War Against the Poor and Workers

“War against the poor and workers.”

It is an era of imperial freefall, and in support, the government is openly attacking Latino immigrants from Guatemala and Honduras, lobbing tear gas canisters at moms and babies.

This, after knowingly separating children from their parents, a gruesome stunt meant to intimidate Latinos and to draw simple human compassion away from them.

Governments have traditionally turned immigrants into scapegoats, making them the latest targets of racist enmity. King Donald the first called them bad dudes, criminals, and gang members.

Yeah, gangsters in diapers, right? Here’s what it really is: class war, the poor versus the poor, workers against workers, divide and conquer.

This ain’t even an American thing. It’s a capitalist thing. Rulers in Europe, America, and Latin America are using the power of fear to turn worker against worker. When politicians sell and spread the toxin of fear, it’s time for workers to join with their fellow workers to unite and fight for all.

The politics of capitalism are the politics of division, of class war, of dog and dog, and of pushing people against each other instead of for each other.

America remains the prison house of nations. It has 5% of the world’s population and 24% of the world’s prisons. The United States is the imprisonator in chief of this planet.

On the bright side, we celebrate the release of Debbie and Mike Africa of the MOVE organization after 40 years in prison. But that brief bright light reveals the horror of the system of shackles, chains, and handcuffs.

That light shows us the injustice of the continued imprisonment of Leonard Peltier, a Lakota Native American activist in American federal prison.

So before I go, I salute our friends and comrades in Germany. Thank you for what you do for human rights and freedom. On the MOVE.

From imprisoned nation, this is Mumia Abu-Jamal.

These commentaries are recorded by Noelle Hanrahan of Prison Radio.