Sitting at me desk, trying to think if something to write is very hard with all the purpose-driven chaos caused by our government and the lack of appropriate media coverage of the damage being done by this corrupt government. It’s hard to stay positive, but I keep reminding myself, “This too shall pass.”
I am looking at my books by authors like Jack London (The Iron Heel), Eugene V. Debs (The Bending Cross), Peter Barnes (Liberty and Dividends for All), Thomas Paine (Common Sense Rights of Man), Samuel B. Griffith (edition of Suntzu’s The Art of War), Niccolo Machiavelli (The Prince) and wonder how many people have read these great works, and had our educational system taught the truths within the covers of these books would our country be in the mess we are in now?
We have a belligerent, insecure, devious, unintelligent, deadbeat conman in the White House bankrupting our country and throwing parades for himself like despots of other regimes, while our feckless executive branch of government does nothing either because they are complicit in the theft or outnumbered by the crooks.
Machiavelli’s The Prince should especially be read by all. It explains the different types of governments and how one can easily slip into another type, which we are witnessing first hand under trump. Machiavelli wrote there are countries are ruled as a republic or principality (family run), which we are succumbing to with trump and his spawn.
I believe and know that in these books lies the answer to what we have to do in order to keep what is left of the freedom here in the U.S. At this time, the corporations and a few very rich people run our country. They have the money that trump covets, they have control over the government as a result of trump’s lust, and they have the power over decisions effecting us little people as a result. The GOP continues to work at taking away our basic needs, such as what little healthcare we have, our Social Security, and even our freedom to protest in the streets.
As The Art of War points out, we need to know ourselves in order to win half of the war, but if we know our enemy, trump and the GOP, we can win the entire war. All should also read The Prince, especially page 160 in Chapter 2, to understand the types of governments and how one form can lead to a more destructive form.
Then we must understand the capital system, which our economic system is based on and makes us wage slaves. This is explained in Thomas Piketty’s book Capital in the Twenty-first Century, which explains how inequality happened and how the rich keep getting richer and richer through the inheritance of wealth. Under trump this inequality is spiraling out of control.
Communities might want to create think tanks to study and discuss these books together and outline ways to fight back using the knowledge learned from these authors and books.
There are labor history books, like Rebel Voices: an IWW anthology, and writings by Noam Chomsky, Walter Reuther to further your understanding and generate ideas. Most of these books will show how we have gotten to where we are in this country today. We can learn how to keep and better our lives, with healthcare for all, a living wage, free education, unions organization, prison reform, and taking measures to curtail the escalating climate crisis while dealing with the loss of jobs to artificial intelligence by implementing a universal basic income.
The bottom line is we can still win and keep a government that works for all if we educate ourselves, our children and our friends. It is still possible to have conversations with those supporting trump if is done without name calling or arguing, but with focused questions that have nothing to do with trump, but their lives and what they hope to achieve, why they haven’t achieved it and what they think is actually holding them back. If the conversation is done without judgment, the person will end coming to the realization on their own that they have been voting against their own best interests.
There are three phases of a general strike and unions must plan for one. Those three phases are: 1. general strike in an industry 2. general strike in a community 3. general national strike We need to move away from being on the defensive and move toward a good offensive. The American Federal of Labor (AFL) could not have held a general strike if it wanted to because they had thousands of different contracts that expired at different times of the year. This was done deliberately so that there is no consolidation of power for a general strike. Also, nowadays, there is no law agency that will support labor, except the National Labor Relations Board (NLBR), which has been under attack and in decline for years. This leaves the burden of change up to unions, and unless unions work together, little will change. We essentially have a combination of job trusts, which are not as strong as contracts, and the courts can break easily because the NLBR will be further weakened and essentially elim...
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