WW News Service Digest #213
1) Bankers try to shift recession burden onto workers
by "WW" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
2) California's energy crisis: fight rate hikes
by "WW" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
3) Iraq Sanctions Challenge IV: Why they're going to Baghdad
by "WW" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
4) 10 years after Gulf War
by "WW" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
-------------------------
Via Workers World News Service
Reprinted from the Jan. 18, 2001
issue of Workers World newspaper
-------------------------
BANKERS TRY TO SHIFT RECESSION BURDEN ONTO WORKERS
By Gary Wilson
The U.S. economy has entered a full-blown recession. The big
bankers know it and they are determined to shift the burden
of the downturn off themselves and onto the backs of the
working class.
The U.S. Federal Reserve Bank clearly said the economy is in
a recession with its surprise move Jan. 3 to cut the short-
term interest rate by half a percentage point. This is its
biggest cut in eight years.
Bankers resist cutting interest rates, since it reduces
their profits. Usually cuts in the rate are small. So a big
cut is generally seen as a sign of fear. What bankers fear
is that loans won't be paid back.
Lowering interest rates is supposed to ease a recession by
making money more easily available. However, lowering
interest rates does not solve the underlying cause of the
recession--capitalist overproduction.
Wall Street agrees that the economy has entered a recession.
Stephen Roach, the chief economist for the Wall Street firm
of Morgan Stanley Dean Witter, calls it "the recession we
need" in an opinion-page essay in the Jan. 4 New York Times.
The "we" Roach refers to are the finance capitalists of Wall
Street.
According to Roach, a recession is necessary when the
capitalist economy reaches a general crisis of
overproduction--he actually calls it a crisis of excesses,
but he means overproduction.
What's good about a recession, from a finance capitalist's
point of view? The good part, Roach says, is that a
recession means shutdowns and layoffs, with higher
unemployment and wage reductions. He calls this a
"cleansing" process and he says this is what fixes the
economy.
Of course, he doesn't mention that a recession can be
"cured" without layoffs and unemployment and the hardship
that it imposes on the majority of the people.
Instead, the bankers' cure for the economy has already
begun. Montgomery Ward, Bradlees, eToys and Office Depot are
going out of business. Sears, American Standard, and Bausch
and Lomb have announced closings and layoffs.
TWA airline and LTV, a big steelmaker, have filed for
bankruptcy. Xerox and BankAmerica may do the same.
Closings and unemployment are sweeping the dot-com industry
like a winter flu.
A SHREDDED SAFETY NET
In the last big recession, this kind of "cure" was eased
somewhat by social programs such as welfare. This time will
be different. That's because this is the first big economic
downturn since Bill Clinton's 1996 "welfare reform."
According to Peter Edelman, a former Clinton administration
official who quit over welfare reform, the number of
extremely poor people has risen dramatically since Clinton's
reform was introduced. Even without a recession, one in five
children in the U.S. lives in poverty.
Everyone who was forced off welfare was a parent with
children. There wasn't a federal welfare program for a
single person without children. Of the millions who were
forced off welfare, 3 million women and children remain
without any means of support.
By some estimates, 40 percent of former welfare recipients
aren't working. Of those who are working, most are making
the minimum wage.
If the recession deepens and becomes more widespread, rising
unemployment and poverty will outpace what social programs
remain. The pressure on Washington will be to reverse the
cuts in social services and use the big budget surplus to
shore up the severely depleted "social safety net."
George W. Bush's proposed tax cut may really be a move by
the rich to make a quick grab for the budget surplus before
it can be used to help the poor and unemployed.
Even if spending on social services is increased, which is
necessary to prevent severe hardship, it cannot reverse the
impact of a severe recession. Much more needs to be done.
An anti-recession program that doesn't put the whole burden
onto the backs of the working class would force the bankers
and corporate bosses to take responsibility for their
economic crisis.
Such measures can include declaring a moratorium on all
interest payments for personal debt, from consumer credit
card debt to housing loans. Energy prices can be set at
reasonable, reduced rates, including the prices for gasoline
and home heating oil. The oil monopolies already use price
fixing, which is why prices vary little from city to city
across the country. So prices can instead be controlled for
the purposes of ending a national crisis.
Job rights can be enforced and a moratorium declared on all
involuntary layoffs. Evictions of the jobless can be banned.
These are just a few of the possible measures that can be
taken immediately to ease the impact of a recession and put
the burden where it belongs--onto the big bankers and
corporate bosses.
[William Gottlieb contributed to this article.]
-------------------------
Via Workers World News Service
Reprinted from the Jan. 18, 2001
issue of Workers World newspaper
-------------------------
CALIFORNIA ENERGY CRISIS:
GRASSROOTS FIGHT-BACK AGAINST RATE HIKE BEGINS
By Bill Hackwell
San Francisco
The anticipated rate hikes to bail out Pacific Gas &
Electric and Southern California Edison have hit consumers
here.
Electric bills have shot up by 7 percent to 15 percent,
effective immediately. The 5 million home owners and renters
in Northern California will pay a 9-percent raise and
shoulder the brunt of the bailout.
These two biggest utility monopolies in California had asked
for a 26-percent hike now and an open window to raise rates
in the future. Pressure from consumer groups and community
activists was so heavy that members of the Public Utilities
Commission were afraid of an all-out revolt if they gave the
companies what they were seeking--nothing short of corporate
price gouging.
The PUC, however, encouraged the state legislature to back
bonds issued by the two utility companies. If the utilities
default the state would be responsible for paying off the
bonds.
While the rate hike was less than what PG&E and Southern
California Edison asked for, and that sent the their stock
rating plummeting, these utility giants can return to the
PUC in 90 days to ask for another increase.
The direct cause of the power crisis in California is
electricity deregulation. That move resulted in record
profits for the energy companies. In the last three fiscal
quarters of 2000, for instance, PG&E posted a $753 million
profit.
That is up 40 percent from 1999.
PG&E bosses try to cover this up by saying that they are
innocent victims of energy suppliers. In fact, they are one
and the same.
Pacific Gas & Electric is owned by Pacific Gas and Electric
Corporation, which buys power from the Power Exchange and
sells it back to its own subsidiary. Pacific Gas and
Electric Corporation made $2.1 billion in profits in the
last three years.
While many poor people in this state are now forced to
choose between food and electricity, the executives are not
suffering in the least. PG&E President and CEO Robert Glynn
earned over $2 million in 1999, according to the Utility
Reform Network.
Glynn has been appearing on television ads telling consumers
that they are excessive in their use of electricity. If they
just conserve and turn off lights "we'll" all get through
this, he says.
In other words, he's blaming the victims of the energy
crisis.
-------------------------
Via Workers World News Service
Reprinted from the Jan. 18, 2001
issue of Workers World newspaper
-------------------------
IRAQ SANCTIONS CHALLENGE IV: WHY THEY'RE GOING TO BAGHDAD
By Paddy Colligan
Coming from seven countries and 15 U.S. states, 50 members
of the fourth Iraq Sanctions Challenge will gather in Amman,
Jordan, on Jan. 13 to fly into Baghdad.
The two tons of medicine these women and men will bring with
them is very different from the bombs that U.S. planes
continue to drop on Iraq. The medicine represents donations
from hundreds of people who were not able to go to Iraq to
deliver this needed assistance.
The Iraq Sanctions Challenge will leave New York on Jan. 12.
The delegates will fly into the Iraqi capital in time for
the commemoration of the 10th anniversary of the start of
the U.S.-led air war against that country.
United States/United Nations sanctions began before the 1991
Gulf War. They have lasted for over 10 years and have cost
far more lives than the bombing.
Month after month 5,000 more people die--not from some
uncontrollable natural disaster, but from the conscious
imposition of this brutal policy, which Washington maintains
despite growing international opposition.
SOLIDARITY AND OUTRAGE
Who are the people who will travel to Iraq in defiance of
the illegal sanctions? They are risking high fines and
prison sentences for the "crime" of traveling to Iraq with
medicine to save some lives and alleviate pain.
For this challenge members are coming from seven countries:
the United States, Canada, Japan, Lebanon, Greece, Britain
and Iceland.
One-third of the delegates are under 30 years old and one-
third are over 60. They are students and educators, a truck
driver, a member of parliament, long-time peace activists
and social workers, lawyers and a lifeguard, a typesetter
and medical workers.
Eleven of them are experienced challenge members, having
already gone to Iraq on previous delegations.
What comes across in talking to each of them is a sense of
solidarity with the Iraqi people and great outrage at the
U.S. policy of sanctioning an entire people.
Here are some of the reasons the delegates have given for
going on the challenge:
"To oppose the human injustice, with its perpetual
punishment of the Iraqi people for no reason," said
Michelle, an educator from New York.
"A sense of obligation drives me: my government is doing
this in my name with my money... how can I not take action?
On behalf of sanity and love, someone must bear witness to
this ... holocaust," wrote Ceylon, a musician from
Tennessee.
"This is urgent. People are dying at the hands of my
government and it must be stopped," explained Emma, a
student at Bard College.
Another delegate wants to further the work he is doing to
expose the dangers of depleted uranium and its use by U.S.
forces in Iraq. Damacio from New Mexico wants to get soil
samples to test because he believes that "the amount of
depleted uranium used in the Gulf War may be much higher
than previously thought."
'I WILL BE DOING IT FOR THE KIDS'
"I believe that what the U.S. has done to Iraq is one of the
worst episodes in American history and that U.S. foreign
policy in the Middle East is a disaster," said Ingrid from
Florida.
"I will be doing it for the kids of Iraq and all the
innocent people who have and are dying from the sanctions,"
wrote Dimtrios, a Greek student from Portland State
University in Oregon.
"My motivation is the indignation within me that refuses to
remain silent before such egregious acts of U.S. imperialism
such as the genocide of an entire nation," explained Lana
from Sarah Lawrence College.
Once they reach Iraq the delegates will visit hospitals,
pharmacies and schools. They will meet with everyday Iraqi
people and government officials to learn about the human
effects of the sanctions policy. They will interview,
videotape, photograph and observe so that they can report
what they have seen to people back home.
The Challenge members intend to go back home and tell their
friends and neighbors what they saw, speak on local radio
programs, show their photos and videotapes, and get articles
published in magazines and newspapers. They will build the
grassroots anti-sanctions movement that continues to oppose
this cynical and anti-human tool of war.
-------------------------
Via Workers World News Service
Reprinted from the Jan. 18, 2001
issue of Workers World newspaper
-------------------------
10 YEARS AFTER GULF WAR:
NEW ERA OF STRUGGLE GIVES HOPE TO IRAQ
By Sara Flounders
On Jan. 16, 1991, jet bombers, aircraft carriers and almost
a million troops from 17 nations began an all-out assault on
Iraq under U.S. command.
This year is the 10th anniversary of the Gulf War, which
provides an opportunity to put it in historical perspective.
As the son of George Bush prepares to sit in the White House
with the same advisors and generals who conducted the 1991
assault on a small, developing nation in the Middle East,
it's important to evaluate what U.S. imperialism achieved--
and what it did not.
U.S. imperialism used both massive, overwhelming military
force and the harshest economic sanctions in history against
Iraq. Yet it did not accomplish its aims.
The United States did not succeed in dismembering Iraq,
although its murderous policy has killed over 1 million
Iraqis.
Nor has Washington been able to reduce Iraq--a country that
ranks second in the world in oil reserves--to a puppet
regime.
The question of who owns and controls oil is vital to the
handful of major corporations and banks that decide
development on a global scale. After a decade of military,
economic, financial, media and diplomatic warfare, the
immense oil profits of Iraq are still not in the hands of
U.S. corporations.
In fact, the sanctions are crumbling. Iraq is breaking out
of its U.S.-imposed isolation.
Despite Washington's fierce resistance, flights to Iraq are
now almost a daily occurrence. Demonstrations across the
world and many solidarity delegations show Iraq is not
alone.
The struggle in the Middle East is on the rise again. The
Palestinian struggle is in a sustained revolutionary mood.
The U.S. government is more hated than ever.
U.S. PRESENCE SPARKS OUTRAGE
Using the war against Iraq as a pretext, the Pentagon was
finally able to permanently position U.S. troops in the
Middle East and establish bases throughout the oil-rich
Persian Gulf. This region holds two-thirds of the world's
oil reserves.
But the presence of U.S. troops and mass awareness of the
enormous suffering in Iraq caused by U.S.-imposed sanctions
has raised the level of anti-imperialist outrage throughout
the Arab world.
U.S. soldiers are under orders to keep a low profile. Bases
are almost hidden.
U.S. officials hardly dare to leave their embassies. U.S.
consulates have closed throughout the region. Families have
been sent home.
The huge U.S. aircraft carriers and destroyers must fuel
offshore. Even offshore, these death machines are a target.
Consider the fate of that most advanced high-tech destroyer,
the USS Cole.
Bush Jr. can't carry out his father's program, even if he
stocks his administration with all the same right-wing and
militarist faces.
It has little to do with intelligence or skill. This is an
altogether different epoch.
'THE NEW WORLD ORDER'
In 1990 the growing crisis in the socialist camp gave
enormous leverage to U.S. imperialism. The working-class
movement and developing nations that had relied on aid,
solidarity and protection from the Soviet Union were
overwhelmed.
For decades, the developing nations and liberation struggles
had had an alternative. Total isolation couldn't be enforced
as long as there was an alternative world system in conflict
with the imperialist powers.
So the setbacks in the socialist camp were a serious blow.
With the 42 days of massive bombardment of Iraq, the
Pentagon moved militarily against the Arab people in a way
that had been impossible when the Soviet Union was strong.
What the senior Bush termed the "New World Order" was really
an aggressive effort to re-colonize the globe.
Today, in contrast, it's a capitalist crisis that is
looming.
The brutal impact of imperialist globalization has
devastated many countries. Resistance to the dictates of the
capitalist market is growing. The tide is turning against
the U.S. ruling class's effort at conquest.
Military strength doesn't always reflect political strength.
It's increasingly clear that even with unopposed control,
Wall Street's system creates far more suffering than
development.
International support and acquiescence to the sanctions are
crumbling. Even the other members of the U.S.-engineered
alliance of robbers and pirates, which were willing to join
in the looting of Iraq 10 years ago, have grown increasingly
restive as they realize they did not benefit from the war.
Why is this happening? Because Iraq has managed to organize
and resist, and because the world movement has refused to be
silent.
Millions have been mobilized in solidarity with the Iraqi
people, especially as the murderous consequences of the
sanctions have become clear.
GULF WAR SYNDROME AND BALKAN SYNDROME
The U.S.-led war against Iraq was a testing ground and an
advertisement for every new weapon. The media were awash in
descriptions of U.S. high-tech military technology. This
included laser-guided smart bombs, cruise missiles, Patriot
missiles and a new generation of tanks equipped with
depleted-uranium shells.
Despite endless wild descriptions of Iraq's "weapons of mass
destruction," Iraq had no weapons in its arsenal with which
to defend itself against this high-tech barrage.
The Pentagon flew over 110,000 bombing sorties--one every 30
seconds for 42 days-- with impunity. "Collateral damage" was
a euphemism coined by the Pentagon to cover up its targeting
of civilians.
Over 100,000 Iraqis were killed in the bombing. U.S. deaths
numbered a mere 148, and more than half of these U.S.
casualties were from friendly fire.
Ten years later, the impact of the war--particularly the
consequences of the radioactive DU weapons first used
against Iraq--is finally coming back to haunt the U.S.
government.
Conventional weapons made with depleted uranium made every
weapon in Iraq's arsenal obsolete. Because of the material's
density, U.S. tanks could shoot twice as far. Their range
was two miles. The Pentagon seemed invincible.
Rank-and-file U.S. soldiers had no idea what the
consequences would be.
In the years since, over 120,000 of the 697,000 U.S. troops
who were stationed in the Gulf region have become
chronically ill with undiagnosed diseases labeled the Gulf
War Syndrome. Many experts, soldiers and activists connect
the extremely high rates of illness in healthy young people
to radioactive and toxic poisoning from the depleted-uranium
weapons in the U.S. arsenal.
In Iraq the impact is still greater. Cancer rates have
increased five-fold and 10-fold, as have immune diseases and
deformities in children.
U.S. Army documents prove that the generals and military
contractors understood the danger of using depleted uranium
during the Gulf War.
Now the issue has exploded in Europe. The political storm
has reached a level that threatens relations in the
imperialist NATO alliance.
It has even brought into question the continued
participation of some European nations in the occupation of
Kosovo.
Governments across Europe are outraged by the number of
cancer deaths of soldiers stationed in Bosnia and Kosovo.
The U.S./NATO bombardment of Bosnia in 1995-1996, and of
Yugoslavia in 1999, with tens of thousands of rounds of
ammunition made with depleted uranium is linked to what is
being called the Balkan Syndrome.
SANCTIONS: A WEAPON OF MASS DESTRUCTION
>From the Vietnam War, the Pentagon had already learned the
limits of its weapons against a people determined to free
themselves from colonial occupation.
Carpet-bombing, napalm, strategic hamlets, concentration
camps and a half-million well-armed U.S. soldiers could not
sustain the occupation of Vietnam in the face of a people's
war.
In Iraq the brass were determined not to repeat their past
miscalculation. U.S. troops did not march on and occupy
Baghdad, even though the Iraqis had no weapon to resist
them.
The generals were afraid that they could not hold the
country in the face of an aroused anti-imperialist movement.
And they feared that any U.S. casualties would awaken mass
opposition at home.
Instead they expected that comprehensive and complete
economic sanctions leveled against every sector of Iraq's
economy would grind the country down. They expected
sanctions to bring about a total government collapse and the
rise of a puppet regime willing to follow Washington's
dictates.
To that end, U.S. bombing systematically targeted Iraq's
infrastructure. Every industry connected to food production,
water purification and irrigation was targeted for
destruction.
A baby formula plant, pharmaceutical plants, fertilizer
plants, pesticide plants, food warehouses, storage,
refrigeration, every grain silo in the country, electrical
generation and communication plants--all were destroyed in
order to intensify the sanctions' impact.
Iraq's government was demonized and isolated. Air travel,
phone calls, the Internet, satellite communications--all
these were denied to Iraq.
Billions of dollars of Iraqi oil revenues were frozen in
banks around the world. All imports and exports were banned.
Iraq was a country cut off from the rest of the world.
The sanctions aren't just paper resolutions. The U.S. Navy
has stopped and boarded over 12,000 ships in the Gulf in an
effort to stop all forms of trade.
Today one-fifth of the total Pentagon budget is dedicated to
the military occupation of the Gulf.
In December 1998, in an effort to further intensify the
impact of sanctions, the United States and Britain began a
campaign of continual low-level bombing of Iraq's
infrastructure. In the past two years they have flown over
20,000 combat sorties.
Incredibly, Iraq has survived and is breaking out of its
absolute isolation.
Baghdad has re-established relations with Syria and Iran.
Since the visit by Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez in
September, Iraq has again been involved in international
conferences. It is once again a force in the Organization of
Petroleum Exporting Countries.
On this 10th anniversary of the Gulf War, the Iraqi people
and the movement in solidarity with them have many reasons
for optimism. But the sanctions and the war have not ended.
The U.S. government--whether led by Republicans or Democrats-
-is firmly committed to overturning the Iraqi government and
seizing control of the country's resources.
The sanctions won't fall by themselves. It will take the
continued determination and renewed commitment of the world
movement to resist this ongoing imperialist crime.
The writer is an organizer of the fourth Iraq Sanctions
Challenge, which is taking 50 delegates and two tons of
medical aid to Iraq in mid-January.
- END -
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