The 2016 Olympics are to be held in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil in August. They will be held up to the world as a beacon of peace & camaraderie, in of a backdrop of poverty & squalor. These should be considered the ‘Last Olympics’– and here is why. Nothing in human civilization will ever be the same after this year. These obscene levels of social inequality will soon come to a head and violently burst onto everyone’s lives. It will appear on television screens broadcasting these Olympic games (and political conventions) which pretend that reality isn’t real, and that this grand charade can continue indefinitely. It can’t and won’t, because it’s now too real and too in-your-face to ignore. The levels of corruption (which are killing all of us) are willfully ignored– so a tiny few can be billionaires & play god. Capitalism is now a system which can no longer sustain itself.
The politicking involved in keeping Russian athletes out of international competition– through targeted doping testing, has reached a new level of corruption with the Maria Sharapova ‘provisional suspension’; which denies her (and other athletes like her) basic rights such as a fair & speedy trial. [1] The institution of the Olympics is now entirely in question, from those who organize, run, and profit from the games; to all those who compete in them. From bribery & favoritism among its officials, to rampant PED use among its competitors (from all nations); the Olympic games now reek of dirty money, corruption and cheating– even to the most casual sports fan. [2]
Speaking of Russia, the first great socialist revolution in human history happened there in November 1917. The infant U.S.S.R. was still a poor and backwards nation, bled white by a World War and then a cruel civil war. Its leadership died (Lenin), and then was purged (Trotsky); ossifying into Stalinism by the late 1920’s. This historical stillbirth existed for 74 years, until it collapsed back into capitalism (to the complete surprise of every bourgeois intellectual), in December of 1991. Trotsky (the last classical Marxist) had predicted & discussed this eventuality in 1936, in The Revolution Betrayed.
The next great socialist revolution will happen in our lifetimes. It will start in the U.S., and then spread globally in permanence. Capitalism will collapse with a sudden cardiac arrest of it’s leadership, as the working people (and the soldiers that make up all the military forces) will march en mass on the final bunkers of Langley, NORAD, the Pentagon & White House… They will seize Wall Street, the Fed, and all the banks & corporations… The media will be overrun and reprogrammed to tell the truth and expose the real class enemies of the working people, so they can be mercilessly hunted down and brought to justice in chains– if they don’t kill themselves first. This is the only endgame for humanity’s survival.
As this is the last U.S. election before a certain civil war (and possible world war), preparations must be made by the working people– in the form of education & militancy. A reliable revolutionary organization must be built. The Republican party will not stand idly by, if defeated on November 8. They will simply regather themselves and whip up their base in preparation for a military brass/ CIA-led right-wing coup. If the Republicans do manage to win (or steal) the November election, fascism becomes a near certainty.
Any political party that unleashes Donald Trump on the people, then begs their electorate to save them from themselves, needs to be forever removed (by the working people) from the arena of political leadership. Trump & his right-wing fascist base must be ruthlessly exposed and physically confronted when necessary, as they will never back down to reasonable words alone.
The greater challenge to revolutionary socialism in the U.S. will be the Democratic party, which still deceives too many who have some (but not nearly enough) brains. They are now the party of business-as-usual, represented by Barack Obama & Hillary Clinton. Bernie Sanders is nothing more than a figment of limited imagination & ability. His purpose to the Democrats is to provide left-wing cover to a party that controls the workers through mafia-enforced unions & identity politics; both of which are thoroughly corrupt and beyond any reform.
When liberalism collapses, it collaborates with the jackboot of fascism for its own protection, forever remaining the historical class enemy of working people. History & human civilization won’t escape the writings of Karl Marx & Leon Trotsky; we will either socialize or annihilate ourselves.
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Extra credit reading on the subject– published 3-31-16 @ wsws.org