A Black Agenda Radio commentary by executive editor Glen Ford Detroit’s “crisis” is a yet another form of “disaster capitalism,” orchestrated by corporate America. “Wall Street is creating new law and new models for the total subjugation of American society to the Lords of Capital.”
Detroit: The Bell Tolls for All of Us A Black Agenda Radio commentary by executive editor Glen Ford “Those who would strip away democratic freedoms and privatize the public sphere have always found it easier to mount their offensives against heavily Black regions and sectors of society.”
In Detroit, even the thin gruel of democracy that America advertises to the world, has ceased to exist. Not one of its 700,000 residents retains the political rights of citizens, those rights having been usurped by the agents of Wall Street: Governor Rick Snyder and bankruptcy lawyer Kevyn Orr, the Lone Ranger and Tonto who were the sole authorities
Or, maybe not. Direct rule by Wall Street, which is the real meaning of the Emergency Financial Manager regime, is not some idea especially concocted for Detroit. It is the political and economic superstructure that the plutocracy envisions for the whole country – for the entire planet, if they can get away with it. Due to the particular racial history of the United States, where Black citizenship rights have always been deemed illegitimate, those who would strip away democratic freedoms and privatize the public sphere have always found it easier to mount their offensives against heavily Black regions and sectors of society. White people with identical interests in democracy and fairness in schools, public services and in the workplace root for the plutocrats when Blacks are under attack, never imagining that the same weapons will soon be turned on them .
“Their mission is to render the judgment of capital that Detroit is too poor, in its present demographic composition, for participation in the democratic order.”
Thus, Detroit’s dissolution is perceived as a Black problem – more politely referred to by its euphemism: an “urban” crisis.
However, Wall Street and its mercenary law firms, like Kevyn Orr’s godfathers at Jones Day disenfranchised
Primary elections are scheduled for Detroit, in August. Mayor Dave Bing Ken Cockrel Jr
For Black Agenda Radio, I’m Glen Ford. On the web, go to BlackAgendaReport.com.
This article first appeared in The Guardian.
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