Some brief comments: be wary of viewing this social crisis as though it were the 1930s. The decisive difference is, unlike that crisis that was precipitated by the collapse of an economy whose everyday workings were at once removed from the functioning of the state, that this economic crisis will be directly reflected as a crisis in the state structure itself. One of the causes of this change was the integration of much of what used to be called the Left in this country, principally the trade union bureaucracy, into the state, leading to the Left's disintegration in the later 1980s worldwide.
This is why the classic model set out in [Leon] Trotsky's writings as how rightist solutions to the social crisis are imposed do not apply now, or will apply only with important modifications. The ruling class needs an executive power that can act directly and arbitrarily, without the limitations that have been imposed by constitutional constraints, to suppress popular unrest and drive down the standard of living.
I think there is a real danger that an authoritarian government is starting to be imposed from the political center. In this situation, the right-wing Republicans are pushing the basic corporatist agenda. The Clintons (Bill and Hillary) are putting up a false front of "caring" about "ordinary people." As you did point out several years ago, the purpose of sex scandals is to get someone to do what you want them to do. The whole Contract with America has a basic right-wing strong statist thrust (under cover of being "anti-statist"), but the line item veto has a particular significance as being a first step toward an Enabling Act. The basic point to remember is that the solution to the Clintons for their personal problems is to create a state of national emergency and declare martial law.
Yes, this question was posed during Watergate and it wasn't going to happen then. But a lot of things have changed since then. One particular difference I'll point to is that the attack on Clinton comes from the Right of conventional politics. Much of it is motivated by hostility to military downsizing. Clinton's whole style is to steal the Right's thunder at the crucial moment by adapting its agenda after pretending to oppose it. I think the Right knows that, and that actually the Starr investigation is disguised to provoke a state of emergency and suspension of the Constitution.
Thorn Roberts
Elizabeth, West Virginia
Masses make change
I am a New Afrikan Political Prisoner. I am 25 years old. My
situation remains the same as far as being Kaptured in
Amerikkka's Konsentration Kamp. These imperialistic prison
conditions came about way before my time. It is hard to
understand why people can endure so much hardship without
becoming more conscious and without rising up in anger and rage.
People of poverty in general and the colonized people in
particular are being devastated on the outside and then
warehoused and destroyed on the inside.
We must never forget that it is the people who change circumstances, going amongst the people with a clearness of open minds, educating and learning from the people, and serving the people. We are the ones who can develop the minds [and] build bodies for this struggle to seize oppression! We ought to not cultivate the exceptional or seek the hero, who's another form of leader. We ought to uplift the people, we must build, strengthen, and develop their brains, create and fill them with ideas. Change them and make them into leaders! The letter I wrote was just my thoughts, which I would struggle to the end to see put in full active effect!
A prisoner
Cresaptown, Maryland
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