I have never read anything as hypocritical as this speech by Barack Obama who is nothing but a puppet on a string being gladly manipulated by Wall Street on behalf of its imperialist aims.
Lisa
Text of Obama’s Speech in Ghana
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Published: July 11, 2009
Filed at 8:51 a.m. ET
Text of President Barack Obama's speech Saturday in Accra, Ghana, as prepared for delivery and provided by the White House:
------
Good morning. It is an honor for me to be in Accra, and to speak to the representatives of the people of Ghana. I am deeply grateful for the welcome that I've received, as are Michelle, Malia and Sasha Obama. Ghana's history is rich, the ties between our two countries are strong, and I am proud that this is my first visit to sub-Saharan Africa as President of the United States.
I am speaking to you at the end of a long trip. I began in Russia, for a Summit between two great powers. I traveled to Italy, for a meeting of the world's leading economies. And I have come here, to Ghana, for a simple reason: the 21st century will be shaped by what happens not just in Rome or Moscow or Washington, but by what happens in Accra as well.
This is the simple truth of a time when the boundaries between people are overwhelmed by our connections. Your prosperity can expand America's. Your health and security can contribute to the world's. And the strength of your democracy can help advance human rights for people everywhere.
So I do not see the countries and peoples of Africa as a world apart; I see Africa as a fundamental part of our interconnected world -- as partners with America on behalf of the future that we want for all our children. That partnership must be grounded in mutual responsibility, and that is what I want to speak with you about today.
We must start from the simple premise that Africa's future is up to Africans.
I say this knowing full well the tragic past that has sometimes haunted this part of the world. I have the blood of Africa within me, and my family's own story encompasses both the tragedies and triumphs of the larger African story.
My grandfather was a cook for the British in Kenya, and though he was a respected elder in his village, his employers called him ''boy'' for much of his life. He was on the periphery of Kenya's liberation struggles, but he was still imprisoned briefly during repressive times. In his life, colonialism wasn't simply the creation of unnatural borders or unfair terms of trade -- it was something experienced personally, day after day, year after year.
My father grew up herding goats in a tiny village, an impossible distance away from the American universities where he would come to get an education. He came of age at an extraordinary moment of promise for Africa. The struggles of his own father's generation were giving birth to new nations, beginning right here in Ghana. Africans were educating and asserting themselves in new ways. History was on the move.
But despite the progress that has been made -- and there has been considerable progress in parts of Africa -- we also know that much of that promise has yet to be fulfilled. Countries like Kenya, which had a per capita economy larger than South Korea's when I was born, have been badly outpaced. Disease and conflict have ravaged parts of the African continent. In many places, the hope of my father's generation gave way to cynicism, even despair.
It is easy to point fingers, and to pin the blame for these problems on others. Yes, a colonial map that made little sense bred conflict, and the West has often approached Africa as a patron, rather than a partner. But the West is not responsible for the destruction of the Zimbabwean economy over the last decade, or wars in which children are enlisted as combatants. In my father's life, it was partly tribalism and patronage in an independent Kenya that for a long stretch derailed his career, and we know that this kind of corruption is a daily fact of life for far too many.
Of course, we also know that is not the whole story. Here in Ghana, you show us a face of Africa that is too often overlooked by a world that sees only tragedy or the need for charity. The people of Ghana have worked hard to put democracy on a firmer footing, with peaceful transfers of power even in the wake of closely contested elections. And with improved governance and an emerging civil society, Ghana's economy has shown impressive rates of growth.
This progress may lack the drama of the 20th century's liberation struggles, but make no mistake: it will ultimately be more significant. For just as it is important to emerge from the control of another nation, it is even more important to build one's own.
So I believe that this moment is just as promising for Ghana -- and for Africa -- as the moment when my father came of age and new nations were being born. This is a new moment of promise. Only this time, we have learned that it will not be giants like Nkrumah and Kenyatta who will determine Africa's future. Instead, it will be you -- the men and women in Ghana's Parliament, and the people you represent. Above all, it will be the young people -- brimming with talent and energy and hope -- who can claim the future that so many in my father's generation never found.
To realize that promise, we must first recognize a fundamental truth that you have given life to in Ghana: development depends upon good governance. That is the ingredient which has been missing in far too many places, for far too long. That is the change that can unlock Africa's potential. And that is a responsibility that can only be met by Africans.
As for America and the West, our commitment must be measured by more than just the dollars we spend. I have pledged substantial increases in our foreign assistance, which is in Africa's interest and America's. But the true sign of success is not whether we are a source of aid that helps people scrape by -- it is whether we are partners in building the capacity for transformational change.
This mutual responsibility must be the foundation of our partnership. And today, I will focus on four areas that are critical to the future of Africa and the entire developing world: democracy; opportunity; health; and the peaceful resolution of conflict.
First, we must support strong and sustainable democratic governments.
As I said in Cairo, each nation gives life to democracy in its own way, and in line with its own traditions. But history offers a clear verdict: governments that respect the will of their own people are more prosperous, more stable and more successful than governments that do not.
This is about more than holding elections -- it's also about what happens between them. Repression takes many forms, and too many nations are plagued by problems that condemn their people to poverty. No country is going to create wealth if its leaders exploit the economy to enrich themselves, or police can be bought off by drug traffickers. No business wants to invest in a place where the government skims 20 percent off the top, or the head of the port authority is corrupt. No person wants to live in a society where the rule of law gives way to the rule of brutality and bribery. That is not democracy, that is tyranny, and now is the time for it to end.
In the 21st century, capable, reliable and transparent institutions are the key to success -- strong parliaments and honest police forces; independent judges and journalists; a vibrant private sector and civil society. Those are the things that give life to democracy, because that is what matters in peoples' lives.
Time and again, Ghanaians have chosen Constitutional rule over autocracy, and shown a democratic spirit that allows the energy of your people to break through. We see that in leaders who accept defeat graciously, and victors who resist calls to wield power against the opposition. We see that spirit in courageous journalists like Anas Aremeyaw Anas, who risked his life to report the truth. We see it in police like Patience Quaye, who helped prosecute the first human trafficker in Ghana. We see it in the young people who are speaking up against patronage and participating in the political process.
Across Africa, we have seen countless examples of people taking control of their destiny and making change from the bottom up. We saw it in Kenya, where civil society and business came together to help stop postelection violence. We saw it in South Africa, where over three quarters of the country voted in the recent election -- the fourth since the end of apartheid. We saw it in Zimbabwe, where the Election Support Network braved brutal repression to stand up for the principle that a person's vote is their sacred right.
Make no mistake: history is on the side of these brave Africans and not with those who use coups or change Constitutions to stay in power. Africa doesn't need strongmen, it needs strong institutions.
America will not seek to impose any system of government on any other nation -- the essential truth of democracy is that each nation determines its own destiny. What we will do is increase assistance for responsible individuals and institutions, with a focus on supporting good governance -- on parliaments, which check abuses of power and ensure that opposition voices are heard; on the rule of law, which ensures the equal administration of justice; on civic participation, so that young people get involved; and on concrete solutions to corruption like forensic accounting, automating services, strengthening hot lines and protecting whistle-blowers to advance transparency and accountability.
As we provide this support, I have directed my administration to give greater attention to corruption in our human rights report. People everywhere should have the right to start a business or get an education without paying a bribe. We have a responsibility to support those who act responsibly and to isolate those who don't, and that is exactly what America will do.
This leads directly to our second area of partnership -- supporting development that provides opportunity for more people.
With better governance, I have no doubt that Africa holds the promise of a broader base for prosperity. The continent is rich in natural resources. And from cell phone entrepreneurs to small farmers, Africans have shown the capacity and commitment to create their own opportunities. But old habits must also be broken. Dependence on commodities -- or on a single export -- concentrates wealth in the hands of the few and leaves people too vulnerable to downturns.
In Ghana, for instance, oil brings great opportunities, and you have been responsible in preparing for new revenue. But as so many Ghanaians know, oil cannot simply become the new cocoa. From South Korea to Singapore, history shows that countries thrive when they invest in their people and infrastructure; when they promote multiple export industries, develop a skilled work force and create space for small and medium-sized businesses that create jobs.
As Africans reach for this promise, America will be more responsible in extending our hand. By cutting costs that go to Western consultants and administration, we will put more resources in the hands of those who need it, while training people to do more for themselves. That is why our $3.5 billion food security initiative is focused on new methods and technologies for farmers -- not simply sending American producers or goods to Africa. Aid is not an end in itself. The purpose of foreign assistance must be creating the conditions where it is no longer needed.
America can also do more to promote trade and investment. Wealthy nations must open our doors to goods and services from Africa in a meaningful way. And where there is good governance, we can broaden prosperity through public-private partnerships that invest in better roads and electricity; capacity-building that trains people to grow a business; and financial services that reach poor and rural areas. This is also in our own interest -- for if people are lifted out of poverty and wealth is created in Africa, new markets will open for our own goods.
One area that holds out both undeniable peril and extraordinary promise is energy. Africa gives off less greenhouse gas than any other part of the world, but it is the most threatened by climate change. A warming planet will spread disease, shrink water resources and deplete crops, creating conditions that produce more famine and conflict. All of us -- particularly the developed world -- have a responsibility to slow these trends -- through mitigation, and by changing the way that we use energy. But we can also work with Africans to turn this crisis into opportunity.
Together, we can partner on behalf of our planet and prosperity and help countries increase access to power while skipping the dirtier phase of development. Across Africa, there is bountiful wind and solar power; geothermal energy and bio-fuels. From the Rift Valley to the North African deserts; from the Western coast to South Africa's crops -- Africa's boundless natural gifts can generate its own power, while exporting profitable, clean energy abroad.
These steps are about more than growth numbers on a balance sheet. They're about whether a young person with an education can get a job that supports a family; a farmer can transfer their goods to the market; or an entrepreneur with a good idea can start a
business. It's about the dignity of work. Its about the opportunity that must exist for Africans in the 21st century.
Just as governance is vital to opportunity, it is also critical to the third area that I will talk about -- strengthening public health.
In recent years, enormous progress has been made in parts of Africa. Far more people are living productively with HIV/AIDS, and getting the drugs they need. But too many still die from diseases that shouldn't kill them. When children are being killed because of a mosquito bite, and mothers are dying in childbirth, then we know that more progress must be made.
Yet because of incentives -- often provided by donor nations -- many African doctors and nurses understandably go overseas, or work for programs that focus on a single disease. This creates gaps in primary care and basic prevention. Meanwhile, individual Africans also have to make responsible choices that prevent the spread of disease, while promoting public health in their communities and countries.
Across Africa, we see examples of people tackling these problems. In Nigeria, an interfaith effort of Christians and Muslims has set an example of cooperation to confront malaria. Here in Ghana and across Africa, we see innovative ideas for filling gaps in care -- for instance, through E-Health initiatives that allow doctors in big cities to support those in small towns.
America will support these efforts through a comprehensive, global health strategy. Because in the 21st century, we are called to act by our conscience and our common interest. When a child dies of a preventable illness in Accra, that diminishes us everywhere. And when disease goes unchecked in any corner of the world, we know that it can spread across oceans and continents.
That is why my administration has committed $63 billion to meet these challenges. Building on the strong efforts of President Bush, we will carry forward the fight against HIV/AIDS. We will pursue the goal of ending deaths from malaria and tuberculosis, and eradicating polio. We will fight neglected tropical disease. And we won't confront illnesses in isolation -- we will invest in public health systems that promote wellness and focus on the health of mothers and children.
As we partner on behalf of a healthier future, we must also stop the destruction that comes not from illness, but from human beings -- and so the final area that I will address is conflict.
Now let me be clear: Africa is not the crude caricature of a continent at war. But for far too many Africans, conflict is a part of life, as constant as the sun. There are wars over land and wars over resources. And it is still far too easy for those without conscience to manipulate whole communities into fighting among faiths and tribes.
These conflicts are a millstone around Africa's neck. We all have many identities -- of tribe and ethnicity; of religion and nationality. But defining oneself in opposition to someone who belongs to a different tribe, or who worships a different prophet, has no place in the 21st century. Africa's diversity should be a source of strength, not a cause for division. We are all God's children. We all share common aspirations -- to live in peace and security; to access education and opportunity; to love our families, our communities, and our faith. That is our common humanity.
That is why we must stand up to inhumanity in our midst. It is never justifiable to target innocents in the name of ideology. It is the death sentence of a society to force children to kill in wars. It is the ultimate mark of criminality and cowardice to condemn women to relentless and systematic rape. We must bear witness to the value of every child in Darfur and the dignity of every woman in Congo. No faith or culture should condone the outrages against them. All of us must strive for the peace and security necessary for progress.
Africans are standing up for this future. Here, too, Ghana is helping to point the way forward. Ghanaians should take pride in your contributions to peacekeeping from Congo to Liberia to Lebanon, and in your efforts to resist the scourge of the drug trade. We welcome the steps that are being taken by organizations like the African Union and ECOWAS to better resolve conflicts, keep the peace, and support those in need. And we encourage the vision of a strong, regional security architecture that can bring effective, transnational force to bear when needed.
America has a responsibility to advance this vision, not just with words, but with support that strengthens African capacity. When there is genocide in Darfur or terrorists in Somalia, these are not simply African problems -- they are global security challenges, and they demand a global response. That is why we stand ready to partner through diplomacy, technical assistance, and logistical support, and will stand behind efforts to hold war criminals accountable. And let me be clear: our Africa Command is focused not on establishing a foothold in the continent, but on confronting these common challenges to advance the security of America, Africa and the world.
In Moscow, I spoke of the need for an international system where the universal rights of human beings are respected, and violations of those rights are opposed. That must include a commitment to support those who resolve conflicts peacefully, to sanction and stop those who don't, and to help those who have suffered. But ultimately, it will be vibrant democracies like Botswana and Ghana which roll back the causes of conflict, and advance the frontiers of peace and prosperity.
As I said earlier, Africa's future is up to Africans.
The people of Africa are ready to claim that future. In my country, African-Americans -- including so many recent immigrants -- have thrived in every sector of society. We have done so despite a difficult past, and we have drawn strength from our African heritage. With strong institutions and a strong will, I know that Africans can live their dreams in Nairobi and Lagos; in Kigali and Kinshasa; in Harare and right here in Accra.
Fifty-two years ago, the eyes of the world were on Ghana. And a young preacher named Martin Luther King traveled here, to Accra, to watch the Union Jack come down and the Ghanaian flag go up. This was before the march on Washington or the success of the civil rights movement in my country. Dr. King was asked how he felt while watching the birth of a nation. And he said: ''It renews my conviction in the ultimate triumph of justice.''
Now, that triumph must be won once more, and it must be won by you. And I am particularly speaking to the young people. In places like Ghana, you make up over half of the population. Here is what you must know: the world will be what you make of it.
You have the power to hold your leaders accountable and to build institutions that serve the people. You can serve in your communities and harness your energy and education to create new wealth and build new connections to the world. You can conquer disease, end conflicts and make change from the bottom up. You can do that. Yes you can. Because in this moment, history is on the move.
But these things can only be done if you take responsibility for your future. It won't be easy. It will take time and effort. There will be suffering and setbacks. But I can promise you this: America will be with you. As a partner. As a friend. Opportunity won't come from any other place, though -- it must come from the decisions that you make, the things that you do, and the hope that you hold in your hearts.
Freedom is your inheritance. Now, it is your responsibility to build upon freedom's foundation. And if you do, we will look back years from now to places like Accra and say that this was the time when the promise was realized -- this was the moment when prosperity was forged; pain was overcome; and a new era of progress began. This can be the time when we witness the triumph of justice once more. Thank you.
11 July 2009
16 June 2009
I haven't posted for awhile with lots of other things needed doing
Today I am posting this blog by Alan Maki. The truth in this blog posting is so overwhelming.
As a society what are we going to do about this?
Lisa Boucher
Racism kills when health care is denied as mobsters and corrupt politicians profit
By Alan L. Maki
The Washington Post and other media published a story about the pathetic state of health care on Indian Reservations.
The story is entitled:
Promises, Promises Indian health care needs go unmet
I publish the complete story below or you can click on this link:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/06/14/AR2009061400903.html?hpid=sec-health?hpid=sec-health
The Indian Health Service is in fact a model health care program based upon socialized health care; but, the Indian Health Service, like most public programs in this country is being sabotaged by those politicians who want to privatize everything from health care to education to maintaining our streets and sewers and hydro dams.
These politicians sabotage these public programs first by appointing people to administer these programs who are opposed to the very programs they are administering.
That the United States Congress allowed and enabled a crooked and corrupt racist bigot like Gale Norton out of the law firm to the mafia and lobbyists to politicians--- Brownstein/Hyatt/Farber/Shreck--- to become the Secretary of the Interior overseeing the Indian Health Service is in itself a racist crime of immense magnitude which tells us a great deal about why there are these serious short-comings in the Indian Health Service. No doubt Jack Abramoff carried enough money around in brown paper shopping bags that he distributed to politicians so that the Indian Health Services could have been funded three times over.
The Indian Health Service is one classic example; here in Minnesota the Department of Health and Human Services is an even better example with Republican Governor Tim Pawlenty appointing one of the most racist, bigoted and viciously anti-working class, anti-people, pro-corporate, pro-free enterprise Neanderthals--- Cal Ludeman--- to head up the Minnesota Department of Health and Human Services.
When politicians appoint those opposed to public programs to oversee these very programs they are opposed to, this is a recipe for disaster.
One has to ask, since the health care needs of Native Americans has been going unmet for so many years, why then, has it taken so long for the media to bring this matter to the attention of the public and politicians? The answer is very simple: The mainstream media is as viciously racist, biased and bigoted as the very politicians who make the decisions and those they appoint to administer social and public programs which are supposed to be about taking care of the needs of the people but are turned into nothing but big government boondoggles where all the friends of these politicians and administrators end up getting rich as people suffer because instead of, in the case of Indian Health Services, you have all these people scamming the system doing everything except providing the government mandated services.
Anyone can look at the budget of the Indian Health Service and see that the problem is a bunch of racist "entrepreneurs" with their dirty, corrupt fingers constantly in "the cookie jar" enabled by a bunch of uncaring administrators.
Barack Obama could pump billions upon billions--- even trillions--- of dollars into the Indian Health Service and it wouldn't improve the health care Native Americans receive because this excellent system of health care is being intentionally sabotaged by a bunch of greedy, profit gouging swindlers who are stealing the funds before these funds can provide the health services people require.
It is ironic that the same tribal governments who operate the casinos send their emissaries out to plead for more funding for the Indian Health Service when the casinos they operate--- and how they operate these casinos--- are responsible for a good share of the health care problems Native Americans are experiencing which is putting a drain on the Indian Health Service which is plagued with corruption--- on and off the reservations.
Here is an example.
This past spring I responded, on behalf of the Midwest Casino Workers Organizing Council as its Director of Organizing, to the Red Lake Tribal Council's presentation to federal government officials who made a presentation at a hearing on the terrible situation regarding Indian health care... I submitted my response to U.S. Senators Amy Kolbuchar (Minnesota Democratic Farmer-Labor Party), U.S. Senator Carl Levin (Michigan Democratic Party), U.S. Senator Debbie Stabenow (Michigan Democratic Party, U.S. Congresspersons Colin Peterson (DFL-Minnesota), James Oberstar (DFL-Minnesota). I would note that these politicians over the combined life of their political careers has solicited, received and accepted MILLIONS of dollars in campaign contributions from the lobbyists of Indian Gaming Industry.
This was my letter to them which received no response:
I then had the following communication with Dr. Nathaniel Cobb of the Indian Health Service:
With all that has take place, along comes the Washington Post and the rest of the mainstream media acting as if no one has known about the health care problems of Indian people.
I would also note that not one single newspaper, radio or television station has documented what is going on in the Indian Gaming Industry when it comes to the health and welfare of casino workers.
Why didn't the mainstream media examine how the Indian Health Service was doing while Gale Norton was in charge at the Interior Department for so many of the Bush years?
But, the larger question is why has hasn't the mainstream media seen fit to explore the conditions under which two-million people are employed in the Indian Gaming Industry in this country of which Indian Country is a part... if it wasn't, the Red Lake Tribal Council wouldn't have sent its representatives to the United States Congress begging for more health care funding.
The United States government shoved Indian people onto reservations after stealing their land and the natural resources; proclaimed these Indian Reservations to be "sovereign nations," intentionally leaving these "sovereign" nations without adequate resources to create real nations... and then, through the development of these anti-labor, racist "Compacts" designed with intent to allow a group of vicious mobsters to control the political, economic, social and cultural life of these "sovereign" Indian Nations; the politicians of this country stand back and say, "We can't do anything. We don't want to intervene in the affairs of sovereign Indian nations. We don't want to be in the position of creating problems among Indian people."
How racist and arrogant. The politicians set up a system of native "self-government" in a way designed to get people fighting amongst themselves and then these politicians stand back holding their bribes and pay-offs in the form of campaign contributions claiming their hands are tied.
I hope this blog posting has given people something to think about;
Alan L. Maki
As a society what are we going to do about this?
Lisa Boucher
Racism kills when health care is denied as mobsters and corrupt politicians profit
By Alan L. Maki
The Washington Post and other media published a story about the pathetic state of health care on Indian Reservations.
The story is entitled:
Promises, Promises Indian health care needs go unmet
I publish the complete story below or you can click on this link:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/06/14/AR2009061400903.html?hpid=sec-health?hpid=sec-health
The Indian Health Service is in fact a model health care program based upon socialized health care; but, the Indian Health Service, like most public programs in this country is being sabotaged by those politicians who want to privatize everything from health care to education to maintaining our streets and sewers and hydro dams.
These politicians sabotage these public programs first by appointing people to administer these programs who are opposed to the very programs they are administering.
That the United States Congress allowed and enabled a crooked and corrupt racist bigot like Gale Norton out of the law firm to the mafia and lobbyists to politicians--- Brownstein/Hyatt/Farber/Shreck--- to become the Secretary of the Interior overseeing the Indian Health Service is in itself a racist crime of immense magnitude which tells us a great deal about why there are these serious short-comings in the Indian Health Service. No doubt Jack Abramoff carried enough money around in brown paper shopping bags that he distributed to politicians so that the Indian Health Services could have been funded three times over.
The Indian Health Service is one classic example; here in Minnesota the Department of Health and Human Services is an even better example with Republican Governor Tim Pawlenty appointing one of the most racist, bigoted and viciously anti-working class, anti-people, pro-corporate, pro-free enterprise Neanderthals--- Cal Ludeman--- to head up the Minnesota Department of Health and Human Services.
When politicians appoint those opposed to public programs to oversee these very programs they are opposed to, this is a recipe for disaster.
One has to ask, since the health care needs of Native Americans has been going unmet for so many years, why then, has it taken so long for the media to bring this matter to the attention of the public and politicians? The answer is very simple: The mainstream media is as viciously racist, biased and bigoted as the very politicians who make the decisions and those they appoint to administer social and public programs which are supposed to be about taking care of the needs of the people but are turned into nothing but big government boondoggles where all the friends of these politicians and administrators end up getting rich as people suffer because instead of, in the case of Indian Health Services, you have all these people scamming the system doing everything except providing the government mandated services.
Anyone can look at the budget of the Indian Health Service and see that the problem is a bunch of racist "entrepreneurs" with their dirty, corrupt fingers constantly in "the cookie jar" enabled by a bunch of uncaring administrators.
Barack Obama could pump billions upon billions--- even trillions--- of dollars into the Indian Health Service and it wouldn't improve the health care Native Americans receive because this excellent system of health care is being intentionally sabotaged by a bunch of greedy, profit gouging swindlers who are stealing the funds before these funds can provide the health services people require.
It is ironic that the same tribal governments who operate the casinos send their emissaries out to plead for more funding for the Indian Health Service when the casinos they operate--- and how they operate these casinos--- are responsible for a good share of the health care problems Native Americans are experiencing which is putting a drain on the Indian Health Service which is plagued with corruption--- on and off the reservations.
Here is an example.
This past spring I responded, on behalf of the Midwest Casino Workers Organizing Council as its Director of Organizing, to the Red Lake Tribal Council's presentation to federal government officials who made a presentation at a hearing on the terrible situation regarding Indian health care... I submitted my response to U.S. Senators Amy Kolbuchar (Minnesota Democratic Farmer-Labor Party), U.S. Senator Carl Levin (Michigan Democratic Party), U.S. Senator Debbie Stabenow (Michigan Democratic Party, U.S. Congresspersons Colin Peterson (DFL-Minnesota), James Oberstar (DFL-Minnesota). I would note that these politicians over the combined life of their political careers has solicited, received and accepted MILLIONS of dollars in campaign contributions from the lobbyists of Indian Gaming Industry.
This was my letter to them which received no response:
U.S. Senators Amy Kolbuchar (Minnesota Democratic Farmer-Labor Party)
U.S. Senator Carl Levin (Michigan Democratic Party)
U.S. Senator Debbie Stabenow (Michigan Democratic Party
U.S. Rep. Colin Peterson (DFL-Minnesota)
U.S. Rep. James Oberstar (DFL-Minnesota)
April 6, 2009
Senators and Congresspersons,
The Midwest Casino Workers Organizing Council was not informed of the March hearings on Indian health care even though each and everyone of you has been repeatedly asked to keep us apprised of hearings which relate to these kinds of issues.
It is with this in mind that I request my comments here be included in the hearing testimony.
You, elected officials, claiming to be public servants with the good of the public at heart in your actions, have gone out of your way to deny us casino workers the right to participate in any hearings relating to labor, health care and environmental issues; and, then, you have the unmitigated gall to preach that we live in the world's greatest bastion of democracy.
As you are fully aware, our Organizing Council consists of Organizing Committees in Minnesota, Wisconsin, Michigan and Iowa assisting casino workers in their attempts to organize unions in an industry--- the Indian Gaming Industry--- which all of you have had a hand in creating through your support of the most anti-labor, most racist vile "Compacts" which have forced over two-million casino workers (and given the huge employee turnover in this industry, millions more) to work under the most disgraceful and Draconian conditions in loud, noisy, smoke-filled casinos at poverty wages without any rights under state, federal or tribal labor laws in this industry now comprising over 350 casino operations many of which include hotels/motel, restaurants, a variety of small shops and boutiques ranging from hair-dressers to artists and even water parks and various theme parks.
And here you are sitting and listening to those like the spokespersons for the Red Lake Nation Tribal government--- a supposedly sovereign nation, but a government that has to ask the federal and state governments for approval before doing anything and begging for tax-dollars as casino revenues in the billions and trillions of dollars go completely without any accountability to anyone except for a bunch of mobsters who own the slot machines and table games leaving the Indian Nations stuck with nothing but a pile of debt and poverty--- talking about how the Indian Health Service is underfunded.
We agree that the Indian Health Service is underfunded. But, the funds are being stolen in many cases before they ever reach the stage of their intended purpose of keeping Indian people healthy and getting them well when sick.
The Indian Health Service is a model program which should be serving as a guide for the kind of socialized health care system we all need in the United States. Instead, you are allowing it to be sabotaged by greedy profit gougers at every level as your colleagues in Congress then point out "socialized health care doesn't work."
A program is intentionally underfunded and then greed takes over with "administrative supervision, oversight and approval" and here we are with one big mess of sick people who can't get the health care they are entitled to.
And, to make maters worse, the very people who provided this testimony from the Red Lake Nation did not tell you that the primary reason for the very substantial need to increase the funding for the Indian Health Services is the direct result of the Indian Gaming Industry.
Common sense tells us that if you put people to work--- force people to work--- in smoke-filled casinos day in and day out seven days a week 365 days of the year, these employees are going to suffer serious health problems because we all know the scientific and health consequences people suffer working under these conditions.
The cancers, the heart and lung diseases, the ill affect on pregnant women and the damage to their unborn children; and, in talking about health problems and risks, perhaps among no other population in America, is diabetes such a killer than on the Indian Reservations. And the medical and scientific community has long ago shown the severe adverse impact that second-hand smoke has on those with diabetes.
So, while the Red Lake Nation Tribal Council has sent their representative to plead the case for an underfunded Indian Health Service, these representatives have failed to state that it is the very policies of this very Tribal Council who control Red Lake Gaming Enterprises who by allowing smoking in their casinos are contributing to the ill-health of the people of the Red Lake Nation, many, who because of the racist hiring practices of employers in northern Minnesota cannot find employment elsewhere, are forced to work in these smoke-filled casinos making them sick--- or sicker than they already are--- which in turn requires an expanded Indian Health Service, which in turn requires greater funding.
Our Organizing Council and our Organizing Committees take the position that Congress should appropriate every single penny required to provide adequate health care to Indian people through the Indian Health Service.
We also insist that there be accountability in gaming revenues and these revenues should be confiscated by the federal government to cover the health care problems being created by an unhealthy working environment.
To add insult to injury to this racism, the Indian Health Service is not even monitoring the health of those people employed in these smoke-filled casinos.
Therefore, it is our contention, that these casino enterprises like Red Lake Gaming Enterprises should be billed for the health care received through Indian Health Services for whatever treatment casino workers require for anything.
Quite frankly, we consider the testimony offered on behalf of the Red Lake Nation Tribal Council to be deceitful and dishonest in not bringing forward the role the tribal government plays in making people sick. Needless to say, these representatives did not make any mention of the way present funding is abused and misappropriated by crooks and thieves.
We point out that dishonesty has been a hallmark of the Indian Gaming Industry from its very inception which began with all of you taking bribes to create this industry which has now resulted in two-million workers going to work in smoke-filled casinos at poverty wages in an industry where the workers have no rights under state, federal or tribal labor laws--- truth is not one of the virtues of such thieves and those like yourselves who pander to these thieving mobsters for campaign contributions.
It is rather ironic that the Red Lake Tribal Council which is wholly and fully complicit in stealing from, and abusing, their own people and everyone else in quest of greater profits... would, under these circumstances, have the unmitigated gall to come before any Congressional Committee demanding funding to solve problems they have helped to create.
Might we be so bold as to suggest that you and your colleagues in the United States Congress contribute the bribes you take from the National Indian Gaming Association and the various state Indian Gaming Associations like the Minnesota Indian Gaming Association and contribute this money to the Indian Health Service?
And then maybe if you would stop wasting our money on wars and maintaining military bases all over the world you could provide an expanded version of the Indian Health Service to include everyone residing in the United States including the thousands of undocumented workers employed in the Indian Gaming Industry.
In closing, let me just say that we know you will take issue with the tone of this letter; but, it is your continued lack of response to our concerns over problems you created in the first place in the way you intentionally created these "Compacts" creating the Indian Gaming Industry that any thinking person would know was going to result in these problems; problem you now want to pretend you had nothing to do with their creation--- including the health care problems being experienced by Indian people.
Alan L. Maki
Director of Organizing,
Midwest Casino Workers Organizing Council
I then had the following communication with Dr. Nathaniel Cobb of the Indian Health Service:
From: Alan Maki [mailto:amaki000@centurytel.net]
Sent:Wednesday,April 22, 20099:47 PM
To: Kimi De Leon; Joan Kim
Cc:'Jim Hart';'John Kolstad';'Kip Sullivan';'Carl Levin';'Sen.Jim Carlson'; rep.bill.hilty@house.mn; rep.tom.anzelc@house.mn; rep.tom.Rukavina@house.mn; rep.tony.sertich@house.mn; ddepass@startribune.com; mmiron@bemidjipioneer.com; bswenson@bemidjipioneer.com;'Chris Spotted Eagle'; jgoldstein@americanrightsatwork.org; teresa_detrempe@klobuchar.senate.gov;
peter.erlinder@wmitchell.edu; peter.makowski@mail.house.gov; esquincle@verizon.net;'Walter Tillow'; nursenpo@gmail.com; 'Steve Early'; 'Joshua Frank'; 'Ta, Minh'; 'Rhoda Gilman';'David Shove'; 'ken nash'; 'Ken Pentel';WCS-A@yahoogroups.com; MARKOWIT@history.rutgers.edu; tdennis@gfherald.com; 'Myers, John'; loneagle@paulbunyan.net; 'Thomas Kurhajetz'; mhoney@u.washington.edu;moderator@portside.org; debssoc@sbcglobal.net; 'Tom Meersman'; peterb3121@hotmail.com; laurel1@dailyjournal-ifalls.com; jscannel@aflcio.org; rgettel@uaw.net; gdubovich@usw.org; info@jamesmayer.org; mzweig@notes.cc.sunysb.edu; rachleff@macalester.edu; advocate@stpaulunions.org; elizabeth_reed@levin.senate.gov; 'Alan Uhl';'Charles Underwood'
Subject: Re: Question on Indian Health Summit
To whom it may concern;
Could you tell me if there will be a discussion at the Indian Health
Summit---July 7-9, 2009 in Denver,Colorado---concerning the issue of casino workers in the Indian Gaming Industry and the impact to their health of second hand smoke in their workplaces?
Could you advise me if there have been any discussions about this with the American Cancer Society and/or the Heart and Lung Foundation?
I am very concerned since I find nothing on this important topic among any of the materials you are distributing for the Indian Health Summit.
With health care costs become an important topic for discussion it would seem that this issue would at least merit some kind of mention at an Indian Health Summit considering the large number of Native Americans employed in the Indian Gaming Industry.
Perhaps you would be interested in having me address one of the plenary sessions since this topic has not been considered previously.
I would point out that I have contacted my of the local offices and administrators of the Indian Health Services concerning this issue and no one will speak to me.
With the Indian Health Services being part of the Department of Interior and associated with the Bureau of Indian Affairs, it would only seem logical that no further casino "Compacts" would be approved unless they contain provisions banning and prohibiting smoking.
I would also suggest that the Indian Health Services insist that all existing "Compacts" be re-opened so a ban and prohibition on smoking can be inserted into them.
"Compacts" are nothing more than contracts and the Obama Administration has seen fit to insist that previously negotiated contracts with labor unions be re-negotiated so there is definitely a precedent that has been established for doing this and I am sure you will agree with me that there could not be a better argument made for renegotiating these "Compacts" than to protect the health of hundreds of thousands of workers employed in these casinos who, in addition to working in these smoke-filled working environments are not protected under any state or federal labor laws, which makes this problem of being employed in a work environment detrimental to human health even a more serious concern.
Perhaps the Indian Health Services could make a recommendation to the Bureau of Indian Affairs and the Secretary of the Department of Interior that the Secretary of Labor, Hilda Solis, becomes involved so that the protection of casino worker's rights under all state and federal labor laws protecting all other workers in the United States be included at the time the Compacts are re-opened to protect the health of casino workers.
If you have any doubts second-hand smoke contributes to an unhealthy work environment and that second-hand smoke is recognized as a leading contributor to a variety of cancers and heart and lung diseases please do not hesitate to request additional information. I will be more than happy to attend your Indian Health Care Summit with the necessary resource materials.
With some two-million workers now employed in the Indian Gaming Industry we want to make sure everything possible is being done to protect the health and well-being of these workers.
If I have addressed this letter to the wrong persons, would you please provide me with the name of the proper person/s and department/s this letter should be sent to.
If you think this issue concerning the impact of second-hand smoke on the health of casino workers is not significant enough to be discussed at the Indian Health Summit would you be so kind as to advise me of your decision and how it was reached?
Thanking you in advance for your timely consideration;
Alan L. Maki
Director of Organizing,
Midwest Casino Workers Organizing Council
58891 County Road13
Warroad,Minnesota56763
Phone:218-386-2432
Cell phone:651-587-5541
E-mail: amaki000@centurytel.net
Check out my blog:
Thoughts From Podunk
http://thepodunkblog.blogspot.com/
Cc: Maggie Bird
President,
Midwest Casino Workers Organizing Council
Dr. Nathaniel Cobb’s response to me:
Dear Mr. Maki:
Your email (below) was forwarded to me for response, as the Agency lead for tobacco control. Thank you for your suggestions - I completely agree that environmental tobacco smoke (ETS) in Casinos is a serious health issue for both the employees and the patrons. Labor law is outside my expertise and purview, but I will try to address a few of the many questions you raise:
1. Can we have a session on casino workers and ETS exposure at the Indian Health Summit?
- reasonable suggestion, but the practical answer is that we did invite the public to submit abstracts, that deadline has passed, and we have already finalized the agenda and cannot add another session. We do have a tobacco session scheduled, but nothing was submitted that focused specifically on casinos.
2. Have we discussed this issue with ACS, AHA, or ALA?
- yes. In discussions with ACS, we have agreed that local advocacy may be the most effective way to approach this issue.
3. Can IHS work with BIA to ban smoking in Casinos?
- IHS is an agency of Health and Human Services, not Interior. We have no regulatory role with regard to Gaming compacts, so no direct influence. In our advisory role with regard to health issues, we may make recommendations to another agency. Your suggestion has merit, and I will discuss it with senior leadership within IHS. I note that you have cc'd your email to your congressional delegation. The Congress has much more power to dictate terms of Indian Compacts than we do, so you should continue to work closely with them. A formal letter to a Member of Congress or to an Agency Head, with a clearly worded request, will always get a response.
4. What else can we do?
- It is true that ETS exposure is a health issue, but the solutions are political. We have great respect for Tribal Sovereignty, and unless and until Tribal Leaders support a smoking ban in casinos, it is not likely to happen. So my suggestion is that you contact the National Indian Health Board and ask for a time slot to present the issue at their next Consumer Conference. That meeting is a great opportunity to influence the thinking of Indian Country leadership.
Thank you for your concern, and I look forward to attending your session at the NIHB conference! If you have any educational materials or scientific studies of ETS and casino workers, I would appreciate your sending me copies.
--
Nathaniel Cobb MD
Chief, Chronic Disease Branch
Division of Epidemiology
Indian Health Service
5300 Homestead Rd NE
AlbuquerqueNM87110
(505)248-4132
My response back to Dr. Cobb:
Dr. Nathaniel Cobb, MD
Division of Epidemiology
Indian Health Service
5300 Homestead Rd NE
AlbuquerqueNM87110
(505)248-4132
Dr. Nathaniel Cobb,
Thank you for the quick response.
As I am sure you must have been thinking as you wrote this response to me, I would not find it satisfactory.
I have contacted all the heads of Indian Health at each of the tribes that operate casinos over the last three years on this issue--- NOT ONE SINGLE ONE has responded to my e-mail or been willing to talk to me on the phone.
Quite frankly, I seriously doubt there are circumstances where the impact of second-hand smoke can be dealt with in one fell swoop.
Yet, we both know this is more about casino PROFITS and the way casino PROFITS influence POLITICS.
What are you suggesting, that it will take some kind of revolution in this country before an agency like yours who has a mandate to educate on this serious issue will act?
I find this coming from a medical doctor such as you very strange; that on this one single issue involving human health where so many lives can be saved and health maintained you suggest that it is up to a union to take the action rather than you.
What are you suggesting is that tribal leaderships motivated solely by profits are to be given into on a health care issue so adversely affecting human health as the issue of being forced to work in an environment composed of second-hand smoke because you do not want to rock the boat--- using as your excuse: "sovereignty."
Is human health not an issue for a “sovereign” nation to be concerned about when it comes to the health of its own people?
There seems to be a clear admission here on your part that these tribal governments involved in gaming have been so corrupted by money they don't even care about the health of their own people; let alone the health of anyone else.
As you are fully aware, most of these casinos are run by outside management firms only using sovereignty to bolster their profits in escaping protecting the rights of casino workers to be free from second-hand smoke in their employment.
You come up with this flimsy excuse that the issue of smoke-free casinos cannot be addressed because the details of the conference are already set and established. However, what is preventing those who will be doing the presentations on the serious consequences of tobacco from raising the issue concerning the need for these casinos to go smoke-free because it is a matter of fundamental human rights for workers not to be forced to work in these conditions that we all know are seriously detrimental to human health.
You, as a medical doctor, are requesting that I should send you further information regarding the consequences of working in these smoke-filled casinos?
It is almost unbelievable that you, being a medical doctor, have even written these words.
That you acknowledge you have known about this problem and not insisted the politicians correct this, is a disgrace. You are the expert witness here.
I find it very difficult to understand how the scientific and medical community has managed to turn out the most respected from these professions to testify:
- Against the tobacco companies in law suits;
- At Congressional and State Legislative hearings;
- In support of smoke-free workplaces for everyone else except casino workers.
But, for some reason there is complete, total, overwhelming and absolute silence when it comes to the issue coercing these casinos in the Indian Gaming Industry to go smoke-free to protect the health of two-million casino workers.
At this point, since you agree this is a very serious problem; I would request that you convey my concerns---AND WHAT YOU CLAIM ARE YOUR SHARED CONCERNS--- to each and everyone of those people who will be participating in the tobacco workshops, forums or making any presentations on tobacco and request that they specifically address the problem of second-hand smoke in casinos and make suggestions and recommendations how this issue will be resolved by coercing these casino managements to go smoke-free.
The Manitoba, Canada provincial government has taken the stand that they will not approve any further casino Compacts or upgrades or new licenses for any casino unless it will be smoke-free.
Something is very wrong with the scenario you bring forward here. I find it kind of strange that a public official such as yourself, who has a legislated mandate to provide the leadership in protecting human health, would tell a citizen writing to you to go and do your job for you.
I expect you to communicate your concerns regarding second-hand smoke (environmental tobacco smoke) to each member of the United States Congress, every single state legislator in each and every state; and, I expect that you will convey your concerns as a medical doctor and in your capacity as a public official with the specific mandate to raise this concern with the Bureau of Indian Affairs and the Secretary of the Department of Interior; and further, that you instruct all of those employed at the local and state levels working for Indian Health Services to immediately undertake discussions about this with their tribal governments.
Sovereignty has nothing to do with this issue.
Can you provide me one single instance where the human health and welfare of a nation’s people is compromised under the guise of “sovereignty” as you are blatantly doing here? No; you cannot provide any such example. How could “sovereignty” possibly be compromised by protecting the health and well-being of any people from any nation? Do you realize how utterly stupid this sounds coming from an educated man like yourself and a doctor on top of that?
Your department and agency is involved in this conference. As a result, you have a mandate to bring this issue forward.
I assume you do not request permission from tribal governments to raise any other issues related to human health; so, why would you conceded your mandate on this vital health issue to tribal governments with no demonstrated concern on this issue or for the human health of their own people?
To suggest that this issue can wait until another conference, where both you and I know that I will never receive permission to speak on this issue, is about as insensitive and uncaring a response that anyone could ever expect to receive from a public official who has the scientific and medical background to know and understand that thousands of casino workers will lose their health while others will die from second-hand smoke they are forced to breath as forced and coerced terms and conditions of their employment.
I am requesting that you carry out the mandate you have from the United States Congress and act to make sure this issue is addressed at your upcoming conference with the aim of resolving this issue once and for all.
I expect to receive written confirmation that you have taken such action.
I assume that President Barack Obama would not appreciate you dragging your feet on this issue since he is so concerned about health care costs; I don't think I have to lecture you, a medical doctor, about the costs involved in trying to cure cancers and heart & lung problems associated with second-hand smoke in the workplace.
With all the attention now focused on accusations of frivolous government spending, I would think you would be more sensitive to the need to bring this issue forward at your upcoming conference.
Respectfully,
Alan L. Maki
Director of Organizing,
Midwest Casino Workers Organizing Council
Cc: Maggie Bird
President,
Midwest Casino Workers Organizing Council
With all that has take place, along comes the Washington Post and the rest of the mainstream media acting as if no one has known about the health care problems of Indian people.
I would also note that not one single newspaper, radio or television station has documented what is going on in the Indian Gaming Industry when it comes to the health and welfare of casino workers.
Why didn't the mainstream media examine how the Indian Health Service was doing while Gale Norton was in charge at the Interior Department for so many of the Bush years?
But, the larger question is why has hasn't the mainstream media seen fit to explore the conditions under which two-million people are employed in the Indian Gaming Industry in this country of which Indian Country is a part... if it wasn't, the Red Lake Tribal Council wouldn't have sent its representatives to the United States Congress begging for more health care funding.
The United States government shoved Indian people onto reservations after stealing their land and the natural resources; proclaimed these Indian Reservations to be "sovereign nations," intentionally leaving these "sovereign" nations without adequate resources to create real nations... and then, through the development of these anti-labor, racist "Compacts" designed with intent to allow a group of vicious mobsters to control the political, economic, social and cultural life of these "sovereign" Indian Nations; the politicians of this country stand back and say, "We can't do anything. We don't want to intervene in the affairs of sovereign Indian nations. We don't want to be in the position of creating problems among Indian people."
How racist and arrogant. The politicians set up a system of native "self-government" in a way designed to get people fighting amongst themselves and then these politicians stand back holding their bribes and pay-offs in the form of campaign contributions claiming their hands are tied.
I hope this blog posting has given people something to think about;
Alan L. Maki
PROMISES, PROMISES: Indian health care needs unmet
Note: The slideshow is available at the link:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/06/14/AR2009061400903.html?hpid=sec-health?hpid=sec-health
SLIDESHOW Previous Next
People sit in the waiting room of the Indian Health Service clinic in Crow Agency, Mont., Oct. 16, 2008. The Indian Health Service system serves almost 2 million American Indians in 35 states. An oftt-quoted refrain on some reservations is "don't get sick after June," when the federal dollars run out. (AP Photo/Mary Clare Jalonick) (Mary Clare Jalonick - AP)
This July 2005 photo provided by the Little Light Family shows Ta'shon Rain Little Light in Crow Agency, Mont. Five-year-old Ta'shon had stopped eating and walking, and complained constantly to her mother that her stomach hurt. On her first and subsequent visits to the Indian Health Service clinic on the Crow Agency, Mont., Ta'shon's mother was told her daughter was depressed, when in fact she had cancer, and died some months later. (AP Photo/Little Light Family) (AP)
Ta' Shon Little Light, 5, right, who died of cancer following a misdiagnosis by the local Indian Health Service, is seen with her sisters Thea Little Light, 13, left, and Tia Little Light, 10, at their home in Crow Agency, Mont. in this undated photo. Ta'shon died of cancer some months after a repeated diagnosis of depression by the Indian Health Service clinic. (AP Photo/Little Light Family) (AP)
Ada White talks about her great niece Ta'shon Rain Little Light, seen in the photo, during an interview with the Associated Press in Crow Agency, Mont., Oct. 16, 2008. Ta'shon died of cancer in a matter of months subsequent to a misdiagnosis of depression by the local Indian Health Service. (AP Photo/Mary Clare Jalonick) (Mary Clare Jalonick - AP)
In this photo taken Oct. 14, 2008, pedestrians walk past the Standing Rock Reservation Tribal Headquarters in Fort Yates. N .D. The reservation's Indian Health Service staff say they are trying to improve conditions. They point out recent improvements to their clinic, including a new ambulance bay. But in interviews on the reservation, residents were eager to share stories about substandard care. (AP Photo/Will Kincaid) (Will Kincaid - AP)
In this photo taken Oct. 14, 2008, a small child walks toward the front door of the Public Health Service Indian Hospital on the Standing Rock Reservation in Fort Yates. N.D. The U.S. has an obligation, based on a 1787 agreement between tribes and the government, to provide American Indians with free health care on reservations. (AP Photo/Will Kincaid) (Will Kincaid - AP)
In this photo taken Oct. 14, 2008, people sit in the Indian Health Services waiting room on Standing Rock Reservation in Fort Yates. N.D. Statistics for health and disease in Indian country are staggering: American Indians have an infant death rate that is 40 percent higher than the rate for whites, are twice as likely to die from diabetes, are 60 percent more likely to have a stroke, 30 percent more likely to have high blood pressure, and 20 percent more likely to have heart disease. (AP Photo/Will Kincaid) (Will Kincaid - AP)
In this photo taken Oct. 14, 2008, Rhonda Sandland weeps as she talks about almost losing her fingers to frostbite at Standing Rock Reservation Tribal Headquarters, in Fort Yates. N .D. Sandland says the reservation's clinic decided to remove five of her fingers because of the pain, but a visiting doctor from Bismarck, N.D., intervened, giving her drugs instead. She says she eventually lost the tops of her fingers, and the top layer of skin. (AP Photo/Will Kincaid) (Will Kincaid - AP)
In this photo taken Oct. 14, 2008, Ron His Horse is Thunder, chairman of the Standing Rock tribe, talks about the Indian Health Service at Standing Rock Reservation Tribal Headquarters, Fort Yates. N.D. His Horse is Thunder says his remote reservation on the border between North Dakota and South Dakota can't attract or maintain doctors who know what they are doing. (AP Photo/Will Kincaid) (Will Kincaid - AP)
In this photo taken Oct. 14, 2008, Dr. Vincent Barnes points out the great distance he and his staff must travel to treat people on the Standing Rock Reservation at Fort Yates, N.D. Barnes is a psychologist with the U.S. Public Health Service. (AP Photo/Will Kincaid) (Will Kincaid - AP)
In this photo taken Oct. 14, 2008, sisters Marcella Buckley, left, and Tracy Castaway pose at Standing Rock Reservation Tribal Headquarters, Fort Yates. N .D. Castaway says her sister is in $40,000 of debt because of treatment for Stage 4 stomach cancer after being misdiagnosed for years by the local health clinic, including for the possibility of a tapeworm and stress-related stomachaches. (AP Photo/Will Kincaid) (Will Kincaid - AP)
In this photo taken Oct. 14, 2008, Marcella Buckley talks about her medical condition at Standing Rock Reservation Tribal Headquarters in Fort Yates. N .D. Buckley says she visited the local clinic for four years with stomach pains and was given a variety of diagnoses, including the possibility of a tapeworm and stress-related stomachaches. She was eventually told she had Stage 4 cancer that had spread throughout her body. (AP Photo/Will Kincaid) (Will Kincaid - AP)
In this photo taken Oct. 14, 2008, Victor Brave Thunder talks about his medical condition at Standing Rock Reservation Tribal Headquarters, in Fort Yates. N .D. The reservation's clinic failed to diagnose Victor Brave Thunder with congestive heart failure, giving him Tylenol and cough syrup, when he told a doctor he was uncomfortable and had not slept for several days. He eventually went to a hospital in Bismarck, which immediately admitted him. Brave Thunder, 54, died in April while waiting for a heart transplant. (AP Photo/Will Kincaid) (Will Kincaid - AP)
By MARY CLARE JALONICK
The Associated Press
Sunday, June 14, 2009
CROW AGENCY, Mont. -- Ta'Shon Rain Little Light, a happy little girl who loved to dance and dress up in traditional American Indian clothes, had stopped eating and walking. She complained constantly to her mother that her stomach hurt.
When Stephanie Little Light took her daughter to the Indian Health Service clinic in this wind-swept and remote corner of Montana, they told her the 5-year-old was depressed.
Ta'Shon's pain rapidly worsened and she visited the clinic about 10 more times over several months before her lung collapsed and she was airlifted to a children's hospital in Denver. There she was diagnosed with terminal cancer, confirming the suspicions of family members.
A few weeks later, a charity sent the whole family to Disney World so Ta'Shon could see Cinderella's Castle, her biggest dream. She never got to see the castle, though. She died in her hotel bed soon after the family arrived in Florida.
"Maybe it would have been treatable," says her great-aunt, Ada White, as she stoically recounts the last few months of Ta'Shon's short life. Stephanie Little Light cries as she recalls how she once forced her daughter to walk when she was in pain because the doctors told her it was all in the little girl's head.
Ta'Shon's story is not unique in the Indian Health Service system, which serves almost 2 million American Indians in 35 states.
On some reservations, the oft-quoted refrain is "don't get sick after June," when the federal dollars run out. It's a sick joke, and a sad one, because it's sometimes true, especially on the poorest reservations where residents cannot afford health insurance. Officials say they have about half of what they need to operate, and patients know they must be dying or about to lose a limb to get serious care.
Wealthier tribes can supplement the federal health service budget with their own money. But poorer tribes, often those on the most remote reservations, far away from city hospitals, are stuck with grossly substandard care. The agency itself describes a "rationed health care system."
The sad fact is an old fact, too.
The U.S. has an obligation, based on a 1787 agreement between tribes and the government, to provide American Indians with free health care on reservations. But that promise has not been kept. About one-third more is spent per capita on health care for felons in federal prison, according to 2005 data from the health service.
In Washington, a few lawmakers have tried to bring attention to the broken system as Congress attempts to improve health care for millions of other Americans. But tightening budgets and the relatively small size of the American Indian population have worked against them.
"It is heartbreaking to imagine that our leaders in Washington do not care, so I must believe that they do not know," Joe Garcia, president of the National Congress of American Indians, said in his annual state of Indian nations' address in February.
When it comes to health and disease in Indian country, the statistics are staggering.
American Indians have an infant death rate that is 40 percent higher than the rate for whites. They are twice as likely to die from diabetes, 60 percent more likely to have a stroke, 30 percent more likely to have high blood pressure and 20 percent more likely to have heart disease.
American Indians have disproportionately high death rates from unintentional injuries and suicide, and a high prevalence of risk factors for obesity, substance abuse, sudden infant death syndrome, teenage pregnancy, liver disease and hepatitis.
While campaigning on Indian reservations, presidential candidate Barack Obama cited this statistic: After Haiti, men on the impoverished Pine Ridge and Rosebud Reservations in South Dakota have the lowest life expectancy in the Western Hemisphere.
Those on reservations qualify for Medicare and Medicaid coverage. But a report by the Government Accountability Office last year found that many American Indians have not applied for those programs because of lack of access to the sign-up process; they often live far away or lack computers. The report said that some do not sign up because they believe the government already has a duty to provide them with health care.
The office of minority health at the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, which oversees the Indian Health Service, notes on its Web site that American Indians "frequently contend with issues that prevent them from receiving quality medical care. These issues include cultural barriers, geographic isolation, inadequate sewage disposal and low income."
Indeed, Indian health clinics often are ill-equipped to deal with such high rates of disease, and poor clinics do not have enough money to focus on preventive care. The main problem is a lack of federal money. American Indian programs are not a priority for Congress, which provided the health service with $3.6 billion this budget year.
Officials at the health service say they can't legally comment on specific cases such as Ta'Shon's. But they say they are doing the best they can with the money they have - about 54 cents on the dollar they need.
One of the main problems is that many clinics must "buy" health care from larger medical facilities outside the health service because the clinics are not equipped to handle more serious medical conditions. The money that Congress provides for those contract health care services is rarely sufficient, forcing many clinics to make "life or limb" decisions that leave lower-priority patients out in the cold.
"The picture is much bigger than what the Indian Health Service can do," says Doni Wilder, an official at the agency's headquarters in Rockville, Md., and the former director of the agency's Northwestern region. "Doctors every day in our organization are making decisions about people not getting cataracts removed, gall bladders fixed."
On the Standing Rock Reservation in North Dakota, Indian Health Service staff say they are trying to improve conditions. They point out recent improvements to their clinic, including a new ambulance bay. But in interviews on the reservation, residents were eager to share stories about substandard care.
Rhonda Sandland says she couldn't get help for her advanced frostbite until she threatened to kill herself because of the pain - several months after her first appointment. She says she was exposed to temperatures at more than 50 below, and her hands turned purple. She eventually couldn't dress herself, she says, and she visited the clinic over and over again, sometimes in tears.
"They still wouldn't help with the pain so I just told them that I had a plan," she said. "I was going to sleep in my car in the garage."
She says the clinic then decided to remove five of her fingers, but a visiting doctor from Bismarck, N.D., intervened, giving her drugs instead. She says she eventually lost the tops of her fingers and the top layer of skin.
The same clinic failed to diagnose Victor Brave Thunder with congestive heart failure, giving him Tylenol and cough syrup when he told a doctor he was uncomfortable and had not slept for several days. He eventually went to a hospital in Bismarck, which immediately admitted him. But he had permanent damage to his heart, which he attributed to delays in treatment. Brave Thunder, 54, died in April while waiting for a heart transplant.
"You can talk to anyone on the reservation and they all have a story," says Tracey Castaway, whose sister, Marcella Buckley, said she was in $40,000 of debt because of treatment for stomach cancer.
Buckley says she visited the clinic for four years with stomach pains and was given a variety of diagnoses, including the possibility of a tapeworm and stress-related stomachaches. She was eventually told she had Stage 4 cancer that had spread throughout her body.
Ron His Horse is Thunder, chairman of the Standing Rock tribe, says his remote reservation on the border between North Dakota and South Dakota can't attract or maintain doctors who know what they are doing. Instead, he says, "We get old doctors that no one else wants or new doctors who need to be trained."
His Horse is Thunder often travels to Washington to lobby for more money and attention, but he acknowledges that improvements are tough to come by.
"We are not one congruent voting bloc in any one state or area," he said. "So we don't have the political clout."
On another reservation 200 miles north of Standing Rock, Ardel Baker, a member of North Dakota's Three Affiliated Tribes, knows all too well the truth behind the joke about money running out.
Baker went to her local clinic with severe chest pains and was sent by ambulance to a hospital more than an hour away. It wasn't until she got there that she noticed she had a note attached to her, written on U.S. Department of Health and Human Services letterhead.
"Understand that Priority 1 care cannot be paid for at this time due to funding issues," the letter read. "A formal denial letter has been issued."
She lived, but she says she later received a bill for more than $5,000.
"That really epitomizes the conflict that we have," says Robert McSwain, deputy director of the Indian Health Service. "We have to move the patient out, it's an emergency. We need to get them care."
It was too late for Harriet Archambault, according to the chairman of the Senate Indian Affairs Committee, Democratic Sen. Byron Dorgan of North Dakota, who has told her story more than once in the Senate.
Dorgan says Archambault died in 2007 after her medicine for hypertension ran out and she couldn't get an appointment to refill it at the nearest clinic, 18 miles away. She drove to the clinic five times and failed to get an appointment before she died.
Dorgan's swath of the country is the hardest hit in terms of Indian health care. Many reservations there are poor, isolated, devoid of economic development opportunities and subject to long, harsh winters - making it harder for the health service to recruit doctors to practice there.
While the agency overall has an 18 percent vacancy rate for doctors, that rate jumps to 38 percent for the region that includes the Dakotas. That region also has a 29 percent vacancy rate for dentists, and officials and patients report there is almost no preventive dental care. Routine procedures such as root canals are rarely seen here. If there's a problem with a tooth, it is simply pulled.
Dorgan has led efforts in Congress to bring attention to the issue. After many years of talking to frustrated patients at home in North Dakota, he says he believes the problems are systemic within the embattled agency: incompetent staffers are transferred instead of fired; there are few staff to handle complaints; and, in some cases, he says, there is a culture of intimidation within field offices charged with overseeing individual clinics.
The senator has also probed waste at the agency.
A 2008 GAO report, along with a follow-up report this year, accused the Indian Health Service of losing almost $20 million in equipment, including vehicles, X-ray and ultrasound equipment and numerous laptops. The agency says some of the items were later found.
Dorgan persuaded Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., to consider an American Indian health improvement bill last year, and the bill passed in the Senate. It would have directed Congress to provide about $35 billion for health programs over the next 10 years, including better access to health care services, screening and mental health programs. A similar bill died in the House, though, after it became entangled in an abortion dispute.
The growing political clout of some remote reservations may bring some attention to health care woes. Last year's Democratic presidential primary played out in part in the Dakotas and Montana, where both Obama and Democrat Hillary Rodham Clinton became the first presidential candidates to aggressively campaign on American Indian reservations there. Both politicians promised better health care.
Obama's budget for 2010 includes an increase of $454 million, or about 13 percent, over this year. Also, the stimulus bill he signed this year provided for construction and improvements to clinics.
Back in Montana, Ta'Shon's parents are doing what they can to bring awareness to the issue. They have prepared a slideshow with pictures of her brief life; she is seen dressed up in traditional regalia she wore for dance competitions with a bright smile on her face. Family members approached Dorgan at a Senate field hearing on American Indian health care after her death in 2006, hoping to get the little girl's story out.
"She was a gift, so bright and comforting," says Ada White of her niece, whom she calls her granddaughter according to Crow tradition. "I figure she was brought here for a reason."
Nearby, the clinic on the Crow reservation seems mostly empty, aside from the crowded waiting room. The hospital is down several doctors, a shortage that management attributes recruitment difficulties and the remote location.
Diane Wetsit, a clinical coordinator, said she finds it difficult to think about the congressional bailout for Wall Street.
"I have a hard time with that when I walk down the hallway and see what happens here," she says.
12 May 2009
Call 800-517-5696 today to protest more war funding!
This important vote could come up this week; possibly next week… Act today.
Insist on a response in writing.
Call 800-517-5696 today to protest more war funding!
Do you want the United States government to spend tens of billions of dollars more to fund the war in Iraq and expand the war in Afghanistan?
Next week, your representative will be asked to vote on a war supplemental bill that would do just that.
Call toll-free on May 12
800-517-5696
Say no to more spending on two wars. Urge your representative to use our tax dollars to
bring the troops home
take care of them upon their return
rebuild Iraq and Afghanistan
take care of health, education, and energy here at home
Oppose more war funding.
The U.S. government already spends $1.9 million every minute on the military — and that doesn't include funding for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.
This is the position of our Organizing Council:
All of this money could be going towards the creation of a public health care system. Any country that can spend this kind of money on wars and militarism that includes funding over 800 U.S. foreign military bases dotting the globe; subsidizing the Israeli killing machine; and fighting wars in three countries at the same time certainly can afford to provide its own people a first-rate, world-class public health care system that is comprehensive, all-inclusive and universal which is publicly funded, publicly administered and publicly delivered. Everyone in. All the profiteers out. Health care for people not for profit.
As a working class mother I did not raise my children to go fight wars and kill other people so oil companies can profit.
I voted for Barack Obama very reluctantly and this war funding is not the change I voted for.
Please call today.
Call 800-517-5696 today to protest more war funding!
Maggie Bird
President,
Midwest Casino Workers Organizing Council
Two-million casino workers employed in the Indian Gaming Industry go to jobs in smoke-filled casinos getting poverty wages without any rights under state, federal or tribal labor laws.
The same government funding these wars created this injustice in the Indian Gaming Industry and refuses to right this wrong.
Distributed by:
Alan L. Maki
Director of Organizing,
Midwest Casino Organizing Council
58891 County Road 13
Warroad, Minnesota 56763
Phone: 218-386-2432
Cell phone: 651-587-5541
E-mail: amaki000@centurytel.net
Check out my blog:
Thoughts From Podunk
http://thepodunkblog.blogspot.com/
Insist on a response in writing.
Call 800-517-5696 today to protest more war funding!
Do you want the United States government to spend tens of billions of dollars more to fund the war in Iraq and expand the war in Afghanistan?
Next week, your representative will be asked to vote on a war supplemental bill that would do just that.
Call toll-free on May 12
800-517-5696
Say no to more spending on two wars. Urge your representative to use our tax dollars to
bring the troops home
take care of them upon their return
rebuild Iraq and Afghanistan
take care of health, education, and energy here at home
Oppose more war funding.
The U.S. government already spends $1.9 million every minute on the military — and that doesn't include funding for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.
This is the position of our Organizing Council:
All of this money could be going towards the creation of a public health care system. Any country that can spend this kind of money on wars and militarism that includes funding over 800 U.S. foreign military bases dotting the globe; subsidizing the Israeli killing machine; and fighting wars in three countries at the same time certainly can afford to provide its own people a first-rate, world-class public health care system that is comprehensive, all-inclusive and universal which is publicly funded, publicly administered and publicly delivered. Everyone in. All the profiteers out. Health care for people not for profit.
As a working class mother I did not raise my children to go fight wars and kill other people so oil companies can profit.
I voted for Barack Obama very reluctantly and this war funding is not the change I voted for.
Please call today.
Call 800-517-5696 today to protest more war funding!
Maggie Bird
President,
Midwest Casino Workers Organizing Council
Two-million casino workers employed in the Indian Gaming Industry go to jobs in smoke-filled casinos getting poverty wages without any rights under state, federal or tribal labor laws.
The same government funding these wars created this injustice in the Indian Gaming Industry and refuses to right this wrong.
Distributed by:
Alan L. Maki
Director of Organizing,
Midwest Casino Organizing Council
58891 County Road 13
Warroad, Minnesota 56763
Phone: 218-386-2432
Cell phone: 651-587-5541
E-mail: amaki000@centurytel.net
Check out my blog:
Thoughts From Podunk
http://thepodunkblog.blogspot.com/
10 May 2009
QUESTIONS FOR SHOMRIM
QUESTIONS FOR SHOMRIM:
Written by Leonard Cohen
Monday, 12 November 2007
And will my people build a new Dachau
And call it love,
Security,
Jewish culture
For dark-eyed children
Burning in the stars
Will all our songs screech
Like the maddened eagles of the night
Until Yiddish, Arabic, Hebrew, and Vietnamese
Are a thin thread of blood clawing up the side of
Unspeaking steel chambers
I know you, Chaverim
The lost young summer nights of our childhood
We spent on street corners looking for life
In our scanty drops of Marx and Borochov.
You taught me the Italian Symphony
And the New World
And gave a skit about blowing up Arab children.
You taught me many songs
But none so sad
As napalm falling slowly in the dark
You were our singing heroes in '48
Do you dare ask yourselves what you are now
We, you and I, were lovers once
As only wild nights of wrestling in golden snow
Can make one love
We hiked by moonlight
And you asked me to lead the Internationale
And now my son must die
For he's an Arab
And my mother, too, for she's a Jew
And you and I
Can only cry and wonder
Must Jewish people
Build our Dachaus, too?
-- Leonard Cohen, poem from 1970's
Written by Leonard Cohen
Monday, 12 November 2007
And will my people build a new Dachau
And call it love,
Security,
Jewish culture
For dark-eyed children
Burning in the stars
Will all our songs screech
Like the maddened eagles of the night
Until Yiddish, Arabic, Hebrew, and Vietnamese
Are a thin thread of blood clawing up the side of
Unspeaking steel chambers
I know you, Chaverim
The lost young summer nights of our childhood
We spent on street corners looking for life
In our scanty drops of Marx and Borochov.
You taught me the Italian Symphony
And the New World
And gave a skit about blowing up Arab children.
You taught me many songs
But none so sad
As napalm falling slowly in the dark
You were our singing heroes in '48
Do you dare ask yourselves what you are now
We, you and I, were lovers once
As only wild nights of wrestling in golden snow
Can make one love
We hiked by moonlight
And you asked me to lead the Internationale
And now my son must die
For he's an Arab
And my mother, too, for she's a Jew
And you and I
Can only cry and wonder
Must Jewish people
Build our Dachaus, too?
-- Leonard Cohen, poem from 1970's
09 May 2009
How many hungry people could this little boondoggle have fed?
According to the New York Times, "The photo shoot of the Boeing 747 was intended to update the official picture of Air Force One, which is what the plane is called when the president is aboard. The last photograph was taken against the backdrop of Mount Rushmore, but in March military officials began planning for a new shot with the Statue of Liberty in the background.The Air Force estimated the flight cost taxpayers $328,835, including $35,000 in fuel for the plane and the two fighter-jet escorts.
The plane, Air Force One which carries the President around, was flying at 1,000 feet. People were scared because the World Trade Center was 1,350 feet tall. They figured they were in for another 9/11.Really, did we need this picture for more Obama hype?
Talk about government waste.
Barack Obama should personally compensate the tax-payers for every single penny this boondoggle cost the tax payers.
The Birchites and their Tea Parties apparently think this was alright because it was promoting "patriotism."
Lisa
06 May 2009
01 May 2009
May Day is as good as any day to have a discussion about why we need the Communist Party USA
I was trying to get my thoughts together for a May Day post. It seems like there is a renewed interest in May Day and some people want to pretend that the Communist Party isn't part of May Day. People organize rallies and demonstrations for May Day. This good. But Communists should be invited to speak at these May Day events simply because Communists are so connected to May Day. Past and present.
Since I received this I figured it would make a good posting for May Day discussions.
Lisa
Lisa,
I thought you might be able to use this in your Club. In my rather lengthy comment in response to this book review by Leo Panitch, I hit on some points we were discussing a few weeks ago.
Canadian Dimension posted this article as a link on their May Day calendar page… while I wrote the “comment” following this book review several months ago, there is a lot of relevant stuff in it and I guess because May Day has brought more attention to this article I started getting a few calls about what I wrote.
People are kind of intrigued by my comment pointing out that the Communist Manifesto was written with the intent of developing Communist Party organizations which would seem to be a no-brainer; but, apparently that has been lost on some people in the left looking for excuses to create all kinds of left/communist/socialist organizations except for the Communist Party with the thinking that you can just kind of pretend you can ignore history and facts.
I also dealt with “20th century socialism” a little.
My comment begins quite a ways down.
I am working on producing something about how to start a Communist/Marxist/Socialist club… I have posted bits and pieces on a few list serves to get some feed-back and ideas… if you have any thoughts pass them on and I will include them.
Alan
North Winnipeg’s Seal of Identity
http://canadiandimension.com/articles/1716/
Leo Panitch | January 7th 2009 | 1
A Glowing Dream: A Memoir
by Roland Penner
J. Gordon Shillingford Publishing, 2007
“The place of childhood provides the seal of identity.” This epigram opens the first chapter of Roland Penner’s memoir, Growing Up ‘Red’ in Winnipeg’s North End. It holds true even for those of us who grew up only “pink” — i.e. whose parents were CCFers rather than Communists, and who as a result never set foot in the Ukrainian Labour Temple at Pritchard and McGregor. Just how much Winnipeg’s working-class political culture sealed our identities was brought home to me last year when I sent my brother an article that touched on the strike at the Hurtig Fur Company in the early 1930s — during the course of which my father, while on the picket line, had his head split open by a scab. My brother, who was born in 1934, responded: “You know, when I was a little boy I used to get confused about whether the really bad guy’s name was Hurtig or Hitler.”
To be sure, the industrial side of Winnipeg’s history of class conflict makes very little appearance in this memoir — apart from a few sentences that recall Roland standing as a teenager “on the bald prairie with the temperature at about wind chill -50°F, handing out union leaflets” as part of an organizing drive at a plant on the outskirts of Transcona. This is hardly surprising, since the Penner family was preeminent for its involvement on the political side of the labour movement — so much so that on one memorable May Day, after some five thousand paraded along Portage Avenue and Main Street to end up at Market Square in front of the old City Hall, the three speakers who addressed them were Penner’s politically passionate and fiery mother, Rose; his eleven-year-old “child orator” brother, Norman; and, of course, his venerable father, Jacob, the famous Communist alderman for Ward Three. (Jacob Penner was “almost always dressed in a conservatively cut three-piece wool suit, a shirt with a stiff celluloid collar, a firmly knotted woolen tie, a carefully blocked and immaculately clean fedora, and sometimes, over his shoes, spats.”)
The story told here of the Penner family is a fascinating one, from its origins among downwardly mobile Mennonite ancestors who once owned an estate on the west bank of the Dniepr River to Jacob’s “form of marriage without clergy” to a Jewish orphan from Odessa, Rose Shapak. One of the most revealing aspects of north Winnipeg’s ethnic culture is uncovered here, as Jacob the Red, before his election as alderman in 1934 at the age of 54, moves from job to job for some two decades, including as a candy salesman with the help of Rose’s connection to the well-off Galpern family. Just as class conflict tore the Jewish community apart in a strike like the one at Hurtig’s, so did family ties often transcend the sharpest of differences in the class politics of Winnipeg’s North End.
The family anecdotes in this book are so profuse that many of the best are found in the footnotes. One of Rose’s nephews goes to the U.S.S.R. in 1933 and gets swept away five years later in Stalin’s murder machine. One of Jake’s brothers-in-law returns home after a visit to Germany in 1936, and becomes a supporter of the Winnipeg Nazi Party. Shortly after Jake is sent off to an internment camp as a Communist in 1940, sixteen-year-old Roland and his twin sister Ruthie are home alone listening to “Saturday Afternoon at the Met” (while Rose is in Ottawa heading up a delegation of wives petitioning for improvements in the camp’s conditions), and the RCMP come barging in waving a search warrant. As one Mountie moves to turn off the radio, Ruthie screams at him: “In this house no one turns off the opera!”
Indeed, so plentiful are Penner’s family anecdotes that one terrific example, which he told when Norman was honoured at a banquet at the University of Manitoba some two decades ago, is left out of this book. As I recall it (and have often retold it), when Norman marched into the principal’s office of his grade school to complain that the phys-ed instructor was picking on him because he was a Communist, the principal sternly and accusingly said (so everyone in the outer office could hear): “You’re a Communist?!” And then, after closing the door, he whispered, “So am I.”
Penner’s admiration for his parents’ Communist politics is palpable, and he explicitly contrasts this with the way other “red diaper babies” like Jim Laxer and Stan Gray have written disparagingly of their parents’ politics. Quoting Laxer to the effect that truth was “a very slippery commodity” in his home, Roland proudly writes: “That was not our experience…. We asked many questions and Dad and our mother told us what they sincerely believed to be true.” His father remains his “primary inspiration” — a man who “fought for the rights of others at great cost to himself” — and this is why his parents commitment to the “Glowing Dream” forms the title of his memoir. Yet, one might have wished that Roland had offered a more sober reflection on his father’s generation of Canadian Communists, not only with regard to what they knew or didn’t know about Stalin’s crimes in the U.S.S.R. or to the limitations of “democratic centralist” life inside the party, but also to the reformist strategy it pursued in the public arena.
Thus, we learn that Jacob Penner left the Socialist Party of Canada in 1911 because he felt it was too oriented toward raising class consciousness through Marxist education alone. He devoted himself to a life of “unceasing struggle for [the] daily needs and pressing problems” of working people in the belief that this practical activity would raise their consciousness as “the essential feature in the development of a socialist revolution.” Yet, when he died in 1965, aged 85 (having only retired as alderman three years earlier), the Winnipeg Free Press made a point of saying that he was a “political curiosity” who drew much of his support from people “who cared nothing for politics but who admired his efficiency and ability and who believed that he worked for the underdog.” Penner quotes this approvingly, without raising the question of how far this achievement nevertheless stood from the development of the class consciousness needed for supporting socialist revolution, which had been Jake’s original purpose. Would more attention to creative Marxist education have produced a better result? This memoir doesn’t go there, perhaps because Roland, from the time of his own engagement in student politics at the University of Manitoba in the late 1940s, adopted a stance “quite in keeping with my father’s approach to political activity on an issue-by-issue basis.” This approach did not mean that he often lost his bearings on the Left of the political spectrum — far from it. But as the main part of the memoir turns to cover Roland’s own adult political life, this “issue-by-issue” approach is visible all along the way: from his slow drift away from the CP (rather than exiting in flames as his brother did in 1957); to his joining Joe Zuken’s law firm; to his foundational role in the establishment of legal aid in Manitoba; to his almost happenstance decision to join the NDP; to what he calls his “life in government” as attorney general of Manitoba.
The limits of this approach came to a head with his role in the Meech Lake Accord, which he still sees as “a reasonable compromise” on the grounds that, while he agrees with those critics who said that “the separatists would always ask for more,” if the Accord had passed it would have ensured that “their call to break up the country [would have] fallen on less fertile ground.” This is pretty conventional stuff. He reserves his real ire, moreover, for the left critics of the Accord, especially those “many women … influenced by flamboyant statements … by Judy Rebick and the National Action Committee,” who saw the deal as concocted by “men in suits” with the aim of using Quebec’s recognition as a distinct society to override the Charter’s equality provisions (“This is, in my view, nonsense.”) and undermine federal social programs (the likelihood of which he sees as “essentially nil”).
Penner’s decision to side with the pragmatic men in suits against the socialist feminists during the Meech Lake controversy in 1987 was presaged by the controversy over the stand he took in 1983 over the newly opened Morgentaler abortion clinic in Winnipeg. In justifying why as attorney general he could not “authorize a blanket stay of proceedings” with respect to criminal charges against Morgentaler, Penner clearly sees himself as properly following the advice Justice Samuel Freedman gave him when he invited Penner to lunch after his appointment: the Attorney General “must not be political.” But if Penner now admits that his Morgentaler moment “still comes back to haunt me from time to time,” this may be because he knows very well (as he puts it in the memoir in relation to his discussion of the task force on legal aid in the 1970s) that “the legal system itself is so much the product of the establishment it serves that it cannot be turned into the front line for law reform and even more obviously for social transformation.” It most certainly can’t if attorneys general act as if their roles are non-political.
It is impossible to do full justice to Penner’s memoir without going even further over the word limit CD’s editors have allotted me. Suffice to say that this review touches upon only a few aspects of the rich and varied life recounted in this book. I especially enjoyed making the connection between Penner’s many entrepreneurial activities during his Communist boyhood in the 1930s with his “life as an impressario,” when he ran the Co-op Bookstore in the late 1950s and was responsible for bringing Pete Seeger and Odetta, among many others, to sing before Winnipeg audiences.
For me, at least, this enjoyable read was enhanced by being able to catch Penner out on such errors as telling us that Lenin “famously said that communism equals socialism plus electric power” (he actually said “soviets and electric power”). Or the misnumbering of the Chapter Two endnotes, so that the citation for the homage Penner pays to the great Fritz Hansen, the American running back who led the Blue Bombers to their first Grey Cup in 1935, amusingly offers sources to the On to Ottawa Trek of that year. The only unfortunate result of this misnumbering is that we never learn who actually coined that wise phrase: “The place of childhood provides the seal of identity.”
Tags: culture, labour, marxism, panitch, reviews, roland penner, winnipeg.
This article appeared in the January/February 2009 issue of Canadian Dimension magazine. SUBSCRIBE NOW to get a refreshing and provocative alternative delivered to your door 6 times a year for up to 50% off the newsstand price.
1 comments
· Leo Panitch’s review of “A Glowing Dream: A Memoir” itself is food for thought, dialogue, discussion and debate as much as is Roland Penner’s excellent book, which I would strongly recommend to every worker to read and study.
Panitch finds problems with Jacob Penner’s approach towards politics and assumes that Marxist education was not simultaneously taking place with the excellent work Jacob Penner did in serving working people on the Winnipeg City Council.
Having personally known many of those in Jacob Penner’s Communist Party circle, I know that this contention simply is not accurate.
And I believe that where Panitch is inaccurate here is the very crux of what is missing in working class struggles in Canada and the United States today, which is holding back the struggle of the working class for real power: social, political and economic; the struggle for socialism—the only alternative to this failed capitalist system.
What Panitch fails to understand is the way the Communist Party works in a collective way… while Panitch’s contention that Jacob Penner paid too little attention to Marxist education of the working class—a very dubious contention at best seeing as how Jacob Penner was the longest serving Communist elected public official in Canada, and perhaps the world—it is hard to believe that Panitch’s assessment is accurate that there was a lack of socialist/Marxist education taking place. How a Communist repeatedly gets elected and re-elected when there is a powerful corrupt web of capitalism spun all around him creating such a hostile environment would then have to be explained… an explanation Leo Panitch never broaches… not everything he hasn’t broached can be explained away as not being provided more space by Canadian Dimension since Panitch has had ample opportunity to do this elsewhere; and he has not.
Panitch forgets, or intentionally omits, the role of the Communist Party Club. Jacob Penner always “had his back covered” by a very powerful Communist movement consisting of very important Communist Party clubs in Manitoba which were more than a little responsible for his repeated re-election campaigns because of the “collective” way these Communist Party clubs operate as the “think-tanks” and “action centers” of the working class and people’s movements constantly stressing that all the various movements for democracy, peace, social and economic justice and for socialism need to work together in unity.
I have noticed that failure to understand the all-important role of Communist parties by Panitch in many of his other writings, too; which boils down to not understanding the very important and significant role these Communist Party Clubs play in winning the day to day struggles working people are constantly embroiled in as a matter to survive the obstacles and problems created by a capitalist social, economic and political system.
Like in this current book review, Panitch even writes about the Communist Manifesto but fails to understand that Marx and Engels in writing this brief pamphlet did so with the intent of encouraging workers to build Communist Parties to advance their demands for reforms AND winning social, economic and political power.
There is all kinds of ample evidence that Jacob Penner and his comrades and friends understood very well “What needs to be done?” And they did what needed to be done—on all fronts, from education to activism.
The real questions Leo Panitch might want to ponder is why Jacob Penner and the Communist Party in Winnipeg did so well while in most other places in North America the working class movement did not fare as well?
A big part of the answer to this question lies in attacks on the Communist Party by the government (which Jacob Penner and the Winnipeg Communists and their friends and allies so successfully fought back) and the attacks on the Communist Party from the right and ultra-left in the working class movement (again, attacks which Jacob Penner and the Winnipeg communists struggled against so successfully).
And Joe Zuken’s campaigns successfully built on all of this.
How and why this powerful Communist movement in Winnipeg lost momentum and suffered losses should be the topic of a forum with the proceedings published in another book… it would be very interesting to see if Leo Panitch’s ideas as to his “critique” (or not so thinly veiled attack on the role and objectives of Communist Parties) hold any water when placed side-by-side with the Communist perspective in all of this.
I really think we need to be asking what has held back the working class movements from achieving what Jacob Penner and his comrades and friends achieved not finding excuses to write them off because in these troubled times, there is not only a Canadian dimension to what these working class Communist Party activists achieved, there is something for all working class activists from throughout North America and the rest of the world to learn from… I find it rather ironic that many people who adhere and cling to Leo Panitch’s perspective regarding the Soviet Union and other socialist countries who found their own way to power and to hold on to that power which they so despise, now like to take cheap pot shots at the very man and the Communist Party he was a member of which climbed towards working class power so successfully in the electoral arena.
Which, also, begs the question: If Canada and the U.S.A. were the bastions of democracy capitalist politicians claim them to be; why then has the policy towards allowing Communists to freely participate in the political lives of these two countries been so restricted—and, I think I am being very charitable in using the term “restricted” when political suppression and repression are more appropriate.
If Leo Panitch would like to participate in an organized dialogue on this question concerning the legacy of the role of the Communist Party clubs I would be happy to participate, too.
Jacob Penner and Winnipeg Communists are not the only example of the success of Communist Party Clubs and how they combined electoral work with other facets of class struggle work—merely the best; an example which many working class activists today have a right to know about… just as working class activists today have a right to know about how Communists like Lyle Dotzert led the struggle to organize Ford in Windsor and his comrades like Phil Raymond, Nadia Barkan, Bob Travis, Bud Simons and Wyndham Mortimer across the river—south of the border—led the struggles to organize the Big Three and then elected the legendary working class activist and leader Coleman Young to public office… in order to know and understand this aspect of the working class struggle and history might make the difference as to whether the working class wins or loses the looming class conflict ahead.
The working class made numerous advances with Communist Parties in the lead… an historic fact that no amount of twisting and misinformation can erase—obscure, yes—but not erase because history is what it is.
Communists have made plenty of mistakes just like anyone else; but, the so-called errors attributed to us here simply are not correct.
There is this “movement” on the part of a section of the North American left which seeks to want to put everything from 20th Century Communism and socialism behind us as if it was all misguided and bad when nothing could be further from the truth.
Roland Penner’s excellent book provides us with aspects of working class history some people would rather just forget… just like they would like to forget Jacob Penner, Lyle Dotzert, Phil Raymond, Nadia Barkan (in Nadia’s case, the “historians” even give her the wrong name!)... but, forgetting primary aspects of history is not the same as these struggles and their leaders—with the Communist Parties at the forefront—being forgotten… or intentionally maligned as Leo Panitch does, and continues doing.
Recently Howard Zinn engaged in similar distortion on Amy Goodman’s “Democracy Now” when he stated:
“No, I was really gratified when Obama called for “Let’s tax the rich more, and let’s tax the poor and middle class less.” And they said, “That’s socialism.” And I thought, “Whoa! I’m happy to hear that. Finally, socialism is getting a good name.” You know, socialism has been given bad names, you know, Stalin and all those socialists, so-called socialists. They weren’t really socialist, but, you know, they called themselves socialist. But they weren’t really, you see. And so, socialism got a bad name. It used to have a really good name. Here in the United States, the beginning of the twentieth century, before there was a Soviet Union to spoil it, you see, socialism had a good name. Millions of people in the United States read socialist newspapers. They elected socialist members of Congress and socialist members of state legislatures. You know, there were like fourteen socialist chapters in Oklahoma. Really. I mean, you know, socialism—who stood for socialism? Eugene Debs, Helen Keller, Emma Goldman, Clarence Darrow, Jack London, Upton Sinclair. Yeah, socialism had a good name. It needs to be restored.”
Well Zinn—the great historian—apparently never heard of Jacob Penner, Willian Z. Foster, Paul Robeson Lyle Dotzert, Wyndham Mortimer, Phil Raymond or Nadia Barkan.
And Sam Webb, the revisionist “leader” of the CPUSA goes even further than Panitch or Zinn in saying he wants nothing at all to do with 20th Century socialism.
I find it very strange that all these attacks of a similar nature come at a time when the working class needs stronger Communist Parties than ever before… and slanting history to suit one’s own biased perspectives will not aid in building a winning working class fight-back as this rotten capitalist system collapses by the day from the time the bell rings on Wall Street until another plant is shut down, both throwing workers out into the streets as if they are merely disposable items like dirty baby diapers.
Alan L. Maki
Secretary/Treasurer
Minnesota/Dakotas District, CPUSA
#1. Posted by Alan L. Maki on January 13th 2009 at 10:30pm
Alan L. Maki
58891 County Road 13
Warroad, Minnesota 56763
Phone: 218-386-2432
Cell phone: 651-587-5541
E-mail: amaki000@centurytel.net
Check out my blog:
Thoughts From Podunk
http://thepodunkblog.blogspot.com/
Since I received this I figured it would make a good posting for May Day discussions.
Lisa
Lisa,
I thought you might be able to use this in your Club. In my rather lengthy comment in response to this book review by Leo Panitch, I hit on some points we were discussing a few weeks ago.
Canadian Dimension posted this article as a link on their May Day calendar page… while I wrote the “comment” following this book review several months ago, there is a lot of relevant stuff in it and I guess because May Day has brought more attention to this article I started getting a few calls about what I wrote.
People are kind of intrigued by my comment pointing out that the Communist Manifesto was written with the intent of developing Communist Party organizations which would seem to be a no-brainer; but, apparently that has been lost on some people in the left looking for excuses to create all kinds of left/communist/socialist organizations except for the Communist Party with the thinking that you can just kind of pretend you can ignore history and facts.
I also dealt with “20th century socialism” a little.
My comment begins quite a ways down.
I am working on producing something about how to start a Communist/Marxist/Socialist club… I have posted bits and pieces on a few list serves to get some feed-back and ideas… if you have any thoughts pass them on and I will include them.
Alan
North Winnipeg’s Seal of Identity
http://canadiandimension.com/articles/1716/
Leo Panitch | January 7th 2009 | 1
A Glowing Dream: A Memoir
by Roland Penner
J. Gordon Shillingford Publishing, 2007
“The place of childhood provides the seal of identity.” This epigram opens the first chapter of Roland Penner’s memoir, Growing Up ‘Red’ in Winnipeg’s North End. It holds true even for those of us who grew up only “pink” — i.e. whose parents were CCFers rather than Communists, and who as a result never set foot in the Ukrainian Labour Temple at Pritchard and McGregor. Just how much Winnipeg’s working-class political culture sealed our identities was brought home to me last year when I sent my brother an article that touched on the strike at the Hurtig Fur Company in the early 1930s — during the course of which my father, while on the picket line, had his head split open by a scab. My brother, who was born in 1934, responded: “You know, when I was a little boy I used to get confused about whether the really bad guy’s name was Hurtig or Hitler.”
To be sure, the industrial side of Winnipeg’s history of class conflict makes very little appearance in this memoir — apart from a few sentences that recall Roland standing as a teenager “on the bald prairie with the temperature at about wind chill -50°F, handing out union leaflets” as part of an organizing drive at a plant on the outskirts of Transcona. This is hardly surprising, since the Penner family was preeminent for its involvement on the political side of the labour movement — so much so that on one memorable May Day, after some five thousand paraded along Portage Avenue and Main Street to end up at Market Square in front of the old City Hall, the three speakers who addressed them were Penner’s politically passionate and fiery mother, Rose; his eleven-year-old “child orator” brother, Norman; and, of course, his venerable father, Jacob, the famous Communist alderman for Ward Three. (Jacob Penner was “almost always dressed in a conservatively cut three-piece wool suit, a shirt with a stiff celluloid collar, a firmly knotted woolen tie, a carefully blocked and immaculately clean fedora, and sometimes, over his shoes, spats.”)
The story told here of the Penner family is a fascinating one, from its origins among downwardly mobile Mennonite ancestors who once owned an estate on the west bank of the Dniepr River to Jacob’s “form of marriage without clergy” to a Jewish orphan from Odessa, Rose Shapak. One of the most revealing aspects of north Winnipeg’s ethnic culture is uncovered here, as Jacob the Red, before his election as alderman in 1934 at the age of 54, moves from job to job for some two decades, including as a candy salesman with the help of Rose’s connection to the well-off Galpern family. Just as class conflict tore the Jewish community apart in a strike like the one at Hurtig’s, so did family ties often transcend the sharpest of differences in the class politics of Winnipeg’s North End.
The family anecdotes in this book are so profuse that many of the best are found in the footnotes. One of Rose’s nephews goes to the U.S.S.R. in 1933 and gets swept away five years later in Stalin’s murder machine. One of Jake’s brothers-in-law returns home after a visit to Germany in 1936, and becomes a supporter of the Winnipeg Nazi Party. Shortly after Jake is sent off to an internment camp as a Communist in 1940, sixteen-year-old Roland and his twin sister Ruthie are home alone listening to “Saturday Afternoon at the Met” (while Rose is in Ottawa heading up a delegation of wives petitioning for improvements in the camp’s conditions), and the RCMP come barging in waving a search warrant. As one Mountie moves to turn off the radio, Ruthie screams at him: “In this house no one turns off the opera!”
Indeed, so plentiful are Penner’s family anecdotes that one terrific example, which he told when Norman was honoured at a banquet at the University of Manitoba some two decades ago, is left out of this book. As I recall it (and have often retold it), when Norman marched into the principal’s office of his grade school to complain that the phys-ed instructor was picking on him because he was a Communist, the principal sternly and accusingly said (so everyone in the outer office could hear): “You’re a Communist?!” And then, after closing the door, he whispered, “So am I.”
Penner’s admiration for his parents’ Communist politics is palpable, and he explicitly contrasts this with the way other “red diaper babies” like Jim Laxer and Stan Gray have written disparagingly of their parents’ politics. Quoting Laxer to the effect that truth was “a very slippery commodity” in his home, Roland proudly writes: “That was not our experience…. We asked many questions and Dad and our mother told us what they sincerely believed to be true.” His father remains his “primary inspiration” — a man who “fought for the rights of others at great cost to himself” — and this is why his parents commitment to the “Glowing Dream” forms the title of his memoir. Yet, one might have wished that Roland had offered a more sober reflection on his father’s generation of Canadian Communists, not only with regard to what they knew or didn’t know about Stalin’s crimes in the U.S.S.R. or to the limitations of “democratic centralist” life inside the party, but also to the reformist strategy it pursued in the public arena.
Thus, we learn that Jacob Penner left the Socialist Party of Canada in 1911 because he felt it was too oriented toward raising class consciousness through Marxist education alone. He devoted himself to a life of “unceasing struggle for [the] daily needs and pressing problems” of working people in the belief that this practical activity would raise their consciousness as “the essential feature in the development of a socialist revolution.” Yet, when he died in 1965, aged 85 (having only retired as alderman three years earlier), the Winnipeg Free Press made a point of saying that he was a “political curiosity” who drew much of his support from people “who cared nothing for politics but who admired his efficiency and ability and who believed that he worked for the underdog.” Penner quotes this approvingly, without raising the question of how far this achievement nevertheless stood from the development of the class consciousness needed for supporting socialist revolution, which had been Jake’s original purpose. Would more attention to creative Marxist education have produced a better result? This memoir doesn’t go there, perhaps because Roland, from the time of his own engagement in student politics at the University of Manitoba in the late 1940s, adopted a stance “quite in keeping with my father’s approach to political activity on an issue-by-issue basis.” This approach did not mean that he often lost his bearings on the Left of the political spectrum — far from it. But as the main part of the memoir turns to cover Roland’s own adult political life, this “issue-by-issue” approach is visible all along the way: from his slow drift away from the CP (rather than exiting in flames as his brother did in 1957); to his joining Joe Zuken’s law firm; to his foundational role in the establishment of legal aid in Manitoba; to his almost happenstance decision to join the NDP; to what he calls his “life in government” as attorney general of Manitoba.
The limits of this approach came to a head with his role in the Meech Lake Accord, which he still sees as “a reasonable compromise” on the grounds that, while he agrees with those critics who said that “the separatists would always ask for more,” if the Accord had passed it would have ensured that “their call to break up the country [would have] fallen on less fertile ground.” This is pretty conventional stuff. He reserves his real ire, moreover, for the left critics of the Accord, especially those “many women … influenced by flamboyant statements … by Judy Rebick and the National Action Committee,” who saw the deal as concocted by “men in suits” with the aim of using Quebec’s recognition as a distinct society to override the Charter’s equality provisions (“This is, in my view, nonsense.”) and undermine federal social programs (the likelihood of which he sees as “essentially nil”).
Penner’s decision to side with the pragmatic men in suits against the socialist feminists during the Meech Lake controversy in 1987 was presaged by the controversy over the stand he took in 1983 over the newly opened Morgentaler abortion clinic in Winnipeg. In justifying why as attorney general he could not “authorize a blanket stay of proceedings” with respect to criminal charges against Morgentaler, Penner clearly sees himself as properly following the advice Justice Samuel Freedman gave him when he invited Penner to lunch after his appointment: the Attorney General “must not be political.” But if Penner now admits that his Morgentaler moment “still comes back to haunt me from time to time,” this may be because he knows very well (as he puts it in the memoir in relation to his discussion of the task force on legal aid in the 1970s) that “the legal system itself is so much the product of the establishment it serves that it cannot be turned into the front line for law reform and even more obviously for social transformation.” It most certainly can’t if attorneys general act as if their roles are non-political.
It is impossible to do full justice to Penner’s memoir without going even further over the word limit CD’s editors have allotted me. Suffice to say that this review touches upon only a few aspects of the rich and varied life recounted in this book. I especially enjoyed making the connection between Penner’s many entrepreneurial activities during his Communist boyhood in the 1930s with his “life as an impressario,” when he ran the Co-op Bookstore in the late 1950s and was responsible for bringing Pete Seeger and Odetta, among many others, to sing before Winnipeg audiences.
For me, at least, this enjoyable read was enhanced by being able to catch Penner out on such errors as telling us that Lenin “famously said that communism equals socialism plus electric power” (he actually said “soviets and electric power”). Or the misnumbering of the Chapter Two endnotes, so that the citation for the homage Penner pays to the great Fritz Hansen, the American running back who led the Blue Bombers to their first Grey Cup in 1935, amusingly offers sources to the On to Ottawa Trek of that year. The only unfortunate result of this misnumbering is that we never learn who actually coined that wise phrase: “The place of childhood provides the seal of identity.”
Tags: culture, labour, marxism, panitch, reviews, roland penner, winnipeg.
This article appeared in the January/February 2009 issue of Canadian Dimension magazine. SUBSCRIBE NOW to get a refreshing and provocative alternative delivered to your door 6 times a year for up to 50% off the newsstand price.
1 comments
· Leo Panitch’s review of “A Glowing Dream: A Memoir” itself is food for thought, dialogue, discussion and debate as much as is Roland Penner’s excellent book, which I would strongly recommend to every worker to read and study.
Panitch finds problems with Jacob Penner’s approach towards politics and assumes that Marxist education was not simultaneously taking place with the excellent work Jacob Penner did in serving working people on the Winnipeg City Council.
Having personally known many of those in Jacob Penner’s Communist Party circle, I know that this contention simply is not accurate.
And I believe that where Panitch is inaccurate here is the very crux of what is missing in working class struggles in Canada and the United States today, which is holding back the struggle of the working class for real power: social, political and economic; the struggle for socialism—the only alternative to this failed capitalist system.
What Panitch fails to understand is the way the Communist Party works in a collective way… while Panitch’s contention that Jacob Penner paid too little attention to Marxist education of the working class—a very dubious contention at best seeing as how Jacob Penner was the longest serving Communist elected public official in Canada, and perhaps the world—it is hard to believe that Panitch’s assessment is accurate that there was a lack of socialist/Marxist education taking place. How a Communist repeatedly gets elected and re-elected when there is a powerful corrupt web of capitalism spun all around him creating such a hostile environment would then have to be explained… an explanation Leo Panitch never broaches… not everything he hasn’t broached can be explained away as not being provided more space by Canadian Dimension since Panitch has had ample opportunity to do this elsewhere; and he has not.
Panitch forgets, or intentionally omits, the role of the Communist Party Club. Jacob Penner always “had his back covered” by a very powerful Communist movement consisting of very important Communist Party clubs in Manitoba which were more than a little responsible for his repeated re-election campaigns because of the “collective” way these Communist Party clubs operate as the “think-tanks” and “action centers” of the working class and people’s movements constantly stressing that all the various movements for democracy, peace, social and economic justice and for socialism need to work together in unity.
I have noticed that failure to understand the all-important role of Communist parties by Panitch in many of his other writings, too; which boils down to not understanding the very important and significant role these Communist Party Clubs play in winning the day to day struggles working people are constantly embroiled in as a matter to survive the obstacles and problems created by a capitalist social, economic and political system.
Like in this current book review, Panitch even writes about the Communist Manifesto but fails to understand that Marx and Engels in writing this brief pamphlet did so with the intent of encouraging workers to build Communist Parties to advance their demands for reforms AND winning social, economic and political power.
There is all kinds of ample evidence that Jacob Penner and his comrades and friends understood very well “What needs to be done?” And they did what needed to be done—on all fronts, from education to activism.
The real questions Leo Panitch might want to ponder is why Jacob Penner and the Communist Party in Winnipeg did so well while in most other places in North America the working class movement did not fare as well?
A big part of the answer to this question lies in attacks on the Communist Party by the government (which Jacob Penner and the Winnipeg Communists and their friends and allies so successfully fought back) and the attacks on the Communist Party from the right and ultra-left in the working class movement (again, attacks which Jacob Penner and the Winnipeg communists struggled against so successfully).
And Joe Zuken’s campaigns successfully built on all of this.
How and why this powerful Communist movement in Winnipeg lost momentum and suffered losses should be the topic of a forum with the proceedings published in another book… it would be very interesting to see if Leo Panitch’s ideas as to his “critique” (or not so thinly veiled attack on the role and objectives of Communist Parties) hold any water when placed side-by-side with the Communist perspective in all of this.
I really think we need to be asking what has held back the working class movements from achieving what Jacob Penner and his comrades and friends achieved not finding excuses to write them off because in these troubled times, there is not only a Canadian dimension to what these working class Communist Party activists achieved, there is something for all working class activists from throughout North America and the rest of the world to learn from… I find it rather ironic that many people who adhere and cling to Leo Panitch’s perspective regarding the Soviet Union and other socialist countries who found their own way to power and to hold on to that power which they so despise, now like to take cheap pot shots at the very man and the Communist Party he was a member of which climbed towards working class power so successfully in the electoral arena.
Which, also, begs the question: If Canada and the U.S.A. were the bastions of democracy capitalist politicians claim them to be; why then has the policy towards allowing Communists to freely participate in the political lives of these two countries been so restricted—and, I think I am being very charitable in using the term “restricted” when political suppression and repression are more appropriate.
If Leo Panitch would like to participate in an organized dialogue on this question concerning the legacy of the role of the Communist Party clubs I would be happy to participate, too.
Jacob Penner and Winnipeg Communists are not the only example of the success of Communist Party Clubs and how they combined electoral work with other facets of class struggle work—merely the best; an example which many working class activists today have a right to know about… just as working class activists today have a right to know about how Communists like Lyle Dotzert led the struggle to organize Ford in Windsor and his comrades like Phil Raymond, Nadia Barkan, Bob Travis, Bud Simons and Wyndham Mortimer across the river—south of the border—led the struggles to organize the Big Three and then elected the legendary working class activist and leader Coleman Young to public office… in order to know and understand this aspect of the working class struggle and history might make the difference as to whether the working class wins or loses the looming class conflict ahead.
The working class made numerous advances with Communist Parties in the lead… an historic fact that no amount of twisting and misinformation can erase—obscure, yes—but not erase because history is what it is.
Communists have made plenty of mistakes just like anyone else; but, the so-called errors attributed to us here simply are not correct.
There is this “movement” on the part of a section of the North American left which seeks to want to put everything from 20th Century Communism and socialism behind us as if it was all misguided and bad when nothing could be further from the truth.
Roland Penner’s excellent book provides us with aspects of working class history some people would rather just forget… just like they would like to forget Jacob Penner, Lyle Dotzert, Phil Raymond, Nadia Barkan (in Nadia’s case, the “historians” even give her the wrong name!)... but, forgetting primary aspects of history is not the same as these struggles and their leaders—with the Communist Parties at the forefront—being forgotten… or intentionally maligned as Leo Panitch does, and continues doing.
Recently Howard Zinn engaged in similar distortion on Amy Goodman’s “Democracy Now” when he stated:
“No, I was really gratified when Obama called for “Let’s tax the rich more, and let’s tax the poor and middle class less.” And they said, “That’s socialism.” And I thought, “Whoa! I’m happy to hear that. Finally, socialism is getting a good name.” You know, socialism has been given bad names, you know, Stalin and all those socialists, so-called socialists. They weren’t really socialist, but, you know, they called themselves socialist. But they weren’t really, you see. And so, socialism got a bad name. It used to have a really good name. Here in the United States, the beginning of the twentieth century, before there was a Soviet Union to spoil it, you see, socialism had a good name. Millions of people in the United States read socialist newspapers. They elected socialist members of Congress and socialist members of state legislatures. You know, there were like fourteen socialist chapters in Oklahoma. Really. I mean, you know, socialism—who stood for socialism? Eugene Debs, Helen Keller, Emma Goldman, Clarence Darrow, Jack London, Upton Sinclair. Yeah, socialism had a good name. It needs to be restored.”
Well Zinn—the great historian—apparently never heard of Jacob Penner, Willian Z. Foster, Paul Robeson Lyle Dotzert, Wyndham Mortimer, Phil Raymond or Nadia Barkan.
And Sam Webb, the revisionist “leader” of the CPUSA goes even further than Panitch or Zinn in saying he wants nothing at all to do with 20th Century socialism.
I find it very strange that all these attacks of a similar nature come at a time when the working class needs stronger Communist Parties than ever before… and slanting history to suit one’s own biased perspectives will not aid in building a winning working class fight-back as this rotten capitalist system collapses by the day from the time the bell rings on Wall Street until another plant is shut down, both throwing workers out into the streets as if they are merely disposable items like dirty baby diapers.
Alan L. Maki
Secretary/Treasurer
Minnesota/Dakotas District, CPUSA
#1. Posted by Alan L. Maki on January 13th 2009 at 10:30pm
Alan L. Maki
58891 County Road 13
Warroad, Minnesota 56763
Phone: 218-386-2432
Cell phone: 651-587-5541
E-mail: amaki000@centurytel.net
Check out my blog:
Thoughts From Podunk
http://thepodunkblog.blogspot.com/
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
