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The times they are a-changing
By Deirdre Griswold
From
Workers World, February
20, 2003
It is times like these that reveal the true strength of the contending forces
in society. Not just their strength in numbers, or their strength in weapons,
but their strength of conviction, purpose and belief in their vision of the
future.
The Bush administration has been preparing for its war on Iraq as though
nothing in the world can stop it from going ahead. It has very big plans.
Besides having a completely grandiose view of achieving U.S. global supremacy,
it is trying to carry out a restructuring at home at the same time. It is
hacking away at what remains of social programs for the poor, privatizing
government workers in a direct attack on unions, raising racism against
immigrants to a new level, outlawing dissent, and trying to create such a
climate of fear that opposition to its lunge to the right will crumble.
It certainly has unequaled material resources for what it is doing, both
financial and military. But it has a very, very big problem. The more that the
people find out what is coming down the pike, the more they are against it.
Bush never had a mandate for his right-wing policies. The Supreme Court decided
he should be president after the debacle in Florida. He wasn't swept into
office on a flood of reaction, like the desperate times in Europe during the
Great Depression when fascist movements rallied huge crowds by attacking the
system, and took over promising radical reforms to a ruined people - only to
line them up for a war to defend capitalism while channeling their anger into
racist and anti-Semitic scapegoating and redbaiting.
This is a right-wing takeover from the top, carried out through the established
political organizations of the capitalist class, which exist on lobbyists'
generous contributions. And big business isn't exactly popular right now, to
put it mildly. Not many workers are looking at the Kenneth Lays and other
millionaire executives as saviors for society's ills.
Bush may pose as the cowboy - another word for "man on horseback"? -
who can ride roughshod over his opponents and whip the herd in line. His
billionaire backers like that. But does he really have the tools for it? Isn't
he relying on the acquiescence, at the very least, of tens of millions whose
lives will be profoundly changed for the worse by what he is doing?
The confidence Bush exudes on stage - for his "public" appearances
amount to nothing but acting - is carefully scripted and rehearsed. Everything
is predictably phony. But behind that confident exterior, when he puts his feet
up, don't doubts seize him as he nibbles his pretzels?
Certainly his class - known rather unscientifically as the "business
class" in popular parlance - is showing extreme anxiety right now. Every
Bush speech pushing his war program has also pushed down the stock markets. His
promises that the war will be a pushover and that the reconstruction of Iraq -
meaning setting up a political structure for the methodical plunder of its
massive oil resources - will be quickly accomplished have not won them over.
There is a lot of gloom and doom in the boardrooms and markets these days,
totally the opposite of the euphoria on Wall Street in the early years of the
Vietnam War, when the markets hit new highs with every escalation of the war.
No matter how ideological they are, the politicos in the Bush camp have to be
feeling this, for these are their class brethren.
In the anti-war camp, however, the mood is different. There are political
struggles, of course, and the clarifying of many misconceptions as the movement
goes forward. But the mood among the people is upbeat and strong. There is a
new sense of the power of the masses, a new sense of what it means to be in
solidarity with the hundreds of millions around the world who so much want a
change in the relation of forces, so much want the political pendulum in the
United States to swing to the left, to the workers, and away from the
insatiable class of exploiters who will never be rich enough.
Each new lie from the government - whether it's on Iraq's "weapons of mass
destruction" or a fiendish plot by immigrants to "destroy
America"- immediately stirs up a legion of indignant people determined to
seek the truth and rebut the disinformation. Informed, thoughtful responses
race around the Internet.
And these are not office-chair activists. They are marching, organizing
teach-ins, riding buses through the night to national protests, getting on
street corners and letting everyone know where they stand.
They have a strong, deep feeling that they are building a movement that will
change the world, and not in the way George W. Bush intends. They have a
passion for what they are doing that is based on self-sacrifice, giving for a
greater cause - the very thing that some columnists complain Bush is afraid to
ask for. He has to lie to the people that this war will be easy - because, on
the bottom, those hired to carry out his commands have no enthusiasm for what
they are doing.
Looking at all these factors, the playing field is not so unequal after all.
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