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

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


  • Fred Hampton speaking at a rally
    Jon Jeter
    Fifty-four Years Later, Fred Hampton’s Martyrdom Looms Large Over Palestinians’ Freedom Struggle
    06 Dec 2023
    The thread connecting the struggles of Black and Palestinian liberation makes itself known in the propagandistic attacks on the Palestinian resistance. The assassination of Fred Hampton helps…
  • Protest with BLM sign and Palestine flag
    Margaret Kimberley, BAR Executive Editor and Senior Columnist
    Black People Won't Be Silenced About Israel
    06 Dec 2023
    As the US continues to conflate every criticism of Zionism with anti-semitism, the predicable happens once again. Black people are used as an avatar of anti-Jewish sentiment. This tactic will not…
  • Poster of Al Fatah through the streets of Algiers. Palestine Poster Project
    Editors, The Black Agenda Review
    MESSAGE: The Palestine National Liberation Movement AL-FATEH to Africa
    06 Dec 2023
    Al-Fateh’s communique at the 1969 Festival of Pan-African Culture offered a brilliant analysis of the overlapping histories of European colonialism and white supremacy in Africa and Palestine.
  • More than 6 million Congolese now shelter in IDP camps.
    Maurice Carney
    D.R. Congo’s Challenges: Elections, Rwanda’s War of Aggression and Critical Minerals for Green Transition
    06 Dec 2023
    The ongoing crisis is a result of converging forces determined to pursue their own interests by controlling the affairs within the Congo and subjecting the masses to inhumane conditions.
  • Kenya Parliament
    Editors, The Black Agenda Review
    ESSAY: National identity and Foreign Domination, Ngũgĩ wa Thiong'o, 1982
    06 Dec 2023
    Ngũgĩ wa Thiong'o reminds us that the primary contradiction in Africa is imperialism and its meek comprador bourgeoisie enforcers.
  • Load More
Subscribe
connect with us
about us
contact us