Vol. 73/No. 39      October 12, 2009

“This is the worst economic crisis any of us in this room has ever lived through,” Fein said in his opening remarks, “and it’s just beginning. The only way to confront it is for the working class to take political power.”

Speaking about the bipartisan attacks on working people at home and abroad, Fein explained, “Obama is increasing troops in Afghanistan. If you add up the troops in Iraq and Afghanistan today, there are more troops there than during the surge.” Fein was referring to the Bush administration’s decision at the beginning of 2007 to send nearly 30,000 additional troops to Iraq. It was dubbed the “surge” in the capitalist media. At the same time, “they are going after our wages and working conditions, making us work longer for less pay,” Fein added.

In the discussion Brian Taveras said that he thought Obama was trying to do some good things but the Republicans were blocking him.

“Obama is not being blocked,” Fein replied. “What he puts forward are attacks against working people. The Democrats and Republicans are the parties of the ruling rich. If we didn’t run in the elections, the working class wouldn’t have a voice.”

Student Gabrielle Felton told her classmates, “Let’s face it. We voted for Obama because he’s Black. But now that he’s in office, we can see he’s just as bad as Bush.”

Felton went on to describe some of the effects of the Clinton administration’s slashing of welfare in 1996 with the elimination of Aid to Families with Dependent Children. “When Clinton got rid of food stamps, the rich people acted like it was a good thing. It was good for them, but it wasn’t good for us,” she said. “Those who were on welfare, now have low-paying jobs with no health insurance and have to pay for child care.”

In response to Fein’s explanation of the fraud of the current “health care debate,” Felton explained how her copayments sometimes prevented her from going to the doctor’s office at all.

Another student, Daniel Carrier, asked, “How are we going to make a revolution, if we don’t have any power?”

“I don’t have any blueprints,” Fein responded, “but if we look at our own history we should realize that we have already made two revolutions in this country—the first American Revolution and the Civil War.” Fein also pointed to the example of the Cuban Revolution and described how working people there took political power and through a revolutionary government, reorganized society to meet their needs.

At the end of the meeting, eight students signed up for more information about the campaign and Bredin invited the Socialist Workers candidates to speak to another class the following week.
 
 
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