NATO Legally Liable for Ethnic Cleansing of Blacks In Libya
The United States and its European allies are liable for prosecution for mass killings and ethnic cleansing of Black Africans in Libya under the principle of “command responsibility,” but “that’s not going to happen” at the International Criminal Court. The ICC, which has charged Libyan leader Moammar Gaddafi with crimes against humanity, “is a joke and a fraud” and “nothing but an imperialist tool.”
EPA Chief Challenged To Resign Over Obama Pollution Retreat
Renowned federal whistleblower Marsha Coleman-Adebayo challenges Environmental Protection Agency chief Lisa Jackson to resign in the wake of President Obama’s cancellation of new air pollution controls. “Blow the whistle on Mr. Obama,” urged Coleman-Adebayo, whose fight against corruption and big business influence at the EPA led to passage of the landmark NO FEAR legislation to protect whistleblowers, in 2002. EPA chief Jackson is now “in a position where there is a conflict between your conscience and what you’re called upon to do to save your job,” said Coleman-Adebayo. “This could be her Rosa Parks moment. Let’s see what she’s going to do.”
Obama Jobs Scheme Inadequate
The president’s jobs plan “is better than nothing,” but will not make much of a difference in the unemployment crisis, said Doug Henwood, editor of the Left Business Observer. “Obama never really articulated a new path, and therefore has a very, very weak political foundation,” said Henwood. “He fundamentally agrees with imperial neoliberalism.” The problem is not whether the president has backbone or not. “He is a fairly center-right politician” who is “facing an extremely rightwing party, but he is no progressive, himself.”
$300 Billion Could Employ All of the Jobless
Obama’s $450 billion jobs plan, weighed down with incentives for business, “is, at best, going to give us five months of what we need, and then it’s going to run out,” said Randall Wray, professor of economics at the University of Missouri, Kansas City. Wray expenditure of just $300 billion in direct federal job creation would put every unemployed person back to work. Obama’s plan, said Wray, is based on the supply side economics that came into vogue under President Reagan. “We recovered jobs at a much faster pace during the 1930s Great Depression than we are doing under President Obama.”
How to Challenge Obama in 2012
David Swanson, publisher of the influential web site “War Is A Crime,” has come up with a formula by which a progressive could run against President Obama in 2012 and escape being pummeled as a “spoiler” for the Republicans. Swanson has drawn up a list of eight executive actions that Obama could take on his own, requiring no assent from the Congress, including withdrawal from Iraq and Afghanistan by October 2012, casting a veto against any reduction in Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid, and introduction of new clean air standards. The challenger would agree to withdraw if Obama took these actions. If not, the Obama would bear responsibility for creating the progressive challenge to his presidency.
Humanity of Attica Prisoners Remembered on 40th Anniversary
“What Attica really showed was the humanity of the prisoners, as juxtaposed with the inhumanity and viciousness of the state,” said Atty. Elizabeth Fink, who helped win an $8 million settlement for 1,200 inmates tortured in the aftermath of the 1971 rebellion. New York State lawmen “mowed everybody down to show what happens when you rebel,” said Fink. Thirty-two inmates and 11 guards died in the massacre. “Our morality, the effectiveness of our society, is totally undermined by the prison industrial complex.”
Mother Who “Stole” Her Child’s Public Education Wants Change of Venue
The Black Connecticut mother who enrolled her five-year-old son in a suburban public school outside heavily minority Bridgeport is asking that her trial on theft of educational services be moved to another jurisdiction. Tanya McDowell’s attorney, Darnell Crosland, says statements by the mayor of Norwalk have made the venue “toxic” for his client. In addition, the prosecutor in the case is the mayor’s stepdaughter – “just like a hired gun in this particular case.”
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 4:00pm ET on PRN. Length: One hour.
Jihad Abdulmumit is a coordinating committee member of the Spirit of Mandela Coalition , a campaign to bring international attention to U.S. violations of the human rights of black, brown, and…
El Jones is a poet and a professor at Mount St. Vincent university in Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada. The Canadian government, like the U.S., is giving special attention and privileges to Ukrainian…
Mississippi Workers' Center for Human Rights webinar, We Still Charge Genocide and racist Canadian immigration policies.
Danny Haiphong and Margaret Kimberley discuss the ways that the Russia-Ukraine conflict has changed the political calculus.
BAR contributing editor Ann Garrison continues her reporting from Ethiopia.
