The detente majority The Wall Street Journal (May 26) says Carter is preparing to veto various civilian budget appropriations to reduce the deficit, but adds: ‘McIntyre and Blumenthal press hard for cuts of as much as $5 billion — mostly in military spending.’’ McIntyre is the budget director, Blumenthal the treas-. ury: secretary. ___ This illustrates a vital point: The basic support for detente is excep- tionally broad, extending across the entire range of social classes, including the capitalist. Blumenthal was chairman of Bendix Corp., which, inciden- tally, continues to do considerable military business. : The extremely powerful pro-war forces are very narrowly based. They include the most aggressive, reactionaries among the very rich, the militarists, like Zbigniew Brzezinski, national security adviser. When Car- ter claims “public opinion’”’ may prevent SALT-II ratification, he is refer- ring to this vicious clique, which owns all-too-many members of Congress and of his own administration. : The sensational May 15th Harris poll, showing overwhelming popular support for detente, disarmament and trade with socialist countries, de- monstrates the broad basis of the peace sentiment. On the most general question, ‘‘Do you favor detente?” the vote was71% to 15% in favor.-Among: “executives” it was 73 to 16 in favor, about the same. Among those with incomes over $25,000, the vote was 82 to 14, somewhat stronger. Union members are also strongly_for detente-and trade, despite the intense contrary propaganda of Meany, Shanker, et al. They voted 74 to 13 for detente, i.e. by a wider margin than the average, or than did executives. Union members are particularly aware of the value in jobs of trade with socialist countries. They had much higher favorable percentages than the average of those polled on the trade questions, including the restoration of most favored nation treatment to the USSR. By more than four to one, unionists, in effect are for repeal of the anti-detente Jackson-Vanik and Stevenson amendments. Another feature deserves special mention. Extreme anti-Soviet ele- ments among Zionists falsely claim to speak for the entire Jewish commun- ity. They have not been able to destroy the historical progressive trend among the vast majority of Jewish people. Their vote was 81 to 6 for detente, notable not only for the high favorable percentage, but the extremely low negative percentage. On one issue the anti-Soviet Zionists made some penetration, connection of trade discrimination with Jewish emigration. On eliminating this discrimination, the overall vote was 64 to 21 in favor, among Jewish people 70 to 22 in favor — again a larger percentage in favor, but this time a significant minority opposed. Inflation is back up to double digit rates, slashing workers’ living standards. We say that profits are the main cause of inflation. Now Fortune, that apologist for big business, helps us prove it. The magazine’s June 5th “Business Roundup” says that in the last quarter of 1975, capitalists took advantage of economic recovery by raising profit margins to unusual heights, and raised prices to a level needed to make this stick, ‘“‘sacrificing sales if necessary.” : Some of these outsize margins were eroded in 1977, and margins de- clined in the first quarter of 1978, recovering somewhat in the second quar- ter to a point about 6% below the 1975 end of year peak. Fortime does not claim they are subnormal now, but implies they are about in line with historical trends. . But, says Fortune, “corporations are bound to do more for their stock- . holders in the months ahead, and so the inflationary push from margins now looks to be a lot larger than anticipated.”’ It estimates that prices will go up anextra 2% on account of this factor — which would in fact put margins well above the outsized end of 1975 peak. Fortune estimates.that manufacturers will be able to get away with this because capacity will be utilized to a high percentage, minimizing competitive price pressures. - But that isn’t all. Fortune estimates that prices of imported manufac- tured goods have already gone up an extra 6%, over and above domestic price increases, because of the latest devaluation of the dollar, and that this process isn’t over. Taking advantage of this, Fortune writes, U.S. manufac- turers will raise prices and profit margins still more. They will not raise prices by the full 6% extra, because they want to “‘take away some market share from imports,” but, ‘‘at a time when they are hungry for profit margins, domestic producers can be expected to boost prices by at least an extra 1%” on this account. Indeed, judging from recent actions by steel and auto companies, it might be closer to the full 6% extra. However, sticking to Fortune’s 1% on this account, and 2% on the factors mentioned above, Fortune concludes that manufacturers’ prices will go up 3% on account of wider profit margins, in.addition to 7% reflecting highter costs, making a 10% rise over the year ahead. . But even the 3% admitted by Fortune, transmitted’to the retail cash register, will cost consumers an extra $40 billion over a year’s time. This admission can be valuable ammunition for workers seeking protection in higher wages from the inflationary profiteering rampage of big business. “in all cases the figures are percentages, omitting those who were “not sure.” Thus the overail vote was 71% for detente, 15% against detente, and 14% “not sure,” for a total of 100%. : PACIFIC TRIBUNE—July 7, 1978—Page 4 Members of the Ali- By Tom Foley ze The revolution in Ethiopia is a genuine one, a mass movement of mil- lions of people,’’ Tony Monteiro told me just after his return from Addis Ababa. Monteiro, executive secretary of the National Anti-Imperialist Movement in Solidarity with Afrécan Liberation (NAIMSAL), gave important insights into the nature of the Ethiopian revolu-. . tion in his interview with World Magazine. “The Ethiopian revolution,’ he said, . ‘“is_a national democratic revolution, and simultaneously an anti-feudal and anti-imperialist one. The ‘pull’ of the Russian October Revolution on it is great. It represents a new stage in the development of the African liberation - struggle, in which after the defeat of Portuguese colonialism in Africa, the strengthened left forces in Africa are moving in to assault the last remaining bastions of colonialism and im- perialism.”’ Monteiro had just returned from a preparatory meeting in Addis Ababa for aconference in solidarity with prog- ressive forces in Africa and the Middle East to take place this fall. The name of the Ethiopian capital, Addis Ababa, means ‘“‘New Flower’’ in the Amharic language, a Semitic language related to Arabic and Hebrew. Today, it is a red flower, blooming in the winds of revolu- | tion which is sweeping Africa and the world. Ethiopia is an East African country of 30 million people, with a land area equal to that of Texas, Oklahoma and New Mexico combined. In its center is the plateau, 6-10,000 feet high, dotted with ambas like our mesas in the south- western U.S. This is the stronghold of the ancient Ethiopian Orthodox Church, -whose members make up 35% of the country’s population. The surrounding areas, bordering on the Sudan, Djibouti, Ethiopian Women Trade Unionists march in the May Day celebration in Aow Somalia and Kenya, are largely Mus lim. : Emperor Haile-Selassie and the feudal nobility he represented, delibet- ately kept Ethiopia backward, in the vain hope, as the emperor once put it, that it “would wake quietly from the 7 sleep of 3,000 years.’’ Nine out of 10 Ethiopians were peasants, lacking eve? iron farm tools and plows, never seeiN& money; the high death rate from dis ease, poverty and hunger meant 65% of the population was under 25 years ° age; literacy was 7%. ; When drought struck Ethiopia 1 1972-73, the corrupt feudal regime Haile Selassie stole and’re-sold abro@ much of the international aid sent help drought and famine victims. In oné province alone, Wollo, northeast ® Addis Ababa, over 200,000 people died of starvation and thirst. Yet all this time, the emperor and the feudal nobles wet® putting millions in foreign banks, mil- lions wrung out of the peasants — much of it from the coffee crop, raised by thé peasants, which accounts for one-halfof Ethiopia’s export earnings (coffee originated in Kafa province of south” west Ethiopia). ; The people were ripe for revolt in early 1974. They were ready to rise, they rose against Benito Mussolini > fascist Italian occupation troops #9 1935-41, only to have Haile Selassie’s d@ spotism once more fastened on the after the Italian fascist defeat. | Monteiro said: ‘President’ Fide!” Castro of Cuba called the Ethiopian T@ volution a combination of the French Revolution of 1789 and the October Re volution of 1917 in Russia. ye “The revolutionary class in th world today is the working class,’’ Mol” teiro said, “and the impact of its strug: gle in Ethiopia, with its relatively sma! working class, has been as profound 4° anywhere else in the world.”