Sandy was a winner
I was saddened to read about the death of comrade Sandy Spiers. Unfortunately I didn't manage to contribute to the recent Zoom memorial in her honor. I first met Sandy when she lived in Minneapolis where she joined Progressive Labor Party and I was helping to organize for the Party in the Midwest some 40 odd years ago. It was mid-winter and Sandy took me out to the university campus to sell CHALLENGE.
Being a Brooklynite, I was not exactly used to sub-zero temperature but Sandy told me it was standard operating procedure for the Minneapolis comrades. She instructed me how to snip off three of the ends of our gloves to be able to grasp the paper and still keep the rest of our hands "warm" as we hawked CHALLENGE.
Sandy was a winner! A truly inspiring comrade, fighting for communism.
*****
Radio red tackles state capitalists and “communists”
On a radio talk show with guest speakers talking about the protests in Cuba and Haiti I expressed a view that the latest capitalist crisis was behind the numerous worker revolts worldwide. I also said the so-called “communist” countries like Cuba which spends billions on luxury tourist hotels while workers suffer lack of housing, apartheid vaccines and poverty and China which has the most billionaires and unreported worker rebellions are not unlike Haiti where workers are unemployed and starving because of capitalism. I concluded that workers need a real communist revolution to end capitalist inequality, poverty, racism, sexism and endless wars.
Then one of the speakers referred to me saying, “Comrade Joe should realize that criticizing the Cuban government lumps him with U.S. imperialists who are trying to destroy the Cuban revolution.” That same speaker’s counter-revolutionary criticism could be brought against comrades who criticize the Palestine Liberation Organization as really supporters of Israel in Palestine or brought against criticizing the billionaire class in “communist” China. All of these criticisms are part of historic capitalist attacks on real communists who first opposed capitalist wage differentials and privileges in the Soviet Union which eventually destroyed their attempt to end the capitalist profit system.
Comrades need to continue to expose phony socialist state capitalists and “communists” who put profits before people's lives. Workers must educate and advocate for real communism that can destroy capitalism’s profit horrors.
*****
Response: excellent, but don’t use “riot”
The two articles on the Newark Summer Project in CHALLENGE (7/21 and 8/4) were excellent,  especially the second article on pages 1 and 8 of CHALLENGE of 8/4) . On page 8 of the 2nd article under the subhead “Criticism as Opportunity for Progress,” the article points to several aspects of the Summer Project that need improvement.  This is excellent!
This is how we will prevent ourselves and our Party from becoming the "loyal opposition" as opposed to the revolutionary communist Progressive Labor Party (PLP) that we have been since 1965.  Our newer members are the ones who will carry on the struggle in the near and distant future.  It is crucial that our newer comrades understand the difficulties that they will face AND that the only way to NOT fall prey to capitalist ideas and practices is through criticism and self-criticism ALONG WITH revolutionary practice with our co-workers and our base.
One small point:  In the first article there is a quote from a speaker who said that the: "Main legacy of the civil rights movement and those riots ... " [emphasis added]  The Black rebellions during the1960s were rebellions,  NOT riots.  It is important to explain to workers the significance of the difference.  In fact,  the Progressive Labor Movement  in 1964 [which became the PLP] was the ONLY organization using the word rebellion to describe these fightbacks.