Re: WWP, IAC and ANSWER

["Gary Wilson" <gary@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

This is not a direct reply to any particular comments, but to the discussion
in general of the direction needed to be taken by the anti-war movement. I
mostly just read a few lists, this one included, but seldom comment. So you
may not know me. Let me put up front that I am in WWP, so no one can say
that I am trying to hide anything.

I think that too much of the discussion about what to do next is tied up in
rigid thinking that's defined by what was done in the 1920s or the 1960s or
even the 1980s. Sure there's much to be learned from those periods, but that
doesn't mean that there is a formula from then that everything has to fit
now in order to be legitimate.

This is not the 1920s, and there aren't mass social-democratic labor
movements sweeping Europe or the United States. The conditions now are
different in many ways from the past decades from the 1920s to the 1980s, so
while there may be some things that look the same, there are many that are
different.

There is no significant social-democratic movement or organization in the
United States. Some think that the Democratic Party played that role in the
1960s; workers were certainly told by some that the Democrats were their
party. And the Democrats certainly made an attempt to take control of the
anti-war movment, not always unsuccessfully. But today there is no
social-democratic pretense in the Democratic Party. These are the Clinton
Democrats. They've pushed out the labor unions so that even the union
leaders no longer give blanket support to the Democrats. Meanwhile, the
Democrats' own leader in the last election couldn't muster enough resolve to
fight to take the office he had won in the popular vote. No one sees them as
a real alternative and there is no mass labor party that has the workers'
loyalty; there's no labor party of any kind in the U.S.

There is no reason to abandon the leadership of the anti-war movement to the
social democrats (they may have the money, but they don't have the ranks to
back it up). They are not the answer and they won't put up a fight when it
comes time to really stand up; they are not unlike Al Gore in this respect.

A social-democratic dominated anti-war coalition is not something to be
welcomed. Global Exchange? AFSC? They don't work in real coalitions; they
only allow other liberals like themselves into their closed meetings and
their test to qualify is based on money resources. They would control every
aspect from a small central office that has no pretense of democracy and
only the "celebrity speakers" they choose will be heard.

In 1991, the split in the Gulf War movement came because of the insistance
that everyone had to condemn Saddam Hussein and support sanctions on Iraq.
The pro-sanctions rally did not allow anti-imperialist, anti-sanctions
speakers to share the platform. That's not democratic. Whatever you want to
say about Oct. 26, there was no attempt there to make anyone say only one
line. It was truly open to many different viewpoints, as long as all agreed
to oppose the war.

There is much in the discussion about Oct. 26 that misses the truly
grassroots character of the event. For one thing, labor played a big role in
Oct. 26 and its success. New York Labor Against War was a big force and
local labor councils across the country passed resolutions against the war
and in support of Oct. 26. The ILWU was an early supporter of the rally and
played a key role in its organizing. West Coast dock workers led both the
march in San Francisco and the one in Washington.

I agree that the anti-war movement must be a coalition and that that
coalition has not yet fully emerged. But ANSWER is a beginning.

Rather than trying to figure out how to give the leadership over to the
social democrats (or the Greens or some others who are similar in the U.S.
but who may not be much different than the Greens in Germany who became the
executioners of Germany's first military operations outside its borders
since World War II). I think that the task before us is to find a way to
build on this kind of grassroots coalition that emerged on Oct. 26, expand
that and build on that.

Gary



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