An excellent look at the disaster waiting to be imposed upon the
Working Class. Hitch up your pants and pull out your threadbare
wallets, this next four years will cost you plenty of sweat, tears and
cash.
Carl Jarvis
On 1/8/17, Roger Loran Bailey <dmarc-noreply@freelists.org> wrote:
> https://socialistaction.org/2017/01/05/as-trump-takes-the-helm-the-war-against-working-people-continues/
>
>
> As Trump takes the helm, the war against working people continues
>
> / 2 days ago
>
>
> Demonstration in LA against election of Donald Trump
>
> By MARK UGOLINI
>
> The Republican Party takes primary charge of the U.S. government this
> month with Donald Trump sworn in as president, and both houses of
> Congress under Republican control by a slim majority.
>
> The new administration is taking shape with announcements of key
> government cabinet posts. These include a combination of professional
> politicians, former military officers, and powerful captains of industry
> and finance representing huge Wall Street and corporate interests.
>
> Like past Republican Party cabinets especially, leading billionaire
> capitalists will be well represented, joining Trump in the new
> government. Billionaire cabinet members include Commerce Secretary
> Wilbur Ross, a longtime Wall Street investor and speculator; Linda
> McMahon, Small Business Administrator, one of Trump's biggest campaign
> donors; and Betsy DeVos, Education Secretary, who comes from a family of
> billionaires and openly advocates dismantling public schools and
> replacing them with private schools run on "free market" principles to
> generate profits.
>
> Big name Wall Street industrialists and financiers chosen by Trump
> include Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin, a hedge fund manager, Goldman
> Sachs trader, and Hollywood financier; Secretary of State Rex Tillerson,
> president and CEO of Exxon Mobile; and Andrew Puzder, Labor Secretary
> and CEO of fast-food giant CKE Restaurants.
>
> The new team will bring new policies, but the overall goal of Trump's
> Republican government will be the same as that of Obama's Democratic
> Party government before him—to conduct the business of the tiny
> capitalist ruling class, and remove obstacles that stand in the way of
> profits for Wall Street and the banks.
>
> Both capitalist parties struggle with how to overcome years of economic
> stagnation and lagging profits. Major divisions have emerged on
> determining the best method to correct this, but under capitalism new
> policies are incapable of addressing this issue in any fundamental or
> lasting way.
>
> So, driven by this crisis, the new Republican-majority government has
> only one recourse—to continue imposition of the severe and ever
> escalating austerity offensive that began in the 1970s and has continued
> through each succeeding presidential administration. Along with union
> busting and economic attacks on the standard of living of working
> people, the offensive's broader features include racist police violence;
> new attacks on abortion rights; anti-immigrant harassment, particularly
> targeting Muslims; and widespread deportations. In all these areas,
> attacks will continue, and likely accelerate during the new Republican
> Party administration
>
> Domestic policy
>
> While much is not yet known about the new Trump administration or its
> priorities, some of its direction is becoming clear.
>
> We are nearly certain to see big tax cuts for the rich, while
> regulations on corporations and financial firms will be eliminated or
> relaxed. The appointment of Scott Pruitt, a climate denier and longtime
> supporter of the fossil-fuel industry, to head the Environmental
> Protection Agency signals full backing to the oil, coal, and natural gas
> interests, as well as to fracking. We can expect that regulations on
> these industries will be either eliminated or substantially weakened.
>
> The selection of Andrew Puzder for Labor Secretary points a direction
> that is more demonstratively anti-labor. Puzder is only interested in
> labor and unions to the extent that he can limit their power. His goal
> is to get rid of unions or minimize their influence, not to defend them
> or ensure workers get a fair shake. As head of a big fast-food chain,
> his corporate objectives were based on exploiting workers.
>
> Puzder is on record in opposing minimum-wage increases above the current
> $7.25 per hour, which has been in place since 2009. Earlier this year he
> proudly told the Business Insider news site his true feelings about
> workers and automation. He said the good thing about machines is that
> "they are always polite, they always upsell, they never take a vacation,
> they never show up late, there's never a slip-and-fall or an age, sex,
> or race discrimination case."
>
> Trump has focused repeatedly on the need for "law and order" and giving
> police departments a free hand to act with limited constraints. His
> comments on this topic nearly exclusively target Black and Latino
> communities that have been victimized by a spate of highly publicized
> racist police murders over the last few years. Trump believes the
> problem is that local police departments are not strong enough.
>
> Trump's selected Jeff Sessions, an Alabama racist with a long history,
> for Attorney General, and retired General John Kelly for Director of
> Homeland Security. They will team up to implement this "law and order"
> policy. Both back police against Black Lives Matter and other opponents
> of police violence. They also support the War on Drugs, militarization
> of the police, mass incarceration of Black youth, and the growing
> private prison industry that sustains itself on slave prison labor.
>
> New attacks will be directed against immigrants, with stepped up
> deportations and harassment. Trump will continue and likely expand
> Obama's aggressive deportation of over 2 million immigrants. Trump
> agrees with Obama's method of targeting "undesirables" or
> "non-deserving" immigrants who may have been arrested or jailed while in
> the U.S. Using this distinction the incoming Republican administration
> will first target the approximately 3 million immigrants who fall into
> the "bad immigrant" category.
>
> Supporters of immigration rights need to loudly condemn this practice.
> The idea that a certain category of immigrant in some way deserves
> deportation is unacceptable and will only divide the protest movement,
> which stands opposed to all deportations. It also provides political
> cover for politicians to unjustly label large sections of the immigrant
> population as "criminals." Nothing can be farther from the truth.
>
> Trump has also announced his support for reversal of the 1973 Roe v.
> Wade Supreme Court ruling that affirmed the legal right of women to
> abortions. During his campaign Trump stated that any candidate he
> proposes for Supreme Court justice must share his opposition to Roe v.
> Wade. Since a new nominee will be selected by Trump early in his first
> term, it's clear that the on-going fight for abortion rights will be
> near center stage during the Trump presidency.
>
> Foreign policy
>
> As the preeminent world power, the United States under Republican rule
> will continue to assert its dominance throughout the world. U.S. foreign
> policy is designed to pave the way for the insatiable drive of powerful
> corporate giants to dominate markets anywhere in the world.
>
> The capitalist crisis is global, as no nation on earth can boast of a
> "recovery" or an economy free from stagnation or decline. Along with
> widespread imposition of austerity measures worldwide, imperialist wars
> of domination and plunder continue unabated throughout the world.
>
> As Obama leaves office the U.S. is engaged in at least seven wars (Iraq,
> Afghanistan, Syria, Pakistan, Libya, Yemen, and Somalia), either by
> direct military intervention or through client states and mercenary
> armies. In many, drone warfare prevails, and the CIA provides leadership
> utilizing covert methods. In others, U.S. military Special Forces
> provide training and support for local troops or intervene directly on
> their own. Meanwhile, regular U.S. imperialist troops remain stationed
> at some 1100 military bases around the world, from which drone attacks
> and a myriad of deadly covert actions are regularly planned and executed.
>
> Trump plans a foreign policy led by Secretary of State Rex Tillerson,
> CEO of Exxon, one of the most powerful multi-national corporations.
> Tillerson has strong ties to Russian government officials and oil
> magnates from years of partnership managing their shared oil interests.
> Tillerson and Exxon will prosper mightily under the new Republican
> administration.
>
> Foreign policy will also be shaped by two retired generals: Secretary of
> Defense James "Mad Dog" Mattis and National Security Advisor Michael
> Flynn. Mattis was a central leader of U.S. wars in Afghanistan and Iraq,
> which destroyed those countries and killed hundreds of thousands in the
> process. Flynn, an Islamophobe who claims that fear of Muslims is
> "justified," supports targeting Muslim organizations and mosques with
> surveillance and spying. Both will be instrumental in executing and
> possibly expanding involvement in U.S. wars.
>
> 'America First'
>
> The foreign policy theme of the new administration will be "America
> First." Trump raised the slogan during his campaign largely as a false
> promise to U.S. workers that his administration would remedy stagnant
> job growth in this country by means of a system of tariffs and other
> protectionist devices aimed at increasing the volume of products that
> are "Made in America."
>
> But "America First" also has a military connotation. Large doses of
> anti-Muslim rhetoric are used to project a strong image of U.S. military
> strength and dominance worldwide. This posture demands subservience from
> less powerful nations. It will be a foreign policy that "respects"
> authoritarian figures such as Russian President Vladimir Putin and
> Syrian President Bashar al-Assad. Trump also seeks closer ties with
> Philippine dictator President Rodrigo Duterte, whose government has
> overseen extrajudicial killings of thousands of suspected drug dealers.
> In accepting a congratulatory call from Duterte following Trump's
> victory, the president-elect communicated approval for these police
> actions.
>
> But Democratic Party administrations also have a long history of
> supporting tyrants and dictators. Many examples from the past can be
> raised, but most recently, the Obama administration provided
> full-throated support for dictatorial regimes like the Saudi monarchy,
> Hosni Mubarak in Egypt, Persian Gulf states including Qatar and Bahrain,
> and Idriss Deby in Chad. Obama greatly expanded funding for apartheid
> Israel—which still tries to pose as a democracy, but has 1.8 million
> Palestinians under siege in Gaza, rules by military occupation,
> regularly tortures Palestinian political prisoners, and has a long and
> well-documented history of human rights abuses of Palestinians,
> including extrajudicial murders.
>
> Trump's "America First" approach is at odds with Obama's foreign policy
> posture, which uses different methods but is designed to achieve the
> same result. Obama's program ostensibly focused on "building trust" with
> other countries. The Dec. 29 Washington Post described it as a
> "collaborative approach and emphasis on international norms [to]
> convince other countries to partner with the United States to do things
> that were not always popular." The Post quoted an Obama State Department
> senior advisor as stating that "America First" and anti-Muslim rhetoric
> "constrain[s] America's ability to persuade world powers to work with us."
>
> Clearly, however, the differences cited here are purely tactical. The
> goal is to force compliance with America's interests, and the
> differences concern how best to posture on the world stage to achieve
> that result.
>
> From Trump's statements there is little doubt he plans a massive
> buildup in military spending, exceeding spending during the Obama years.
> Trump has called for 90,000 more Army soldiers, dozens of new Navy ships
> and hundreds of warplanes, as well as bolstering nuclear and missile
> defense. As expected, justification for this massive buildup is the
> "heightened threat of terrorism."
>
> Forbes cited expert government analysts on the cost: "[a] good ballpark
> estimate … is about $800-900B higher over ten years than the most recent
> president's budget requests. Foreign Policy Magazine estimates about
> "$100 billion more than the Pentagon has currently budgeted for Trump's
> first term."
>
> Trump is proud to admit that a big chunk of military spending will go to
> upgrading the military nuclear arsenal, continuing and expanding Obama's
> work in this area. In fact, Trump is calling for "a new nuclear arms
> race." He says it's important for the U.S. to "expand its nuclear
> capability until such time as the world comes to its senses regarding
> nukes." The U.S. currently has 4500 nuclear warheads, including 1800
> deployed strategic nuclear weapons, far surpassing all other countries
> that have them.
>
> The Republican Party administration will build on the work of their
> predecessors. Despite Obama's carefully crafted statements posing as an
> opponent of nuclear weapons, he has taken major steps to strengthen the
> U.S. nuclear military capability with an extensive "modernization"
> program, which the Dec. 22 New York Times reported "may cost up to $1
> trillion over three decades. It features new factories, refurbished
> nuclear arms and a new generation of weapon carriers, including bombers,
> missiles and submarines. The bombers are to carry a new super-stealthy
> cruise missile meant to slip through enemy air defenses."
>
> This "modernization" means replacing older and outdated missile systems
> with smaller more streamlined versions equipped with newest technology
> that makes them much more accurate in hitting targets and more difficult
> to shoot down.
>
> Continued support to Israel
>
> Staunch bipartisan military support for Israel, the only military
> nuclear power in the Middle East, has further heightened the risk of
> nuclear war. Former President Jimmy Carter estimated in 2014 that
> Israel's nuclear arsenal totaled somewhere near 300 warheads, with ample
> delivery systems to deploy them.
>
> Obama's award to Israel of a record $38 billion in military aid over the
> next 10 years will greatly strengthen its nuclear capability and poses a
> grave risk of nuclear war in the region. To this day, Israel denies it
> has a nuclear program and it refuses to sign the Non-Proliferation
> Treaty (NPT), a widely recognized international treaty to "limit the
> spread" of nuclear weapons. The NPT is supposed to include all states
> that possess nuclear weapons.
>
> Regarding support to apartheid Israel, the new Republican administration
> has clearly taken "blind and unquestioning support" to a new level. The
> selection of David M. Friedman as U.S. Ambassador to Israel is a "green
> light" for Israel to accelerate land-theft from Palestinians in the West
> Bank and East Jerusalem. Jewish settlements there have long been
> declared illegal under international law.
>
> Friedman, who refers to the West Bank by its Biblical name, Judea and
> Samaria, does not recognize the rights of Palestinians to any part of
> these territories or to East Jerusalem, which are currently occupied by
> Israel. Friedman said he looked forward to working "from the U.S.
> Embassy in Israel's eternal capital, Jerusalem," rather than Tel Aviv,
> where the American Embassy has resided for many years.
>
> Palestinians have long sought Jerusalem as the capital of a future
> Palestinian state, and moving the embassy to Jerusalem will be
> considered an outrage throughout the Arab world. Friedman is connected
> to ultra-religious Jewish settlement groups and raises money for them.
> He was also a major contributor to the Trump election campaign.
>
> Despite differences on how to handle Israel on settlements, the
> Democrats and Republicans are largely in agreement on the most critical
> questions. Both see Israel as the bastion of U.S. imperialist interests
> in the Middle East and a critical ally, justifying huge sums in military
> aid from the U.S. each year; both fully support Israel as a Jewish
> exclusive state, in which non-Jewish residents are relegated to
> second-class status, without equal rights; both fully support imposing a
> Bantustan-like state on the Palestinian people without real political or
> military sovereignty; and both also reject granting all Palestinians and
> non-Jewish residents equal rights, including the right of all
> Palestinians currently living outside historic Palestine to return to
> their homeland.
>
> The state of Israel was established in 1949 as an act of colonial
> domination, and is based on Jewish religious supremacy over the
> Palestinians, who are in second-class status, persecuted, and deprived
> of basic rights. This master-slave relationship must end before a truly
> just society can be built—a democratic and secular state throughout all
> of historic Palestine, which recognizes full and equal rights to all
> regardless of religion, race, or national origin.
>
> Photo: Mike Nelson / European Pressphoto Agency
>
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> January 5, 2017 in Anti-War, Elections, Labor. Tags: Trump
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