I do have to admit. At least this year's election campaign is interesting, but not for the reasons you may think. Although the capitalist media talking heads keep marveling at how well Donald Trump is doing among working class voters, its not difficult to understand why and how this is happening. Working people are perpetually exploited by the super rich in this capitalist system. A quick example is that so many people are working longer and harder to make ends meet, to no avail, while ill responsible corporations receive record breaking bailouts. These types of obvious contradictions are making people more and more angry. Then along comes Trump talking about these contradictions as if he's your uncle at the family reunion. The only person in the room who isn't afraid to call out the domineering relative. At least that's how the capitalist system portrays him and its also how his supporters see him. That isn't hard to understand. The problem is that isn't remotely what's actually happening because Trump is very much a part of the capitalist system. The same system that is the cause of all your problems. He can say whatever he wants while he's running, but if he were to win, he would have no choice except to submit to the dictates of the system and he could do that very easily because he's already a part of it. He has participated in it as a developer, banker, product producer, and entertainer. Are there any better ways someone can demonstrate their place within the capitalist system?
I don't blame people for being blinded by his rhetoric though because to the untrained eye, that can happen easily enough. What's interesting is how quick and simple the Trump folks have been sold the con game that a billionaire, any billionaire, is going to be able to identify with your working class problems. And, that this billionaire is really going to do something to alleviate your suffering when people like him made their billions exploiting the conditions of people like you. In fact, all of them are corporate politicians. That goes for Hillary Clinton, the former WalMart Board Member, Bernie Sanders - Ted Cruz, and all the rest of this election's cast of characters. And the way you know that they are all corporate politicians, despite their campaign rhetoric, is based on their records. Isn't that why history is important? Down the line, regardless of party, all of them believe issues of poverty, white supremacy, patriarchy, police terrorism. houselessness, etc. will be resolved by reforming the capitalist system. Those of us who have spent our lives battling capitalism know that this is the ultimate political scam because a system built on exploitation cannot be amended to be non-exploitative. Even Bernie Sanders, the alleged socialist, can be easily exposed on this contradiction. We see the videos and stories his supporters keep pushing on us showing his participation in the civil rights movement as if that somehow validates him as a warrior for justice. There are thousands of people who marched, got arrested, and did this and that action on the right side of history before selling out the masses. Tom Watson was a populist leader 100 years ago who worked tirelessly to mobilize people of all races into the Populist Party, but when the reforms broke down and that pathway was no longer politically available, he ended up joining the Ku Klux Klan. So, students of history know better. Sanders keeps talking about a political revolution. Maybe he doesn't understand what a revolution is? No revolution has been won by winning votes inside of the exploitative system. Revolutions overturn systems, they don't create space to fit inside of the society they are fighting against. Besides, even if a real revolutionary were to exist inside the capitalist political system, that revolutionary would be outvoted on every bill and issue that came to the floor by the corporate financed politicians that make up this system. And any real revolutionary would not, could not, support the zionist state of Israel, a regime based on theft, murder, and oppression of the Palestinian people. No real revolutionary would vote to extradite Assata Shakur from Cuba to return to a racist system that seeks her death and/or imprisonment for daring to stand up against it. These are just two of the reactionary positions taken by Sanders, but maybe this is possible in his arbitrary world of "political revolution." Our definition of revolution is a process to transform an exploitative capitalist system into a socialist system. This process takes place only through a mass political education campaign and a relentless effort to organize the people to rise up against the system. Rising up looks like mass strikes. It looks like guerrilla warfare against the capitalist state. It looks like sustained efforts to push the system to the state of collapse. Then, it looks like the people seizing power and building a socialist system based on the principles of a planned economy, free health care, free education, etc. None of this lines up with Sander's reformist rhetoric so calling him a socialist is like calling Huey P. Newton a member of the republican party in the tradition of Ronald Reagan.
Corporate system friendly politicians is what you are watching. And for us that means any politician who pretends we can get serious changes within the capitalist system without having a mass movement that functions effectively outside of the system to hold the system accountable. Since most people do not belong to any organizations there is no organized capacity among the masses of people. That means the only course of action left to you is voting, which without the movement, is an extremely powerless activity that can at best, hopefully influence some possible and limited good, and at worse, is simply a rubber stamp for an already decided capitalist agenda.
Whether it's Trump, Sanders, or anyone of them in between, this system is still based on millions of dollars of finance to win. That means you are extremely naive if you believe your interests will be met simply because its the right thing to do. Your interests will only be met when you organize to exert power to achieve your objectives. So, if you believe the answer is to vote, do your thing, but remember, if you don't belong to an organization that is working to build a movement designed to hold the capitalist system accountable, you are fooling yourself. No where in history has any oppressed people gained their liberation simply by working through the system of the people exploiting them. Even by militantly working within that system it hasn't happened. Our only ability to hold the system accountable is when we are organized to do so and this cannot happen just by having a few individuals speaking out. Only when the masses come together will there be safety. In other words, that means we won't organize and win by you being content to be keyboard revolutionaries. The capitalists don't rely on social media to organize every facet of your lives. They build institutions to do that and they build institutions to deal with you when you don't cooperate. So, fantasy won't beat them. Only true work will do that.
Short of that work, for those of us who want something better than what we have in front of us today, the best scenario this election represents is a chance at maybe breaking off a few more crumbs, but most likely, it is just another clown show from the traveling circus that comes to your town every two to four years. Its entertaining, but like the circus, its magic. Its not real folks. And when the show is over, just like real life, we will go back to our day to day lives of waiting for the next circus to bring some light and hope into our oppression.
I don't blame people for being blinded by his rhetoric though because to the untrained eye, that can happen easily enough. What's interesting is how quick and simple the Trump folks have been sold the con game that a billionaire, any billionaire, is going to be able to identify with your working class problems. And, that this billionaire is really going to do something to alleviate your suffering when people like him made their billions exploiting the conditions of people like you. In fact, all of them are corporate politicians. That goes for Hillary Clinton, the former WalMart Board Member, Bernie Sanders - Ted Cruz, and all the rest of this election's cast of characters. And the way you know that they are all corporate politicians, despite their campaign rhetoric, is based on their records. Isn't that why history is important? Down the line, regardless of party, all of them believe issues of poverty, white supremacy, patriarchy, police terrorism. houselessness, etc. will be resolved by reforming the capitalist system. Those of us who have spent our lives battling capitalism know that this is the ultimate political scam because a system built on exploitation cannot be amended to be non-exploitative. Even Bernie Sanders, the alleged socialist, can be easily exposed on this contradiction. We see the videos and stories his supporters keep pushing on us showing his participation in the civil rights movement as if that somehow validates him as a warrior for justice. There are thousands of people who marched, got arrested, and did this and that action on the right side of history before selling out the masses. Tom Watson was a populist leader 100 years ago who worked tirelessly to mobilize people of all races into the Populist Party, but when the reforms broke down and that pathway was no longer politically available, he ended up joining the Ku Klux Klan. So, students of history know better. Sanders keeps talking about a political revolution. Maybe he doesn't understand what a revolution is? No revolution has been won by winning votes inside of the exploitative system. Revolutions overturn systems, they don't create space to fit inside of the society they are fighting against. Besides, even if a real revolutionary were to exist inside the capitalist political system, that revolutionary would be outvoted on every bill and issue that came to the floor by the corporate financed politicians that make up this system. And any real revolutionary would not, could not, support the zionist state of Israel, a regime based on theft, murder, and oppression of the Palestinian people. No real revolutionary would vote to extradite Assata Shakur from Cuba to return to a racist system that seeks her death and/or imprisonment for daring to stand up against it. These are just two of the reactionary positions taken by Sanders, but maybe this is possible in his arbitrary world of "political revolution." Our definition of revolution is a process to transform an exploitative capitalist system into a socialist system. This process takes place only through a mass political education campaign and a relentless effort to organize the people to rise up against the system. Rising up looks like mass strikes. It looks like guerrilla warfare against the capitalist state. It looks like sustained efforts to push the system to the state of collapse. Then, it looks like the people seizing power and building a socialist system based on the principles of a planned economy, free health care, free education, etc. None of this lines up with Sander's reformist rhetoric so calling him a socialist is like calling Huey P. Newton a member of the republican party in the tradition of Ronald Reagan.
Corporate system friendly politicians is what you are watching. And for us that means any politician who pretends we can get serious changes within the capitalist system without having a mass movement that functions effectively outside of the system to hold the system accountable. Since most people do not belong to any organizations there is no organized capacity among the masses of people. That means the only course of action left to you is voting, which without the movement, is an extremely powerless activity that can at best, hopefully influence some possible and limited good, and at worse, is simply a rubber stamp for an already decided capitalist agenda.
Whether it's Trump, Sanders, or anyone of them in between, this system is still based on millions of dollars of finance to win. That means you are extremely naive if you believe your interests will be met simply because its the right thing to do. Your interests will only be met when you organize to exert power to achieve your objectives. So, if you believe the answer is to vote, do your thing, but remember, if you don't belong to an organization that is working to build a movement designed to hold the capitalist system accountable, you are fooling yourself. No where in history has any oppressed people gained their liberation simply by working through the system of the people exploiting them. Even by militantly working within that system it hasn't happened. Our only ability to hold the system accountable is when we are organized to do so and this cannot happen just by having a few individuals speaking out. Only when the masses come together will there be safety. In other words, that means we won't organize and win by you being content to be keyboard revolutionaries. The capitalists don't rely on social media to organize every facet of your lives. They build institutions to do that and they build institutions to deal with you when you don't cooperate. So, fantasy won't beat them. Only true work will do that.
Short of that work, for those of us who want something better than what we have in front of us today, the best scenario this election represents is a chance at maybe breaking off a few more crumbs, but most likely, it is just another clown show from the traveling circus that comes to your town every two to four years. Its entertaining, but like the circus, its magic. Its not real folks. And when the show is over, just like real life, we will go back to our day to day lives of waiting for the next circus to bring some light and hope into our oppression.
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