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

Dr. King’s Televised Challenge to Obama: Tavis Smiley's Anti-War MLK
Glen Ford, BAR executive editor
31 Mar 2010
🖨️ Print Article
by BAR executive editor Glen Ford
Since the onset of the Obama phenomenon, Dr. Martin Luther King’s birth and death days have been “polluted” by false and ahistorical comparisons between Obama and MLK. The two men represent opposite political poles: one, a radical opponent of imperial war and concentrated economic power, the other, an ally of Wall Street and commander-in-chief of “the greatest purveyor of violence in the world today.” In focusing on King, the man of peace, Tavis Smiley’s PBS special corrects a history that has been distorted, sometimes beyond recognition – not the least by the revisionist and poseur in the White House.

Do you need and appreciate Black Agenda Report articles? Please click on the DONATE icon, and help us out, if you can.


More Stories


  • Margaret Kimberley, BAR Executive Editor and Senior Columnist
    Obama Colluded with the Surveillance State Against Trump
    30 Jul 2025
    It is true that Barack Obama used the surveillance state apparatus in an effort to undermine the first Donald Trump administration with the Russiagate fraud.
  • Editors, The Black Agenda Review
    EDITORIAL: Centenary of Negro Emancipation, Marcus Garvey, 1934
    30 Jul 2025
    “When the American and West Indian Negroes get to know their history…they will have a greater love for the African through whom they have sprung.”
  • Ann Garrison, BAR Contributing Editor
    Zionists Accuse Yves Engler of Genocide Denial
    30 Jul 2025
    The Canadian branch of B'nai B'rith has accused author, activist, and political candidate Yves Engler of genocide denial.
  • Jon Jeter
    Betraying Howard Zinn: How the White Left Uses Scholarship to Undermine Black/White Solidarity
    30 Jul 2025
    Howard Zinn showed that scholarship can fuel solidarity and liberation—but now, some white leftists use it to undermine Black struggle.
  • Anthony Karefa Rogers-Wright
    Breaking it Down with Barron: The New York City Mayoral Race, New York City Politics, and a Primer for an Independent Black Revolutionary Polity
    30 Jul 2025
    Charles Barron dissects the NYC mayoral race, Mamdani’s struggles with Black voters, and why independent Black radical politics are essential.
  • Load More
Subscribe
connect with us
about us
contact us