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The Global Class War and Working with Classes

By Horace Coleman (reviewer)

The Global Class War: How America's Bipartisan Elite Lost Our Future - and What It Will Take to Win it Back.
By Jeff Faux
(John Wiley & Sons, 2006)

Jeff Faux's language is clear, crisp and comprehensible. The book's about globalization, those who put it into effect and how it affects various economic classes and countries.

Some sample chapter headings:
• NAFTA [North American Free Trade Agreement]: Class Reunion
• "Good Jobs" and Other Global Deceptions
• The Governing Class: America's Worst-Kept Secret
• How Reagan and Thatcher Stole Globalization
• A Bipartisan Empire
• NAFTA: Who Got What
• The Constitution According to Davos [Davos is a Swiss resort where corporate managers meet annually with political leaders to "discuss" the "state of the world"]
•Toward, and Beyond, a Continental Democracy

Faux founded the Economic Policy Institute (EPI), a think-tank on political and economic issues American face. He's been an economist in the Departments of State, Labor and Commerce. EPI's mission is providing research and education that promote a prosperous, fair, and sustainable economy.

To paraphrase and summarize Faux's book:

* NAFTA was supported and promoted by America's financial and political elite.

* Business lobbyists are regularly against minimum wages, health and safety rules.

* Any place in the world is essentially the same as any other if wage competition, encouraged by trade agreements, pushes wages down and eliminates job security.

* Three overlapping circles at the top of the American pyramid shape and affect government the most: The Policy Formation Organizations of politic and technocratic Washington; the Corporate Community's managers; the Social Upper Class (the super rich who live off their investments).

* Corporate executives and lawyers move back and forth and in and out of power positions in business and the government.

* There is only one political party in this country [Demopublican /Republicrat (call them Dimocrat or Repiglican if you like)].

In an article published in the Nation magazine in February 2006, Faux wrote "Here in America, the coming unrest could turn right as well as left. The Republican Party is hopelessly tied to the multinational priorities of the US business elite, but its managers are skilled at stoking nationalist resentment among the working-class victims."

And, say I, in using "identity politics, "family values," "pro-life and abstinence only" sex education issues, religiosity, sexual orientation, etc. to divert and stir up the "common" folk. Do we have home grown, US style, Sharia law, Taliban and jihadists tearing us apart? The flag follows the dollar; the dollar follows the flag. The military goes along, ahead, or soon after, to support and defend corporate--not national--interests.

Class in America is as blatant and obvious as rank insignia on a sleeve, cap, shoulder or collar is in the military. In civilian life we know about knockoffs, imitations, counterfeits and the real thing—supposedly. Except in politics. And, taste, style, bluster, garishness and ostentatiousness (hopefully). Why is it that those who have the most money and clout, are usually the first to shriek whenever class warfare is mentioned? Even though their class is winning.

"It's worth remembering," said Faux in a February 06 Nation article, "that Franklin Roosevelt, who was as elite and privileged as one could get, responded to the economic crisis of his time by becoming--as they muttered in the best clubs--"a traitor to his class." But a positive problem solver for his nation.

It's hard to have people respond appropriately to what is painful, long-term and difficult.

Lately I've found myself working with a priest in a low income parish, with middle school teachers and students, high school teachers. Providing literature, sharing personal history, answering questions, making referrals, getting a letter-to-the-editor published, etc. Low key, unglamorous things.

It's Memorial Day for me every time I watch the Nightly News on PBS and see another batch of young faces--KIAs from Iraq and Afghanistan. So many "good citizens" who say they "support the troops" don't do any thing that does that.

All those faces: Male. Female. Soldier, sailor, reservist, Marine, Air Force, National Guard. White, Latino, Black, Asian, Middle Eastern and all the combinations--all the patches--in the American quilt.

I hate to see people die in dubious battles they've entered because they didn't know recent history, current affairs or the reasons for what they've committed to. Informed assent is one thing. Putting your life, mind and soul on the line because of some power and money seeking, stay-at-home, Judas goats is another.

The struggle for truth and justice is a continual.