Building a Smarter, Stronger Democratic Movement in the Face of Opposition

Continued from previous page

In Egypt, we are pleased to see that some in the resistance movement realize the military is not the same as the movement. In particular, unions are striking against the current transition government because like the Morsi and Mubarak regimes before them, they are not treating workers fairly. Indeed, the rights of workers and their fair treatment has been a key component of resistance movements around the world; and are a key component in the United States where there has been an assertive week of actions by low-wage workers.

Noam Chomsky made an important point this week that we should never forget: governments fear their people. Governments know that they behave in unethical and often illegal ways and work for the richest in the nation, and therefore they want to keep the people ignorant, or worse, filled with myths and misinformation, which is why they intimidated journalists at the Manning trial. They know that 8 out of 10 Americans suffer economic insecurity and fear poverty and joblessness; and that this is a recipe for revolt.

We can see their fear of the truth in the reaction to Bradley Manning, Edward Snowden and other whistleblowers. Manning, a prisoner of conscience, exposed important truths about illegal and unethical actions of U.S. foreign policy. The list of the crimes exposed is impressive and they demonstrate the importance of a free press. His conviction on espionage charges, the first time a whistleblower has been found to be a spy, is a threat to the First Amendment and to investigative journalism. As Julian Assange wrote in reaction to the verdict, “journalism is now espionage.”

Edward Snowden exposed the dragnet spying program of the NSA. He let the American people know that the NSA is keeping all of their Internet records as well as telephone call data. Because of his revelations, a political protest movement against the NSA is growing and more Americans are concerned about government spying than they are about terrorism.

In addition, we hope to see new technologies developed that will make the Internet private, as this article suggests. This is creating a new world where people have privacy in their communications; no doubt there are activists in our movement who can accomplish this feat.

And, people learned another lesson this week – neither of the corporate-dominated political parties is an ally of the people. When Congress voted on whether to end the funding for NSA spying, a close look at the votes showed it was the progressive Democrats who ensured the vote’s failure. We have seen this before when it came to the bailout of the big banks, the health insurance giveaway known as Obamacare, and the funding of the Iraq war. Repeatedly, the members of the Progressive Caucus gave just enough votes to the leadership of their party to ensure the corporate-security state was not challenged. 

The lesson: we need an independent movement. When Martin Luther King, Jr. faced two segregation parties, he remained independent, saying: "I feel someone must remain in the position of non-alignment, so that he can look objectively at both parties and be the conscience of both—not the servant or master of either." Today, we face a corporate political duopoly when the issue of the times is corporate power. We too must remain independent and challenge both dominant parties.

Snowden learned lessons from the prosecution, and now verdict, of Bradley Manning. He knows that if he were to stand trial in the United States, it would not be a fair trial. His rights would be abused and he would be subjected to a show trial. Snowden warned President Obama that prosecuting whistleblowers will not stop people of conscience from letting the truth out, but it will make them smarter.