Letters from Our Readers

Jahan Choudhry BAR Comments Editor

25 Mar 2020

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This week the Democratic Party and the failures of US healthcare were on your mind. We share your letters for “Sanders Gets Swallowed by the DNC Machine: It’s Time to #DemExit” and “Late Stage Imperial Omni-Crisis: Death by Virus and and Internal Contradictions.”

“Sanders Gets Swallowed by the DNC Machine: It’s Time to #DemExit” by Danny Haiphong asserts that the demise of the Democratic Party is essential to free up the revolutionary energy of the masses.

Noah Stein writes:

“The Party will have a hard time surviving in its current form as more local people organize and run in local elections. Sanders supporters can still vote for a Dem Pres ticket AND keep working locally to bring on third party entities.

“Frederick Douglass chose Black Freedom and Constitutional Male Equality over the larger fight of universal suffrage. Lost him lots of white women friends. Some that ‘turned racist’ and are now vilified for ignoring Black women's rights in the push for an amendment that was revolutionary. Instead of being remembered as the ground troops and grassroots supporters of the Movement for Abolition.”

Jabra Ghneim writes:

“Absolutely. The Green Party and other third parties that had ballot access in 2016 need to have at least 2% to keep ballot access. Saving the Greens’ ballot access is a worthier cause than saving the Democrats from themselves.”

In “Late Stage Imperial Omni-Crisis: Death by Virus and and Internal Contradictions” Glen Ford argues that the crisis reveals the decrepit state of the US healthcare system and the elites’ overall disregard for the welfare of the masses.

Paul Billings writes:

“Indeed, we have a ringside seat, watching the implosion of ‘Late-Stage’ US capitalism. The paper of record had an op-ed yesterday justifying government plans to bailout large corporations (many of whom have spent $ billions on share buybacks while laying off workers) and a one-time payment to working people. The implication being that the people -- Congress, the FED and financial elite -- who created this mess in the first place by providing $ trillions to Wall St for share buybacks, prop up [still] insolvent banks, inflate bond markets and real estate in NYC, Boston, SF and spent $ trillions of taxpayer money on the Pentagon and wars across the Middle East are now entrusted with rescuing the financial bubbles that are exploding and at the same time, lookout out for the interests of working people. Obviously, the only people who are going to be bailed out are large financial interests who have the most political power.”

Michael Buergermeister writes:

“There are a lot of conflicting reports: those saying that the corona virus is very real, very nasty and that people are dying and those that say that the whole media alarm is fake and all heavy-handed measures inappropriate. Whichever the case may be what we DON’T need is CENSORSHIP from Fool Book, which one minute says that a posting offends ‘community standards’ (of Stalin’s Russia?) and then the next that it doesn’t. It is a time for caution, awareness but NOT for panic. Above all else: it is ridiculous that the taxpayer should solely bail out the banks. What is needed is a radical reallocation of resources. The vast sums being expended on biological warfare (e.g. coronavirus) should be slashed to zero. The vast sums being wasted on ‘defense’ (against whom?/against what?) and the Police State should be slashed to zero. The vast sums being funneled to private Swiss bank accounts via ‘bank bail-outs’ should be slashed to zero. Unconditional Basic Income should be immediately introduced. Debts (e.g. college loans) should be cancelled and the money previously allocated to ‘defense’ should be redirected toward a sound health system and income redistribution. There is no need for a single person on this planet to die of either hunger or disease. The only form of overpopulation is the excessive number of mendacious, corrupt and useless kleptocrats, whose role is redundant.”

The coronavirus is accelerating a crisis of legitimacy for the system. Together we are developing a way forward in these circumstances.

Jahan Choudhry is Comments Editor for Black Agenda Report. He is an organizer with the Saturday Free School based in Philadelphia, PA.

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