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Vol. 74/No. 5      February 8, 2010

 
Letters
 
Clarification on Jim Crow
I enthusiastically applaud the editorial “Defend the Cuban Revolution!” against the false charge of racism and the accompanying article in the February 1 issue of the Militant. I especially like the point about what an armed working class can do to fight against racism. However, both say that a “Jim Crow-style” system of racist segregation was in place on the island before 1959. Such a characterization is likely to convey images of what existed in the United States.

While racial discrimination was a reality in Cuba before 1959 it differed in significant ways from what was in place in the U.S. Most important, the Cuban working class was never separated on the basis of skin color to the degree it was in the U.S. Nowhere was this more evident than in the trade unions.

Exactly because of this difference the working class in Cuba could make a socialist revolution. For its counterpart in the U.S. its task in 1959 could only be the overthrow of Jim Crow—the prerequisite for doing what took place in Cuba.

August Nimtz
Minneapolis, Minnesota

Editor’s note—The Militant appreciates the reader’s point on accuracy about the situation facing blacks in Cuba before the 1959 revolution.

More rapid utility cutoffs
Like many other California workers, I recently received a letter from Pacific Gas and Electric explaining how excited they were that new “SmartMeters” would soon be installed in the neighborhood. These meters, PG&E promises, “will empower you to take greater control of your energy consumption, use less energy, and save money.”

But a recent article in the San Francisco Chronicle points out that PG&E is predicting that the new technology will mean that 85 percent of late-paying customers could be disconnected in 2011—a number approaching 380,000. Instead of sending a crew out to manually disconnect your service, a manager would now simply flip a switch.

Bill Kalman
Richmond, California

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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