The 2016 socialist platform

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1) Abolish the U.S. war machine now! • Bring all troops home now! Close all U.S. foreign and domestic military bases. End all military spending now—not a penny for war! • U.S. out of the Middle East! • No to U.S. overt and covert wars, drone wars, oil wars, privatized death squad wars, sanction and embar­ go wars or wars for the re-colonization of Africa. • Abolish NATO and all other imperialist military al­ liances! • Self-determination for all oppressed nations and peoples. • Self-determination for Puerto Rico. No to imperi­ alist-imposed austerity in Puerto Rico. Abolish Puerto Rico’s debt to U.S. banks and speculating hedge funds. • Self-determination for Palestine! End all U.S. aid to apartheid Israel. For a democratic, secular Palestine with the right of all Palestinian refugees to return. Soli­ darity with Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) campaigns. • U.S. hands off the Cuban Revolution. 2) Immediate conversion to 100% renewable pow­ er: sun, wind, geothermal and micro-hydro! Keep all fossil fuels in the ground! • Guarantee jobs at top union wages for all fossil fuel workers during and after a just and rapid transition to clean and renewable energy systems. • Rapid conversion to carbon-sequestering agro-eco­ logical farming. • Immediate halt to expansion of all new fossil fuel extraction and transportation projects • 100% tax on all fossil fuel corporations. Zero profits for the polluters. Close down and dismantle the fossil fuel industry, from extraction on up. • Dramatically expand mass transit—especially for low-wage workers. Reverse urban sprawl and unsus­ tainable development patterns. Remediate and expand our forests, wetlands, and natural eco-systems. • For an immediate cleanup of Native American, Af­ rican American and Latino communities that have been victimized by environmental racism. • No to nuclear weapons. Shut down all nuclear power plants now. • U.S. reparations and zero interest loans to neo-colo­ nial and island nations suffering from climate change due to past practices of the major industrial and impe­ rialist nations. 3) Jobs for all at top union wages! • Shorten the work week by 25 percent with no cut in pay, so that everyone can work and enjoy more free time. Modern technology should benefit the exploited 99 percent, not the boss class one percent. • Create a massive public works program to provide jobs at top union wages through building homes, con­ verting to 100% renewable power, expanding mass ... Vote Socialist Action!

(continued from page 1: “A Militant Socialist Campaign!”) us there is no war but the class war.”

Human and civil rights The American working class is among the most di­ verse in the world. It embraces those whose ances­ tors were indigenous, others brought here as slaves, and immigrants from many lands. When mutually respected, these differences can make us strong. But the ruling class stirs up bigotry and suspicions to try to keep us divided and fighting among our­ selves.

This also enables them to pay women, workers of color, and undocumented immigrants far less in wages. Segregated communities pay more for rent and mortgages—and even groceries. Whether in “prosperity” or recession, Black and Latino workers are last hired, first fired, always with much higher unemployment rates. Racism and sexism is profit­ able for bosses and merchants, and depress wages and conditions for the whole working class. The poverty and despair among youth in de­ pressed, segregated neighborhoods, which have been articulated by movements like Black Lives Matter must become the concern of all. Women workers deserve equal pay for work of equivalent value. We need to fix the inequities of Social Security that leave many widowed or di­ vorced women penniless in old age. Socialist Action supports employer-paid quality, professional child care for working mothers and public funded care public transportation, constructing hospitals, parks, schools, and other social necessities. Priority should be given to projects where they are most needed—espe­ cially in Black and Latino communities.

• Raise all pensions, Social Security benefits, unem­ ployment and disability compensation, welfare, and veterans benefits to top union wage scales and protect them with cost-of-living escalator provisions.

• For $15 and a union now as a first short step on the road to a much higher minimum wage to sustain a qual­ ity standard of living.

4) Quality health care, education, and housing for all as basic rights!

for those looking for, or unable to work. We fight against the sometimes violent attacks by the theocratic right on women’s access to birth control.

We applaud the judicial victory allowing same-sex couples to marry if they so desire. But even that advance is facing attacks by religious bigots in public office. The same “social conservatives” have stirred up fresh targeting of transgender people with the so-called “bathroom laws.” And violence against LGBT Americans has continued, as we were reminded by the mass killing at the Pulse club in Orlando.

Socialist Action supports the popular demand for Canadian-style single-payer health care for all as a transitional reform leading to superior socialized medicine— such as won by the British Labor Party de­ cades ago, and the even better system put in place by the Cuban Revolution.

For Fifteen Now!

There are two complementary currents in the mass movement for $15 an hour. It began with fast food workers striking and demonstrating nation­ wide for “15 and a union,” an upsurge that is not only still growing but that now includes other low-wage workers—even adjunct college instructors. The other component has won numerous victories in establishing state and local minimum-wage in­ creases progressing in stages to $15. Socialist Ac­ tion has been supportive of both approaches as a • Close down the profit-gouging “health-care” insur­ ance companies and establish a single-payer system in rapid transition to a universal and free national sys­ tem—that is, socialized medicine. • Use the savings towards provision of quality health care for all and retraining insurance workers for new jobs. • Free quality public education at all levels from the cradle to the grave. Cancel all student debt. • Void all drug patents to cut public costs to a mini­ mum. • Cancel all medical debt. (continued on back page)

Karen Schraufnagel for VP!

Karen Schraufnagel is a member of Socialist Action’s National Committee and organizer of its Twin Cities branch. She is a founder of Minnesotans Against Islamophobia, and is active in the anti-Zionist Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions movement and the animal rights, antiwar, and environmental movements.

modest down-payment toward an adequate raise. Socialist Action is part of the historic tradition that works simultaneously for a revolutionary socialist party and for a party based on the foundation of our only class-based mass organizations—our unions. We think that a labor party will come about as the outgrowth of a reborn democratic, fighting union movement.

A labor party will be a giant step forward toward breaking the ruling-class political monopoly and will work toward putting a government in power that is run by and for the working class. n SOCIALIST ACTION 2016 CAMPAIGN 3

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Socialist Action