Democrats: "Mondale, I guess."

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SOCIALIST ACTION JULY 1984 A1 union, and religious figures was set up in El Salvador as part of John Kennedy's Alliance for Progress, with secret preparatory seminars held after the Declaration of San Jose in 1963. "Communism," John Kennedy instructed six Central American heads of state, "is the chief obstacle to economic development in the Central American region."

United States military and intelligence officials created and christened Orden, the paramilitary apparatus which permeated the countryside with a network of executioners whom they coordinated down to the village level. Under John F. Kennedy, Lyndon Johnson and Jimmy Carter, Mano Blanco operated with impunity, liquidating close to 100,000 people-not 50,000 as reported in the bourgeois press.

Democratic administrations, from Kennedy's onward, have been obsessed globally with counterrevolution on the cheap, the better to reduce deficits while operating repression more efficiently. In El Salvador, another benefit of the celebrated liberal program of the Alliance for Progress was the setting up of ANSESAL by Kennedy personnel. "An elite presidential intelligence service, it gathered facts on Salvadoran dissidents. Death squads were the 'operative arm of intelligence gathering,' " stated Nairn in the the Progressive.

High-ranking U.S. intelligence officials were assigned by consecutive Democratic administrations from Kennedy through Carter to earmark specifically those to be murdered by El Salvador's death squads:

"They supplied ANSESAL, the security forces, and the general staff with electronic, photographic, and personal surveillance of the individuals who were later assassinated by death squads. According to Col. Nicolas Carranza, director of the Salvadoran Treasury "The people of this country have got to get that Presidency back," says Walter Mondale, the frontrunning contender for the Democratic nomination for president, "and get a President in that White House who knows what it's like to be a working person, and is on the side of working men and women."

Mondale's rote repetition of the standard Democratic Party assertion to be the party of working people contains one truthful, if inadvertent, admission-it is working people who will determine the success or failure of the Democratic Party's challenge to Republican President Ronald Reagan.

But a Democratic Party victory over Reagan will not signify a victory for working people. Beneath the veneer of the Democratic Party "alternative" now being marketed for the November election lies the big-business program of austerity and militarism that is in essence identical to the policy of Keagan.

Once again workers are being asked to buy the "lesser evil" of a Democratic administration as the solution to their needs. Walter Mondale intends to conjure up the image of a real alternative by pressing three major issues in his campaign against Reagan. The first issue, as the media pundits put it, is the "fairness question" —that Reagan's policies have hurt the poor and benefited the rich. Secondly, Mondale wants to give the impression that the world will be a safer place if he is elected; that the threat of war will be reduced if Reagan's bellicose policies are turned out of office. The third issue is the huge budget deficits, which Reagan had I HUNT Walter F. Mondale promised to curtail once in office.

On all counts Mondale's "alternative" falls apart. Mondale, the "politician's politician," is a seasoned pro at promising everything and delivering nothing. It was not so long ago that Carter and Mondale made the same promises in 1976 to promote the interests of working people, minorities, and women against the openly anti-labor program of Republican Gerald Ford.

But what happened? In 1976, CarterMondale promised more jobs, but all the unemployed got was a jobs bill named after Mondale's mentor, Hubert Humphrey, that did not create a single job, while unemployment continued to increase.

Carter-Mondale promised to cut the defense budget by $5 billion to $7 billion annually, but by 1980 they were proposing to spend a thousand billion dollars (a trillion dollars) over the next five years for defense.

Carter-Mondale talked about the need for a national health program. And that is what we got—a lot of talk— as medical costs skyrocketed and Medicare and Medicaid programs were cut back.

Carter-Mondale pledged to back the Equal Rights Admendment, but did next to nothing as the ERA went down to defeat, while gutting "costly" affirmative action programs and encouraging attacks on the right to abortion.

Carter-Mondale promised more funds for the cities and schools but that was nothing more than an empty campaign promise. The acute crisis in housing, jobs, education, and transportation has continued to worsen under both Carter and Reagan.

Carter-Mondale assured the labor movement that they would find a sympathetic ear in the White House, but their real sympathies were revealed when they intervened on the side of the employers during the United Mine Workers strike in 1978, invoking the Taft-Hartley act in an attempt to break the strike.

Remember "human rights"?

What about the new "human rights" foreign policy proclaimed by CarterMondale in 1976? Translated into real life this meant reassuring the shah of Iran of U.S. support the day after the shah gunned down thousands of people in the streets of Teheran on Sept. 8, 1978. "Human rights" meant urging (continued on page A4)

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Wing class: "A program that promises to successors and are responsible to son's objectives, and each avows that reincorporate in our capitalistic culture nobody. They treat the nation as an only matters of tactics divide them. so many Americans who are presently exclusive whorehouse designed for their promoted by Walter Mondale and Gary alienated...to discharge blue-collar comfort and kicks. The president of Hart. Jesse Jackson has delared his sup- anger. Defusing blue-collar anger can these United States, in their private Ezra Pound once wrote that the techport for the "land reform program in El help cut down strikes and absenteeism nique of infamy is to invent two lies and and result in more efficient perform- G. William Domhoff described the get people arguing heatedly over which Walter Mondale's chief de-sensitizer ance. This will reflect in greater produc- Republican and Democratic parties in a one of them is true. Eugene Debs had is Harold Brown, who is, in Alexander similar succinct fashion: "A Property different counsel. "It is far better," he Cockburn's apt phrase, "the father and Party with two branches is one of the told working people during the election the mother of MX." But he is more than that. Brown, as the Russell Tribunal on U.S. war crimes in Indochina documented, organized the saturation CL RISING ABOUT IT? bombing of Indochina in his capacity as secretary of the Air Force under LynBrown was responsible for the selection of the bacteriological weapons, which included plague bacteria with which the fragments of fragmentation bombs were impregnated; gases which "America is run largely by and for about five thousand people." explode the pupils of the eye; phosphorus and napalm. Harold Brown was -Robert Townsend, president of American Express and Avis Corp. also secretary of Defense under Jimmy Carter and prepared not only the Rapid Deployment Force but the plans for the role of the Democratic party when neatest devices ever stumbled upon by campaigns, "to support what you want U.S. intervention in El Salvador, which The said: "Unless some program is devel- rich men determined to stay on top. It and not get it, than to support what you were first formulated in detail under Hoped to accomplish this, we face a social gives them a considerable flexibility, upheaval that goes beyond the moderate allowing them to form temporary coali- There is a fallacy often repeated that Another of Walter Mondale's advis- changes called for by the McGovern tions with different elements of the reforms can be obtained from a more ers has also advised Gary Hart. He is program and threatens the profitability underlying population as the occasion moderate or more reasonable wing of Cyrus Vance, the secretary of State of business, if not the very fabric of our demands." (Fat Cats and Democrats, the ruling class. In fact, historically, under Jimmy Carter. But Cyrus Vance reforms have taken place in the United was also General Counsel to the Penta- This is the heart of the matter and it States when an independent political gon from 1961 to 1962, secretary of the The Communist Party, Jerry Rubin, is why those who succumb to "lesser movement of the dispossesed or the Army from 1962 to 1963, and deputy- Abbie Hoffman, and virtually all evil" temptations are serving the role of widespread disaffection of the exploited secretary of Defense from 1964 to 1967. organs of the radical movement and the legitimizers of capitalist rule and are have threatened the political monopoly During his reign, the U.S. Air Force "socialist intelligentsia" stampeded the providing it with protective coloration. dropped the equivalent in tonnage of Black and antiwar movement into sup- "Despite the social and economic Paradoxically, the very limited two Hiroshima bombs every week in porting the McGovern campaign in hardships suffered by hundreds of mil- reforms invoked by advocates of supVietnam. This involved more tonnage in 1972, as they had that of Eugene lions of Americans over the past one port for lesser evil politics only occur the period of nine months than was used hundred years, the power elite has been when there is movement independent of during the entire Second World War Never mind that Wilbur Mills of able to contain demands for a steady capitalist parties. Only when the ruling Arkansas, the Pentagon's chief protago- job, fair wages, good pension and effec- class feels the need to palliate and coThis perhaps illuminates why "Mr. nist in Congress, was McGovern's secre- tive healthcare within very modest lim- opt does it make concessions. Reforms Human Rights" Jimmy Carter, as gov- tary of the Treasury-designate. Never its. One of the most important factors are a reflection of the strategy of surernor of Georgia, declared a Lt. Calley mind that Arthur M. Okun, chairman in maintaining those limits has been the vival and are withdrawn the moment the day in Georgia after the My Lai massa- of the Council of Economic Advisors Democratic Party. The party dominates movement has been deflected back into cre. In his race for governor, Carter under Lyndon Johnson, was George the left alternative in this country and the arms of the ruling order. Witness to promised to bring the politics of George McGovern's nominee for a comparable the sophisticated rich want to keep it this are the gains of the Civil Rights Wallace to Georgia. He called Lester post in his own administration.

Maddox "his political model." The Arthur Okun wrote in the New York Jesse Jackson's contribution has been Ironically, even the bourgeois Atlanta Constitution labeled Carter's Times that under his direction, the eco- to arouse expectations and to prepare reforms invoked as a debate for supadvisers the "stink tank," after the nomic policies of the McGovern presi- for illusions as he marshalls Black sup- porting the Democrats will only occur Constitution published a fake photo dency would guarantee that "corporate port for the One Big Property Party. It as a movement escapes their control. which Carter had fabricated of his profits would continue to rise through is not surprising, since Operation Push Nothing better teaches us, therefore, gubernatorial opponent with his arms 1974 [and] would reflect his desire for organized franchises for Burger King in that elections provide an opportunity to around a Black farmer. The doctored healthy advances in private investment Little Rock, Ark., and arranged for Bill pose a working-class alternative and to photo was distributed by Carter and corporate after-tax income." (Aug. Cosby to sponsor Coca Cola. Little else challenge capitalist hegemony. The can be cited beyond such corporate greater evil is to postpone our task yet This is why the chairman of Chase services. Andrew Young, a member of again. For the longer we wait, the Manhattan, David Rockefeller, assigned the Trilateral Commission, shares JackChase Manhattan director Patricia From 1964 to 1965 Gary Hart was Roberts Harris, to be credentials chairdirector of a section of the internal secu- man of the 1972 Democratic convenrity division of the U.S. Department of AcTioN tion-the same Harris who represented Justice. This division, it should be State Department policy in Central recalled, "monitored Communist front organizations." It reviewed orders by the Subversive Activities Control Board (SACB), and designated groups as "Communist infiltrated." (The Nation, The Democratic Party has controlled the presidency or the Congress for 44 Hart calls for a "real increase" in out of 50 years. Since 1880, every major defense spending, advocating "small spokesperson for both parties has aircraft carriers," which cost as much as asserted that the primary task of corpothe big ones. He is supported by the rate capital is to secure hegemony over energy industry, the electronics industry and the banks, who have contributed Since 1945, 15 million people have died in colonial wars, a direct conseAs manager of George McGovern's quence of the disappearance of an anticampaign in 1972, Hart told the New capitalist movement after World War II.

York Times: "Our strategy all along was The dissolution of the left into the folds to co-opt the left." (May 9, 1972) of liberal corporatism was led by the The economic spokesperson for Communist Party and its coterie of libGeorge McGovern's presidential cam- erals and left intellectuals during the paign, as managed by Hart, was Robert K. Liston, former chief executive of the In the aftermath of World War II, Transcontinental Investing Corporation. U.S. capitalism was able to reconstruct In an article for the New York Times capitalist Europe under the Democratic (Aug. 13, 1972) Liston "made perfectly Party as a market for U.S. production clear" what George McGovern repre- and a barrier to revolution. Thus it was sented: "It is one of his fundamental the dissolution of the left through economic beliefs that the strength of the default which allowed the present American economy is due mainly to the calamity wherein 2 percent of the popudynamic growth of the private sector led lation owns 87 percent of the wealth in by corporations and other business. It is the United States and averages 14 corsound public policy to create the condi- porate directorships per person. tions for business to function effec- Robert Townsend, the president of American Express and of Avis Corp., Liston spelled out the central theme put it this way in his book Up the of the McGovern campaign as one of Organization: "America is run largely co-option, the touchstone of Gary by and for about five thousand people.

Hart's self-proclaimed utility to the rul- The five thousand appoint their own A2 SOCIALIST ACTION JULY 1984 ...Democrats (continued from page Al)

view, is head towel boy."

Salvador."

tivity and profit."

Liston set out for all eyes to see KEAGANOMICS HAS BROUGHT WHAT DOES REAGAN KUNAWAY DEFICITS, ROPOSE TO DO UNEMPLOYMENT, ÷ AND A DEEPENING NOTHING!

RECESSION

don Johnson.

Jimmy Carter.

capitalist society." page 29)

McCarthy before him.

throughout the Pacific theater.

that way." (ibid) 23, 1972) throughout rural Georgia.

Hart's "new ideas"

America under Jimmy Carter.

Both parties support capital March 31, 1984) Boston Socialist Action P.O. Box 1046 GMF Boston, MA 02205 Buftalo Socialist Action world markets. P.O. Box 275 Buffalo, N.Y. 14207 generously to his campaign.

Chicago Socialist Actior Box 80 B 2520 N. Lincoln Chicago, IL 60614 (312) 248-1094 1930s and 1940s. Cincinnati Socialist P.O. Box 3033 Cincinnati, OH 45201 (513) 242-9043 Cleveland Socialist Action P.O. Box 6151 Cleveland, OH (216) 429-2167 tively." WHAT DO WE PROPOSE TO DO ABOUT IT?

longer it takes. Houston Socialist Ac ion University of Housto Box 551, 4800 Calhol in Houston, TX 77004 (713) 643-2030 Los Angeles Socialist 18653 Ventura Blvd Box 217 Los Angeles, CA 91356 (213) 343-4511 Michigan Socialist Action P.O. Box 4523 Ann Arbor, MI 48106 Minneapolis Socialist Acti P.O. Box 14087 Dinkytown Station Minneapolis, MN 55414 New York Socialist Action P.O. Box 20209 Cathedral Finance 693 Columbus Ave New York, NY 10025 "Support what you want" NOTHING do not want-and get it." of the parties of big-capital. movement of the 1960s.

WHERE TO FIND US:

Phoenix Socialist Action P.O. Box 5161 Phoenix, AZ 85010 (602) 951-0354 Pittsburgh Socialist Action P.O. Box 10769 Pittsburgh, PA 15203 Puget Sound Socialist Action P.O. Box 2903 Olympia, WA 98507 San Francisco Socialist Actiol 3435 Army Street, Rm. 308 San Francisco, CA 94110 (415) 821-0458 Washington Socialist Action P.O. Box 3467 Washington, D.C. 20010 (202) 232-1481