Global Research

Mass protests in the US and elsewhere over racist killings of Black men like George Floyd aren’t good enough.

They divert attention from an array of core issues ignored by officialdom and establishment media.

Justice won’t be served unless they’re all addressed and corrected, systemic change that requires longterm struggle.

Days, weeks, even a few months of street protests alone will fail like always before, especially if pacified by cosmetic changes alone.

Tinkering around the edges alone assures status quo forever wars, inequity and injustice for ordinary people while privileged ones enjoy gravy train benefits.

That’s the American way that’s replicated throughout the West and elsewhere worldwide — governance of, by, and for special interests at the expense of the exploited vast majority.

All lives matter, those most disadvantaged harmed most by institutionalized fantasy democracy, racism, inequity and injustice in the US and worldwide.

Systemic change that’s needed demands going for the following — without compromise:

Money power put back in public hands where it belongs, in the US by abolishing the Wall Street owned Fed and giving back to Congress what’s constitutionally mandated.

Break up and prohibit too-big-to-fail banks, including an end to allowing commercial and investment banking combinations, along with letting them own insurance companies.

End countless billions of dollars of corporate handouts and bailouts.

Rescind the Commodity Futures Modernization Act that greatly contributed to speculative excess, including no regulatory oversight of derivatives and leveraging that turned Wall Street more than ever into a casino

Enact progressive policies, eliminating neoliberal ones, including force-fed austerity on ordinary people, the nation’s wealth used for everyone, not just the privileged few.

Mandate social justice in the US by constitutional amendment, including universal healthcare, public education to the highest levels, along with human, civil and organized labor rights, what was omitted in the US founding document.

Breaking up and banning corporate monopolies and oligopolies.

Getting money entirely out of politics.

Changing rigged elections to free, fair and open ones.

In the US, ending one-party rule with two right wings, fostering a climate that encourages parties independent from the current system.

Mandate ecosanity over raping and plundering the earth for maximum profits.

Reestablish and strengthen the vanishing middle class.

Reinstate progressive taxes, requiring the wealthy and business to pay their fair share.

Slash military spending, declaring a new era or peace and stability by beating swords into plowshares, using the revenue for rebuilding US infrastructure and enhancing social programs.

End corporate personhood, the US gulag prison system, capital punishment, and unrestrained predatory capitalist practices.

The difference between the latter and my decades of experience in small family business is worlds apart — public service v. big business rapaciousness for maximum profits in cahoots with big government, an unholy alliance against peace, equity and justice.

Todays America is the product of its founders — a men-only Wall Street crowd equivalent, given their economic status and prominence.

Designers of the nation’s founding document were bankers, merchants, lawyers, politicians, judges, and other wheeler-dealers.

The Constitution and Bill of Rights five years later served their interests, not the general welfare — notably not African Americans considered property, not people.

Not women at the time, considered child-rearers and homemakers alone, not decision-makers, not independent from their husbands.

The general welfare was off the table, special interests alone served, not ordinary America — fantasy democracy institutionalized from inception.

In his last State of the Union address on January 11, 1944, Franklin Roosevelt proposed a second bill of rights, economic ones, because original ones in the Constitution’s first 10 amendments “proved inadequate to assure us equality…”

FDR didn’t live long enough to push for what he proposed to become the law of the land post-WW II.

Economic rights he proposed are more greatly needed now, what should be core demands of protesters on US streets. They included the following:

• Full employment with a guaranteed living wage adjusted to the real cost of living the way it was calculated pre-1990.
• Freedom from unfair competition and monopolies.
• Ending homelessness by assuring housing for all.
• Universal healthcare and public education to the highest levels.
• Enhanced social security beyond what New Deal legislation provided — that’s greatly eroded today.

All of the above and more are needed for egalitarian rule over governance serving privileged interests alone like now.

Roosevelt died on April 12, 1945, his economic bill of rights along with him.

The vast majority of protesters on US streets know nothing about it, along with little about the nation’s dark history from before its inception to the present day.

Ending institutionalized racism and police brutality are vital objectives.

It’s not enough. Key is ending all forms of inequity and injustice along with forever wars on humanity at home and abroad.

These are goals to pursue by committed longterm struggle.

Achieving them won’t come any other way.

Iconoclast muckraking journalist IF Stone once explained the following:

“The only kinds of fights worth fighting are those you are going to lose, because somebody has to fight them and lose and lose and lose until someday, somebody who believes as you do wins…”

That’s what longterm struggle is all about — fighting the good fight for peace, equity and justice so one day what’s now unattainable is possible.

If that’s not worth fighting for, what is?

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Award-winning author Stephen Lendman lives in Chicago. He can be reached at [email protected]. He is a Research Associate of the Centre for Research on Globalization (CRG)

His new book as editor and contributor is titled “Flashpoint in Ukraine: US Drive for Hegemony Risks WW III.”

http://www.claritypress.com/LendmanIII.html

Visit his blog site at sjlendman.blogspot.com.

Featured image is from Rise Up Times