IRSCNA: Our Position on the US Presidential Election -- Stormont Watch

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Date Posted: Thu, Oct 23 2008, 7:09:08 PDT
Author: Danielle Ni Dhighe
Subject: IRSCNA: Our Position on the US Presidential Election

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

22 October 2008
Irish Republican Socialist Committees of North America

Our Position on the US Presidential Election

As the 2008 presidential election in the United States approaches, we
in the Irish Republican Socialist Committees of North America wish to
place our position on the record.

Simply put, the presidential election, like all bourgeois elections,
is a sham. Workers are asked to vote on which representative of the
ruling class should lead the capitalist state's government for the
next four years. No matter which major party candidate wins, the
ruling class wins while the working class, our class, continues to lose.

It's certainly true that there are policy differences between John
McCain and Barack Obama, but both candidates are part of the
capitalist status quo and fully endorse that status quo. Neither man
is a friend to the working class, no matter how much they pander to it.

They both support imperialist interventions that kill working class
people. Obama may want to withdraw some troops from Iraq, but only to
send more to Afghanistan, and he recently characterized the
progressive, democratic regime in Venezuela as an enemy of the United
States. His party, the Democratic Party, has historically resorted to
military action as often as McCain's Republican Party.

We certainly understand why some workers choose to vote for the least
conservative of the major candidates, if only because they think that
candidate will be slightly less harmful and may enact some reforms, or
even just to keep the most conservative one out of office. We can't
condemn any member of the working class who votes on that basis, but
we think it would be better to protest the capitalist status quo by
voting for an alternative candidate and then trying to create real
change.

If there's a revolutionary socialist candidate on the ballot in your
state, vote for them instead of the "least conservative" major party
candidate, and if there isn't, write one in. While socialism won't be
built through bourgeois elections, we think a vote for a revolutionary
socialist alternative is a worthy one.

In particular, if you live in one of the twelve states where their
campaign is on the ballot, we suggest voting for the Party for
Socialism and Liberation ticket of Gloria La Riva and Eugene Puryear
for President and Vice-President of the United States.

If you live in a state where they're not on the ballot, write them in
or vote for another revolutionary socialist ticket if one is on the
ballot. The revolutionary politics of working class women and men
like La Riva and Puryear represent a real alternative to the status quo.

Their campaign website with further information can be found here:
http://www.votepsl.org/

However, ultimately, no matter who is in office, it's the working
class organizing and exercising our collective will through solidarity
and mass struggle that will transform society.

The fundamental cause of working class misery is the ownership of the
means of production, distribution, and exchange concentrated in the
hands of the capitalist class, a tiny minority. As long as the working
class, including the higher paid members of the class who
falsely see themselves as a middle class, are forced to sell their
labor power to a small, parasitical class, it will continue to suffer.

As the ongoing financial crisis once again proves, capitalism is an
inherently unstable system that places private profit above the public
good. The stock market is a casino for capitalists and aspiring
capitalists, where an entire economy can be destroyed in the pursuit
of profit. Capitalism cannot be reformed. Reformists have been
trying to do so for over two hundred years without success because
reformism cannot address the root cause of exploitation and
alienation, which is the existence of the capitalist system itself.

Only the working class can put an end to the exploitation and
alienation caused by capitalism by organizing and fighting for the
alternative of socialism, where the working class will own the means
of production, distribution, and exchange, administered democratically
through new institutions created by the working class.

Socialism cannot be built by a minority, no matter how class conscious
it may be. It can only be built by the masses as they liberate
themselves from capitalist ideology, an ideology that is promoted on a
daily basis through educational institutions and the mass media. We
view Gloria La Riva and Eugene Puryear as comrades in the struggle to
build a revolutionary socialist alternative to capitalism, both in the
United States and worldwide.

Since 1984, the Irish Republican Socialist Committees of North America
have existed to support the revolutionary, anti-imperialist Irish
Republican Socialist Movement in its struggle to liberate Ireland from
capitalism and imperialist occupation, and as Americans we also
support a socialist revolution in our own country.

The power to bring about real change resides in the hearts and minds
of every working class man or woman. We have the power. Don't give
away your power by voting for a capitalist politician. We can create
real change. In fighting for a better future for our class, we must
take every opportunity to support fellow revolutionaries. It's long
past time to build a revolutionary workers' movement right in the
heart of world imperialism.

Onward to victory!

###

Irish Republican Socialist Committees of North America
PO Box 88341
Tukwila WA 98138-2341
USA
irscna@irsm.org
http://www.irscna.org/
http://www.irsm.org/irsm.html

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