| Black Agenda Report

by BAR executive editor Glen Ford
Mass Manufacturers of Slander and Lies
04 Apr 2019
The U.S. has nothing to offer Africa but guns, drones and an extended half-life for the neocolonial order. “Although Donald Trump has gotten a respite from Mueller, the orchestrated demonization of Russia, China, Venezuela, Syria and ‘socialism’ will remain.”
Kelly Lytle Hernandez
How the Government Built a Trap for Black Youth
10 Apr 2019
Mass Black incarceration didn’t just happen; it was engineered at the highest levels of US government. “Between the late 1960s and early 1980s, the federal government slowly built a trap, creating the conditions for the mass incarceration of black youth.” From the War on Poverty to the War on Crime…
Joan P. Gibbs and Rosemari Mealy
An open letter to the Congressional Black Caucus on the US’s attacks on Venezuela and Cuba
10 Apr 2019
Washington’s generations-long blockade and aggressions against Cuba have now been extended to Venezuela, all in violation of international law. “US actions are tantamount to a declaration of war against Venezuela and Cuba and their peoples.” Greetings. We write to urge you to support the…
Rafael Stedile
Socialist Revolutionary Workers Party launched in South Africa
10 Apr 2019
Over a thousand gathered in Johannesburg to attend the Launch Congress of the party which seeks to build socialism in South Africa “We are serious about the Revolution.”
Todd Steven Burroughs
Newark’s Black-Powered Engineer: Kenneth Gibson (1932-2019)
10 Apr 2019
The still-chocolate city bids farewell to its first Black mayor. “There was a determination to make him fit into a Black Power vibe that just wasn’t him.”
Rob Smith
Julian Assange Threatened With Expulsion from Embassy
10 Apr 2019
Ecuador’s president appears to be using Assange as a bargaining chip for debt relief. “If Assange is expelled from the embassy, he will most likely then be extradited to the US to face trial in a kangaroo court.”
Roberto Sirvent, BAR Book Forum Editor
BAR Book Forum: Shane Vogel’s “Stolen Time”
10 Apr 2019
The 1950s calypso craze provided black performers with new occasions to intervene in the public sphere as well as new creative and financial opportunities. “Calypso craze performers appropriated the fleeting time of the fad to alter some of the conditions of black labor in entertainment and…
by BAR contributor Danny Haiphong
The International Struggle Against the Fake News of the U.S. Empire: Remarks at the National Writers Union
10 Apr 2019
The Mueller Report’s conclusion cannot reverse the damage that has been done to left journalism and activism by the fake news witch hunt. “Social media and Silicon Valley monopolies changed their algorithms to suppress any content that challenged the many myths of American exceptionalism.” The…
by BAR contributor Ann Garrison Ann Garrison
Another African Convicted in Another Racist, Chauvinist Western Court
10 Apr 2019
Western propaganda about the Rwandan Genocide has been so triumphant that a Rwandan Hutu on trial in the West faces inevitable jury bias. “Teganya’s trial became a de facto trial for genocide crime.”
by BAR poet-in-residence Raymond Nat Turner
…solidarity sounds like…
10 Apr 2019
I’m a Seoul Man, da-da-da—dat-da-da-da I’m a Seoul Man, da-da-da—dat-da-da-da I’m also a Pyongyang, Managua, Manilla, Teheran Man, too—As opposed to despot As I am to coup! When they go high— Pole dancing palace and peacock throne— I go low— on my own: grassroots, salt of the earth… Lookin’ here…