Recently I was privy to listen on Paul Cienfuego's lecture on "Corporations vs The People" and this union veteran did hit the mark with myself, and in light of all the recent readings I have been embarking on, the revolutionary zeal seems to have bubbled a little more when Cienfuego bleated out that single issue activism is simply illogical and ignorant of the structural enemy that we are up against and that trying to take down the giant by one chink here and there is embarrassing and to be truthful, misses the mark. I definitely have been guilty of such an error and I am emerging to a newer outlook, a newer target and a bigger scope; although I never really limited myself to just one single issue as I had always tied everything together with the systems that we have inherited with capitalism and imperialism as well as neocolonialism, I cannot just write and read only of the single issue of Palestine and Israel. Mainly that (1) who really has the time to deal with every hasbara nutjob out there; (2) I grow weary of the same old, tired arguments that befuddles left-right as well as left-left analysis of the conflict and (3) with all due respect, I have read as much as I could possibly can to stay interested in this, and I will never be a scholarly expert on the topic (and to be perfectly fair, even scholars limit themselves to a certain field and dedicate years to such a practice) BUT I know enough (and know more than the average dipshit) about it to make informed comments and decide that Israel is a piece of shit and that Palestine should be free. I have the biggest regard for all those laying their lives on the line in B'ilin and they are forever in my thoughts. Aside from the guys on Mondoweiss, it seems that everyone else worth reading that dedicates themselves mainly to the Israel/Palestine show has slowed down their posts and many have even been missing for months at a time, myself included. Now that is not to say that there isn't anything to write about as shit happens in Gaza every day (re: Jewbonics who's in Gaza now) but things haven't changed in 40+ years in Palestine, just the terrible bullshit that Israelis throw to us. But somehow, bringing down Israel for the sake of justice, although it would be quite satisfactory and welcomed by millions around the world and definitely an example to hold for other wannabe colonial enterprises to take down, free Palestinians would somehow still suffer just like free South Africans and free Vietnamese and other free colonial subjects to the vagaries of power and currency. And that leads us to revolution.Now we are living in very testy times, and if you're an identified leftist, you must be either putting a gun to your head or constantly shaking in disbelief at what has become of this world gone mad. Right now in the West, we are witnessing terrible attacks on jobs, public sector institutions as well as the welfare state, healthcare, food, housing, immigrants, non-whities, unions and regressive taxes. Although the downing of Congresswoman Gifford may have not been explicitly linked to such a purpose, we are shocked to see such things unfolding in front of our eyes here (remember a Federal judge was killed in the same attack), as I definitely have a hard time believing that such an incident would have occured if Loughner was not a product of the environment around him. He may have been crazy, but crazy people aren't so crazy that they cannot absorb what is around them. And what was around Loughner? Arizona.
Unfortunately because of the hoopla, we will not even get close to arguing what really is at stake here and what Obama has been doing under the cover of being a "centrist" or one friendly to the working poor. We have been decimated in the last twenty years and there has been no end in sight and no real check on the corporations that have run rampant over the industries of North America. Get a reality check! Those jobs have gone down south for good. It is not coming back and you better get used to working three part-time service jobs to make ends meet. On top of that we live in inflationary times and food prices skyrocketing and it is a recipe for poverty and a subservient population searching for answers and a quick way out of the mess that they dug for us and then dumped us into.
Sadly the Left did not capitalise on the misery, did not cross bridges, did not reinforce the unions, did not reinvigorate the student masses, nor did it make any distinctive effort to get any initiatives forward. Instead it chose to rely on a party that has its hands dirty with corporate money, elected a rich Black man who studied in the same university with those who modeled the Pinochet economy into disaster as well as other disasters that now has South America beating back the atrocities of capitalism and US predatory practices in the region. It failed to organise a legimitate option for an alternative to the disaster that makes us sick, poor and hungry. Instead it lumped its hopes on the audacity that is Obama (yes, that was intentional) and now turning to his third year in office and taking a major beating in midterm elections, he will now focus on a re-election campaign that will have him embracing the right even more to find some kind of middle ground so not to be viewed as some kind of communist for his pitiful healthcare "reform" that didn't reform anything. (What "reform" has all the big insurance companies supporting it?) Obama seduced the Left into thinking that he was capable of doing something better than Bush but he is turning out to be the monster that made Nixon the most progressive President in recent history. Now I know those truly in the know were not fooled but we certainly are weak and rather irrelevant.
And I have to say it is because of this idea of fighting everything singularly, that if we take down one corporation that we can take down another. That simply will not work in times like these. The Right has been able to use its influence and capital to suffocate those most vulnerable and use its capital to pit us against each other and direct the hate to those undeserved of it. Our jobs, our livelihood, our children's future are on the line here and to be in so narrow in scope that to think that this system is able to sustain itself with the rampant pace that the oligarchy is marching at is sheer idiocy. The Tea Party are dopes but they mobilised their asses to get the nutjobs they wanted into office. The Left has seen opportunity after opportunity to take on electric issues that could spark the sleeping poor into action only to see the right get stronger and the Left look even more depleted than ever. I have to say that times like these make me wonder how worse it will get before we can take charge of this madness, dismantle the bourgeoisie and make capitalism, imperialism and colonialism a thing of the past and make the lives of those who toiled and suffered all the better and get what we deserve.
