The CPUSA’s position is that George W. Bush is the gravest danger to humanity and borders on fascism. However, Bush is not a borderline fascist, he is a main stream Republican capitalist politician.

But even if Bush were a fascist, the working-class vanguard would never urge a vote for Kerry, or Nader, or any other capitalist candidate or party, as a way to stop fascism.

Support to democratic imperialism is no way to stop fascist imperialism, but this was exactly the CPUSA’s line in the late 1930s (and remains so today) under the banner of the “Popular Front.” This led to the defeat of the Spanish Revolution and the victory of fascism in Spain followed by the second world imperialist slaughter.

Only a revolutionary struggle by the workers against the capitalism system can stop fascism.

Dan Fein
New York, New York
 
 
Red-baiting in Mississippi
The 66-year-old Black-owned and -operated Jackson Advocate newspaper has enjoyed a historic connection with the struggle for Black rights in Mississippi. Firebombs and acts of vandalism have failed to close it down. The red baiting of SWP presidential candidate Róger Calero and vice-presidential candidate Arrin Hawkins point to its vote for dead-end, bankrupt capitalist politics to deal with Black oppression. Speaking to leaders of black newspapers last March, Terry McAuliffe, head of the Democratic National Committee, pledged to use the Black newspapers to get Kerry elected. A vote for Roger and Arrin and support of their program puts conscious-minded working-class Black people on the proper path to battle against national Black oppression.

Ken Morgan
Baltimore, Maryland
 
 
Free Speech Movement
The second week of October a series of events took place in Berkeley around the 40th anniversary of the Free Speech Movement.

Unfortunately, most of the program made a mockery of that struggle. For those who aren’t familiar with the Free Speech Movement, it was a response to an edict by the administration of the University of California banning “all political activity on campus.” The administrators primarily imposed their ban to attempt to shut down student support for and participation in the civil rights movement. But it conveniently also covered such student activities as support for the Cuban Revolution and the early opposition to the Vietnam War.

Campus political groups, including the Young Socialist Alliance (of which I was a representative), formed an organization to seek student support for a reversal of the ban. Early in the fight the university bosses brought a cop car on campus and arrested a non-student sitting at a table for the Congress on Racial Equality (CORE). Thousands of students sat down around the police car and refused to allow it to move. After three days, the university officials agreed to negotiate the issue, and the crowd dispersed.

The negotiations, which went on for two months, gave the activists a chance to win the overwhelming majority of the student body (of 25,000 or so) to their cause. When the administration finally showed that it had no intention of revising the ban, students occupied the administration building and 763 were arrested. The crises provoked by the arrests led to a repudiation of the ban by the University faculty, and, within a matter of weeks, to a capitulation by the administration. Students took advantage of the opportunities created by the Free Speech Movement to build support for the movement in opposition to the Vietnam War, and to continue and broaden support for the civil rights movement.

Last week’s events largely consisted of an attempt to rally support for the “Kerry for President” campaign. The low point came when, speaking from a platform erected over a police car, Howard Dean called on the crowd to support “getting tough” with Iran and North Korea.

Speaking as a participant in one of the panels on the history of the FSM, I pointed out that 1964 had also been an election year, pitting a conservative Republican, Barry Goldwater, against a “mainstream” Democrat—Lyndon Baines Johnson. If students in Berkeley in 1964 had abandoned their struggle to ring doorbells for a Democrat, I said, the history of the 1960s might have been much worse than it was.

The leadership of the “commemorative” event clearly wanted students to subordinate every humanitarian demand to the “Defeat Bush” drumbeat. There were no speeches about the war in Iraq, or the imperialist role of the U.S. around the world, or the bipartisan attacks on workers, African-Americans, women, or immigrants. There was some talk about the threat posed to civil liberties by the Patriot Act, promptly undercut by Kerry when he confirmed during his second debate with Bush that he supported the Patriot Act.

The planners of the anniversary events reflected a narrow section of the former leadership of the FSM, and did a serious disservice to that movement.

Syd Stapleton
Bow, Washington

The letters column is an open forum for all viewpoints on subjects of interest to working people.

Please keep your letters brief. Where necessary they will be abridged. Please indicate if you prefer that your initials be used rather than your full name.  
 
 
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