01.09.2004

An insult to intelligence

Martin Schreader, editor of Appeal to Reason, paper of the revolutionary Debs faction of the Socialist Party USA

Elections have never been an easy time for working people in the United States. From spring through autumn, it is a non-stop assault on our senses and sensibilities - one insult to our collective intelligence after another.

This year has been no exception. On the contrary, if one can say anything about the 2004 presidential contest, it is that it is a textbook example of what working people have had to endure for decades.
As I write these lines, delegates are meeting in New York City for the Republican National Convention (as are hundreds of thousands of anti-RNC protestors). By the time you read this, they will be on the cusp of re-nominating George W Bush to be their candidate for president.

I mention this because, as I recall, this is the first time that one of the two main capitalist parties has held its nominating convention so late in the year. Usually, at this point in the cycle, the candidates are preparing for their first ‘debate’.

The reason for the tardiness in the scheduling of the RNC is, of course, as obvious as the choice of location. You do not have to be a media pundit or Washington insider to figure out that the Republican Party is looking to capitalise on the events of September 11 2001 in this campaign. Because this is the first post-9/11 presidential election, supporters of both parties are seeing it as a referendum on the course of the so-called ‘war on terror’.

If you only listened to the rhetoric in the media and at campaign rallies, you might think they had a point. Both sides have gone to great lengths to portray their man as ‘vastly different’ from the other. Even the two candidates themselves, Bush and the Democratic candidate, senator John Kerry, work night and day to present themselves to the public as having fundamentally different outlooks for the future.
Thus, it is unfortunate for the two candidates, having made the mistake of putting their positions in writing, that they have a literate population to contend with.

Traditionally, socialists and radical leftists in general spend the year denouncing the two main candidates and writing them off as having ‘not a dime’s worth of difference’. Conversely, social democratic and liberal elements of the left (and the ‘official’ communists) work overtime to prove the existence of great, fundamental differences.

“Across the country there is a growing anti-Bush feeling, but that alone is not enough,” writes Communist Party USA national chairman Sam Webb in a recent issue of the CPUSA newspaper, the People’s Weekly World. “To win requires that millions be convinced that the differences between Bush and Kerry are real, substantial and consequential to their lives on the whole range of issues” (August 28).

Comrade Webb then goes on to list a number of areas that he sees as representing those “real, substantial and consequential” differences, including reproductive rights, gay rights, civil liberties, Cuba, pre-emptive war and the occupation of Iraq. So, what are the differences? Comrade Webb does not say, and that is probably for the best. After all, if he actually read the positions Bush and Kerry take on these issues, he might have to rework his entire strategy.

For example, on reproductive rights, both Bush and Kerry are personally against a woman’s right to have an abortion. In the US Senate, Kerry has voted on many occasions to restrict access to abortions for women. While he mouths a lot of words about ‘choice’, his actions show him to be as anti-choice as Bush and the Republicans.

Same-sex marriage has become a major social issue in this election. On this point, Bush and Kerry stand side by side. Both of them oppose the right of same-sex couples to obtain a marriage licence from the state, offering non-binding, second-class ‘civil unions’ as an alternative.

Kerry voted for the anti-democratic Patriot Act, and his running mate, senator John Edwards, helped write some of it. Kerry might want to tinker with some of the more outrageous provisions, but he has already made it clear that he will not work to repeal it.

Both Kerry and Bush support ‘regime change’ in Cuba, and have backed a plan of terror and sabotage by the fascistic émigré community in Miami meant to bring that about. Both have also stated their support for the overthrow of president Hugo Chávez in Venezuela, and both have backed ‘regime change’ in a number of other places.

Even though they use slightly different language, both Bush and Kerry have stated their support for pre-emptive wars of aggression. Whether they call them “coalitions of the willing” (Bush’s formulation) or “coalitions of the able” (Kerry’s formulation) is irrelevant.

As for the occupation of Iraq, both candidates have declared their support for maintaining it until the occupiers ‘win the peace’ - or, to put it in the language of a generation ago, to ‘win the hearts and minds’ of the Iraqis. In order to do this, both candidates support sending more soldiers to Iraq (Bush proposes moving them from Europe and Asia; Kerry wants to just add another 40,000 to the active duty roster).

If you are not seeing the “real, substantial and consequential” differences, do not be surprised. As I said at the beginning, this year is a textbook example of what workers have had to tolerate for decades. And that goes double for the cheerleading from large sections of the supposed ‘anti-capitalist’ left. Far from having major, life-or-death differences to deal with, working people are being offered a ‘choice’ of formulation and image.

But that does not stop those who have a need to find differences between the candidates from fabricating them - if only in their own minds - and attacking those who have the gall to declare that the emperor has no clothes.

In the words of Sam Webb: “The responsibility of left and progressive people is not to spend their time bellyaching over Kerry’s shortcomings [!], but to convince millions that there is a choice and that the outcome of this election will have enormous consequences for our nation’s future” (People’s Weekly World August 28).

I think I’ve just been insulted.