CounterPunch Exclusives

CounterPunch Exclusives

The Life Work of Jesse Jackson

Jesse Jackson in 1983. Public Domain.

His life work was mobilizing members of an underclass that was presumed not to exist where the “American Dream” reigned. In his second run at the presidency in 1988, he found them by the millions.

His Rainbow Coalition spanned the whole of society: farmers, white unionists, feminists, Hispanics, students, environmentalists, and a full 95% of black people.

Jackson flatly rejected the notion that Americans had any common cause with the likes of Batista, Diem, Pinochet, the Shah, Somoza, and Marcos. He called for a freeze on nuclear weapons, large cuts in Pentagon spending, withdrawal of U.S. troops from Europe, the elimination of first-strike MX, Cruise, and Trident D-5 missiles, as well as the canceling of Reagan’s first-strike enabling Star Wars delusion. Alone among candidates, he held that Palestinians were a people deserving of national rights and a homeland.

Billed by the capitalist media as a non-viable regional candidate........

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