The Genie Is out of the Bottle: Women’s March Heralds Radical Upsurge in U.S Politics

There is a radicalization unfolding in this country.  It reached its highest point Saturday.  A half-million people turned out for the Women’s March on Washington. In New York City, 400,000 people marched through mid-Manhattan. Hundreds of thousands of people also turned out in Los Angeles, Chicago and other major cities while smaller locales like Portland, Maine saw 10,000 and Ann Arbor, Michigan 5,000.  We saw history being made by people taking control of their own lives. These were some of the largest demonstrations of people we have ever had.

It started with Occupy Wall Street.  Then Black Lives Matter.  Three years ago 49 percent people under the age of 30 told pollsters they preferred socialism over capitalism. This spread.  In his run for the Democratic nomination, Bernie Sanders received 13 million votes while running as a self-proclaimed socialist. Now, Saturday's historical outpouring.

Why?  Real wages haven't gone up in 40 years.  Unemployment and underemployment is huge, perhaps 20 percent and double that for black people.  New jobs are temporary and low paying.  The rich are getting richer. Health care and education are good only for the well off. Half the population is either poor or near poor.

Trump’s solutions are BS.  Scapegoating Mexicans and Muslims, building a wall,
creating a registry, deporting young people, strengthening local cops, spending even more on the military, lowering taxes for the rich, charging tariffs, cutting health insurance, drilling for more oil, fracking for natural gas, denying climate change.  All of this will do nothing to relieve people's suffering.  

So they hit the streets.  Millions. Diverse. Young. Trump had only been in office one day.  The genie is out of the bottle and the ruling class must be terrified of what will come.   They didn't want Trump in the first place.  But their candidate Clinton didn't cut the mustard.  People didn't like or trust her and not enough of them would vote for her.  So the elite tried to delegitimize Trump with the lie that the Russians interfered with the election.  This only added fuel to the fire.

Saturday's tremendous outpouring first and foremost sent a message to the people there:  look how many and how powerful we are.  It sent a message to the American people.  All the marchers have families and friends.  Multiply three million times this.  

It was mobilizations like this that ended the war in Vietnam.  Antiwar sentiment spread to the soldiers over there.  They wouldn't fight.  They stopped fighting and it was all over.  That's what could happen here.  Trump could be all over.

We know now we can stop Trump and his deplorable cabinet full of billionaires and generals. He found a fox for every chicken coup.  These people want to end public education, pollute the environment, impoverish workers, control women's bodies and further unleash the cops. 

Can they get away with this?  After Saturday, I think not. The man has been in office but a few days and his plan to "make America great again " might succeed but ironically in a way he didn't plan on.  He mobilized the American people who are out there acting in their own interests for a change.  When this happens and it doesn't happen often people make their own history as Howard Zinn taught us.  They realize they have a world to win