Chapter Five: Reforms At Election Time (1984)

From Samuel Leight's book, The Futility of Reformism

About 2½ weeks prior to the Mid-term General Election, during a televised speech on October 14, 1982 President Reagan, our leader at the helm, in a supposed non-partisan report on the economy, urged:

“We can do it, my fellow Americans, by staying the course.”

Meanwhile, below decks, the working class were at the oars and 11.6 million unemployed American workers were overboard in the high seas attempting to survive.

The candidates were all united on one basic issue—capitalism was unquestionably acceptable, but adjustments were needed and proper leadership was necessary. The reformist programs verified that the system was in no jeopardy whatsoever. The “leaders,” all apparently endowed with superior talents at problem-solving, masqueraded as opponents representing different ideologies that professed disagreements but maintained an unspoken alliance on fundamentals. The political stage-setting was customary; all items were concerned with the running of capitalism, while none stood for the interests of the working class.

Both the Republican and Democratic Parties echoed the same refrain of cutting down the federal deficits, keeping a hold on taxes and limiting governmental powers. A third candidate for the U.S. Senate race in Arizona came from the Libertarian Party. He sported an unconventional beard and ponytail, but appearances are no indication of revolutionary thinking. The Libertarian Party’s main thrust is to reform capitalism by attempting to curtail government interference until it eventually declines and is no longer needed. However, as they are not suggesting a replacement with socialism this notion becomes outlandish wishful thinking.

There were a total of 237 statewide ballot measures in 42 states with the Nuclear Freeze as the most common issue, followed by the Environment with four Western states seemingly concerned that the landscapes should not be sullied with discarded cans and bottles. Crime was also a prominent topic, and there were 27 ballot items dealing with taxes.

The State of Arizona had various measures on the General Election Ballot, submitted for voter approval or rejection. They ranged from establishing deposits and refunds for certain beverage containers, to a “nuclear freeze” proposal allied to a declaration of a “Peace Sunday.” The nine propositions were all described in a Publicity Pamphlet issued by the State of Arizona, typical of political trivia that was presented country-wide. The nuclear freeze issue was subsequently approved in 8 out of 9 states, with Arizona being the sole dissenter. Other specific issues included the regulation of ambulances and ambulance services; prohibiting bail for persons charged with or convicted of a felony who pose a danger to society; an amendment relating to the compensation of state elective and judicial officers; tax exemption for certain property in slum or blighted areas; the composition of the State Board of Education; establishing a system of permitting registration of voters at the time and place where they apply for a drivers license; and a recommendation by the Commission on Salaries for Elected State Officers to increase the salaries of Legislators.

All these propositions, were they to be approved or disapproved, bear no relevance to any of the real problems that beset propertyless workers, beleaguered with unemployment, insecurity, poverty and war. They constitute an enticement to the unwary to become involved in piddling non-issues.

The text of Proposition 201, dealing with the Nuclear Freeze issue, reads as follows:

“Be it enacted by the people of the State of Arizona:

Section I:Text of Transmittal. The governor shall prepare and transmit on or before December 1, 1982 the following communication to the President of the United States, the Secretary of Defense, the Secretary of State and all members of the United States Congress:

  ‘The People of the State of Arizona recognizing that the safety and security of the United States must be paramount in the concerns of the American people, and further recognizing that our national security is reduced, not increased, by the growing danger of a nuclear holocaust between the United States and the Soviet Union which would result in millions of deaths of people in Arizona and throughout the nation; do hereby urge that the Government of the United States propose to the Government of the Soviet Union that both countries agree to immediately halt the testing, production and further deployment of all nuclear weapons, missiles and delivery systems in a way that can be checked and verified by both sides.’

Section 2: Peace Sunday — The Governor of the State of Arizona shall declare the last Sunday in May of each year to be Peace Sunday for the purpose of remembering those who died in combat, and to encourage the people of the State of Arizona to work for peace.”

Proposition 201 was accompanied by various arguments “for” and one “against.” The pro-argument given by the Phoenix Chapter of Business Alert to Nuclear War was unbelievably insensitive and tasteless with its heading in bold print: “Nuclear War And The Arms Race Is Bad For Business.” Immediately following this absurdity the first sentence reads as follows:

“The most profound result of accelerating our nuclear arms race is the eventual destruction of our people and our society, along with our business-economic system.”

Granted that the sequence in the sentence places “people” before the “business-economic system,” but to even mention the destruction of the system, and to apparently mourn its passing, in the same context of a catastrophe that could eliminate humanity, gives an insight into the warped approach that some supporters of capitalism possess. To discover such sentiments within a government publication would pre-suppose a sympathetic reaction from the powers-that-be. Of one thing you can be sure—socialist attitudes were not aired. Many religious groups were in evidence along with various bodies and individuals all clamoring for peace; arguing that with the present build-up of nuclear weapons “enough is enough,” and “the freeze is the first step.”

The argument against a Nuclear Freeze has been the assertion from President Reagan and his supporters that the U.S.S.R. is ahead of the U.S.A. in its nuclear power, and they want a verifiable reduction in arms to equal levels, prior to a freeze; coupled with the problem of appropriately being able to monitor Russian weapon development.

The whole question is insoluble, impractical and a complete waste of time. First, the colossal build-up of nuclear armaments has already been accomplished, it is a fait accompli. A so-called freeze will do absolutely nothing to diminish the potential for destruction that already exists. Second, the cause of war is inherent within capitalism—this is a chronic condition that is both irremovable and incurable as long as the system survives. Given a society organized as a gigantic market place, wars will continue to be fought over private property and related issues when diplomacy and negotiations fail. The big question is: will the “small” wars continue on a daily basis, as they have for decades, or will they be interrupted by a worldwide nuclear disaster? At the present time the U.S.A and the U.S.S.R. have the capability of destroying life on earth many times over. We are therefore being asked to sanctify the existing nightmare by calling a halt to further advancement of the madness, but at the same time doing nothing to eradicate the cause of the problem. If it were possible to introduce a so-called nuclear freeze tomorrow the conditions that could activate World War III would still remain—in fact, they always will until the system is removed. Incidentally, it was estimated in 1976 by the authoritative Stockholm International Peace Research Institute that within nine years about 35 countries will be able to manufacture atomic weapons. China joined the nuclear “club” in 1968; Britain, France and India are “members,” and many other nations may already have the weapons in their possession. The situation, therefore, becomes a global one, not limited exclusively to the two major powers, or for that matter within their control.

A “freeze” on nuclear armament production would be “bad business” for certain arms manufacturers; good business for the capitalist class as a whole who would be saved substantial tax sums. It would not change the status of the working class one iota. The possibility of both classes being wiped out by a nuclear war would remain undiminished, freeze or no freeze.

Crying out for peace, joining in peace marches, creating peace movements, deploring the nuclear build-up and writing pleading letters to heads of governments, are all activities that are useless from a practical standpoint because they ignore the cause of war. They are always fully manned by the reformists and supporters of capitalism—the culprit that is never properly identified or condemned, except by the socialist. Ironically, many of the “peace proponents” in the past have broken ranks when wars occur, willing to justify their change of policy under the banners of newly discovered ideals and revitalized nationalism.

The reformists, disregarding the causes of war and the true nature of capitalism, have permitted an unprecedented arsenal of the most horrendous weapons to be created. Then, after the stock-piles acquired a grotesque over-kill capacity, they once again ply their trade with fresh reforms that will preserve the creation but hopefully would prevent its further growth. Should the so-called freeze ever take place the world would still be left as a sitting target because the nuclear weapons would not have been deactivated but would still be ever-ready to fulfill their original function should the buttons be pressed. Capitalism has so far not been able to satisfactorily solve the disposal problem of ordinary nuclear waste, let alone the elimination of nuclear armaments which are firmly established as a supposed deterrent, akin to mutual terror, ora first-strike possibility.

It can be assumed that a nuclear war, should it erupt, will not be started as a result of democratic procedures, but will occur either through a surprise first strike initiative or through some kind of miscalculation or technical error—unlikely, but still a possibility, “Peace Sundays” and “Nuclear Freezes” notwithstanding. Further, according to the 1982-83 edition of Jane’s Weapons Systems, a London-based military survey, war in space is now feasible and aircraft-launched anti-satellite systems are the latest developments in the U.S. and Soviet arsenals, likely to destabilize the balance of power. Add to all the foregoing the existing “conventional,” germ and chemical warfare weaponry and the very contemplation of reformism as a practical solution becomes illogical and pathetically incomprehensible.

 II

Candidates for political office nation-wide discussed other issues that included unemployment, social security, crime and violence, a balanced budget, the environment, military affairs, abortion, prayer in the schools, water needs and education. Most of these questions ultimately involve decisions related to, directly or otherwise, the allocation of funds, the determination of priorities, together with the collection of revenues to defray expenditures. They are business matters concerned with the running of capitalism. When workers become involved in such considerations they abrogate their own interests in favor of their masters’.

Unemployment, referred to elsewhere, defies the rhetoric of the politicians together with the ingenuity of the professional economists. In times of world recession it assumes an international character that affects the majority of the countries, especially those that find themselves dependent upon each other for trade. The malady does not limit itself to national borders and therefore solutions are not discovered fortuitously by the candidates at election time. Capitalism always runs its course, controlling the performance of the administrators more than they would care to confess.

“Social security” is a misnomer for the reorganization of the misery and poverty of the elderly. Most receive meagre allowances at the age of 65 and, on average, survive for only a few years afterwards. The fund has reached a financial crisis with an expected need for new revenues of between $150 billion to $200 billion through the next decade, as reported by the Social Security Review Commission in November, 1982. Assuming that the system is kept afloat, it guarantees the recipients a sub-standard poverty level for their few remaining years.

When one considers the legal theft that occurs when workers produce surplus values for which no payment is given, and the legal violence unleashed by the state machine when wars are prosecuted, the illegal acts of individuals, deplorable as they might be, are put into proper focus. To discuss the pros and cons of handgun control, for example, and at the same time condone a society that can produce a nuclear war, which could destroy untold millions, is nothing short of political madness displaying topsy-turvy priorities. The imposition of stiffer penalties for crimes, the expansion of jail facilities, the attempts to control drug smuggling, are all doomed for failure. They deal only with the effects of a system that spawns anti-social behavior patterns caused primarily by antagonisms, conflicts and situations related to insecurity, poverty and private property. A study conducted by the Center for Applied Social Research at Northeastern University in Boston was published in an issue of the journal Crime & Delinquency in 1981. The study of capital punishment in New York from 1907 to 1963 indicated that the number of homicides increased slightly in the month after an execution was carried out. The researchers called the implication of their findings “ominous.” Of course, the evidence has always confirmed that punishment has never been an adequate deterrent to acts of personal violence and crime. Socialism cannot be expected to immediately eradicate 100 per cent of all forms of violence. There would certainly be no comparison, however, between the violence produced by capitalism as compared to the anti-social acts of a small minority, in socialism, who might well be genuine cases requiring medical attention, possibly hangovers from the previous era.

The Reagan administration has conceded that deficits in the Budget could crest between $150 billion to $200 billion for fiscal 1984. The politicians clamor for a balanced budget but the problem remains. This is not a working class issue—workers are challenged enough attempting to balance their own budgets, let alone those of the ruling class. It’s their system—let them figure it out, while we introduce a replacement!

Years ago the military sahibs of the British Empire, ensconced in their comfortable clubs, would delight in theoretical discussions of military maneuvers relating to past and present wars, sometimes using cruets and silverware to simulate the movements of armies. The technology of destruction has now escalated to the nuclear age. Their modern-day counterparts in the U.S. are now engrossed in the analysis of theB-1 bomber program, the contemplated MX missile horror, together with a host of other major weapons systems. Working class participation in such matters is tantamount to becoming involved in grandiose schemes for their own possible future demise. Alongside of these deadly considerations, incongruous concern is shown for “the environment” with the proper monitoring of air standards and the extension of cleanup deadlines. The reformists are intent on both a “strong America” and “a clean one.” We can only hope that the first aspiration does not, at some time, negate the second.

Abortion is a non-political issue as far as the socialist is concerned—a personal matter between the individuals, their medical advisors, and their conscience. It is presently being used by the politicians to suit their own purposes of demagoguery and hypocrisy. When politicians and priests evoke a supreme reverence for life by opposing abortion, they contradict their professed compassion and become charlatans with their support of wars and their acceptance of the conditions that give rise to them.

The educational system is under continual surveillance because it has the responsibility to produce potential workers equipped with the ability to function properly in a highly complex and technological society motivated by the profit incentive. In addition, pupils receive a nationalistic indoctrination that proves beneficial for military recruitment purposes and the prosecution of war. Currently, a minor furor has developed amongst candidates as to whether organized prayer should be allowed in schools. The socialist opposes all the supernatural, man-made fantasies of religion wherever they may occur, either inside or outside the schools. To the extent that the working class become socialist, religion will be rejected; socialist parents can then be relied upon to rebut any religious nonsense that the schools might offer.

The Los Angeles Times reported October 24, 1982 that 50 school officials recently met secretly with Attorney General George Deukmejian, the Republican candidate for Governor in California, who subsequently was returned to office. One might be deservedly skeptical of such anti-democratic procedures. However, Deukmajian did spell out to the Commonwealth Club in San Francisco that:

“Teacher strikes are illegal, and I will work to keep them so.”

Quite obviously the good governor is not a strong union man; neither apparently does he favor open public meetings, irrespective of the issues under discussion.

For the fourth time George Wallace was re-elected Governor of Alabama. It is interesting to recall that this apparently “reformed” segregationist and racist emerged on the national scene in 1963 when he personally blocked the school house door in an attempt to prevent federal officials from enrolling a black student in the previously segregated University of Alabama. A majority of black voters must have forgiven him, because without their support he would not have won as easily as he did, 60 per cent to 40 per cent. Apparently, in this instance, one past generation must surely have learned a lesson about bigotry which, sad to relate, was soon forgotten by another.

The final outcome of the election from the 66 million voters on November 2, 1982 was that the Democratic Party picked up 26 House seats and 7 governorships, with no gains in the Senate. One oilman, seeking re-election, spent $14 million, and lost; another shopping center tycoon $7 million, and lost; and other candidates also spent massive sums of their own money to no avail. Money is therefore not the automatic key to political victory. As is usual a large bloc of voters abstained from voting, and one wonders why. Were they apathetic, apolitical, disillusioned, or perhaps in need of a new, revolutionary presentation? We can but hope so. One thing is certain. The only clear message that the American working class who voted gave, was: carry on with capitalism. However, nothing is static, the future lies ahead, and the working class have a mission yet to be accomplished.

The 1984 U.S. General Election found eight Democratic Party presidential candidates competing with each other. One would reasonably assume that as they all belong to the same Party, they would more or less be in agreement with each other on basic reformist proposals. Superficially, at any rate, such is not the case. Once again, the ambitious leaders must convey the impression that they as individuals possess the talent, knowledge and charisma to solve problems that have defied their predecessors for well over two centuries.

In a three-hour, nationally televised marathon debate on January 15, 1984 at Dartmouth College, they peddled and argued the same old, time-worn hackeneyed issues. Proposals for reducing budget deficits were aired—but these were vague in content, without specific price tags. Cuts were favored for the military and agricultural programs, as well as holding down health care costs; a raise in taxes was suggested and additions for selected social programs. “Defense,” or rather armament strategies, were debated; a consensus agreed that a woman should receive strong consideration asa running mate. Apparently there was more agreement than controversy on the nuclear weapons freeze issue. The candidates criticized the U.S. military position in Lebanon, but no one volunteered exactly how to get out.

Walter Mondale, the front runner and former vice president, said that he would have a strong and effective policy to deal justly with all workers, businesses and farmers (my emphasis). Does such puerile, evasive nonsense deserve comment? At one point in the debate Mondale was challenged by one of his Party opponents who said, “You cannot lead this country if you have promised everybody everything.” Mondale denied he had done any such thing. Then he added, I think most pointedly, “America is nothing if it isn’t promises. That is what America is about.”

With some modifications, that is what reformism is all about— unfulfilled promises, wasted energy, and prolonged futility.

Running Commentary: The laws of nature? (1984)

The Running Commentary column from the August 1984 issue of the Socialist Standard

The laws of nature?

An established part of what is sometimes called the charm of an English summer is the series of social and sporting events at which the ruling class both disport themselves and demonstrate their privileged standing in capitalist society.

Summer is the time for top hats and elaborate dresses — and elaborate and nonsensical regulations about them — at Royal Ascot. It is the time when a few youths under elaborately hyphenated surnames play out, as if it were some epochal battle, the Eton and Harrow cricket match at Lords. It is the time for royal garden parties, when practised toadies make their way, in rented clothes, to Buckingham Palace to consume a little food and to profess a huge delight should they so much as see, let alone touch or talk to, a royal personage.

These rituals, and the others, are often the subject of both admiration and gentle derision, as if they were no more than harmless eccentricities. We are all assumed to accept them without discomfort as if class divided society, in which a small minority wallow in boundless riches while the useful, working majority grapple endlessly with the pressures and degradations of poverty, exists and operates under some eternal law of nature.

Implied in this expectation is also a warning, for it is a perilous business to go against the laws of nature. Class society must, therefore, be allowed to go on its way unmolested by any talk of a revolution to put the majority into ownership of the world.

For the ruling class this is of course a very comfortable argument for this law of nature sanctions their enjoyment of innumerable costly meals and clothes, of opulent homes and expensive schools for their children. It grants them an enormous consumption of wealth in the production of which, as a class, they have no part. Those who do produce all the wealth — the other class — are also subject to the same law of nature, which allots to them the role of enduring poverty.

Except that it may be described as a stage in human history, there is nothing natural about capitalism. Neither is it eccentric and it is certainly not harmless. It is a malignant society, responsible for an enormous burden of human suffering, all of it unnecessary and which could be abolished in the immediate future. This is the reality behind the season, this annual opportunity for the capitalist class to flaunt their riches before the world and. in that way, to defy the working class to do anything about it.

Directions to Greenham

The embattled women of Greenham were recently visited by Pensioners for Peace, an organisation whose members think like this: “We have seen that two world wars and dozens of localised lesser wars solve nothing"; and "I have six grandchildren and I want a future life for them". Perhaps they were drawn by the popular assumption that the anti-nuclear movement stands for peace; it is common to see car stickers with the CND symbol, against a rainbow background, with the slogan "Give Peace A Chance".

But anyone who wants to give peace a chance should be thinking a long way beyond CND, which has the limited object of persuading the British government to abandon, on its own, its nuclear weapons. CND has no policy for the abandonment of what are called conventional arms, nor for the disbanding of the armed forces or any part of the coercive state machine; indeed it is safe to say that the majority of CND members support the continuance of the state. CND is not a pacifist organisation; its members do not declare that they will oppose all wars and refuse to take part in them on moral grounds. How could it make such a claim, when it is chock-full of members of political parties which always stand up for the interests of the British ruling class when there is a war?

CND does not attempt any analysis of the cause of modern war, which would enable it to pronounce a solution. It opposes the socialist argument that to end war we must undertake a social revolution to bring about a fundamental change in relationships in society. Instead, CND thinks the human race can continue to scratch its way through this social system, with its fear, its destruction, its deprivation. The best it can offer is an effort at humanising some aspects of capitalism—a pious hope that the system will act out of character and begin to fight its wars in a more gentlemanly way.

Pacifists, or anyone who in interested in setting up a world without war, should ponder these facts before they commit themselves to membership of CND. It is true that one of the world's most urgent needs at present is the abolition of nuclear weapons. But this will not be achieved by any methods which allow that capitalism will carry on—by methods which aim at reforming capitalism. These weapons grew up directly as a response to this social system’s needs and its priorities, which are immune to any appeal on the grounds of human interest. They are as typical of the system as buying and selling, rich and poor, privilege and deprivation. Only the abolition of capitalism will end war and all its weapons. Workers everywhere have a united interest on that score and there is an urgent need that they assert it.

Release into slavery

In the first days of July hundreds of prisoners were released before their time, many of them to exchange the rude security of prison life for the state of being homeless, jobless and aimless. Their abrupt transition into freedom resulted from Home Secretary Leon Brittan using his powers to widen the scope of releasing prisoners on parole by reducing the qualifying period for it.

There need be no concern that this came about through any softness on the part of Brittan, than whom a less sentimental man would be difficult to imagine. There are other reasons; importantly a long-standing concern at the chronic overcrowding in prisons, as the numbers behind bars have stayed obstinately above the level described by Roy Jenkins, when he was Home Secretary in the sixties, as “intolerable”.

At the same time the evidence has been piling up to show that, while prison has little effect on crime rates, it is also the most expensive way of dealing with the criminal. The sacred phrase “cost effectiveness” has been heard in the august, secretive chambers of the Home Office. Reforms have been tried — the suspended sentence, the deferred sentence, community service — but the prison population has remained high. This has brought the advocates of cost-effectiveness to their latest solution — to let the prisoners out early, a reform which will of course last as long as the courts don’t fill the prisons up again.

This may not be pleasing to those who regard anyone who has been in prison as a sort of wild animal, unsafe to walk the streets with innocent children and frail pensioners. Neither does it please those who are expected to work within the confines of cost effectiveness — the probation officers and social workers who now have the role of controlling the released prisoners — when all along they have kidded themselves that their job was. inviolably, to put people before the balance sheet.

All such delusions are unhelpful, because they evade the fact that a society based on property rights defines crime in such a way as to protect the privileges of the ruling class, which must always mean against the interests of the majority. In the name of the ruling class a massive historical offence is committed — the offence of exploitation, with all the misery and destruction which it legally entails. Of course this social system puts human welfare very low in its priorities; it could not function in any other way.

No one should be under any misapprehension; those prisoners, happy as they may be at their unexpected change of fortune, have not been released into freedom but into wage slavery.

Woman’s touch

At the end of the spasm of ballyhoo called the primary elections. Walter Mondale went to the Democratic convention with his party’s nomination apparently in his pocket. Of course there might have been some last minute hitch for him; there have been shock nominations in the past and conventions, ungentle occasions where arms are agonisingly twisted and political debts ruthlessly gathered in, are not always predictable.

As Mondale assumed he would be the Democrats’ man against Reagan in November he turned his attention to the matter of who should be his running mate, the Democrat candidate for Vice-President. This is always a complicated, tricky business, more a matter of tightrope walking than arm twisting which Mondale. with his background, should know more about than most people.

The usual object in selecting a running mate is to arrive at a balanced ticket — a pair of candidates who between them appeal to almost every accessible prejudice among the voters. That was why Kennedy, wealthy and sophisticated New England Irish with a reputation as a “liberal", swallowed his antipathy for Lyndon Johnson and asked the coarse, rich, folksy Texan to run with him in 1960. With what results we know.

But if the polls are correct, Mondale has an especially tough job ahead of him. which means that his tightrope walk had to be particularly slick and delicate. Apart from anything else he needs to expunge the workers memory of those ghastly years as Jimmy Carter’s Vice President, when capitalism in America and outside would do hardly anything right for them.

When Mondale let it be known that he was considering selecting a woman he got a plentiful press coverage with admiring profiles of the women concerned, implying that they were something special among the administrators of capitalism. It might be a smart move for the Democrats to put a woman into the field — a touch of excitement and evidence that they are liberal, tolerant and progressive to set against the image of Reagan’s ageing, conventional attitudes.

Any American worker who feels like puking at the sight of Nancy Reagan simpering adoringly at her Ron might have found the thought of the Democrats’ Geraldine Ferraro irresistibly attractive. It is quite common for workers to mistakenly believe that the personality of a candidate is significant.

Now that the Democrats have chosen Ferraro we shall probably hear a lot about the merits of having a woman trying to run capitalism — except that in the time of Golda Meir and Margaret Thatcher there is no need to labour the point that this is no happier nor more fulfilling a society under female leadership than under males.

The selection of the candidates, like the campaign itself, is a matter of cynical deception, as the Democrats and the Republicans try to persuade the American working class that it is worth choosing between two slightly differing styles of running American capitalism. Mondale and Ferraro are intended to present as a seductively handsome couple but if there is any hope in the election it lies with those few who are aware enough to look beneath the facade to the cruel reality.

Madness or sanity

Are there still any fossilised members of the Communist Party who greeted, as a move to safeguard peace, the recent announcement by the Russian “Defence" Minister Ustinov that Russia has increased its missile carrying submarine fleet off the American coast and can now hit American targets within ten minutes?

Ustinov was responding to the siting of American cruise and Pershing missiles in Europe and he warned that any increase in these missiles will lead to a step up in their Russian counterparts. So if World War Three breaks out the missiles from each side will be passing each other on their way to 

their targets and within minutes a large part of the world will be devastated.

Any alarm at this prospect should be tempered by the realisation that this is the deterrent theory in practice — the theory which is supposed to have protected us from war since 1945 and. unless some meddling disarmers take over, will continue to keep us safe. The less gullible will realise that the deterrent theory is really another name for the arms race. And who can guess how this one will end — what unimaginably frightful weapons will yet be developed, what will be left of life if they are used?

The supporters of the deterrent theory respond that its whole point is that the weapons will not be used. If the theory is correct, there will be a lot of hardware left to rust in its siloes; a lot of intricate knowledge will have been devoted to something which will, in effect, be thrown away. And all of this will have happened through a concern, in Moscow and Washington and London, to protect human lives and happiness.

So far, however, capitalism has not worked like that and there is no reason to expect it to. The conflicts which are endemic to this social system are still in existence; the world remains divided into powers in rivalry over markets, material resources, trade routes. This rivalry is the immediate cause of modern war; to understand that is to understand why capitalism expends so much of its resources in the production of such devastating armaments.

In this horrific situation, the best that capitalism's protagonists can offer is a sham debate between the advocates of deterrence and disarmament in which both are in basic agreement that capitalism can somehow be run in the interests of its people. Both, in other words, deny the system's essential character.

The truth is that capitalism cannot operate without war. The function of any state is to foster the interests of its ruling class, which means that governments manufacture — and if need be use — the most destructive weapons available to them. We are now at a point where people all over the world accept, almost without question, the fact that a modern civilisation will produce things which can destroy it within a few minutes. It is tempting to call this madness. except that from capitalism’s viewpoint it has an awful sanity.

God returns to the White House (1984)

From the December 1984 issue of the Socialist Standard

The 1984 US Presidential Election campaign, which seemed to have been going on for ever, is at last over. For some of the hopefuls who fell by the wayside, such as Gary Hart, the run up to 1988 has already begun. (The BBC 9 o'clock News on October 29 called this Life after Mondale — where was the life with Mondale you may ask!) The overwhelming victory of Ronald Reagan had appeared inevitable all through and there is little evidence that the alternative strategics suggested for the Democrats (Jesse Jackson’s “rainbow coalition" being the front runner) would have produced a better result.

Reagan’s victory clearly owed nothing to the brainpower of the candidate; he was clearly reluctant to engage in even the two so-called debates with his opponent. Indeed his performance, stripped of its multi-million dollar showbiz trappings, was more akin to "The President’s Brain Is Missing", that brilliant lampoon from Central TV’s Spitting Image, than the wise pontifications we are taught to expect from those "born to rule”.

Equally it could not be put down to the promises made in the Republican election platform, at least not the sort that appear to offer immediate benefits to workers, such as increased welfare spending or "fair fares" on public transport. Such apparent concern for the workers' plight was noticeably lacking, and any promises made were to increase rather than make good the cuts already made in this area. The charity soup-kitchen and in a few places even the parish workhouse have reappeared as features of American working class life. How can a party with such a record and campaigning on such a platform win such an overwhelming victory? A glance at the areas of the country which voted Republican tells us that very few of those workers who are dependent on the "welfare" programme did vote for Reagan, either in 1980 or this year. A strategy which writes these votes off is certainly brutally cynical, but a winner none the less.

A radio commentator at the Republican convention in Dallas in August put this particular brand of cynicism down to what he termed “compassion fatigue". His viewpoint was that capitalists (not only American ones, of course) have been getting so fed up with the welfare handouts they have been forced to give that they are now flatly refusing to finance any more. Despite all these apparent handouts, however, the queue of the needy is longer than ever. It is very difficult for any party trying to run capitalism, even on a "radical" reformist basis, to counteract this without being wide open to counter-attacks alleging "profligacy”.

Having seen on TV excerpts from the Democrats’ convention in San Francisco in July, it was natural to speculate on how much worse the Republicans could be when their turn came. In the event they comfortably exceeded the grimmest expectations with a degrading display of sycophancy and puerile hero-worship that beggared belief. An especially disturbing thought was that if Reagan’s campaign managers had thought that votes would have been lost by all the ballyhoo they could easily have toned it down. They didn't and their judgement has been proved right. The Times (29 October 1984) referred to his luck with the present trends in the American economy (and luck it is, as capitalism cannot be "managed”) and said: "The other thing most Americans clearly like about Reagan is his unashamed patriotism". Sad as we are that so many workers think this way, this figures. Indeed it parallels the Falklands campaign of two years ago and the way Thatcher used it to improve her poll ratings. That it is Reagan rather than the party he leads that projects this image is shown by the election results viewed as a whole. The other Republican candidates for office had at best only moderate success in clinging to Reagan's coat tails.

Another feature of Ronald Reagan is his tendency to treat really serious issues in a light-hearted vein. This was highlighted by his "joke", cracked during a radio microphone test, about ordering the bombing of Russia. The following extract from The Times says: In a letter due to appear in the September 24 issue of Forbes magazine, Mr Reagan writes: "Granted. I shouldn’t have said it, even though I was sure I was saying it only to the several people who know me well and with whom 1 work. The damage, if any, was due to the worldwide press dissemination."

We should not forget either the union bashing tactics of his administration, typified by the smashing of the air traffic controllers strike. Union membership is now only 18 per cent of the total labour force. Even this does not appear to have lost him votes in the present political climate.

Cartoon by George Meddemmen.

Perhaps the most alarming aspect of the Dallas convention was the light it shed on the activities and influence of the movement known as Moral Majority. This body is one of a number of overlapping forces consisting of politically-minded fundamentalists (Protestants who claim to believe in the literal truth of the Bible). Part of their aims is revealed by a new one of the brood, the American Coalition for Traditional Values. The Times comments: “The title says it all: ‘The coalition parades a strong ‘pro-family' line, is vehemently anti-abortion. wants prayer in school, an emphasis on strong defence and stricter welfare policies. It is opposed to homosexual rights and is against the Equal Rights Amendment that would cement equal rights for women into the constitution.’” (21 August 1984)

Moral Majority, the best financed and most visible of the interlocking groups, is led by Jerry Falwell, a Baptist minister from Lynchbury, Virginia. After a short period of gathering momentum they surfaced in 1980 at two pre-election rallies. In April a “Washington for Jesus" event had overt political overtones. In the late summer a rally in Texas was attended by Ronald Reagan in person, to endorse the aims of the movement. The day after the 1980 election Moral Majority claimed credit for supporting Reagan and backing some extreme right wing candidates who won election to Congress. They argued that in the two previous presidencies there had been a moral decline which had seen "liberals, humanists and leftists conspire to take God out of public life”. (“The New Christian Right"—article in Encyclopaedia Britannica Book of the Year 1981 by Martin E. Marty.) Although a religious man himself, Marty easily disposes of Majority’s claim to speak for any silent majority which they may say exists, and mentions highly personalised scandals in which some of its prominent members have been associated.

Between elections the efforts of Majority and their allies carried on at a more local level. The Encyclopedia Britannica Book of the Year 1982 reported "an alarming increase in demands for the removal of books and material from schools and libraries. Many of the books being questioned dealt with American history, feminism and racial attitudes." The Majority also claimed to be monitoring television programmes allegedly for “sexual, profane and violent content”.

The election campaign of 1984 found Moral Majority in the Republican party’s machinery and working hard to register "Christian" voters. Jerry Falwell delivered the benediction at Reagan's formal nomination, his “coronation” as some dubbed it. Support for Majority’s views has been expressed during the campaign by the Roman Catholic hierarchy, through the Archbishop of New York’s intervention against Geraldine Ferraro on the abortion issue, and the Mormon Church. At Dallas, The Times (21 August 1984) reported, “some observers are concerned at what they regard as a mix of politics and religion that is growing uglier”. Four days later the same newspaper was clearly disturbed at the surfacing of “a style of anti-communism that the Republicans have not worn since 1964". The Republican Party may not have been responsible for dubbing Russia as "socialist”, but they have certainly taken advantage of the seeds of confusion sowed by the Bolsheviks to commit some monstrous crimes of their own. We need only recall the activities of the late Senator Joseph McCarthy and the Un- American Activities Committee. It appears all too likely that another attack of this deadly disease is imminent.

All this suggests that there is a considerable danger of something akin to the Fascism of the 1930s emerging in the USA. It is to be hoped that American workers will not make the mistake of thinking that things could have been much different had Mondale been elected president. The same forces would have exerted the same pressures at local and national levels as at present. The hope lies in a greater participation by the American working class in the democratic process, to establish socialism.

E.C. Edge

For Carter and Ford—Read Capitalism (continued) (1976)

From the November 1976 issue of the Socialist Standard

Arch-reactionary Barry Goldwater, who was for all-out war in Vietnam in 1964 when Johnson was still regarded as a “dove”, is supporting Ford. This is taken as an indication of how far to the “right” Republican sentiments have moved. The lines of demarcation between so-called “liberal” and “conservative” are entirely imaginary. Those who fondly regard themselves as liberal regard Carter as a liberal, and the conservatives think he is one of them. The balancing trick of appearing to be all things to all men is the essence of the capitalist politician.

All the polls indicate that people vote on the candidate’s personality rather than his policies. They want to know how steady his finger would be on the button. . . .
(Sunday Times 22nd August 1976)

Since differences in their policies need to be searched for with a large magnifying glass, “personality” becomes the only means of telling t’other from the which. There is no conception as yet in the minds of the American working class, of a world without “the button”. This lack of any penetration beyond the reformist spectrum is something they share with their fellow sufferers throughout the world.

Running Walter

Carter’s running mate, Senator Walter Mondale, is reported as saying:

in the whole range of human problems I’ve dealt with in my 12 years in the Senate — hunger, housing, labour, Indian education, migrant workers, children, ageing — I keep getting back to one thing; the strength of the family.

A nice piece of side-stepping, but what about the problems? The choice of running mate is a shabby bit of expediency aimed at “balancing the ticket” (vote-catching). Mondale is rated a liberal, and this has focussed attention on spending. Are people opposed to spending as such or only to wasteful government spending? Do people want less government or better government? “The opinion polls show total ideological confusion”. (Guardian, 17th July 1976.) The opinion pollsters ask only a limited range of questions, designed to sound out what is popularly expected of capitalism. Workers are not asked to consider and discuss the nature and extent of waste under capitalism, or the desirability of a world run democratically, without government.

In 1967 Mondale made a speech supporting Johnson’s Vietnam policy. Four years later, he told an interviewer that it was

a painful speech . . .  I think the worst mistake I’ve made in public life is to be a slow learner on Vietnam. This has been the most tragic mistake this country has ever made . . .  and I share part of that blame, and the record is there, I’m not proud of it.

(Guardian, 17th July 1976)

Mondale supports capitalism but pukes at its most brutal outcome. Here is no condemnation of war, but a slow learner realizing a tragic mistake. Any capitalist politician in power, who refused to endorse a war involving “national interests” would be forced out. The Labour Party in Britain has spawned many “slow learners” about war, who have rallied to the flag when the time came.

The Black vote

Carter is wooing the votes of America’s black workers with promises to put “more than one” black in the cabinet. There are the traditional “black jobs” in the echelons of administration, and black Congressmen, but there has yet to be a black man in the government. The Democratic convention of 1964 in Atlantic City, which nominated Johnson, had an all-white segregationist delegation from Mississippi. This year a new image is being put over. Andrew Young, an influential black Congressman, is working to get Carter the black vote. If it were a solution of problems for people to be the same colour as those in power, then white workers would have had all their problems solved long ago. So would the black workers living under black dictatorships in Africa. Incidentally, it is fear of Russian “infiltration” in Africa that prompts Ford to send Kissinger to put pressure on the South African government to help bring about majority rule in Rhodesia. Kissinger is obviously thick-skinned enough to ignore America’s own brutal record of racism. America has its own style of apartheid and ghetto living. Though not backed by legislation, the effect is the same.

Issue

Senator Moss of Utah, who is chairman of the Senate Committee investigating alleged fraud and abuse in the Medicaid programme for the poor, sent out a team of snoopers who made more than two hundred visits during four months in eight cities. (Investigating fraud is a form of waste peculiar to capitalism.) They found that patients usually get substandard care whether they need attention or not. Cases were reported of patients in need of care going untreated and X-rays being taken without film in the machines. In Los Angeles a woman who handed in a mixture of a soapy water was told her “urine sample” was normal.

Medicaid was started in 1965 to provide medical facilities for 20,000,000 poor Americans. Eligibility varies from place to place. In New York, you need a family of four and an income of less than $5,000 a year. Some doctors are making more than $100,000 out of fiddles. More than half the delegates at the Republican convention were in the $30,000 income bracket.

Ford and Carter and (if capitalism remains) those who succeed them, will be promoting more reforms to sort out the mess produced by past reforms in the vain attempt to reduce the running expenses of capitalism. The poor and their problems will still be here.

Issue — What Issue?

The governor of California, Edmund (Jerry) Brown Junior, who was a rival candidate to Carter for the nomination, is to give Carter all the help he can. Governor Brown, a former Jesuit Seminarian, says that Catholic misgivings about Carter are “overblown and inaccurate”. Asked if he would run again in 1980 Brown said:

I’m not even sure I’ll run for Governor again. I may even retire to the monastery to figure out what this is all about.

As both Carter and Ford are bible-belters, God is put in a difficult position rather like that of wartime, with both sides praying for victory. In his “infinite wisdom”, he has the consolation of knowing it will make no difference either way. Farcical though the whole thing is, it is too tragic to be funny.

As Socialists, we often observe when an election takes place in the UK that the “manifestos” of all parties other than the SPGB are so closely similar that if the names were blanked out they would be virtually indistinguishable. Although we have been dealing with the American Presidential election, capitalism and its absurdities are so similar all over the world, we could change the names and be dealing with almost any other country.

How much longer we will have to live in the suffocating atmosphere produced by a politically ignorant working class is the real question of our times. Socialists, however, have good grounds for optimism. Nothing demonstrates the bankruptcy of our opponents better than an election, and we have the only workable answer to their system of chaos and misery.

Socialism will be a classless world community, democratically administered without leaders, Presidents, or governments. Production will be geared to meeting human need, on the basis of free access. The privileged private or state property institutions of capitalism will make way for communal interest and cooperation. Money, wages and profits will be no more. Thus, every “issue” being bandied about during the Presidential election campaign will disappear, never to be seen again.

Harry Baldwin

Making of a candidate (1984)

From the May 1984 issue of the Socialist Standard

President Andrew Jackson (1829-1837) is widely credited with having democratised American politics. Reforms initiated about this time led to party conventions taking over as the vehicle for the selection of presidential candidates. Each state sends delegates, mostly pledged to vote for a particular candidate although some are uncommitted. In fact this was not as successful as had been hoped. Control of state delegates fell into the hands of party bosses, the most notorious of whom were those who ran Tammany Hall, the headquarters of the Democrats in New York. This put into a key position another class of professional politicians who expected and received patronage from political hopefuls whose path to power they smoothed. A major reason for the advance of the primary system was that it struck a blow at these state bosses.

The primary system varies from state to state, with a number still mandating their delegates through a party caucus. Others hold closed primaries where the voter is required to register as a member of the party before voting. Some have open primaries where the voter selects the primary ballot for and then can choose candidates from that list only. In a few, however, the names of all candidates from all parties are printed on the ballot and the voter can cross party lines. This gives the process the trappings of democracy. However the graft, corruption and scandals of the heyday of the party bosses are still remembered.

Very little has been heard this year of Republican primaries, as Ronald Reagan has finally decided to stand for re-election. Not since 1912, when William Howard Taft dispensed patronage ad lib to beat off a challenge from Theodore Roosevelt, only to be beaten out of sight when Roosevelt stood as a third party candidate, has an incumbent president had any real difficulty in securing the nomination of his party. While recent opinion polls have shown Gary Hart running ahead of Reagan, these are still early days. Comparison with the British election last June shows what a difficult task the Democratic hopefuls face this year. It has even been suggested that this is the reason that Edward Kennedy has opted out this time. While the upturn in the American economy is extremely modest it is a weapon that Reagan will use for all he is worth. Although in earlier times relative unknowns arriving at the convention with little support sometimes were chosen as compromise candidates when deadlock between the main contenders could not be resolved, this again hasn’t happened for some time. Now that they no longer follow an isolationist policy, American capitalists are much more concerned with their image abroad. They do not want a repeat of the Teapot Dome scandal which finished Warren Gamaliel Harding, the last of the old-style compromise candidates to reach the White House. Their recent "bad luck” with Richard Nixon and Spiro Agnew is still fresh in their memory.

The Democrats’ choice to face the president in November thus appears to boil down to three, one of whom is already looking like an outsider. He is the demagogue Jesse Jackson, who draws attention to the disadvantages which negro workers suffer even in comparison with their oppressed white fellow wage slaves. Jackson claims that the election of a black president can fundamentally alter this situation. This is dangerous nonsense. The special problems of the negroes arise from their being an easily distinguished minority within the oppressed class of the capitalist system. Ignorant workers pick on them as scapegoats for the evils they experience which are in fact an integral part of the system itself. Jackson in directing his appeal to such a degree to negro prejudices, however understandable these may be, risks inflaming these passions, thus doing the class a considerable disservice. The votes he has collected thus far have come almost entirely from black areas and his appeal seems too narrow to give him a real chance. He might just acquire some bargaining power if it is a close call in the San Francisco convention this summer.

Walter Mondale is the candidate most favoured by party workers and those city bosses still with influence, such as those who control the famous Cook County in Chicago. This in itself is no guarantee of selection. The darlings of the faithful are not necessarily the best winners of uncommitted votes. One of the reasons for the existence of the more open type of primary is to gain some indication of the winning potential of the candidates. The system is not fool proof in this respect, as was shown by the candidacy of the backwoodsman Barry Goldwater for the Republicans in 1964. However it would be incorrect to class Mondale as the Democrats’ 1984 equivalent of Goldwater. Mondale's association with the Carter administration has led to insinuations that he is a “yesterday's man”, and he has made no real attempt to dissociate himself from the former president. While the Democrats have never claimed to be a socialist party, since the era of Franklin Roosevelt they have performed many of the functions the Labour Party carries out in Britain. Like Labour, the Democratic Party has relied to a large extent for its vote on the less well off sections of the working class, and most American cities vote Democrat just as they usually vote Labour here. Mondale realises the need to hold on to this traditional support. As The Times reports (22 March 1984):

Mr Mondale won the Illinois primary the old fashioned way by piling up a big margin in white working class areas of Chicago, and then performing better than expected in the suburbs and down state. He also won a majority of the Hispanic vote and held on to those blacks who were not mesmerized by Mr Jackson’s vision of a "rainbow coalition”.

Mondale has also widespread support inside the trade unions. It is of little importance whether in achieving this working class support he has acted as a conscious deceiver or as an honest but rather ignorant individual. Either way it is the stuff of which presidents are made.

Gary Hart burst onto the scene a few weeks ago, apparently from nowhere, promising sweeping new' deals both inside the Democratic Party and in the USA at large. When this “new" approach is examined much of the cosmetic glitter fades. The Times (10 March 1984) had a feature article on “What Makes The Maverick Hart Tick". In this we read:

   Arguing that "the pragmatism of the new deal has become doctrine”. Mr Hart says the US must find a way to move from the economy of the past to the economy of the future, an economy not only expanding but which can meet the challenges of increased international competition and rapid technological change.
  He is an advocate of an "industrial policy" in which the Government would take the lead in bringing business and labour together to work out the nation's industrial strategy.

and later:

   He believes that the burgeoning cost of social entitlement programmes, such as Medicare and Medicaid, must be restrained, not simply through cuts but by putting more emphasis on preventive medicine and home care.
   On most economic issues Mr Hart has tried to emphasize the need to examine how government money is spent rather than how much. He believes the economic debate between Republicans and Democrats has become bogged down between those who favour fiscal generosity and those on the side of frugality.

This is just a sample of what Professor Samuel Beer of Harvard calls Hart’s "ideological mishmash". This is the confused groping of the politically ignorant, distinguished only by the inevitable concern for capitalism’s welfare. Hart fails to distinguish the old from the new in politics. Indeed we have now reached the stage when there are no new options for capitalism to try, only regurgitations of old, and Hart scarcely seems the best equipped to find the least sickly mixture. No wonder Hart’s star is now emitting a much dimmer light.

Nevertheless, barring real surprises, either Hart or Mondale will win through to oppose Reagan in the autumn. Certain Reagan is far from invincible. His track record on welfare, the US term for social services, is callous even by capitalist standards. The soup kitchen and the church mission, both of which many though had gone for good, have made a big comeback in the wake of the cuts imposed by the Reagan government. But could the Democrats take advantage of this? It would scarcely suffice merely to promise redress, as everyone knows that increased "public expenditure” (actually taxation on the capitalists) would be required. In the present climate few dare to advocate this. Still fewer will advocate a serious reduction in the US arms arsenal. No wonder voting in American elections is so low, particularly in deprived inner city areas. While many have fallen prey to apathy and despair a sizeable number are through with voting for capitalist parties, period.

E. C. Edge