Activism Change

Bush, Bloomberg wage war on New York

Question:

Police-state tactics vs. right to protest Bush, Bloomberg wage war on New York By Fred Goldstein New York The months-long, carefully orchestrated campaign of intimidation against protests at the Republican National Convention, spearheaded by Mayor Michael Bloomberg of New York, was aimed at protecting the representatives of his fellow billionaires and millionaires from the justifiable wrath of the people. Under the political cover of the so-called "war on terrorism," Bloomberg, Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly and the Bush administration mounted a major show of force in an effort to forestall a militant, Seattle-type protest. Bloomberg was the point man for the Secret Service, the Department of Homeland Security, the Justice Department and the Pentagon. He had the complicity of the totally pliable big business media, which reinforced the message of intimidation and passed over the gross violations of constitutional rights, endorsing police-state tactics, just as it cheered on U.S. aggression in Iraq when it was embedded with the Pentagon. When they planned their convention over a year ago, the Republican Party and the Bush administration undoubtedly planned to make a triumphant march into New York City after having set up a puppet government in Afghanistan and completed their conquest of Iraq. But that was then, and this is now. Now they have come to New York–historically a center of progressive, radical and revolutionary politics–as an invading army of reaction that has stirred the anger of the world. They are the bloody occupiers who cannot subdue the national resistance of the Iraqi people. They are the architects of torture at Abu Ghraib prison, Guantanamo and Afghanistan. They are the corrupt tools of Halliburton and the oil billionaires. They are the benefactors of the military-industrial complex and the darlings of the rich through their tax cuts. They engage in sabre rattling in every direction and have promised "endless war." Add to this the Patriot Act and all the racist and repressive measures they have carried out. Throw in their economic program of cutbacks across the board on social spending, anti-union policies and attacks on overtime pay, among other things. Then consider their totally reactionary social program of racism, attacking women’s reproductive rights, and denying equality to lesbians, gays, bi and trans people. The very presence in New York City of this assemblage of political reactionaries and their obscenely opulent ruling class sponsors is a major provocation. It is no wonder that Mayor Bloomberg had to enter into an alliance with the Bush administration and the Republican Party in order to come up with the $75 million they are spending on the most massive show of force in the history of any city against its people. Warmakers are lawbreakers The "war against terrorism" was invoked to justify unprecedented measures taken to prepare for repression against the masses of people. Over 30,000 police were deployed to protect the RNC, including 10,000 street cops in the area surrounding Madison Square Garden. They were supplemented by hundreds of bicycles and scooters for mobile tactics clearly aimed, not at a conspiracy of a few, but at the resistance of the many. Bloomberg took a "law and order" line from day one, promising to crush anyone who, in the eyes of the ruling class, breaks the law. It was an attempt to divert attention from the fact that the Bush administration has violated just about every international law with regard to war, including the United Nations Charter and laws like the Geneva Conventions that forbid preemptive invasions and military aggression, plus the U.S. Constitution. As a consequence of these violations of law, tens of thousands of Iraqis and Afghans have died. Hundreds of thousands more have been wounded, made homeless and had their livelihoods destroyed. Almost 1,000 U.S. troops have now been killed and many thousands more seriously injured. The capitalist ruling class has violated these laws to advance the interests of the oil companies, the Penta gon and the transnational corporations seeking profits and control of the Gulf region. Bloomberg, Kelly and the entire capitalist media do not want to call attention to these violations of law. The authorities are prepared to brutalize and jail protesters who want to take to the streets to protest the crimes of Bush. By these standards of "upholding the law," Bloomberg and Kelly would have arrested Martin Luther King Jr. and the tens of thousands of civil rights demonstrators who committed civil disobedience to overturn the lawlessness of segregation. It was the right of the African Amer icans and the civil rights movement to use whatever means available to overturn the criminal, racist practices of segregation and racism in general. It is certainly the right of the political movement to struggle in the streets to prevent imperialist aggression, intervention or colonization of Iraq, Palestine, Haiti or anywhere else, and to prevent crimes against the poor, against people of color, against women or lesbian, gay, bi or trans people. It is the right of workers to fight for their survival against the bosses despite court injunctions, anti-labor laws and other "legal" means that restrain labor from defending itself against the exploiting capitalist class. Right to resist war crimes The movement has to insist that the right of the people to defend themselves against ruling class injustice takes absolute and total legal priority over the right of the oppressing classes, such as those represented by Bloomberg and Kelly, to enforce their will upon the people. It is important to protest against the use of "excessive force" and put the police and the government on the defensive about their brutality. The unprovoked and completely disproportionate aggression by the cops must be exposed. But we should also point out that no force by the capitalist state against people fighting for their rights is justified. Whatever class-based complaints the government utilizes to justify its repression of the protesters against the RNC should be regarded as subordinate to the legal right to demonstrate to stop monumental war crimes, crimes against the poor, the racist death penalty, crimes against the environment, and so on. The recently emerged Bush-Ridge-Ashcroft-Bloomberg axis of reaction has more than the short-term goal of suppressing demonstrations at the RNC. The longer-range goal is to intimidate the entire working class and progressive and revolutionary movements in New York, while sending a signal to the country as a whole. There is much talk about how New York is a Democratic Party town and this is what’s behind the massive demonstrations. To be sure, the Democratic Party is strong in New York, even though it serves the same ruling class, for the same reactionary aims as the Republicans. But for the ruling class, that’s not the primary significance of this show of force in crowd control and mass repression. Bloomberg fears NYC’s workers and oppressed New York is a major center of progressive and revolutionary politics. The ruling class knows the country is headed into a period of deepening military intervention and war, as well as a deepening and insoluble economic crisis. Bloomberg, with the backing of Wall Street and Washington, anticipates coming struggles and is moving to strengthen the state apparatus while waging a campaign of intimidation. New York has been vilified around the country by the ruling class media for its progressive character. It is a labor town with more union members than any other city. It has become the most Asian, Arab and other peoples of color. It has Harlem, the African American political and cultural center of the country. It is the stronghold of the reproductive rights movement in the country. It has the largest lesbian, gay, bi and trans community in the country. It has a huge immigrant community and a sweatshop industry with massive numbers of super-exploited workers. It is the largest city in the country by population. Its massive numbers of workers and oppressed people are concentrated into a very small geographical area, which facilitates united action. New York is where the first major post-World War II mass urban uprising against racism and police repression took place–in 1964, with the Harlem rebellion. Dozens of rebellions followed around the country. Abortion rights were won in New York before the rest of the country. The Stonewall Rebellion took place in New York in 1969, spawning a world-wide struggle for lesbian, gay, bi and trans rights. During the Vietnam War, massive, militant demonstrations against the war and the draft forced the government to close down draft boards and deterred government officials from coming to the city. On Feb. 15, 2003, half a million people marched in New York, trying to prevent Bush from invading Iraq. Great labor demonstrations shook the city during the 1930s. Ever since the unions have periodically demonstrated their militancy and organization. The Labor Day demonstrations, although tame in recent years, attract tens of thousands and are an annual reminder to the ruling class of the sleeping giant living here. This is also true for the annual turnout of a million people for Brooklyn’s Caribbean Day and the yearly massive Puerto Rican Day parades. Recently, 100,000 immigrant workers and their supporters held an unprecedented and historic demonstration in the multinational borough of Queens. The ruling class knows that poverty in this country is growing, including in New York, which houses some of the richest millionaires and billionaires in the world. This parasitic class sees only continued occupation and military expansion. Whether Kerry or Bush gets elected, plans for the draft are on the drawing board. The weak capitalist recovery presages another … read more »

Response:

Police-state tactics vs. right to protest Bush, Bloomberg wage war on New York By Fred Goldstein New York The months-long, carefully orchestrated campaign of intimidation against protests at the Republican National Convention, spearheaded by Mayor Michael Bloomberg of New York, was aimed at protecting the representatives of his fellow billionaires and millionaires from the justifiable wrath of the people.

Typical Commie propaganda spin at work. The fact of the matter is that the left through its anarcho-socialist agitators spread the word that they would seek violent confrontation in New York, and the city fathers decided to present a "show of force" to let it be known that they wouldn’t put up with that shit. The Lefty Liberal losers who spit on people, blocked intersections, physically attacked people, set their own float on fire, endangered themselves as well as others, and who generally behaved like immature, retarded assholes did more to convince the rest of the country that they were totally unfit to be elected to any positions of power and/or responsibility whatsoever, than any talk-radio personality or GOP political ad. You morons dug your own grave on this one… :O|

Response:

Filed under: Civil disobedience

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