Vol. 79/No. 43      November 30, 2015

 

25, 50, and 75 Years Ago

 

November 30, 1990

Bernard Sanders, who publicly presents himself as a socialist, defeated both the Democratic and Republican contenders for Vermont’s only congressional seat in the recent elections.

Although Sanders has run for and been elected to public office as an “independent” and a “socialist,” neither his record nor his political perspectives offer a road forward for working people.

Sanders operates totally in the framework of the capitalist system and accepts the limits it imposes. He has stated that his model for “socialism” is imperialist Sweden’s social welfare program. Through reforms he attempts to make capitalism work more decently for the majority. But neither his efforts nor those of like-minded reformers has halted or could halt the employers’ offensive against working people or won working people protection from the ravages that are coming.

November 29, 1965

NOV. 23 — The events of the past two weeks have underscored the need to bring the GIs home from the senseless slaughter in the illegal war in Vietnam. At the same time the opportunity for the antiwar movement here in the U.S. to help bring about an end to the war has also increased.

The battles in the Iadrang Valley of Vietnam, where U.S. troops have suffered by far their heaviest casualties of the war, show the impossibility of an end to the war by a quick victory of U.S. forces. In spite of overwhelming superiority of U.S. equipment, in spite of massive tactical support by airplanes — all on the U.S. side and none on the other — and in spite of massive bombings in a scale larger than in any previous war, U.S. spokesmen acknowledge that the strength of the Vietnamese revolutionaries is increasing.

November 30, 1940

Letters of protest, demanding the freedom of the Negro sailors on the U.S.S. Philadelphia and an end to the Jim Crow practices in the Navy, began to pour into the offices of President Roosevelt and Secretary of the Navy Knox last week at the same time that the government announced its intention of standing by the policy of segregating colored sailors to the mess attendants division only.

The letters from various organizations and individuals printed in the Pittsburgh Courier last week showed that an increasing number of people are aroused over the case of the imprisoned Philadelphia sailors.

The N.A.A.C.P. upheld the action of the mess attendants in bravely signing their names to the published letter of complaint, saying they had done so “in belief that they had a just complaint, which ought not to be weakened by an anonymous letter.”

 
 
 
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