Comrade Toussaint

United States: The news received last Thursday that the President of the United States has COVID-19 has set off a storm of speculation and “Leftist” catharsis across social media. The two ruling class parties, the Democrats and Republicans, have been exposed even further as two sides of the same dirty coin. Joe Biden, the Democratic nominee for President, has been seen wishing the President well and has suspended so-called “negative” ads against Trump. Even the “Left” Democrats, represented by the centrist Bernie Sanders, have been calling for unity of Americans in light of Trump’s diagnosis. Trump himself appeared to have been floored by the news, repeatedly asking his aides and medical personnel whether or not he would survive the illness. The news was received by the online Left with a stream of memes and expressed desire that this would mark the demise of Trump. We note that despite promoting the use of the drug hydroxychloroquine and the promotion of all sorts of quack physicians, Trump himself did not follow his own “medical advice”. Instead, he received the very best care under the very best physicians, in a luxurious presidential suite at the Walter Reed Army Medical Center.

While we share the joy of the masses when enemies of the people suffer, we who are serious about the necessity of ending capitalism-imperialism all over the world must realize that we cannot rely on the forces of old age or nature to deal with our contradictions and problems. The demise of the current manager of Yankee imperialism from COVID-19 will not, in any meaningful way, impact the majority of the world’s people both at home and abroad who suffer from Yankee imperialism as a system. The Left, like most Americans, still suffers from the bourgeois cult of personality syndrome that fails to take into account the existance of a well organized, disciplined system to continue the system of exploitation. This system works regardless of who holds the office of President. The entire United States government exists solely to exploit and rob the people of the world of the fruits of their labor. This antagonistic contradiction can only be solved through the formation of a Maoist Communist Party deeply rooted in the masses of people, guided by Maoism applied to the concrete conditions of the American imperialist metropole. We have seen many progressives and even so-called revolutionaries falling to the “we must stop Trump” disease, using all sorts of mental gymnastics to justify taking the coward’s way out and falling in line behind Biden. We encourage those to study seriously the Obama and Clinton periods and what happened to the masses of people, particularly New Afrikan people under Clinton and Indigenous people during the Obama Era, and abandon this false hope and foolishness. We have also seen progressives praising and lauding social-imperialist China as a contrast to the capital-imperialist United States. We remind readers of Mao’s warning that social-imperialism is simply socialism in words, imperialism in deeds. Revolutionaries have the duty not to fall into this trap and must consistently make an analysis of things as they are.

Finally, a word on Facebook and Twitter forbidding celebration of Trump’s diagnosis. Be mindful of the fact that these entities are dangerous, turning over information to the police and other law enforcement agencies. Revolutionaries must be in organizations where security culture is taught and followed, and where breaches are dealt with. We have seen many so-called revolutionaries making public posts regarding their whereabouts, their mental health, events they are hosting or attending, and various other things that make it all to easy for law enforcement and street fascists such as the PBs and various lone wolves to identify and track progressives and revolutionaries. We encourage readers to use social media not for catharsis reasons but as a tool to help build contacts and spread political education information and other relevant things. We also remind readers that the lowest and deepest masses are not to be found in Leftbook groups, on social media, they are to be found at bus stops, working temporary or migrant labor jobs, or hustling every day for a basic living. Go among them, learn from and teach them, and build the revolutionary movement into an impregnable fortress that can weather and resist repression.