Japan’s ruling party wins upper house election

Ben McGrath

Japan’s ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) took the majority of seats up for election in Sunday’s upper house race. The final results leave the LDP and its ruling coalition short of the necessary two-thirds it needs to approve a constitutional change, but workers and youth should place no faith in the so-called opposition to fight a genuine campaign against remilitarization.

Voter turnout in Sunday’s contest reached only 48.8 percent, the second lowest on record. Voter turnout among youth, aged 18 and 19, was particularly low, standing at only 31.33 percent. Japan’s upper house, or House of Councilors, holds elections every three years for half the 245 seats in the body. Members are elected to six-year terms. The lower house in the National Diet is the more powerful of the two.

The LDP won 57 seats out of 124 in the race while its coalition partner Komeito took 14. Including the independents and the opposition Nippon Ishin no Kai, which won 10 seats, parties favoring revising Article 9 of Japan’s constitution hold 160 seats, or four short of a two-thirds majority. Article 9 is known as the pacifist clause for its ban on a standing military and Japan’s ability to wage war. Constitutional amendments require passage by two-thirds majority in both houses of the Diet and then by a national referendum.

Prime Minister Shinzo Abe intends to insert a clause into Article 9 to directly recognize the Self-Defense Forces (SDF), the formal name of Japan’s military. Combined with military legislation passed in 2015, this would accelerate Tokyo’s ability to send the SDF overseas in wars of aggression. He held a hand out to the opposition parties on Monday, stating, “Although we have provided a basis for debate (on Article 9), which we believe is the best, we want to have flexible discussions without sticking to our proposal.”

Among the election bloc of parties claiming to defend Article 9, the main opposition Constitutional Democratic Party of Japan (CDP) won 17 seats, increasing its total strength to 32 while the Democratic Party for the People (DPP) won only six seats, a loss of two from pre-election numbers, bringing its total to 21. The Japanese Communist Party (JCP) won seven seats, a net loss of one, reducing its overall total to 13 seats. The Social Democratic Party (SDP) retained its seat up for reelection. It holds two in the upper house.

While typhoon rains in western Japan may have played some role in the low turnout, the reality is the official opposition is discredited in the eyes of the working class and youth. It is this lack of a political alternative in Japan that allows Abe’s LDP to maintain power despite broad opposition to remilitarization and its economic agenda.

This opposition was confirmed in a Kyodo news survey after the election in which 56 percent of respondents stated they opposed revising Article 9. If the CDP, DPP, Japan’s Stalinists, and the social democrats cannot win support based on this, it is because they support, either directly or tacitly, Japan’s remilitarization.

None of these parties sought to build on the antiwar movement that developed in 2015 against the LDP’s military legislation. Rather, they deeply fear that such a movement would grow outside of their control and represent a threat to capitalism as a whole. This is especially true for the JCP, which is one reason it provides an extremely thin left-wing cover for the Democrats, hoping to convince workers and youth that an election bloc is the only way to stop Abe’s agenda.

In pre-election debates, Yukio Edano and Yuichiro Tamaki, the leaders of the CDP and DPP respectively, rejected attempts to galvanize support based on an antiwar perspective. They accepted the passage of a revised Article 9 as an accomplished fact, instead arguing with Abe over reforms to the national referendum law. Both know, as do the JCP and SDP, that there is widespread support, particularly in the more conservative DPP, for constitutional revision, a fact that was covered up during the election.

Taking advantage of the bankruptcy of these parties, a new political grouping called Reiwa Shinsengumi has gained wider support, though it only won two seats. It is led by Taro Yamamoto, a former actor who gained political prominence for his criticisms of nuclear power following the Fukushima disaster in 2011. He won an upper house seat in 2013, but lost in this election despite receiving 970,000 votes, a record for the most votes received by an unsuccessful candidate.

Yamamoto poses as a political outsider. However, none of his criticisms of Abe or the LDP go beyond the confines of accepted bourgeois politics. He has called for the abolition of the consumption tax and raising the minimum wage to 1,500 yen ($13.86).

Reiwa Shinsengumi also ran candidates that included members of the LGBT community, single parents, and part-time workers. In a country where the disabled are routinely stigmatized, it became newsworthy that the party’s two successful candidates, Yasuhiko Funago and Eiko Kimura, are both disabled.

This does not alter the bourgeois character of Reiwa Shinsengumi. Yamamoto declared his party will create “a society that doesn't cut anyone off,” but such empty phrases are meant to prevent workers and youth from breaking with the current capitalist system by convincing them it can be reformed.

Furthermore, Yamamoto’s characterization as an “outsider” is entirely for show. He is politically connected to Ichirō Ozawa, currently a member of the DPP and the lower house. Ozawa bolstered Yamamoto’s political credentials when the two formed the People's Life Party and Tarō Yamamoto and Friends in 2014. This became the Liberal Party which was absorbed into the DPP this past April.

Ozawa is the definition of a political insider, winning his late father’s seat in the lower house in 1969. He spent the first part of his political career in the LDP before moving into the opposition circles in the 1990s that comprise the Democrats today. He wields a great deal of influence behind the scenes while also supporting remilitarization and revision of Article 9.

Genuine opposition to remilitarization can only be fought through a clear political program of opposition to war and capitalism. This means above all a complete break with all of these bourgeois parties and a fight for international socialism.

Defective transmissions on Ford vehicles tied to numerous injuries and accidents

Shannon Jones

Ford officials are continuing to stonewall in the wake of revelations of serious transmission problems with the company’s Focus and Fiesta models that can lead to sudden, unexpected acceleration or loss of power.

Numerous injury accidents related to the defect have been reported and more than 4,300 complaints related to the defect have been reported to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA), the US government oversight body.

The defect involves the DPS6 transmission, which Ford introduced in the wake of the Great Recession in an attempt to meet new federal gas economy standards. The transmission works for the driver like an automatic but operates internally more like a manual.

Ford marketed the car as an affordable vehicle that would get good gas mileage using high tech dual clutch technology that improved overall drive-train efficiency.

Soon after the new transmission hit the streets dealers began receiving complaints from customers. The Fiesta was the first model equipped with the DPS6 and it was rolled out in March 2010, followed by the focus in March 2012.

An investigation by the Detroit Free Press uncovered internal company memos showing that engineers were well aware of the problems before the launch of the transmission, but company officials decided to cover up the defect and install the equipment anyway.

Shortly after the story ran, Ford quietly sent a note to dealers instructing them to fix problems with the transmission for free for the next week. There was reportedly a spike in customer visits to Ford dealers following the Free Press report.

In response to the reports, Ford wrote, “After the new transmission was on the road, other problems developed. We acted quickly and determinedly to investigate the problems. ... While we eventually resolved the quality issues, the solutions were more complex and took longer than we expected. We regret the inconvenience and frustration that caused some consumers.”

Despite Ford’s repeated insistence that the transmission defect was not a safety issue, there have been documented serious injury collisions related to the sudden acceleration or loss of engine power caused by the faulty transmission.

The driver of a 2012 Ford Focus told federal safety regulators “I was stopped at a parking lot exit waiting to enter a thoroughfare, engine idling, with my foot lightly on the brake. Suddenly, the car accelerated forward, into the traffic lane, as though someone had pressed the accelerator pedal to the floor. I took a 45 mph T-bone on my driver’s side door. [My] wife suffered severe injuries and was only saved by her air bag.”

The Free Press reported other similar horror stories, including vehicles stalling at high speeds and being rear-ended.

Long before the initial launch Ford engineers knew of issues with the DPS6, but management applied pressure to go ahead anyway.

Following the release of the 2012 Focus, which was 300 pounds heavier than the Fiesta, problems got worse. There was a reported 10-fold increase in complaints to dealers. But Ford remained adamant that there was no need for a fix. One engineer noted in an internal memo the “high cost of substituting a different transmission in low-cost vehicles with a thin profit margin.”

Engineers at all levels knew of the problems but were pressured to keep quiet. “The weight of the company is on your shoulders and it’s incredibly stressful and intense,” said one engineer.

In 2013, a Florida dealer wrote in an email, “I’m tired of looking like the bad guy for repairing all these DPS6 transmissions, when truthfully Ford’s the bad guy here. Let’s be honest. Ford produces a horrible product and we trans guys get the wrath of it.”

As complaints and reports of accidents piled up, the NHTSA finally became involved. However, as in the case of the notorious General Motors ignition switch defect, NHTSA moved to cover up the seriousness of the problem and defend Ford management, not protect the public. After a conference with Ford officials in 2014, NHTSA decided not to order a recall or even launch a formal investigation.

Instead of a fix, Ford proposed installing a warning system that would alert drivers when the car was about to slip into neutral.

Currently there are several class action lawsuits against Ford, including one based in federal court in Los Angeles covering 1.9 million owners and former owners. Ford lost its only trial case to date on the defect, being forced to pay out $700,000.

Currently no deaths are attributed to the faulty transmission, but that is hard to track since police crash investigators would likely not look for the possibility of a transmission failure. However, many serious injury accidents related to the defect have been documented involving thousands of dollars in hospital bills.

An official with the watchdog group Center for Auto Safety told the Free Presshe was concerned by the refusal of NHTSA to investigate. “The law is specific where you don’t need to wait for a body count. It may be we don’t know of further tragedies, not that there haven’t been some.”

Like the GM ignition switch cover-up and the Takata exploding airbag scandal, the latest revelations of faulty transmissions with the Fiesta and Focus underscore the incompatibility of a system based on production for profit with the health and safety of the public.

No credibility should be given to the calls by Democratic Senators Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut and Ed Markey of Massachusetts for a safety investigation. Both Democratic and Republican administrations have collaborated in the transformation of NHTSA into a toothless front for the auto companies. Grossly underfunded, the agency regularly turns a blind eye to even the most egregious safety violations in order to shield corporate malefactors from liability.

That was the case in the GM ignition switch scandal, where only the determined action of accident victims and their families finally led to the forced recall of the dangerous vehicles. In the end, no high-ranking GM officials were held criminally responsible. The company merely faced slap-on-the-wrist fines that amounted to exoneration.

The incessant profit demands of Wall Street are forcing relentless cost cutting by the auto companies at all levels. Over the past year, Ford, GM, VW and other companies have slashed tens of thousands of jobs globally, including engineers and technicians.

The Ford transmission scandal follows the revelations that VW, Fiat Chrysler, Renault, Volvo, Hyundai, Ford, Subaru and other carmakers deliberately manipulated software to cover up violations of emissions and fuel efficiency standards. It also follows the criminal actions by Boeing related to the 737 Max, which led to the deaths of hundreds of people.

Industry analysts have made much of the new technologies, including electrical and self-driving vehicles, that will profoundly change the global auto industry. Under capitalism, however, these technological breakthroughs will not be harnessed for the benefit of society as a whole. The cost of developing these technologies has already led to a wave of global mergers and acquisitions, including the Ford and VW tie-up, mass layoffs and demands that autoworkers in the US and around the world accept more wage and benefit concessions.

As the Ford transmission scandal shows, the relentless drive for profit leads to a reckless disregard of the health and safety of the traveling public, making systematic cover-up a business necessity. This situation can only be resolved through the transformation of the global auto industry into a publicly owned utility under the democratic control of the working class.

Boris Johnson premiership deepens Brexit crisis and heralds bitter class conflict

Robert Stevens

Boris Johnson won the leadership of the ruling Conservative Party Tuesday after decisively defeating Foreign Secretary Jeremy Hunt by a two to one margin. Johnson will take over as prime minister today from Theresa May, after she resigns following her last Prime Minister’s Questions session in parliament.

The pro-Brexit Johnson defeated Jeremy Hunt, a supporter of the Remain campaign in 2016, by 92,153 votes to 46,656. Johnson won 66 percent of the vote of 139,000 Tory members on an 87 percent turnout. Like May, Johnson has not become prime minister based on any popular vote, but via the tiny proportion of the population represented by the aging right-wing Tory membership.

Despite Johnson’s boast in his victory speech that he will “deliver Brexit, unite the country and defeat [Labour leader] Jeremy Corbyn,” his position is precarious.

The Tories are as deeply divided as ever over Brexit. May was forced to resign last month after failing on three occasions to get her deal with the European Union (EU) maintaining tariff-free access to the Single European Market through parliament, in the face of the combined opposition of the pro-Remain opposition parties and her own hard-Brexit faction and the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP). In April, the EU has set a new deadline for a deal to be agreed by October 31—just 100 days from now.

Ahead of the leadership announcement, the Financial Times declared, “If elected Tory leader…Johnson will call for his party to deliver Brexit and to unite behind him, but few peacetime prime ministers have entered Downing Street facing such a daunting set of political challenges.”

Even before Johnson won the election, May’s chancellor, Philip Hammond, a Remain supporter, pledged that he would resign along with May, as he could not support Britain exiting the EU without a deal, which Johnson has threatened to do. Justice Secretary David Gauke stood down, declaring that he could not work with Johnson. Education Minister Anne Milton did the same, expressing “grave concerns about leaving the EU without a deal.” According to the Financial Times , Hammond “will lead a group of about 30 Tory MPs determined to halt a no-deal exit: a sign of the divided party the new premier will inherit.”

Johnson has less room to manoeuvre than even May. He takes over a party with a wafer-thin parliamentary majority, reliant on the votes of the 10 DUP MPs. The Tories’ working majority now stands at just three seats and could be reduced if they lose a by-election set for August 1. Johnson could therefore be forced to call a snap election in a matter of weeks.

His threats to exit the EU without a deal are opposed by the dominant sections of big business, who were more clearly represented by Hunt. They will not forget Johnson’s response when the issue of continued access to the EU’s markets was raised at a diplomatic gathering in 2018, “Fuck business.”

Moreover, despite efforts to portray Johnson has a popular figure, he and his political agenda are widely despised outside of the rarefied ranks of the Tory party—especially by the working class.

Media commentators have noted that at least half the population is opposed to Brexit and even among supporters there is concern at the potentially devastating social and economic consequences of a no-deal exit.

Johnson has cemented close ties with US President Trump and his inner circle, including his former adviser, the fascistic Steve Bannon, on the basis that Brexit will weaken the EU as a trade and military rival to the US. Trump tweeted his approval immediately after Johnson’s victory, declaring, “He will be great!”

But this alliance will only stiffen the resolve of the EU in rejecting any further concessions to the UK. In response to the bravado of Johnson and his supporters in the European Research Group led by Jacob Rees-Mogg, the EU refused to budge on its insistence that the deal agreed with Theresa May is the only one on the table.

In addition, even the Scottish Tories have expressed concern that Johnson’s hard-Brexit stance will strengthen the Scottish National Party and demands for independence, given the overwhelming support for remaining in the EU north of the border.

Most importantly, Johnson’s political agenda is for Brexit to provide the basis for a further massive austerity assault on wages, essential services and labour protections to transform the UK into “Singapore by the Sea.” Among the measures he has suggested is the creation of six free ports where businesses will pay little or no tax and raising the 40 percent income tax threshold from £50,000 to £80,000 to benefit the top 12 percent of earners. But far more serious attacks must come.

The media faithfully accepts Johnson’s carefully cultivated persona of a bumbling gaffe-prone figure, which serves to conceal his vicious anti-working-class agenda. This is a man who was taped agreeing to supply a friend threatening to beat up a journalist with the intended victim’s address, who described black people as “piccaninnies,” and approved a Spectator editorial accusing “drunken” and “mindless” Liverpool fans of responsibility for the deaths of 96 people at Hillsborough Football Stadium in 1989.

As mayor of London, he was asked by firefighters, “Will you accept responsibility in a criminal court when people die as a result of your cuts?” He replied, “Get stuffed!” The following year, 10 fire stations were closed in the capital and nearly 600 firefighters’ jobs lost. These cuts contributed to the 72 lives lost in the Grenfell Tower inferno—blood on Johnson’s hands.

Political responsibility for such an individual being able to assume leadership of a despised Tory government—as the third UK prime minister since 2016—must be laid at Jeremy Corbyn’s door.

Corbyn has spent almost four years as Labour leader suppressing the demands of his own supporters for the right-wing to be driven out of the party and for him to take the fight to the Tories. There has been one retreat by Corbyn after another—accepting Trident, NATO membership, allowing a free vote on war in Syria, opposing mandatory reselection of MPs and now accepting the right-wing’s slander that the “left” is anti-Semitic and promising to speed up expulsions.

His desire to maintain party unity and convince big business that he could be trusted as prime minister saw his sitting down to Brexit talks with May and abandoning demands for a general election. Even now, after Johnson’s election, Corbyn responded to a question from the BBC asking whether Labour will table a vote of no confidence in the new prime minister with the evasive response, “We’ll decide when that will be—it’ll be an interesting surprise for all you.”

The net result of Corbyn’s political leadership has been to exclude the working class from intervening in its own interests in the worst crisis the bourgeoisie has faced since the Second World War. But this must and will change. The lurch to the right that characterises both pro- and anti-Brexit factions within the ruling class can only be fought through the building of a new and genuinely socialist and internationalist leadership, the Socialist Equality Party. Against all attempts to divide the working class over Brexit, a unified struggle for socialism must be waged in alliance with workers throughout Europe and internationally.

Australian cancer victim sues Bayer-Monsanto

Frank Gaglioti 

On June 4, in the first such case in Australia, the Melbourne lawn mowing service operator Michael Ogalirolo launched legal action in the Supreme Court against the global chemical giant Bayer, the current owner of Monsanto, which manufactures the herbicide Roundup.

The case follows similar recent cases in the US that have heightened concerns internationally over the use of the herbicide. Bayer, the German pharmaceutical company, bought out Monsanto, the original producer of Roundup, in 2018. The US agrichemical company had been founded in 1901.

Ogalirolo has developed the potentially lethal cancer, non-Hodgkin lymphoma (NHL), which he claims is due to 18 years of exposure to glyphosate, the active component of Roundup.

His writ declares: “The defendant [Bayer] knew or ought to have known that the use of Roundup products were dangerous for the plaintiff… in particular causing DNA and chromosomal damage in human cells, cancer, kidney disease, infertility and nerve damage among other devastating illnesses.

“As such, Roundup products are dangerous to human health and unfit to be marketed and sold in commerce, particularly without proper warnings and directions.”

Ogalirolo’s case follows three successful legal actions against Bayer in the US. School groundskeeper Dewayne Johnson sued Bayer after contracting an extremely aggressive and lethal form of NHL and was awarded $US289 million in August 2018.

In a statement to jurors, a lawyer for Johnson, Brent Wisner, condemned Monsanto for putting profits first. He said that he had seen internal Monsanto company documents “proving that Monsanto has known for decades that glyphosate and specifically Roundup could cause cancer.”

In a second case in March, the US District Court in California found that Roundup caused Edwin Hardeman to develop NHL after using Roundup for 30 years on his property. Farmers Alberta and Alva Pilliod were awarded $2 billion in May, the biggest settlement so far, after developing NHL.

Alva Pilliod told the media after her court hearing: “We wish that Monsanto had warned us ahead of time about the dangers of using Monsanto [weedkiller]… And that there was something on the front of their label that said ‘danger may cause cancer.’”

Currently, there are 13,400 claims pending in US courts and a number of other Australian cancer victims considering taking action against Bayer.

As a result of the law suits and significant scientific studies, action is being discussed in a number of countries. Vietnam and France banned glyphosate products in April and July respectively, and other European administrations are considering bans.

In Australia, municipal councils are reconsidering the use of Roundup.

On July 4, 500 outdoor workers from Blacktown council in suburban Sydney walked out over safety concerns over the use of Roundup. The strike took place after six workers were told that they would be placed on other duties if they refused to use the herbicide.

The workers returned to work after an Industrial Relations Commission hearing ruled that the council should trial an alternative weed control process. One crew would trial the alternative but the majority of workers would still have to use Roundup.

In June, residents reacted angrily to the Illawarra council’s annual aerial spraying of Roundup to control weeds on the local escarpment, south of Sydney. Petitions opposing the spraying were signed by thousands of residents.

One petition signed by 2,500 people stated: “Roundup is extremely dangerous as proven in court now multiple times… The health implications for residents, their pets, and small children is simply unacceptable.”

The Illawarra District Weeds Authority officer David Pomery rebuffed residents’ concerns, stating Roundup was the “only practical and feasible method to control.”

The chemical giant Monsanto introduced Roundup in 1974. According to figures published in 2016, Roundup is the most heavily applied weed killer in the history of chemical agriculture internationally. There are 500 glyphosate products available to farmers and gardeners in Australia.

The huge expansion in the use of glyphosate products occurred after 1996 when Monsanto developed genetically modified seeds, including corn, wheat, soy, canola and cotton that are immune to the effects of the herbicide. This enables farmers to spray plants throughout their lifecycle, suppressing weeds but leaving the crop unharmed. Roundup-resistant seeds are marketed as Roundup Ready. This effectively ties the farmer to the continued use of Monsanto products, including having to rebuy seed every year.

According to a scientific paper, Trends in glyphosate herbicide use in the United States and globally, published in 2016, the introduction of Roundup Ready seeds enabled a 15-fold increase in the agricultural use of Roundup and allowed Monsanto to dominate the world herbicide market.

Glyphosate is also used for pre-harvest crop desiccation: That is the application of a herbicide near the end of the growing season to cause crops to dry and die uniformly, making them easier to harvest, and increasing the risk of chemical contamination of food products.

Bayer and Monsanto have conducted relentless campaigns against critics of the herbicide and Bayer continues to aggressively promote Roundup as a safe product.

Bayer has not responded to the Australian writ, but in the US it has indicated it will challenge the court victories of the successful litigants.

“We continue to believe firmly that the science confirms that glyphosate-based herbicides do not cause cancer,” Bayer stated in March in response to the Hardeman case.

A number of scientific reports have questioned Roundup’s safety record. In 2015, the World Health Organisation’s International Agency for Research on Cancer classified the herbicide as “probably carcinogenic to humans,” based on a review of existing research.

A study published in February concluded that exposure to Roundup increased the probability of developing NHL by 41 percent. One of the co-authors, Lianne Sheppard, professor in the Environmental and Occupational Health Sciences at the University of Washington, told the Guardian that “from a population health point of view there are some real concerns.”

An Australian Broadcasting Corporation program, “The Monsanto Papers,” broadcast in October 2018, published an internal email from Monsanto’s chief toxicologist that contradicted the company’s promotion of the herbicide’s safety record. “[Y]ou cannot say that Roundup is not a carcinogen… we have not done the necessary testing on the formulation to make that statement,” the scientist stated.

Thus, there is mounting evidence that the continued promotion and sale of Roundup is another glaring example of the pursuit of corporate profit with scant concern for the potential consequences for health and the environment.

Indonesian court backs Widodo’s election

John Roberts

Indonesia’s Constitutional Court upheld the re-election of President Joko Widodo for a second five-year term on June 27, rejecting a petition by his challenger, Subianto Prabowo, to have the April 17 election overturned on the basis of electoral fraud.

The unanimous decision confirmed that Widodo and his vice-presidential running mate, the conservative Muslim cleric Ma’ruf Amin, secured 85.6 million votes, outpolling Prabowo, and his running mate, Jakarta deputy governor Sandiaga Uno, at 68.7 million. The ruling also gave Widodo’s five-party coalition a majority of more than 100 over Prabowo’s four-party group in the 560-member lower house of the national parliament, the DPR.

Widodo’s second term administration will be installed in October. In the meantime, following the court’s ruling, Widodo and Prabowo, directly or through their representatives, have begun to work out what are essentially power-sharing arrangements.

The mass of the 263 million population, many of whom live in abject poverty, will not be involved, nor are their interests being discussed. The election itself was a thoroughly anti-democratic process, with many parties barred from participating.

Both men, and the political parties gathered around them, are based on different factions of the ruling elite. Widodo’s coalition, and the party that leads it, former President Megawati Sukarnoputri’s Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P), represent sections eager to attract foreign investors to finance infrastructure projects. A key partner in this coalition is Golkar, the political instrument of the US-backed military dictatorship of General Suharto installed in the bloody coup of 1965–66.

Widodo said investment was necessary for job creation, but the main beneficiaries will be the wealthy. The richest 1 percent of the population owns 50 percent of national wealth; the richest 10 percent owns 77 percent. This wealth concentration has steadily increased since the collapse of the Suharto regime in 1998.

In his first policy speech since the election, on July 14, Widodo said he would invite “as much investment as possible” and that “anything that obstructs investment must be trimmed.”

The international financial press welcomed Widodo’s victory and listed the measures needed to remove these “obstructions.” These included removing regulatory burdens, offering labour laws attractive to foreign investors, and further cutting price subsidies on fuel and electricity, which will affect the living standards of millions of the poorest people. Widodo was also urged to reconsider local content requirements, reducing investment restrictions and limiting the role of state-owned enterprises.

Like leaders throughout the Asia-Pacific region, Widodo has tried to balance between the US and China, which is now a leading investor in Indonesia. Prabowo accused Widodo of being too soft on China and declared he would review all Chinese-funded projects if he won the presidency. While Prabowo attracted no support from Washington, his anti-China stance is in tune with the Trump administration’s aggressive policies.

Prabowo, a notorious Suharto-era general, and a former son-in-law of Suharto, also stood against Widodo in the 2014 presidential election and challenged that result as well. His faction represents less competitive layers of the ruling elite. It favours protectionist measures to ensure its economic interests are not side-lined in the dealings with foreign investors.

Prabowo and his Gerindra party attacked Widodo’s reliance on Chinese capital. He posed as the defender of workers and farmers by claiming Beijing was sending too many Chinese workers into the country to work on infrastructure projects, and that Chinese involvement was undermining Indonesia’s sovereignty over its energy and food sector.

The Prabowo faction relied on the same forces it used to remove Widodo’s protégé Basuki Tjahaja Purnama as governor of Jakarta in 2016–2017. They mobilised an anti-Chinese chauvinist campaign led by Islamist hard liners who painted Widodo as a Beijing stooge.

There were two days of protests and rioting by these Prabowo supporters in Jakarta on May 21–22, disputing the legitimacy of the election commission’s poll declaration. Clashes with police left at least eight dead, 600 injured and hundreds arrested.

Concerns on both sides that the unrest could trigger wider discontent over poverty and inequality led to sordid deal making behind the backs of the masses, including Prabowo’s protesting supporters. According to Asia Sentinel, with Widodo’s permission his current vice president Jusuf Kalla, a member of Golkar, met with Prabowo the day after the Jakarta riots.

Tempo magazine reported National Intelligence Agency (BIN) chief Budi Gunawan, a man close both to Widodo and Megawati, then met with Prabowo in Bali on June 24. The involvement of Budi and BIN is significant. It underscores the reality that the military-intelligence apparatus, the ruthless instrument of the Suharto dictatorship, is still politically powerful and will again be well represented in Widodo’s new cabinet.

On July 13, Prabowo and Widodo met in public, joined by Budi, Prabowo’s Gerindra party general secretary Ahmad Muzani and Widodo’s presidential campaign chief Erick Thohir. In his July 14 speech, Widodo hinted that a power-sharing deal could be worked even if Prabowo’s faction remained in “opposition,” saying “acting as opposition is also a very noble thing.”

On July 20, the Prabowo faction let it be known that its price for formally joining the Widodo government would be eight positions in the 35-member cabinet, including control of the energy and food portfolios. However, Prabowo and his allies have said they would not make a final decision until September. Entry into the government would mean they could no longer pose as an “opposition” to head off social and political disaffection.

Whatever the final outcome of the horse-trading, two factors are pushing both factions to reach an accommodation.

One is the growing economic malaise. The effects of the trade war between Indonesia’s two largest trading partners, China and the United States, are being felt throughout the region. Singapore, the largest source of investment in Indonesia, suffered an economic decline of 3.4 percent in the second quarter of 2019. Between January and June, Indonesia’s exports fell 8.75 percent year-on-year and imports were down 7.63 percent.

The second related factor is the explosive social situation. Official figures show 26 million Indonesians are living in poverty. But the poverty line, outside of Jakarta, is just 401,220 rupiah ($US27.76) per month. One study showed that the real cost of living, for one person in a single room and minimal electricity, food and transport, on the outskirts of Jakarta, would be 790,000 rupiah.

The fear in ruling circles is that infighting in the political establishment could open the door for a mass movement of working people that rapidly spirals out of control, threatening the country’s fragile bourgeois rule.

German automaker Opel to cut a further 1,100 jobs

Marianne Arens

According to the tactic of divide and conquer, German automaker Opel and the works council are imposing round after round of attacks on autoworkers. Shortly before the plants closed for the summer holiday, news emerged that 1,100 jobs will be cut in Rüsselsheim, Eisenach and Kaiserslautern.

Job cuts have already been underway at the company’s International Centre for Research and Development (ITEZ) for a year. Up to 700 engineers and technicians are to transfer to the French services company Segula, while a further 2,000 will lose their jobs. It remains entirely unclear what the approximately 6,000 workers will confront when they return from holiday in August.

Last year, Opel cut 3,700 jobs across its locations. An additional 600 jobs will now be added to this in Rüsselsheim, coinciding with the 120th anniversary of the Rüsselsheim plant. At the same time, 200 jobs will go at the Eisenach facility in the state of Thuringia, while up to 300 jobs could be lost in the parts plant in Kaiserslautern.

Overall, this means that since being taken over by PSA, one in three out of Opel’s 19,000 workforce has lost their job. Out of a total global workforce of 38,000, over 8,000 jobs had been cut by the end of last year.

The job cuts are part of the “Pace!” restructuring programme. Two years ago, the French automaker PSA (Peugeot, Citroen, DS) purchased Opel and Vauxhall from GM, and the works council and IG Metall trade union voted in favour of “Pace!” They also praised PSA head Tavarez to the skies.

The World Socialist Web Site warned at the time, “There is much to suggest that the sale will be the prelude to a comprehensive restructuring programme. Opel currently employs some 38,200 in Europe, more than half of whom work in Germany. The PSA takeover could result in more than 6,000 people losing their jobs.” This has been fully confirmed.

Although these plans were fully worked out from the beginning, they have only gradually come to light. This is exactly what auto industry expert Ferdinand Dudenhöffer said on ZDF in July 2018, when he noted that the board and the union “intentionally didn’t announce everything at once,” because otherwise “they feared triggering a revolution or strike.”

IG Metall and the works council have played a central role for years in imposing job cuts as seamlessly as possible. Immediately after the PSA takeover, IG Metall and works council officials travelled to Paris to offer PSA chief executive Carlos Tavarez their “loyal collaboration.”

On February 21, 2017, the IG Metall website published a “joint statement from the central works council, IG Metall, and the European Opel/Vauxhall Central Works Council” in which the union praised the “confidential and honest talks.” With “confidential” they meant to say—behind the backs of the workforce.

Since then, the works council and IG Metall have supported the elimination of thousands of jobs, the laying off of thousands of contract workers, and the imposition of work rules and wage concessions at every plant. Prior to that, they were jointly involved in imposing the closure of Opel plants in Antwerp and Bochum.

In January, there was a change in the position of human resources head at Opel, with Ralph Wangemann, who has worked in management for 20 years, becoming director of human resources and labour. He is tasked with leading the entire human resources department for Opel and Vauxhall. His job is to collaborate with the works council to accelerate the restructuring measures and job cuts.

Several weeks later, the central works council also announced a change in leadership. Wolfgang Schäfer-klug, who led the central works council for seven years, resigned and handed the post to his deputy, Uwe Baum. It remains unclear whether Schäfer-klug will be rewarded with a high paying management job, like many other union bureaucrats.

Schäfer-klug said he would focus on leading the works council in Rüsselsheim and the European works council. This can only be taken to mean that further deep cuts are planned at the company’s facilities. Baum, the new central works council leader, is known as a hard-liner who suppresses all critical opposition.

The IG Metall and works council’s ruthless manoeuvres have been known for a long time. As appendages of the company boards, they are chiefly concerned with increasing productivity and profits. They subordinate the interests of the workers and the entire workforce to the profit interests of the company. Their goal is to support company management and shareholders in their global struggle with competitors.

The entire auto industry is being restructured due to factors such as the trade war with the United States, Brexit, and the weak Turkish lira (pushing down profits from exports). In addition, there is the expensive transition to electric vehicles and digital technology. The company knows no other way to protect their profits apart from imposing concessions on the backs of workers.

Two years ago, PSA CEO Carlos Tavares declared, “The only thing that protects workers’ jobs is profit.” However, according to company finances from July 2019, PSA’s losses continue to mount. In the first six months of 2019, PSA’s four brands sold a combined 1.9 million vehicles, 12.8 percent less than the same period in 2018. The latest round of job cuts was announced at about the same time.

The media never tires of noting that the cuts will be implemented through “voluntary” measures. There will be no compulsory redundancies, so the story goes, only part-time work for elderly workers, early retirement programmes and buyouts. This is utter nonsense, since it does not apply to contract workers, who can be laid off overnight. Secondly, the jobs eliminated through “social contracts” are lost forever. This, above all, destroys the future prospects for the younger generation. Only a handful of trainees are hired permanently.

Thirdly, the early retirement measures merely mean that elderly, better paid workers are forced out of the plants, to be replaced by younger workers able to work harder for less. In Kaiserslautern, the early retirement programme is currently being expanded to workers aged 58.

Measures are also being enforced at the ITEZ research centre in Rüsselsheim. At least 1,340 workers have accepted their departure from the centre, either through buyouts, early retirement or part-time work. Only 140 have volunteered to be transferred to Segula. After the holiday, a further 500 workers are expected to be forced out. If they refuse to work for Segula, Opel management has threatened that their jobs will be lost for good and they will have no right to a buyout.

As the WSWS has been arguing for some time, jobs, wages and working conditions can only be defended if the workers break free from the control of the union bureaucracy. They must build action committees entirely independently of IG Metall and coordinate their struggle internationally.

The problems confronted by Opel workers are the same as those faced by workers at VW, Ford and the other automakers and parts suppliers. They can only be resolved if workers take up the struggle for socialism, i.e., for a rationally planned economy under workers’ control directed towards meeting the needs of the entire population—workers as well as car owners—not the profit demands of shareholders.

US coal giant Blackjewel, LLC and affiliates declare bankruptcy

Zachary Thorton

The recent bankruptcy declaration of coal giant Blackjewel, LLC and its affiliates, which has left some 1,800 workers unemployed and owed unpaid back wages, is a case study in gross incompetence and criminality.

The company made an emergency Chapter 11 filing in the Southern District of West Virginia on July 1. Included in the filing are Blackjewel’s offshoots, Blackjewel Holdings, LLC, Revelation Energy, LLC, Revelation Energy Holdings, LLC, and Revelation Management Corp. Workers were not aware of the move until they reported for their shifts, after which they were escorted off the premises and given no indication of when or if they would be allowed to return to work.

Blackjewel, which is headquartered in Milton, West Virginia, also operates mines in Virginia, Kentucky, and, as of 2017, Wyoming, when it took over two sizable mines in that state. The Wyoming mines are located in the largest coal-mining region in the country, the Powder River Basin (PRB). This makes Blackjewel the latest PRB operator to file for bankruptcy following Cloud Peak Energy in May of this year.

The declining demand for coal due, due to the slowdown of the world economy and escalating trade tensions, coupled with the unresolved effects of the 2008 financial crisis and the sharp decline in the price of natural gas, has driven numerous coal companies, such as Peabody Energy, Arch Coal and Alpha Resources, into insolvency. However, in virtually every instance these companies were prepared months in advance to file for Chapter 11, thus allowing them to continue their operations. Blackjewel represents an exceptional case, in which the company apparently disregarded numerous indicators that it was approaching ruin up until the very last minute, when it could no longer continue operations.

In a court hearing, Blackjewel’s counsel, Stephen Lerner of Squire Patton Boggs, suggested that all was well with the company until one creditor, Riverstone Credit Partners, withdrew its financing, telling a judge, “That happened Wednesday. Prior to Wednesday there was no issue. Zero issue.”

That assertion is directly contradicted by Blackjewel and Revelation founder and CEO Jeff Hoops, who stated in his testimony, “Myself and our CFO, Drew Kesler, we maintain a very detailed cash flow model of the company, week to week. And we review cash needs and cash requirements each week.” If such an accounting was indeed taking place, then there is little doubt that Blackjewel was well aware of what was on the horizon.

Upon examination, it is a wonder that Blackjewel was able to last as long as it did. Before Blackjewel was formed in 2017, its affiliate, Revelation Energy, was struggling with cash flow since at least 2013. Blackjewel inherited this problem as well. Meanwhile, the companies were accumulating vast sums of debt. Clark Williams-Derry, director of energy finance for the Sightline Institute, draws this conclusion:

“The fact that Hoops’s companies have been short on cash, even as they racked up hundreds of millions of dollars in unpaid bills, leaves only two options: business failure or fraud. Either Hoops’s coal mining empire was spending more than it was taking in, or someone was siphoning money out of the company. Or perhaps both.”

A lawyer for one lender contended that Hoops had engaged in what is known as “check kiting,” a type of check fraud that Wikipedia defines as “intentionally writing a check for a value greater than the account balance from an account in one bank, then writing a check from another account in another bank, also with non-sufficient funds, with the second check serving to cover the non-existent funds from the first account.” Evidence before the court showed that Hoops would often transfer funds into and out of Blackjewel, with many of these transfers done on the same day.

In its petition for bankruptcy, Blackjewel lists 30 creditors to which it owes a combined total of approximately $288 million. Topping the list is the US Department of Interior, with a claim of over $60 million, followed by Wyoming’s Campbell County Treasurer, with over $37 million owed. In 2018, Revelation Energy was ordered to pay $7.3 million in damages to Fifth Third Bank for violating an agreement in which Revelation was not allowed to transfer assets—in this case, the transfer of the Wyoming mines to Blackjewel—while it was in default on loan obligations to Fifth Third.

In addition to racking up huge debts, the company piled up numerous environmental and safety violations. On January 16, Blackjewel’s acquisition of its Wyoming assets were temporarily halted due to Revelation Energy’s 42 outstanding violations, some of which were so severe that regulators threatened to shut down the offending mines.

Blackjewel was prepared to file for Chapter 7—that is, liquidation—if not for an emergency $5 million loan approved by the court on July 3. The loan agreement was contingent on the resignation of Hoops and all of his family members.

The bankruptcy has completely devastated Blackjewel’s 1,800 workers, their families, and their communities. Workers had already had their wages, benefits, and working conditions eroded by decades of forced concessions imposed by the trade unions and their corporate masters.

Blackjewel owes about $6 million in unpaid wages to its employees. Paychecks that workers received on June 28 were withdrawn from their accounts by banks on July 1, leaving many with debilitating overdraft fees. Some workers were issued cashier checks but were unable to access them due to bank holds. Meanwhile, despite driving his companies into the ground, now former-CEO Jeff Hoops will have no trouble putting food on his plate. Indeed, Hoops will continue to develop a $30 million resort in West Virginia called The Grand Patrician, complete with a 500-person convention center, a nine-hole golf course, and a 3,500-seat replica of the Roman Coliseum.

As of this writing, there has been no indication as to when workers may return to their jobs.

Iran accuses 17 of spying for CIA as tensions escalate

Steve James & Robert Stevens 

Amidst rapidly spiraling tensions, the Iranian government announced Monday that it had arrested 17 Iranian nationals working in military and nuclear installations whom it accused of being US intelligence agents.

According to the Iranian Students News Agency, the intelligence ministry’s counter-espionage department said some of the alleged agents had already been sentenced to death, while others were said to be assisting Iranian efforts to garner information on US activities. Iran says those alleged to have been CIA spies were employed in “sensitive centres” in military and nuclear facilities and arrested over a 12-month period up until March this year.

Tehran claimed the individuals had received “sophisticated training” and been promised US visas or jobs in the US.

US President Donald Trump rejected the Iranian claims as “totally false” while Secretary of State and former CIA Director Mike Pompeo said that “the Iranian regime has a long history of lying.” He admitted however that there was “a long list of Americans that we are working to get home from the Islamic Republic of Iran.”

The arrests come after weeks of escalating tensions. In late June, the Trump administration was 10 minutes away from a potentially catastrophic military attack on Iran that would trigger all-out regional conflict and threaten to draw in the world’s major powers on opposing sides.

In the intervening weeks, the US administration has worked to ramp up more sustained pressure on Iran. Over the weekend, Iran’s seizure of the British flagged oil tanker Stena Impero as it transited the Strait of Hormuz was made the pretext for new naval and air provocations.

The Stena Impero was seized in retaliation for the July 4 boarding of the Iranian flagged supertanker Grace 1 by British Royal Marines off Gibraltar in an unprovoked act of piracy.

Marking a new and dangerous phase in the US campaign of unrestrained gangsterism against Iran, bringing the region to the brink of war, the crisis over the Stena Impero is inflaming already deep divisions within British ruling circles.

The Conservative government upholds the 2015 Iran nuclear accord, which the US government has abrogated. Like the EU, British companies hold substantial interests in Iran. But British imperialism has for decades relied on US influence and military backing in order to punch above its weight.

Following a meeting yesterday morning of the government’s Cobra emergency committee chaired by outgoing prime minster Theresa May, Foreign Minister Jeremy Hunt issued a statement in the House of Commons.

Hunt described Iran’s action as “an act of state piracy” and a “flagrant breech of the principle of free navigation on which the world economy depends.”

He said he had spoken to the foreign ministers of the US, Oman, France, Germany, Italy, Spain, Finland and Denmark and would now “seek to put together a European led maritime protection mission to support safe passage of both crew and cargo in this vital region.”

Hunt described this EU dominated force as a complement to US proposals in the region, but made clear, “it will not be part of the US maximum pressure policy on Iran because we remain committed to preserving the Iran nuclear agreement.”

Hunt’s position was immediately endorsed by Labour’s shadow defence minister Fabian Hamilton who intoned, “Iran’s actions in recent weeks in the Strait of Hormuz have been utterly unacceptable and should be condemned from all sides.”

However, military conflict with Iran had to be avoided he said, voicing the concerns of substantial sections of the British state over the recklessness of US actions in the Gulf. “Escalation has been inevitable since the United States walked away from the Iran nuclear deal and re-imposed sanctions... on any country or company that continues to deal with Iran.”

Hamilton asked whether the UK’s seizure of the Iran tanker Grace 1 off Gibraltar on July 4 was carried out at the request of the United States. “We know from the Spanish newspaper El País that the US told the Madrid Government 48 hours in advance that Grace 1 was headed for the Iberian peninsula, which could also explain why, 36 hours in advance, the Gibraltar Government introduced new legislation to shore up the legal basis for the seizure taking place in their waters.”

Hunt refused to give a categorical answer to Hamilton’s question.

Hamilton asked Hunt how the government intended to “get the nuclear deal back on track” and “persuade the Trump administration to drop its sanctions against Iran” before “we reach the point of no return.”

Putting the issue more bluntly, Labour’s shadow justice secretary Richard Burgon tweeted over the weekend, "A war on Iran could be even more damaging and destabilising than the war on Iraq. We need to avoid being the sidekicks of Donald Trump and [US National Security Adviser and anti-Iranian hawk] John Bolton and instead pursue the path of diplomacy."

Former Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson, Hunt’s contender for the Tory leadership who is set to become party leader and prime minister, has cemented close ties with Trump since the 2016 referendum vote to leave the European Union.

While a section of Johnson’s supporters have demanded he takes a firmer stance against Iran than has been advocated by May, Johnson has so far ruled out backing any US military strikes against Tehran.

However, Johnson supporter, Brexiteer and former Tory leader Iain Duncan Smith accused the May government over the weekend of being unprepared to follow through on the Grace 1 capture. “I understand... from reasonable sources that Washington had offered the UK Government—even in the event that they haven’t quite agreed an allied position to this—to use US assets to support British shipping and they were not taken up at the point.”

On Monday, Pompeo was asked about Iran’s capture of the Stena Impero and replied, “The responsibility in the first instance falls to the United Kingdom to take care of their ships.” He added, “The United States has a responsibility to do our part but the world’s got a big role in this too, to keep these sea lanes open.”

Pompeo didn’t miss an opportunity to continue threatening Iran, declaring it a “bad regime” which has “conducted what amounts to national piracy, a nation state taking over a ship that’s traveling in international waters… We don’t want war with Iran. We want them to behave like a normal nation. I think they understand that and I think the whole world is waking up to the fact that this threat is real.”

None of this rules out that events could escalate into warfare, with a number of influential political and military figures noting over the weekend—as did Britain’s Admiral Lord West—that “despite what some people think, should a war start there is no way the UK could avoid being fully involved on the US side.”

Mass protests shake Puerto Rican and US political establishment

Jerry White

In what has been described as the largest demonstration in the history of Puerto Rico, hundreds of thousands of people in the US island territory marched Monday to demand the resignation of Governor Ricardo Rosselló.

The daily newspaper El Nuevo Día estimated that a half-million demonstrators participated in the “March of the People,” which paralyzed the capital of San Juan, shutting businesses and halting traffic. The demonstration included a huge procession down the island’s busiest highway, the Expreso Las Américas.

Hundreds of thousands march to demand the resignation of Rosselló

The mass mobilization marked the twelfth consecutive day of demonstrations, which have included clashes with riot police dispatched by Rosselló. Calls are mounting for an island-wide general strike amid solidarity protests in several cities on the US mainland with large Puerto Rican populations. Marchers in San Juan and at mainland protests chanted, “Ricky, ¡renuncia, el pueblo te repudia!” (“Ricky, resign, the people reject you.”)

Truck drivers parked their vehicles to help protesters occupy the main highway. A group of medical students told local media they were protesting because people are unable to get basic medical services at hospitals because the “government is so corrupt” and the funds needed to meet the needs of the people “go straight into politicians’ pockets.”

The governor’s effort to diffuse opposition by announcing he would not seek reelection next year and was handing over leadership of his New Progressive Party (PNP) only fueled popular anger. In a Facebook live broadcast Sunday, Rosselló reiterated that he would not resign and was “looking forward to turning over power to the person elected democratically.”

Rosselló, however, is politically isolated. Major news outlets including El Nuevo Día, the youth movement of his own party and other political officials are calling for his resignation.

Protesters demand the resignation of Governor “Ricky” Rosselló

Pressed by a Fox News reporter Monday to point to one political figure who supported him, Rosselló cited Javier Jiménez, the mayor of San Sebastian. A few hours later, Jiménez said, “It’s not true that I support the governor.”

The protests have escalated since Puerto Rico’s Center for Investigation released nearly 900 pages of private chat messages between the governor and top officials in his administration. The chats exposed the political establishment’s contempt towards the island’s 3.2 million inhabitants.

In one exchange, the governor’s chief financial executive, Sobrino Vega, joked with Rosselló about the growing number of dead bodies piling up in the morgue after Hurricane Maria in 2017, with Vega quipping, “Don't we have some cadavers to feed our crows?”

The release of the messages was only the catalyst for the social explosion, which was fueled by decades of factory closures and layoffs, compounded by austerity measures imposed by the Financial Oversight Board set up by President Obama and the devastation wrought by Hurricane Maria. An estimated 5,000 people perished in the hurricane and flooding that followed, largely as a result of the criminally negligent response by the Trump administration and local officials.

A section of the San Juan protest

The messages were leaked the same week that the FBI arrested two former officials in the Rosselló administration—Education Secretary Julia Keleher and Angela Avila Marrero, the executive director of the health insurance administration. The two were indicted on federal corruption charges.

Keleher, a close political ally of Trump’s education secretary Betsy DeVos, sparked teacher strikes and mass protests after she seized on the hurricane to shut 283 public schools and lay off 5,000 educators.

Juan, a 58-year-old informal sector worker, told the WSWS: “This is a historic moment in Puerto Rican history that we have dreamed of for many years. This protest is not just about the chats in which the governor insulted the people of this country. These protests have been building up for the past 15 years.

“They are driven by the economic problems, job insecurity, attacks on labor rights, the high cost of living, and the imposition of Wall Street and the economic junta. This reminds me of the US invasion of Puerto Rico in 1898. All of these protests are due to the emotional exhaustion of the country.”

Juan continued, “It is significant that there are young people as well as elderly people in these protests to defend their pensions. The youth are fighting for public education, which is being dismantled for private companies. I do not want this to end just with the resignation of the governor, but with a whole restructuring of political life in this country.

“I think the same process is taking place throughout Latin America and in Europe. It is a struggle on the one hand of the international interests of workers, to protect public education and pensions, and on the other of private capital. This is not a national problem—it has international consequences.”

“The content of the governor’s chats was obviously horrible,” Mario, a student at the University of Puerto Rico in Piedras Negras, told the WSWS. “But the PNP has moved further to the right, not only in economic terms but also social. Social security, teachers’ pensions and the services that the government should provide have all been cut.

“These austerity measures have created a divided society, where the poor and the workers on one side and the most fortunate on the other live in two different worlds but coexist in the same geographic areas.

“The education system is segregated by class. Public schools are badly run with a tiny budget and people cannot pay for private schools. Keleher justified her cuts by saying there was no money, and now she’s been arrested for stealing $15 million. The ruling class and the fiscal junta are punishing the working class unjustly, and this act of terrorism is driving people into the streets.”

Protesters in San Juan occupy a highway overpass

The WSWS also spoke to Anthony, a student whose grandfather needlessly died after the hurricane because he could not get his regular dialysis treatment due to lack of electricity.

“This is yet another chapter in the story of the government looting public funds, but this time the people are not willing to take any more of this nonsense. Everybody is clear that the group chat is not the problem but was only the mechanism by which the problem got exposed.

“The protests are about corruption, the dismantling of public education, the millions of dollars in donations that were never provided for the victims of the hurricane. No one is satisfied by the governor’s decision not to run nor be the president of the party. Each and every person involved in the scheme must be brought to justice.”

Politicians on the island have tried to adapt to popular sentiment, with San Juan Mayor Carmen Yulín Cruz of the Popular Democratic Party (PDP) calling for Rossello’s impeachment, but not his immediate resignation. President Trump has sought to distance himself from Rosselló, while several Democratic presidential candidates, including Bernie Sanders, Elizabeth Warren and Tulsi Gabbard, have issued empty statements about “standing with the people of Puerto Rico.”

The Democrats are just as responsible for the horrific conditions on the island as the Republicans. The Obama administration imposed a financial dictatorship on behalf of Wall Street and wealthy bondholders, using the same bankruptcy judges and asset strippers as were employed in the bankruptcy of Detroit. The financial restructuring of Puerto Rico is, in turn, the preparation for new attacks on the pensions of public sector workers on the mainland.

Protesters shut down a major highway

The outpouring of hundreds of thousands of people demanding the resignation of Rosselló is sending paroxysms of fear through the entire US political establishment. The Trump administration is also isolated. It is seeking to use fascistic attacks on socialism, along with xenophobia and racism, to counter the growing radicalization of workers and young people on the US.

On the Twitter account of Congresswoman Alexandra Ocasio-Cortez, several people tweeted that the American people should launch similar mass struggles to demand the resignation of Trump.

“If Puerto Ricans can do this, why can't we? When is enough, enough?” one post said.

“Why can’t we do this here. Demand for removal of the current crap ass President. It clearly works. Majority wins. We need to walk the street demanding justice. This should be happening in every American city,” another said.

But this the last thing the Democratic Party wants. A mass movement by the working class demanding Trump’s removal could quickly evolve into a struggle against the dictatorship of the corporate and financial elite, whose interests the Democrats defend just as ruthlessly as the Republicans.

The protests in Puerto Rico are the latest example of the mounting worldwide movement against austerity and social inequality produced by the capitalist system. After more than a decade of government policies that have funneled unlimited cash to the financial elites who crashed the economy in 2008, strikes and protests have spread across the Americas, Europe, Africa and Asia.

The struggle to end the bankers’ dictatorship in Puerto Rico and secure the social rights of workers on the island can be taken forward only by appealing to workers and youth on the mainland to join the fight as part of an internationally coordinated struggle by the working class against capitalism and for socialism.