This election year has
given the voters two of the most unpopular candidates in the nation's history.
Especially hard not to notice is the "Bernie or Bust" crowd. They are
the millennials who are so disillusioned over the cheating and biased actions
of the DNC and the Democratic Party in general they just refuse to support
Hillary Clinton. Some of these millennials and many other voters I know are
planning to vote for the Green Party. Jill Stein is
the party's leader and presidential candidate.
But before people vote
for Stein or any other Green Party candidate it is important to realize that
the US Green Party is not a left-wing party, it is certainly not a socialist party
at all.
Probably the most well
known Green Party in the world is in Germany . The German Greens do
have left-wing factions. It includes leftists, socialists and
Marxists.
But the US
version of that party is different. There are no Marxists. The Greens do not
advocate socialism. They do have a lot of progressive platforms, such as
supporting a national health care program and generous social welfare benefits
for workers and others. But in essence they are a bourgeois party that
supports capitalism.
"A.
Ecological Economics
1. We call
for an economic system that is based on a combination of private businesses,
decentralized democratic cooperatives, publicly owned enterprises, and
alternative economic structures. Collectively, this system puts human and
ecological needs alongside profits to measure success, and maintains
accountability to communities."
It almost sounds like a socialist platform. Some past
communist governments, such as the Soviet Union ,
had cooperatives, publicly owned enterprises (state owned) and some private
businesses. Many people don't realize that most communist movements support some small businesses, or at least they tolerate them.
But the next line tells us a lot:
"2. Community-based economics constitutes an alternative to
both corporate capitalism and state socialism. It values diversity and
decentralization......."
This statement is most
likely a rebuke at past communist or socialist style governments. It is
basically an anti-communist/ anti-socialist statement. There is little to doubt
about this.
They also make it
perfectly clear they don't want to abolish corporations, they want to reform
them:
"C. Curbing Corporate Power
Greens want to reduce the economic and political
power of large corporations, end corporate personhood and re-design
corporations to serve our society, democracy and the environment......."
They call for reforming corporations and the language they
use is somewhat utopian:
"Greens believe the legal structure of the
corporation is obsolete. At present, corporations are designed solely to
generate profit. This legal imperative — profit above all else — is damaging
our country and our planet in countless ways. We must change the legal design
of corporations so that they generate profits, but not at the expense of the
environment, human rights, public health, workers, or the communities in which
the corporation operates."
This statement ignores the very definition of a corporation.
They are primarily to make profit at all costs. That is the only goal of a
corporation. To believe that these entities can be changed to be democratic and
serve society while at the same time producing profit is absurd. Corporate
mangers and owners are greedy. That is their primary reason for all that they
do. Since corporations were founded the goal has always been to maximise
profits and minimize costs- including the cost of labor. Trying to
"reform" such institutions doesn't make any sense. The only logical
move is to convert them to democratically run coops. The greedy managers must
be dismissed or put under constraints. They can't be allowed to make as much
money as they want to. In other words the corporations need to be destroyed and
replaced with either coops, state run institutions or something of that nature.
Rather than following any kind of worker led models, the
Green Party promotes small businesses and corporations not all that different
from any other capitalist model. This is in no way a socialist, worker's
oriented, labor style or Marxist movement. This is a bourgeois model for
business:
"G. Small Business and the
Self-Employed
Greens support a program that counteracts concentration and abuse
of economic power. We support many different initiatives for forming
successful, small enterprises that together can become an engine of (and
sustainable model for) job creation, prosperity and progress. Small businesses
are where the jobs are being created. Over the past decade and a half, all new
net job growth has come from the small business sector.
The Green economic model is about true prosperity—Green means prosperity. Our goal is to go beyond the dedicated good work being done by many companies (referred to as "socially responsible business") and to present new ways of seeing how business can help create a sustainable world, while surviving in a competitive business climate.
We believe that conservation should be profitable, and employment should be creative, meaningful and fairly compensated.
Access to capital is often an essential need in growing a business."
The Green economic model is about true prosperity—Green means prosperity. Our goal is to go beyond the dedicated good work being done by many companies (referred to as "socially responsible business") and to present new ways of seeing how business can help create a sustainable world, while surviving in a competitive business climate.
We believe that conservation should be profitable, and employment should be creative, meaningful and fairly compensated.
Access to capital is often an essential need in growing a business."
Some
of the wording of this platform is quite bourgeois and could easily have come
from one of many conservative news sites or the Republican Party itself:
"Government should reduce unnecessary restrictions, fees, and
bureaucracy. In particular, the Paper Simplification Act should be seen as a
way to benefit small business, and it should be improved in response to the
needs of small businesses and the self-employed."
As we see the Green Party is in some ways quite reactionary
or at least a conservative party. Some of their ideas are even primitive, such
as:
"The creating and spreading local currencies
and barter systems."
I have seen a lot of comments on Facebook recently from
Marxists who decided to vote for Jill Stein as a protest vote against Hillary
Clinton or Donald Trump. On one hand Stein has no chance of winning. Because of
the Electoral
College she can run, but will be unable to win any delegates. Our
founding fathers decided the people were too stupid to vote directly for the
president so they came up with the Electoral College. We only vote for electors who really
chose the president. There is no way the Green Party can win those electors. So
if the idea is to register protest vote, it won't really matter. But organizing
or campaigning for Stein or any other Green Party candidates is to vote for the
opposite of what most leftists want. We don't want nicer capitalism or
corporations with a smiling face. We want them abolished and replaced with
worker cooperatives and other progressive types of economic organization.
Support for the environment and generous benefits for
workers are always a good idea. However the Green Party is not worth
supporting. It is too reactionary to work for us.
-សតិវ អតុ
Pix
by www.zazzle.com.
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