Editorial Board
As the latest election cycle begins amidst a summer of strikes, natural disasters, and a general mood of discontent among the people, events are proving that the next election will be the most farcical yet in US history. The phony slogans and platforms have less appeal to people while the similarities among the candidates are becoming more obvious.
For all the political quarreling among themselves, the slogans of the various representatives of the capitalist class are basically the same: what they do not and cannot answer is the question “For who?” They are all tied up in the same myths that this or that adjustment will unite the country in the interests of the people, yet the fact is those who create value and those who reap profits are never going to be the same peopleunder the capitalist mode of production. There will never be and can never be true unity between those who labor and those who do not labor while reaping lavish profits. The summer of strikes speaks meagerly still, yet confirms this basic Marxist principle. Working people in the US are still struggling to undo the intense apparatus of deception that draws them into the capitalists’ myths. On one hand, they are promised a return to mythical greatness, a greatness that never existed outside of fiction. On the other hand, they are promised that by increasing the capitalists’ ability to exploit them they will get better crumbs to live off of. The essence remains the same—put your faith in the capitalists while they exploit and humiliate you and they will solve all your problems for you.
The past four years of Biden’s presidency and the debacle and failure of the January 6th reactionary riots have resulted in a veritable quelling of mass unrest that exploded in 2020. However, the rebellions of the people cannot be quenched for long, and the intensifying and record-breaking strikes this year are only a sign of what is to come in 2024.
It is most likely that the electoral farce will be a re-run of the 2020 election in many ways: for one thing, the main characters of the spectaclehave so far remained the same.In a second match between Biden and Trump both will go to extremes in a more farcical manner. Biden’s electoral victory was based mainly on the fact that he was not Trump, while Trump’s close contention is based on the fact that he is. In the next election,it will likely once again be a question of whether hatred for Trump or adoration for him will win out. What is certain is that the underlying issues the people suffer from will not be resolved, and this is the main feature across all elections. As much as the candidates try to dictate what the “real” problems of the people are—and the empty solutions they offer—they will never truly be able to solve the underlying issues of the people, because they themselves are at the heart of it.
Far right reactionaries, including organized fascists, will comprise the Trump movement, and they will once again take their message to the streets, while the rival representatives of exploitation and oppression will continue their political mockery represented by classical conservatism and a flirtation with social democratic rhetoric and postmodernist identity politics. In short, both sides will continue in decomposition and foist this on the masses. For the working people, they will continue to receive wages that cannot keep up with the rising cost of living, many will be thrust out of work as the crisis continues, and the poorest among them will face the brunt of state violence. Tension is ramping up, and mass uprisings are sure to develop in the midst of the electoral farce.
The immediate task is to prepare to bring real proletarian politics to these struggles—that is to say, communist politics, politics relying on revolutionary theory to guide the mass struggles to greater victories and amass support, forming durable organizations. Durable organizations mean union fractions, new unions, committees for specific struggles against state violence and imperialist reaction, proletarian women’s committees that can mobilize women in the interests of socialism, organizations that can fight against evictions in the streets and in the courts, legal committees that can defend the unknown numbers of working people and masses who are sure to face arrest and prison in the coming turmoil, and any other organization of the people that mobilizes their unlimited strength and creativity to overcome their problems and take control of their own lives. Organization is the vehicle for the people, especially the working class, to become the masters of their own fate; it is decidedly against the electoralism of the capitalist class that brandishes a new messiah every few years amidst intensifying crises.
It is the sense of the communist to organize and to do so with great audacity; anything else—anything that rejects mass struggle and organization—supports the capitalist effort to disarm workers and liquidate the impulse for revolution.
