Black Agenda Report
Black Agenda Report
News, commentary and analysis from the black left.

  • Home
  • Africa
  • African America
  • Education
  • Environment
  • International
  • Media and Culture
  • Political Economy
  • Radio
  • US Politics
  • War and Empire
  • omnibus

Listen to Black Agenda Radio on the Progressive Radio Network, with Glen Ford and Nellie Bailey – Week of December 23, 2012
27 Dec 2012
🖨️ Print Article

 

Bill to Head Off U.S. War Against Syria

“It has actually reached the point that presidents don’t give a darn about the Congress,” said Harlem Democrat Charles Rangel, one of six congressional signatories to a letter urging President Obama to ask Congress’s authorization before waging war on Syria. Rangel appeared at a Capitol Hill press conference held by North Carolina Republican Rep. Walter Jones, author of legislation calling for impeachment for unauthorized presidential war-making. Patrick Lang, a former head of Defense Intelligence Agency operations in the Middle East and North Africa, said “the government of the United States has embarked on a course which, if followed, will lead to military intervention in Syria.”

American Revolution was a Racist Revolt

Dr. Gerald Horne, professor of History and African American Studies at the University of Houston, said, the American revolt of 1776 against British rule “was basically a successful revolt of racist settlers. It was akin to Rhodesia, in 1965, assuming that Ian Smith and his cabal had triumphed. It was akin to the revolt of the French settlers in Algeria, in the 1950s and 1960s, assuming those French settlers had triumphed.” Dr. Horne explores the racist roots on the American Revolution in his new book, Negroes of the Crown. “It was very difficult to construct a progressive republic in North America after what was basically a racist revolt,” said Horne. “The revolt was motivated in no small part by the fact that abolitionism was growing in London…. This is one of the many reasons more Africans by an order of magnitude fought against the rebels in 1776, than fought alongside them.”

Black Soldiers Crucial to American War of Independence

Black soldiers “were the most experienced fighters” at Yorktown, comprising a quarter of the soldiers under General George Washington’s command in the decisive battle, said Alan Gilbert, author of Black Patriots and Loyalists: Fighting for Emancipation in the War for Independence. Gilbert disputes estimates that only 5,000 Blacks fought for American separation from Britain. However, far more Blacks served with the British, who promised freedom, while Washington’s Continental Army did not.

 

Black Agenda Radio on the Progressive Radio Network is hosted by Glen Ford and Nellie Bailey. A new edition of the program airs every Monday at 11:00am ET on PRN. Length: One hour.


More Stories


  • Things Don’t Get No Better
    Ann Garrison, BAR Contributing Editor
    Things Don’t Get No Better
    13 May 2020
    The current season of sickness – biological and political – is, indeed, strange, with no hint of a better day any time soon.
  • Archaic capitalism’s COVID cops?
    Raymond Nat Turner, BAR poet-in-residence
    Archaic capitalism’s COVID cops?
    13 May 2020
    What if COVID-19 came and drove down crime by 40%? What if capitalism’s cops be- came useless 
  • The Sheepdog Caucus and So-Called “Democratic” Socialists
    Quetzal Cáceres
    The Sheepdog Caucus and So-Called “Democratic” Socialists
    13 May 2020
    The “democratic” socialist worldview supports socialism except in places where people are actually trying to build it.
  • US Blocks Vote on UN’s Bid for Global Ceasefire Amid COVID-19
    Telesur
    US Blocks Vote on UN’s Bid for Global Ceasefire Amid COVID-19
    13 May 2020
    The US veto trashes the UN’s efforts to convince armed factions in more than a dozen countries to call for temporary truces as the world battles the pandemic.
  • BAR Book Forum: Symposium on Sarah Haley’s "No Mercy Here" 
    Jennifer S. Leath
    BAR Book Forum: Symposium on Sarah Haley’s "No Mercy Here" 
    13 May 2020
    Georgia’s convict leasing system was created to devour Black people of both genders.
  • Load More
Subscribe
connect with us
about us
contact us