Working Class Resistance # 4

Recent events have taught us all a valuable lesson about the true nature of democracy and the utter futility of placing any trust in ‘our’ politicians. The Hutton Inquiry and the treachery of ‘anti-fees’ Labour MPs should have combined to deliver a severe blow to the body politic and the state.

That Hutton was a whitewash and that ‘independent’ state inquiries into the activity of the state can never be independent should come as no surprise. The government whitewash that was the Widgery report confirmed that to many of us in the north a long time ago.

The only conclusion that can be reached in relation to the Hutton Inquiry, Dr David Kelly’s death and the launching of a barbarous war on Iraq, a war excused by government on a tissue of lies, is that the State has at its heart death, deception and dishonesty.

The 2,000 strong, hi-tech, Iraq Survey Group have found no weapons of mass destruction. They have spent £300 million on finding nothing! Not one WMD in Iraq proves the lie of the former regimes “clear and present danger” to the west.

Here are four more lies from the Bush-Blair axis:
i) Blair promised that neither the US nor the UK would touch Iraqi oil. Resolution 1483 of the UN Security Council grants the coalition of two complete control over the oil fields.
ii) Blair claimed he had “nothing to do with” the decision to leak Dr David Kelly’s name to the press. The Hutton Inquiry discloses three meetings chaired by Blair, where the decision was made.
iii) Labour make great play of the fact that they “allowed” a vote in parliament on the decision to go to war. Robin Cook has admitted that Blair made a pact with Bush the year before to go to war on Iraq.
iv) The war on Iraq was to result in a “Road Map for Peace in the Middle East”. Now Israel has bombed Syria and is erecting a new, bigger, “Berlin Wall” through the occupied territories.

It is to be hoped that the professional activism and lobbying, which have been growing in popularity (in the absence of a movement willing and able to engage in struggle as opposed to grovelling) has been dealt a fatal blow.
Writing as a worker returning to study as a ‘mature student’ I could not believe that the latest student demo in Belfast – held in October – was almost identical to one I had attended as a tech student over 15 years ago!
The chants had changed – “Maggie, Maggie, Maggie” ditched for “Tony, Tony, Tony – Out, Out, Out!”. I seem to remember that on one of these student ground-hog protest days the chant was amended to “Major, Major, Major…” but its all a bit too hazy and samey.

As ever we were treated to pledges of support from the great and the good, pledges from student ‘leaders’ of action and commitment, determination and solidarity. It has, time and again, turned to so much ash in our mouths as it became apparent that our ‘leaders’ meant to convince the countries ‘leaders’ of the righteousness of our cause - by letter writing, lobbying, grovelling and pleading. And of course another rally next year to keep us marching in time to defeat after defeat, attack after attack on education and students.

But perhaps the bubble has burst and we can begin to get somewhere. With treachery apparent some students outside Westminster on the day of the “crucial tuition fees vote” got so upset that scuffles with the police were reported.

Are we, as working class people, whether unemployed, or working full or part-time, temporary, casual, expendable, student or whatever, ready for a new strategy? Has the grip of professional inactivism been weakened? Are we ready, and willing, for a bit of direct action?

Remember, whether its domestic or foreign policy, an extension of the class war against students or any other section of the working class or a war of domination and aggression fought against another country and counted in the lives of working class people - not those who sent them in – NEVER TRUST A POLITICIAN!