Bankers and State Owe Detroit
Instead of figuring out ways to strip Detroit of its assets to pay banks, the courts should force bankers and the state to repay the city hundreds of millions owed. “Some of the main creditors have been bogus, complicated interest rate swaps by banks who overcharged hundreds of millions of dollars of interest,” said community activist Debra Taylor. “If anything, that needs to be renegotiated.” Taylor said the city was also denied $224 million in revenue sharing funds when the state arbitrarily changed the payment formula.
Obama Schemes to Cut Social Security
President Obama has “enabled” the assault on Social Security and other entitlement programs since his first days in office, said independent journalist Arun Gupta, a co-founder of the Occupied Wall Street Journal. The president has long sought an austerity “Grand Bargain” with Republicans, but has been stymied by GOP reluctance to cut a deal. “The U.S. has become so dysfunctional, in terms of its political system,” said Gupta, “it seems the most you can hope for is gridlock.”
Who Stopped Stop-and-Frisk?
Opposition to stop-and-frisk is now all but mandatory among New York City Democrats. But, that wasn’t the case two years ago, when Carl Dix and others began a civil disobedience campaign under the Stop Stop-and-Frisk banner. “Things like stop-and-frisk were not front-burner issues” back then, said Dix. “The question of torture in prison was something hardly anyone knew anything about. We thought that waging a mass resistance movement was a key way to bring these issue front and center.”
Hi-Tech Corporations Behind National Surveillance State
A new study shows the high-tech industrial sector uses its campaign contributions to bolster congressional and White House support for the national surveillance state. “It’s really a giant interest-group issue,” said Dr. Thomas Ferguson, professor of political science at the University of Massachusetts, at Boston, and an author of the report. “These are industries that we’d already identified as uniquely friendly to Obama,” based on campaign contributions.
U.S. Facilitates Congo Genocide
Six million Congolese have died since neighboring Rwanda and Uganda invaded the country in 1996, said Maurice Carney, director of Friends of Congo. Speaking at the 7th anniversary celebration of Black Agenda Report, at New York City’s historic Riverside Church, Carney said “these crimes could not be committed without the backing of the United States and the protection of its allies, Uganda and Rwanda.” How could Washington call for military action in Syria and Libya, where thousands were at risk, Carney asked, “when you’re not even willing to take diplomatic action in Congo, where we’re talking about millions?” It all depends on whether “one values Black life, or not.”
“Organize!” says Danny Glover
Actor and political activist Danny Glover called for a “reinvigoration of the idea of democracy.” Speaking at a fundraiser for Benton Harbor, Michigan’s Black Autonomy Network Community Organization (BANCO), the TransAfrica Forum chairman said: “It is important that people are active in the process. We need to organize!”
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.
In this week’s segment, we hear about the ongoing uprising in France against neo-liberal austerity, colonialism, and white supremacy. But first, we discuss a new report that reveals a 25% decline in…
The Center for Economic and Policy Research (CEPR) recently reported on Federal Reserve data indicating that Black people in the U.S. have lost 25% of their wealth between 2022 and 2025. Whites,…
Bouna Mbaye is an activist, writer, and a member of the Pan-African League-Umoja, the Pan-African Brigade for Palestine, and the US Out of Africa Network. He joins us from Paris to discuss the…
As Black Agenda Report is poised to celebrate its 20th anniversary, we reprint Glen Ford's commentary on the killing of Trayvon Martin and the impunity provided to his killer in a criminal justice…
The Democratic Party is terrified of even small liberal reforms and will not abide left leaning democrats thwarting their plans for austerity and neoliberal orthodoxy.
