forjoints?

America's rulers are out to reassert,literally, their supposed right to be "copsof the world." In the wake of Uo'S.imperialism's humiliating defeat at thehands of the Vietnamese peasants andworkers, Washington sought to bury the"Vietnam syndrome" through militarybuildup and bluster. Carter's anti­Soviet "human rights" crusade culmi­nated in his declaration of Cold War II

over Afghanistan. Reagan used his "waron terrorism" line to invade Lebanonand Grenada, to bomb Tripoli and to setthe Sixth Fleet adrift 'in the PersianGulf.

Now it's the "war on drugs," particu­larly intended at re-establishing Ameri­can "manifest destiny" over LatinAmerica. se where Carter's national

i

security adviser Brzezinski-made a pil­grimage to the Khyber Pass to pose witha Soviet AK-47, the world's most reli­able assault rifle, Reagan's top cop EdMeese (facing multiple indictments athome) went to the Bolivian jungledecked out in safari suit and DEA(Drug Enforcement Administration)cap to inspect a WW II-surplus bolt-

action rifle.The "war on drugs" already meant a

small-scale invasion of Bolivia in 1986,which was met by a massive popularoutcry and general strike against U.S.troops and IMF austerity policies. Ayear later, when thousands of U,S.National Guardsmen were sent to

continued on page 10

Oer SpiegelFirst Lady of Horrorscope.

activities in line with the planets. Butit wasn't easy for the poor astrol­oger, either. Nancy Reagan testilycomplained to Don Regan aboutrevisions in the president's sched­ule, "I wish you'd make up yourmind. It's costing me a lot of money,calling up my Friend with all thesechanges:' As somebody wrote theNew York Times, the whole thing isgiving astrology a bad name.

Revelations that America's impe­rial first family are a couple ofzanies, vicious and vindictive star­gazers, suckers for any free-floatingsuperstitions around, have made thealready deeply discredited Reaganpresidency a laughingstock aroundthe world. The day after the "zodiacfactor" hit the news, Reagan madea speech in Chicago mentioningspace invaders, saying: "I've often

. continued on page 10

bombshell on the White House:"Virtually every major move ordecision the Reagans made duringmy time as White House chief ofstaff was cleared in advance with awoman in San Francisco who drewup horoscopes to make certain thatthe planets .were in a favorablealignment for the enterprise." .

The astrologer's influence includ­ed casting star charts to determinewhen Reagan should sign agree­ments with Gorbachev. She even setthe timing of the upcoming Mos­cow summit! According to DonRegan, her warnings of '.'bad days"for public activity were what madethe president clam up for monthsafter the first Iran/Contragate reve­lations hit the news.

"At least this astrologer isn't askooky as the last one:' Deaverexplained to Regan when he tookover trying to schedule presidential

Is this the Age of Aquarius afterall? Reagan's Jupiter may align withMars if the moon's in the seventhhouse, but it sure isn't love that'ssteering the stars in the White Housethese days. Salvos of devastatingrevelations have already been firedby ex-courtiers, scribbling theirmemoirs while scrambling to avoidindictments: David Stockman toldhow they always knew "supply-sideeconomics" was a scam designed toenrich the rich; Michael Deaver saidReagan had to be kept on his feet tostay alert, lest he doze off into totalnon compos mentis in the midst ofpress conferences; Larry Speakesrevealed that he made up whole pres­idential quotes without bothering tohave the First Actor read them offcue cards. Now embittered ex­chamberlain Donald T. Regan's Forthe Record has dropped the lat~~t

, .~

.ba·! Do Na,ncy, Hitler .and the Tsarina Have in Common?

Reagan's Star VIars

LetterBT Protests Too Much

New YorkBox 444, Canal St. Sta.New York, NY 10013(212) 267-1025

NorfolkBox 1972, Main PONorfolk, VA 23501

OaklandBox 32552Oakland, CA 94604(415) 839-0851

San FranciscoBox 5712San Francisco, CA 94101(415) 863-6963

Washington, D.C.Box 75073Washington, D.C. 20013(202) 636-3537

.TorontoBox 7198, Station AToronto, Ontario M5W 1X8(416) 593-4138

internationalist in its very foundations;their attempts to' seal deals with imperi­alism (like over Afghanistan) jeopard­ize its defense. As Trotsky wrote in1932, "We accept the workers' state as itis and we assert, 'This is our state.'Despite its heritage of backwardness,despite starvation and sluggishness,despite the bureaucratic mistakes andeven abominations, the workers of theentire world must defend tooth and nailtheir future socialist fatherland whichthis state represents."

This passage was quoted in July 1941by Czervony Sztandar (Red Flag), thepaper of the Trotskyists in the WarsawGhetto, in a statement on Hitler's inva­sion of the USSR. "The first workersstate is fighting for its existence," theywrote. "The war of the Soviet Unionagainst Hitler is the war of the interna­tional proletariat; it is our war." No sir,BT, you-won't even hail the Red Army'sfight to smash Nazi barbarism. But theTrotskyists of the Warsaw Ghetto did.They end their declaration proclaim­ing: "Long live the Red Army! Long livethe Russian Revolution! Long live theinternational revolution!"

Our readers might also take a lookat the front page of the AmericanTrotskyists' Young Spartacus (Novem­ber 1932) on the anniversary of theOctober Revolution, headlined "HailRed Russia!".

imperialism while resting on (and attimes forced to defend) the proletarianproperty forms which issued from theOctober Revolution. Their statementwipes out the whole basis for Sovietdefensism, which is the foundation ofthe T-rotskyist call for workers politicalrevolution to oust the Stalinists.

The bottom line is, it isn't their state!The Soviet Union belongs to all theworkers of the world. The Stalinists'nationalism undermines the USSR,

DetroitBox 441794Detroit, MI 48244

IthacaBox 6767Ithaca, NY 14850

Los AngelesBox 29574, Los Feliz Sta.Los Angeles, CA 90029(213) 380-8239

MadisonBox 2074Madison, WI 53701(608) 251-6431

HI. ..... II

TROTSKYIST LEAGUEOF CANADA

.National Office:Box 1377 GPO, New York, NY 10116

(212) 732-7860

SPARTACIST LEAGUE/U.S. LOCAL DIRECTORY

AtlantaBox 4012Atlanta, GA 30302

BostonBQx 840, Central Sta.Cambridge, MA 02139(617) 492-3928

ChicagoBox 6441, Main POChicago, IL 60680(312) 663-0715

ClevelandBox 91037Cleveland, OH 44101(216) 881-3700

November1932 issue of

AmericanTrotskyist

youth paperon fifteenth

anniversary ofthe OctoberRevolution.

mouthed on . Afghanistan. But whatdoes it mean to call for "military vic­tory" now, precisely when Gorbachev &Co. are pulling the Soviet troops out?It's an empty statement to try to coverthe fact that you're openly renouncingthe Spartacist slogan, "Hail Red Armyin Afghanistan!"

We always said if the BTlET werehonest, they'd admit they hated thatforthright stand, which was reviled inthe rad-lib milieu caught up in JimmyCarter's "human rights" crusade, the"moral rearmament" phase of the post­Vietnam anti-Soviet war drive. So nowthe BT has finally come out with it, butthey're still trying to weasel. As wepointed out in WV 449, they're payingthe admission price to crawl into the all­Canada popular front: no "soft-on­Russia" pinkos allowed.

But the BT's letter does have the vir­tue of putting it baldly. "Trotskyistsnever hail Stalinist traitors or theirstate," they say, "because doing soobscures the treacherous and anti­revolutionary character of Stalinism."And they wonder why we say their realposition is Stalinism is counterrevolu­tionary through and through! What isthis "Stalinist state" (shades of Shacht­man!)? This completely wipes out thefundamental Trotskyist understandingof the dual character of the Stalinistbureaucracy, which seeks to conciliate

Afghanistan." You're even "not indif­ferent" to the fact that the Soviet Armyintervention meant social progress toAfghan women-like literacy andremoving the veil. How very big of you,especially since for the last six yearsyou've remained conspicuo~sly close-

LENIN

20 May 1988

WV replies: So you say you're for"Military Victory to the Soviet Army in

it contributed to the defense of theUSSR. It also represented a possibilityof significant social progress for theAfghan masses-particularly women.Trotskyists are not indifferent to this.The reason that it was a mistake to"hail" Brezhnev's army in Afghani­stan-while at the same time necessaryto defend it militarily-is because it pos­sessed at every moment the capacity tobetray the Afghan women, workers andleftists who placed their faith in it.

You rhetorically ask whether theSoviet army's struggle against the Naziswas "just 'Stalinist treachery'." Perhapsyou think that the Trotskyists shouldhave been "hailing" the Stalinist appa­ratus in that struggle as well? .. 'Farfrom "hailing" the Stalinist militaryapparatus, as you propose, Trotskyadvocated combining military defenseof the property forms with prepara­tions for the political revolution againstthe bureaucracy. This is how Trotsky­ists defend 'the Soviet Union.

Fraternally,Cathy Nasonfor the Bolshevik Tendency

Toronto, Canada8 April 1988

No. 453

TROTSKY

!!~l!!.'t!..,.~'!!£.t'L~~~.s~DIRE'CTOR OF PARTY PUBI.ICATIONS: Liz Gordon

EDITOR: Jan Norden

PRODUCTION MANAGER: Noah Wilner

CIRCULATION MANAGER: Jon Lawrence

EDITORIAL BOARD: George Foster, Liz Gordon, Frank Hunter, Jane Kerrigan,Len Meyers, Jan Norden, James Robertson, Reuben Samuels, Joseph Seymour,Alison Spencer, Marjorie Stamberg, Noah Wilner (Closing editor)

Workers Vanguard (USPS 098-770) published biweekly, except 2nd issue August and with 3-week interval December,by the Spartacist Publishing Co., 41 Warren Street, New York, NY 10007. Telephone: 732-7862 (Editorial), 732-7861(Business). Address all correspondence 10:Box 1377, GPO, New York, NY 10116. Domestic subscriptions: $5.00/24issues. Second-class postage paid at New York, NY. POSTMASTER: Send address changes to Workers Vanguard,Box 1377, GPO, New York, NY 10116.

Opinions expressed in signed articles or letters do not necessarily express the editorial viewpoint.

The End of EmpiresIt is afar cryfrom the secularhumanism'

of the bourgeois-revolutionary Enlighten­ment which inspired the first leaders oftheearly American republic to the cynicismand mysticism.of the gang lodged in theWhite House in the twilight years of theAmerican empire. The decadence anddecline of the Russian autocracy, sweptaway by the revolutions of 1917, wassimilarly mirrored in the personalqualitiesof the last autocrat, Tsar Nicholas II. In

his History of the Russian Revolution. Leon Trotsky observedas ageneral historicalrule that social orders which have outlived their reason for existence reflect thisirrationality in the individuals chosen to lead them. .

Historians and biographers of the psychological tendency not infrequently seekand find something purely personal and accidental where great historical forces arerefracted through a personality. This is the same fault of vision as that of thecourtiers who considered the last Russian tzar born "unlucky." He himself believedthat he was born under an unlucky star. In reality his ill-luck flowed from thecontradictions between those old aims which he inherited from his ancestors and thenew historic conditions inwhich he was placed. When the ancients said that Jupiterfirst makes mad those whom he wishes to destroy, they summed up in superstitiousform a profound historic observation. In the saying of Goethe about reasonbecoming nonsense-':"'V..ernunft wird Unsinn"-this same thought is expressedabout the impersonal Jupiter of the historical dialectic, which withdraws "reason"from historic institutions that' have outlived themselves and condemns theirdefenders to failure ....

Even the most despotic of autocrats is but little similar to a"free" individualitylaying its arbitrary imprint upon events. He is always the crowned agent of theprivileged classes which are forming society in their own image. When these classeshave not yet fulfilled their mission, thenthe monarchy is strong and self-confident....It is quite otherwise when the sun of the old society is finally declining to the west.The privileged classes are now changed from organizers of the national life into aparasitic growth; having lost their guiding function, they lose the consciousness oftheir mission and all confidence in their powers.

-Leon Trotsky, The History of the Russian Revolution (1932)

Workers VanguardNew York, NY

Comrades:

Noone reading your piece wouldhave any idea that what you are polem­icizing against is our decision to adoptthe slogan "Military Victory to theSoviet Army in Afghanistan" in place of"Hail Red Army in Afghanistan." Yourpolemic is deliberately intended to con­vey the impression that we are changingsides in Afghan conflict-rather thanchanging the formulation expressingour-military support to the Soviets andtheir allies.

As cde. Riley pointed out, "Trotsky­ists never hail Stalinist traitors ortheir state" because doing so obscuresthe treacherous and anti-revolutionarycharacter of Stalinism. The interven­tion of the Soviet army in Afghanistanwas historically progressive inasmuch as

We print below excerpts of a let­ter by the "Bolshevik Tendency" (ex­External Tendency) in response to ourarticle, "BT Says Don't Hail Red Armyin Afghanistan" (see WV No. 449,~25 March).

2 WORKERS VANGUARD.•.•.' I"

Solidarnosc Revival Fizzles

What's Behind Polish Strikes

[London) GuardianFlanked by cross, Solldarnost leader Walesa (second from left) leads smallband out of Gdansk shipyard In defeat, May 10.

20 MAY 1988

A Spartaclst Pamphlet $1.00

$1.00(39 pages)

SolidamoSc:Polish

Company Union forCIA and,Bankers

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Make checks payable/mail to:Spartacist Publishing Company

Box 1377 GPO, New York, NY 10116

conceded that Solidarnose now had apro-capitalist program (see "Solidar­nose Calls for Wall Street to RunPoland," WV No. 406, 20 June 1986).

At the same time, Solidarnose was.becoming moribund within Poland,reduced to small groups of intellec­tuals with clandestine printing presses.Last year the conservative LondonEconomist (25 April 1987) reported:"Working-class support for Solidarityhas dwindled rapidly, as polls con­ducted even by pro-Solidarity sociolo­gists show." And Jacek Kuron, a lead­ing intellectual figure in the movement,admitted, "Even the strongest optimistsacknowledge that the influence of Soli­darity activists on the silent majority ofsociety has been radically diminished."Moreover, the Solidarnosc leadershipdisintegrated into competing factionsand cliques.

Solidarnose' godfathers in Washing­ton and the Vatican were naturallydis­traught over the sorry state of theorganization and made some effort torevive it. Last June John Paul Wojtylavisited Poland and prayed for ''the spe­cial great heritage of Polish Solidarity."A few months later .Reagan's man,former CIA chief George Bush, madeliis pitch, On a pilgrimage toa Warsawchurch along with Mr. Solidarnose,

continued on page 9

May 5 a police raid broke the NowaHuta strike, while police cordoned offthe Lenin Shipyard in Gdansk. Im­mediately the mass of strikers wenthome, leaving Walesa with about 500raw youth. From Warsaw the Solidar­nose leadership appealed to workersthroughout Poland for "actions of soli­darity" on behalf of Walesa and hisholdouts. But Polish workers did notanswer this appeal. History did notrepeat itself.

The Rise and Fall of SolidarnoicDuring the 1970s the Stalinist regime

of Eduard Gierek, grossly corrupt andincompetent, mortgaged Poland to theloan sharks of Wall Street, the City ofLondon and the Frankfurt Borse, Whenin 1980 the Western- bankers turned the

- screws, the Warsaw government cut liv­ing standards by sharplyraising prices,thus setting off a strike .wave whichgave rise to Solidarnose. The legitimategrievances of Polish workers against theeconomically and politically bankruptStalinist bureaucracy were channeledinto a clerical-nationalist movementtied to the apron strings of Washingtonand the Vatican., At its first national congress in

September 1981, Solidarnose consoli­dated around a counterrevolutionaryprogram of "Western-style democracy"with Walesa praising Japan and theUnited States as economic and politicalmodels for Poland. At that point theinternational Spartacist tendency, al­most unique on the left, raised the cry:Stop Solidarnose Counterrevolution!Fortunately for the international work­ing class, indeed for all humanity, Soli­darnose' bid for power was spiked atthe last minute by the (near-bloodless)counter-coup carried out by the Polishregime under General Jaruzelski inDecember 1981.

Since then the Solidarnose leadershave been completely unashamed intheir support to "free world" capital­ism and anti-Soviet militarism. Theyhave denounced the social-democratic"peace" movement in West Europe asKremlin agents and dupes. In 1985 theSolidarnosc Temporary CoordinatingCommission (TKK) adopted a pro­gram calling for a thoroughgoing mar­ket economy in Poland complete withprivate ownership in industry and astock market to boot. Even some of itsardent supporters in the Western left

Strike atLenin Shipyard

In Gdansk,birthplace ofSolldarn06t,

collapsedwithin a week.

before, while Stalowa Wola's demandedthe legalization of Solidarnosc, The lat­ter strike was settled in a few days for ahefty wage hike, but the Nowa Hutastrike continued. Then on May 2 strik­ers occupied the Gdansk shipyards.Now Walesa was once more on theforefront of the Polish stage. Here thedemand to re-establish Solidarnose wasfirst and foremost, wage concerns weresecondary.

Solidarnose' masters and paymastersin Washington (this "free trade union"has received millions from the CIA, andthe U.S. Congress last year openly voted$1 million for it) and the Vatican im­mediately launched a campaign on itsbehalf. U.S. State Department spokes­man Charles Redman lectured the Jaru­zelski regime: "The current strikes inPoland demonstrate more clearly thanever that' successful economic' reformand recovery require genuine dialoguebetween the, government and society"(Washington Post, 3 May). By "soci­ety" the Reagan gang means Walesa &Co. On his way to visit Paraguayandictator Stroessner, Pope John PaulWojtyla (originally of Krakow) de­clared that the Solidarnose leaders"deserve unconditional support andencouragement."

This time the best efforts of Presidentand Pope to subvert Poland fell flat. On

Massive price hikes ordered by thePolish government in everything fromfood to rent sparked the strike wave.Transport workers wildcatted, steel andmunitions workers shut down theirplants demanding catch-up wage in­creases. The leaders of Solidarnoscrushed to place themselves at the head ofthis spontaneous strike' wave. "I canmobilize the whole country," braggedLech Walesa on May 4 as he once againled a strike at the Lenin Shipyard inGdansk, the birthplace of Solidamosc.A week later Walesa led a few hundreddispirited followers out of the shipyardgates as the recent strike wave in Po­land collapsed. That night he and hiswife Danuta attended Catholic mass.Afterward Walesa proclaimed to re­porters, "There is no freedom withoutSolidarity." His wife, visibly bitter, said,"There is no Solidarity." .

For a few weeks everyone in Po­land and ,in the world was asking:would it happen again? Would So­lidarnose again challenge the War­saw regime on behalf of open anti­Communist clerical-nationalism? As in1980 the current strike wave was trig­gered by an austerity program dictatedto Poland by Western bankers. The NewYork Times (28 April) noted, "the Gov­ernment is seeking to demonstrate tointernational lenders, such as theInternational Monetary Fund, fromwhom it seeks fresh credit, that it meansbusiness in cleaning up the economy."Since February the price of food hasjumped 40 percent, public transport by70 percent, heating by 100 percent andrents by 200 percent. Everyone expectedtrouble, and in late April trouble came.

It began with a wildcat strike of trans­port workers in the northern city ofBydgoszcz. This ended almost immedi­ately when the regime came up with a 60percent wage increase. The next day thelargest industrial enterprise in the coun­try, the Lenin Steel Works at NowaHuta near Krakow, was shut down andright after that another big metal­working and arms-producing complexin Stalowa Wola. The Nowa Huta strik­ers were not only demanding a 50 per­cent wage hike for themselves but bigpay raises for all state employees inPoland.

While the main thrust of the steelstrikes was more money, they also had apolitical edge. The Nowa Huta strikecommittee demanded the, reinstate­ment of Solidarnose activists fired years

Confederate SoldiersHarvard Yard?~

•In

charge of men with a battering ram andbroke down the door of the BostonState House to free - fugitive slaveAnthony Burns. He was a close associ­ate of John Brown, as well as a fighterfor women's rights, an early opponent ofU.S. imperialism, and the commandingofficer of the black regiment, the FirstSouth Carolina Volunteers. Unlike hisConfederate classmates, who Higgin­son noted were schooled in all the socialgraces but could neither read nor write,Higginson broke the "Harvard mold"and became a fighter for the oppressed.His actions should inspire opponents ofthe campaign to honor racist trash atHarvard today.

Finish the Civil War! Black libera­tion through socialist revolutionljs

capitalism; we will fight any moveto enshrine, glorify, or apologize forthe racist Confederacy. Fighters forblack freedom today honor the coura­geous Union soldiers-particularly the200,000 black troops who, fighting fortheir own liberation and the destructionof the hideous slave system, turned thetide ofthe Civil War. Among the namesinscribed in Memorial Hall is that ofRobert Gould Shaw, a former Harvardstudent who became the commandingofficer of the heroic black regiment, theMassachusetts 54th.

Another former Harvard student,Thomas Wentworth Higginson, ded­icated his life to fighting e~¢ry form ofsocial injustice braintrusted bythis prig­gish ruling-class institution. He led a

waging "war against fascism." Harvarditself had more than a few ties to theThird Reich. Ernst "Putzi" Hanfstaengl('09) turned a Harvard fight song into aNazi march that Hitler's brownshirtsplayed on the day they took power inGermany ("rah, rah, rah" was changedto "Sieg Heil"), And just as Reagan laida wreath in homage to the kill-crazysadists of Hitler's SS at Bitburg, Har­vard now proposes to praise black chat­tel slavery by honoring those whofought to perpetuate it. As the premierthink tank for U.S. imperialism, Har­vard is a Valhalla of counterrevolution­ary terror.

As communists who fight to finishthe Civil War, to end the systematicoppression of black people under

omen and Revolution Culver PicturesHarvard graduates who led black Unionsold'iers in Civ,1 War: monument to Robert Gould Shaw, commander of54th MassaChusetts; Thomas Wentworth Higginson (right), leader of 1st South Carolina Volunteers.

All Ho'nor to the Union Dead-Finish the Civil War!Under the dark arches of Memorial

Hall, one can barely see the marble tab­lets where the names of Harvard'sUnion dead are carved. Yet the contro­versy sparked by a group of professorsand alumni who propose to honor Har­vard's Confederate soldiers illuminatesthe unfinished business ofthe Civil Warin racist America. The campaign tocommemorate yesterday's fighters forwhite supremacy is a cover and en­couragement for today's racists who areviolently lashing out against blackstudents and other minorities on cam­puses across the country-especially thesmug, effete institutions like Harvard.In 1986 Harvard hoisted the Confeder­ate flag over the Yard to flaunt 350 yearsof race and class privilege. This flag,which rallied those slaveholding sons ofHarvard to keep blacks in chains, israised today as the banner ofKlan lynchmobs in Forsyth County and race­haters in Howard Beach and Boston.

Memorial Hall was built specificallyto honor Harvard students who foughtin the Union Army against the slavoc­racy. Now Harvard Rev. Petei: Gomes"justifies" a memorial to Confederatesoldiers by pointing out that even Ger­man World War I and World War IIveterans are commemorated in Memo­rial Church. This is a false equation.International working-class fighters ral­liedbehind and joined the Union Armyin a tremendous social struggle which,through blood and iron, purged thisland of chattel slavery. In contrast, inthe interimperialist conflicts of WorldWars I and II the workers' interest wasto struggle against their own rapaciousbourgeoisies. As the German MarxistKarl Liebknecht said, "The main enemyis at home."

In World War II, the class interest ofworkers of all nationalities was todefend the Soviet Union, homeland of"the 1917October Revolution, and it wasthe Soviet Red Army which crushedNazi Germany. The American rulingclass tried to sucker working people intosupporting the bosses' aims with talk of

Racist RounduR Seizes Thousands of Black" Latino Youths

LAPD The DeadliestGllng in Blue

Pizac/APLos Angeles-More than 8;000 minority youths have .beenvictimized by theracist cops.

LOS ANGELES-it was Easter week­end and the Los Angeles Coliseum wasbathed in spotlights as hundreds gath­ered in its vast parking lots. This was nosporting event or concert, however, butone of the several command posts set upby an army of cops during their six­week-long invasion of South CentralL.A, and other neighborhoods underthe guise of "cracking down" on gangviolence and drug dealing. A continu­ous stream of black and Hispanic youthin handcuffs are marshaled through amobile booking unit to expediteprocessing the enormous number ofarrests: a total of 1.500 in one weekendalone. The eerie scene conjures upimages of Pinochet's Chile-and in­deed, since the end of February minor­ity sections ofLos Angeles County havebeen under siege by the L.A. PoliceDepartment.

The LAPD's racist offensive wassparked by the senseless January 30 kill­ing of Karen Toshima, who was caught

.in the crossfire during a rival gangshoot-out while shopping in Westwood,an upscale entertainment and diningcommunity adjacent to UCLA. Re­sponding to the mainly white citizenry's.outrage that the gangs were invadingtheir turf, the cops began a mobi­lization which targeted black youthentering the area. The obviously racistcharacter of this police sweep promptedan off-duty Hawthorne Police Depart­ment officer to mount a "sting" opera­tion exposing cop harassment of blackyouth. Sergeant Don Jackson took agroup of black teens to Westwoodwhere they were almost immediatelystopped, interrogated, thrown upagainst the wall and frisked. Jacksonhimself was arrested on "suspicion ofobstructing justice" for protesting thisapartheid-style mass bust.

The black and Hispanic communi­ties were irate over the racist doublestandard that a single killing in whiteWestwood garnered such attention

4 WORKERS VANGUARD

Longshoremen -Read WV, Stalinist Hacks Fume

Glasnost on the Waterfront?

WV PhotoWide readership of Trotskyist press among Bay Area longshoremen makesCP Stalinists see red.

LAPD chief "Choke Hold" Gates and his drug tank.

The Spartacist League's fight to forgea revolutionary workers party standssharply counterposed to the reformist"left" tails on the Democratic Partydonkey. For the first time since 1964,when they went "all the way with LBJ,"the Communist Party (CP) is not evenrunning a token presidential campaign.On the West Coast, the CP has beenstung by the strong sales of WorkersVanguard to International Longshore­men's and Warehousemen's Union(lLWU) members in the Bay Area.When the SL flyer, excerpted below,was distributed at the SF union hall,it sent the CP's mouth on the water­front, Archie Brown, into paroxysms ofCIA-baiting.

A few weeks ago, Communist Partysupporters handed out a leaflet at the SFlongshore paylines in which "Water­front Friends of the Peoples DailyWorld" urged workers to support theCP paper. "Don't confuse the PDWwith other so-called publications-whoare part of the phony left," it rants. "Wedon't cause confusion and disruption."The opponent the CP won't name?Workers Vanguard (published by theSpartacist League), the only other papersold regularly at the paylines. And thehearing WV has won on the waterfrontas a class-struggle, Trotskyist paper hasgot the CP's goat.

WV tells the truth: Jesse Jackson andthe Democratic Party are enemies ofworkers and blacks. And WVis the onlyleftist paper around that openly fightsfor defense of the USSR against imperi-

from the LAPD, along with rewardsoffered by the L.A. City Council, whilehundreds of black and Hispanic youthshave died in gang turf fights and feudsover the past year. But outrageously, onFebruary 16, the middle-class-led SouthCentral Organizing Committee and theUnited Neighborhoods Organizationcalled on police chief Daryl ("ChokeHold") Gates to bring his killer cops and"war on gangs" to black and HispanicL.A. And they didn't have long to wait.Given a green light by the so-calledneighborhood leadership and a citycouncil which had even debatedpeti­tioning the governor to send in theNational Guard, Gates simply waitedfor the next incident. When gunfireerupted on a city bus between rivalgang members, injuring four people,it was only a matter of hours beforehundreds of cops descended on SouthCentral L.A.

Over the next weeks, in what ChiefGates calls "Operation Hammer," morethan 8,000 youths have been arrested,overwhelmingly black as well as Lati­no. Alexander Cockburn reports, that"not a single white person has beenpicked up so far" (Wall Street Journal,5 May). On Easter weekend alone, anarmy of 1,000 cops swept through L.A.County. Anyone fitting the LAPD'sdefinition of a gang member by wearingred or blue (the colors, respectively, of'the Bloods and the Crips, two of the big­gest black gangs), low-slung pants, plainwhite T-shirts, a baseball cap sideways,or making certain gestures-in short,practically any black or Hispanic teen­ager-became a target for the self­described "Fly the Flag" Task Force.

The real aim of this campaign is to ter­rorize minorities in the city and furtherreinforce the bonapartist cops' controlover the black and Latino populations.Gates became infamous when his copskilled 16people, 12ofthem black, using

20 MAY 1988

alism. On the other hand, the PD W,says their leaflet:

" ... welcomes Jessie [sic] Jackson'scampaign as the biggest contribution inyears in helping to build labor's inde­pendent political action [!!] and as abase for a united peoples front againstmonopoly capitalism."Senators Helms and Gore attack JessieJackson from the 'right'.... They arejoined by a phony left here on the water­front and elsewhere who also attackJesse Jackson." And: "The PDW ...helps counteract the anti-Soviet propa­ganda whether they are lies from theright or the so-called left, who attack theSoviet Union from a radical position."

Workers Vanguard and the People'sDaily World represent counterposedpolitical programs and perspectives.

the murderous choke hold, and he"explained" this racist murder sayingthat blacks were not like "normal peo­ple." Now it's "shoot to kill" for thisracist pig and his troops. On April 21,71-year-old LiC, Hadnott became thelatest victim, when he was shot and fa­tally wounded in his own kitchen whenpolice in khakis and ski masks stormedhis home. Hadnott's niece, who hid un­der the kitchen table, denied the policeclaims that the elderly black man washolding a shotgun. No drugs were foundat the home.

The problems of gang warfare and thedrug dealing which frequently setsit offare all too real in Los Angeles and in cit­ies across the country. The film Colors,about the gang wars in L.A., has. cre­ated a furor among police departments(who think the film is nothing more thana recruiting tool for the gangs) and suchdisparate groups as the Guardian An­gels vigilante gang and the NAACP,which see the movie, with its depictionsof the desperation of ghetto life, as "rac­ist." But in many L.A. neighborhoods,

WV says that the partnership of capitaland labor is a lie. The working classneeds its own revolutionary party tofight for its own interests and to strug­gle for state power. WV says that"Labor's Gotta Play Hardball to Win"and that therefore it is necessary to wagea political struggle within the unionsagainst the treacherous pro-capitalistlabor misleaders who sell out workers'struggles and tie them to the Dem­ocratic Party.

The PDW supports Jackson-whoopposes independent labor or blackstruggle-because they support the rac­ist, strikebreaking, imperialist Dem­ocratic Party that Jackson fronts for asa "lesser evil" to the racist, strikebreak-

few people venture from their homesafter dusk and many won't even risk sit­ting on the porch on a hot summer nightfor fear of the gangs run wild.

But the largest, most well-armed anddeadliest gang in blue remains theLAPD. In his drive for bonapartistpolice power, Ch1ef Gates has longsought to terrorize minority neighbor­hoods. His last ploy was the drug tank, asix-ton armored vehicle with a 14-footsteel battering ram, which in 1985smashed through' the front room wallof a house in Pacoima, nearly kill­ing two women and three children.And Gates' boss, L.A. mayor (for­mer top cop) Bradley, relies on thecops to keep the ghettos and barriosunder control. From Philly mayorWilson Goode to Atlanta's AndrewYoung, the black Democratic Partymayors are overseers on Ronald Rea-gan's plantation. .. Now black Democratic presidentialhopeful Jesse Jackson is going aroundthe country preaching his "hope, notdope" moral uplift message which

ing, imperialist Republican Party. And[they] support "progressive" labortraitors like ILWU president JamesHerman, the godfather to SF's new "lib­eral" mayor Art Agnos who threatensthousands of city workers with layoffs.and apologizes for racist killer cops.PDWand theCP say capitalism can bereformed by the ballot box. WV says, noway! The working people have to get ridof capitalism by revolutionary classstruggle.

PDW is a "communist" newspaperthat won't even come out and say. thatworkers have to defend the SovietUnion against imperialist attacks orcapitalist restoration from within. Theypush "detente," the dangerous illusionthat the land of the 1917 workers revo­lution can rely on the good will of U.S.imperialism, who-Republicans andDemocrats alike-have the aim ofsmashing the gains of the Russian Rev­olution and restoring capitalism topower. In contrast, WV opposes thebetrayal of Afghanistan (and Sovietdefense) by Gorbachev's impendingpullout of the heroic Red Army.

No one has any trouble telling PDWapart from Workers Vanguard, whichexposed Jesse Jackson's shameless pur­suit of the arch-segregationist GeorgeWallace or his outrageous statement toembattled black working people in Nor­folk, VA struggling to defend busingthat "I am not in town marching fordesegregation. I am marching for thevoter registration boost." ,

So why the sudden polemic? Jacksonis popular, yet a lot of longshoremen arebuying WV (an average of about 45 perissue from March '87 to March '88). Tothe CP, that's a crime against nature.But many waterfront workers deeplydistrust the racist Democrats and someof them don'tlike the Reverend hustlerfrom Chicago in particular. The CPreally gets bent out of shape when westand our ground and argue-and timeafter time, longshoremen buy our paper.

continued on page 9

blames black youth for the racist op­pression of the ghetto. Visiting LosAngeles last week, Jackson spoke atFremont High School where he exhort­ed black and Latino kids not to be "acrawling snake" but human beings!Meanwhile, the sinister Louis Farra­khan (who calls Hitler, the biggest rac­ist murderer in history, a "great man")provides his "Fruit of Islam" squads asshock troop vigilantes for the Jackson/Reagan drug crusade to terrorize theghetto.

It is the social and economic decay ofcapitalism which provides the back­drop to the proliferation of street gangs.As unemployment skyrockets amongblack and Hispanic youth-currently at75 percent in some Los Angeles minor­ity neighborhoods-many teenagers,thrown on capitalism's scrap heap, seenothing to look forward to and nothingto lose. The answer to street violencebred ofhopelessness and despair is notthe jackboot ofthe police, but the ascen­dancy of an integrated workers partyand the fight for a workers revolution tosmash this racist system and provide a

.. real future for America's youth.•

"Revolutionary Trotskyism-TheBuildir:t9 of the Fourth International"

Wednesday, May 25,7:00 p.m.Boelter Hall 5280, UCLA

For more information:(213) 380-8239 (evenings)

5

Warnin-g: Anti-Smo'king CrusadeDangerous to Your Rights

"This is it, Figby - throw out the cigarettes andcome out with your hands up!"

Capitalist profit drive means coal miners dying of blacklung, industrial pollution poisoning atmosphere.

drugs such as heroin, cocaine, etc." Andyou know what they do about those.

Train crash, plane crash-forgetabout the antiquated signal systems, theoverloaded air traffic control, they testthe workers for drugs and alcohol, andthe merest trace will get the bosses offthe hook in the media ... and out ofliability suits. Random urine testing is agreat way to cow the workforce, andthrow in lie detectors to establish"proper employee morale." Now withthe smoking bans, a third of the Ameri­can population and almost half theindustrial proletariat will be turned into"legal addicts." There is a strong classbias to the various anti-smoking lawsand regulations-the private officeretains its sanctity while those on theshopfloor or in the typing pool have tosnuff their butts, or else. And in this rac­ist society, no doubt cigarette bans willfeed into discrimination against blacksand Latins, more of whom are smokers.

The bosses' concern is not for ourhealth but for their balance sheets.Northwest Airlines, whose ads ballyhoothe great smokeout in the sky as a boonto passengers, is really concerned about"the cost of changing filters and cabinair outlets gummed up by tar and nic­otine" (Christian Science Monitor,23 March). The name of the game is"Increasing Productivity Through On­Site Smoking Control," the title of anApril 1985 article in Health CareStrategic Management, which amongother things claims that "approxi­mately 92 nonsmokers can accomplishthe same workload as 100 smokers."Occupational Health and Safety (July/August 1984) reports that "The Ameri­can Lung Association puts a price tag of$25 billion annually on lost productiv­ity, lost wages and absenteeism." Mili­tary Medicine{August 1986)says smok­ers take 50 percent more sick leave, needmore medical care, "waste 6 percent of[their]working hours to the smoking rit­ual," require expensive ventilation andexact "a high price in employee morale."

Over and over, articles aimed at man­agers stress that by making workers quitsmoking, anywhere from $300 to $1,000per smoker per year can be added to thetill. And, as a nice bonus, corporationsget a made-to-order mechanism for all­out repression of the workforce. In trueBig Brother fashion,USG AcousticalProducts (a defendant in thousands oflawsuits brought by workers who gotlung disease through working withasbestos and other fibers) has threat­ened to use urine tests to detect workerswho smoke, even at home! Businesshas never been overly concerned withjob-related health risks to workers, fromthe now notorious asbestos industry tothe horrible mutilation of packing­house workers: it's "part of the job." Butgiven a chance to control the privatelives of the workforce, the ruling-classkillers of tens of thousands of workersscream bloody murder about "liability"for "second-hand" smoke. Profits, nothealth, are the bottom line of the anti­smoking crusade.

The airlines, for instance, are glee­fully jumping on the anti-smokingbandwagon. Clean air for the passen­gers was never their strongest pointanyway, but if it seems worse latelythat's not because your seatmates arelighting up more often. WVspoke to theflight attendants union and several FAAofficials who confirmed that the air­lines are typically using only part oftheir air conditioning capacity, in theinterests of "fuel efficiency." A Boeing747 has three air conditioning packs, a737 has two, but frequentlythey run on

Profits Not HealthToday, volunteer "smokeout" cops

are being mobilized around the countryfor an ideological crusade whose goal isnot health but wholesale regimentationof the workforce, to increase productiv­ity by any means possible. And thesearen't Moral Majority backwoods big­ots. You've got the '70s "Me Genera­tion," '80s yuppies and quite a few lib­eral civil libertarians, who a few yearsago were all for legalizing marijuana(we're for it), now in-an unholy alliancewith the Reagan administration to wipeout the "evil weed," tobacco. Nicotine isbeing added by the Surgeon General tothe list of "addictive drugs." The head ofthe Federal Office on Smoking andHealth said on CBS's Face the Nationthat smoking should be given "the seri­ous attention that we do for the illicit

DPA

Ken Alexander/Copley News

Tobacco Leaf" award for "coming outagainst laws that restrict areas wheresmoking is allowed. The Sparts blast the'new generation of clean-living Yup­pies ... [who] are running point for a sec­tion of the ruling class which hasdecided it can improve its profit-and­loss figures by tightening up on theworkforce, all in the name of "health".'''

tempt to dictate behavior, and Ameri­cans are not very good at havingbehavior dictated to them, especially byself-righteous moralists who have de­cided it's not good for you to smoke."

-Los Angeles Times, 14January

(As a matter of fact, during Prohibitionnine states banned tobacco as well asbooze.) There are powerful interests atwork here. Behind Big Brother is BigBusiness, rubbing its hands in anticipa­tion of a profitable speedup-particu­larly for the nation's 33 million officeworkers-backed by the U.S. SurgeonGeneral, the Meese police and yuppiepower prudes.

Our coverage of the anti-smokingcrusade (see "Smokers Revolt Against'Health Fascism'," WVNo. 445, 29Jan­uary, and also "Anti-Smoking Witch­hunt," WV No. 427, I May 1987) hassparked controversy among some of ourreaders, as the letters from S. Colmanand Jerry M.illustrate. Our oppositionto "smokeout" moralism certainlywasn't popular with the popular-frontrad-lib crowd. Frontline (20 July 1987)gasped at our references to the "bean­sprout totalitarians of Santa Barbaraand Berkeley." And the Guardian (20January) presented the SpartacistLeague with a "Jesse Helms Memorial

In the past month, New York City's"Clean Indoor Air Act" has outlawedsmoking in practically every indoor areaimaginable, and a total smoking ban onevery domestic airline flight of twohours or less (including segments oflonger flights) went into effect, courtesyof the feds. "This is going to be one ofthe best self-enforced laws in the coun­try," crowed New York's hysteria­mongering mayor, Ed Koch. How gro­tesque-New York City currently leadsthe U.S. in carbon monoxide pollutionand barely escaped a multimillion­dollar cutoff of federal monies last yearby the notoriously lax EnvironmentalProtection Agency ... and they want toblame the smoker for the rotten air qual-:ity in the Big Apple! In keeping with thespirit of social totalitarianism, no soon­er did the NYC ban become operativethan commuter vigilantes beat up asmoker in a train station.

Then, on May 16, the Surgeon Gen­eral of the United States issued a reportdeclaring that smoking is an addiction.They're taking aim at cigarette vendingmachines, talking about licensing to­bacco sellers. This is a move to enforcesocial conformity. Using the pretext of"secondary smoke" harming others,they're going to treat smokers as legal"addicts." Donald McDonald, Rea­gan's drug adviser, calls tobacco alongwith alcohol and marijuana "gatewaydrugs," the first step to heroin andcrack. Who's next on their list? Junkfood "junkies," chocolate "freaks," cof­fee drinkers ("caffeine addicts"), every­one who doesn't do the Jane Fonda LowImpact Workout-you name it, you'reon it. Now the Supreme Court okaysgovernment snoops rifling your trash.How long before they tell you what toread and what to think?

They're trying to stamp out smokingwith the jackboot of the state and thesnarling zealotry of "live clean or die"puritans. During the debate over Cali­fornia's sweeping ban on smoking on allpublic transportation, which took effectin January, one Republican state sen­ator aptly denounced "health fascists."A spokesman for the Bakery Confec­tionery and Tobacco Workers Interna­tional Union, Ray Scannell (a non-smoker), said: .

"This is Big Brother. This is CarrieNation. This is good old-fashioned pro­hibitionism run rampant. It's an at-

6 WORKERS VANGUARD

Last smoke on the LlRR; NYC waitress posts smoking ban.

one: there are no FAA requirements forminimum ventilation standards. Extraair is routinely pumped to the cockpit tokeep the pilot and copilot functioningefficiently and to cool the instruments:"I know that's been an issue for sometime, why does the crew get ten times theair as the passengers, and so on," anFAA official told us. So instead of ban­ning cigarettes, how about turning on allthe air conditioning units with theirfiltering capacity?

It's completely within the power ofmodern technology to adequately ven­tilate airplanes, offices, wherever. Evenin taxis-Jerry M.'s heartfelt point­where you have a really small enclosedspace, it's easy enough to completelyseparate the driver from the passenger,like in the big London taxis, addinggreatly to driver safety (as CB radioswould also), privacy, and keepingsmoke in the appropriate area. Butproper ventilation isn't profitable. Innew office and institutional construc­tion, heating, ventilation and air condi­tioning (HV AC in the trade) is thesecond most expensive component infinishing a building; and since electricalwiring is pretty strictly regulated bycodes, and insurance companies inspectclosely (because of fire danger),HVACis a prime target for cost-cutting. Youget lousy air quality so the board ofdirectors can breathe easy about theirbonuses and stockholder dividends.

In fact, ventilation has been gettingworse, not because of smokers butbecause corporate owners decided afterthe mid-'70s increase in oil prices tobecome more "energy efficient." Theirsolution was to cut down-in fact,almost eliminate-the intake offresh airin the ventilation systems of newer con­struction. This has created the phenom­enon of the "sick building," where all thechemicals, molds, viruses and bacteriaare simply recirculated through thebuilding, with the result that officeworkers get sick a lot. In addition toclogged filters, contaminated air duets,etc., a five-year study of 240 buildingsfound more than a third had their airintakes completely sealed off(New YorkTimes, 8 May). Another found fungilevels "comparable to that in a chickencoop or a swine confinement facili­ty" (Heating/Piping/Air Conditioning,February 1986). More and more officeworkers are crammed into ever smallerworkspaces in buildings with no win­dows and minimal outside air, and theyblame smokers for fouling it up!

The Medical Evidence

As Peter Berger, a Boston Universitysociologist, recently noted (New YorkTimes, 24 April), thefuror over "passive

smoking" is "not because of the weightof the evidence but because of the ide­ological usefulness of the idea .... Whatpeople believe comes from placing faithin a.certain authority. People say, 'TheSurgeon General said so'." SurgeonGeneral C. Everett Koop gets on TV inhis gold-braided admiral's uniform, andeveryone is supposed to believe it is true.Koop has won respect for his relatively(by Reagan standards) decent positionon AIDS, but people forget that he wasput in office as an anti-abortion cru­sader. And the data this spokesman forthe Reagan administration has mar­shaled to back up his drive againstsmoking falls far short of provinganything.- S. Colman queries our statementthat medical evidence on the effects of"secondary smoke" is "inconclusive."So what is the "proof" cited by propo­nents of smoking bans? The 1986 U.S.Surgeon General's report on The Health

Consequences of Involuntary Smokingmakes three major assertions: I) "Invol­untary smoking is a cause of disease, .including lung cancer, in healthy non­smokers"; 2) "The children of parentswho smoke, compared with the chil­dren of nonsmoking parents, have anincreased frequency of respiratoryinfections ... "; and 3) "Simple separa­tion of smokers and nonsmokers withinthe same air space may reduce, but doesnot eliminate, exposure of nonsmokersto environmental tobacco smoke."

The Surgeon General's report cited 13major studies, six of which he claimsshow some statistically significant cor­relation between "passive smoking" andlung disease, cancer in particular-andnot a large correlation. at that. Eventaken at face value, you have to be waryof spurious correlations. '..As Chest(September 1985), a journal of thoracicmedicine, pointed out, "associationsmay exist that have nothing to do with

causation, such as the parallel decline inEuropean birth rates and the stork pop­ulation," or a recent international studywhich showed a higher correlationof lung cancer with beer drinkingthan with cigarettes. Moreover, thestudies cited are scientifically highly sus­pect. Seeking an aura of scientificrespectability, the Surgeon General'sreport even acknowledges many of thecriticisms, admitting for example thattwo studies were' "not designed to studythe long-term effects of involuntarysmoking," or that "the findings of thisstudy were questioned because the diag­nosis of cancer was not pathologicallyconfirmed in 35 percent of the cases."But having failed to refute many of thesecriticisms, the report accepts the valid­ity of the studies!

A 1987 article by West German bio­statistician K. Oberla in the Interna­tional Archives of Occupational andEnvironmental Health reviews theavailable studies, noting: "None of thesix case control studies yielding apositive relationship" produced "rea­sonable and sound evidence whichcannot be explained by chance, bias,confounding or misclassification." Eventhe one study which may show a realcorrelation, of about 200,000 Japanesewomen, is tainted: who is or isn't asmoker was determined once, in 1965­if a subject forgot she had smoked pre­viously, didn't report that she smoked orstarted smoking later and died of lungcancer, she was listed as a non-smoker.There was also no consideration ofexposure to other substances in theworkplace, outdoor and indoor air pol­lution, genetics,' food, medical care.Uberla also points out that if "side­stream smoke" were an importantcausal factor, smoking pipes would be amuch higher risk than it is for lung can­cer; non-smoking bartenders shouldalso have a higher incidence, whichhasn't been shown. The reviewconcludes:

"The volume of accumulated data isconflicting and inconclusive. The ob­servations on nonsmokers that havebeen made so far are compatible witheither an increased risk from passivesmoking or an absence of risk."

The Surgeon General's second asser­tion, over the effect on children, has themost emotional impact. Studies indicateit's probably true that infants under oneyear of age who live with parents whosmoke are subject to an increased risk ofrespiratory infections. This would standto reason with infants' smaller pulmo­nary passages and developing immunesystems. However, even here, if you takeinto account parental respiratory symp­toms-i.e., baby got bronchitis because

continued on page 8

Smoking· Letterswreck his body, that's his business. Butto wreck other bodies by way of puffingaway? Its secondary effects on others?Uh uhf The right to poison the air?Uhuh!

No, I'll not wait until medicos tell meconclusively on the effects of secondarysmoking. My lungs, throat are alreadytelling me!

Dear Editor,

Civil Rights for Smokers! HuinanRights for Taxicab Drivers!

... I drive a taxi in New York City.Every week I spend 28 to 36 hoursbehind the wheel. This is my work space.According to the rules and regulationsof the Taxi and Limousine Commis­sion (T.L.e.) I have no power over mywork space ... , According to the rulesand regs I am not allowed to have a e.B.in the car, a matter of simple safety. I amsupposed to go wherever the passenger

Workers Vanguard

To the Editor,

Whenever I'm near a lit cigarette, mylungs sure feel it!

-as I ponder that article last 1-29about medical evidence re secondarysmoking as "inconclusive" .. "

That article, I'd say-along with theone last year on the same topic-is theultimate in naivete! True, it's aproblemwhen the capitalist" state does theanti-smoking regulation. But to call it"Health Fascism" is stretching matters(reminiscent of the early-'30s GermanCP calling Social Democrats "socialfascists").

Some, not many but some measuresmerit working-class support. Like (asthe SL indeed supported) the schoolbusing of last decade.

Or like the anti-smoking ordinances,increasing as they may be. I'd not sup­port illegalizing junk foods, booze oreven harmful drugs. If somebody isdamn fool enough to indulge these, to

20 MAV 1988

* * *

S. Colman

tells me to go, period. According to therules and regs I am not supposed todefend myself from attack. If this isn'tenough, until recently a passenger couldlight ~p or tell me to put out a cigaretteat will. When I drive I eat exhaust fumesall day long. But I can't smoke a cig­arette if I wish. And until recently Icouldn't tell the passenger in the backseat to put out a cigarette if it botheredme. This is my work area and I shouldhave control over it. , ..

As long as I am on the subject. Nico­tine is addictive and probably moreharmful than heroin. This is an argu­mentfor the legalization of heroin. Butit is also an argument for treatingnicotine addiction the way any otheraddiction would be treated in a rationalsociety; well funded support systems,free medical care and free therapy ...state intervention should be fought butself-help networks to break the addic­tion should be promoted.

I find it curious that you give no atten­tion to the tobacco industry in any ofyour articles on this issue. For years itsold death as good health. I remembercigarette commercials saying that to-

bacco was good for the digestive systemand was recommended by doctors. TheU.S. government has subsidized andsupported the tobacco industry in itsrapacious destruction of farm lands,expropriation of small farmers andexploitation of workers. It would begood in one of your articles if you wouldmention the tobacco industry and its liesand extortions, which are no more orless than any other capitalist enterprise,but still deserve some attention.

Finally, your analysis of the culturalsignificance of the health nut move­ment is basically correct. But let mepoint out that it is a movement ofdespair that is essentially anti-political.People who have no control, over theway they see this society destroying theenvironment, and despair at ever hav­ing control, maintain an obsessive illu­sion of control, by going to the healthfood store or attacking cigarette smok­ers. One breath of L.A. or N.Y.e. air ona normal day probably damages thelungs more than all the secondarytobacco smoke inhaled over the courseof a week in a smoke filled room.

.terry M.

7

0'

Drug raid in Florida.......will smokers be next?

-MARXIST LlTERATURE­

Bay AreaThurs.: 5:30-8:00 p.rn.• Sat.: 1:00-5:00 p.m.1634 Telegraph, 3rd Floor (near 17th Street)Oakland, California Phone: (415) 839-0851

ChicagoTues.: 5:00-9:00 p.rn., Sat.: 11:00a.m.-2:00 p.m.161 W Harrison St., 10th FloorChicago, Illinois Phone: (312) 663-0715

New York CityTues.: 6:00-9:00 p.rn., Sat.: 1:00-5:00 p.rn.

'41 Warren SI. (one block belowChambers SI. near Church SI.)New York, N.Y. Phone: (2l2) 267-1025

Spartacist LeaguePublic Offices

Der Spiegel

Surgeon General C. Everett Koopfuels anti-smoking hysteria.

days of McCarthyism and the '50s ditty,"if your mommy is a commie, turn her .in." Indeed, there has been a rash of chil­dren turning their parents in for havingdrugs at home (see "Drug Witchhunt,"WV No. 410, 29 August 1986). To talkof "health fascism" here is not entirelyfacetious-the Nazis encouraged suchjunior finks (and Hitler, by the way, wasa rabid anti-smoker).

The argument about tobacco indus­try power.is specious. Yes, cigarette adsused to claim that smoking was good forthe lungs and stomach, and the com­panies poured a lot of money into find­ing "proof" to deny the very real risks ofsmoking. But all that proves is that thetobacco industry's "moral standards"are no better or worse than any othercapitalist endeavor-which is to saythey're for profit first, last and all thetime. Interestingly, the Guardian, whoawarded us the "Jesse Helms MemorialTobacco Leaf," last year ran an articleheadlined, "Tobacco is Moral Equiv­alent of Krugerrand." The author of the29 July 1987 article claims that smok­ing represents "personal financialinvestment" in "a system that shouldelicit hatred, revulsion." This is the sameliberal moralizing that urges Americancorporations to divest (usually at aprofit) their South African holdings.But U.S. imperialism isn't one whitmore "moral" than Botha's racistregime, your hands aren't any cleanerfor not touching krugerrands, andsmoking is the moral equivalent of. ..smoking.

Sociologist Barry Glassner ruefullynotes that if the current trend of regu­lating and regimenting our behaviorcontinues, "we'll have a homogenizedpopulation in which everybody will bewithin the recommended weight ranges,

.and nobody will smoke anymore, andnobody will drink and everybody willwork out" (New York Times, 7 May). Inthe end, all that clean living may do zilchfor your health. But it will help reg­iment the population for greater pro­ductivity and profits, and make peopleinto excellent cannon fodder for war.And when you're in the trenches, they'llprobably start passing out cigarettesagain like they did in WW II to keep sol­diers alert. •

On the heels of the Surgeon Gen­eral's report, municipalities, states andcompanies began pushing anti-smokinglaws and policies. Most were passed andwent into effect with barely a whimper.Across the country, cowed smokershave retreated to stairwells, fire escapesor back alleys to enjoy a cigarette. Soonjob applications will read: "Are you nowor have you ever been a smoker?" Theattempt to make smoking into an anti­social activity ominously recalls the

"Are You Now or Have YouEver Been ... a Smoker?"

breath, wracked by coughing, spittingup blackened sputum. And after yearsof research, study and hard labor strug­gle, it was finally admitted that a dis­ease exists. A 1972 pamphlet by theUnited Mine Workers of America(UMWA) estimated that 125,000 activeand former miners suffer from coalworkers pneumoconiosis, commonlycalled "black lung." A UMWA officialestimated that 4,000 miners die from thedisease yearly.

And it's not just coal mines. Accord­ing to the Amalgamated Clothing andTextile Workers Union (ACTWU), atleast 150,000 of 800,000 textile workersin the United States suffer frombyssinosis-brown lung-caused byinhaling cotton dust in the mills. Thirty­five thousand of these are totally dis­abled (ACTWU, The Right to Breathe).Construction workers, dock workers,seamen and others exposed to asbestosget a pulmonary disease known asasbestosis. According to the Associa­tion for Mariners' Rights, a studyby aMt. Sinai doctor showed 39 percent ofthose who sailed in the engine depart­ment get asbestos-related diseases (OnWatch for Health and Safety, March1987). And a U.S. Department of Laborpamphlet reports, "Nearly half-45%­of all asbestos workers will die fromsome form of cancer." In the smeltingindustry there is antimony pneumoconi­osis; in aircraft manufacturing, it'sberyllium disease; in foundries, quar­ries and masonry you get silicosis. Thelist goes on and on.

And for black workers, concentratedin the most :dangerous, dirtiest andlowest-paying jobs, the statistics aremuch worse. As compared to whites,black workers have a 37 percent greaterchance of suffering an occupational ill­ness, and are 1.5 times more likely to beseverely disabled from job illnesses andinjuries (Frank Goldsmith and LorinKerr, Occupational Safety and Health[1982]). The bosses, of course, blame allindustrial respiratory diseases on smok­ing-the routine response from coaloperators when faced with demands forblack lung benefit payments. But theminers responded with class struggle. Athree-week political wildcat strike by30,000 West Virginia miners in 1969,culminating in a UMWA march on thestate capitol, finally forced passage of abill making black lung a compensabledisease.

In 1986, 11,700 people died fromwork-related causes and 1.9 millionwere disabled by injuries at work. Indus­trial accident rates in high-risk occupa­tions are soaring and many workplacesare deathtraps because of the bosses'"economy" drives; safety inspections areall but nonexistent. According to theSan Francisco Chronicle (7 September1987), a report based on data from theNational Safety Council and the Bureauof Labor Statistics estimated that"nearly 6,000 workers in high-risk jobswho died in the first half of the 1980swould still be alive" but for the decline inenforcement of standards by the Occu­pational Safety and Health Adminis­tration. Out in "lotus land," Californiagovernor Deukmejian last year tried toget rid ofCalOSHA, the state inspectionagency, entirely! As profit margins fall,the bosses' attention turns to choppingsafety measures, cutting the workforceand squeezing every last penny they canout of those who remain.

o $2/4 issues ofWomen and Revolution

0$2/10 introductory issues ofWorkers Vanguard(includes Spartacist)

ing the smoking section on a 16-hourSan Francisco-Tokyo round trip wouldinhale the amount of nicotine of onecigarette. Japanese researchers testingsmoky pubs, cars, etc., found in all­day monitoring that the highest "dose"was equal to one-third of a cigarette.But it's yet to be proven that there'is any correlation between such lowlevels of inhaled smoke and seriouspulmonary disease. And there is hard­ly the evidence which would justifysuch drastic measures as banningsmoking.

The vague conclusions of the Sur­geon General's report rest on poor sci­entific foundations. There is presentlyinadequate evidence to justify the bansand the social heat being put on smok­ers. What's called for is not a hystericalwitchhunt against smoking but accu­rate and precise studies to determine theeffects of environmental tobacco smokeon non-smokers, and to determineeffective measures to ensure decent airquality. But you aren't going to get

-that from this government of MoralMajority crusaders, whose hypocritical"concern" for the health of "passivesmokers" goes hand in hand with theircallous disregard for AIDS victims,not to mention tens of thousands of

psychiatric patients thrown onto thestreets or millions disabled by' indus­trial accidents.

Industrial DeathtrapsWith all the yuppie yapping about

health through clean living, what aboutthe truly murderous respiratory dis­eases caused by polluted air at indus­trial job sites? Millions of workers spend

. upwards of 43 hours a week in atmos­pheres infinitely more poisonous thanthat in an air conditioned office wherepeople light up cigarettes. In coal pits,the miners work in grimy, poorlyventilated shafts where swirling dustclogs the lungs. Company doctors usedto claim that coal dust was actually ben­eficial to health. But miners knew thatafter years in the pits they were short of

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prohibitively expensive." Studies havebeen done to figure the amount of ven­tilation required to create a comfort­able environment; one calculated thattwo to four times the going rate of freshair flow in a typical office would removethe irritants of cigarette smoke. How­ever, the researcher noted, "increasedventilation as a measure to, protectpassive smokers is not recommendablefrom the energetical- point of view"(Tokai Journal of Experiments in Clin­ical Medicine [1985]). For "energetical"read "profits."

The starting point for any considera­tion of the medical effects of "passivesmoking" is that the volume of smokeinhaled is tiny compared to that ofsomeone smoking a cigarette. One studyshows that an airline stewardess work-

Marxist Working-Class Biweekly of the Spartacist League

Anti-SmokingCrusade...(continued from page 7)mommy caught the bug first-theevidence of a connection is not so clear.And this tendency disappears alto­gether among older infants. A review ofstudies through 1985 reports, "Adeleterious effect of passive smoking inolder children is unproven" (Chest,September 1985). Factors which havebeen ignored in most studies include useof gas stoves for cooking, low birthweight, the number of siblings, poornutrition, crowding in inadequatelyventilated housing, and lack of medicalcare. And these are all the moreimportant as poor and working-classparents are far more likely to smoke.

As for the Surgeon General's third"conclusion," that it is hard to segre­gate smokers' air from non-smokers',this is undoubtedly true. But there issomething that can be done about itother than discriminating against smok- .ers-namely, improved ventilation. Allthe report has to say on this, in one shortparagraph out of 64 pages of policy rec­ommendations, is that it "can be

8, WORKERS VANGUARD

imperialist loan sharks. Yet no politicalgrouping in Poland demands repudia­tion of the debt-not even the shadowy"leftists" of the so-called Workers'Opposition Alliance, promoted inter­nationally by pseudo-Trotskyist ErnestMandel. The Workers' Opposition Alli­ance blames the economic crisis solelyon "the parasitism, the incompetenceand the dictatorship of the Stalinistbureaucraci'YnrernationaIVkwpom~27 October 1986).

All tendencies from the most rabidanti-Communist nationalists to themost hardline Stalinists take for grantedthat Poland must endure years of hard­ship to repay Western bankers. Thisview was stated clearly by a Polishacademic visiting Harvard, Jan Chowa­niec, last year in a letter to the New YorkTimes (31 March 1987):

..... Poland owes to her Western cred­itors a total of $33.5 billion.To meetthat challenge alone willrequireyearsofbelt-tightening policiesand huge sacri­fices from the whole of Polish society.However, I am afraid that before thePoles can be either fed or housed bet­ter, they will first have to work harder,produce more, export more and paytheir foreign debts."

Jaruzelski's economic advisers woulddismiss any talk of repudiating the debtas wildly unrealistic. The bankers wouldretaliate by organizing a boycott of Po­lish exports in Western markets. Polandcould not then pay for vital imports offood and raw materials. Its economywould totally collapse. Moreover, noeconomic assistance could be expectedfrom the Soviet Union, especially underGorbachev. In fact, Gorbachev wouldstrongly oppose Poland's repudiation ofits debt to Western creditors.

This is all quite true. What it proves isthat there is no solution to the Polish cri­sis within the framework of national-

Burnett/Contact

ism or Stalinism. Only a proletarianpolitical revolution can liberate Polandfrom the IMF because only a revolu­tionary workers government can affectthe international conditions to counterimperialist retaliation. Only from thestandpoint of socialist internationalismcan Polish workers effectively appeal toSoviet workers, who have their own rea­sons for opposing and resisting Gorba­chev's market-oriented reforms. At thesame time, revolutionary workers inMoscow, Warsaw and East Berlinwould have the moral authority toappeal to workers in West Europe andthe United States against imperialisteconomic warfare against East Europe.

The Polish bureaucratically de­formed workers state was established bya social revolution carried out fromabove by Stalin's Russia in the after­math of World War II. For some yearsnow Polish workers have been deludedthat their liberators are in the Vaticanand White House. In reality Wojtylaand Reagan, acting through Solidar­nose, have conspired to bring about abloodycounterrevolution in Poland as astep toward destroying the SovietUnion. Aiding in the delusion ofthe Po­lish working class have been Westernsocial democrats, Eurocommunists andpseudo-Trotskyists like Ernest Man­del, who for years havescreamed, "Sol­idarity with Solidarnosc!"

Now it appears that Polish workershave become disillusioned with Soli­darnosc. It is only by returning to theroad of proletarian internationalism,exemplified by Rosa Luxemburg andthe early Polish Communist Party, thatPolish workers can liberate themselvesfrom the Stalinist bureaucracy and thebloodsuckers of the IMF. For a Trot­skyist party in Poland, section of areborn Fourth Internationalljs

Return to the Roadof Lenin ~!~ Trotskyl

Tile ~olaltd of luxemburg VS. the Poland of Plisudskt

MemOirs of a Revolutionary Jewish WorkerA ReView .... PAGE 53

Where Is Gorbacb'ev's Russia Going~PAGE 20

(Spartacist issent to all WVsubscribers.)

Make checkspayable/mail to:SpartacistPublishing Co.•Box 1377 GPONew York, NY10116 '

SgartacistEnglish Edition

No. 41-42Winter 1987-88

. (64 pages)

$1.00

Lech Walesa flauntsmoney. from Westernbackers; Pope JohnPaul Wojtyla, godfatherof ,counterrevolutionaryPolish Solldarnosc.

"Soviet leaderGorbachev.ncouragesPolish generalJaruzelski(right) to imposesavage austerityprogramon behalfof Westernbankers.

the same time, the working class andsociety at large show little support or.loyalty for Solidarnose, It is doubtfulthat many Poles wantLc:ch Walesa, whoacts like a holy idic:Jt.,to govern theircountry.

Both the Stalinist Jaruzelski regimeand the Solidarnose opposition serve astransmission belts for internationalfinance capital into Poland. At theheight of its strength in 1981 Solidar­nose demanded tbat' Poland join theIMF, which in fact Jaruzelski did afewyears later. Thus the Polish workingclass is totally without leadership toresist the extortion of the Westernbankers.

Economic desperation is-driving Po­'Iish workers 'to struggle. hi the nextmonths we cao'expectat least localizedstrikes over wages. However, there canbe no question of economic recoveryas long as the surplus produced byPolish workers is turned over to the

27 April 1988

bosses away from hard class struggle.Our highest sales to Local 10 memberslast year (WV No. 434, 7 August­102 copies sold) were when an espe­cially rotten sellout contract was beingrammed down the ranks' throats:"Defend the IL WU! Shut Down theCoast!" was the WV headline; PD W

.didn't even oppose the Jimmy Herman/Rudy Rubio takeaway deal.

When longshoremen have wanted tofight, as at Redwood City in '87 whenthey ran scabs off the docks, or at atime when they were voting down thesellout contract, they have looked toWV. Workers Vanguard is a genuinecommunist paper that tells the truth,a weapon in the struggle to forgean integrated, revolutionary workersparty. Buy it-read it!

fessor Jan Mujzel, one of Jaruzelski'stop economic advisers, is quite blunt: "Ihave no doubt that we will see bankrupt­cies and unemployment.. . . Reformrequires much harder conditions for allworking people" (Wall Street Journal,10 April 1987).

The Jaruzelski regime has loudlyidentified its economic reforms withGorbachev's perestroika (restructur­ing). And there are indeed importantsimilarities. However, the main authorsof the Polish "reforms"do not reside in

. Moscow but in the IMFheadquarters in

. Washington. As a public relations ploy,Jaruzelski & Co. held a referendum lastNovember on the-austerity program.Over half the registered voters eitherabstained or voted against so that thereferendum failed. Still, the WarsawStalinists pushed ahead with the pricehikes, despite knowing full well theywere heading into a confrontation 'withthe Polish working class.

For RevolutionaryInternationalisml

The New York Times maintains thatthere were "no winners" in the recentstrike wave in Poland.'In a sense that istrue. The Jaruzelski regime is totally dis­credited. Everyone knows that econom­ic "reform" is just a code word for severeausterity measures, and nobody believesthe promises of "democratization." At

But Warsaw still has to borrow just tomeet its existing debt service.

By last year it was clear that Polishworkers had reached the end of theirrope and would resist further austeritymeasures. Even the official unions,which Jaruzelski set up to replace Soli­darnose, complained that social bene­fits and housing in Poland were muchlower and much worse than in otherEastern bloc countries. And when theJaruzelski regime first proposed bigprice hikes last spring, the official, bu­reaucratized unions declared this "unac­ceptable to working people" and implic­itly threatened to strike against it.

Nonetheless, the Jaruzelski regimewent ahead with plans for sweepingmarket-oriented reforms dictated by theIMF: elimination of most, or all. sub­sidies for consumer goods; closingoownunprofitable enterprises; expanding thescope ofsmall-scale private capital; andencouraging foreign investment. Pro-

Waterfront. .,(continued from page 5)

Moreover, hundreds of longshore­men came back from Pittsburg, CA onMarch 19 with a sour practical taste ofJackson in "action" and copies of WVintheir pockets (1,265 copies of WV were,sold in Pittsburg that day). ILWUbureaucrats hustled the ranks up thereunder the pretext of fighting scab con­tractors at the USX-POSCO steel plantand "non-H.WU" work on the Pittsburgdocks. What they got were speeches byJackson and a bunch of flag-wavingbureaucrats spewing racist protection­ism-and no action against the scabs.

But then, the whole point of Jack­son's campaign is to divert workers'and blacks' hatred of Reagan and the

Bush proclaimed, "I am proud to bestanding beside Lech Walesa, a man sowell respected in the United States"(Chicago Tribune, 29 September 1987).The crowd responded by chanting, "Nofreedom without Solidarity! Long liveBush! Long live Reagan!"

Wojtyla's prayers and Bush's praisewere unable to restore the influence ofSolidarnosc. .But the economic pres­sures on Poland, for years bled white bythe IMF, were rapidly building toward aworking-class explosion. These were thesame conditions which originally gaverise to Solidarnosc.

IMF Bankers Bleed PolandPoland's debt to Western bankers­

some $36 billion-amounts to $1,000for every man, woman and child in thecountry. This is equivalent to the annualwage of the average worker. Poland hasbeen paying off the debt at $3 billion ayear. By depressing living standards andstarving industry for investment funds,the Jaruzelski regime has managed inrecent years to run a balance of tradesurplus of about $1.5 billion annually.

PolishStrikes...(continued from page 3)

20 MAY 1988 9

Mad monk Rasputln (second.from left) mesmerized decaying RUllSilinautocracy but couldn't save It.

Reagan'sStar Wars ...(continuedfrom page 1)

wondered, what if all of us in the worlddiscovered that we were threatened by apower from outer space, from anotherplanet?"

At least one section of Reagan's con­stituency is deeply offended. "It's obvi­ouslytroubling to think of nationalleadership being influenced by supersti­tion.... It seems so medieval," said aReagan stalwart. Sounds downrightsecular humanist, except this is the headof the National Association of Evangeli­cals, the Rev. Robert Dugan, talking.

. He's upset that Reagan is abandoningJesus Christ to dabble in the works ofSatan! The Moral Majority must befurious with Nancy, too, who Reganreports snapped, "I don't give a damnabout the right-to-lifers" as she was cen­soring a point on abortion in 'a ReaganState of the Union talk.

These latest tidbits from rats desert­ing the White House bunker have afamiliar ring; indeed many have madethe obvious analogy to that otherimperial couple, the weak Tsar of All theRussias and his scheming, strong-willedTsarina, who ran the court through"Our Friend," the mad monk Rasputin.Trotsky's portrait of the Romanovs inThe History of the Russian Revolutionevokes eerie parallels to Reagan hob­nobbing with Ollie North and the ter­rorist contras:

"This dim, equable and 'well-bred' manwas cruel. ... This crowned black sheepgravitated with all his soul to the verydregs of society, the Black Hundredhooligans. He not only paid them gener­ously from the state treasury, but lovedto chat with them about their exploits,and would pardon them when they acci­dentally got mixed up in the murder ofan opposition deputy.... This 'charm­er,' without will, without aim, withoutimagination, was more awful than allthe tyrants of ancient and modernhistory."

As for the Tsarina, Trotsky com­mented, "This Hessian princess was lit­erally possessed by the demon of autoc­racy.... She believed the more inflexiblyin her vocation, the more naked becamethe foulness of the old regime." Alexan­dra Romanov wrote her husband:"Don't yield. Be the boss. Obey yourfirm little wifeand our Friend. Believeinus." Trotsky noted that "Witte [thetsar's financial minister] called this rul­ing circle, against which he himself twicestubbed his toe, 'the leprous courtcamarilla'."

A similar atmosphere of lunacyemanated from Hitler's bunker in thelast days of his empire, as- WilliamShirer pointed out in The Rise and Fallof the Third Reich. As bombs were fall­ing and the Red Army was advancing toliberate Berlin, Goebbels "sent for twohoroscopes, which were kept in the filesof one of Himmler's multitudinous

"01111 War"...(continued from page 1),

Ecuador for "training," the enragedEcuadoran congress voted to expel allU.S. forces. Earlier this year a ham­fisted kidnapping of an alleged drugtrafficker in Honduras managed 'toevoke such a hostile response in thatpuppet dictatorship that leftists andrightists joined forces to bum the Amer­ican embassy.

Ironically, it was the military whichpointed out that the new legislation is asweeping violation of constitutionallaw. A Pentagon spokesman lecturedCongress: "This country, for over 200years, has kept the military out of civil­ian law enforcement.... The UnitedStates military has not been empow­ered to arrest American citizens, and wedon't think that it is the time now tobreak that precedent." Of course, themilitary brass had no qualms about

10

Media has field day with Don Reganrevelations, exposing high priestessof Reagan cult (right).

'research' offices." Results of both Hit­ler's horoscope and that of the W.eimarRepublic amazingly buoyed the madFuhrer, revealing that Germany wouldhave a hard time in April 1945, but"starting in 1948she would rise again."Too late for Hitler, it was under NATOthat German imperialism revived.

Knowing they're stuck with Reaganfor another eight months, the more"responsible" media and politicians arehastening to pooh-pooh all the scandal,dismissing astrology as merely a"charming" eccentricity. Why, they doit in Russia, too, the New York Times(14 May) wrote in a front-page story, nodoubt with the Moscow summit inmind. The more far-sighted guardiansof the American bourgeoisie are not atall amused by the "kiss and tell" books:after Iran/Contragate, "damage con­trol" was messy enough, and more leaksabout how they've got a total idiot astheir commander in chief isn't going tohelp restore confidence in the decliningAmerican empire.

Maybe millions of Americans do lookat their horoscope after reading thecomics in the daily paper, secretariesvisit fortune tellers for lunch-hour fun,

deploying troops and tanks to quell the1967 Detroit ghetto rebellion.

But the generals and admirals are notsanguine about the prospects of beingsucked into harebrained adventures invarious cocaine kingdoms around theworld. They remember only too wellhow 241 Marines got blown away whenReagan ordered them into Beirut. Andthe bizarre idea of sealing 'tqe bordersagainst drug penetration, as the Penta­gon warned Congress, would requirepulling in a sizable chunk of the U.S.armed forces deployed around theworld.

If the American government reallywanted to do something about inter­national drug trafficking, it could startby abolishing its Central IntelligenceAgency. From the notorious activitiesof Air America in the "Golden Tri­angle" of Southeast Asia in the '60s tothe Nicaraguan contras and Afghanmullahs today, the CIA is one ofthe big­gest international dealers'around. Rea-

New Age Colorado entrepreneurs tryto bend forks with mental power. Butmost people get pretty worried whenthey see the most powerful leader of'the Westtm World, who's got his fin­ger on the nuclear button, staring off at.the stars. Astrology, which originated inancient Babylonia as a means of pre­dicting the will of the gods, probablymade as much sense as any other relig­ious superstition back in the days whenpeople thought the earth was flat (hasanybody seen a globe in the Oval Officelately?). But Galileo, Newton, scienceand all that other "secular humanist"subversive stuff has never gotten much

gan's contra terrorists got nowhere o~the battlefield against the Sandinistas,·but they made a mint exportingdrugs tothe U.S. on their CIA supply planes.

Washington's bumbling attempts toremove Panamanian strongman Norie­ga have stumbled over the fact that thegeneral has been on the CIA payrollunder both Carter and Reagan, and isnot only heavy into drug-running andmoney laundering but knows plentyabout The Company's involvement aswell. Now Newsweek (23 May) revealedthat a key Washington operative in thecontra drug network worked throughBush's security adviser Donald Gregg.

The "war on drugs" is. a hypocriticalsham. From the start a prime purposehas been to promote the: regimentationof the population for war, and to justifyescalating cop terror in the ghettos andbarrios of the inner cities. Legalizationof these drugs would destroy the drugtrade overnight by taking the profit outof it, and a few Democratic mayors

of a hearing from the current inhab­itants of the White House.

Four years ago we headlined "KeepGod Out of It! Religion in the Elec­tions" (WV No. 363, 28 September1984), pointing out that one ofthe mostfundamental gains of the Americanbourgeois-democratic revolution of1776 was separation of~hurch and state.Must we now add, "For Separation ofZodiac and State!"? The tidal wave ofenforced- intolerance that has sweptAmerica in the last decade didn't beginwith Ronald Reagan, butwith his born­again Christian predeeessor. AsMarx­ist materialists, we understand thatreligion in all its forms, from the mostancient superstitions to the most "up todate" theological speculations, are atbottom reflections ofruling-class ideol­ogy given heavenly sanction, and a des­perate search for solace by the ignorantand oppressed in a heartless world.

In the United States of late, religiousfundamentalism of the "Moral Major­ity" ilk has been pressed into serviceby areactionary government increasinglyfrustrated in its attempts to enforceprayer in the public schools, forbid theteaching of evolution, and eliminatewomen's right to abortion. We com­munists believe people have the right toworship or not worship whatever theychoose, but imposing reactionary relig­ious obscurantism on the rest of human­ity must be stopped.

The real danger of this regime is notso much that a couple of lunatics in theWhite House think the stars guide theirdestiny, but that the imperialists are pre­pared to plunge the world into nuclearholocaust against the USSR in order todefend the profound irrationality of thecapitalist profit system. Reagan's fondof attacking leaders he dislikes, fromDaniel Ortega to Qaddafi, as "loony

.tunes dictators." Sure, there's a lot ofnuts in this world: Panama strongmanNoriega, for example, is into astrology,too. But even Khomeini -Iooks rathermore rational than Reagan's gang of"smoke and mirror" sorcerer's appren­tices with their gifts of cakes, Bibles andpearl-handled revolvers.

And this loony's got the bomb. Hisreal "Star Wars" plans, all the ridicu­lous bombast about an "impenetrableprotective shield" aside, are gearedtoward a nuclear first strike against theSoviet Union. Reagan believes in theBiblical prophecy of "Armageddon" inour time. As we commented about "TheArmageddon Debate" (WV No. 366,9 November 1984):

"We Marxists are fighting for the futureof humanity in this world. And we aredetermined that, just as the decadent,crazed and corrupt court of the tsarswas swept away by the Bolshevik Rev­olution in Russia, so this increasinglybizarre and desperate ruling class mustbe swept away by workers revolution.Isn't it a 'portent' that this capitalist rul­ing class has long outlived its useful­ness that it has chosen as its leader a cer­tifaable nut? To cite not scripture, butEuripides: those whom the gods woulddestroy, they first make mad.".

(Washington. Baltimore, Minneapolis)have advocated this. But the Dem­ocrats are running point in the insid­ious "war on drugs." While Nancy Rea­gan's "Just Say No" campaign works thewhite suburbs, Jesse Jackson taps themisery of the black ghettos with thesame message.

As we wrote in "Down with Meese'sDrug Witchhunt!" (WV No. 400, 28March 1986): "Laws against so-called'crimes without victims'-drugs, gam­bling, prostitution, sodomy and homo­sexuality-s-threaten the privacy andrights of everyone and should be abol­ished." The human devastation wreakedby widespread crack and heroin addic­tion in the ghettos cannot be done awaywith without eliminating the socialconditions which cause it: vicious racialoppression, unemployment, poverty,homelessness and hopelessness. Andthat requires nothing less than social­ist revolution. U.S. Hands Off theWorld!.

WORKERS VANGUARD

Gruesome Racist Murderin Cleveland

CLEVELAND-April 23 was a day ofhorror in the second most segregatedcity in the U.S. On that day, a three­week-old black baby was killed by rac­ist punks who drove his aunt off theroad, and a homeless black man was rundown and decapitated by a racist killerin a car.

Brian Fletcher, 21, was accused bytwo white passers-by of robbing anelderly white man, and a pack of racistschased and beat Fletcher and anothershelter resident. Fletcher managed toescape, and was returning with helpfrom the shelter when one of the racists,Robert Schulte, screamed to watchingpolice, "I'll show you how to handle

these n-----s!" Schulte got into his carand deliberately rammed Fletcher as hewas crossing the street, throwing himinto oncoming traffic and gruesomelybeheading him. Schulte, who was in­dicted by the Cuyahoga County grandjury for "aggravated murder," is free onbond pending arraignment later thismonth.

Later that same day, a black familyfrom Toledo, visiting friends in Cleve­land Heights, was terrorized by two rac­ist thugs, Thomas Gallagher and JeffreyAnderson, who hurled racist insults andglass bottles at the family's car. In tryingto avoid a bottle, Denise Wiley, thedriver, lost control and hit a telephone

pole; the impact threw her sister, AngelaMcFarland, through the windshield.Three-week-old Darris McFarland,who had been sitting on his mother'slap, was killed. Denise Wiley's l l-year­old son, Stephan, needed 35 stitches inhis face. The two killers have beencharged with "involuntary manslaugh­ter," with a maximum sentence of tenyears. In both cases, the police havedenied any "racial motivation" on thepart of the killers, calling the.murder ofbaby Darris a "traffic altercation"! .

Over 200 people attended the funeralservice for Brian Fletcher on April 28.In response to popular outrage overthese racist atrocities, the NAACPheld a press conference on April 29,at which Mylion Waite, director of theInterchurch Council of Greater Cleve­land, called the deaths "vehicular lynch­ings." The president of the ClevelandNAACP, James Hardiman, called onthe U.S. Justice Department to investi­gate the murders.

The criminals who murdered Brian

Fletcher and Darris McFarland deserveto be locked up for the next century! Butthe racist U.S. Justice Department isheaded by Ed Meese, who ran theCOINTELPRO war against the BlackPanthers in California for his boss,then-governor Reagan, and who praisedMayor Wilson Goode of Philadelphiafor the racist firebombing of MOVE.Likewise, the racist Cleveland cops areresponsible for the execution of MichaelWoods in 1982, as well as for the,outra­geous numbers of young blacks who"commit suicide" in their jail cells eachyear.

The deeply racist U.S. "justice" sys­tem rests on decaying capitalism whichtargets labor, blacks and all the op­pressed for cutbacks, unemploymentand union-busting, and threatens nu­clear WW III against the USSR. To stopthe racist rampage, the power of laborand blacks must be mobilized in strug­gle for socialist revolution which willavenge the murders of Brian Fletcherand Darris McFarland!.

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Black History and the Class Struggle

massive labor-centered demonstrationsback on May 13, 1985, Ramona Africawould not be in jail today. The labormovement has the power to bring thiscity to a halt!" Gene Herson, a militantin the National Maritime Union and asupporter of the Spartacist League,added: "From the bombing of the blackcommunity in Tulsa in 1921 to MOVEin 1985, this is the nature of the racistcapitalist system.... We must build aworkers party with an integrated lead­ership that can end this system and putthe working class in power."

But the union tops, who were crimi­nally silent on and after May 13, con­tinue to bind the integrated labor move­ment to the racist Democratic Party andMayor of Murder Goode. In the recentDemocratic Party primary, Phillyworkers and blacks were faced with theobscene spectacle - of Jesse Jacksonstanding shoulder to shoulder with theman who bombed black Philadelphia!Like the Philly city fathers who needWilson Goode to discipline the heavilyblack city unions, Jackson stands by thisDemocratic Party front man for Rea­gan reaction.

An Inquirer editor living in the USSRin 1985 mocked the coverage of theMOVE massacre in the Moscow press:"The Soviets got right to the nub ofthings-drawing the immediate and ob­vious connection between the Reaganadministration's handling of MOVE ...and its grander plans to eradicate thesocialist motherland" (9 May). In fact,the mass murder of Philly MOVE cameon the heels of Reagan's salute of NaziSS graves at Bitburg. The war-crazedregime in Washington emulates theThird Reich as they bomb black babiesat home, surrogate targets for their holywar against the Soviet Union. The vic­torious American proletarian revolu­tion will, among its first tasks, avengethe MOVE martyrs.•

can Friends Service Committee to "con­front and move beyond the horrors ofthat terrible day." But what is needed isnot the liberal calls for "atonement" and"education," and hopes of a "better"Democratic Party mayor, which domi­nated the meetings. At a communityforum Partisan Defense Committeespokesman Paul Cooperstein pointed towhat is necessary: "If there had been

the report transforms MOVE into "anextremist group, well-practiced in theart of urban terrorism" to justify 570cops with machine guns, automaticrifles and an anti-tank gun pouring10,000 rounds into a home with elevenblack men, women and children.

This past weekend, city activists gath­ered under the auspices of the Ameri-

A Spartacist Pamphlet

before the massacre, SWAT teamagents from the FBI approved the planof the Philly cops as "sound."

The report could have been written inthe White House basement, as part ofthe "anti-terrorism" war on blacks andlabor. MOVE's "crimes" were: they wereblack, they didn't kill insects, they didn'tpay their electric bill, they thought theyhad the right to defend their home. But

Black Historyand the

18f~Struggle

Jesse Jackson rallies with Mayor of Murder Wilson Goode and transit unionlocal president Roger Tauss (right) in Pennsylvania Democratic primary.

Under instructions not to indict thereal criminals, the grand jury's report isshot through with the obscene conclu­sion that MOVE brought it on them­selves. The whole "investigation," likethe massacre of MOVE itself, has thesmell of Ed Meese, who praised WilsonGoode's murderous assault as a "goodexample." And no wonder-two days

former mayor Frank Rizzo, and now byWilson Goode. Prominent black jour­nalist, MOVE supporter and formerBlack Panther Mumia Abu-Jamal sitson death row, framed on charges of kill­ing a cop. All Philly labor, from thepowerful longshoremen to the combat­ive teachers, sanitation and transitunions, must demand freedom for allthe victims of racist cop terror! SaveMumia! Free Ramona Africa and allMOVE prisoners!

Philly MOVE...(continued from page 12)

The Signature of theReagan Years

The grand jury report can't disap­pear the horror of what took place onOsage Avenue: "An urban disaster ofscarcely imaginable proportions result­ed ... eleven people died, an entireneighborhood lay in ruins, and two hun­dred and fifty people lay homeless." Butnot one single person who carried outthis hideous racist crime is even indict­ed! The 279-page document goesthrough legal contortions to exoneratethe "Big Four": Goode, city ManagingDirector Leo Brooks, Police Commis­sioner Gregore Sambor and Fire Com­missioner William Richmond. For thegrand jury, "even if Goode's conductwas otherwise criminal" it was a"justified ... use of deadly force," and"that was his management style.thatday"! But they can't hide the stench ofdeliberate premeditated mass murder.Testimony before the grand jury re­vealed that:

• The massive cop assault began withthe use of C-4 plastic explosive chargeslike "hand grenades" against the MOVEhome on Osage Avenue. Police "Stake­out" teams repeatedly detonated pow­erful explosives throughout the MOVEhouse. .

. • Sambor ordered the cop who madethe bomb used on the roof to "use fragand shrapnel if you have to, to get themmother fuckers."

• The cops repeatedly perjured them­selves to cover up thefact that it was theFBI which provided 37.5 pounds ofC-4in January 1985.

The grand jury simply dismisses the,witnesses who testified before theMOVE Commission two years ago that"police gunfire prevented some occu­pants of 6221 Osage Ave. from escap­ing from the burning house to the rearalley." Despite the fact that firefight­ers-Vietnam veterans-heard semi­automatic firein the alley which couldonly have come from the massive policearsenal, the grand jury decided only adozen shots were fired, and those by aMOVE member!

20 MAY 1988 11

".'I'·,~, •• ".,.; ~~.~I·'~ ,1/.'."

WfJRNERS "NIUIIR'I

Grand Jury Can't Wash BloodOff Mayor Goode's Hands

,

same condition, finished her sentenceand was released on May 13 this year.Eleven other ¥OVE family members-remain jmprisoned, victims of a decadeand a half of state terror-run first by

, continued on page 11

prison under a seven-year sentence,denied parole because she refuses tobow to the D:A. and the parole board,who demand she have nothing to dowith MOVE. Alberta Africa, who washeld in prison for seven years under the

,+ •.UPI

Holocaust on Osage Avenue, 13 May 1985: Democratic mayor Wilson Goode and Police Chief Sambor (inset, right)ordered firebombing of MOVE commune, killing eleven people 'and burning out entire black neighborhood.

should be penalized for it?" (Philadel­phia Inquirer,.} May).

After three years, the only personconvicted for the events of May 13is thesole surviving adult victim, RamonaAfrica. She remains in Muncy state

It's "the worst whitewash I've everheard in my lifetime," said OsageAvenue resident Wayne Renfrow. "Itseems like a political conspiracy to com­mit murder." Renfrow was angrilydenouncing the report of the grand jurythat investigated the massacre of thePhiladelphia MOVE group on Moth­er's Day, 13 May 1985. It was' a policeracial revenge murder of eleven blackmen, women and children. Millionswatched the scene on TV as the killers inblue bombed the MOVE home, anddeliberately burned down the entireblack neighborhood. But the carefullyguided grand jury exonerated everysingle official behind this obscenecrime-from "Mayor of Murder" Wil­son Goode to the cops who fired onMOVE family members desperatelytrying to escape the holocaust.

Issued almost three years after thebombing of MOVE (and convenientlydelayed until after Goode's re-electionand the recent Pennsylvania Dem­ocratic primary), the grand jury reportoutraged many Philly residents. A min­ister aptly likened the assault on MOVEto the U.S. Army's slaughter of Viet­namese peasants at My Lai. Evenmembers of Goode's hand-picked 1986MOVE commission were incredulousthat the D.A.'s report, approved by a16-to-4 vote of the grand jury, absolvedthe cops and Goode. Commission mem­ber Julia Chinn said, "I'm totallyspeechless.... We know II peoplediedon May 13. How can they say no' one

Chicago: Protest Stops"Right to Life" Bigots

CHICAGO, May 7-Emboldened by clinic block­ades in New York, anti-abortion bigots here, led bythe sinister Joe Scheidler, hoped to shut down theMich-igan Avenue Medical Center for Women andother downtown clinics today. But when the2o-odd "pro-lifers" showed up, they were met by amilitant demonstration of over 60 people deter­mined to defend the clinic against the right-wingcreeps. The bigots were prevented from blockad­ing the clinic entrance and from harassing wom­en going in, and had to. content themselves withanabortive curbside rally about 50 yards away.

A contingent of the Spartacist League, Sparta­cus,Youth Club, Labor Black Struggle League andPartisan Defense Committee participated in thedemonstration called by the National AbortionRights Action League and the International

Socialist Organization. The social-democratic ISOgenerally shuns the communist SL like the plague,but the~ouldn't exclude us when we showed upwith a m itant integrated contingent that doubledthe size 0 the demonstration. The result was aneffectiveunited front that successfullydefended theclinic.

The frantic attempts by the "god squads" to shutdown clinics is a sign of frustration over their fail­ure to make abortion illegal in this country. JoeScheidler, who orchestrated the New York block­ade, is a particularly dangerous element. Scheidlerwas arrested in June 1986for storming and smash­ing up the twice-bombed Ladies Center inPensacola, Florida. Against the deadly threat ofthese "right-to-lifers," the Spartacist League hasinsisted: Labor MUst Defend Abortion Rights!.

WV PhotoSparlacist contingent in May 7 Chicago protest againstanti-abortion terrorists.

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