The coming working class fightback in the U.S

Scan page 7

•UNEMP HOMES demonstrations to demand The following is an edited version of the Political Report approved by the November 1986 Second National Convention of Socialist Action.

American capitalism faces its stiffest challenge since the 1930s Great De -pression.

The U.S. ruling class is besieged by revolutionary upsurges of workers and peasants in Central America, the Philip -pines, South Africa, and elsewhere. Domestically, the capitalists are facing a growing state of anger and dissatisfaction among working people.

The Iran/Contragate affair is only the latest episode of government disinformation and secret diplomacy. This scandal both reaffirms and deepens the distrust the American people have toward the government.

Capitalist austerity drive

The seeds of the current crisis were planted during the Vietnam War. Unparalleled military spending plunged the economy into a massive deficit-spending tailspin. This set the stage for the sub -sequent inflationary spiral of the 1970s.

Then-President Richard Nixon tried to short-circuit some of these problems by instituting a wage freeze in 1970 and by allowing the dollar to devalue when it was removed from the gold standard in 1971. These steps signaled the beginning of U.S. capitalism's efforts to reassert its dominance of the world market through an austerity drive at home.

By making imports more expensive, driving down wages, and cutting federal funds for social programs, the capitalists hoped to slow the flood of foreign products into the United States and to restrain the double-digit inflation that was a permanent characteristic of the 1970s.

Variations of these austerity measures HIEP THIS VILLEY voting for a Democrat or a Republican would change the worsening condition of their lives.

Completely out of step with the healthy cynicism and alienation of American working people during the elections was the union bureaucracy and the reformist American left. The official labor leadership and virtually the entire left focused their major energy on electing Democrats to replace "Reaganite" Republicans.

Instead of seizing on the discontent of working people as an opportunity to explain the need for independent political actions-such as demonstrations, rallies, picketlines, and strikes against the strikebreakers and warmakers—the union leadership and the reformist left organizations beat the drums for the Democrats. According to the Communist CLOSING lies and deception as* the capitalist government.

Americans moving to the right?

The post-war baby-boom generation has not become flag-waving "Rambos," as the ruling rich and its media wish us to believe. The college campuses are not returning to the sterile passivity of the 1950s. American youth are not rushing to join the Armed Forces because they want to fight in Central America or Lebanon.

On the contrary, great numbers of Black and Latino youth are joining the Armed Forces to escape from the worst aspects of capitalism-a bleak future of unem -ployment and poverty. They have no stake, whatsoever, in the capitalist system.

Public opinion polls opposing aid to the contras and supporting women's rights

----- pull-quotes -----

JM-JI17 VELIGENT 65