[Marxism] White workers history, proletarian internationalist formula (sorry

[Waistline2 at aol.com]

(sorry wrong version; rough draft, previously sent) 
 
The explanatory power of Marxism is its insistent on class and property as  
the foundation and pivot of social life. Marx method informs one that all 
social  movement and motion of classes requires studying their history; the 
economic,  social and political environment in which social relations (production  
relations) are played out; the contending and  intersection of class with  their 
invisible connections and so forth.  Even the personality of  individuals is 
considered to the degree that their personality expresses the  mood of the 
moment and becomes a material forces is guiding the masses along  what ever path 
they are following. 
 
President Obama like all presidents represent a class that has political  
representatives writing the national and international agenda for their classes  
behavior in the political sphere. The capitalist class represents all classes 
in  America, as understood and governed by the capitalist class policy and 
agenda,  and that in a nutshell is the problem. 
 
In moments of exuberate enthusiasm, individuals and even classes tend to  see 
themselves and their  aspirations, to one degree or another,  represented in 
the popular leader. When the popular leader or the supreme  popular leader 
speaks of the concerns of the lower classes and then promise  to  help them in 
their economic and political struggles, the masses  rightfully sing and dance 
and listen. 
 
I listened and followed the Obama campaign and did not believe he could win  
Iowa, but he did to my amazement. I did not believe that a black man,  no  
matter what his politics could win even a Senate seat, much less President,  
unless they were the kind of person that licked boots - including the sole/soul,  
of our bourgeois masters; or a black man had to be something like a male  
Condelezza Rice. Talk about being wrong . . . .again. 
 
I did  not believe that Obama could win the Democratic Party  nomination for 
a complex  of reasons of which white supremacy ideology was  an important 
factor, but only  one of many factors. For instance, his  appeal to broad sections 
of voting  America - (not the real proletariat or  the lowest wage workers), 
on the matter  of a "National Health Care"  package seemed out of alignment 
with voting  America. Voting America, big  and smaller employers alike wanted 
the economic  burden of health care to  be shifted on to the back of government 
for sound  economic reasons;  profits. 
 
Then Obama's public talk about killing an individual in the war against  
terrorism seemed to violate the protocols of even bourgeois politics. Talk of  
murder and assassinations is generally left to the fanatic religious like  
lapdogs of capital in the mode of  . . . you know who. Then  I felt  that the 
Clinton machine and the undeserved adulation voting black America felt  towards the 
Clinton machine was to strong for them to break. "Clinton was the  man." 
"Clinton was really the first Black President." 
 
Although Clinton did what no Republican President could -  (changing  welfare 
as we know it, economically hurting blacks and all poor, while   lowering the 
bottom rung of the economic ladder by which the working class  could  be 
pushed), blacks struck with Clinton through thick and thin. As a  black man - old 
school Negro meaning I ain't like that Obama, I understood why  the love 
affair with Clinton, but it would piss me off. 
 
President Clinton was by no stretch of imagination a white supremacists in  
any aspect of his life and personality and the personal charisma - juice, was  
overwhelming. Yet, he did to the workers - NAFTA, what no  Republican  
President could do, and proven in the flesh he was not hung up on color. 
 
Then a part of me also felt that voting  America was not ready for a  women 
President and most certainly not more of the Clinton machine. A huge  section 
of white voting America had enough of the  Clinton's, even while  the blacks 
clung to his legs. 
 
Wrong, wrong wrong! 
 
In May of last year I went to Detroit to take part in my brothers  retirement 
Party - 40 years employed by Chrysler and an  International  representative 
of the UAW. 
 
All the big "muckity mucks" were present  from the company and union  as well 
as the top layer union reps from a dozen or so Chrysler facilities. You  
know, the guys and dolls with perfect teeth from using dental plan and  politician 
hand shakes that  pulled you up close, only to be overwhelmed  with genuine 
bears hugs that bent ones back in the most uncompromising position.  
Momentarily I buried a deep distrust and dislike for some of these folks,  especially 
from the Chrysler section of the union. Much of  this dislike is  from 
experiencing their ignorance and contempt for reading books and staying  abreast of 
issues. Sadly, many of the top leaders cannot read and   comprehend the union 
contract, which is a legal and complex document. Privilege  in the way of higher 
paychecks and excess time the ordinary worker will never  receive in his work 
life, should mean one should educate themselves when given  the opportunity 
and now and again give out copies of the Communist Manifesto. 
 
"Yea, that his communist fucking brother he's been saving all his life."  
"Don't day that shit so loud, y'all know how he is about his brother." 
 
Yea, brother was the man with acute political instinct and an encyclopedic  
knowledge of the contract compelling the two Presidents of the union Chrysler  
division to ask him what everything meant. Of course many were glad he was  
retiring because they hated him and his arrogant and demanding ways. 
 
Yet, virtually all of  these folks have an acute and profound  understanding 
of the feelings of the membership and  intimately understand  how the workers 
think things out. 
 
I asked  "what the story with Obama?" 
 
Several of them - mostly black, and in the case of the white reps all of  
them, repeatedly stated that Obama was going to win everything because a clear  
majority of white workers in the plants, concentrated amongst the skilled  
workers in particular, were openly siding with Obama. The skilled workers  
generally carried the unskilled in their wake due to their superior  organization, 
greater literacy and compactness. 
 
Still  . . . I  did not believe Obama, a black guy with an  Arabic/African 
name could win President of the United States of America. I   privately pondered 
what a vote for Hillary Clinton would mean to myself; not the  working class 
as a whole, that happens not to vote at all. I understood - I mean  really 
understood, these guys and dolls are extremely accurate in their gage of  the 
pulse, mood and striving of the organized - trade union, section of the  working 
class and what this meant. Generally, where every the organized section  of 
the labor movement went, the vast majority that constitute the meaning of  
"labor' must follow due to their lack of organization and a coherent voice. The  
labor movement is spontaneous and unarticulated masses; all those who must sell  
their labor for wages. The union is the organized (trade union) section of 
the  labor movement. One confuses the one with the other at their own peril. 
Voting  America is likewise one section of the working class, with the majority  
perpetually revolving outside the electoral arena. 
 
I danced, shook hands, pressed flesh and as the evening progressed proposed  
marriage to two or three women. 
 
Still, I could not make myself believe a black man - name Obama, which  
rhymes with "your momma," could win President. 
 

Likening the action of the voting section of the working class to the  
revolutionary memory of John Brown, who with arms in hand attack outpost of  
slavery,  under the concept of "anti-racism" seems like some kind of  blasphemy. Yet, 
there is no denying that millions came out in rallies and  celebrations of 
the Obama victory. 
 
What? 
 
Is one suppose to liken Obama election to the  election of Lincoln and  then 
the emancipatory actions of Lincoln. 
 
Pleaseeeeeeeeessse. 
 

Not withstanding his detractors on the left and right, Lincoln did in  fact 
speak out early against slavery during his campaign and then . . . . then,  was 
driven by social forces unleashed with the South or rather most of the  
Southern states, leaving the Union establishing the  Confederate States of  
America. This act -  (dissolving the Union), in turn caused a   profound realignment 
of social forces in America and also created the conditions  for sharpening of 
the internal class struggle within the CSA. The Civil War is  and remains the 
only blueprint for class intersection available to communists  historians and 
remains the starting point frame of reference in discussing real  life class 
interactions. None of this history can be gleamed from Lenin. Some  from Marx 
and Engels letters. 
 
Studying American history  had informed me that huge segments of the  
Southern white population hated the Slave Oligarchy and one should not lump all  
white people  together. 
 
There is something unsettling about likening the  election of Obama to  John 
Brown. . 
 
Yet, Obama election is a profound step in the voting section of the   working 
class proving to all segments of American society that the color  factor  in 
our history is being further annihilated. This annihilation  happens to 
coincide with, and collapse into a general shift in official American  ideology. 
Class intersection and policy shifts is the watchword. 
 
For all of our lives official American policy and ideology was a complex of  
extremely aggression anti-communism wedded to white chauvinism.  With the  
collapse of Soviet Power an ideological and policy shift began under the CIA's  
public spokesperson Bush 1. This shift was completed was completed by Clinton  
and then remastered - like a recording, by Bush W. as an expanded version of  
Clinton's war against terrorism. 
 
White chauvinism as official ideology was delivered a series of death  
strokes with the overthrow of Jim Crow. Jim Crow is not the meaning of white  
chauvinism. White chauvinism was the modern rationale for Jim Crow. 
 
Actually, the voting white workers did in fact close a chapter in our  
history with the crossing of the color line,  which Dubois predicted would  remain 
the paramount question in 20th century  America. There is no one  single reason 
for the closing of a chapter of our history, only class  intersection. 
 
This crossing of the color line means different things to different people  
and different classes. Not in the subjective sense of each "individual head"  
having a distinct personality and opinion. For the black bourgeoisie, (the  
real  black bourgeoisie rather than the petty bourgeoisie or intelligentsia  that 
is black), it means the sky is the limit. For a generation of black leaders  
carrying the burden of a long and tortured history, Obama means their role as  
"black leaders," leaders of black people has ended. 
 
Yea, there will be leaders of different gender and colors, but that  peculiar 
phenomenon of the black leader, a product of Jim Crow has come to an  abrupt 
end. 
 
Here is a story all communists and Marxists in America  should know.  White 
supremacy still exists and there is much of it still  poisoning the  political 
landscape. What has been wiped from history is Jim Crow. The material  step 
taken by the voting section of the working class, crossing the color line,  is 
one of the landmarks in American history that will live forever, but hardly a  
sign of proletarian internationalism. Proletarian internationalism today means 
 the unity of the fighting section of the workers in their battle against  
capital. 
 
Emancipation. Obama of course, promised no one emancipation. 
 
I am glad to be a part of the voting section of the workers crossing this  
line. Crossing this line in the current political environment of  America  does 
mean the opening a of opportunity for communists to openly champion our  
views. 
 
This also means an increase in danger in the form of the fascist movement. 
 
If anything I liken the crossing of the color line, at this moment in   time, 
to the historically specific alignment - intersection, of class   forces that 
existed during the growth of the original Populist Movement in  America. An  
intersection of class forces, with the middle class in the  lead, ushered 
Obama  into office. 
 
All such non-class movements possess the danger of being co-opted by the  
fascist movement. Non-class movement means an intersection of classes, in  
motion, that lacks an awareness that the working class fight is to be able to  write 
the economic and political agenda for the entire country. Moving into the  
1890's, at a higher level is the historical likening I see, with the last period 
 roughly mirroring 1865 - 1880. Roughly. 
 
This time the fascist movement has no need for the  ideology of white  
supremacy. 
 
WL. 
 
 
In  a message dated 2/2/2009 6:45:31 P.M. Eastern Standard Time, 
__cdb1003 at prodigy.net_ (mailto:_cdb1003 at prodigy.net) _ (_mailto:cdb1003 at prodigy.net_ 
(mailto:cdb1003 at prodigy.net) )  writes:  The history  made in O's election was not 
made by Obama, and it was not  made by  Black people. It was made by the 
masses ( although minority)  of  White working people who voted for  Obama. The 
majority of  white  people did not vote for Obama, but the minority who voted for 
him  was  critical to victory. More White people voted for Obama than  Black  
people. There were appeals to racism made by the Republicans and  
rightwingers in the election. The sufficiently large White vote for  Obama  amounts to a 
historic repudiation of this racism , and the larger  racist  legacy of 
American history. If Obama had lost, I would have been   attributing it to racism. 
Since he won, I have got to say "it" was   anti-racism. The division of the US 
working class by racism is the  main  division of it. The history in the 
election of Obama is especially that   masses of White working class people voted 
for a Black candidate  for  President. Glory to the White American anti-racist 
spirit and  sentiment.  John Brown's soul is marching on  ! 
 
Charles 
 
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