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

Lynne Stewart Gets Ten Years – The Progressive Movement Gets Lethal Injection
Bill Quigley
21 Jul 2010
🖨️ Print Article

lynee and ralph

by U-Savior

It’s time to regroup, rethink, and possibly re-boot the “movement,” which has been gravely damaged from inside and out. “The back biting and murmuring amongst the agenda-less, corrupted, dysfunctional and disheveled ‘grass root progressives’ has led us to exactly where we are today.”

 

Lynne Stewat Gets Ten Years – The Progressive Movement Gets Lethal Injection

by U-Savior

“Our inability to secure the release of Lynne Stewart supports my assertion that the so-called ‘movement’ has stopped and has functionally collapsed.”

Where was the massive movement to set Lynne free? Time served? Why do we allow our enemies to set the tone, pace, debate, discourse and agenda? It keeps us off balance and off our A-game. Twenty-eight months was ridiculous. Lynne broke a bullshit law that was inherently unconstitutional. No one was hurt, maimed or killed by her actions but she has received a death sentence because ten years for a seventy year-old woman fighting cancer and poor prison medical care spells death. In contrast Bush’s and now Obama’s war policies kill people every day! Our inability to secure the release of Lynne Stewart supports my assertion that the so- called “movement” has stopped and has functionally collapsed. Despite all the issues that plague this case and many cases like this we still face the innate inability of individuals and groups to put aside small and petty differences. Where’s my name on this flier? Whose speaking first and how much time will I get on the microphone or stage? I’m not coming or supporting if this person or group is there. Lynne is not Black, Lynne is not Brown, She didn’t support me when, Lynne is too radical, blah blah....

No, you’re probably not radical enough and she makes you feel uneasy because your uninspiring weak approach sounds so silly and corny against her clear courageous uncompromising analysis. The back biting and murmuring amongst the agenda-less, corrupted, dysfunctional and disheveled “grass root progressives” has led us to exactly where we are today, where the wicked can at will kill us in broad daylight, snatch our young, crush our dreams and imprison and/or kill the best thinkers, speakers and fighters.

We must start fresh! Imagine a world where Mumia, Peltier, The Cuban Five, Mehanna and Lynne are among us.

“It’s a time to get things right and learn from past mistakes.”

When things collapse it’s not always a bad thing (unless you’re caught in the debris). It’s a time to start unsullied, introduce new and youthful ideas, blood and tools. And to get things right and learn from past mistakes.

1. Zero tolerance for gossip, back biting and slander. Only the facts.

2. Individuals and groups will be judged on what they actually do.

3. A resurgence of a people-led lunch, literacy and health program.

4. Ending all vertical movements – lead by example and everyone should be an example.

5. Defy containment.

6. Destroy the illusion.

7. Crush the Machine.

On the other hand, knowing what I know about Lynne there will be a surge in jail house lawyers, prison reform and anti-imperialist, anti-Zionist and anti-fascist revolutionaries. One of my catch phrases for the last twenty years has been, ”this entire system was never designed to empower us.” Knowing this and being in media, everything I touch is aimed at exposing, indicting and criticizing this system while creatively designing a world without fascists, imperialists and dictators masked in free enterprise. Lynne was not the only one indicted, tried, convicted and sentenced; every attorney who would defend The Poor, The Destitute, The Unpopular, The Depraved, The Insane, The Innocent, The Framed, The Black, The Brown, The Red, The Yellow, The Radical Thinker, The School Teacher who teaches Mao, Huey and Avakian, etc. You, me; we all have been sentenced to a lack of access to this beautiful bright light that made us better every day.

One day Bush, Rumsfeld, Rice, Gonzales, Powell and Cheney were in jail and needed a great defense attorney. They’re all looking around at each other and Sarah Palin asks, "What happened to that frumpy passionate woman attorney Lynne Stewart?" Cheney looks over at Bush and says, “That’s another thing you fucked up.”

U-Savior is a journalist, media activist and filmmaker. He is the director of Disappearing Voices - The Decline of Black Radio. He can be reached at usavior@blackwaxx.com. www.disappearingvoices.com

Do you need and appreciate Black Agenda Report articles? Please click on the DONATE icon, and help us out, if you can.


More Stories


  • Margaret Kimberley, BAR Executive Editor and Senior Columnist
    Eric Adams and the Death of Black Politics
    09 Oct 2024
    The indictment of New York City mayor Eric Adams is the latest example of moribund Black politics. Rich donors and corporate media decide who will be elected to office, while the people’s needs go…
  • ​​​​​​​ Ajamu Baraka, BAR editor and columnist , Margaret Kimberley, BAR Executive Editor and Senior Columnist
    October 7th, The Election and Capitalist Crisis, A Conversation with Ajamu Baraka
    09 Oct 2024
    Margaret Kimberley and Ajamu Baraka discuss the US upcoming presidential election, and the historic events unfolding in Western Asia - where Israel continues its onslaught of the region with an…
  • Editors, The Black Agenda Review
    ESSAY: Rethinking Race, Rethinking Class, Charles W. Mills, 1995
    09 Oct 2024
    “We need to give greater theoretical centrality to the fact that European conquest of the world has established what is in effect: global white supremacy.”
  • Ann Garrison, BAR Contributing Editor
    Social Media Beyond Corporate Control
    09 Oct 2024
    ​​​​​​​Social media bans on African Stream should remind us that corporations will never facilitate anti-imperialist, anti-capitalist narratives and stir us to look for alternatives.
  • Abayomi Azikiwe, Black Agenda Report Contributor
    Britain Cedes Control of the Chagos Islands to Mauritius While Maintaining Pentagon Base
    09 Oct 2024
    After nearly six decades, the right to self-determination and independence is still being denied to the Indigenous people as the United States prepares for expanding imperialist wars in Asia and…
  • Load More
Subscribe
connect with us
about us
contact us