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
  • omnibus

How will we pay for it?
Raymond Nat Turner, BAR poet-in-residence
12 Jan 2022
How will we pay for it?
M. Wuerker POLITICO Universal Uclick

                                                                                            How will we pay for it?

How will we pay for it?
How will we pay for it:
59 missile shooting spree—
$110, 000 a pop?
Mother Of All Bombs?
A boondoggle bomber?
800 bases in faraway places?
States with more warheads than congress members? A modern-medieval torture
chamber on foreign soil? A weapons lab disguised as an apartheid state?

How will we pay for it?
How will we pay for it:
Surgical strikes on hospitals—
renaming babies Collateral Damage?
Orders to “Light ‘em up!”?
Lethal gifts dropped on wedding parties?
‘Taking out’ other nations’ generals?
Swapping strongmen for wrong men?

How will we pay for it?
How will we pay for it:
Drinking water juiced with jet fuel?
Freedom to breathe blue-black air?
Fracking fluid flavored springs?
Freedom of fires gorging themselves year round?
Freedom of floods to wash away labor’s fruits?

It’s not neurosurgery or rocket science—
and I’m no genius but— I know-I know
I know-I know-I know-I know-I know-I know…
I know-I know-I know-I know-I know-I know…
Tents, tarps, cardboard mattresses—cancer,
Diabetes, tooth decay are one way we pay—
Feel free to fill in anything I’ve missed…
 

© 2022. Raymond Nat Turner, The Town Crier. All Rights Reserved.

Former forklift driver/warehouse worker/janitor, Raymond Nat Turner is a NYC poet;  BAR's Poet-in-Residence; and founder/co-leader of the jazz-poetry ensemble UpSurge!NYC. You can Vote for his work at:  

GoFundMe: https://www.gofundme.com/f/the-town-criers-big-tooth-fund

PayPal: paypal.me/towncrierRNT

Military Industrial Complex

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


Related Stories

Biden has Money for War, but Not for the Poor
Danny Haiphong, BAR Contributing Editor
Biden has Money for War, but Not for the Poor
23 March 2022
Joe Biden and congress have plenty of money for the military industrial complex, but only austerity for the people.
US War Lobby Fuels Conflict in Russia, Ukraine, and Syria: Ex-Pentagon Advisor
Aaron Maté
US War Lobby Fuels Conflict in Russia, Ukraine, and Syria: Ex-Pentagon Advisor
12 January 2022
A former senior advisor at the Pentagon confirms what was obvious to those who pay attention.
Raytheon’s Raven caws “War—Evermore!” Not wind beneath Negroz wings…
Raymond Nat Turner, BAR poet-in-residence
Raytheon’s Raven caws “War—Evermore!” Not wind beneath Negroz wings…
29 September 2021
Afghan Crisis Must End America’s Empire of War, Corruption and Poverty
Medea Benjamin and Nicolas J. S. Davies  
Afghan Crisis Must End America’s Empire of War, Corruption and Poverty
01 September 2021
The U.S.

More Stories


  • Anthony Karefa Rogers-Wright
    Whitewashed, Bleached, and Alabastardized: How white “supremacy’s” Subjective Identification of War Criminals Reveals its Deeper Psychopathology
    20 Aug 2025
    The manufactured outrage over the Alaska summit is not about holding power accountable; it's about reinforcing a global racial order. The rules-based international order has always been a hierarchy…
  • Clau O'Brien Moscoso
    US Counterinsurgency Wins in Bolivia: Intentional Factionalism Within MAS and the Capture of the Lithium Triangle
    20 Aug 2025
    Missing the enemy, or why Western leftists fail again.
  • PACA protest
    Pan-African Community Action PACA
    The Federal Takeover of D.C.: The Colonial Occupation Disguised as “Public Safety”
    20 Aug 2025
    The deployment of federal agents and National Guard troops to Washington, D.C. is a militarized occupation disguised as a public safety initiative. This move weaponizes the state's power to…
  • Black Alliance For Peace
    BAP Haiti/Americas Team Condemns US Government Attack on Venezuelan Sovereignty
    20 Aug 2025
    US Issues $50 million Bounty while Sanctioning Venezuelan People and Starving Gaza.
  • Palestine Chronicle Staff
    Responding to Mohamed Salah: Who Killed the ‘Palestinian Pelé’?
    20 Aug 2025
    Al-Obeid, 41, was killed on Wednesday, August 6, 2025, in an Israeli attack on civilians waiting for humanitarian aid in the southern Gaza Strip.
  • Load More
Subscribe
connect with us
about us
contact us