San Francisco --- In what appeared to be the biggest political rally in the city since the renewal of bombing of Iraq in March 2003, tens of thousands of oppressed nation people took to the streets to demand legalization for migrant workers. Comrades distributed hundreds of MIM Notes and fliers demanding the abolition of all illegitimate borders , particularly the one separating the United $tates from Mexico.

There were many differences between May Day 2006 and March 30, 2003 in San Francisco. Though the masses of May Day demonstrators clogging the streets blocked all traffic for hours, there was no concerted effort to shut down the financial district as happened in 2003. 2003 had greater stress on "direct action." While the response to the bombing of Iraq was probably 80 to 90 percent white, May Day was closer to 90 to 95% oppressed nationals by our estimates.

The latter difference being the more decisive, we at MIM place more hopes in progressive change in the recent rise of resistance from the oppressed nations.

While there were more strong anti-imperialist sentiments being expressed at the Iraq rallies, they were accompanied with blatant amerikan chauvinism. The main organizers of the direct actions to shut down the financial district in 2003 issued a statement for the one year anniversary actions in 2004 accusing Bechtel of "transferring wealth from the majority of the people in the US and public services to big corporations and the wealthy." (1) The message was clear, less stolen wealth for Bechtel CEOs, more for the rest of amerikkka. Those people who chained themselves outside of Bechtel that day generally acknowledged that they had the privilege to risk arrest and felt that was their way to express resistance. The migrants that risk arrest, deportation and loss of livelihood for merely marching and demanding basic humyn rights clearly took direct action themselves.

The most advanced of the Iraq War demonstrators want to believe that only finance capital owes reparations, and mostly to white people inside Amerika. They offer crumbs to the migrant workers. In contrast, the May Day rally targetted white nation consciousness generally-- Lou Dobbs, the Minutemen and the ordinary San Francisco pedestrian and driver-- and held a more realistic view of the economic roots of problems, with trillions each year stemming from bloated white so-called worker parasitism.

Here's where the scientific aspect of MIM's analysis comes in. The petty bourgeoisie which led the anti-Iraq war actions was merely fighting in its own self-interest, as the oppressed nationals on May Day 2006 were. The different outcomes stem from the very different class interests of the two groups.

While much of the leadership calling themselves anarchist, socialist, communist or even green expressed excitement in response to the current pro-migrant movement, this was often based on empty identity politics. Their ideas of race and their integrationist goals prevent them from reaching the correct conclusions about how humynity can progress to a peaceful, equitable society. Instead they end up tailing the masses, being forced to take up the correct internationalist slogans after the reformist and religious leaders in the oppressed nations had been chanting them for months.

One man at today's rally held a sign that listed various products and where they came from such as "Coffee from Colombia" and "Cars from Japan" and then asked why not workers from Mexico. Twenty years ago amerikkkans almost forced trade barriers against Japanese cars, but the international bourgeoisie struck a preferable deal to them where Japan voluntarily controlled its exports. (2) If the current pro-migrant movement began and ended with the demand for free movement of goods and labor across borders, then it would be more progressive than oppressor nation protectionism and anti-globalization movements.

MIM doesn't hate amerikkkans the way our critics like to accuse us of. We merely interpret the facts in order to promote social change. People stuck in circular forms of thought, metaphysics and white hysteria believe that the devil placed hate in people which must be conquered by Christian love. In contrast, we at MIM observe, study and analyze first, see who is doing the exploiting and oppressing and then choose our enemies to hate. That's the difference between a dialectical materialist approach and religion. Furthermore, we support all the token Euro-Amerikans who are not cops or spies that showed up at the migrant rights rallies.

Globalization is nothing new: Lenin wrote about it 90 years ago. (3) Neither is protectionism; it helped bring about the Great Depression, eventually resulting in World War II, quickly vindicating Lenin's writings. Amerikans don't understand that globalization is here and you can't stop it. (Nor do they understand the self-defeating strategy of protectionism, but we'll let the imperialists worry about that.) Migrants on the other hand do. Speaker after speaker at the recent rallies stressed that they are here because of neoliberal capitalism as well as imperialist militarism. The May Day crowd has probably read less Marxist economics per capita than the largely student-based anti-war demonstrators; yet they understand globalization better than amerikans because that is their reality.

The best bet we have to convince amerika that it can't just boot out 12 million people from within u.$. borders was put bluntly by a KTVU San Francisco reporter covering the May Day events who said such action would result in "dirty dishes in restaurants, dirty laundry in hotels, and no one to pick fruits and vegetables. The economy would grind to a halt." Though apparently it did not occur to this reporter that the millions of people who peacefully protested today might not be so peaceful if the U.S. government passes the anti-migrant legislation. Many people in this world will fight harder for clean water, basic medicine and an education than amerikans will fight for cheap oil, even if the leaders of white nationalism don't believe it.

The united $tates and Kkkanada are the only countries that don't recognize May 1st as International Workers' Day according to the IWW, despite its origins with the 8 hour work day movement in the united $tates. The fact that it took Mexicans, Salvadoreans, Koreans, Chinese, Filipinos and many other new arrivals to the united $tates to return this piece of proletarian culture to this country should tell people something. The course of history will only continue to shame those white nationalists who put their hopes for progress in amerikkkans.