In several “news” articles posted over the past few weeks, oil and gas industry and their allies argue that a local Community Bill of Rights ballot initiative submitted by Youngstown voters is “too expensive” for the community. Inside Sources  (http://www.insidesources.com/activists-costing-youngstown-anti-fracking-bill-of-rights/), WKBN News (http://wkbn.com/2017/07/27/keeping-fracking-issue-on-ballot-costly-for-youngstown/) and The DailyDigger  (http://www.thedailydigger.com/) present facts and figures provided by the industry (note: Inside Sources and The Daily Digger are the industry), leaving out the full story.

The Bigger Picture

Florida 2000 Case Study

In 2000, Democrat Al Gore, the incumbent Vice President, won the nationwide presidential vote tally by more than 500,000 votes. But for the first time since 1876, a Constitutional crisis arose over the alignment of the Electoral College. The final decision was thrown to the state of Florida (which had also been “in play” in 1876).

The Bush campaign was coordinated by Karl Rove. The Florida election was officially controlled by Republican Secretary of State Katherine Harris, who openly supported Bush as the co-chair of his election campaign.

The GOP campaign employed a wide range of tactics reminiscent of the Jim Crow era to cut into the turnout among tens of thousands blacks and Hispanics, who favored Gore by as much as 9:1. Among other things, state police and other law enforcement agencies physically intimidated potential voters in predominantly black areas of Orlando and elsewhere.

On August 13, the day after activist Heather Heyer was murdered and many others injured at the Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville, about 500 leftists gathered at Goodale Park and marched to a solidarity vigil at the Ohio Statehouse.

Several who spoke from an open mic at the vigil addressed a fundamental question: What is the most effective way for the Left to combat racism and white supremacy? Can racism be eliminated in a capitalist system? Or is racism inextricably linked to and driven by capitalism?

 “We cannot rely on the police to protect us from violence,” said Rachel Reiser of the International Socialist Organization. “Right-wing vigilante violence, in many ways, is beneficial to the state. Right-wing violence against black people, Muslims, queer people, women, leftists, and activists is not prosecuted like it should be, because they are doing the state’s job for them, which is to keep oppressed people scared to death of fighting against the system.”

As most everyone knows, white supremacists descended upon my city of Charlottesville, VA, this past weekend, and chaos, violence and tragedy ensued. I’ve been thinking since then about the concept of supremacy and how odious it is–as if one race were purer and better than another, as if one color of skin were of a higher virtue than another.

But it has also crossed my mind that most Americans are American supremacists, thinking that their country is the greatest in the world, believing that America has the wisdom and the right to decide the fate of every other nation in the world, and that those decisions should be based on American interests alone.

The idea of American supremacy is as odious to me as the idea as white supremacy. As American supremacists, we don’t even negotiate with other nations anymore. We impose sanctions and call that diplomacy. Sanctions are a form of force.

As American supremacists, we don’t try to see another country’s point of view. Our message is: Do it in the way that best supports American interests, or else we will crush you economically and militarily.

1. Let’s start with the obvious. Charlottesville, Virginia, and Charlotte, North Carolina, are actually two completely different places in the world. The flood of concern and good wishes for those of us here in Charlottesville is wonderful and much appreciated. That people can watch TV news about Charlottesville, remember that I live in Charlottesville, and send me their kind greetings addressed to the people of Charlotte is an indication of how common the confusion is. It’s not badly taken; I have nothing against Charlotte. It’s just a different place, seventeen times the size. Charlottesville is a small town with the University of Virginia, a pedestrian downtown street, and very few monuments. The three located right downtown are for Robert E. Lee, Stonewall Jackson, and the Confederacy. Neither Lee nor Jackson had anything to do with Charlottesville, and their statues were put up in whites-only parks in the 1920s.