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Via Workers World News Service
Reprinted
from the Aug. 15, 1996
issue of Workers World newspaper
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What's all the fuss about "personal conscience"? That vague but nice-sounding phrase is supposedly at the core of a supposedly hard-fought battle of supposed principle now under way inside the Republican Party. You wouldn't know it without being told, of course, but "personal conscience" has something to do with women's reproductive freedom, sort of. It's a thrice-removed euphemism-it stands not for abortion rights per se, but just for Republicans' right to hold differing opinions on abortion.
In this, we are told, the GOP's soul is at stake. Will the ultra-right wing wrest complete control of the party from its traditional leadership by upholding the removal of that phrase from the party platform? Or will party moderates like California Gov. Pete Wilson, New Jersey Gov. Christine Todd Whitman, and Massachusetts Gov. William Weld ride to the rescue, banish the forces of reaction and save the day for a plank that acknowledges the role of "personal conscience"?
What? Who's writing this script? Reading most bourgeois reporting on the Republican platform hijinks, you'd almost forget we're talking here about the party of Barry Goldwater and Ronald Reagan. Social moderates holding the fort against extremists?
Pete Wilson is the racist ringleader of a vicious war against immigrants and affirmative action. Neither Whitman nor Weld could wait for Congress to get rid of federal welfare guarantees; they beat Washington to the punch with nasty measures penalizing unemploy ed women and their children for being poor. So much for the "moderates."
Next to this crew of right wingers, you've got to be pretty reactionary to stand out as an "extremist." Pat Buchanan and Ralph Reed manage. They, along with a reported majority of delegates to the party's upcoming convention, represent the shock troops of ruling-class reaction. The whole boss class and both its political parties are riding high over the welfare bill and are united in their commitment to continuing the anti-working-class offensive. But there are differences over tactics and degree.
Buchanan, Reed et al represent the view that a renewed political offensive joined with a heightened ideological offensive-aimed particularly against people of color, women and gays-must complement the welfare cuts. That's the way to make sure the cuts stand, in their view, and to move on to swing the ax against other programs.
To expect Bob Dole, or the Republican Party as a whole, to champion women's right to reproductive freedom is of course laughable, especially in this period of ascendant reaction. But for those alarmed by the misogyny-fest about to unfold in San Diego, there's no point in looking to Dole-clone Bill Clinton either.
This Democrat is about to sign the most anti-woman piece of legislation in recent history. Fifteen years nearly to the day after Reagan opened the current phase of the war against workers by firing 13,000 PATCO strikers-relatively privileged mostly male workers-this Democrat punctuates the era by consigning millions of women, including a high proportion of women of color, the workers most victimized by capitalism, and their children to even more desperate poverty.
This Democrat plans to sign the anti-gay-marriage bill if the Senate passes it next month. During the administration of this Democrat-who has apparently forgotten he was elected on a promise to fight for a national health-care plan-cuts to health programs are hitting the poor, women, people with AIDS very hard, and further narrowing the range of readily available reproductive medical care for the women who are among the 40 million people in the United States without health insurance.
This Democrat has proved so adept at carrying out the ruling class's program of war on the working class that few in the right wing care whether Dole wins or not.
The forces of reaction know they've got Clinton in their pocket; now they want to raise the level of the attack. The New York Times reported Aug. 7 that New Jersey Gov. Whitman "said she believed that many delegates were more concerned with keeping the tolerance language out of the platform than they were with getting Mr. Dole elected."
In the face of all this-capitalist villainy whichever way you turn-there's only one viable choice. Turn away altogether. Turn away from the class that oppresses the class that produces all the world's wealth. The enemy camp is expert at waging the class struggle-against our side. It's time to turn the tables. The moment to revive the struggle for socialism is at hand.
Spreading that message is the whole point of Workers World Party's Moorehead/La Riva campaign. Casting a vote for WWP's candidates is a good start. Serve notice on the ruling class. Capitalism has got to go.
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(Copyright Workers World Service: Permission to reprint granted if source is cited. For more information contact Workers World, 55 W. 17 St., NY, NY 10011; via e-mail: ww@wwpublish.com. For subscription info send message to: ww-info@wwpublish.com. Web: http://www.workers.org)