Imperialism or Humanity? Black America Must Choose
Ever since the demise of mass movement politics, “the Black Misleadership Class has had a free hand to take the most backward positions on the State and violence and war,” said Ajamu Baraka, the Green Party’s 2016 vice presidential candidate and a founder of the U.S. Human Rights Network. Baraka is spearheading a campaign to revive the anti-war movement in Black America. “It’s important that people decide which side they are going to be on: on the side of the imperial powers -- the congealed expression of institutional white supremacy in the form of the U.S. state -- or are they going to stand with the rest of humanity?” Baraka is also an editor and columnist for Black Agenda Report.
UNAC Expecting Record Black Presence at Richmond Conference
The United National Anti-War Coalition (UNAC) is expecting the largest Black presence in its history at its national conference in Richmond, Virginia, June 16-18. “Not since the first conference, in Albany in 2010, has there been a purposeful decision to ensure that Black voices play a strong role on the issues of peace and anti-imperialism,” said Ana Edwards, of Virginia Defenders, a founding member of UNAC. Peace voices have been “stifled” in both Left and Black politics “since the election of Barack Obama,” said Edwards. “It really hasn’t been until Trump’s election that people have found a way to begin to galvanize their thinking.”
Cynthia McKinney: Hillary Supporters are NOT the Left
“I’m almost speechless at what the Democratic Party has become,” said Cynthia McKinney, the former six-term Congresswoman from Georgia, who is currently teaching political science overseas. “Whoever would have thought that the Democratic Party would be the most rabidly pro-war, pro-bank, pro-military-industrial complex?” The political spectrum has done “a 180 degree flip,” said McKinney, the Green Party’s 2008 presidential candidate. “The Left is defined as people who supported Clinton. I say that those who support the war machine are not the Left.”
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.
Read against the terrible incineration of Rafah today, this poem of resistance and refusal, by Palestinian poet Samih al-Qasim, is as powerful now as it was fifty years ago.
I spoke to William Sakawa, a producer and reporter with the Nairobi-based media outlet African Stream, about Kenyan President William Ruto’s agreement to invade Haiti for the US.
"Hearing! Hearing! Hearing!" is the latest from BAR's Poet-in-Residence.
This week’s featured authors are Jeanelle K. Hope and Bill V. Mullen. Their book is The Black Antifascist Tradition: Fighting Back From Anti-Lynching to Abolition.
Despite the undeserved loyalty of Black people to the Democratic Party, lawmakers continue to push policy that ignores concerns about climate change and environmental damage in their communities.
