Trump’s trade war with China is waged to make the rich richer

May 21, 2019

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from Dean Baker

https://rwer.wordpress.com/2019/05/21/trumps-trade-war-with-china-is-waged-to-make-the-rich-richer/

Donald Trump seems determined to double down and keep pressing forward on his trade war with China. He promises more and higher tariffs, apparently not realizing that U.S. consumers are the ones paying these taxes — not China’s government or corporations.

While tariffs clearly impose a cost on people in the United States, this cost could be justified as a weapon to change a trading partner’s harmful practices. During his campaign, Trump pledged to wage a trade war with China over its currency policy. He said he would declare China a “currency manipulator” on day one of his administration, putting pressure on China to raise the value of its currency against the dollar.

The value of China’s currency matters, since it determines the relative price of goods and services produced in China and the United States. Ordinarily, the currency of a rapidly growing country with a large trade surplus like China would be expected to rise against the currency of a country with a large trade deficit like the United States. However, China’s government intervened in currency markets to keep its currency from rising, thereby keeping down the price of China’s goods and services.

This was ostensibly the behavior that Trump was determined to change in his China trade war. But now that we are in the war, the currency issue has largely disappeared from the conversation. According to the published accounts, the big issue is over China’s respect for the intellectual property claims (i.e., patent and copyrights) of U.S. corporations.

The most bizarre aspect of this turn is that Trump’s demands in this area have the support of economists and commentators across the political spectrum. We repeatedly hear the line that we have to stop China’s theft of “our” intellectual property.

The problem with this argument is that it is not “our” intellectual property that Trump is protecting. After all, very few people have any patents or copyrights that we are worried about China using without compensation.

The intellectual property that Trump and his allies across the political spectrum want to protect belongs to major corporations like Boeing, Pfizer and Microsoft. Their goal is to make China pay more money to get access to technology these companies have developed. That’s great for their profits — sort of like Trump’s tax cut — but does not help the vast majority of people who do not own lots of stock in these companies.

In fact, if China has to pay more money to these corporations for their technology, it is likely to hurt most U.S. workers for several different reasons.

First, if companies like Boeing and General Electric don’t have to worry about being forced to transfer technology to Chinese companies when they outsource to China, they will have more incentive to outsource to China. That’s about as straightforward as it gets.

Second, the more money that China has to pay for the technology of U.S. companies, the less money they have to pay for other exports from the United States. This means that we will have a larger trade deficit in everything other than technology.

In the same vein, this is yet another policy the U.S. government is pursuing that will increase inequality. If we increase the returns to various technology sectors, then we expect that the highly educated people doing this work will see their pay rise relative to everyone else. As is more generally the case, it is not technology that creates this inequality in wages, it is the policy on inequality.

There is an argument that we should not allow China to just take, at no cost, the technology that we spent hundreds of billions of dollars to develop. That is a reasonable argument, but that hardly implies that we need to force them to respect patent and copyright protection.

We need to ensure that China and other countries share in the cost of developing new technologies. There are far more modern and efficient mechanisms than patent monopolies, which are a relic of the medieval guild system. While negotiating sharing mechanisms may be a difficult process, it is no more difficult than preserving the patent system. President Obama likely would have had the Trans-Pacific Partnership completed and approved by Congress before he left office if it had not been for haggling over terms of drug patent-related protections.

It is also important to recognize that we will likely have far more to gain from having access to China’s technology than the other way around. China is already far and away the global leader in clean technologies, with as much installed solar and wind energy as the rest of the world combined, and an electric car industry that now produces as many cars as all other countries put together.

China currently spends roughly the same share of its GDP on research and development as the United States. Its economy is already 25 percent larger than the U.S. economy and will be more than twice as large in less than a decade. Rather than focusing on bottling up U.S. technology, a forward-thinking trade agenda would be focused on ensuring our access to Chinese technology.

Unfortunately, trade policy is not crafted in the national interest, it is crafted with the goal of making the rich richer. This is what Trump’s trade war is all about. And, as is the case with so many other wars, it is about working-class people being forced to sacrifice by paying high tariffs to advance the goals of the rich.

See article on original site

Why Bolton makes even Trump nervous

By VIJAY PRASHAD

https://www.asiatimes.com/2019/05/opinion/why-bolton-makes-even-trump-nervous/

Even US President Donald Trump, who is getting ready to pardon war criminals, fears John Bolton. Trump had hesitated to give Bolton a seat in his administration (initially because of Trump’s distaste for Bolton’s bushy mustache). Bolton and General H R McMaster were both in line to become national security adviser (NSA). Trump went with McMaster, who lasted a year, after which Bolton, called “The Mustache” by Trump, slipped into this post.

The NSA is the main adviser to the US president on foreign policy, often more important than the secretary of state. Bolton has Trump’s ear. Trump, mercurial in his policymaking, therefore, has the world’s most dangerous man whispering at him.

As his trigger finger tightened with Iran in the gunsights, Trump said of Bolton, “If it was up to John, we’d be in four wars now.” Bolton is on record saying that he would like to turn the immense force of the US military against Cuba, Iran, North Korea and Venezuela. These are likely the “four wars” that Trump mentioned. These would be additional wars, for the United States remains actively at war in Afghanistan as well as in Iraq and Syria. The United States currently operates more than 100 military bases, many of them in active operations, around the world.

The normal aggressiveness of the US military force does not satisfy Bolton; he wants the United States to deepen its aggressiveness.

Contentious and intemperate

Bolton is much like the typical war hawk. Such people want to send others to war. They don’t want to go to war themselves. Bolton smartly went into the National Guard in 1970. In a Yale reunion book, he wrote, “I confess I had no desire to die in a Southeast Asian rice paddy. I considered the war in Vietnam already lost.” When Bolton made this personal decision, his heroes Richard Nixon and Henry Kissinger began their illegal and barbaric bombing of Cambodia and Laos. Between Bolton’s decision not to go to Vietnam and the US retreat from Saigon, 3,304 US soldiers died as well as uncounted numbers of Vietnamese, Cambodian and Laotian people.

In government for most of his life, Bolton worked hard against the good side of history. A key part of Bolton’s work was to help the cover-up of the Ronald Reagan administration’s role in supporting the Contras and in the Iran-Contra affair.

After the left-wing Sandinistas came to power in Nicaragua in 1979, first the Jimmy Carter and then the Reagan administration assisted the military and the oligarchy to form La Contrarrevolución (the Counter-Revolution) or the Contras. Trained by the United States, the Contras used the most brutal methods against ordinary people to undermine the Sandinista government.

When the US Congress – pushed by public opinion – stopped overt US funding for the Contras, the Reagan administration illegally sold arms to Iran, whose profits went to fund the Contras. This was the Iran-Contra scandal.

Bolton fought to block then-senator John Kerry’s attempts to investigate drug-smuggling and gun-running by the Contras in Nicaragua. He refused to allow documents on the Iran-Contra affair to be turned over to congressman Peter Rodino. Bolton did the heavy work for the administration, which nonetheless found his language to be often “contentious and intemperate,” as White House spokesman Marlin Fitzwater said in 1987.

Bolton’s hammer

Intemperateness is the mood of Bolton. In 1994, he said of the UN Secretariat building in New York that if it “lost 10 stories, it wouldn’t make a bit of difference.” Chilling words. Bolton lived them. He spent years trying to undermine any decent arms control treaty in the United Nations framework and he spent years trying to shield the United States from any international accountability. In 2000, Bolton ridiculed the “Church of Arms Control” – the phrase a clear indication of his attitude to peace, one shared with large sections of the US ruling class.

It was Bolton who pushed the George W Bush administration in 2001 to walk away from the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty of 1972, an act that sent belligerent signals to Moscow. It was Bolton again who egged Bush in 2003 on to smash the Agreed Framework of 1994 between the United States and North Korea. When US intelligence – whose credibility was damaged by the Iraq materials – said that North Korea had begun to enrich uranium, there was to be no further dialogue. Bolton later wrote, “This was the hammer I had been looking for to shatter the Agreed Framework.”

It was Bolton once more who urged Trump to depart from the Iran nuclear deal, and most chillingly it was Bolton who killed the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty of 1988.

Bolton’s record is clear. But so are his words, not only his speeches, but also his deeply informative book Surrender Is Not an Option (2008). The contours of Bolton’s vision are clear in both the acts and in the words. The fulcrum of his thinking is this: that US power must be unchecked, and it must be used to ensure the perpetuity of US domination. There will be no surrender to any multipolarity or to bipolarity (China and the United States). US domination is absolute and should be permanent.

Few US elected officials have the guts to disagree with this disagreeable worldview. They salute the flag and send the bombers to spread the Stars and Stripes across the globe.

What are the hindrances for this permanent and absolute US dominion?

The United Nations, and any international treaty or body, should not be allowed to interfere with US actions. The UN must be “reformed,” says the US regime, which means that the UN should be brought to the heel of the White House.

The European Union, which pretends to be superior to the United States, must not be allowed its “endless process of diplomatic mastication,” wrote Bolton in his book. It must be silenced.

The substantial adversaries of the United States – Russia and China – must be cut down, their vulnerabilities used against them. Sanctions are an effective tool here, since to go to war with them would be, even for Bolton, suicidal. Overthrow of the main allies of Russia and China – places such as Venezuela and Iran – would further weaken these aspirant states.

Regime change against countries such as Venezuela and Iran, as well as Cuba and North Korea, would not only weaken Russia and China but it would also send a strong message that no one should ever defy the United States.

Bolton has a coherent worldview. His hawkish peers – both Republicans and Democrats – don’t have his nerve. They’ll back this regime-change war (Venezuela) or that (Iran). They will do so pretending that they are being pragmatic and are responding to “intelligence.”

But none of these wars of aggression, whether against Iraq or Iran, Afghanistan or Venezuela, are merely driven by pragmatism. Bolton lays out the full agenda. He is more a mainstream US intellectual than the mainstream would like to admit. The US mainstream is Bolton with manners. Their normalcy is merely Bolton’s philosophy in bits and pieces.

This article was produced by Globetrotter, a project of the Independent Media Institute, which provided it to Asia Times.

Indonesia sentences Frenchman to death

Lombok court says Frenchman should face firing squad

The prosecutors sought a 20-year jail term but Indonesian court said he deserved the death penalty

By ASIA TIMES STAFF

https://www.asiatimes.com/2019/05/article/lombok-court-says-frenchman-should-face-firing-squad/

A Frenchman who was convicted of drug smuggling in Indonesia has been sentenced to death. He could have to face a firing squad if the penalty is upheld by higher courts.

Felix Dorfin, 35, was found guilty of possessing about 3 kilograms of methamphetamines and 22 tabs of ecstasy at Lombok airport in September 2018. The drugs were worth at least US$220,600, The Independent reported.

A panel of three judges handed down the death sentence at Mataram District Court on Lombok Island on Monday, despite prosecutors only seeking a 20-year prison sentence.

Presiding Judge Isnurul Syamul Arif said the case showed that Dorfin was legally and convincingly guilty of bringing narcotic drugs into the country.

He said Dorfin was involved with an international drug syndicate and the amount of drugs he was caught with were aggravating factors.

“The defendant’s actions could potentially do damage to the younger generation,” the judge was quoted as saying.

So, there was no reason to give him a lighter sentence.

The Frenchman declined to speak to the press on his way back to prison. His lawyer said they would appeal against the sentence.

Dorfin, who hails from Bethune in France, had said he was unaware of drugs found in his luggage and claimed that someone had instructed him to carry the bag.

The man had managed to escape from a detention center in January with the help of a police officer who was bribed. But 10 days after, he was caught near a forested mountain on Lombok.

Indonesia has some of the world’s toughest drug laws and has executed foreigners in the past. More than 150 people are on death row, mostly for drugs. About a third of them are foreign citizens.

The country’s last execution took place in 2016.

Freedom-Wielding High Schooler Freedoms Down 16 Classmates In Latest Mass Freedoming

https://www.theonion.com/freedom-wielding-high-schooler-freedoms-down-16-classma-1834921265

NORTHAMPTON, MA—In a deadly exercise of freedom that has already sparked nationwide debate, authorities confirmed Tuesday that freedom-wielding high school sophomore Langston Perry Shamet freedomed down 16 classmates in the latest in a series of mass freedomings.

“This tragedy was a senseless act of freedom perpetrated by a young man who was able to get his hands on freedom without going through any background checks,” said activist Wesley Monroe, citing video footage that showed Shamet practicing with his legally purchased freedom at a public freedom range just days before using semi-automatic freedom to incapacitate his school’s security guard and exercise his God-given freedom upon several dozen classmates.

“These demonstrations of our freedoms are just getting bigger and bigger and claiming more and more lives. This was already the 24th mass freedoming at a public school since January, not to mention one of the bloodiest. While some find it convenient to blame certain video games which crudely express freedom, this tragedy represents a failure of the state to ensure the welfare of its citizens. Police had ample advance warning that Wes was a freedom nut, and they refused to act before he had already committed a brutal celebration of his personal freedom. It’s a shame that people are reacting to this crisis by advocating for the public to acquire more and deadlier freedoms instead of taking a closer look at the damage these freedoms have done to so many innocent Americans.”

Families of the victims of this latest freedom have, in the meantime, requested privacy in this immense time of freedom.

The Lee Camp Ledger

https://leecamp.com/

THE ONE-MINUTE RUNDOWN:

I opened the show this week with a scathing critique of VICE News: the media company selling war propaganda to the ‘cool’ kids — on this episode of Redacted Tonight

The disability rights direct action group ADAPT were in DC yesterday (May 20) demanding better access to helpful services - on Disability Scoop

The Pentagon failed an audit with $21 trillion in budgeting adjustments over two decades — this and an update about the Embassy Protection Collective on VIP this week

As the US’s coup attempt in Venezuela continues to fall apart, now a major opposition leader is admitting that Maduro ISN’T a dictator - on The Grayzone

Instead of addressing poverty in the US, Trump has decided to redefine poverty levels so they don’t seem as bad - and more this week on my podcast Common Censored

Imperialism is getting really weird as the POTUS this week said openly that the Military Industrial Complex is trying to push him into war with Iran. — on The Real News Network

Chelsea Manning is back in jail for refusing to testify against Julian Assange & the government turned the Venezuelan Embassy over to an ambassador without a government — this week on my Viewer Questions episode

Watch the first 10 minutes of my newest comedy special, “Not Allowed On American TV,” for free at LeeCampComedySpecial.com

Austria: snap elections and political explosions

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Emanuel Tomaselli

21 May 2019

http://www.marxist.com/austria-snap-elections-provoke-political-expolosions.htm

Last Saturday, the Austrian government, made up of the main bourgeois party, ÖVP and right-wing Freedom Party (FPÖ), stepped down and announced re-elections. In a spontaneous demonstration, 10,000 people gathered in Vienna to celebrate. This is a setback for the bourgeois bloc, who have been diligently working on attacking the working class to prepare the capitalists for the next crisis.

But it was not the mobilised working class who brought down the government, and the capitalists and their politicians are adamant on continuing their agenda. The Left, starting with the Socialist Youth, must use this opening to bring down the bourgeois bloc for real.

On Friday evening, two German media sources published short excerpts of a several-hour-long, secretly filmed video. The Ibiza video features FPÖ politicians Heinz-Christian Strache and Johann Gudenus hinting that corporations purchased favourable legislation via party donations. Strache named several Austrian corporations and personalities who enforced their interests in this way. Despite Strache’s boasting, he also gives away that these donors not only finance his party but “all of them”. He mentions the weapons producer Glock, the property speculator René Benko and the billionaire Heidi Horten, as well as the gambling group Novomatic.

Besides specific laws, these ladies and gentlemen also anticipate lower taxes for the rich. Furthermore, Strache raises the prospect of privatisation (of drinking water, for example), handing over part of the public news channel ORF to the Red Bull-billionaire Didi Mateschitz (who calls himself “Red Bull Boy”) and bribes for public infrastructure projects. He talks about buying media content and journalists and shows particular interest in controlling the biggest tabloid in Austria, Kronen Zeitung.

The two politicians, Strache and Gudenus, are visibly under the influence of drugs and negotiate with someone they believe to be a rich, Russian oligarch, allegedly looking for new possibilities in Austria. In fact, it is an actress, who for months played her part in this charade.

Liberalism and the EU vs. nationalism and populism

This video is now being publicly used to bring down Strache and to weaken the “populists” in Europe. Here, we see a conflict carried out within the ruling class, between the nationalist-demagogic capitalists on one side and the liberal-multilateral oriented capitalists on the other. The timing is obvious: this coming weekend, the EU elections will take place, where the functionality of the European Union, and with it the competitiveness of the European capital in the international trade war, are at stake. The capitalists want to prevent an electoral victory for Salvini, Le Pen, Strache etc. They want to guarantee that important political positions will be filled with persons they deem trustworthy. The capitalists in Europe want a functioning, strong EU, that can assert its interests within and outside the EU without making too much noise. Such as it was during the “Greek debt crisis”, when a country and its people were sacrificed for the stability of European banks. It’s no secret that this political status-quo is also being defended by manipulating the “public debate.” It has been openly declared by the EU-commission and the French president Macron (written in his open letter to the citizens of Europe).

While Strache now tries to one-sidedly present himself as a victim of a conspiracy, the liberal media styles the FPÖ as the sole traitors of the nation. Many international commentators (such as Angela Merkel) emphasise the danger of populism in general, and Russian lobbying in particular (such as the New York Times). The latter is a particularly flimsy argument since the only Russian aspect of the fateful night in Ibiza was the vodka. Both interpretations are one-sided and conceal more than they explain. But put together they paint a picture a little closer to the truth. Yes, the timely publication of the Ibiza-Tape serves political interests, and yes, they represent the general truth, which is that capitalists and their political staff engage in constant horse tradings amongst each other to serve their interests and manage their shared exploitation for the working class, which they all regard with contempt.

Fake oligarchs vs. regular “democratic” exercise of power

The Conservative Party (ÖVP) exceeded the legal election campaign spending by almost double (specifically, by 6 million Euros) in 2017, and their funds are not transparent. The political homepage of Blümel, an associate of Chancellor Sebastian Kurz, owns a certain “Society for Supporting Bourgeois Policies” whose address is the same as the ÖVP-headquarters. For what might he use such complicated legal constructions? After all, Blümel is chairman of the ÖVP-Vienna, so why the need for an additional “Society” as a political platform?

Consider the “independent” Kronen Zeitung. Estate speculator René Benko now owns one-quarter of this media machine and is fighting in court for full control. Benko belongs to the circle of businessmen around ÖVP-chancellor Sebastian Kurz, who helped him personally in securing a highly lucrative estate-deal in an expensive shopping area in Vienna. Kurz called this “service-oriented administration”.

One more political event last week also reveals the bankruptcy of bourgeois democracy. The Department for Prosecution of Economy and Corruption indicted their own head, the highest justice official of the republic, Christian Pilnacek, who is general secretary in the ÖVP-led Ministry of Justice. Pilnacek is accused of impeding a long-lasting corruption investigation around an arms purchase that happened during the last ÖVP/Freedom Party government in 2002. Where is the liberal outcry against corruption in this case? Why is chancellor Kurz worried about the independence of the judiciary and the police in the case of the Ibiza-Tapes, but at the same time protects this high-ranking justice official who is close to the ÖVP?

The list of hypocrisy is endless and only leads to one conclusion: Kurz is just like Strache, but with real power in the state apparatus, real influence on the media and real support from the capitalists, as opposed to the wannabes from the Freedom Party. The Ibiza-Tape doesn’t show the power of the Freedom Party but their impotence in elite circles, and their incompetence. Their connection to the capitalists is weaker. The real politics, in the interest of stability and profits for the capitalist system, are being organised via the ÖVP.

Manoeuvres in the interest of the capitalist system

It’s unclear why liberal European strategists (whose main profiteer is Germany) chose Austria to make an example of. But objectively, Austria still has some room to improve the general situation of European capital.

For one, there is the Russia-affinity of Austria. Only this week, Austria’s “Green” president, Alexander Van der Bellen assured Russia’s president Putin of his continued partnership. To be more exact, president Van der Bellen spoke against the EU sanctions against Russia and in favour of the gas-pipeline-project Nord Stream 2. After all, Austria’s most important banking group, Raiffeisen bank, makes 40 percent of their profits in Russia and the export market to Russia is booming, despite the EU-sanctions. The Austrian oil and gas company OMV is financially invested in the Nord Stream 2 pipeline. But Germany is against this pipeline and is bothered by the Kurz-government‘s obstinacy in this matter. Also, Austria’s secret service has been cut off internationally from the West for a few months already, because it’s seen as an open door for Putin’s secret agencies.

Additionally, the ÖVP is still a stable bourgeois party that can be “improved” in the interests of European (German) capital without plunging Austria in a deep political crisis. At the same time, the Austrian Social Democracy is dutifully ready to solve any crisis in the name of “stability” and “reason”. In Italy, Hungary, Romania and Poland there is no such option for the capitalists – in all of these countries, capitalists have to govern with and through the so-called populists. Great Britain has already been lost. President of the EU-commission, Juncker, said it was one of his biggest mistakes not to have intervened in the Brexit-debacle more decisively. Apparently, the elite has learned from the British chaos and now acts more proactively.

Then there is the specific political culture in Austria that always oscillates between fantasies of grandeur and an inferiority complex particularly toward our German neighbours. Sebastian Kurz tried over the recent years to step on Angela Merkel's toes when speaking in talk shows or Bavarian conservative party meetings. The German government repeatedly let their irritations known and told him to stop these games. International pressure played an important part in Kurz‘s decision to call for re-elections after the revelation of the Ibiza-Tape.

Lastly, we shouldn’t forget about the role of the individual. One doesn’t have to be an expert to realise that Strache & Co are entirely open to the influence of money, power and seduction (the video shows Strache repeatedly commenting on the fake Russian oligarch: “Damn she’s hot.”) When Strache started to suspect a trap (because the toenails of the oligarch-actress weren’t manicured, befitting a rich lady), his polit-groupie Gudenus assured him: “This isn’t a trap.” Strache thus continued to spill stories – a perfect victim to the plot.

Kurz‘s strategy: flight forward

We are told that Kurz had a warning before everyone else found out about the video in the news. His first idea was to continue the coalition government, while changing some ministers. However, the Freedom Party refused to sacrifice their theoretical head and Minister of the Interior, Herbert Kickl. Him leaving would likely have split the party, although it would have been the preferred solution for the bourgeoisie. The Federation of Austrian Industries had already publicly approved this procedure. It would have been an easy game for Kurz, who could’ve basically governed as a single-party administration.

But as this coup was denied by the FPÖ, Kurz started to work on his re-election speech. He presented himself as a long-suffering victim of the countless “isolated cases” of racist and fascist clangers by the FPÖ. But to continue the amazing success story of his political line (i.e. attacks on the workers), he said he would now choose the path of re-elections. In the same speech, he appealed to the voters to increase their support for him. He said he couldn’t govern with “today’s” Freedom Party, not with the Social Democracy with their “different political approach” and not with other parties (such as the neoliberal NEOS), because they are too small. At the same time, he talked about protection from migration, upcoming tax decreases and used coded anti-semitic language while attacking the Social Democrats.

Kurz is in the course of re-organising the bourgeois block. His plan is to increase his votes and arrange for some majority provider such as the neoliberal outfit NEOS and to continue his onslaught against workers’ rights and the welfare state.

Social Democrats could sink Kurz

An serious opposition could now expose all the manifest contradictions within the government and the state apparatus and massively weaken both major bourgeois parties – the FPÖ as well as the ÖVP. For this, they should direct the public debate towards the obvious hypocrisy of both.

But even this purely democratic question is too much for the SPÖ-leadership. They didn’t demand re-elections but waited for hours and hours until Kurz did it himself first. Their accusations were purely directed towards the FPÖ and even then, they didn’t attack them with political arguments but by simply reporting them to the Department for Prosecution of Economy and Corruption – the very same department that indicted its own head to for corruption in the interest of the conservative party only this week!

While tens of thousands of people celebrated and demonstrated on the streets after the demise of Strache, the SPÖ leadership didn’t manage to connect to this mood to finish off this anti-working-class government. They only hope is to be incorporated into a future government come the next elections. This is in line with their general orientation towards “social partnership” and the state apparatus. Even after Kurz declined any cooperation with the SP in his re-election speech, the SP party chairwoman Pamela Rendi-Wagner stubbornly stuck to this idea.

If this continues, Strache’s fall will turn out to be a Pyrrhic victory. It will result only in strengthening Kurz and the neoliberal NEOS party and also the stabilisation of the Freedom Party. The orientation of the SP-leadership directly prepares for a second Kurz government, and as such, a government of cuts and of slashing social and democratic rights. The liberal indignation will die away and the working class will be defenceless in the face of the reorganised bourgeois bloc.

But this is not inevitable. The ongoing political conflict is a struggle between bourgeois factions, re-organising their power amongst themselves. What we need is an offensive of the working class on the basis of social issues and class struggle, instead of participating in the corrupt capitalist state apparatus. The re-elections will only change the status quo if a new programme can be pushed through within the workers’ movement. This is only possible by openly opposing the SP-leadership.

Democratic control and expropriation are in order!

It is thus the task of the Left to use this crisis of the bourgeois to launch an offensive struggle with the correct orientation. This way, we can weaken capitalism and its exercise of power via the state. Within the first few hours of the government’s crisis, we saw that the Socialist Youth (SJ) would be in a position to do just that. The SJ, together with other SP-youth organisations, called for a demonstration in front of the Chancellor’s Office and 10,000 people followed this spontaneous call. The SJ leader, Julia Herr, received rapturous applause. Her speech made the following points:

“No to a government that can be bought! No to both ÖVP and FPÖ! The rich give you money and you deliver. Your donors wanted the 12-hour working day, you are implementing it! Your donors wanted to smash the health insurance so that private insurance companies can make profits. You delivered. Your donors wanted low taxes on profits, you deliver and want to lower the tax!”

This is, in the abstract, a correct position. But what does it mean, concretely, to fight against a government that can be bought? It is not enough to say the right things, now is the time to start as big a campaign as possible to fight against the status quo.

The first task is to openly argue for the overthrow of the government. In the current situation, this can even be done via the parliament. The Freedom Party hinted that they might support a vote of no confidence against Kurz, because all of their ministers were forced to resign. Such a vote of no confidence was announced – not by the SP but by a Green-Party split called “Jetzt!” (Now!). Will the SP support this vote? Only if they are forced to by events. The SJ head, Herr, has a responsibility to take concrete steps in the struggle against the ÖVP/FPÖ-government, for which she and the SJ stand. She should demand the following: overthrow Kurz by supporting the vote of no confidence.

With this, Kurz would be the shortest-serving Chancellor in the history of Austria, and this is exactly what we want.

This could serve as a 180° turn on and environmental issues, and could overcome the divisive ideology of racism. Take back all the counter-reforms!

Get rid of the 12-hour-working-day.

Full control of social and health insurance by the insured instead of representatives of the capitalists.

Take back the cuts in the basic income for the poor and ill.

Against racist division of the working class and against the strengthening of repression: take back the headscarf ban in kindergartens, the mounted police unit and the use of hollow-point bullets.

It is now necessary to concretely test the opposition parties, including the SP, in their reaction to these demands. The trade union leaders have now a historic chance to make good on their promise of last year by starting a massive campaign to reintroduce the 8-hour-working-day. The fact that the metal industry boss Collini already announced that he wanted to cancel the collective bargaining round this autumn is enough reason to go into a strong offensive. This can and should be demanded by trade union members, shop stewards and trade union officials.

For a socialist programme!

How can we ensure that a future left government will not be bought by the capitalists? After all, laws for party finance transparency and anti-corruption laws obviously don’t work.

Democratic control is only possible if the financial practices of the capitalists are mercilessly opened up to the public. Open the books! The capitalists called out in the Ibiza-Tape are only the tip of the iceberg. We know how big capital, such as the Raiffeisen bank & Co., have the politicians in their pockets. We don’t trust the “judiciary”, who cover the powerful and only go after the corrupt, drunken smallfry. We want shop stewards, trade unions and activists not only to get access to the books and insight into the capitalists’ power plays, we also want to report this to the public. We want to know for sure who the buyers of political power and policies are – and we argue for their full expropriation without compensation under workers’ control and the public.

Down with the bourgeois block!

For a mass campaign to take back all the cuts!

Open the capitalists’ books!

For expropriation without compensation of all corporations and capitalists that bought policies!

No waiting for an election – fight now!

Mass support for Assange as workers and youth oppose militarism and war

Australian voters speak out

By our reporters

21 May 2019

https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2019/05/21/aui1-m21.html

Socialist Equality Party (SEP) campaigners interviewed scores of workers and youth at polling booths where the party ran candidates in the lower house electorates in Queensland, New South Wales and Victoria during last Saturday’s Australian federal election.

Labor, the Liberals and the Greens, along with the corporate media refused to discuss any of the major political questions confronting millions of ordinary people during the short four-week election campaign. Nothing was said about the widening chasm between rich and poor, Australian involvement in the US-led preparations for war against China or the imprisonment of WikiLeaks journalist Julian Assange.

By contrast, hundreds of workers passionately endorsed the SEP’s campaign to secure the release of Assange and US whistleblower Chelsea Manning, describing the two as courageous individuals, heroes, legends and similar appellations.

There was enormous support for Assange and Manning in Calwell, the working class electorate in north-western Melbourne that is home to many refugees and immigrants from countries devastated by US imperialism, including Iraq, Syria, and Afghanistan.

Amgad said: “I feel very strongly about this—I feel 100 percent positive about Chelsea Manning and Julian Assange. It’s a question of American imperialism. They are pushing for war in Iran, look at John Bolton, look at that fool Trump. There is no moral backbone amongst any politicians in any country.

“Nothing Julian Assange did was wrong in his publications as a journalist. Why isn’t Rupert Murdoch in jail? There is free speech, but not for all. What is happening to Julian Assange is a free speech violation and it’s happening in a Western country, not Saudi Arabia. One thing we have to do is make this the Australian government’s biggest responsibility, and get Julian brought back here.”

Matt, a Bangladeshi IT worker, said: “Julian did the right thing. That’s the real truth. The sad reality is that big, powerful people always run the world. Obviously they didn’t like that he brought to light many things. I’m always against war. The media and politicians just spread hate for their own monetary benefit. There are two groups in the world: one is the ruling class, the other is the general class. The ruling class manipulates us in any way they want.”

Franklin, a taxi driver originally from Sri Lanka, said he was “extremely concerned” about Assange. “Julian Assange is the man that should be free and those that committed the war crimes behind bars. The US government is the criminal. Assange is being treated this way because he spoke the truth. The man that speaks the truth is in jail and the ones that carry out the crimes are free and counting their millions. Every war, wherever it is fought, is all about profit.”

Khalid, a worker, originally from Lebanon, said: “If Julian is sent to the US, he will never see the light again. I think he is an honest man. All he did was to tell the people the truth… and he shouldn’t be in jail. We, as citizens, should have the right to know what’s going on, where our money goes, what our government is doing.”

Khalid supported socialism, he said, because it was antiwar. “Wars are not about people, they’re about money. That’s why the US is now threatening war against Iran—so the Arab countries will run and buy guns from the US. Every time they go to war, it is to make money.”

Khalil, an engineer said: “Assange is in prison because he revealed their dirty secrets—all their influences in the Middle East, their bad deeds and the political dirt. Governments weren’t happy and they accused him of hurting their security—this is what governments do and it is what is happening in the Middle East, and is being done by the rulers there. I’m with Assange.”

Mehdi, a construction worker originally from Afghanistan, said: “My country has been in war for the last 30 to 40 years. I’ve seen war and all the disadvantages and bad things in war and I’m against it. I really like this man Assange. He leaks all the internal policies of the USA and international politics. Whenever America or NATO intervenes in a country it is to help the governments not the people.”

Hamid, originally from Algeria, opposed the persecution Assange. “On the one hand, the western powers say that they are promoting human rights, democracy and freedom but on the other they are abusing freedom of speech. I don’t think they have any justification for arresting Assange. He tried to reveal what they were hiding,” he said.

“I have great respect for Assange. Without him we don’t know what is going on underneath. Everyone knows that the USA makes reasons to justify where they intervene, especially if there is oil. A long time ago they used the pretext of human rights—that a country wasn’t complying with human rights—and go to war with that country. Now they are not even using that. They don’t even care.”

Feristah, a teacher, voted for the SEP, as did her daughter Eve, a lawyer. “Your slogan ‘No to militarism and war!’ was appealing. The Liberal government has spent a lot of money on preparing war with China. If you talk about going to war, you’ll end up going to war. I think countries like the US, France, Germany, the UK are dominating world politics,” Feristah said.

“Look at Venezuela. What is Trump doing there? What are we doing there? Why are we interfering? If they hadn’t been interfering in Syria as they have been for years, the world wouldn’t have to deal with 10 million Syrian refugees.”

Eve defended Assange. “His only ‘crime’ was to let people know of the dirty work that these governments get up to. These countries are no longer accountable for their actions. We need to take ownership of Assange, he hasn’t done anything wrong. It’s sad that he’s lost so many years of his life confined to such a small space. He’s a hero at many levels. They’re out to get him in any way shape or form—he’s a victim of great power politics.”

These sentiments were repeated in the western-Sydney electorate of Parramatta.

Zabi, 50, originally from Afghanistan, said he voted for the SEP.

“What they are doing to Assange is horrible. It’s an attack on freedom of speech, against journalism. Now, all journalists are threatened because of what they are doing to Julian Assange.…

“The ideas presented by the SEP are in line with my ideas, my way of thinking, the way things are going. I don’t like the other parties—the Liberals, the Labor party, the Greens. Their track records, their history are totally opposite from the way I think. They are for the corporate wealthy and supporting military interventions.

“The US will do anything to maintain its control, their number one position in the world. Sadly, Australia is a follower. Whatever the US dictates, Australia follows without thinking what is in the best interests of Australia.”

Ioana, 28, said the election was “a joke” and added: “The fact that they haven’t mentioned war means that something big is going to happen around the world because people are getting angry and fed up…

“I know about Julian Assange and I think everyone has a right to voice what they believe in and the truth should be out there. He’s been unfairly treated, almost worse than an animal, and there are no human rights. He should be free…”

Jay, a 34-year-old western Sydney construction worker, said Assange should be released. “He’s a legend and wants to expose what the big players are doing. There should be more people like him. Each of the big players is trying to cover themselves…

“This is an attack on freedom of speech. And now we are in danger of a new war in the Middle East where more innocent people are going to be slaughtered, people displaced all over the world.… The big players are after oil, resources. They don’t care about ordinary people like us.”

Merwais, a Western Sydney University student, praised Assange and spoke about the danger of war. “All the organisations, publications and journalists that have abandoned Assange and attack him are run by private business funds. They don’t follow the facts and don’t want to damage their reputation even if that means hiding the reality, he said.

“The world is becoming more destabilised and what’s happening in the Middle East is spreading and now the US wants to intervene into Iran. Whatever Iran is doing is better than a US intervention—look at the disaster the US created in Iraq. It’s much worse than what it was like under Saddam Hussein. The strategy the US is using to inject their government and culture is not working. It’s leading to colonialism and if precautions are not taken it will lead to World War III.”

Isaac voted for the SEP in the Hunter electorate after meeting party campaigners in a local shopping centre. “None of the real issues have been discussed by any other of the parties in this election. The issue of war and the dangerous situation now present is not discussed. Yet this danger of war is affecting people everywhere including in Australia.

“The governments here will not act on our concerns about war because they know if they back away from support for the US war drive they will quickly be made accountable by US so they remain totally committed. Assange has let people know about what the US has done, and is doing, and now he is being persecuted for it. He should be supported by everyone.”

Lachlan, another Hunter voter and a bushland regeneration worker, said Assange has “done great things and doesn’t deserves the punishment he’s been getting and shouldn’t be extradited to the US or Sweden.”

Governments are “preparing for war” everywhere, he said. “There’s so much going on behind closed doors that we don’t know about… There’s lots of evidence of America trying to interfere in the politics of foreign countries for their own economic gain, and Australia goes along with it. What’s needed is a complete overhaul of government. I don’t know what I’d put in place of that, but I lean towards socialism. I think anything would be better than capitalism.”

Zameel, a low-paid aged care worker who had just finished night shift, spoke to SEP campaigners in Oxley, a working-class electorate in Queensland.

“I hope you [the SEP] do very well. I’m all for a socialist campaign, for equality. Corporate capitalism obviously isn’t working at the moment.”

Zameel was outraged over the persecution Assange and Manning. “They’re heroes, especially Chelsea Manning, for refusing to testify for the second time,” he said. “That takes true guts. And people recognise that.

“It’s a travesty the way the Australian government has treated Assange. The inaction by both the major parties is pathetic. For Julia Gillard to call Assange a criminal made her a bit of a fool, considering the secrets he uncovered, some of the program he helped disclose.”

Peter, a public servant, was passionate about the defence of Julian Assange. “Knowing the decline of journalism, we need people like him,” he said. “He’s informing society, and the Australian government should step in and defend its own citizen. Exposing the workings of the government is not a crime. He’s a part of the media and helps preserve our civil liberties, which generations of people fought for.

“Every thinking person realises that we are heading toward a one polar world, with one prevailing view, and everyone is supposed to fall into line and be obedient, despite the fact that we are supposed to have freedom of speech. So the one who speaks out is an enemy of the state. How democratic is this?”

Colin, an unemployed labourer, was disgusted by the election campaign. “The two parties [Liberal-National and Labor] are the same,” he said. “They don’t care about people, and voting won’t change the system, which is stupid and useless.”

Referring to Assange and Manning, he said: “Manning is so courageous for refusing to testify against Assange, which is my understanding of why they’ve jailed her. Both Assange and Manning have a much higher moral strength and argument, in my opinion, than Trump and his administration… Julian Assange should be brought home to Australia and treated like a celebrity, given a hero’s welcome.”

Asked about the SEP’s slogan “No to militarism and war, for internationalism and socialism,” Colin said: “I’m against all the flag-waving you see. There should be no national boundaries. I agree that people ought to be able to live wherever they want. There’s no difference between countries … I think people in all countries are basically the same and I agree they need to fight together against the corporations.”