I think it's extremely dangerous in many
ways like the ones I mentioned and
others that you're quite familiar with
on the other hand there's plenty of
opportunities that we should bear in mind
that the country has become much more
civilized in the past 50 or 60 years
a meeting like this could not have been
conceivable in 1969-70 the kinds of
commitment and engagement that you and
many others like you are apart committed
to is something quite new and there have
been many advances and achievement
women's rights civil rights generally
rights of gays opposition to aggressions
wave of environmental concerns that even
exist at that time there's been
tremendous progress that means that
struggles today start from a much
higher plane than they did not many years
ago at the time when Harry was marching
in Selma it was a much harsher world than it
is today
the reason is that plenty of people did
commit themselves to constant
dedicated struggle and there were plenty
of achievements and that goes back in
American history
no need to review it but the earlier
period is one of total horror after all the
country was founded on two incredible
crimes
unbelievable crimes that one ex..
virtual extermination of the indigenous
population, its kind of migrant crisis in
the kind we don't think about today and
form of slavery which is the most
vicious in history and is in fact the
basis for a large part of the wealth
and economic development of the
United States, England, France and others
that's history when Donald Trump talks
about making the country great again for
many people it wasn't that great
quite the opposite [Applause]
But the point is there has been plenty of
progress because people facing
much harsher conditions than we do
didn't give up
that's an important lesson. Furthermore
even the election itself suggests major
opportunities. For one thing as you know
the Democrats actually had a
considerable majority of the vote and if you
look at the younger voters, the people
who will shape the future they were
overwhelmingly anti Trump and even more
overwhelmingly pro Sanders [applause]
you should also bear in mind
what a remarkable phenomenon the Sanders
campaign [applause] there's somebody unknown came from
nowhere practically no one in the country
knew who he was, he was using words like
socialism which used to be a real curse word
No corporate support, no media support,
no support from the wealthy
everything that has always been crucial
to winning elections,
mostly we have bought elections, had none of it
and practically took over one of
the two major parties, that could have taken it over
if it hadn't been for shenanigans [applause]
It was primarily driven by young people all
of these are very hopeful signs, means there are plenty of
things that can be done there are
opportunities that can be grasped and no
time to run through them but there are
plenty of them and its really very much
in our hands and among the younger of
you in your hands to carry us forward in
this long long arduous path towards
trying to create a civilized society and a decent world.
A lot of dicussion in recent weeks about
the role of workers, of the
working class in this election of
Trump's supposed appeal to white workers
and, Harry you know that the civil rights
movement, as it was growing
and developing needed and was fueled
as well by progressive unions like 11 99
and the auto workers and others that
give it strength and organization and
resources I'm wondering how you're looking at
this issue, cause Noam as you mentioned all
the young people the problem is that the
young people of the so-called creative
classes are increasingly concentrating
in the big cities they're in Seattle and
they're in Chicago and New York and
and the issue then is what happens
in the rest of the country. You know back in the
sixties and seventies we used to say you
gotta go back out and organize
organize in the communities from which
you came from
How do you see this whole analysis of
quote: "loss of the working class", to sort of
progressive politics that we're
hearing in the commercial when the
corporate breast.. Well take a look again
at the last few elections. In..  Many
of the Trump voters
among the white working class voted for
Obama. They were deluded by the slogans
of the campaign, you may recall that the 2008
campaign was based on the slogan hope
and change
well many people voted rightly for hope
and change. The working class has
suffered not disastrously but severely
from the neoliberal policies of the past
generation pretty much from 1979
so if you look, say, just take the 2007 the
peak of what economists were calling the
economic miracle right before the crash
2007 American workers had real wages
lower considerably lower than in 1979
before these policies were instituted
they lost it
listen to Alan Greenspan who during the
height of the euphoria over the economy
he was called St Alan, the greatest
economist of all time he testified to
Congress explaining the basis for the
success of the economy that he was
running. He said it was based on growing
worker insecurity, growing worker
insecurity, meaning if workers are
beaten down enough and intimidated
enough and if their organizations
their unions are sufficiently destroyed
that they can't ask for higher wages and
for decent benefits
then it's good for the economy, creates a
healthy economy by some measures we know
the measure well all of this has
happened and the working class has
suffered from it they had a real need
for hope and change
well they didn't get hope they didn't
get change.
I don't usually agree with sarah palin
but I think she she nailed it when she
asked at one point that where's all this
hopey changey business number wasn't it
so no hope no change already it shows
very quickly in mid term future elections
this election a comment came along and
offering hope and change and they're
going for it
suppose that people like you
the people who formed the Sanders
movement would present an authentic
constructive program for real
hope and change it would win these
people back
I think many of the Trump voters
many of the trump voters could have voted for
Sanders if there had been the right
kind of activism organization and
those are possibilities
it's been done in the past under much
harsher circumstances organizing white
working people in Indiana is a lot
easier than what the Freedom Riders
tried to do in the South six years ago
much is it takes work that can be done
my feeling is that a core part of the
progressive program is to rebuild the
organized structure of the labor
movement which all throughout modern
history has been in the forefront of
progressive change and that's not
possible either been beaten down pretty
severely in the first generation has
been worse before they go back to the
nineteen-twenties a period which is not
unlike today in many ways the the guild
today's you know the the labor movement
was virtually destroyed Wilson Woodrow
Wilson's Red Scare practically wiped it
out there had been a militant activist
labor movement there's nothing left of
it in nineteen twenties by the
nineteen-thirties it provides the
militant labor action organization of
the CIO overcame racist conflict laid
the basis for the New Deal
programs which were highly beneficial to
the extent that they remain they remain
beneficial that can happen again
no reason why it can't
