COCKROACH! #5 A EZINE FOR POOR AND WORKING CLASS PEOPLE. WE HAVE NOTHING TO LOSE BUT OUR CHAINS. It is time that the poor and working class people have a voice on the Internet. Contributions can be sent to Subscribtions are free at How often this zine will appear depends on you! ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- -------------- Read the book! Ha Ha Ha McNamara,Vietnam-My Bellybutton is my Cristalball. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- -------------- 1. Trade unions and the "welfare" bill! 2. The Transitional Program 3. Russia and Cuba again! 4."Marxism" at Jefferson Village "reorganises"! ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- >Robert Maleck: I think you can guess which of the two scenarios I >endorse. My previous LaboTalk piece, "Work Ethic for the Poor," makes >that clear. With righteous wrath, you command American colleagues to >get off their fat asses to do something. I'd be interested in your >suggestions. Harry. Harry, could you send me the "piece" you mention above. Well as far as the trade unions are concerned and especially the trade unions in the public sector the welfare stuff is extremely important. Not only do most of our members work in this field involving health, childcare, the sick, the old and welfare in general, but most of our members through their own experience see the price behind the present system which benefits the people with money against those who have nothing. Here is and intersting set of lists i recently found on the subject in regards to numerous countrie. ****************************************************************** Percentage of children and elderly living in poverty 1984-1987:(3) ****************************************************************** CHILDREN ELDERLY COUNTRY IN POVERTY IN POVERTY United States 20.4 10.9 Canada 9.3 2.2 Australia 9.0 4.0 United Kingdom 7.4 5.2 France 4.6 4.5 Netherands 3.8 3.4 Germany 2.8 2.8 Sweden 1.6 4.3 Source: Timothy M. Smeeding, "U.S. Poverty and Income Security Policy in a Cross National Perspective, October 1991, Luxembourg, October, 1991, Luxembourg Income Study, working paper 70. ****************************************************************** Percentage of population covered by public health insurance, 1990(25) ****************************************************************** COUNTRY PERCENT COUNTRY PERCENT Australia 100 Sweden 100 Canada 100 United Kingdom 100 Denmark 100 Austria 99 Finland 100 France 99 Ireland 100 Switzerland 99 Italy 100 Spain 99 Japan 100 Belgium 98 New Zealand 100 Germany 92 Netherands 100 United States 21 Norway 100 Sources: Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (Paris), Health Data file, 1991: U.S.: National Center for Heath Statistics, Advance Data, No. 201, June 18, 1991. ****************************************************************** We're Number One in percentage of population without health insurance. ****************************************************************** Percentage of preschool children with full polio, DTP (diphtheria-tetanus-pertussis), and measles immunizations, 1985--87:(50) ****************************************************************** COUNTRY POLIO DTP MEASLES ------------------------------------------------------------------ Denmark 100.0 94.0(51) 82.0 Belgium 99.0 95.0 90.0 France 97.0 97.0 55.0 ------------------------------------------------------------------ Germany 95.0 95.0 50.0 Netherlands 96.9 96.9 92.8 Switzerland(52) 95.0 90.0 60.0 ------------------------------------------------------------------ United Kingdom(53) 87.0 87.0 76.0 Norway 80.0 80.0 87.0 Spain 80.0 88.0 83.0 ------------------------------------------------------------------ United States 55.3 64.9 60.8 ------------------------------------------------------------------ U.S. nonwhite 40.1 48.7 48.8 ------------------------------------------------------------------ Sources (for chart and text): Bret C. Williams and C. Arden Miller, Preventive Health Care for Young Childnen (Arlington, Va.: National Center for Clinical Infant Programs, 1991), p. 76; Bret C. Williams, "Immunization Coverage Among Preschool Childnen: The United States and Selected European Countnes," Pediatrics (Elk Grove Village, 111.: American Academy of Pediatrics, 1990), p. 1052: various releases and publications of the American Academy of Pediatrics, Elk Grove Village, Illinois. ################################################################## Cumulative number of offcially reported AIDS cases and cumulative rate per 100,000 population, as of 1991:(57) ################################################################## CUMULATIVE COUNTRY TOTAL CASES RATE PER 100,000 ################################################################## U.S. nonwhite 93,569 155.7 ################################################################## Malawi 12,074 131.8 Uganda 21,719 120.9 Congo 2,405 107.3 ------------------------------------------------------------------ United States 202,843 81.0 ------------------------------------------------------------------ Switzerland 1,891 28.0 France 15,534 27.6 Spain 9,1 12 23.2 Canada 5,228 19.7 Australia 2,678 15.8 Italy 9,792 17.0 Denmark 842 16.4 Netherlands 1,799 12.0 ------------------------------------------------------------------ Belgium 896 9.0 Germany (unified) 6,708 8.5 New Zealand 274 8.3 United Kingdom 4,758 8.3 Austria 594 7.8 Sweden 587 6.9 Ireland 205 5.9 Norway 220 5.2 Finland 88 1.8 Japan 405 0 3 ------------------------------------------------------------------ Sources: World Heath Organization, Global Programme on AIDS (October, 1991); U.S. figures: U.S. Centers for Disease Control "HIV/AIDS Surveillance," December, 1991, p. 9. ------------------------------------------------------------------ ################################################################## Ratio of average teacher salary to per capita gross domestic product (GDP), 1988-90(30) ################################################################## MAXIMUM SALARY STARTING SALARY (RATIO TO PER (RATIO TO PER COUNTRY CAPITA GDP) CAPITA GDP) Switzerland 2.97 1.69 Austria 2.60 0.98 Canada 2.22 1.10 Japan 2.21 0.75 Germany 2.19 1.37 United Kingdom 2.05 0.95 Australia 1.60 1.09 ------------------------------------------------------------------ United States 1.58 0.94 ------------------------------------------------------------------ Source: American Federation of Teachers. The above tabells give us a lot to work on and is clear proof that there is a price on the great American apple pie dream! I would suggest that a working class party based on the trade unions and urban poor with a program that clearly state a goal of a complete redistribution of the wealth in America is neccessary. Naturally it has to based on the people who in America get the shitty end of the apple pie stick..This at least for starters. There is a furios debate going on at Usenet about the Welfare reform. These exchanges i have posted to the list. In fact the present right turn by the Congress is going to have far reaching Social consequences. History has shown us that the urban pooor in despair go out and start burning down the ghettoes. My position on this is better to burn the local bank if you have to burn something! However it does not solve the problem! So unless the trade unions and urban poor can come up with a political party that fights in its interests and its interests alone we are certainly doomed. However, if the rage of the urban poor is not directed in a direction which can attack those responsible for their misery. There are certainly figures in the wings that will make them in to the next generation of Brownshirts! In fact this is already happening here in Europe and Scandinavia.. So obviously we are going to have to address this question far more seriously then before as trade unionists. Because the Urban poor section of the population is growing in leaps and bounds because of downsizing and cuts everywhere. However we do not need a new bunch of bureaucrats that sit behind their desks and turn papers. We need people that can go out and organise amogst the urban poor,around housing, childcare,healthcare,pensions and all the rest. In other words and organisation that is prepared to go all the way in a redistribution of wealth to the majority of the people that works in there interests and not in the interests of the rich and powerful. Thats the short version.. malecki ---------------------------------------------------------------------- THE TRANSTIONAL PROGRAM.. After Hugh's post on the transitional program i felt almost forced to do a close reading of it once again. it has been awhile since the last time. What is so incredible is how relative it is to today,s situation. As a working class kid it was the Transitional program which first attracted me to the Trotskyists. It was the answer i needed after being raised in a ghetto with working class parents. I was raised on picket lines and the McCarthy era. Later on used a a piece of meat in imperialist colonial warfare both in Cuba and Vietnam. When I first began to wake up it was hardly the Trotskyists i turned too, but direct action, some very adventurist action, directed at taking on imperialism single handidly! Well, it did not work and i wound up in exile first in Europe and later Scandinavia. Here I came into contact with the Transitional Program. A little book (60 pages) which for the first time showed me a way out of the dead end. Only to find out through futher studies the Stalinists had sabotaged any kind of Bolshevik politics in the workers movement over a whole historical period leading up to today. But i knew that if there was a way out this was it. Unfortunately at this time there were very few workers at least in Europe who adhered to any kind of Trotskyism. In fact it was mostly students and intellectualls in the post war revival around Vietnam and May of 68. Naturally this unbalance has caused a lot of problems and splits in the Trotskist movement. It is much easier for a student to theorize and split here and then there then for a working class kid. In fact it has been very difficult trying to find a way through the maze of intellectuals claiming the banner. But what kept me hanging on was that little book the Transitional Program and Trotskys and Lenins writtings.. In fact if all of those who claim the Trotskyist mantel were to take this document (The transitional Program) as a starting point for and International regroupment it would be a great leap forward in preparation for come what must! The post war Trotskyists groups have also been effected by much of what has happened. There has been some pretty horrible opportunism, out right betrayal, splits and all the rest. One of the main reasons I believe is the tremendous pressure put on these groups both by events, but also the domination of the Social Democrats and the Stalinists in the Labor movement. And not in the least the physical liqidation of Trotskyist cadre during this historical period. Many still are sitting in their trenches, others who make the claim of being Trotskyist and who are opportunist to the core and even others who have become old and inbittered or just given up.No group or individual has been left unscarred by all of this. Therefore i claim that no group or tendency can claim the mantel without a serious International conference taking place for a discussion of the very basics. In the Trotskyist world there is also a tendency of not seeing what the enormous events in the past years really mean. A tendency of despair, a tendency of trying to find new slick formulas and a tendency to completely disregard events that open up a real opportunity for the future. The most vital is the complete disintegration of the Stalinists and the jump by the Social Democracy in to the camp of the bourgeoisie! Naturally we have left overs from the Stalinist parties, not in the least the maoists of the ultra left period, but also of the right period. However without state power and Moscow or Peking to hold them up they are dead in the workers movement. There ideas stem from many of the dead end tactics of the now dead Stalinism. All the various groups and tendencies of Stalinism are in a shambles. The Euro-Communists are becoming Social Democrats. The State Capitalists are trying to reorientate their fundemental counter revolutionary betrayal of any kind of Bolshevik politics. The Anarchists are in a shambles. The Social Democrats are leaping into the arms of the bourgeois. Today more then ever in the Transitional program and the basic documents of the of the Trotskyist left opposition up until its founding lie the seed of a revolutionary regroupment Internationally under the banner of a reforged Communist International. All of the present tendencies and groups who do not take this opportunity to go back to the very basics and founding documents of the Fourth International, but continue on their merry way as if nothing has happened the last few years in regards to the Stalinist and Social Democratic traitors of the International Proletariat and do not realize that The transitional program (in its entirety) makes a good ground for an International regroupment of forces claiming the Trotskyist banner would be criminal. In fact more than criminal, a direct betrayal of those in back of us who fought and died for these documents in one of the blackist periods of history.But also a direct betrayal of the International Proletariat that has been beheaded of its Social Democratic and Stalinists leadership in later years and a Revolutionary leadership far longer! The International Proletariat has no leadership today! Into this space that has opened up would be a good place for a reforged International leadership of Trotskist forces based on the fundemental documents of the movement we derived from! But it should be based on those documents in their entirety and a leadership and a cadre who are prepared to fight for that program in forming a mass revolutionary vanguard. It can not be a halfway house for those who advocate just parts of the Transitional Program, nor ultra leftists who deny that the program does not go far enough! But a cadre who are prepared to move forward on the concrete basics and the Transitional program in its ENTIRETY. That i,m afraid is the only road forward! That i am prepared to work for. All else is just bullshit! For the first time since the consolidation of the Stalinists as a counter revolutionary force in the Labor movement, their power is broken! Smashed and disintegrated by its own rotten politics and imperialist pressure. The Social Democrats after this Spectacular event have taken gigantic leaps into the arms of the bougeoisie both on the National level and International level. For the first time the path is layed wide open for the intervention of the basic politics of the Fourth International. If we miss this chance we are heading for a new and unpresidented period of barbary! But this time we can not blame the Stalinists and the Social Democrats. The blame must be put squarely on the shoulders of those who claim the mantel of Trotskyism! Finally without a serious International Conference an attempt of regroupment by all parties and groups on the basic fundementals and Transitional Program of Trotsky and the Left Opposition the Proletariat should turn their backs to all of those claiming the mantle, because none of you deserve the right of their history. Besides it is only these documents that can lay a basis for real unity and possibility of moving Forward to the reforging of the Fourth International. In exile, in Sweden and still a Trotskyist! --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Russia and Cuba again! >But even on Lenin's definition there were periods when Russia clearly did drain >capitaL from E>Europe eg in the years immediately after the war when stalin >looted East Germany, Hungary etc sending back railway line, capital equipment >and whole factories to Russia. Also there was capitaL flow inside the USSR from >the Asiatic and other non-European parts to the imperialist Russia heartlands. > >The gross national oppression within the old USSR was also an imperialist >policy. There was a clear economic motivation in the Stalinists oppression of >the non_rUssian peopl's it was not simply because Stalin did not understand the >national question. Mick, Jorn and others on the list who claim that the former Soviet union was imperialist are dead wrong. The above about what the Stalinists did immediately after the second world war had nothing to do with imperialist policies, but was a continuation of the Stalinist bureaucracy's bonapartist policies of disarming the possibilty of workers revolution. It is well documented Stalins mistrust of all who opposed him in Russia after coming to power. He did everything in his power to eliminate the opposition. And in East Europe this meant dismantling just about everything and sending it back to the Soviet Union connected to Red Army occupation and building up and infrastructure of loyal Stalinist hacks in these countries. But after that new industries were built up and in places like Checkoslavakia the arms industries were built up again. In fact many of the weapons that wound up in the third world came from these factories. At this point in time the Soviet Union certainly was playing and anti-imperialist role despite the Stalinist policies! Or do the "State Caps" think that the cold war was just a myth? And in regards to Cuba. Trotskyists do not critize the Stalinists for exporting guns or whatever to the Cubans. In fact we would have called for a nuclear shield of the Cubans against imperialist attack. But we do critize the price ticket that went along with it. Although the Cubans, unlike the Vietnamese, were not as servile to the Stalinists as far as politics were concerned. But the Cubans certainly did not or perhaps could not avoid capitulating to Kremlin bureaucrats either. In fact i agree that the United States was partially responsible for throwing the Cuban leadership into the arms of the Russians. However that was certainly a step to the left (!) in the early days of the Cuban Revolution. Unfortunately i have to agree with Louis that the Cubans certainly had to choose between the support of the Stalinists in material things in order for the Revolution to survive. However I disagree that this line in the long run can lead to success. And in fact much of the Cubans exporting of revolution depended on material from Russia but also and ideology which was at best centrist in character. And the proof is that today Cuba is more isolated then ever before. Naturally it is the duty of every revolutionary to defend Cuba against imperialism, however to ignore the possibilities of building a revolutionary International based on struggle for power, the Cubans appear to be caught in the Stalinist ideology of a popular front against the Americans Internationally based on a program of petty bougeois peace organisations. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- ------------ "Marxism" at Jefferson Village "reorganises!" Well now it is official. The spoon at Jefferson village has decided to reorganise the list and discussion. Naturally, like class struggle, all things change. The actors move in different directions and the battles draw lines even here in cyberspace. Despite the rosy picture presented by spoon as "reorganisation" one must say that the reorganisation is something that is connected to the history of M1 and M2 lists. The people involved, at least those who have been here for a while, is the dynamic force in this new reorientation. These people including myself is the human material with all of its various ideological and living experience in interaction which has brought about the present state of things. The remarkable think about this process is how the cyberspace is being used to enforce all of these political and personal *real* life experiences. Thus trying to turn this media into deviding up this human material into various files where they can survive in peaceful bliss without being contaminated by a virus from the other rich political and personal backgrounds of those who claim to be "marxist" orientated. A family of revolutionaries that can exist, at least in cyberspace, in seperate little rooms where they feel comfortable. Sort of like packing lollipops in individual or group plastic bags to keep them sterile for the uninformed consumer...Even better would be the history of the "new" leftwhich has led a gruopie existence especially amongst intellectual circles for a rather long time. It appears that the spoon is looking for organisational and moderation forms to strenghen this process of groupie existence of the left on Internet. In other words a little fack or room for each member or family to move into and be happy with their convictions. How quaint! I think that it is a very logical outcome of the last months of struggle. Especially amongst the intellectuals on this list whos politics is connected to presenting their views to small groups of polite people who don,t have to worry about where the next meal is coming from or have been unemployed for months or years. However i defend free speech and even the right to live in isolation and groupie existence even for those that prefer this alternative. However i do intend to subscribe to all of the new groups and try to follow the rules in order to make life uncomfortable for my political opponents. Or will i be prevented from doing this by my political opponents? Thus proving; That the present "reorganisation" is not more then a physical expression of the present groupie and individualist life that our "marxists" on this list appear to prefer in private little rooms rather then and open forum where ideas can clash. Because it is quite clear there are certain individuals that are trying to use this reorganisation as a tool to gag people from participating in the debate. Naturally i defend the right of people to discuss in anyway they want to the questions facing those who claim to be "marxist".. However to organise the discussion along the sectarian and groupie principals that the left has so long been doing in real life and raising it to a principle under the guise of "reorganisation" would be criminal. In fact, only a broad and open discussion with all political tendencies with people from all walks of life can show the way forward. We have nothing to lose but our chains and the chains that those who will gag a free and open discussion will put on us under the guise of moderation and reorganisation. The best thing that can happen to people is to be confronted with living ideas and politics is through and open clash on and open forum where moderation is directed only against facist provacateurs and *real* cops! Those who need to hide behind closed and moderated doors have something to hide or are afraid that there politics can not stand up to open and real confrontation are the only ones who gain by building walls around themselves with this new orientation by the spoon. This i,m afraid, despite all the rhetoric, is the underlying reason for the new reorganisation of the lists. Warm Regards malecki I am posting this to the newsgroups and it will go in a future number of cockroach.. Bulletin Board ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- -------------- Read the book! Ha Ha Ha McNamara,Vietnam-My Bellybutton is my Cristalball. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- --------------