CoTells theu Factsn and Nameste the NamesrPunch$2.50 November 1-15 2001 Alexander Cockburn and Jeffrey St. Clair VOL. 8, NO. 19 In This Issue What Workers Talk About ANOTHER BUMPER When They Talk About War SPECIAL ISSUE nonprofit sector, read out a statement is- BY JOANN WYPIJEWSKI WAR OR PEACE sued by an ad hoc group called New York “You know what they say: a conserva- City Labor Against the War: tive is a liberal who was mugged. I was “September 11 has brought indescrib- • “I Was Under Those under those towers, and it changed me”. able suffering to New York City’s work- Towers and It Changed Dan Walker, a firefighter with Engine 212 ing people. We have lost friends, family Me, and It Hurts My in Brooklyn, had noticed my red, white members and coworkers of all color, na- Heart to Say That.” and blue peace sign button, and somehow tionalities and religions—a thousand of the conversation turned to the subject of them union members. An estimated one Dan Walker, Firefighter, war. They call 212 The People’s Firehouse hundred thousand New Yorkers will lose Engine 212, Brooklyn because back in the1970s, when arson was their jobs. We condemn this crime against New York City’s de facto redevelopment humanity and mourn those who perished. •”We Believe That policy and firehouses in poor and work- We are proud of the rescuers and the out- ing-class neighborhoods were being shut pouring of labor support for victims’ fami- George Bush’s War Is down like runaway factories, the people lies. We want justice for the dead and Not the Answer.” of Williamsburg successfully fought to safety for the living. And we believe that New York Labor save it. Walker told me he’d never been George Bush’s war is not the answer…” Against the War much of a drum-beater for war, but some- When she finished, adding that the thing as arbitrary as time—the fifty-four statement had been endorsed by her local, seconds between when he, his engine- by twelve principal officers of city unions, • “It’s Still the Same mates and some workers at the World by 260-plus New York unionists and 100- System.” Russ Davis, Trade Center escaped from Tower One and plus labor people from around the coun- Jobs With Justice saw it collapse—“that changed me, and it try, there was polite applause and some hurts my heart to say that, it really hurts unspoken anger. Between the silence and my heart, but it did”. the tears lies a space for all the conversa- MARK GREEN’S LOSS I met Walker at a bar called Teddy’s, tions within labor that haven’t happened, where some of the same people who’d or have happened half-way, the conversa- • Another Epitaph to fought for the firehouse were holding a tions about war and foreign policy that some people are too afraid even to con- White Liberal Racism fundraiser for HERE Local 100, whose members used to have jobs at Windows sider, and that others believe must begin, on the World. More than a month had and soon. The question is, How? PLUS... passed since the towers fell, but restau- Working-class people have typically rant workers who’d lost seventy-five col- not been the first ones to show up at a leagues, union and nonunion, were crying peace rally. Individual workers and unions • Anthrax as Normalcy as if it had been only days. In most of the opposed the war in Vietnam, but it wasn’t city the memory is not quite so raw. There until 1971 that unions acting in concert • America’s Most are services to provide, an economy on the broke with the AFL-CIO to form Labor Wanted: Pancho Villa skids and, for some, a war to think about. Against the War. In the 1980s labor com- Earlier that evening at a meeting of the ponents emerged in the nuclear freeze, New York Central Labor Council, Brenda antiapartheid, and Central America soli- • Odd Hitchens Claim Stokely, president of AFSCME Local 215/ darity movements, but it’s not as if every DC1707 representing city workers in the (Workers continued on page 5) 2/COUNTERPUNCH NOVEMBER 1-15, 2001 conditions for the murders of Amadou Diallo and Patrick Dorismund, among too OUR LITTLE SECRETS many others. White voters may not have paid attention to this-but black voters did. Green’s attacks on Fernando Ferrer, his WHY GREEN LOST have hammered as a signal of how he’ll Hispanic opponent in the run-off-New Dave Marsh sends us this report. Aside handle those conflicts. If the conflict is- York primaries, weren’t based on Ferrer from being a longtimeCounterPuncher, sue arose during the mayoral campaign, it being a political hack, which he is, but Dave coedits the terrific Rock ’n Rap Con- wasn’t Mark Green’s doing. were laced with implications that Ferrer fidential. The last week of the campaign, was unqualified because he came from the In the November 2001 elections, the Bloomberg fell into an embrace with Rudy wrong part of town. When a Bloomberg Northeast was swept by Democrats. For Giuliani who, even since 9/11, remains staffer got caught with racist literature, the the first time in decades, Democrats in feared and hated by black and Latino vot- staffer lost his job. But when it was re- New Jersey seized the governorship and ers. In fact, Giuliani was vulnerable to vealed that Green’s aides held a meeting both houses of the legislature. In Connecti- exposure of the autocratic, thuggish, de- in Brooklyn to figure out how to exploit cut, Democrats took over almost the en- ceitful way he actually ran affairs down- Ferrer’s ties to Al Sharpton in order to tire city government of Norwalk, the may- town during the post-WTC attack crisis. win more votes from Jews there, Green or’s post in Waterbury, and even the city Mark Green had the same information did nothing. As a result, Ferrer refused to government of Greenwich, the Bush fam- about Giuliani being Giuliani that campaign for Green; Sharpton threatened ily seat. But in New York City, where CounterPunch ran several weeks ago. (I a black boycott of the election; and all the Democratic registrations outnumber Re- know, because I gave it to his staff.) It major black-owned media supported publican by 4-1, the guy who got elected came from notes taken by a city council Bloomberg. mayor is not only a Republican political member with comments from other offi- Green got less than half the Latino vote novice who trailed by double digits com- cials from the affected area. Green never in a city where Democrats always do much ing out of the primary, he’s a Red Sox fan. used it, even though he was tarred and better. Bloomberg got almost 30 per cent Mark Green never mentioned it. feathered for saying he could have done of the black vote, which cost Green at least Michael Bloomberg is also a billion- as well or better than Giuliani in manag- ten to 15 points. Sounding like a Naderite aire with a business deeply entangled in ing the crisis. talking about Al Gore, Muhammad said city affairs, and he’s made no effort to re- But that doesn’t explain why Green that Green winning “would have been a move himself from it while spitting in the lost the election. Nor was it the fact that great tragedy”. What happened here in eye of city campaign finance regulations such big name Democrats as Ed Koch and New York was predictable, not because by spending $60 million to get the job, Hugh Carey turned on Green out of per- Mark Green is a fool but because this is which you’d think his opponent would sonal dislike or because of Green’s pa- the way the Democrats now run their af- thetic last-minute attack ads slamming fairs. Bloomberg for sexual harassment. It Green has been trying to become a Editors wasn’t even because Green was the only high elected official since he ran for the ALEXANDER C OCKBURN idiot in the Democratic primary willing to Senate against Al D’Amato in 1986. That JEFFREY ST. C LAIR say that, because Rudy was so swell at year, he asked me, through a contributor, handling things after the attack that the for help gaining access to performers to Business Manager Mussolini of the Hudson should be given help in his campaign. When told that the BECKY G RANT the extra months in offices for which he’d price was helping to register minority vot- Design been whining. ers in Harlem, Green responded (I was DEBORAH THOMAS Mark Green isn’t mayor of New York told), “I can’t do that, I’m Jewish”. Imag- today because black voters finally said ine a black candidate saying such a thing. Counselor “enough” to white liberal racism and Green, who could not have won the elec- BEN SONNENBERG spited him by voting for his opponent. tion without a huge black turnout, was They had good reason for doing so. Green trounced, visiting six more years of Published twice monthly except spent a year trying to have it both ways. D’Amato sleaze upon the nation. August, 22 issues a year: He had solid credentials as the only big- In 1992, learning nothing from this, the $40 individuals, name pol in town who had consistently Democrats ran Robert Abrams against $100 institutions/supporters attacked Giuliani for his bullying and big- D’Amato.