Workers Vanguard No 159 - 27 May 1977
Workers Vanguard No 159 - 27 May 1977
Workers Vanguard No 159 - 27 May 1977
159
25
27 May 1977
populated portion of the I';.tilstir,ia"
Arab West Bank which the "Labor
continued on page 10
Alom Reininger/Contact
of the Fa;:hrui"L
th(;_){
Inent It iccated !n \-
program IS b:lsed on the lact that in the
Jewish state some Jews arc more
"equal" than others. Likud's base of
support comes from opposite ends of
the Yishud. including those sectors most
alienated from tbe instil\ltions of "La-
bor Zionism": Sephardic Jewry--im-
migrants of African or Near Eastern
origins. who are relegated to the status
of a slum proletanat of unskiIied
labor---and the nouveaux richf's profes-
sionals and entrepreneurs.
Occupied Territories or Eretz
Israel
Likud is less well-known for its
reactionary economic policies than for
its virulently chauvinist position on the
Palestinian question, especially as em-
bodied in the fascistic demagogy of
Irgun terrorist Begin. Likud's slogan for
the Arab territories occupied by Israel
during the 1967 war is "not an indi'
whereas the "Labor" government uncT
Rabin claimed to be willing to reLm
some territory in exchange for a p,:ace
treaty with m;ighboring Arab states.
t! .S. president Carter pressured the
Rabin government to accept a Pax
Americana in which Israel would
withdraw from almost all the occupied
territory in return for a U.S.-imposed
peace. Clearly the Likud victory is a
setback for Carter's peace plan and
"Labor" politicians are blaming Cart':':,'s
heavy-handed arm twistmg tor their
defea t.
To demonstrate his prog;.;
nl'lt changed the- or; i
back the services. dismantling the
state and. Histradrut sector, banning
;1'11,"'o'rr+:'tttinf>; other workin\!-
it';..' \,'::;:c:H_Hi:t"
Shamuel; 5ygma
philanthr,Jpy) and is a "Labor Party" in
name ol)iy. Yet
Cl..:n l! III i. t .... j ,_,; dL'. ,-,.:'!: '::' "h,'
\\cifare :-:ta-tc and a
tist "labor" movemenl. the H
which encompasses trade unions and
social services for its members and
controls 25 percent of the Israeli
economy.
Likud calls for dismantling the
institutions \11' "Labor" Zionism. cutting
Menachem
Begin,
winner
in last
week's
eledion.
by changing labels to escape the disgust
in which Labor is held by the majority of
the Israeli masses. But even this ne-
ophyte movement claiming to stand
above the squabbling. squalid political
heritage of the Yishud (Israeli Jewry)
was brought into disrepute. The maver-
ick Uri Avner: ran a series of
dfrich..:'':. in his \\Tekh,. 11(['0-
fani f!a:::efl ;s a
of archaeology Yadin had' In
the illicit tratTic of
\\ohJle Likud"s upset engenden::d
Jr/.' h' los.. of .. uoport for
ga.ns lor extr:':lllC-
rightist bloc. the victory
represents a sinister shift to the right in
IsraeL politics. Likud's program is
stridently anti-workingclass and anti-
Arab. "Labor" is. of course, integrated
into a establishment which rests
firmly on a ..:apit<di,t eCO,h)my
ized by U.S. irnperidiism and Jewish
Israeli police arrest Arab demonstrator in the West Bank occupied territory.
PAGE 6
..I.. .... :... ..:...t!
In the elections for the 120-member
Israeli parliament. or Knesset. the
Likud won 43 seats and "Labor" 33. The
right-wing bloc won only six more seats
than it carried in the last Knesset
ejection in the aftermath of the October
War. But the "Labor" lost 18.
Most of the "Labor" loss went to the
newly formed Movement for Democrat-
ic Change which won 14 seats.
Headed by the archaeologist Yigael
Yadin and featuring various "independ-
ent" intellectuals and personalities. the
Movement purported to stand above
the cronyism, bureaucratism and cor-
ruption characteristic of Zionist esta-
blishment parties. However, its pro-
gram regarding foreign policy and the
territories occupied by Israel in the 1967
Six-Day War was indistinguishable
from "Labor." On domestic issues the
Movement stood to the right of "La-
bor." cailing along with Likud for a ban
on strikes and for compubory arbitration.
These demands currently have immense
appeal to israel's grasping capitalist
class, which has just passed through the
most lriiitant strike wave in the history
of the Zionist state.
Many Movement candidates are
deserters from "['\bor" who had hoped
masses.
Shifting Lines in Zionist Camp-
Menachem Begin, Irgun terrorist
Fiihrer and the butcher of Deir Yassin,
now head of the extreme right-wing
Likud CT nJt''') bloc will in all likeli-
hood be hrael's next prime minister.
The so-called "Labor" Party. the pillar
of the Zionist establishment which has
ruled Israel SInce its independence, has
gone down to a humiliating t11<.'
stench ot co;ruption and scandal.
For 29 years. "Labor"-ied
govcrnrncnts nr',)upht the l;;,racli r'opu-
lace the of exorbitant td.\d.i.ion,
CrUShl'1g 3 -;,.j(,,:L:i;'lg
of Ii .. :ng. !\1mt or all: rwy haH' broughl a
blood-soaked heritage of perennial war
and perpetual militarism to deny the
Palestinian people their homeland and
evoke the bitter enmity of all Arab
Israeli Elections
Butcher of Deir
Yassin Takes
__le"el __
Thugs for
Eco-Faddism
RACE, CLASS AND "ROOTS"
March 23, 1977
To the Editors:
BEHIND "BEHIND THE 'ROOTS'
CRAZE"
The article "Behind the 'Roots'
Craze" which appeared in the 4 March
issue of Workers Vanguard is such a
classical example of V.S. left institu-
tionalized racism that even those of us
who make it a matter of principle not to
comment on your material must speak
out. The bulk of the analysis is, as usual,
"correct in the It is basically
an ahistorical appUtation of Marxist
analysis and, mc[eover, is directed, as
always, at the nincompoops who make
up the vast majority of the V.S. left, and
are easy game for anyone who has even
an alienated and abstract understanding
of world history.
What the article of course fails to
explain (and what it supposedly sets
itself to explain) is why the very strong
reaction of black people across the
country to this piece of bourgeois
propaganda. The reason the Spartacist
League analysis fails to do this is
because it requires an understanding
which goes beyond abstract Marxism
and pays attention to actual circum-
stances. The talmudic application of
Marx, Lenin and Trotsky (the Transi-
tional Program) sometimes gives an
organization a debating advantage (if
they are applied consistently) over those
who either do not apply them at all or
apply them with haphazard inconsisten-
cy. But such talmudic application
should never be confused with science
and is thoroughly inappropriate to the
task of successfully analyzing what in
the hell is going on in the world.
The failure of the SL to understand
the response of the biack population of
the country to this TV show is apparent
in the final line of your studious social
analysis. Here the SL stands up and
unashamedly exposes their left sectarian
racism for all to see. That final line
reads: "With the economic integration
of the blacks into capitalism's factories,
their future is bound up_decisively with
their white class brothers. V.S. blacks,
more than any other group in this
country, have truly 'nothing to lose but
their chains'." Such bullshit has led the
black population of this country to
regard the V.S. left as but another racist
institution. The fact is that the black
population of this country has not been
integrated into capitalism's factories
and moreover current economic reali-
ties internationally and in this national
sector make it absolutely plain that the
bulk of the black population will never
be integrated into capitalism's factories.
The vast majority of the black popula-
tion is unemployed, unorganized,
unrecognized, on welfare, etc.-in a
WfJltNEltl
VANGIJAltD
Marxist Working-Class Weekly
ofthe Spartaclst League ofthe U.S.
EDITOR: Jan Norden
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EDITORIAL BOARD: Jon Brule, Charles
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Published weekly, except bi-weekly in August
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Second-class postage paid at New York, N.Y.
Opinions expressed in signed articles or
letters do not necessarily express the editorial
viewpoint.
2
word, thoroughly unintegrated eco-
nomically and socially. The reaction by
the black population to "Roots" derives
to a large extent from their socio-
economic location in V.S. society, i.e.,
they have not been and are not likely to
ever be integrated into V.S. capitalism.
But the SL, like other left sectarian
groupings, needs to rewrite history to
make it accord with their own empty
petit bourgeois politics and strategic
and tactical' perspective. What the SL
means by saying "With the economic
integration of the blacks into capital-
ism's factories, their future is bound up
decisively with their white class broth-
ers." is that those blacks currently
integrated into capitalism's factories are
bound up with those white males who
work in those factories. This observa-
tion is nothing but a racist and sexist
tautology!
There is no need to carry this any
further since I have grown wiser by years
of watching the petit bourgeois
sectarian V.S. left rewrite history and
alienate the poor and working people of
this country. I can think of no good
reason for directing this note to you, but
occasi'onally even the most scientific do
something for no good reason at all.
Ed Thomas
WV replies: Ed Thomas' barrage of
contemptuous race-baiting and con-
temptible anti-communism fails to
his political and factual disori-
entation. Because such errors are still
maintained by a dwindling number of
Marxoid nationalists, and because the
political strategy implied is suicidally
dangerous for the black masses, we will
answer Thomas, despite the fact that his
tone indicates he wishes we would not.
It is no wonder Thomas wants to
reduce the discussion to the level of
insult: he is dead wrong on his central
point of fact with regard to the econom-
ic integration of blacks in the U.S.
Thomas the self-styled "scientist" offers
the following core observation about
the source of the popularity of "Roots":
"The reaction by the black population
to 'Roots' derives to a large extent from
their socio-economic location in V.S.
society, i.e., they have not been and are
not likely to ever be integrated into V.S.
capitalism." Marxism is a science, and
facts are stubborn:
In 1974, a depression year, 73 percent
of all black males between 16 and 65
were either employed or looking for
work; the comparable figure for white
males was 79 percent (V .S. Department
of Labor, Handbook of Labor Statistics
1975). The same year 49 percent of black
women were in the active labor force,
while only 45 percent of white women
were (ibid.).
Far from being powerless, black
workers are concentrated in strategic,
unionized sections of the industrial
proletariat. According to a 1973 study
by the federal Equal Employment
Opportunity Commission, blacks made
up 19 percent of unskilled production
workers in basic steel, 22 percent in auto
and 27 percent in urban transit (Equal
Employment Opportunity Report,
1973). These figures understate the
strategic placement of black workers,
who are concentrated in the main urban
industrial centers. In case Thomas
hasn't noticed, Detroit auto workers,
south Chicago-Gary steel workers and
New York transit workers are heavily
black-and their power is directly
bound up with their white class brothers
in these key industries.
II' blacks live in segregation, they
work in an integrated setting, integrated
into production at its base. What
characterizes U.S. blacks is social
segregation combined with economic
integration at the bottom.
So the truth is concrete. It is Thomas
and not WV who "needs to rewrite
history to make it accord with ... empty
petty- bourgeois politics and tactical
perspective." The danger of his nation-
alist perspective is obvious as soon as
one considers what it would mean for
U.S. blacks if Thomas was factually and
sociologically correct. If blacks as a race
were in fact not integrated into the
the consequences would
ultimately be genocidal.
Then Thomas and the other
nationalists would have their "internal
colony" of blacks in the U.S. as fact and
not just reactionaryI utopian reflex.
Then they would at last have a material
basis for their black nationalism. But
this "internal colony" would resemble a
concentration camp. In this fiercely
racist country, it is not hard to imagine
what genocidal fate would lie in store for
a black race which was in its totality
economically useless to the ruling class.
Fortunately, this condition does not
exist.
And as for the short-lived "Roots"
craze, the enthusiastic response among
black people to "Roots" does not make
the work an attack on the racist status
quo nor an inspiration for struggle
against black oppression. American
blaCkS. like any other oppressed social
group, are prey to escapist-utopian
cultural influences. To take a rather
more important cultural phenomenon
than "Roots," a majority of blacks
believe. to one degree or another, in the
Christian Bible. We trust that Thomas
does not believe therefore that the
Baptist church is a progressive institu-
tion which fosters black pride.
The popularitv of "Roots" was not
due simply to i'ts portrayal of black
slaves as other than dumb. helpless
victims. "Roots" is a capitalist success
story of a family which goes from a
mutilated. rebellious slave to the pros-
perous owner of a lumber company in
four generations. Its message is a more
modern version of Booker T. Washing-
ton's Up From Slaven: that blacks can
overcome the condition and heritage of
brutal racial oppression through indi-
vidual adherence to the capitalist work
ethic.
It is revealing that a number of" black
power" advocates have taken "Roots"
as good nationalist coin as eagerly as
Jimmy Carter-era black Democrats
have claimed it as their own. This is
another indication of how black
Marcus Garvey to
Elijah Muhammad-can peacefully
coexist with the racist status quo in
capitalist America.
"Roots" is the American dream in
blackface. Whatever its conscious pur-
pose, its main effect would be to help
keep the black workers and poor tied to
racist imperialists like Kennedy, J ohn-
son and Carter. Ed Thomas' anti-
communist nationalism masquerading
as "science" in its own way also
perpetuates the racist status quo. Liber-
ation from racial oppression requires
the unity of the black workers and poor
with the white workers in proletarian
struggle around a program representing
the interests of all the working people
and oppressed. That is not "bullshit"
nor tautology but' scientific Marxism
rooted in decisive fact.
SL/SYL PUBLIC OffiCES
Marxist Literature
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Phone 427-0003
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Monday-Friday , 6:30-9:00 p.m.
Saturday 1:00-4:00 p.m.
260 West Broadway, Room 522
Ndw York, New York
Phone
German
Stalinists
Assault ILD
BERLIN-On April 30 the "critical"
Maoists of the Kommunistischer Bund
(KB) showed their true Stalinist face by
launching a brutal and unprovoked
assault on comrades of the Trotzkisti-
sche Liga Deutschlands (TJLD), German
section of the international Spartacist
tendency. The TLD had been manning a
literature at a Maoist-sponsored
"May Day Initiative" at West Berlin's
Technical University when two KB
supporters (including a member of the
KB's Berlin leadership) jumped a TLD
member from the front and back
simultaneously. As he defended himself
against this cowardly onslaught, TLD
comrades rushing to his aid were
attacked by more KBers. Only the TLD
comrades' alertness enabled them to
ward off this assault, but one TLDer
suffered an eye injury.
The KB's violence is the Stalinists'
response to the TLD's refusal to
conciliate the petty-bourgeois anti-
nuclear movement, which has dragged
along the entire ostensible left in
opposing all construction of atomic
power plants. So far has this ecological
hysteria progressed that in West
fake-leftists even marched to oppose a
proposed coal-powered electricity
generating plant! The TLD has insisted
that Marxists do not oppose technologi-
cal advances and that the real "nuclear
disaster" against which revolutionaries
must struggle is a nuclear conflagration
arising out of the willingness of the
imperialist powers to set off a holocaust
in their drive for world domination.
The anti-nuclear movement of priests
and peasants, ex-student ecofreaks and
disgruntled dairy farmers constitutes
the only thing even remotely resembling
a mass "protest movement" in West
Germany today. Predictably, the fake-
left has clamored for support to the
"revolutionary dynamic" and "anti-
capitalist thrust" Of this petty-bourgeois
movement. All the pseudo-Marxists-
from ostensible Trotskyists_ to the
Greater China revanchists of the KPD
(who call for atomic weapons to the
West German bourgeoisie, in order to
defend capitalist West Germany against
the "social imperialism" of the East!)-,-
leap on the anti-nuclear bandwagon,
which is simply a diversion from the task
. of constructing a revolutionary party in
West Germany to resolve the crisis of
proletarian leadership and liberate the
working class from the reformist
stranglehold of the Social Democracy.
The KB explicitly called for physical
violence against the "fLO. Next to the
TLD's table it set up a provocative
banner reading: "Are these people who
directly oppose the most significant
progressive movement in the BRD
[German Federal Republic] and WB
[West Berlin] to be allowed to set up a
literature table at a May Day celebra-
tion? No, that's going too far!" The
Stalinist frenzy of the KB was also
revealed in a sorry attempt to polemicize
against the TLD a few weeks previously.
An article, "TLD: Atomic Power?-
Yes, Go Right Ahead," in the April issue
of the KB's West Berlin organ, Rot-
frontstadt, showed its anti-Leninist
prejudices in ridiculing the "Interna-
tional Spartakus Tendency" for naming
its U.S. paper Workers Vanguard. In
the same article these Maoists indulged
in further unintentional self-exposure
by terming the TLD simply an "off-
shoot" ["AblegeO of the iSt-a graphic
continued on page 9
WORKERS _VANGUARD
27 MAY 1977
LWOP for San Francisco, despite the
demagogic tactics of Local 10 president
Williams, who made threats to the other
locals of enforcing transfers through
Affirmative Action suits, claiming that
the. reason for opposing transfers was
racism.
Bureaucrats from other locals want
no transfers primarily because they are
under pressure to fill existing job
openings from their own lower-seniority
members. While opposing the San
Francisco LWOP scheme, they have
nothing to offer the beleaguered Local.
10 members. At the ILWU convention a
motion presented by the Seattle local for
a 30-hour workweek at no cut in pay,
which would provide more jobs
throughout all the ports, was heavily
defeated. Since then compromises have
reportedly been worked out, under
which the other locals have agreed to
accept "voluntary transfers" from San
Francisco in return for the right to
upgrade a certain number of their lower-
- seniority workers.
Williams, however, is well aware that
"voluntary transfers" will not rid him of
the troublesome problem of high unem-
ployment in Bay Area longshore.
Despite the "agreements" with other
locals, he is pushing ahead with his plan
to implement LWOP in San Francisco.
This he hopes to achieve by wearing
down the membership and excluding a
democratic debate of the issue. This is
clearly the intent of the referendum,
which would prevent the membership
from hearing both sides before voting.
The escalation of bureaucratic
pressure tactics at the May meeting
reflects the desperation of Williams &
Co. to ram through the job-slashing
scheme. The LWOP issue, which in-
volves the fate of Local 10, was placed
late on the agenda, while the ranks were
subjected to boring speeches by candi-
dates for the International elections in
June (none of whom were barred from
the meeting even though many were
non-members of Local 1O!). Further-
more, when it came time to discuss
LWOP, the floor mike was mysteriously
out of order and only three speakers got
to speak.
The strongarm policy was made clear
at the very outset of the meeting with
Williams' ruling that -except for those
invited by the Local leadership-non-
Local 10 members could not attend.
According to veteran longshoreman
Howard Keylor, a publisher of the
"Longshore Militant," and a member of
the Local 10 executive board, such an
exclusion is unprecedented. Williams
made it clear that this was a political
exclusion when he motivated it by
asserting the need to keep out people
who are "slandering" officers-the
standard bureaucratic response to class-
struggle opposition.
Waving a copy of the "Longshore
Militant" in the air, he specifically
denounced Bob Mandel, a member of
the Local6 (warehouse) executive board
and of the Militant Caucus of that
Local. demanding his expulsion frQm
the meeting. At the recent ILWU
convention. Mandel was the primary
spokesman against the policies of
Bridges, Williams & Co., in particular
denouncing the attempt to impose
LWOP on San Francisco longshore.
Later in the meeting, Williams explicitly
attacked the "Longshore Militant" for
making "destructive criticisms," a
charge echoed by International vice
president Bill Chester.
It is not accidental that Williams
singled out the "Longshore Militant"
for his bureaucratic attack. This class-
struggle newsletter has been the only
forthright opposition within Local 10 to
the forced transfers/ LWOP scheme.
Clearly Williams is running scared on
the issue, which has temporarily divided
the union leadership. While the Coast
Caucus adopted no militant program to
fight for jobs, it did refuse to invoke
LWOP, if only in fear of swamping
other ports with transfers.
Williams' attempts to ram through
the forced transfers scheme appears to
he a direct doublecross of his bureau-
continued on page 10
3
SAN FRANCISCO, May 21-Geanng
up for forced transfers as their "solu-
tion" to the jobs crisis, bureaucrats of
International Longshoremen's and
Warehousemen's Union (lLWU) Local
10 are going all out to intimidate the
membership. At a meeting this evening,
Local president Cleophus Williams
took the unprecedented step of denying
admission to non-Local 10 ILWU
members, summarily fined a member
$25 for demanding the right to question
candidates for International office who
were present giving campaign speeches,
and high-handedly placed the issue of
declaring the Bay Area a "low work
opportunity port" (LWOP) on a
June referendum without even obtain-
ing the approval of the executive board
beforehand.
The San Francisco area has borne the
main brunt of the decline in available
longshore work on the coast. Man-
hours have dropped by over a third in
the last four years. Unemployment,
however. has not reached the level
where the employers can contractually
institute LWOP. which would mandate
forced transfers of longshoremen to
other ports. Therefore, the employers'
Pacific Maritime Association (PMA)
wants the union to "voluntarilv" declare
San Francisco a low work op'portunity
port. But it has made it clear that it will
not stop there. and is seeking to
eliminate 1.000 longshoremen from the
Bay Area-through forced early retire-
ment and deregistration if necessarv -
thus gutting the historic center - of
longshore militancy_
While the Local 10 leadership has
backed the PMA proposals to slash S.F.
longshoremen's jobs, it has been unsuc-
cessful in ramming this down the throats
of the membership. The March mem-
bership meeting refused to endorse a
"voluntary" declaration of LWOP,
voting instead to postpone the matter
until after the Coast Caucus, which met
in April at the time of the International
convention. At the Caucus meeting, the
delegates explicitly refused to endorse
people waiting on line to see a movie on
Chile.
The cause of Fernando Marcos also
evoked a response of solidarity interna-
tionally, with contributions from sup-
port&rs in Canada. Australia, Germany,
Italy and England. The small Bolshevik-
Leninist Group of Italy made a contri-
bution, while Canadian PDC support-
ers raised over $1,000 toward the goal.
Marcos has already had the first of
two operations at the world-renowned
Barraquer Opthamological Institute in
Barcelona, Spain. Doctors there report
that the operation went without compli-
cation and was a technical success. But
the final success or failure awaits the
second operation. scheduled for June;
campaign supporters will be kept
informed of Marcos' medical progress.
Indicative of the gratifying response
to the campaign was a letter from a
supporter in Oregon:
"It was so good to learn in the April 22
WV of the progress being made towards
providing comrade Marcos with the
opportunity to see again. Truly it is a
measure of this comrade's devotion to
the working class that he refused to
leave Chile and his socialist work there
to seek medical attention abroad.
"Congratulations to each of you for
your work in this class-struggle anti-
sectarian effort."
The Partisan Defense Committee
wishes to thank all those who devoted
their time, energy and money to this
important cause. Without their support,
Marcos would not have had this crucial
chance to regain the capacity to devote
himself fully to the struggles of the
exploited and oppressed.
Hubert Schatzl
Fernando Marcos (center)
university ~ professors. Some church
groups also assisted, with a denomina-
tion in New York City making an
important contribution and a church
council member in Cleveland sending
campaign materials to 100 people. But
the vast majority of the funds came in
small contributions from individuals
who have followed the work of the POC
and were impressed with its record of
anti-sectarian class-struggle defense
work.
In the U.S., New York City led tlie
way by raising $3,000 for the campaign;
both Chicago and the San Francisco
'Bay Area went over the $1,000 mark.
The Bay Area POC raised more than
$150 just by discussing the case with
WV Photo
Containeri -
zation has
................ . . . - - : ~ drastically
cut jobs.
Strike for Jobsl
Stop Bureaucrats'
Scheme to Gut
S.F. Longshore!
Fernando Marcos may have a chance
to see again! The Partisan Defense
Committee (POC) this week announced
the successful completion of its cam-
paign to raise funds for an urgent eye
operation for this exiled Chilean mili-
tant. Collections reached and surpassed
the $10,000 goal set by the POc.
Indicative of the POC's growing reputa-
tion for anti-sectarian solidarity and
integrity, more than $2,500 was also
received to support the work of the
Partisan Defense Committee itself.
Marcos, a trade-union leader in Chile
and an opponent of the Chilean popular
front, lost his eyesight in a 1972
explosio:1 of industrial supplies at a
copper foundry. Prior attempts to
perform a corneal transplant had failed;
doctors advise that this is probably
Marcos' last chance remaining to
restore his sight. The POC committed
itself to making available the best
medical treatment.
During the two-month campaign,
POC supporters presented the case to a
wide spectrum of groups and individu-
als around the country. In Chicago, for
example, the National Lawyers Guild,
Socialist Party, Hispanic Labor Coun-
cil, Industrial Workers of the World and
Student Union Workers granted POC
supporters agenda time to present the
campaign. Trade unionists-
particularly in the maritime, longshore
and auto industries-were generous in
aiding their class brother. Mailings on
behalf of Marcos were sent out by
diverse supporters, including a Chicago
surrealist art collective and several
Over $10,000 Raised bY PDC
Marcos Campaign Success
ii
Ixon on oose
Nixon: '< Paranoia for peace isn't that bad."
There he was again on prime-time
TV: the "new Nixon," scratching his ear
and droning on in mad sincerity about
how he brought "peace with honor" to
Vietnam. In his unforgettable tone of
hollow-sounding moral uplift, he ut-
tered the familiar alibis for the plumbers
and assassins. He called on the "great
silent majority'" to vindicate him,
quoting witless aphorisms by Bob
Hope's wife on love and hate, forgetting
whether or not he had authorized the
firebombing of the Brookings Institute,
oozing bitter resentment over not being
invited to the White House by the
Kennedys and comparing himself favor-
ably to Lincoln and Jefferson.
He was, as always, banal, frumpy,
rancorous and stupid. But in this third
televised interview there was not th"
repentant Nixon of the earlier sessions
when he did his hangdog, "I have let the
country down," routine. No, this was
Nixon on the offensive, the warrior in
"the national interest." It was Joseph
McCarthy's ex-staffer going after his
abundant enemies with evny a\ailable
means (usually illegall: Nixon the
criminal .. and the criminally imane.
"Paranoia for Peace"
On the bombing of Cambodia, ;\iixon
said his "only regret" was that he hadn't
moved "sooner, stronger." He argued
that it was he and the militarv who were
trying to achieve peace in 'Indochina,
dragging in the old line about how it was
necessary to bomb the North Vietna-
mese to the ba r gaining table. ! twas
"violence-prone" protesters who pro-
longed the war, Nixon claimed with a
straight face, so it was necessary to crush
ami-war demonstrations in order to get
a negotiated settlement. After all, Hanoi
had to be convinced that they couldn't
win in Washington what they didn't take
on the battlefield.
I t is, of course, true that nothing
could be won through peace crawls with
Democratic Party doves in Washington
that wasn't won by force of arms in
Vietnam. Despite the unpopularity of
the war, U.S. imperialism continued to
bomb away until its puppet army
co!J::psed. In the end, the NLF; DRY
tock it all on the battlefield, but it wasn't
for lack of trying to strike a deal with
Washington. More than once Ho Chi
Minh and his proved willing
to gill' up what they had won, in
exchange f'Jr empty promises from the
imperialists. But the intransigence of the
l'ixon re,;:lmc and the terminal COrJUp-
tion of it-; iackcy' :n SJigon fruqrakd
the CL1SS-,-cilahuLHic'I1ist r,lan'- of the
but the ex-president nowjustifies refusal
to deiiver aid on the spurious grounds
that the North Vietnamese allegedly
violated the accords. Nixon seemed
determined to prove the inverse of the
Reader's Digest axiom that you can
never trust the Russians to live up to a
treaty.
While advocating "peace through
war," Nixon also asserted that the
president need not bother with legal
niceties in order to uphold "law and
order." Driven to distraction by peace
demonstrators (who could be heard as
they enCIrcled the \Vhite House, "even if
! had plugs in my ears"), the imperialist
commander-in-chid z,ttel11l'led to
silt:n:;e his orponents. S(1umiir,g like a
crns, between CaLgtib and the ;vlad
to a
1/'_',1 \>.L fO:-.lrl
t_' " T",; t:' ;'1' j .
Aetualidad Espanola
thing because of the national security,
or in this case because of a threat to
internal peace and order of significant
magnitude, then the President's deci-
sion in that instance is one that enables
those who carry it out, to carry it out
without violating a law. Otherwise
they're in an impossible position.
"FROST: So, that in other words, reallv
you were saying ... between burglar)
and murder ... the .div;Jing line is the
President's judgment? -
":\IXON: yes.... "
The history of Nixon's "judgement"
in such matters is well-known. There
was no "di\iding line" for the infanwlIs
COINTELPRO in its war against the
gO\ernment's usual targets: the left.
black and labor movement'. There was
not only authorization fer ii!t:,l!al wire-
Ups_ [naIl p,-,l,,_,_' pro\ ()':d-
tton:< "hL.lck bag"
je,I")>.., l"c: n\" tt-:\.'
til, i'. u
r
B
,'inl' !:.j+'(- ('71
\\ ;,i> 1'1\::,
States would harass and Vtctlmize the
left, but why did his "enemies list"
include Joe Namath? Why did Nixon
use the Intemal Revenue Service ilgainst
prominent liberals? Nixon asked the
obvious question himself: "A paranoiac
attitude?" He answered with a clinical
version of Barrv Goldwater's famous
dictum for Republicans:
"Call it paranoia, but paranoia for peace
isn't that bad."
Nixon Isn't the Only One
It is beyond mere hypocrisy for
Richard Nixon to proclaim that he
"brought peace with honor," but it all
made sense to this self-diagnosed
paranoid. The political paradox and
irritating irony is that this most discred-
ited and exposed U. S. president of the
imperialist era, a self-evident criminal
and bumbling liar, when nailing about
for a defense of the indefensible has been
in some respects the most straightfor-
ward of recent American chief
executives.
There has been p\enty of
image-building for duplicitous and
mediocre U.S. presidents. TV cameras
trotted behind LBJ along the Peder-
nales River picking up bits of "folksy"
Texas humor: meanwhile, the other
Lyndon Johnson was directing massive
carpet-bombing of Vietnam from his
toilet seat. While television focused on
the Kennedv of Camelot the debo-
naire his fashion-conscious
wife, jet-setting relatives and French
chef--the secret JFK was not simply
fiddling and faddling, but arranging the
Bay of Pigs invasion and authorizing
CIA assassination teams with Mafia hit
squads. But there is no secret Nixon.
After the transparent display of
contrition in the initial installments of
the' Nixon-Frost interviews, the Water-
gate president offered his best defense:
they all do it, it comes with the job. And
it's true, of course, which helps to
explain why the Democrats were, at the
end, not so anxious to engage in
impeachment proceedings. Kennedy,
Nixon pointed out bugged Martin
Luther King and spread the gossip "all
over Capitol Hill."
When Nixon states that the president
may sanction burglaries or murders
with impunity, the IVell' York Times and
the rest of the liberals professed shock.
But why'? Isn't it established that
Kennedy repeatedly tried to have Fidel
Castro assassinated': Kennedy \\as
slmp,y smart enough and stealthy
cnou"h not II) gD biabbing about ;\ :,'s
thcu:;h it ",,'cre Lll'ld (,fdivtnc j'lghl,
'\1.\.('1] is the \vh;j
no\\- C'dt'tcr tb... the
cPt .' a:--, ': th:_' )av,
Jt been liiegd! (Oi to
LiP phl.)!ics \\ithout a \\,:'1rr.aH in all
utilCr bur that hasn't storred the
continued on page 9
v"'liiing enough to under-
stand why the president of the L nited
It 'l d .,,\ t ... \ I,";' (1(\;_'
>" I.,:."
''\i\,f)'. Exat'.'ti\, If the
for example, ,:pr:C)ves S0t11C-
treaty pf(J\ L ,\!r; d::llH..'d h\
l\ixon Ford administration ofiil;iah,
12 27 MAY 1977