Editorial

The campaign legacy

Continued from page 1

pitches. Old warhorses like Emmett Hall and Simon Reisman were thrown into the battle. Workers were threatened with massive job losses, U.S. retaliation and market crashes. Even Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher openly came to Mulroney’s rescue in the crucial last days of the campaign.

The din rose to a crescendo then to pandemonium.

It was only under intense pressure — which forced Mulroney to promise publicly and categorically that our sovereignty and social programs will remain intact after implementa- tion of the trade deal — that some were convinced to take that “leap of faith.” They will be cruelly disappointed.

The amazing thing isn’t that the Tories took a majority of seats (170) with a minority of votes (43 per cent) — the result of Canada’s unfair electoral system — but that, despite the unprecedented, hard-sell, pro-free trade blitz, 56 per cent of Canadians voted against the Mulroney trade deal.

Brian Mulroney received no public mandate for the FTA. On Nov 21, one million more Canadians opposed it than supported it.

Accordingly, there must be no capitulation by the 125 MPs who were elected to defend Canada’s sovereignty and to oppose the deal. There must be no phoney “co-operation” for its speedy passage and implementation.

The clearly-stated opinion of 56 per cent of the country must not be ignored. These 125 NDP and Liberal Members should be told by their electors to stand up for Canada when Mulroney calls Parliament into session Dec. 12 to ratify the FTA. They must continue to oppose the deal, to vote against it, thereby fulfilling the mandate they received on Nov. 21.

But the most important feature of Election ‘88 was the massive intervention into political life of the broad people’s movements —the pro-Canada, anti-Tory forces which turned this election into a genuine, passionate, wide-ranging debate on those issues vitally affecting our country’s future. :

The Pro-Canada Network and other forces, born in the struggle against the neo- conservative agenda and the sell-out of our country, added a vital new dimension to people’s consciousness. ‘lens of thousands, even perhaps millions, are now products of an intensive, seven-week political school.

Having played this new role, one of massive intervention into political life, having forced the Tories out of their cocoon, haying piled up a majority of the popular vote — the Canadian people are not likely return to “normal” until 1993 and let the Tories run rampant.

The fact is, this new political reality of an involved public is the real guarantee that the Tories are challenged every step of the way as they strive to impose their agenda on the country.

And what is that agenda? The trade deal and its many-sided impact on Canadian life, the regressive child-care package and pending federal sales tax; the costly and dangerous provocative military program, the continued drive to privatization and an increased attack on the labour movement, just to name several items on Mulroney’s list.

The unity and mobilization seen in the election battle is needed today more than ever. Rather than ending the debate on Canada’s future direction, this election in a real sense has begun it.

The key will be to maintain and strengthen the pro-Canada, anti-conservative people’s movements. The battle against Mulroney’s agenda has now moved to phase two.

Building upon the tremendous achievements and experience of the past weeks and months is the key to the next stage of the battle.

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The following editorial appeared in the Nov. 11 edition of the U.S. People’s Daily World.

President George Bush. Vice-president Dan Quayle. Those titles do not do our nation proud. They mean that the~

Commentary

favoured candidates of big business, of the military-industrial complex and of the right wing will control the White House for four more years.

It was a sleazy campaign, but the organ- ized peopl@s forces can be proud of their role. Their opposition to Bush and Quayle was virtually unanimous. Labour, Black, Hispanic, women, peace, environmental and civil liberties organizations put unprec- edented energies into this election and suc- cessfully mobilized a majority of their constituencies.

Those who worked so hard to reverse the direction of our country, to stop the government’s attacks on workers’ living standards and democratic rights and just plain decency which were the hallmark of the Reagan years and to make govern- ment responsive to people’s needs will feel an understandable disappointment.

But it would be a misjudgment of the situation to allow that disappointment to lead to pessimism or inaction.

Bush won, but his administration is starting out in a much weaker position that Ronald Reagan’s eight years ago, or even Reagan’s last year. Bush won an elec- tion but not a mandate.

How did Bush win, you might ask, if all

the constituencies of the broad people’s movements mobilized to their utmost?

First, one must mention the ugly, sleazy character of the Bush campaign. He ran a campaign of smears and fear-mongering that would have done Joe McCarthy proud. He cleverly and unscrupulously appealed to the basest sentiments, includ- ing racism. As befits a former director of the CIA, he ran a campaign of disinforma- tion. The American people who are in their majority fair and democratic- minded, have already begun to reject this ideological offensive but it did for a time obscure the issues and disorient the electo- rate.

Second, Bush had a powerful ally, or tool, in the media, which are owned and sponsored by the very big business forces that overwhelmingly favoured Bush. They held back damning stories about Bush. They brazenly attempted to create a bandwagon effect — pushing polls, inclu- ding ones that were later shown to be inaccurate — that put Bush ahead. On election night, Dan Rather really let the cat out of the bag when he opened an interview with Senator Ted Kennedy by asking: “When is the democratic Party

going to stop nominating these union- label liberals who always lose?”’

Third, although the organized working class and people’s movement did its utmost, it does not include the majority of the electorate. And people who are not organized are easier prey for the kind of demagogy that emanated from the Bush campaign.

To overcome these circumstances, the organized sector must organize more and they must define issues in a way that cuts through the reactionary fog of confusion and misinformation.

One might also ask: Why did Dukakis lose?

While posing an honourable alternative to Bush on many issues, Dukakis insisted for most of the campaign that politics is about “competence, not ideology”. That is not true.

Politics is about classes and their inter- ests in the first place That is what ideology is all about. Dukakis, while battling charges of the “‘l” word, refused to invoke the “c” word — class. His refusal — until the tail end of the campaign — to appeal to workers on a class basis left him defenceless against Bush’s scurrilous attacks.

No Reagan mandate for George Bush

It left him unable to go on the attack

_ against right-wing extremism.

And it left him unable to generate momentum among his natural supporters. Congressional candidates who were also attacked, Bush-style, as “liberals” but who answered the charges directly, by and large did well even in districts in which Dukakis did poorly.

The road that lies ahead is rocky.

We have a monumental legacy of prob- lems left over from the Reagan years, including a $3-trillion debt, and the Washington address of the wrecking crew will still be on Pennsylvania Avenue.

The illusory prosperity projected by the Reagan administration was bought on credit and the payments are coming due. It must be a top priority in the coming period to see that that bill is not presented to the people for payment.

The major role which the people’s movements and the labour-Afro-Ameri- can alliance, in particular, played in determining the make-up of the new Con- gress creates a firm foundation from which to launch a struggle for a new agenda in Congress.

The alliance between labour and the Afro-American people has grown tighter. The independent political role of that alliance is becoming clearer.

There is no reason to be demobilized by the election results — to roll over and play dead. New victories can be ours, as long as unity continues to grow.

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4 e Pacific Tribune, November 28, 1988 °