Issue 8 - September 10 2013 $3 / $5 (solidarity price) REMEMBERING FLAG CHILE 1973 RED PAGE 17 Newspaper of Socialist Alternative www.redfl ag.org.au DISABILITY NO NORTHERN PLAN NOT TERRITORY WHAT IT SEEMS NUCLEAR DUMP Page 8 Page 13 WIPE THE SMILE OFF HIS FACE INSIDE: How we can resist Abbott’s attacks ALSO: ONLY MILITANT UNIONISM WILL HOLD OFF ABBOTT Jerome Small looks at the prospects for unions under the Liberals - Page 9 2 10 SEPTEMBER 2013 Newspaper of Socialist Alternative FLAG www.redfl ag.org.au RED CONTENTS EDITORIAL 3 How Labor let the bastards in Mick Armstrong analyses the election result. 4 Wipe the smile off Abbott’s face ALP wouldn’t stop Abbo , Diane Fieldes on what we need to do to fi ght back. now it’s up to the rest of us 5 The limits of the Greens’ leftism A lot of people woke up on Sunday leader (any leader) and wait for the 6 Where does real change come from? a er the election with a sore head. next election. Don’t reassess any And not just from drowning their policies, don’t look seriously about the Colleen Bolger makes the argument for getting organised. sorrows too determinedly the night deep crisis of Laborism that, having David confront a Goliath in yellow overalls before. The thought of Tony Abbo as developed for the last 30 years, is now prime minister is enough to make the at its most acute point. Jeremy Gibson reports on a community battling to keep McDonald’s soberest person’s head hurt. Labor has destroyed itself. But out of their town. What made it worse is that Abbo there is no point in the le si ing got in without a fi ght. It is no wonder around moping. We need to organise 8 Disability plan not what it seems that record numbers of people didn’t resistance to the Liberals, and we need The NDIS is going to hurt many, explains Lana Woolf. even bother voting, so uninspiring to start now. was the alternative: another three Red Flag plans to play its role in 9 FEATURE: Only militant unionism will hold off Abbott’s years of Labor. the anti-Abbo resistance. On election night Labor politicians Over the past few months we are attack fell over themselves to admit that the proud of what we have done with our Jerome Small takes stock of trade unionism under Labor and points to ALP had made mistakes. Problem was, new paper: reporting on struggles by the tasks ahead. they all missed the point. “Disunity workers across the country; taking is death” they all said in unison. If up the defence of heroes like Chelsea 12 Workplace and union reports only the party wasn’t so divided, so Manning and Edward Snowden, wracked by infi ghting, it could have who have dared to expose the truth Abattoir workers challenge non-union agreement; Egyptian sailors on won. about our rulers; and giving an strike at Port Kembla; casual workers organising; WA teachers rally Of course if it wasn’t for the unapologetically le wing take on against cuts. shambolic leadership wrangling, all the issues and controversies of Labor might have polled be er. But Australian politics. 14 No NT nuclear waste dump! the reality is that infi ghting over the The Abbo era will give us many Jon Lamb and Cathy Lawless speak to Barb Shaw and Dave Sweeney leadership was a symptom of Labor’s more such challenges. When the about the campaign to stop the waste dump at Muckaty Station. malaise, not its cause. corporate press inevitably covers up The core of the problem is that the Liberals’ lies, and makes excuses 15 We need free childcare Labor stands for nothing. Nothing, for Labor’s failure, we will be standing that is, except a watered down version on the side of everyone whose Kate Jeffreys makes the case. of the Liberal Party, short a few silver rights Abbo a acks: championing spoons and landed gents. resistance, building solidarity, and 16 Syria: Support the revolution, oppose US attack Year a er year Labor moves making the case for building a new Vashti Kenway explains why. further to the right. And every time socialist movement that can unite it does, it brings more disasters upon people in a fi ght against every 17 Chile 1973: Lessons of the coup itself. injustice of the system. With every new catastrophe there We know we will have our work Jorge Jorquera looks back on the 40 years since Pinochet took power. are some who hope: maybe now they cut out. So if you share our contempt will see sense. But they never do. And for the state of politics in Australia 20 Forgotten revolutionaries: Monty Miller now, as Labor contemplates its latest today, we need your support. debacle, the same people are coming Take out a subscription to our US expands arms sales to Indonesia up with the same answers that got paper to help us keep ge ing out an James Balowski them down this rabbit hole in the fi rst alternative to the corporate media. reports from Jakarta. place. Be er still, get involved in the 21 World in struggle The seemingly agreed strategy struggle alongside us, and help build coming out of this election from the an alternative to the madness of our From Manila to New York, our side is fi ghting back. Labor MPs is unite behind a new current system.. REDFLAG WHAT IS REDFLAG ABOUT? We live in a world where “political This politics of resistance is Telling the truth. The capitalist press is full of lies, distortions and right struggle” is a sullied phrase. The what Red Flag is about. wing bias. We need an alternative press, free from corporate interests and term evokes dishonesty and the We took the name Red Flag government spin, to provide news and analysis of major developments in kind of vacuous, self-serving antics because it represents solidarity, our world. that are on display whenever we struggle and internationalism, but Supporting resistance look at the major parties of Aus- also because it stands for socialism . Those that own and control the corporate media tralia politics. If the parliament is – a world organised to meet human are hostile to people fi ghting for their rights. They make money out of the all there is to “politics”, then it is need, not the interests of the rich exploitation and oppression of workers and the poor. Red Flag is a paper on wholly understandable that most minority that currently in control. the side of the oppressed, telling the story from our side and giving solidarity people want nothing at all to do Out of the struggles against the to those in struggle. with it. injustices of our current system, Fighting for socialism. Red Flag is about more than just highlighting problems But there is another kind of pol- we want to be part of building a with the system, or supporting individual struggles. It campaigns to win itics: the politics of resistance and new socialist movement that can people to socialism, to convince them that the revolutionary overthrow of struggle. Over the past few years mount a challenge to the whole capitalism is the solution to the problems of society. – from the Arab revolutions to Oc- structure of capitalist rule. This is Intervening in struggles cupy to the resistance to austerity an enormous task. But the courage . Red Flag’s socialist politics doesn’t just mean in Europe – people have time and of the thousands of people resist- general arguments for socialism. Red Flag is an interventionist paper, again taken to the streets, organ- ing oppression and injustice from bringing socialist arguments to the debates of today about how we can best ised in their communities and their one side of the planet to another, mount a fi ghtback, what tactics and strategies are needed to take on the workplaces, and set themselves the gives us confi dence that the future right. And while Red Flag will fi ght for the views of Socialist Alternative, the task of fi ghting for a be er world. belongs to all of us. paper is also a forum in which crucial questions on the left can be debated. 10 SEPTEMBER 2013 3 FLAG Newspaper of Socialist Alternative RED www.redfl ag.org.au How Labor let the bastards in cent. workers’ rights and conditions, no That campaign involved hundreds Mick Armstrong The two party preferred swing mandate for a wave of cuts. of thousands of striking workers tak- to the Liberals of 3.5 per cent was Abbo won because Labor did ing to the streets and had the poten- In what passes for democracy in Aus- enough to give them a clear majori- not deliver for workers. He kept to tial not only to defeat WorkChoices tralia, the vilest of the vile has won. ty of seats, but this was no landslide. his small target strategy and was very but to begin to revive working class Labor lost because for six years it It was less than the 5 percent swing careful not to endorse publicly the confi dence to stand up to the whole ruled, just like the Liberals before it, John Howard got in 1996. wish list of anti-worker demands the neoliberal off ensive. We had a chance for the big end of town and did noth- Labor still gained almost 47 per Liberals’ big business backers cham- to begin to turn the tide and rebuild ing to advance the interests of its cent of the two party preferred vote.