The article in the November 27 issue is helpful along those lines. However, I do not fully understand the headline "Factionalism in ruling circles around the elections is about future class confrontations" and the paragraphs that go with it that state that the heat is being generated by unresolvable "ideological divisions" in the ruling class rather than differences over "immediate practical policies."

What are these ideological divisions? And why would they generate so much factional heat if there are no immediate stakes for wings of the ruling class? Isn't there a more concrete and simpler explanation like a fight over the privileges and patronage that go with the presidency? Isn't the rug being lifted on the real character of bourgeois politics in the context of increasing class polarization?

John Steele
Toronto, Ontario  
 
 
U.S., Puerto Rico elections
In the wake of the recent elections in the United States, there have been allegations of improprieties by both major big-business parties. The most serious involve bribing voters and excluding voters from polls based on the color of their skin, the area they live in, or the language they speak.

These allegations are none too shocking, but obviously we wouldn't be hearing about them in the corporate press if this election hadn't been so close and so marked by factionalism.

But even if ALL of the allegations are true, this election is cleaner, freer, and fairer than any election ever held in Puerto Rico. In presidential elections here, which are a smokescreen for bourgeois rule, it doesn't really matter who wins, and allegations of fraud and abuse reflect negatively on this veneer of democracy, so elections generally are relatively clean.

In Puerto Rico, however, plebiscites are held to justify the U.S. government's occupation. There, it is not enough for the bourgeois media, the government schools, the financiers who control the stock market, the corrupt union officials, and the bosses to use their influence to pressure workers into casting anti-independence votes. In addition there are "dirty tricks" such as moving polling places without notice (more than in the U.S.), as well as physical intimidation by soldiers (some of whom don't speak a word of Spanish) and thugs. What's more, the pro-independence community is muzzled by the threat of political imprisonment or killing. To top it all off, of course, is widespread mishandling of ballots during the counting process.

The Republicans and the Democrats both say they want a fair, legitimate count of the votes in this year's election.

So how about a free election for Puerto Rico, in accordance with established procedures on decolonization?

Loren Meyer
Helena, Montana  
 
 
Front page (for this issue) | Home | Text-version home