Leon's OpEd

2011-04-28T14:31:00.000-07:00

Budget in Context

What's the budget debate about? Obama put the question of "how to balance the budget" in the context of "what kind of country will we be?"

The GOP puts the issue as entirely a matter of "living within our means"; it is strikingly silent on what kind of America will come out of the process. Despite Obama's recent speech, the predominant approach from the Democrats has also not really come to grips with what's happening to America and what to do about it.

The America of 2011is not the country some thought it would be a decade ago when Washington and Wall Street prematurely laid claim to a "New American Century". Far from triumphalism, the mood and reality today define a country that is deeply troubled. The stock market is back and profits are at record highs, but the economy is very sick. No remedy is emerging to deal with chronic high unemployment and underemployment; disparity in wealth distribution has never been as great; health care costs are galloping out of sight and poverty is expanding apace; educational opportunity is eroding and the infrastructure of the country is descending into potholes.

The structure of the economy has undergone drastic changes: its manufacturing base has been decimated, unions have shrunk, jobs have gone overseas and multinational corporations are evading taxes on a grand scale. On top of all this is the cruel burden of unending and unwinnable wars, the unbearable cost of maintaining a gargantuan military establishment with thousands of overseas bases policing the world.

America remains powerful on the world stage, but it is not the superpower whose strength can dominate the course of international developments. There are self-confident rivals who act with independence in economic and political affairs. Moreover, in a world that is undergoing epic economic and environmental crises, we are failing even to face up to the existential problem of climate change.

All in all, our problems are not a matter of a temporary glitch that can be resolved by cutting social programs or waiting for an upturn in the economy. Any meaningful remedies require taking account of the dimensions of the crisis and decline that grips the country. It also requires, as Obama said, a vision of what kind of America will be shaped by the way in which our crisis is confronted.

The Ryan budget ignores everything about the present crisis but the federal deficit. The GOP says absolutely nothing about what America would look like if it were to get everything it’s asking for: slashing education and basic services at every level, gutting Medicare and Medicaid, while shrinking revenue by cutting taxes on the wealthiest Americans.

There may be no magical solution to all our problems, but we can achieve a great deal by practical and humane alternatives in the way we budget and allocate the government’s resources. There is no mystery to the essential approaches that would both improve life for most Americans while reducing the federal deficit. (What’s not simple is how the people can overcome the obstacles to progress manipulated by corporate wealth with all its lobbyists, politicians, and largely controlled media.)

The “People’s Budget” put forward by over 80 members of the Progressive Congressional caucus points the way. It shows how to reduce the deficit while dealing more effectively with the nation’s crucial needs. The remedy is threefold: increasing revenue by raising (rather than lowering) taxes on the wealthy, especially the extremely wealthy, and closing tax loopholes; gaining control of and reducing the costs of heath care; getting out and staying out of wars, and sharply reducing the bloated military establishment. How far we go in dealing with these three problem areas will influence what we can do to stimulate the economy, generate jobs, expand education, renew infrastructure, and become serious about developing alternative energy and confronting climate change.

Rightist and corporate resistance to both healthcare reform and significant retrenchment of the military-industrial complex threatens to dig the nation into an ever-deepening hole. On healthcare, necessary control over costs is impossible without placing the public interest over the profits of the mega health insurance and drug corporations. Medicare for all, cutting out the role of private greed, is the ideal solution, but at least some significant measures to strengthen the public’s hand are essential.

As for the colossal “defense” budget, it was shaped by exploiting the exaggerated paranoia that marked the Cold War and it has continued to expand out of any reasonable relationship to present reality. As Defense Secretary Gates recently acknowledged, “any future defense secretary who advises the president to again send a big American land army into Asia or into the Middle East or Africa should have his head examined.” Particularly irrational and dangerous is the hugely costly nuclear weapons arsenal. Beyond that, the vast network of bases abroad serves no worthwhile purpose since notions of “policing” the world prove illusory as well as provocative.

So there is an effective and humane way forward. Ryan’s corporate backers tout his “courage” in putting on the table so-called “entitlements”, the privileged set’s euphemism for programs such as Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid that meet fundamental human needs. The courage that’s needed is what the Congressional Progressive Caucus has urged. One has to hope that the negative public response to the GOP-Ryan Plan, the overwhelming nationwide opposition to gutting Medicare, will encourage a demand to go after the real “entitlements” of the corporate world: tax evasion, profiteering at the expense of public health, and the sacred cow that is the military-industrial complex.

Better than hope, what’s called for is a lot more of the outpouring of anger and protest that Governor Walker has encountered in Wisconsin. It’s time for the people to get into the debate.

2011-04-02T21:18:00.000-07:00

LIBYA

A week or two ago, the most urgent and contentious question was whether or not the US and its Western allies should intervene militarily in Libya. Now the missiles have rained down and a “no fly” blanket covers Libya. The possible massacre in Benghazi that Qaddafi threatened may have been averted, but events quickly made it clear that US/ NATO military power is not a solution for Libya any more than “shock and awe” was for Iraq and Afghanistan.

Now the urgent question is, can the course of events be altered soon enough to prevent another prolonged war of intervention in the Middle East. How, for the sake of the Libyan people and a war-weary world, can we avoid sinking deeper into the morass of unending wars?

What’s called for, it seems to me, is international intervention, but intervention of a different kind than has been the sad pattern of the past. The UN has been bullied and bribed time and again into providing “sanction” for interventionist “holy” wars. Can that be different now? Can there be intervention for a cease-fire that protects the ability of the Libyan people to pursue their own democratic struggle as part of the “Arab Spring”? I think there are reasons why it can be different now.

Before looking at the reasons, a positive change in the character of international response to the Libyan crisis would have to involve urgent diplomacy efforts by the UN, shifting initiative toward members of the Security Council that abstained from supporting military action. The immediate aim would be a cease-fire that would halt Qaddafi’s military assaults and bombing by NATO. The longer-range outlook would be to secure conditions in which the Libyan people can bring about social change on their own terms without the tragic consequences of foreign military intervention and another prolonged war. However events develop, world opinion and effective international solidarity will be a force in support of the Libyan people against Qaddafi’s tyranny, as it was in the heroic struggle of the South African majority that finally ended the Apartheid regime.

Circumstances are far different today than they were when a triumphalist Bush Administration invaded Iraq in defiance of opposition at home and abroad. Iraq and Afghanistan destroyed the conceit that the US government can determine outcomes and force “solutions” by virtue of its overwhelming military superiority. The American people, like people everywhere, want no part of a third war in the Middle East. Moreover, Barak Obama and Robert Gates have shown great reluctance about being drawn into another disastrous military adventure. (While they are decidedly leery of more land wars, their reluctance does not extend to the widespread use of missiles and drones, as well as the CIA, Special Forces, and killer contractors.)

While views on the intervention in Libya have differed widely, including on the left, UN Resolution 1973 cannot be ascribed primarily to “same-old, same-old” imperialist motivation. Humanitarian concerns about Qaddafi’s brutality were real, regardless of mixed and ulterior motives among “Western” and Arab governments. Strong public support for prompt UN intervention came not only through the pleas of Libyan rebels facing imminent massacre, but from veteran anti-imperialists like Uri Avreny, Israeli leftist, and Juan Cole, analyst of Middle Eastern affairs. At the same time, it would be foolish to ignore the dangers inherent in unleashing US and NATO military power in Libya and possibly wading into another hopeless quagmire. The important governments that abstained in the Security Council vote had good reason to worry about potential “humanitarian” considerations as a formula for intervening militarily in the internal affairs of nations.

As for the United States, its greatest contribution to peace and democracy in the Middle East would be to sharply curtail its military presence. That should be the demand, in the interest of the beleaguered American people as much as in support of new generations of Arabs striving courageously to shape their own democratic destiny. The weapons that we sell and supply are the main instruments of tyranny and violence in country after country in the Middle East.

The uncertainty about Libya and what is happening in the Middle East brings America’s changing place in the world into focus. The US is powerful, but it is not the almighty superpower Bush and Cheney thought it was. The McCann and Lieberman hawks still cling to the deadly illusion, but reality is beyond denial. The serious economic and political decline, pushed into a deepening spiral by the political right and its corporate bosses, limits US influence despite the fact that we still have far more weapons of war than all other nations combined. Ending wars and keeping out of new ones is the imperative for any improvement in the lives and fortunes of most Americans. It would also be the biggest boon to worldwide aspirations for peace and democracy. That’s the big picture, the goal that shouldn’t be compromised in Libya or anywhere else.

2011-02-28T13:38:00.000-08:00

SEEING THE WORLD BY WAY OF EGYPT

Egypt’s upheaval, following the one in Tunisia, is not just a regional earthquake with aftershocks rumbling throughout the Middle East. It reveals much about the contemporary world, in which new realities are evolving that impact popular struggles for social progress. Here, I don’t mean primarily the technological tools of social networking, remarkable as they are.

Egypt is the latest example that relatively peaceful popular democratic revolts can arise even under conditions of severe repression and dictatorship. It’s not that the dictatorial regime shies away from using violence to the maximum extent feasible: the Egyptian Health Ministry reports a toll of 365 deaths during the uprising. It’s that it may not be feasible to unleash its full arsenal of violence against a united, courageous and determined mass opposition while the whole world is watching. Such revolts have ousted tyrants and toppled their governments, although they have usually fallen short of achieving fundamental social change.

As revealed so clearly in Egypt, the great tension of our time is between entrenched political and economic systems on one hand and the powerfully growing pressures within society for social change. People everywhere who struggle for social justice and a better world need to recognize both sides of that tension. To lose sight of the first permits optimism and illusions that can’t be sustained; failure to appreciate the second nurtures pessimism and despair, a mood that is paralyzing in trying times.

Despite the dominance of finance capital in the global economy and over most governments, there is a river of social and cultural progress that cannot be diverted or effectively contained. In Egypt, a new generation of youth sparked an uprising that gave voice and power to labor and all sections of society no longer willing to tolerate Mubarak’s dictatorship. But it isn’t only Mubarak’s regime that failed to stem the rising tide of social change. The failure also belongs to the foreign policy establishment of the United States, which not only underwrote the dictatorship with massive military and financial investments, but which played catch-up so reluctantly as the Egyptian resistance inspired worldwide admiration. The failure belongs to a foreign policy that supports anti-democratic regimes so long as they serve as “allies” in unending wars and in pursuit of “our strategic interests” that are enforced by military bases all over the globe.

We don’t yet know the scope of change that the Egyptian people will be able to bring about. We can bet that the military government and its patrons in the Pentagon and US State Department aim to keep control of the transition and manage its outcome. We also don’t know the full impact of spreading resistance to authority in Bahrain, Yemen, Libya and throughout the Middle East as desperate monarchs and dictators resort to greater violence to try to escape Mubarak’s fate. In Libya, where Qaddafi has insanely unleashed all the military force he can muster against mass protests, the protests have become an armed revolution that is sweeping his regime away.

The story is ongoing, yet it gives much food for thought about the struggle for democracy and social progress. What moves the process forward?

Even though reactionary or neoliberal administrations have dominated politics in the United States and most countries of the “West” for decades, and despite the dire effects of unfettered capitalist globalization, important currents of social and cultural progress have gained strength within the USA and worldwide. For example, struggles for the rights and equality of racial and ethnic minorities, women, and people of diverse sexual orientations have advanced and won popular support, among youth most of all. For the most part, the structures of government initially resist every new step forward, and then tail along behind as it becomes necessary to adjust to changing reality.

It is painfully clear that changes in the realm of public opinion are far from uniformly progressive. The ultra-right, which owns a lion’s share of the US media, exploits public anger over the economic crisis and failures of the government to amplify hatred and violence against immigrants, unions, racial and religious minorities, women, gays, liberals and progressives. That’s all the more reason to consider the sources and potential of factors that generate pressure for progressive social change.

The revolutionary expansion of technology for instant communication and access to information is changing just about everything. Like almost all technological advances, it has its downside: exploited by mega media and advertising agents of corporate power, it magnifies influences that erode cultural values and educational standards. Yet it has a truly historic upside: no longer can billions of people on all continents be kept in ignorance. It is too vast and multifaceted to be entirely controlled or silenced by political elites, oligarchs, or billionaires. The secrets of corruption and abuse of power are no longer secure. Increasingly knowledge of how societies function and how people live in any part of the world circulates everywhere. And in the hands of creative people, especially the young, the varied instruments of information can become clarions of freedom, remarkably practical weapons of protest and rebellion against oppression.

Within the United States and in other countries of the “West”, there are large-scale demographic changes that also press against an old order dominated by wealthy white elites. Immigration by poorer masses to the richer countries has changed the political landscape despite frenzied, often racist, opposition. Within the USA, the flow of immigrants in recent decades, particularly from Latin American and Asian countries, has penetrated all parts of the country. That — together with the historic internal migration of African-Americans (documented in Elizabeth Wilkerson’s “The Warmth of Other Suns” [2010, Random House]) — is changing America dramatically. People of color are now a majority, or close to it, in some states. Children of mixed color and ethnic backgrounds are a growing presence everywhere.

Perhaps the most important factor in rising pressures for social change, although its eventual consequences are uncertain, is the multi-dimensional crisis of the existing world order. In this still young century it appears that the era of effective domination by one or two “superpowers” may be over. The power of Washington to control events on a world scale is diminished. Other sources of economic and political influence are rising, but it is unlikely that any power will achieve the degree of imperial and military dominance that the USA has exercised. Moreover, the economic and environmental crises are beyond the capacity of any single or small group of nations to resolve.

An epochal change may be taking place on the role of war as a viable instrument in world politics. The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, stubbornly pursued by the US government, are the crowning evidence through decades of wars that have proved unwinnable despite overwhelming military superiority. Coming on the heels of retreat from the “crucial” Pech Valley in Afghanistan, Secretary of Defense Gates has made a remarkably sweeping acknowledgment of war’s folly. As reported in the New York Times (2/25/2911):

Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates bluntly told an audience of West Point cadets on Friday that it would be unwise for the United States to ever fight another war like Iraq or Afghanistan, and that the chances of carrying out a change of government in that fashion again were slim.

“In my opinion, any future defense secretary who advises the president to again send a big American land army into Asia or into the Middle East or Africa should ‘have his head examined,’ as General MacArthur so delicately put it,” Mr. Gates told an assembly of Army cadets here.

It is hardly likely that the military-industrial complex will fold up after Gates’ confession of failure, give up its bloated budget and worldwide bases, and cease its high-tech assassinations and far-flung interventions via “special forces”. Nevertheless, historic constraints are emerging against interventionist wars and occupation of foreign lands. These constraints arise fundamentally because the great majority of the people of the world oppose war. No matter how much destructive power the military may have at its disposal, unbridgeable political and moral limits on war have been evolving since it first became evident that modern war could destroy humanity.

The waters of social progress are not passive. Whether in Cairo, Benghazi, or Madison, the current is driven by actions and uprisings of people when they are ready to resist oppression and intolerable living conditions. One can’t predict the outcome of every battle, or even of the overall war for earthly survival. Unwarranted optimism (rare as it has become) can be balanced out with awareness of reactionary countercurrents so apparent in the USA today: the unaltered grip of Wall Street on our economy and political institutions, the emergence of racist and fascist–style movements, the assault on weakened trade unions and collective bargaining rights.

But the poor and long oppressed of the Arab world are reminding us that “people power” is inextinguishable. When masses awake, the walls of tyranny and elite privilege begin to crack. And when a new generation of youth unexpectedly kicks over the traces, we remember never to say “Never.”

2011-01-01T23:29:00.000-08:00

THE LEFT, OBAMA AND HIS BASE

Where do we go from here?

That's the question Paul Krugman and Robin Wells ask in the New York Review of Books, 1/13/11. That's the question that grips everyone on the left of American politics.

On many domestic issues there is a broad progressive consensus, the need to fight like hell to convince and rally people to push back against the corporate billionaires and their shameless political front men in Congress. Only greater public understanding — the will to confront those making out like bandits while masses face long-term joblessness and poverty — can turn things around and revitalize momentum for progressive change. There is no lack of serious programmatic ideas, nor is there serious disagreement on most issues.

It's a different matter when it comes to analysis of why things turned sour and of strategy going forward. Here frustration and differences are rife. Argument often divides over estimates and attitudes toward Obama and his administration.

Krugman/Wells, while acknowledging objective difficulties imposed by the severe economic crisis and the ultra-right's dominance in mis-shaping "public opinion", put the onus for the startling rightward political shift on Obama's political mistakes and leadership failures. Echoed by Jeffrey Sachs, Michael Lerner, and many others after the 2010 election debacle, Krugman/Wells essentially write off Obama and admonish Democrats to "to delink their political fate from Obama". Lerner and a few others call for a candidate to challenge Obama in the primaries before the 2012 elections.

In contrast, a minority left view is offered by Sam Webb in the People's World, 12/31/10. His criticism of Obama is muted, and he admonishes the left to recognize its own responsibilities: "For too long we have assumed that the American people are ready to wholeheartedly embrace left solutions. If we, and especially the Democrats, project them, 'the people will come.' Tell that to Russ Feingold!"

My intent in this brief commentary is not to try to pull together a direct answer to the question posed by Krugman/Wells: "where do we go from here?" As noted, prescriptions on issues and the need for resolute action are similar across the left spectrum. Emphasis does vary, and it is striking that an anti-war thrust is ignored in the Krugman/Wells projections. I just want to express a few reactions and concerns.

First, a positive note: Krugman deserves a medal to go along with his Nobel for his relentless debunking of prevailing rightwing economic nonsense and exposure of the GOP's venal assault on the interests of all but the wealthiest Americans. In tandem with Bob Herbert, who focuses on Americans living in poverty and on the human costs of war, Krugman provides an exceptional contrast to the norm in mainstream journalism.

The Krugman/Wells (Sachs, Lerner) extreme condemnation and virtual dismissal of Obama is another matter. Here things are not so simple. To accept that analysis whole and to act on it strategically could prove counter-productive. Yes, I think progressives must be independent and critical, exerting pressure to its maximum without being bound by what Obama may or may not do. In that sense, "delinking" is necessary. But that doesn't mean indifference to the political fate of Obama's presidency and what it means for the American people. It doesn't mean writing off Obama and the many who continue to support him as representing the best in the current sorry mess of American politics. That raises the question of Obama's base, often glibly assumed to be "the left" that claims credit for his election and now feels abandoned. Actually the base goes far beyond ideological boundaries, including the large majority of African-Americans, of Latinos and recent immigrants, of Gays and others who feel that Obama is on their side and resent the racist backlash against him. Those on the left who feel cavalier about closing the book on Obama, should think twice about alienating themselves from the largest part of his base.

Obama has achieved some social and legislative gains against enormous counter pressures, but his chosen course and political decisions have contributed significantly to the dramatic rightward shift in political power during 2009-10. Whether or not there was an alternative to his "deal" with the GOP in the lame duck Congress, much of what was done or not done in 2009 and 2010 made the electoral "shellacking" a foregone conclusion. His cabinet choices and policy decisions were conditioned by avoidance of conflict with the rich and powerful, the generals and the military, and even the defeated GOP. He correctly read the desire of most Americans for a different spirit of cooperation in Washington — he felt that if he offered his hand to the Republicans and they spurned it, they would pay the price in public opinion; instead, their consistent obstructionism made him the fall-guy for the ever worsening situation. Despite his elevation of massive community organizing in his victorious 2008 presidential campaign, he relied in office on personal negotiating approaches, to the virtual exclusion of mobilizing public support for the necessary scale of stimulus and jobs programs. Unlike FDR, he largely neglected to reach out directly to the people through his "bully-pulpit".

Given how thing have turned out so far, it's comfortable for some on the left to pass off the Obama phenomenon as all myth and illusion from the very beginning. The "neo-liberal" label is pinned on him, he's 'always been a conservative', 'he's really pro Wall Street'. Such stereotyping and assignment of an individual to a closed political box runs counter to much historical experience. Movements and the flow of events can change how individuals see things and how they act. All things considered, there can be little doubt that Obama views himself as on the side of struggling Americans — nor is there any doubt that defeating him and "taking back the country" is the prime objective of the neo-fascist mob.

As Krugman/Wells remind us: "American politics have proved astonishingly mutable, with not one but two supposedly permanent majorities quickly collapsing in 2006 and 2010. Things may turn again, as long as progressives fight on."

AFTER THE VOTE

2010-03-23T22:49:00.000-07:00

My email batch today included angry condemnation by some of my fellow leftists of the new Health Reform Act and everyone who supported Sunday’s historic vote. Laura Bonham of Progressive Democrats of America (PDA), of which I’m a member, called it “A Kafka Moment” and bitterly attacked MoveOn for congratulating the Democrats who voted for it. Ralph Nader and Chris Hedges scorned “craven Democrats”, especially attacking Howard Dean. This was an echo of the attacks on Dennis Kucinich for “folding” when he announced he would vote “yes”.

That’s certainly not the way I see things. The times call for militancy and resolve, but not for a nasty war against anyone who sees today’s momentous challenges from a broader perspective than do Bonham, Nader and Hedges. I can’t support PDA in an assault on MoveOn. Nor can I conceive of a significant American left if Dennis Kucinich, Al Franken, Barbara Lee, Barney Frank, John Lewis and Bernie Sanders just sold us out by favoring a “yes” vote on the final bill.

Is it possible to see two realities at once? Is it possible to be highly critical of limitations and compromises in the new legislation and yet to see it as an advance? Is it possible to recognize a flawed process, with serious shortcomings, and still acknowledge that in its final stage Barack Obama and Nancy Pelosi did a praiseworthy job of advancing health care as a basic right and beating back the violent ultra-right counter-attack against the results of the 2008 elections?

It had better be possible to see the whole contradictory reality as we go on from here. It’s never been more necessary to fight hard on a host of vital issues, yet never more necessary to bridge gaps and hold a progressive majority together. Whatever the Administration does or doesn’t do, holding back on critical struggles is not an option for leftists and progressives — not on ending the wars, fighting for immigration reform, universal health care and jobs programs, or fighting cuts in education and social welfare. While pushing vigorously for the President and Congress to live up to the promise of change that swept the 2008 elections, we have the responsibility to do everything we can to defend and extend what’s positive and hopeful. We cannot dismiss for a single moment that a rightist and racist cabal has targeted the Obama presidency, trying desperately to reverse the historic opportunity to change America for the better. This vigilante crusade aims not just at a return to something like a Bush/Cheney regime, but something far further to the right that’s closer to fascism.

I’m glad the Health Reform bill became law and not Obama’s “Waterloo” as the GOP projected. The majority can do a lot better and the door is open. It might have been slammed shut not just on health care, but on any possibility for progressive headway in the next several years.

2010-02-27T07:45:00.000-08:00

ABOUT LESTER RODNEY

I met Lester at the end of WWII. By then he was already one of my personal heroes, and had been ever since he began his crusade against Jim Crow in baseball in 1936. I was one of thousands of young people who rallied with great enthusiasm to the cause he spearheaded. We collected petitions, protested at ballparks and spread the word from Lester’s groundbreaking interviews and initiatives. In my home state of Connecticut, we demanded without success a try-out in AA baseball for a talented young pitcher, Billy Taylor. And Lester’s example galvanized us to challenge Jim Crow at other recreational facilities. I remember our group, which included a high school student who eventually became the first African-American woman to be appointed as a federal judge, militantly protesting the shameful color bar at a community swimming pool in New Haven. I mention this because to appreciate what Lester meant to us, it’s important to remember that in those days baseball reflected the widespread poison of Jim Crow that permeated every aspect of life, North as well as South.

In his book with Irwin Silber, “Press Box Red”, Lester’s landing a job as the Daily Worker’s first real sports editor is depicted accurately as a strange and somewhat awkward marriage. Embracing a genuine lover of America’s pastime was certainly new ground for the Communists of that day, but the fight against Jim Crow and lynching had been a core cause for many years that joined Communists to the struggle of African-Americans for full equality. What Lester and his comrades did was to add a new dimension, one that reached into the daily lives of millions of Americans and that ultimately reached beyond Sports. Like all civil rights progress, the victory over discrimination in sports resulted mainly from long years of determined effort in the African-American community, often with no apparent white support. Lester recognized that and put a priority on direct solidarity with Black athletes and publications such as the Pittsburgh Courier that were leading the fight.

I met Lester through his wife, Clare. Clare and I were organizers in the same youth movements during WWII and for quite a few years after. Clare and Lester, and Roz and I, were bringing up new families as the cold war unfolded and McCarthyism gained sway. It wasn’t an easy time for those of us on the left, progressives and liberals included, as blacklists, and attorney general’s lists, and subpoenas and arrests multiplied. One of the things that amazed me most about Lester was his boldness, in and out of the press box, his unwillingness to be intimidated by the “red” label, his absolute refusal to be cut off from the main stream of American life. It took guts, more than most of us have, to take his rightful place as a journalist, to connect with famous ball players, to go face to face with the powerful in the pursuit of social justice.

Life changed pretty dramatically for each of us during the mid-to-late 1950s. Some ideas and organizational allegiances were left behind, while fundamental values and commitment to social change remained central. Clare and Lester forged new and very worthwhile careers in California, despite periodic political harassment. It’s in these latter years that my own relationship with Lester became close and flourished, until the last few years when Roz's illness made visits too difficult.

Lester and I shared two passions that never left us even as we got to old age. The first page I open in the morning is the sports section; then I get to the serious stuff about the state of the world. As we walked around the Lafayette Reservoir, we went back and forth between both passions. We were more likely to disagree as fans (I’m a Giants fan) than on politics or the human condition. Talk was particularly intense during the time that Gorbachev was seeking to transform the USSR into a democratic socialist society. We both rooted passionately for that process to succeed, and the world would be better off today if it had. Of course the change we most wanted to see was in our own America, with so much to offer to our people and to the world, but so badly afflicted by the injustices of an uncontrolled and destructive capitalist system.

Lester was optimistic about America. I think that came of his own experience, his faith in accomplishing in the sports world what most people once considered impossible. It took a long time, too long, for Lester Rodney to be recognized as one of America’s greats. To me he was always that, and a dear friend as well.

2009-12-11T13:35:00.000-08:00

War Mind Set

The Nobel speech was Obama’s worst by far. It was an unqualified representation of the United States as forever saving the world from evil with the blood of its citizens.

Is that the full legacy and ongoing record from Korea, Vietnam, Grenada, Panama, El Salvador, Nicaragua, Iraq and Afghanistan? In contrast to his Cairo speech, even token “self-criticism” of the US record was totally absent. World War II was used as the prototype to label all our wars as “just”. Why cloud the message with any hint of selfish motivation, of interests of empire and super-power domination, or of intervention to sustain allied oppressive regimes?

Worst was the argument that wars are inevitable as far into the future as anyone can foresee. King and Gandhi were acknowledged, then condescendingly relegated to irrelevance. This was an exposition of war mentality from the man who was going to change the "mind set" of war. No wonder Gingrich, Palin, and Rove embrace this speech.

I try to focus on keeping hope alive, but this was an unqualified downer.

2009-12-07T12:36:00.000-08:00

My “wrong course” blog got some contrasting responses. One respondent who has bashed Obama almost from the beginning said “right on”. But I have not changed my mind about the promise and possibilities brought about by the historic election of Barack Obama. Another respondent, “D”, was disappointed in my strong criticism of Obama. Here is D’s comment and my reply:

D wrote:

Dear Leon,

I'm sorry I haven't written sooner. I have read your blogs and I have been in agreement with your ideas and sentiments. In fact I was happy that you were still an optimist, until this last blog: “the wrong course”. I think Obama needs this next year for us to see the results of all his efforts. I'm going to remain an optimist until then.

Of course I didn't want him to send more troops to Afghanistan, nor I'm sure did he, but he did announce he has "benchmarks" for Karzai and he did announce to the people over there that we are not there to "win" or to "bring democracy" to their land. Only to help them get trained to fight the Taliban and hopefully the Al Qaeda bordering Pakistan.... This is the part you are not happy about, but I'm still on the fence thinking it may be the smart thing for now.

I agree that he must get jobs for people to improve the economy at home; then more Americans will rally around Obama again. Poor man, he inherited this cesspool of trouble and we all want him to fix it in his first year as President. It would be easy if only we had a united Congress. The ultra-right is truly troublesome.

Dear D,

As you can tell from my earlier blogs, it was hard for me to write the latest one. I have not given up on Obama, but I am worried about the way things are going. I'm sure he knows that he has to re-inspire his supporters, who can't be expected to remain enthusiastic as their hopes give way to disappointments on domestic issues and dismay over another war escalation. He may lose the wavering Senate in 2010 and his presidency will be at great risk in 2012 if unemployment is high and a serious drawdown of the wars is not in progress. Given the ongoing crusade of the ultra-right, what a disaster that would be! I hate to think of Patraeus or McCrystal as Obama's successor. I would like to share your optimism, but I can't support the war and imperial aspects of US policy that remain dominant. I still have optimism that Obama's supporters can encourage his generally progressive aims and reignite hopes for real change. This is such a complicated and tough time. I respect your attitude as we both (along with many others) struggle to figure things out.

Leon

2009-12-02T16:26:00.000-08:00

ON THE WRONG COURSE

It’s taken me a while, longer than most of my friends, to face up to Barack Obama’s accommodation to the powers that be. He is the most powerful individual in the world — only within terms imposed by a system stronger than any president. So far, when his promises and proposals require confronting entrenched power, he bows to a pragmatic perception of “reality”. That means retreating and weakening chances for meaningful change on almost every critical issue. It now means being the standard bearer for escalating the disastrous war in Afghanistan and Pakistan.

I don’t question Obama’s desire for significant reform. Nor, as difficult as the struggles are, do I doubt the capacity of the people to achieve changes that a majority voted for with enthusiasm a year ago. The “Obama coalition” showed what was and is possible. On the other hand, the ultra-right is far more dangerous than ever and is counting on Obama’s failure. Preventing that failure and its consequences calls for a fight to change the Obama Administration’s self-defeating course of weakness toward Wall Street and compliance with the military-industrial complex.

The biggest problem for Obama, and for the country, clearly is the economy. That has compounded every difficulty in moving a progressive program forward. The great need is for a serious investment in putting people to work. There is no longer room for hesitation and timidity.

No one can know where things would stand if Obama risked being bolder on the stimulus and universal health care, or in defying rather than appeasing the war hawks. What we do know is that the course we're on is not headed to the promised land embraced by so many at the beginning of the "Obama era".

2009-10-31T12:03:00.000-07:00

GUESSING ABOUT OBAMA AND AFGHANISTAN

Why all these meetings and deliberations about Afghanistan? I can't believe they are simply a charade that will end up with Obama giving McCrystal what the hawks demand.

I think Obama wants desperately to avoid being locked into a military escalation that spells quagmire for many years ahead. I think he hopes to open a window to a change of course that will provide more room for political and diplomatic maneuver and a possible escape route from commitment to endless war.

Of course the pressures are enormous, and he'll probably end up adding some troops and still trapped in a hopeless war. Nevertheless, the war in Afghanistan has finally come into question, with a majority of the public now opposed. The Obama Administration's own uncertainty, it's insistence on deliberation in defiance of demands from top generals and Republican hawks, underscores the growing anxiety and public counter-pressure for an end to the war.

As in the past, popular anger over the toll that a winless war exacts is what will prove decisive — sooner, let's hope, rather than disastrously later.

2009-10-08T21:33:00.000-07:00

TROUBLED RELATIONSHIP

Obama and the Establishment

A remarkable thing about Obama's election is that he had support from all progressives and a big grass-roots majority, while at the same time he earned the favor of much of the rich and powerful establishment. He probably could not have won without substantial establishment support, and it's not hard to figure out why he received it. After eight years of Bush-Cheney, the ship of state was so deeply mired in trouble that Obama's call for reform reached eager ears even among the high and mighty. Obama was able to inspire a people desperate for change, while assuring establishment supporters that he would be "responsible" and not turn things upside down.

Thus began a historic presidency, electrifying in its shattering of shameful Jim Crow precedents, full of hope for a bright new day of progressive reform.

So why is Obama having such a hard time? Why are so many initiatives stymied or watered down by compromise?

An obvious reason is the depth of the economic crisis that defies a quick fix. The hypocrites of the defeated Right blame all the accumulated ills on Obama. They work for and bank on his failure as their way back to political control.

Another dynamic is at work that makes change so difficult. The general support Obama gets from much of the establishment fractures when it comes to any particular measure of significant reform. It breaks on the rocks of any perceived threat to corporate profits. The welfare of the health insurance industry comes before universal health care. Oil and coal profits pay off in congressional sabotage of efforts to deal with alternate energy and climate change. Wall Street wants no regulation to interfere with its unsavory no-holds-barred financial gambling.

The same dynamic operates with regard to foreign policy, matters of war and peace. Despite widespread recognition that the US position in the world can no longer be based on the discredited assumption that "we" are the all powerful superpower, even limited efforts to adjust to reality run up against the military-industrial complex and entrenched imperial interests. So the commitment to the disastrous war in Afghanistan remains, and the general goes outside the chain-of-command to pressure a wavering White House to dig in even deeper. When Obama joins Latin-American governments in denouncing the military coup in Honduras, that position is undercut in compromise with demands of cold war die-hards of Yankee Imperialism. Similar vested interests rail against modest efforts to rein in settlements aimed at making Israel's occupation of Palestine permanent.

When it comes to moving forward on the promise of change, the common sense and "enlightenment" of some in the establishment is countered by the norms of the system of greed, privilege and power for the few over the many.

Where does that leave Obama and the groundswell that put him in the White House? A determined push back from the bottom up is the only way to keep the promise of change from being squandered issue by issue. That's being played out now on health care as the demand grows to reject and reverse deals that would surrender the public interest to the tyranny of the health insurance conglomerates.

Reform may have some shaky support in high places, but the only assurance is in the fight put up by the people who must have it.

2009-10-07T11:29:00.000-07:00

ON THE LEFT

Embarrassed by the extreme antics of ultra-Right inciters like Rush Limbaugh, Glen Beck, and Joe Wilson, intellectual conservatives and the mainstream media paint a mythical landscape of American politics. David Brooks, guest pundit on virtually every TV news panel, is master of the art: the extremists and crazies on the Right are a fringe element that doesn't represent the GOP; the Left is the equivalent extreme on the fringe of American politics; the great majority of Americans occupy the Center, leaning Right.

What's wrong with that picture?

First, when it comes to die-hard opposition to every single facet of change that Americans voted for in electing Obama, the GOP is as stubbornly united as any political party ever was. On policy and on determination to bring Obama down, there is no crack in the ranks from Rush Limbaugh, Sara Palin and Newt Gingrich to Mitch McConnell, John Boehner and Tim DeMint.

Second, the big majority that elected Obama clearly rejected the GOP and endorsed the progressive change that was promised. Within that majority, there is a strong, though very diverse, Left — one that is neither extremist nor a marginalized fringe. It bears no resemblance to the dangerous vigilantism that has become the hallmark of the ultra-Right.

The Left in American politics is not confined or defined by a political party. Nor is there a self-conscious recognition of the Left by all its diverse constituencies. Given that left and right are relative terms, is there a reasonable description of the American Left?

I think there is. The picture is becoming clearer as the fight for progressive change encounters huge systemic resistance. The Left's common denominator is the recognition that progress — every single step forward in the public interest — has to be won in struggle against corporate wealth and power.

That conviction is not universal in the overall majority that constitutes the Obama coalition, nor is it the philosophy of President Obama and his Administration. Still in practice, Obama and the entire progressive majority are pressed into conflict with corporate power over even modest reforms in health care, job stimulus measures, climate and alternate energy policy. The broad American Left has to be the engine that pushes the struggle forward. That outlook is crucial not only on domestic issues, but in the pursuit of peace against powerful pressures for war and persistent ambitions of imperial dominance.

Measured by the standard of struggle for human needs in deliberate opposition to anti-democratic corporate power, who and what is the American Left? It is a political conglomeration with no single leading center and with many different voices. There is no messianic component that is wiser than all the rest. Its public intellectuals include economists like Krugman and Steiglitz, analysts and journalists from Noam Chomsky to Bob Herbert, Rachel Maddow, Bill Fletcher, Barbara Ehrenreich, Bill Moyers, Amy Goodman and many, many others. There are strong trade union voices, especially Richard Trumka. The most dynamic leaders are community organizers fighting injustice at ground level in areas devastated by joblessness and foreclosures. There are a multitude of Left organizations, movements and publications. There are legislators such as Barbara Lee, Dennis Kucinich, Bernie Sanders, Barney Frank and like-minded members of Congress.

The diversity of the Left is a great strength, but it also makes for problems. Its place in the political landscape lacks definition, so it is readily misrepresented by those who seek to marginalize its influence. Also, particular organizations and individuals can be targeted for slander and frame-ups while others are silent and the entire Left is smeared. (Cases-in-point: the assault on Acorn and the forced resignation of White House Adviser Van Jones.)

It would be impossible to merge all of the Left into one formation, and foolish to try. But a developing strategy of unity and cooperation is essential, as is the defining theme: fighting for the public interest, for basic democratic reforms, against corporate greed and power.

The Left has an impressive place in our country's history. Its legacy is in anti-monopoly and farmer-labor coalitions; in every battle for progressive social legislation; in pioneering advances for trade unionism, for human, civil and immigrant rights, for racial and gender equality. A hallmark of the Left was its early consciousness of fascist danger and commitment to overcoming Jim Crow. Within the Left, advocates of socialism have been a significant presence, highlighted by the great popularity of Eugene V. Debs while imprisoned for opposing the First World War. The Left included, but never was limited to, socialists and communists of varying convictions, who contributed much though often diverted by ideological combat with each other.

Today the part of the American Left in various socialist and Marxist organizations is much smaller than in other times. That's another discussion, but it's a mistake — and demoralizing — to view the strength and impact of the Left through that narrow window. As the current severe crisis of Capitalism reminds us, Marxist analysis and socialist ideals have much to offer toward understanding and coping with the world we live in. But that's significant only in the context of openness to the total experience and thoughts of a broad and influential Left.

2009-09-23T17:24:00.000-07:00

IT'S THE SYSTEM

Shortly after Obama's election, Fidel Castro is said to have commented: "He's a good guy, but the system is stronger than he is."

Nine month's into Obama's presidency, that judgment is validated. The bigger question remains: is the system stronger than the will of the majority of Americans who voted for Obama and delivered a historic mandate for progressive change.

So far, every initiative for significant reform has been blocked, delayed, diverted or watered down. There are things that Obama may have done or should do differently, and some criticism is justified and necessary. But the heart of the problem is not "Obama". In fact, his qualities of intelligence, energy, accessibility and eagerness to communicate surpass those of any president since FDR. The problem is indeed "the system".

The essence of reform is curbing the power of big financial and corporate oligarchies. Measures that advance human rights to health care, employment, education and housing are all resisted as threats to the profits of various staked-out corporate domains. So protection of the heath insurance industry trumps affordable health care for everyone. Securing coal and oil profits trumps progress toward alternate energy and coping with climate change. The solidarity of the financial and corporate world against government "intrusion" in the public interest brings enormous wealth and power to bear against social progress. That power dominates the media. It taps into fear of insecurity in this crisis-ridden economy and feeds on legitimate distrust of politicians, many being beholden to corporate patronage. It befuddles issues, propagates lies, and blinds millions to their self-interest and to a shared concern for fellow beings. An ultra right minority, rallied by racist demogogues from talk radio and Fox TV, has fashioned a vigilante strategy to demonize Obama, shout down his supporters and frighten politicians away from any liberal or progressive position.

Progress can come only by wresting it from the system. That requires firming up the popular majority that embraced Obama's bold call for change. That in turn demands that a broad array of voices within the Obama majority serve as an effective political left, taking deliberate aim at the system and its controlling economic royalists. The terms of the universal health care battle need to be reset, putting an elementary human right above corporate greed.

2009-09-18T15:29:00.001-07:00

BETTER WORLD AHEAD?

The compass of my life has always pointed to the vision of a better world ahead. “Looking for the Future” is the title of the memoir I wrote in my seventies. Now I’m 87. Time has blurred the perception of a future socialist society that once I viewed as clear and certain. Idealism and hope still inspire the search, but experience and pragmatism also necessarily shape its evolution.

Now I want to question, rethink and sum up — not because I feel I will arrive at some grand conclusions, but simply to respond to a basic inner urge that I don’t want to ignore.

Even though this project is personal, it is obviously ambitious and difficult. I don’t want to start with apologies for my deficiencies. Areas in which I lack sufficient grounding will be acknowledged, and may be obvious, as I go along.

The easiest way to get started is to ask myself some key questions and try to give some preliminary answers, which could subsequently be fleshed out and debated more fully:

What do I mean by a better world?

Has the election of Obama set us on the path to a better America in a better world?

How does the present situation compare to that of America and the world in the 1930s? Are there features common to periods of social upheaval and change?

Are there new circumstances and conditions that may make a better world possible?

What kind of changes are essential to setting a new course?

Can an end be put to war?

Can the international community contain fundamentalist religious and ideological movements that war against society and promote terror?

Can progressive governments be sustained and major advances consolidated?

Is a better world compatible with the survival of capitalism? Where public and private sector economies may coexist, can governments and social institutions keep the capitalist sector under control and reverse the growth of inequality?

How do socialist ideas and 20^th century experience relate to perspectives for a better world?

* * * * *

What do I mean by “better world”?

The fact that progress is always being made in some areas of culture and technology is not nearly enough to balance the deepening crises and looming dangers of the 21^st Century. Still, by “better world”, I don’t have in mind a utopian vision of a time when humanity’s problems are solved. Rather I look to a time when basic changes in our country and in the world provide the means for facing up to the great challenges and making progress toward a decent future on a healthy planet earth.

That minimal vision suggests creating conditions that are far from being realized in today’s world. It means achieving in America and around the world governments that are driven by the needs and hopes of the people rather then pressures from powerful wealthy elites. It means changing priorities from narrow, so-called national interests and imperial dominance to a clear focus on cooperation to resolve crises that destroy lives and imperil the future. Atop the agenda of a better world would be issues of poverty and economic inequality, global warming, the environment, energy, public health, and education. Above all it would be a world that would oppose war and occupation of foreign lands. It would foster disarmament and the elimination of nuclear weapons. It would promote equal rights, opposing all forms of discrimination based on color, gender, ethnicity or sexual orientation.

Put that way, what begins as a modest outlook on the future turns out to be a tall order indeed.

* * * * *

With the election of Obama, are we now on course to a better America in a better world?

Not yet, in my opinion — but some road blocks that seemed impenetrable have been cracked open. The Obama election electrified the country and was cheered by most of the world. It certainly changed the political climate, infusing it with hope and opportunity, after the devastating reign of a supremely reactionary administration.

But early experience under the Obama administration shows that resistance to progressive change is deeply rooted in the way our society works. Whatever people want and need, whatever is good for the country, is subject to being compromised or blocked by pressure to accommodate the interests of economic, military and political power. So the bold actions demanded by the severe economic crisis, the urgent need to turn foreign policy toward peace, the efforts to do the right thing about health care, climate change, education, civil liberties, and immigrant rights all run up against a familiar drumbeat by corporate lobbyists: ‘government programs to create jobs and stimulate recovery cost too much; they undermine private enterprise; it’s socialism to compete with the health insurance industry, or to tax the rich, or to crack down on the banks and Wall Street; demanding accountability from the CIA or the military jeopardizes national security.’ The Obama Administration hears that drumbeat and its echoes in the media as well as among Republicans and conservative Democrats in Congress. As a result, it too often equivocates and contradicts the goals of its forward-looking agenda.

I don’t mean to downgrade major possibilities opened up as a result of Obama’s presidency and the movements in response to critical challenges of our time. But the election of a new president, however significant a figure he may be, doesn’t alter structures of power that support corporate welfare over public interests. That’s the reality of capitalism. Nevertheless, the success or failure of Obama’s legislative agenda may well indicate whether we are entering on a time when people can change society in major ways.

It’s not surprising that so much attention focuses on Obama. His rise to the presidency was historic and no president in generations has had to deal with such severe crises. In the first months of his administration, his popularity remains high. As hard legislative battles unfold, some of his supporters worry: Is he committed to his inspirational promises or is he backing away? Is he progressive or centrist? Is he really bold or simply pragmatic? Why doesn’t he act as forcefully as FDR did during the Great Depression? Why especially is he beefing up the war in Afghanistan and Pakistan?

How much headway may be made during the Obama presidency, both overcoming critical domestic problems and moving toward a more peaceful world, depends on sustaining and expanding the popular push for change that elected Obama and opened up major new opportunities for progress. That is where the judgment on Obama’s commitments and leadership will eventually be determined.

In a series of unusually probing addresses, both as candidate and as President, Obama has projected an outlook on change that has many elements of a different and far better future: notably his Philadelphia speech on race, his Cairo speech on relations with the Muslim world, and his recent speeches on disarmament of nuclear and other weapons of mass destruction. Contrary to the history and continuing pursuit of US imperial dominance, he has struck a new note of respect for the rights and dignity of nations, especially noteworthy in regard to Latin America where US intervention has been most persistent and oppressive. If this thoughtfulness and vision define the trajectory of his presidency, it will indeed be historic despite difficulties and contradictions along the way.

* * * * *

How does the present situation compare to that of America and the world in the 1930s? Are there features common to periods of social upheaval and change?

For perspective on social change, it may be more worthwhile to compare historic periods than to compare the attributes of Obama and FDR. The present economic crisis is the most severe since the Great Depression, but so far it is not as devastating. The turmoil of mass unemployment and hunger drove millions into action in the early thirties. Veterans and unemployed marched on Washington; “Hoovervilles” sprang up; demonstrations for unemployment insurance brought out throngs in cities and town squares in defiance of police violence. Labor began to make huge advances, organizing the unorganized and moving toward formation of the great industrial unions. That is not descriptive of present day America, although a majority voted for major progressive change and millions worked together to achieve that mandate.

The crises of today are actually more profound in important respects, with the very fate of humanity threatened in ways not generally apparent back in the 1930s. Still their immediate impact is less acute and the response accordingly lacks the urgency the situation demands.

The world of the 1930s was different too. To many people everywhere it seemed that an alternative to the very sick capitalist society was emerging. The ideas of socialism, a society in which power passed to the workers, gained widespread popularity after the Russian revolution. The Soviet Union would evolve in ways that tragically contradicted the socialist ideal. However its existence as a possible alternative to capitalism catalyzed economic and social changes during and after the Great Depression. The struggles that erupted during the depression drew inspiration from a vivid American home-grown tradition of labor radicalism, anti-monopoly and socialist movements: a freshly remembered history of powerful strikes met with deadly violence by industrial magnates, of battles waged to gain equal rights under the constitution for black Americans and for women, of courageous opposition to the first World War led by socialist Eugene V. Debs, and of militant resistance to "alien and sedition" laws against foreign-born Americans.

Today capitalism is in trouble, but alternative visions for fundamental change have only begun to appear as we confront the present challenges.

During my lifetime, several features characterized the upheavals that produced dramatic changes in society, whether the reforms of the New Deal or the repudiation of Jim Crow in our country, or revolutionary outcomes such as the break-up of colonial structures after World War II, or the overthrow of South Africa’s apartheid regime, or the removal of unpopular authoritarian regimes in Eastern Europe, Asia and Latin America. In general, basic reforms and revolutionary changes in society are driven by major crises that shake up the existing order and cannot be resolved without departing sharply from the status quo. Major changes become possible when masses of people decide that existing conditions are no longer tolerable.

When things reach such a stage, division occurs among the powers that be — some see the urgent need to adjust to new circumstances or even to retreat from some positions that have become a liability; others fight to hold on to power and privilege by obstructionism and schemes to divert the demand for change toward even more reactionary ends.

Ultimately the extent and direction of change depends on the scope and persistence of the movements engaged in the struggle and the kind of political leadership that comes forward.

* * * * *

Are there new circumstances and conditions that may make a better world possible?

Today’s world is strikingly different from what was anticipated by those who held the reigns of our government when this new century began. With the neocons calling the shots, there was a dramatic upturn in the aggressive assertion of US power. The claim to global dominance as the sole superpower and the arrogant projection of a new American Century may then have seemed beyond effective challenge. Yet that outlook crashed badly in the very first decade of the 21^st Century. The ultra right Bush Administration miscalculated and overreached, especially in the disastrous Iraq War, and an emerging new reality in world power relationships became apparent. Instead of overwhelming the world with the “shock and awe” of US military invincibility, the Iraq War showed that an era was coming to an end: military conquest and occupation of foreign lands are not a viable foreign policy since they inevitably evoke popular resistance, opposition worldwide, and ultimate rejection at home. Meanwhile, new economic powers are rising rapidly, especially, but not exclusively, in Asia. Most countries of Latin America, long dominated by US corporate interests and military interventions, are now taking control of their own destiny.

The fact that no superpower can dictate the terms of “world order”, that multipolarity is the inevitable and growing reality in international affairs, increases the pressure for cooperative approaches to humanity’s critical problems. This makes, too, for greater flexibility, more elbow room, for people and nations to seek their own diverse paths forward. There is a more favorable climate for sustaining populist governments, as is evident already in Latin America.

A second, actually most important, change dominating American and world affairs is the profound economic crisis. In the United States and in most countries, joblessness and poverty are at levels unseen since the Great Depression. Among the bubbles that have burst is the myth that capitalism and globalization have resolved the chronic problem of recurring economic crisis. Suddenly the heralded “free market economy” — a euphemism for unfettered capitalism — proves instead to be a formula for unbounded greed, corruption, and total disregard of consequences inflicted on the public. Fierce institutional resistance to regulation and shameless government giveaways to banks and financial institutions, especially in the United States, are causing great anger as unemployment and suffering mount. Internationally pressure is rising to alter the global financial institutions and arrangements that impose the will of US and European big capital. These arrangements not only squeeze poorer nations into poverty and dependence, but make the world economy fully vulnerable to any downturn in the US economy.

A huge potential engine of change is the late emerging awareness that global warming and pollution have become a do or die issue for humanity. This developing crisis of survival ought to move the world, if anything can, toward urgent and basic reform. Only international cooperation based on fairness and mutual interest can change the grim outlook. That requires containing and curbing the capacity of multinational corporations to operate in violation of necessary standards of public health and welfare. The question here is whether climate change will reach the point of no return before society changes enough to do what’s necessary. (Paul Krugman views that dilemma in his column, “Boiling the Frog”, New York Times, July 12, 2009.)

The point in considering relatively new circumstances and crises is not to predict the outcome — I certainly can’t. They do constitute arguments and possibilities that influence prospects for a livable future.

There is another phenomenon, not new, but a continuous current of change in our culture, in the ways that we live and communicate. It is worth considering that in recent years, in contrast to the very conservative cast of our government, cultural attitudes have changed dramatically to favor respect and equality for women, people of color, and gays. The Internet and new communication technologies have reached into every corner of the earth. The impact of these innovations reflects and even aggravates society’s fault lines and inequalities, but people are connected to each other to a degree that is qualitatively new, unimaginable for most of my lifetime. The voices of the people can now be heard in every situation, and that’s a basic ingredient of any hope for a better world.

* * * * *

What kind of changes are essential to setting a new course ?

Getting firmly on track toward a better future requires moving to reign in Wall Street and changing arrangements that have given the IMF and World Bank such destructive power over the economic fate of poorer nations and the state of the global economy. The demand for regulation and reform has emerged in the present crisis because Wall Street’s culpability and chronic greed are so undeniable. There is great anger because the priorities for economic recovery favor financial giants while unemployment and foreclosures mount. Outstanding economists Stiglitz and Krugman have been hammering away at the need for more stimulus to stem the tide of joblessness, strong measures for government regulation of the banks and Wall Street, and major revision of international monetary and trade institutions to make them more representative and accountable. So far the administration’s proposals for regulatory reform fall short and Wall Street’s hubris is greater than ever. Goldman-Sachs and Chase, having stepped over weaker rivals, are piling up enormous profits and doing it in the same old ways. An opportunity for change may already have been missed as the financial sector has been rescued at public expense from a full-blown crash. But the problems are so deep that the need for serious government intervention will assert itself with each new shock that descends on the public, especially on the poor and the unemployed.

In countries with labor movements stronger than ours, there are new eruptions of militancy, the refusal to take job loss or wage cuts lying down. Quite a few countries have made political and economic changes that empower working people more fundamentally than the reforms that are today on our developing agenda. Still there is much in the legislative program that Obama has advanced that can begin to make a difference if people fight for it hard enough. The fate of the battle for universal health care is cardinal. It would be a big and promising step forward if the public sector becomes the main actor, if the health insurance industry’s monopoly is ended, and if the principle of taxing the wealthiest prevails.

* * * * *

Can an end be put to war?

Putting an end to war is the only way to turn the page on humanity’s worst legacy.

It is alarming that the United States is expanding the war in Afghanistan and Pakistan at the very outset of what is heralded as a new era in our relations with the rest of the world. The official rationale is that we have to defeat Al Qaeda and the Taliban to overcome worldwide terrorism and prevent new attacks on the United States. That is neither a complete nor convincing explanation, since a decisive military victory in Afghanistan is even far less likely than it proved to be in Iraq. The continuing exercise of US military power remains part of the strategic outlook of the establishment even as it turns away from grandiose neocon ambitions that proved bankrupt in Iraq. Whatever adjustments may ultimately have to be made to achieve some regional modus vivendi, the administration and its generals want to reassert US military muscle and avoid the perception of general retreat in the wake of the Iraq fiasco. This is likely to be another tragic miscalculation making it harder than ever to get out of the quagmire.

While many countries are still ready to resort to military force if they conclude that their security or interests are seriously threatened, the United States may be the only power that still manages to fight prolonged wars. That observation doesn’t hold for some civil wars or uprisings in occupied lands, which are very difficult to bring to a conclusion.

Abolishing war is enormously difficult, because the factors that serve as incentives for war are deeply embedded in existing society: conflicting interests over control of markets and resources, especially lucrative and dwindling energy reserves; nationalist, religious, ethnic and racial hatreds that fuel violent regimes of occupation and apartheid; a military-industrial network that profits from the endless overkill production of weapons of war.

Still worldwide opposition has grown to the point that makes it much harder to launch a war and difficult to prolong it against universal condemnation. There is strong resistance to any resort to military action in the ongoing dispute with Iran. The recent horrific Israeli war in Gaza sparked worldwide protest and an unprecedented wave of disavowal from millions of Jews; it has even begun to open a degree of seperation between Washington and the far right regime of Netanyahu and Lieberman.

Two other factors have the potential to restrain the resort to war.

One is the growing recognition that nuclear proliferation cannot be slowed unless the United States, Russia and lesser nuclear powers commit to serious steps toward nuclear disarmament and general arms reduction. The fear of nuclear holocaust was certainly a factor in preventing the cold war from going hot. The Bush Administration manipulated that fear toward an opposite end. In the name of the “war on terror”, Bush reneged on the historic Reagan-Gorbachev joint statement on the elimination of nuclear weapons, broke the test ban treaty, and actually sped up nuclear arms production — which in turn provided the impetus for a new burst of nuclear proliferation. Now there is the possibility that the specter of terminal nuclear madness may once again lead to rational measures for peace and survival.

The other factor is that economic and political power is not the monopoly of any one state or group of states. Historically the competition of rival nations for markets, resources and territory was a prime cause of major wars. At this point the consequences of a world war would be so colossal, probably terminal, that a more likely development is that most nations would block (or take advantage of) any power willing to gamble on war. We can see that now as major Asian, European and Latin-American countries steer a separate course while the United States carries its burden of costly wars.

All of this does not add up to a compelling prospect of a world free of wars. Ultimately there would have to be significant institutional changes, economic and political, so that world community would take on real meaning. New arrangements would have to alter or replace the IMF and the World Bank. It remains to be seen if the United Nations can become the instrument of peace that the people of the world have hoped it would be.

* * * * *

Can the international community contain fundamentalist religious and ideological movements that war against society and promote terror?

Terror inflicted on non-combatant populations is a scourge that demands an international response. It is embraced by messianic crusaders, often merging fundamentalist religious fanaticism with the struggles of masses living in conditions of oppression and misery. The answer to such terror is not the state terror of war that kills far more civilians than suicide bombers can. The wars in Iraq, Gaza, Afghanistan and Pakistan have further alienated and dislocated populations who bitterly resent living in conditions of military occupation, humiliation and hopelessness.

It is in the interest of all countries to find and bring to justice perpetrators of terrorism, including (but not only) those linked to Al Qaeda. That holds for all terrorists acting on the basis of religious or ideological fundamentalism, whether Muslim, Christian or Jewish. However, the phenomenon of terrorism can only be diminished significantly through a long-term commitment to creating conditions of equality, reducing poverty and lowering sectarian barriers to mutual understanding and friendship. That brings us back to the main question, whether it’s possible to alter the way the world works to favor the many instead of a few super-rich elites. The best hope is the rapidly growing desire among people everywhere, especially younger generations, to join in a culture that welcomes diversity and the commonality that connects all people.

* * * * *

Can progressive governments be sustained and major advances consolidated?

A discouraging fact is that hard-won political advances are often reversed and have to be fought for all over again. Forces of reaction and greed never quit. Their great wealth is a huge advantage in manipulating opinion and disrupting progress. The problems of society are severe and winning an election does not insure a progressive or liberal government against failure. Nor has a socialist revolution proved irreversible. Success depends on acting on problems in a way that builds on popular participation, especially of the working people and poor who have been held down historically. It requires rallying that support to further limit the capacity of the super-rich old guard to obstruct. There also is potential strength through solidarity, mutual sustenance as more countries and regions choose new paths forward.

An encouraging fact is that important social reforms, once established, are not often surrendered by the people even as political fortunes fluctuate. However, the timeline for safeguarding the future is such that recycling political power once more to the Bushes, Berlusconis and Pinochet-like monsters could bring humanity to the point of no return.

*****

A better world as I see it — a world capable of coping with humanity’s critical challenges — is not one in which the capitalist mode of production for profit has been discarded. It is one that is no longer a slave to capitalism and in which the publicly owned sector of the economy is growing. That requires governments whose economic policies actively favor the public interest and shield society from the destructive potential of the chase for private profit. Clearly the balance between public and private will be different between countries — it already is. In a healthier international climate, some countries may opt for a socialist economy in which the public sector has established clear dominance. In others, almost certainly the United States, it will be a prolonged struggle to uphold the public interest against increasing inequality inherent in capitalist “private enterprise”. That tension is starkly evident today in China’s rapidly growing economy. No one can proscribe how this complicated and varied process may play out in different countries and the world as a whole. In the long run much will depend on non-governmental movements and institutions, especially trade unions, which would be a constant force to make and keep governments democratic.

* * * * *

How do socialist ideas and 20^th century experience relate to perspectives for a better world?

Socialist ideas and movements have been and are a great catalyst to human progress. They have pioneered and fought for virtually every major social advance in modern industrial society. They have elevated labor as the main driving force for social justice. They have inspired and joined in the struggles of the exploited and oppressed in every corner of the earth. The most prescient analysis of capitalism was developed by Karl Marx a century-and-a-half ago, born out more clearly than ever by current events. Marxism contributes to a philosophical understanding of the material world and the dynamics of change in nature and society. As interpreted and developed by a succession of followers, Marxism and Marxism-Leninism guided major socialist revolutions in the 20^th century (principally Russia and China) and continue to be an influence in varying ways on existing regimes of diverse character (e.g. China, Cuba, South Africa, and Venezuela).

The world, however, looks very different today than many of us anticipated so confidently when I was young. That is due in significant measure to the distortion and ultimate demise of the Russian revolution. I have argued elsewhere that the Soviet Union should be viewed not alone through the prism of Stalinism’s horrors, but of its historic significance and contributions — not least of which was to the defeat of fascism and the collapse of colonial empires. I believe that the Russian and Chinese revolutions stand as heroic milestones in the struggle to overcome the ravages of capitalism, even though they have dashed hopes that human freedom could be achieved without great complications and tragic setbacks. I also think it was not inevitable that the USSR had to go under. The world would be far better off today if efforts to reform and democratize the Soviet Union had come earlier when they might have been successful. But that history can’t be replayed. If a better world is possible, the path forward is different now than it might have been.

Looking back now at the preliminary answers to the questions I asked myself at the beginning, there are clearly departures from things I once took pretty much for granted. I have blurred over what once were sharp distinctions in how I regarded “reform” and “revolution”. It seems to me that if a better world is to be, people in different countries will have to find a variety of ways forward that no theory can fully predict. As for the United States, we are at a very critical point. There is a chance, by no means an easy one, to make headway on significant reforms that could begin to offer promise of a brighter future. Even though many countries are likely to advance on a more radical trajectory, what happens in the USA is very important to the world. If reaction manages to slam shut the door of hope that opened up in the past year, it will be devastating. We have to keep moving forward.

Summing up…

So, as I reach my tentative conclusion, is a better world possible? Maybe!

Leon Wofsy

July 2009

lwofsy@berkeley.edu