A-Infos (en) US, Open City, A broadsheet of the NYC local of NorthEast Federation Anarchist Communist NEFAC Sep. 2011

Dump the Democrats and Republicans! ---- Working People Need A New Strategy! ---- The rich 
and powerful of the US are waging class war on working people. After driving back unions 
in the private sector, they are now attacking public employee workers and their unions, 
and all who receive public services. ---- These attacks are not just coming from 
Republicans, they are being made by Democrats as well. For example, the Democratic 
governor of New York, Andrew Cuomo, got elected on a promise to attack public employees. 
The Democratic mayor of Providence, RI “fired” all of that city's teachers, so as to 
rehire only those he wants, regardless of tenure or seniority. Democratic president, 
Obama, appointed a Secretary of Education, Arne Duncan, who blames teachers and their 
unions for the failings of schools. And even in Wisconsin, Democratic legislators who 
opposed the governor's anti-union laws, agreed with his proposals for cutting back union 
wages and conditions.

So did the union “leaderships”. But the “budget deficit” was immediately caused by the 
enormous tax cuts which Wisconsin (and the US government) gave to the very rich. Also this 
is due to the enormous expansion of military spending by the Obama administration.

At the national level, the Republicans take every chance they
have to demand cuts in social services for the majority while
further cutting taxes on the wealthy. Obama and the Democrats
continually "give in" to these demands, and even go beyond
them, in the service of the very rich.

Liberals, union officials, leaders of the African-American com-
munity, leaders of the organized women's movement, of the
GLBT community, the environmental movement, and the peace
movement all urge us to vote for the Democrats—a dead end.
The electoral arena belongs to the moneyed elite, the capitalist
class. To get any party's nomination and to run in an election re-
quires big bucks. The Democrats are one of two parties of big
business. It is committed to capitalism and empire. And it fears
to rouse up its base, of working people and people of color, be-
cause this might threaten capitalism. In 2008, a Democratic pres-
ident was elected, with big majorities of both the House and
Senate. They bailed out the wealthy. They failed to pass a serious
jobs program. They passed a health care program barely better
than nothing. They abandoned a union recognition-reform law.
They sought to expand offshore oil drilling and nuclear power,
and otherwise abandoned efforts to halt global warming. They
did nothing for immigrants. But they did expand the war in Af-
ghanistan and Pakistan, continued the war in Iraq, and began
one in Libya. Yes, it is historic that a Black man was elected presi-
dent, but this has not really done anything for the average Afri-
can-American working family.

Attempts to create a new, third party will fail, in the US's
“winner-take-all” system. Also, a new party would still need
huge funds to run in elections and would still have to develop
a program to manage a capitalist economy. Even if based
inthe unions, it would be dominated by the reformist union
bureaucracy and composed of the same type of politicians who
are currently on the liberal wing of the Democrats. The electoral
arena is the big business people's, not a space for working and
oppressed people.

What is Our Strength?

Working people, poor people, oppressed people, have a differ-
ent set of strengths than are useful for running in elections. We
have our numbers. People who work for a living without being
bosses are the big majority of the population. And we have a
potential power in that we do the work of society. We can shut
it down, if we choose. A major strike in any city pretty much
shuts down the whole city. And we can start it up again, with
a new and better organization. No one else can do this.

photo: Communication Workers of America: ON STRIKE

The great gains of the people were won in this way, not
through elections. The civil rights movement ended Jim Crow
segregation through mass civil disobedience. And won Great
Society benefits through urban rebellion ("riots"). Unions won
the right to organize through big sit-down strikes in the 30s.
The movement against the Vietnam War made its impact
through mass demonstrations and college strikes, as well as
by a virtual mutiny in the armed forces.

Unions, and all oppressed and progressive people, should
stop wasting our time, energy, and money by working in
elections. We need a new strategy, based on our real power.
We need to build toward militant strikes, citywide general
strikes, boycotts, demonstrations, civil disobedience, and
general hell-raising. Workers could occupy factories, schools,
and offices, and run them ourselves. Then we can win real
gains.

But the capitalist system is in trouble. It cannot afford to give
even the kind of limited gains it gave in the 50s and 60s. We
can build a movement to eventually reorganize the whole of
society. Power must be taken away from the capitalists and
their agents. We, ordinary working people will be able to take
it over and democratically run it. We could replace the central-
ized, bureaucratic government (the state) with a federation of
workplace councils and neighborhood assemblies. We could
replace capitalist corporations with a federation of self-man-
aged workers’ and consumers’ associations (cooperatives).
We call this “anarchism” and “libertarian socialism.” This is the
hope for a better, freer, ecologically balanced, and more
cooperative world.

=================================

 Mumia Abu-Jamal

ACTIONS CALLED ON DECEMBER 9 AS NEW THREAT EMERGES TO MUMIA'S LIFE

Supporters of Black revolutionary journalist and
Pennsylvania political prisoner Mumia Abu-Jamal have
called for an International Day of Solidarity this coming
December 9 as his execution has edged back onto the table.

The December date marks the 30th year that Mumia has
been in prison and last month Philadelpia District Attorney
Seth Williams announced he was appealing for the second
time to the U.S. Supreme Court a lower court decision which
threw out Mumia's death sentence. The next day, Decembe
10 is also Human Rights Day, commemorating the adoption
by the United Nations in 1948 of the Universal Declaration
of Human Rights.

Mumia Abu-Jamal was convicted in 1982 of the killing
of a Philadelphia cop in a trial which is Amnesty
International has condemned as failing to meet even the
most minimal standards of fairness. That's putting things
diplomatically; during the trial the judge promised he would
help the prosecution “fry the
nigger”. Since then the appeals
courts have rendered a long
series of bizarre decisions,
several times overturning
even their own precedents,
in order to keep Mumia in
prison or on a path to
execution.

After one such precedent-
trashing decision, which
upheld Mumia's conviction
by the same court which
overturned his sentence,
many of his supporters
appealed to the US
Justice Department and new
Attorney General Eric Holder to open an investigation into
the widespread and decades-long violations of Mumia's civrights. Not surprisingly, Holder 
sided with the same racist
corporate system which has kept Mumia in jail for so long;
that is, he did nothing.

However, these same supporters are not giving up. After
all, without the hell-raising that they have done over the
decades, Mumia would have been long ago dead. Instead,
supporters are taking the case to international arenas to
embarrass the United States (as if it shouldn't be seriously
ashamed already) and to deepen support domestically for
his release. As revolutionary anarchists, we endorse these
efforts.

Down With The DA & The Death Penalty!
Down With The Cops & The Courts!
Why?

1. A long line of District Attorneys, beginning with former
governor Ed Rendell at the time of Mumia's trial, have
made the case into a political football rather than a search
for truth. They have done so to show that their capitalist
government is boss. The current DA, Seth Williams, is merely
the latest.

2. The death penalty is the ultimate weapon in the
government's criminal system, to terrorize working class
and oppressed people; and killing an innocent man like
Mumia is a particular application of it.

3. The cops have lied over and over about Mumia's case
because, as a journalist, he told the truth about their lying,
racism, brutality and corruption. This is not surprising,
because the cops' bottom-line duty is to reflect the racism
of white supremacist society and enforce its laws to protect
corporate property.

4. Far from being a remedy to the lying and political games,
the courts have shown themselves to be part of the
problem. We believe Mumia should be released immediate-
ly. There are two reasons for this. First, we believe the ample
evidence that he is innocent. Second, the capitalist
government is the prime organizer of terrorism against
working class and oppressed people—one only has to
remember the bomb it dropped in 1985 on the MOVE
Organization, killing 11 people and burning down an entire
Philadelphia neighborhood to see this. As such, the state
has no right to judge this case.

As revolutionary class struggle anarchists we believe that in
place of a state with its armies, cops, courts, and prison com-
plex to enforce its system of dog-eat-dog capitalism, people
should be able to govern themselves through federations of
democratic organizations-a cooperative commonwealth.
Production should be for the use of the many rather than the
enrichment of the few; the environment should be a thing to
be respected rather than raped; and people should be judged
by who they are rather than their race, religion, sex or sexual
orientation. To get there we advocate mass direct action, such
as strikes, general strikes, boycotts and blockades, to defend
ourselves against the capitalists and their state.

For more information on Mumia's case, please go to
www.freemumia.com or call the Free Mumia Abu-Jamal
Coalition of New York Hotline, 212-330-8029. The Coalition
also greatly needs contributions—no amount is too small.
Please sendchecks made out to FMAJC/IFCO to the Free
Mumia Abu-Jama Coalition, P.O. Box 16, College Sta., New
York, NY 10030.

=====================================================

NYC NEFAC local: nymetro@nefac.net
Northeastern Federation of Anarchist-Communists
Federación de Comunistas Libertarias del Nordeste:
www.nefac.net / secretary@nefac.net
The Northeastern Anarchist magazine:
northeasternanarchist@nefac.net
_________________________________________
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