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The German Neutrality Law – a Travesty

One of the interesting things about Berlin’s Neutralitätsgesetz (apart from the fact, of course, that it isn’t very neutral) is that it is a relatively new law. This is weird because when listening to white Berliners talk about, you could be forgiven for thinking has existed since before the dawn of time, or at least […]

Jacinta Nandi
26/09/2020

The truth is, in my opinion, that before 2005 Germany was such a racist country, that white Germans didn’t SPECIFICALLY need a racist law to keep Muslim women out of important positions of power. There was the racist education system which upheld the racist order and managed to keep women out of universities and then from getting proper careers in public life. But as the new millennium dawned, a generation of non-white Germans with immigration backgrounds – including women wearing headscarves – left school and uni with more qualifications and self-confidence. The Neutralitätsgesetz was born.

Of course, nobody – or hardly anyone – who supports this law admits, even to themselves, that it is pure racism. The white German headscarf fantasy goes like this: Islam is a sexist religion, so obviously the women who wear headscarves are wearing a symbol of sexist oppression. They are weak victims of a patriarchal oppression and we Germans are far more advanced and liberated by them. Oh, and plus, headscarves are a religious symbol aren’t they, and since religion should be kept out of public life, women who wear headscarves should not be employed by the state. Win-win, huh? You get to keep “religious symbols” out of public life in Germany, and whilst doing so, you can liberate a few Muslim victims.

Seeing as how most of the immigrants in this country come from a Muslim background, what this law essentially equates to is a Berufsverbot for non-white women. You’d think that even white Germans would be intelligent enough to acknowledge this. Many non-white women living in Germany are legally forbidden from ever becoming teachers, judges, or even a social worker at the social services. I don’t understand how anyone can think this is even vaguely okay.

This is what really fucking blows my mind: lots of Western things we wear every day are vaguely sexist – to be honest, I only wear a bra because I have really big, sexy, provocative nipples and I don’t like men looking at them. Bras are sexist, lipstick is sexist, high heels are not just sexist but actually totally damaging for your legs and feet. High heels are a symbol of sexist oppression. Nobody ever, ever, ever EVER discusses banning these things. The most ardent white feminist, even the most ardent German white feminist, might look down on the women who wear these things – but nobody goes so far as to call for a ban. We just kind of accept that they’re these slightly annoying sexist things which exist in this slightly annoying sexist world we live in.

But the idea (actually excuse) that the ban on wearing headscarves is acceptable because they’re a religious symbol is ludicrous in my eyes. First of all, I think it contradicts religious freedom which is meant to be protected in the German constitution, BY THE FUCKING WAY, but more than that, as an Atheist, I think it is, perversely, a way of inserting religion into public life. For if you or I were to wear a headscarf, for fashion, or maybe even cancer reasons, it would be allowed. In the same way, if a practising Muslim woman were to cover her hair with a wig, this too would be allowed. I find this perverse and I also, actually, in a weird way, think it places religion as far too important for a society which could be (and in my eyes should be) secular. If religion and the state are separate, why do I care whether you are covering your hair for religious reasons or because it’s a bit greasy? It’s literally nothing to do with me.

And also, the high number of practising Muslim women who do not wear a headscarf prove that to everyone except an actual simpleton, the headscarf is not a straightforward “religious” “symbol” but more of a cultural norm.

I can’t even be bothered to go into how ludicrous it is that a Christian teacher is allowed to wear a nice dainty cross under their blouse, even one with a naked man slowly bleeding to death on it. But I will say I find it absolutely horrific that if history in Germany had been different, and we had larger Sikh or Jewish communities living In Berlin, they too would be forbidden from taking any jobs as public servants. A Jewish man with a kippah or a Sikh man with a turban are also, theoretically at least, affected by the Neutrality law. Luckily for white Germans there aren’t hardly any living here, hey.

I also find it absolutely absurd that a woman wearing a headscarf IS allowed to teach in Berlin – as long as she teaches religious education classes. Like what the actual fuck? What is this so-called neutrality law meant to be neutral on?

I think they should call it a segregation law and be done with it.

What really makes me mad is this: even if you were, no offence, dumb enough to think the headscarf is in some way more horrifically sexist and oppressive than, say, the fact that women have to wax their legs and men, basically, don’t: does a Berufsverbot help? If there are all these meek Muslim women, petrified at home, total subservient victims, petrified of their fathers, terrified of their husbands, forced into headscarves – who exactly is this Neutrality law helping? Even if you think absolutely not one Muslim woman in Berlin wears a headscarf by choice (and no offence, but you’re a bit stupid if you do) who does this law help? If I am forced by one system to cover my hair and by another system to not cover it, I haven’t been freed at all, have I? But the truth is, this law is not about freeing women at all. It’s about keeping brown people in their place. White Germans talk a lot about integration. But really, if any of them cared about it at all, they would be up in arms about this racist, unconstitutional law.

Tech Workers Coalition

Organising workers in the IT industry

The Left Berlin
25/09/2020

Why are we not in Trafalgar Square?

‘The truth is that we have all been too cowed, too demoralised, hopeless or frightened. It is time for us to change that in ourselves.’

Jonathan Neale

The virus is exploding in Britain, and we are heading into a new lockdown.

This happened before in March. But this time is different. Last time our leaders were ignorant, or stupid, or thought the lessons learned in Asia were irrelevant to white people.

Last time some of them believed that they could save the economy by letting the virus rip. Last time some of them believed the virus was like a cold. Last time some of them believed an app could solve the problem.

Epidemic

Or they believed whatever, it doesn’t matter. The point is that it is now obvious that they were wrong.

There is now a great deal of practice, many experiments and different policies in different countries.

Everyone who cares to now knows how to stop the epidemic. The scientists know it, the Conservative prime minister Boris Johnson does, his health minister Matt Hancock does, the opposition Labour leader Starmer does.

And this time we are going into an epidemic when we knows how to stop it.

Why are we not in Trafalgar Square?

School

Here is what needs to be done. Face coverings. Obvs. Social distancing. Obvs. Protective equipment for all workers. Obvs. Everyone who can works from home. Obvs.

But also, we need testing for everyone who is infected, or thinks they might be infected, or has been in contact with someone who might be infected, or who has symptoms, or is worried, or their parents are worried.

All those people need the results back within 24 hours, so they act on them.

Ideally, we need testing for most students and workers.

Everyone who is tested and is positive needs a place where they can be isolated, fed and treated. Don’t send them home to give it to other people in their household, who will give it to other people at work and school, and so on.

Test

Alternatively, everyone who is positive and does not live with someone vulnerable could be quarantined, if the whole household was quarantined.

Everyone who has to stay home because they are infected, or because they might be infected, or because they are in serious danger if they are infected, needs enough money to live on. That means government payments.

We need people employed to trace all the recent contacts of each person who tests positive.

That means phoning all those people, and then being prepared to stay on the phone talking with that scared person for half an hour or an hour, explaining, answering their questions, arranging the immediate test for them.

If people don’t answer the phone, we need people who go knock on their doors.

Pay

We don’t have anything remotely like that. We don’t have it because the government has contracted out the services to private contractors who cannot wipe their own bottoms.

The only way test and trace and isolate will work is if it is run through the NHS.

That means run by local GP surgeries, hospitals and public health departments. It means hiring many extra workers, on proper salaries.

That will be good, because there are an awful lot of unemployed people on the dole. It means training those people on the job. It means asking final year science students to take one year out on decent pay to help.

Economic

That sounds like a lot, doesn’t it? But there are countries in the world that have done those things. They worked. In March there was a global shortage of the reagents for tests, the chemicals, the supplies. There is no global shortage now.

It sounds impossibly complicated to organise. It is not. Just ask the all the GPs in each area to organise it. And say to them, hire all the people you need to and spend all the money you have to, and the government will cover you.

Sounds expensive? Not compared to the economic consequences of what this government has done instead.

The key is – no private contracts.

Trafalgar Square

Why are we not in Trafalgar Square?

As it happens, there are people in Trafalgar Square protesting over the epidemic. Anti-maskers, anti-vaccers, anti-lizard, climate deniers and racist conspiracy theorists. In substantial numbers.

I know people who look at all those people in Trafalgar Square and say how can they be so crazy, how can so many believe that? Because some of them are scared and angry and know that no one is doing anything for them. And because others are died in the wool political activists of the racist right.

But also, because we are not in Trafalgar Square. That’s why.

Covid and the related economic collapse are the most important political issue in the country in people’s real lives. It is obvious that the current situation is not good. Where are the people who protest everything else?

Where are the environmentalists? The Green Party? The Labour Party? The unions? The school students? The climate strikers? The anti-racists?

If those people do not fill Trafalgar Square, someone else will fill Trafalgar Square.

Other things we need

We know the other things we need to do too. People who are vulnerable, or live with people who are vulnerable, need to be paid enough to stay home. People need to work from home if they can. We need to be careful about how many of us come together.

None of this will work if we don’t control people coming from abroad.

Not asylum seekers – rich people, business people, tourists from abroad and British tourists returning.

We need to test everyone at the ports and airports, and give them the result before they leave the building. And offer them safe isolation. And check up on and arrest people who do not quarantine.

Many countries in the world doing this. It is crucial. Many countries have also blocked all but the most essential travel between places within the country, in complicated ways. That works too.

Money

Not everything needs to work. We just need to get the R rate down below 1.0, so each person with the virus gives it to less than one other person. Many countries have done this.

Why don’t we? Lots of reasons.

For example, the government is venal and incompetent. Obvs. But one big reason is that the Tory ministers have a bedrock commitment to privatisation.

The one thing that is utterly nonnegotiable for them is that there must be outsourcing contracts. This is a central part of the neoliberal economic project they have been committed to for forty years.

It is also how their friends make much of their money. And it is how they hope to make money when they leave office.

Demoralised

We have learned, in the pandemic, watching them, that nothing is more important to them than outsourcing the contract.

This is not simply corruption, or stupidity. For them, this is bedrock principle. If they lose on privatisation here, they will begin to lose everywhere.

The other reason is the lack of an opposition. Starmer’s strategy is to wait for Johnson to eat his own head, and stand well back. That may win an election, but does not solve our problems.

But it would be silly to blame Labour, or the unions, the environmental movement, the Green Party or whoever.

The truth is that we have all been too cowed, too demoralised, hopeless or frightened. It is time for us to change that in ourselves. To do what we have done before, what we know how to do, what we do best.

Kills

Of course, we may not be able to protest in another lockdown. We can protest right after. Of course, most people will protest in their own town, not in London. Of course, banner drops, and spray painted sheets, and vigils at the hospital, the university or the school. Of course, anything and everything. But also, Trafalgar Square.

Is there a point? Can we move the government? Really? This government?

Maybe not all the way. Maybe our movement will not be big enough. But the government are in deep disarray, publicly shamed, and mired deeper in doo doo every day. A big enough movement can move them part of the way.

But this is also about the future.

There will be other global pandemics. Covid kills between one in a hundred and one in two hundred of those infected.

Grow

There will be a future pandemic that kills one in ten, or one in five, or one in two. When that comes, we need to already know what to do, to be practiced, to put our machinery into action immediately.

This is also about all the climate change disasters that are coming. It is a dry run, a practice test, on a very small scale, for the enormous task of stopping emissions and avoiding climate breakdown.

This is about what kind of society, what kind of place we live in, who we are, what we are ready to roll over for.

We don’t have to arrive in the square with agreed demands. The people in the Square now are diverse and utterly confused. But what they do still has an impact, and allows their different messages to grow.

So, why are we not in Trafalgar Square?

Jonathan Neale is a writer and climate jobs activist. He previously worked for the NHS. He tweets at @NealeSayles. This article first appeared in The Ecologist. Reproduced with the author’s permission

A Socialist Comes off the Fence

Anna Southern’s resignation letter from the Labour Party

Anna Southern
23/09/2020

Dear Sir Keir

I joined the Labour Party full of enthusiasm in 2017. A manifesto full of excellent progressive policies inspired me. Since then I have been a CLP Women’s Officer and I am currently a Branch Treasurer, at least until I send this resignation letter. It has been an honour to carry out those roles and I am grateful to the members who elected me to those positions. For the past few years, the Labour Party could count on my activism, rain or shine. Now, unfortunately, it can’t even count on my vote. It will need to win it back.

As a socialist I am no longer comfortable being a member of the Labour Party. This statement is probably music to your ears (not the Jeremy Corbyn song). If I had wanted to join a Union Flag-waving party of patriotism, ‘family values’ and security, I would have joined the Tories or UKIP. I don’t want to stand up for British interests, I want to stand up for humanity. I want to work for internationalism, equality, and peace. I want to tax the rich, nationalise public services, eradicate poverty and homelessness, scrap tuition fees, make childcare free and start to tackle the climate emergency. Not fight the Tories for a handful of bigots (socially conservative voters, if we’re being charitable). I fear Labour comrades will soon be drinking their ‘Oh so British’ [1] tea from “Controls on Immigration” mugs again; frankly I’d rather die of thirst.

I have gritted my teeth (when not gnashing them in frustration) and tried to give this New Management Labour Party a chance. However, the disillusion has built to such a crescendo that I can’t do it anymore. I could take hours to list all of my grievances, including the internal sabotage shown in the ‘Leaked Report’; the abandonment of progressive policies; the lack of new policies; the inconsistent and factional attitude taken on the issue of anti-Semitism; the failure to take any responsibility for the disastrous Brexit policy in 2019. And on and on.

But it’s the whole shift in what we stand for that’s done for me. A shift away from a party for the many, back to grey-suited politics for the few. Chasing electability by harking back to the halcyon Blair or Miliband days. There is now the opportunity to be bold, to fight for big societal changes, to improve people’s lives. Instead, you – Sir Keir – are looking approvingly at the Ed Stone, or down at your shoes, or at the figures from your focus groups. Anywhere but towards a socialist future. Your Shadow Ministers are writing in ‘The Sun’, to their and the Party’s absolute shame.

The shiny new, blandly competent image you’re selling is worlds away from that enthusiasm captured in 2017; the huge rallies attended by ordinary people excited by politics, excited by the prospect of a better life for everyone. Excited by an allotment-tending socialist without a shiny respectable image. If you want to be ‘electable’, why not try to recapture that enthusiasm? Don’t you think that “Oh Sir Keir Starmer” has a nice ring to it? If you carry on like this, I reckon Rishi Sunak is going to thrash you in the next election.

We came so close in 2017, imagine what we could do if everyone was working towards a victory for the many? The contrast with the current “we support the government” stance is stark. Imagine being a party for working class people, the party of organised labour, and supporting this despicable, incompetent, murderous government. Throwing the education unions under the bus during a pandemic in order to look acceptable to the ‘acceptability deciders’ in the media. Putting lives at risk by doing this. I cannot imagine behaving like this. This is a very different thing to the inspiring, hope-fuelled thing I signed up for and I don’t like this other, grey, managerialist thing. I’m out.

To the comrades that say, “Stay and fight, they want the left to leave”, I say this: I can sympathise, and I wish you all the luck in the world. I’m cheering you on from the outside and I hope you can exert some influence. But in my opinion, we’ve fucked it. We were too soft when we were in charge and now we’re screwed. I know it’s hard when you’ve devoted a lot of your energy and enthusiasm to something to say, “I’m done”. I know it’s hard to leave socialist comrades who are still in the Party. I just don’t see a way forward for us in Labour. Perhaps I’m just not tough enough, sorry Tony Benn.

I remain committed to fighting for working class people and building a better society. I’ll be getting more involved in the various important social movements, particularly the ongoing fight against racism and fascism. I hope to be fighting alongside you, whether you’re in or out of the Labour Party. I’ll still be here, in the struggle, but I’ll wave the Union Flag for no one; I’ll court the Britain First vote for no one. No ifs, no buts, no equivocation.

I was tempted to stay a member out of spite, but it’s a waste of good spite. There are plenty of more deserving recipients. Keep your Union Flag, Sir Keir, and I’ll take the red one.

In beige-tinged disappointment,

Anna Southern

Footnote

1 Not at all British

Until very recently, Anna Southern was an active member of Labour Berlin. She remains politically active in Berlin

More Signs of Establishment Moves against Trump

1. Inter-capitalist contradictions in the USA Recently I wrote on ‘Berlin Left’ and in an amplified version elsewhere [1] – that there had been an exodus of major sections of the ruling class from Trump’s camp. In brief the argument presented was that the main sections of the ruling class who have supported Trump […]

Hari Kumar
20/09/2020

1. Inter-capitalist contradictions in the USA

Recently I wrote on ‘Berlin Left’ and in an amplified version elsewhere [1] – that there had been an exodus of major sections of the ruling class from Trump’s camp. In brief the argument presented was that the main sections of the ruling class who have supported Trump included heavy industry and extractive industries – epitomised by the oil, gas, mining sectors. In contrast the dominant section of the ruling class interests represented by the Democratic Party are formed by the financial capitalists. But as Trump has failed to move out-shored American industry back to the USA, there has been a cooling between Trump and his industrial backers.

“The (Trump-ite) trade war has come at a cost. Tariffs imposed by the United States and retaliatory measures taken by aggrieved trading partners have shaved billions off the U.S. economy, according to a Federal Reserve paper. And a 2019 study by economists at the Fed, Princeton University and Columbia University showed that tariffs imposed additional burdens on American households, raising the cost of imports and curtailing exporters’ access to markets. For all that cost, there has been no improvement in Mr. Trump’s preferred indicator of economic dominance, the nation’s trade balance.” [2]

The Democratic Party has dived head-long into this opportunity. Recent overtures from the Democratic Party signal to sections of the heavy industrial capitalists, that they have no need to worry about the Democratic party leaders.

“In July, former Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. presented an economic strategy to “rebuild domestic manufacturing capacity,” restoring local supply chains from semiconductors to pharmaceuticals. In September he added a tax penalty to the plan, aimed at companies that move jobs to other countries, alongside a tax credit for businesses that bring them home. The proposals might have seemed like something from President Trump’s playbook.” [2]

This is a dramatic battle within the ruling class of the USA, but one that has enormous repercussions for the working peoples of the USA and the world. Meanwhile events force most reasonable progressive observers to warn of a potential right-wing coup from a Trump-led counter-strike.1, [3]

However as more and more sections of the USA come out against Trump, the likelihood of a transition to a Democratic Party Presidency rises. Recent statements by prominent bodies in the scientific establishment are very relevant here. Significant sections of American society, have signaled their unwillingness to live with the Trumpites. This has become so widespread, that it has now extended to important sections of the ideological superstructure.

2. The Superstructure of states

Marx and Engels are famous for their sharp focus on the essential economic factor driving changes in society, or as they termed it – the ‘base’. But as they pointed out in their joint work – ‘The German Ideology’ – the ruling thoughts of a society reflect the ideas of the owners of this base

“The ideas of the ruling class are in every epoch the ruling ideas, i.e. the class which is the ruling material force of society is at the same time its ruling intellectual force.” [4]

This edifice around a particular society, one reflecting its economic base is called the ‘superstructure’. The ideas of the ruling class are organised by the superstructure:

“The totality of these relations of production constitutes the economic structure of society, the real foundation, on which arises a legal and political superstructure and to which correspond definite forms of social consciousness.“ [5]

Of course the relationship between base and super-structure is not a simple one-way street. And at a time when the ruling class is so severely divided within itself, there is plenty of scope for wobbling super-structures. Nonetheless, if establishment chunks leave their cloistered worlds and join in an open battle within the ruling class, this is significant. Such a seismic shift can be seen now in the USA, with the recent statements of the ‘New England Journal of Medicine’, [6] and ‘Science’ [7] . In both cases, the editorial board has been quite outspoken about the current elections taking place now.

3. Physicians and Scientists in todays state

Marx and Engels proclaimed that in its chase of total power and control:

“The bourgeoisie has stripped of its halo every occupation hitherto honoured and looked up to with reverent awe. It has converted the physician, the lawyer, the priest, the poet, the man of science, into its paid wage labourers.” [8]

While the general thrust was fully correct, there were a few later developments. These included the fostering of illusions in “the physician, the lawyer, the priest, the poet, the man of science” etc – that they are ‘better’ than your average Joanne or Joe. But in fact at bottom, most of these occupations are objectively part of the working class. If they employ any staff, they may be considered to be in the vacillating petit-bourgeoisie – prey to fascist ideology. A few of them have ascended to high management positions in state medical systems. Some fewer, even own huge companies – whether in the pharmaceutical industries or in the ‘Health Management’ industries. These latter two categories are clearly another breed of person. Such physicians have become part of the ruling capitalist class.

However the vast majority of physicians and scientists remain – objectively – a specialised form of worker. I believe this also the case of the members of the very prominent scientists making up the editorial boards of such journals. Yet they invariably – at least in usual time! – take a ‘neutral’ position on what might be labeled as ‘partisan politics’. What have these editors of the NEJM and Science said?

Unsurprisingly they focus on the COVID aspect of the current USA crisis. Nonetheless, some long quotes are worth reading. For example the NEJM 6:

“Covid-19 has created a crisis throughout the world. This crisis has produced a test of leadership. With no good options to combat a novel pathogen, countries were forced to make hard choices about how to respond. Here in the United States, our leaders have failed that test. They have taken a crisis and turned it into a tragedy. The magnitude of this failure is astonishing….

The United States leads the world in Covid-19 cases and in deaths due to the disease, far exceeding the numbers in much larger countries, such as China. The death rate in this country is more than double that of Canada, exceeds that of Japan, a country with a vulnerable and elderly population, by a factor of almost 50, and even dwarfs the rates in lower-middle-income countries, such as Vietnam, by a factor of almost 2000. Covid-19 is an overwhelming challenge, and many factors contribute to its severity. But the one we can control is how we behave. And in the United States we have consistently behaved poorly. We know that we could have done better…..

Why has the United States handled this pandemic so badly? We have failed at almost every step. We had ample warning, but when the disease first arrived, we were incapable of testing effectively and couldn’t provide even the most basic personal protective equipment to health care workers and the general public. And we continue to be way behind the curve in testing. While the absolute numbers of tests have increased substantially, the more useful metric is the number of tests performed per infected person, a rate that puts us far down the international list, below such places as Kazakhstan, Zimbabwe, and Ethiopia, countries that cannot boast the biomedical infrastructure or the manufacturing capacity that we have. Moreover, a lack of emphasis on developing capacity has meant that U.S. test results are often long delayed, rendering the results useless.”

The NEJM editors continue that the (short-term) ‘solutions’ are not exactly rocket science. It is the mixed messages, vacillation and political opportunism of the leading politicians that is to blame for the current USA health crisis of COVID:

“Although we tend to focus on technology, most of the interventions that have large effects are not complicated. The United States instituted quarantine and isolation measures late and inconsistently, often without any effort to enforce them, after the disease had spread substantially in many communities. Our rules on social distancing have in many places been lackadaisical at best, with loosening of restrictions long before adequate disease control had been achieved. And in much of the country, people simply don’t wear masks, largely because our leaders have stated outright that masks are political tools rather than effective infection control measures. The government has appropriately invested heavily in vaccine development, but its rhetoric has politicized the development process and led to growing public distrust.”

There is no hesitation to castigate the Federal (“consistently inadequate’) – or regional governments (lacking in ‘competence’); or the “politicization: of the Food Drugs Administration (FDA):

“The response of our nation’s leaders has been consistently inadequate. The federal government has largely abandoned disease control to the states. Governors have varied in their responses, not so much by party as by competence. But whatever their competence, governors do not have the tools that Washington controls. Instead of using those tools, the federal government has undermined them. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which was the world’s leading disease response organization, has been eviscerated and has suffered dramatic testing and policy failures. The National Institutes of Health have played a key role in vaccine development but have been excluded from much crucial government decision-making. And the Food and Drug Administration has been shamefully politicized, appearing to respond to pressure from the administration rather than scientific evidence. Our current leaders have undercut trust in science and in government, causing damage that will certainly outlast them. Instead of relying on expertise, the administration has turned to uninformed “opinion leaders” and charlatans who obscure the truth and facilitate the promulgation of outright lies.”

Meanwhile the editor of ‘Science’ is more succinct, but more pithily scathing:

“When it comes to the crisis of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19), Trump’s words could not be more destructive. When scientists tried to tell him a crisis was coming, he called it “their new hoax.” About the extraordinary number of lives lost he says, “it is what it is…. It’s no wonder that the braggard who said, “I alone can fix it” can’t bring himself.. (to say): ”Two words for those who have borne the battle of COVID-19. Two words Donald Trump simply can’t say: “Thank you.” [7]

If this is considered as tame language by left-wingers – they must be living in their own bubble far, far away from all other humans.

Thus the open positions of the NEJM and Science editors are important. But what do they signify? The increasing contradictions within society, force everyone to take sides. Numerous articles show the scale of this (including my own relatively early warning to progressives to take this pandemic seriously). [9] As regards the USA election, if Trump should launch a coup, at this stage it is not just the workers who will face him down – as suggested by some. It is rather also his opposition within the ruling class, including the military. [2] Nonetheless, in the longer term – only a solid Marxist working class party can assist the working class to ensure a more equitable society.

Hari Kumar – declares no conflict of interest, he is not currently on any medical or academic editorial boards, and was never on the editorial board of ‘NEJM’ or ‘Science’.

Footnotes

1. Hari Kumar, The Stakes Rise: Inter-Capitalist Warfare in the USA Ruling Class – Dumping Trump; and Hari Kumar, Berlin Left; and expanded at:The Stakes Rise: Inter-Capitalist Warfare in the USA Ruling Class – Dumping Trump’, Marxism Leninism Currents Today; at http://ml-today.com/2020/07/24/the-stakes-rise-inter-capitalist-warfare-in-the-usa-ruling-class-dumping-trump/

2. Eduardo Porter, “Trump, Biden and ‘Made in U.S.A.’: Same Refrain, Varying Notes;” New York Times, Sep 29, 2020; at

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/09/28/business/economy/biden-trump-made-in-usa.html

3. Jeremy Brecher, Social Self-Defense Against the Impending Trump Coup

4. K. Marx, 1859 The German Ideology; Volume 5 Collected Works; Moscow 1976; p.59

5. K. Marx, 1859 Preface to A Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy; Moscow, 1977

6. The Editors, ‘Dying in a Leadership Vacuum’; October 8, 2020; N England Journal of Medicine 2020; 383:1479-1480

7. H. Holden Thorp, Two words Trump can’t say; later amended to Words Matter; ‘Science’, 09 Oct 2020, Vol 37, Issue 6513

8. K.Marx and F.Engels, 1872, ‘The Communist Manifesto; section 1′; ‘Selected Works’ Vol 1; Moscow 1969; p. 111.

9. How Should Marxists View the COVID-19 Pandemic of 2019-2020?’; March 17, 2020