REVOLUTION 75

Blood-Soaked Oppressors Talk of “Joy,” “Freedom” and “Compassion”

BOB AVAKIAN—REVOLUTION

Number Seventy-Five: Blood-Soaked Oppressors Talk of “Joy,” “Freedom” and “Compassion.”

Tim Walz, Kamala Harris’s “vice presidential running mate,” tries to sound a lofty lyrical note as he intones that Kamala Harris is “bringing joy” back into the politics of this system!

“Joy”—at what? At the life-stealing exploitation, murderous oppression, and literally massive slaughter and destruction, of people and the environment, that this outmoded system of capitalism-imperialism actually rests on and continually carries out?

Harris and Walz claim that their campaign is about “freedom, compassion, and the rule of law.” But where is the “rule of law” in the illegal invasion and occupation of Iraq, and the many other war crimes that this country has repeatedly carried out (which I spoke to in my previous message, number Seventy-Four)? Where is the “freedom” and “compassion” for the masses of Palestinian people, including more than 15 thousand children, who have been massacred in the genocidal slaughter being carried out by Israel, armed and fully backed by Biden, Harris, and the rest of the ruling class of this country? Where is the “freedom” and “compassion” for the billions of people throughout the world who are cruelly exploited—including more than 150 million children, who are denied a childhood, and instead are forced to work in slave-like conditions, in sweatshop factories, mines and farms—creating the wealth that the capitalist-imperialist system rests on?

Is it “freedom, compassion, and the rule of law” that Harris was carrying out in her role as a prosecutor in California, where she was a driving force in mass incarceration, particularly of Black people and Latinos? Where is the “freedom, compassion and rule of law” in the way the Democratic Party insists on giving more funding and backing to police, who consistently kill a thousand people every year, especially Black people, as well as Latinos and Native Americans? (Since 1960, the police have killed more Black people than the thousands who were lynched during the whole time of open, “Jim Crow” segregation and Ku Klux Klan terror after the Civil War!)

All this is fact. It is truth that far too many, especially many liberals and “progressives,” try their hardest to ignore, deny, downplay, and explain away. They stubbornly cling instead to the “unifying mythology” of this country that, whatever “flaws” it may have, it is based on (or at least it is continuing to strive and advance toward) freedom, opportunity and inclusion for all. This enables these liberals and “progressives” to believe that they occupy a privileged position in this world because of their own determination and efforts, and not because of the actual determining factor: the position and role of the U.S. as the dominant imperialist power, plundering people in all parts of the world. It enables them to believe that, in any case, even with its “faults,” this system is the best possible system, and everything else is worse.

It is also a fact that the illusion of “inclusion”—and promises of “freedom and equality” for all— deceive and mislead people who have not led a more privileged, but in fact a more desperate, existence within this country—and who have been preached at repeatedly that there is no good alternative to this system, and the most and best you can do is strive for a better place within its confines—without knowledge or concern about what it all rests on.

All this will no doubt be on display, and relentlessly hyped up, in the Democratic Party convention this week.

But reality is coming for these lies and illusions.

In the world as a whole, the very functioning of this system of capitalism-imperialism—including the actual policies of Biden and Harris—is leading to the accelerating destruction of the environment. (At revcom.us, there is extensive exposure of the actual policies, and the lies and misleading claims, of the Biden/Harris administration, regarding the environment.)

In arming and backing the actions of Israel, the U.S. government is not only enabling the genocidal slaughter of Palestinians but is also increasing the possibility of a war with Iran, and perhaps an even wider and more destructive war. At the same time, by massively providing weapons, as well as intelligence and strategic direction to Ukraine, the U.S. government, headed by the Biden/Harris administration, is already indirectly at war with Russia, while also making preparations for military confrontation with China —all of which could lead to world war, between nuclear-armed imperialist powers, with the possibility of wiping out human civilization as we know it.

Within the U.S. itself, the racist, woman and LGBT-hating, immigrant persecuting, science-denying, environment plundering, future-destroying fascism of Trump and the Republican Party poses a direct challenge to the unifying mythology of America as a land of freedom, equality and opportunity for all, and it is a direct threat to the “normal way” that this country has functioned, and the rule of the capitalist class has been held together, and exercised over the people, for generations, with the “peaceful transfer of power” from one section of the capitalist ruling class to the other, depending on the outcome of elections, accepted by both sides.

Besides the ugly truth of what Harris (and Walz) are really all about, there is the fact that, in the election this November (assuming it is held then), if Harris/Walz were to win the majority (not just in the popular vote but also the Electoral College count) it is almost certain that Trump and the Republicans would refuse to accept this, and things would likely be thrown into chaos and upheaval, even beyond what happened with the last presidential election (in 2020).

As I have emphasized in message number Eight:

The country as a whole is being torn apart by divisions that can no longer be covered over and things can no longer be held together in the way they have been for generations.

Everything will very likely be coming to a head and coming up for grabs this year, 2024, with the presidential election this year a sharp focus of the fight between the dominating ruling class parties—Democrats and Republicans—a fight that is very likely to break all out of the bounds of the “normal way” they exercise power over the people, and keep their whole murderous system going....

This kind of deep division—and especially this bitter antagonism among the powers-that-be—has not been seen in this country since the time of the Civil War way back in the 1860s.

I got into all this more fully in messages numbers Sixty-Three through Sixty-Six, and I will have more to say about it, as things develop. But, for now, there is this profound, critical truth, from my message number Eight:

This is not a time to be siding with one group of oppressors or another. This is a rare time—a very rare opening—a chance that may come only once in a lifetime—a chance to take advantage of the deep divisions among the ruling oppressors and go after their whole system, with the aim of bringing the whole thing down, and putting something much better in its place.

And in this light, to echo the important point I emphasized in message number Fifty-Eight: For those liberals and “progressives” who are willing to confront inconvenient but profound truths and can recognize that whatever “goodies” they get from this system are not nearly as important as the tremendous suffering and destruction caused by this system, worldwide—and the very real threat it poses to the future, and the very existence, of humanity—and for those who are not so “invested” in this system, but suffer terribly under its rule: there is the urgent need to be joining, and working actively for, the only real, positive alternative to this monstrous system—the emancipating revolution that is possible right in this time we are living in, now.