| Black Agenda Report

by BAR managing editor Bruce A. Dixon
What's More Important For Black Leadership? Turning Off Fox News? Or Stopping the President's Cat Food Commission?
01 Sep 2010
While black political leaders and activists focus on turning off Fox News, and clownish disputes with Tea Partyers and the likes of Sarah Palin and Glenn Beck, are they missing something more important? Can any good come from a Democratic president reaching across the aisle to team up with…
by BAR managing editor Bruce A. Dixon
We Know Tea Party Repubs Are Scary. But Are Democrats in Congress Worth Defending At All?
27 Oct 2010
By BAR managing editor Bruce A. Dixon Four years ago, the nation prepared for a congressional transition from Republican to Democratic rule. Rather than point to the scaaaary tea party hacks, let's examine what the nation expected from Democrats in the Congress, and whether we got it... any of it…
Bill Quigley
Reclaiming the Dream and Brand Obama
01 Sep 2010
A Black Agenda Radio commentary by BAR columnist Jared Ball A stroll through Al Sharpton's recent MLK-themed demonstration, in Washington,DC, was anything but a walk down memory lane. Gone were theprincipled voices of yesterday. "None were there to challengeObama, whose presidency has so far been…
Bill Quigley
The Most Visible Mulattoes: Drake and Obama Match Hip-Hop and Politics
08 Sep 2010
A Black Agenda Radio commentary by BAR columnist Jared Ball Mulattoes are all the rage in some circles, for obvious presidential reasons. Deep political and social meaning is invested in the proliferation of luminaries of the 'two-worlds" kind - although little in the way of insight seems to…
Bill Quigley
Reparations…for Present Injustice
21 Jul 2010
by Paul Street The author’s problem with African American reparations is that some of the demands seem to stop with the demise of Jim Crow. “Why stop with the 20th century?” Racist crimes that cry out for repair are constantly committed in the United States. “The very distinction between past…
by BAR executive editor Glen Ford
Forget “Skip” Gates: There Are Real Differences on Reparations
12 May 2010
by BAR executive editor Glen Ford Harvard corporate henchman Henry Louis Gates’ attempt to absolve Europeans of blame for slavery is easily dismissed as an absurdity. But honest activists on the Black Left disagree on the debt that is owed to African Americans. Some think reparations are a…
Bill Quigley
Pardon You: Racism, Reparations and the Politics of Blame (as Explained by Henry Louis Gates Jr.)
11 May 2010
by Tim Wise Harvard Prof. Henry “Skip” Gates' attempt to blame the trans-Atlantic slave trade largely on Africans and to absolve Europe and America of their historical crimes is a “moral and intellectual absurdity.” The U.S. owes a debt to African Americans, and to lots of other people. “The…
by BAR editor and senior columnist Margaret Kimberley
Freedom Rider: The Dangerous Henry Louis Gates
28 Apr 2010
by BAR editor and senior columnist Margaret Kimberley Harvard Prof. Henry “Skip” Gates has made it his life’s work to pander to whites by defaming Black people. In his latest blood-libel, Gates claims Africans share equal blame with Europeans for the centuries-long holocaust of the African slave…
Paul Street
“Despite the Power of Money”: Reflections on the Vapid Obama Commentary of Professor Angela Davis
27 Oct 2010
by Paul Street Angela Davis recently told television audiences that Barack Obama won the presidency “despite the power of money.” Any knowledgeable person – much less a learned academic and activist heroine – should know better. The reality, which is not in serious dispute, is that Obama “set…
Bill Quigley
The Limits of Anti-Racism
04 Nov 2009
by Adolph Reed What does it mean these days to be “anti-racist” and to struggle against racism these days when a black family is in the White House? Unlike today's anti-racist activists, the historic Freedom Movement had clear, if limited goals like the establishment of voting rights or the…