Break
with the Democrats and Republicans! Form
a Workers Party!
An
interview with Wolf Larsen
from the book Capitalism Sucks!
Question: Do you support the Republicans or the
Democrats?
Answer: Neither!
The Democrats and Republicans are pretty much the same! The Democrats talk a lot of pretty words
about helping working-class people, blacks, Latinos, and women. But after they get elected the Democrats
pretty much do the same as the Republicans.
The Democrats voted for the Patriot Act just like the Republicans, so
the Democrats are attacking our civil liberties just like the Republicans. The Democrats in Congress voted for two wars
at the same time – Iraq and Afghanistan – so you can see the Democrats are
warmongers just like the Republicans.
The Democrats vote for hundreds of billions of dollars a year for the
war machine just like the Republicans.
Q.
But don't you think you we should support our troops?
A. The same politicians that talk about
supporting our troops are the same politicians that cut medical spending for
veterans. The politicians – both
Democrat and Republican – use rhetoric about supporting our troops in order to
launch all their endless wars. The best
way to support our young people is to give them a free college education or job
training skills. Let's stop sending our
young people into war! If the
politicians want war then let's send all the politicians themselves into war,
and let's bring all the troops home. I
hear a lot of soldiers are sick of being in the armed forces – they've been
called back to Iraq and Afghanistan so many times that they're sick and tired
of war. They thought they were going to
defend our country, but instead they find themselves getting shot at in order
to further the interests of oil corporations in Iraq or the interests of a
corrupt government in Afghanistan.
Q.
So you're a pacifist then?
A. No.
But these wars only serve the interests of the privileged few, and those
privileged few are not the ones doing the fighting and the dying.
Q. I
see, but since you say you're not a pacifist, which wars do you support?
A. The Civil War to smash the Confederacy and
the War for American Independence are the only wars I support.
Q.
Not the Second World War?
A. By the time the American troops landed on the
shores of Normandy the Soviet Union was already kicking the ass of Nazi
Germany. The American entry into the
Second World War was more about stopping the Soviet Union from liberating all
of Europe.
Q.
So you seem to be arguing that the Democrats are warmongers as you call
them. But many people view the Democrats
as historically being the party of peace – how do you answer that?
A. The Democrats market themselves as the party
of peace in order to get more votes and fool the people, but their actions
after they get elected are no different than the Republicans. It was the Democrats that got us into both
World Wars I and II, it was the Democrats that dropped the atomic bomb on
Hiroshima and Nagasaki, it was the Democrats that escalated the war in
Vietnam. The Democrat John F. Kennedy
attempted to invade Cuba and brought the world to the brink of a nuclear
holocaust during the Cuban missile crisis.
The Democrats may talk peace, but they are warmongers just like the
Republicans. The Democrats are war
criminals just like the Republicans. The
Democrats have blood on their hands just like the Republicans.
Q.
But the Democrats have put up a black man as candidate for President. A woman – Hillary Clinton – almost became a
presidential candidate for the Democrats as well. Isn't that significant?
A. No it's not.
We've been through this before – we've had black mayors, black judges,
black cops, etc. The black mayors and black judges and black cops have pretty
much done the same as the white mayors and the white judges and the white
cops. I don't think a black President
will be any different than a white President.
The rich people will keep on getting richer, and everybody else will
continue getting poorer. And these wars
are never going to stop as long as the Republicans and Democrats are in
power. You mentioned that the Democrats
put up a woman for President – or nearly put up a woman up for President – but
England has already been through that.
They had Margaret Thatcher, and she was as ruthless as any man! She attacked unions just like male
politicians, launched wars just like male politicians in the Malvinas or
Falkland Islands, and attacked the poor and social programs just like male politicians.
Q.
But there's at least one difference between the Democrats and the Republicans –
the Democrats are more for workers and for the poor – isn't that true?
A. No it's not.
The Democrats are union busters just like the Republicans. Democrats will call in the police and even
the National Guard to break your picket lines and escort scabs into your
workplace just like the Republicans.
Hillary Clinton, who was supported by many union bureaucrats in the last
Democratic primaries, well she supports union busting legislation like the
Taylor act, which makes it illegal for many workers like the transit workers in
New York to go on strike. And as for the
poor it was under the last Democratic administration in the White House – Bill
Clinton – that welfare was replaced with slavefare. It was the last Democratic administration in
the White House that ended welfare as we know it, and cut off many poor women
and children from the welfare rolls.
Q.
But the Democrats are more for women, aren't they?
A. No.
The Democrats in the White House have come and gone and we still don't
have equal pay for equal work. And how
about free quality child care for all working women? The Democrats haven't delivered that, they're
not even talking about it! Why shouldn't
working women have free quality child care, they pay taxes don't they? But instead all we get for our endless taxes
is endless wars and more wars, and also our taxes pay to keep over 2 million
Americans behind prison bars every night because of the war on drugs. And by the way it was the Democrats under
Clinton – the last Democratic administration in the White House – that presided
over the biggest buildup of prisons in American history!
Q.
So if you don't support the Democrats and the Republicans who do you support? Do you support the Green Party?
A. No I don't support the Green Party. The Democrats and Republicans put
corporations before working people. The
Green Party puts animals before working people!
(Laughs) The Green Party and its
kind are more concerned about the rights of some dog than they are about the
rights of a working person – these so-called left-wing liberals put dogs above
the working person.
Q.
Left-wing liberals put dogs above the working person? Don't you think that's a slight exaggeration
– or a big exaggeration?
A. Maybe, a slight exaggeration. (Laughs)
But you know, there's a certain type of liberal that gets on people's
nerves. They're all holier than thou
with their political correctness, and they're so sexually puritanical with
their political correctness that they sound just like the conservative
Republicans that they're always criticizing.
And on top of that they're gentrifying our inner cities and driving up
the price of rent!
Q.
So if you don't like the Green Party who do you like? What kind of political party would you
support?
A. We need a workers party! A party that will fight for all working class
people – regardless of race, gender, sexual preference, religion, national
origin, etc. We need a workers party – a
political party that will fight for quality free medical care for everyone,
quality affordable housing for everyone, equal pay for equal work, equality for
black people, equal rights for homosexuals and immigrants, a decent free
education for all, double the minimum wage...
Q.
Double the minimum wage? Are you
crazy? The Democrats just raised minimum
wage 50%. If we raised minimum wage
again wouldn't that hurt the economy?
A. It would certainly hurt the profits of the
big corporations and the rich people, but it would be beneficial to poor
workers – the people who need it most.
Everyone who works deserves a decent salary! If people are working for miserly wages
there's a name for that: wage slavery. And
if paying working-class people a decent wage isn't good for the economy then we
need a different kind of economy – we need the kind of economy that pays
working people decent wages, where quality medical care is free for all, where
everyone has the right to quality affordable housing, everybody has the right
to a job, and where there's equal pay for equal work.
Q. But
that all sounds like pie in the sky – how do you propose to have the kind of
society where people make decent wages, everyone has free quality medical care,
and everyone has quality affordable housing?
A. It would take a revolution – a workers
revolution.
Q.
But wouldn't that be violent? Wouldn't there be lots of bloodshed?
A. Well, if the rich people all just said you
workers are right, we've been screwing you too long, and so we'll give up our
power and our money, and we'll let you working people run the show – well in
that case there wouldn't be any bloodshed.
Q.
Well isn't that kind of naïve – to expect the rich people to just voluntarily
give up their wealth and power?
A. It sure is!
A workers government will have to defend itself against violent elements
who don't want to give up their wealth and power to the working-class
majority. All governments are
instruments of class oppression. Either
rich people oppress workers, or the workers oppress the rich people.
Q.
But hasn't that manner of thinking gone out of style? I mean the Soviet Union collapsed didn't it?
A. The Soviet Union was governed by a bunch of
Stalinist hacks – it's amazing that the Soviet Union survived as long as it
did! And under a planned economy the
working-class people in the Soviet Union were far better off than they are
today in capitalist Russia.
Q.
But things in Russia are improving – aren't they?
A. Lately things are improving because the price
of oil is up up up! The Soviet Union
exports a lot of oil and gas. But even
with oil and gas exports bringing in lots of money most workers were far better
off under the Soviet Union than they are in capitalist Russia. The standard of living of workers was higher,
the people had free medical care, the people had affordable housing, they had
pensions, they had the right to a job...
Q.
But don't you think freedom is more important than material things?
A. Do the people in capitalist Russia have
freedom today? God forbid that a Russian
should criticize the new czar of capitalist Russia! The news media has little freedom. Political parties are being repressed...
Q.
But isn't that the way it was in the old Russia – I mean the ex-Soviet Union?
A. Yes.
So when Russia went capitalist the workers lost the right to a job, the
right to affordable housing, the right to free medical care, and lots of other
things too – but they never had freedom of speech under the old Stalinist system
and they don't have freedom of speech under the new capitalist system either. What we need is a workers democracy – not a
Stalinist bureaucracy like there was in the Soviet Union. And the fact that workers in capitalist
Russia have little freedom today is proof that capitalism does not bring
democracy. In fact, here in the USA we
have less democracy every year. More and
more our country feels like a bipartisan dictatorship of the rich.
"Build a Workers Party!" from my YouTube channel SucksCapitalism:
Buy the book Capitalism Sucks on Amazon or other online retailers,
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You can also click on whatever chapter you wish listed
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