Episodes
Monday May 28, 2018
Black Agenda Radio - 05.28.18
Monday May 28, 2018
Monday May 28, 2018
Welcome to the radio magazine that brings you news, commentary and analysis from a Black Left perspective. I’m Glen Ford, along with my co-host Nellie Bailey. Coming up: a national conference was held in North Carolina, last week, in hopes of revitalizing the Black liberation movement. And, the film “Black Panther” turned Black super-hero images into a worldwide box office smash. We’ll talk with someone who’s been turning out Black superhero comic books for more than 40 years.
Mumia Abu Jamal and his longtime collaborator, Stephen Vittoria, have a new book out. It’s titled “Murder Incorporated: Empire, Genocide and Manifest Destiny – Book One: Dreaming of Empire. The book is a sweeping examination of the white settler and colonial project from Christopher Columbus to the present day. The authors will later release Books Two and Three, covering CIA interventions around the world and perpetual U.S. wars, the mass security and surveillance state, and the delusion of a post-racial America. Six years ago, Stephen Vittoria produced the documentary film, “Long Distance Revolutionary: A journey with Mumia Abu Jamal.” Vittoria explains how he got into the book venture with Mumia.
Black super-hero characters are all the rage in the wake of the huge box office success of the movie “Black Panther.” But the Black comic book hero genre has been out there for many decades, pioneered by people like Professor Turtel Onli, of Onli Studios, in Chicago, producers of a long list of comic book titles. Professor Onli told us how he got started in the Black super-hero business.
In Durham, North Carolina, last week, activists from around the country came together for a National Assembly for Black Liberation, aimed at injecting new life into the Black Freedom Movement. One of those who spoke was Larry Hamm, chairman of the People’s Organization for Progress, based in Newark, New Jersey.
Monday May 21, 2018
Black Agenda Radio - 05.21.18
Monday May 21, 2018
Monday May 21, 2018
Welcome to the radio magazine that brings you news, commentary and analysis from a Black Left perspective. I’m Glen Ford, along with my co-host Nellie Bailey. Coming up: Israel’s massacre of unarmed Palestinians has once against shocked the sensibilities of the world, unless, of course, you are a U.S. Democrat or Republican, in which case, whatever Israel does is fine; And, the Move 9 have been imprisoned for nearly 40 years, but the struggle to free them, continues.
Rev. Edward Pinkney, the activist from Benton Harbor, Michigan, was exonerated, this month, of election tampering charges that put him prison for two and a half years. Rev. Pinkney is back pursuing his old nemesis, the Whirlpool Corporation, which has dominated the poor, Black town for decades. Rev. Pinkney is set to disrupt Whirlpool’s pet project, the local PGA senior golf tournament.
Israel has once again shocked the world, methodically slaughtering Palestinian demonstrators in Gaza. Scores of Palestinians have been killed by Israeli snipers, and literally hundreds more wounded and maimed, as they demanded the right to return to their ancestral lands that were seized by the apartheid Zionist state. We spoke with journalist and educator Vijay Prashad, and asked him what the Gaza massacres show about Israel.
Protesters inhave been trying in vain to stop the Philadelphia Orchestra from going on trip to Israel. Susan Abulhawa is with the Philly Don’t Orchestrate Apartheid Coalition.
President Donald Trump delighted the Israeli regime, by recognizing Jerusalem as the apartheid state’s capital, in clear violation of international law. But Black Agenda Report’s Bruce Dixon says the Democrats are just as guilty of coddling the Israelis as the Republicans.
Black Agenda Radio producer Kyle Fraser spoke with Mike Africa Jr, of the Philadelphia MOVE Family, whose father and mother, Mike Africa senior and Debbie Africa, and other MOVE members have been locked up for four decades in the death of a policeman. Supporters of the MOVE 9 have recently been organizing on behalf of Puerto Rican relief, as well as raising money for legal defense. Mike Africa Jr says
Monday May 14, 2018
Black Agenda Radio - 05.14.18
Monday May 14, 2018
Monday May 14, 2018
Welcome to the radio magazine that brings you news, commentary and analysis from a Black Left perspective. I’m Glen Ford, along with my co-host Nellie Bailey. Coming up: There has not been one pause in U.S. wars since the invasion of Iraq, and the corporate media has been beating the drums for every one of them, with play-by- play from lying generals and the CIA; a new study shows that three out of four people renters that get evicted would not have been put out of their homes if they’d had a good lawyer; and, Mumia Abu Jamal says farewell to a central figure of Black Liberation theology.
No sooner had President Trump withdrawn from the agreement international agreement with Iran, than Israel launched massive attacks against Iranian and Syrian military targets in Syria. We spoke with Ajamu Baraka, the veteran human rights activist and lead organizer for the Black Alliance for Peace.
Fifteen years after the U.S. invasion of Iraq, almost everyone responsible for the attack now admits that Iraq had no weapons of mass destruction. Yet, the same voices that spread lies about Iraq are constantly on television and in newspaper op-ed pages, beating the drums for a wider war against Syria and Iran, and demonizing Russia. Jeff Cohen is one of the nation’s foremost critics of corporate media. Cohen is director of the Park Center for Independent Media at Ithica College, in New York. He was a founder of the watch dog group FAIR, Fairness & Accuracy In Reporting. He says military and CIA liars and spies get top bllling in the corporate media.
A new study shows that one of the most effective ways to combat homelessness and neighborhood instability is to strengthen renters’ rights. The report, by the National Law Center on Homelessness and Poverty, is co-authored by Tristia Bauman. She says there is far too little affordable housing to go around, and tenants rights need to be protected.
The nation’s best known political prisoner, Mumia Abu Jamal, marks the passing of the man who became known as the father of Black Liberation Theology.
Monday May 07, 2018
Black Agenda Radio - 05.07.18
Monday May 07, 2018
Monday May 07, 2018
Welcome to the radio magazine that brings you news, commentary and analysis from a Black Left perspective. I’m Glen Ford, along with my co-host Nellie Bailey. Coming up: Inmates at prisons across the nation will go on strike, in August, against slavery behind the bars; the Democratic Party sides with CIA spies and the FBI, in its suit against Wikileaks; and, Winnie Mandela is remembered as a voice against compromise with white corporate power in South Africa.
In a unanimous vote, the Michigan Supreme Court last week exonerated and set free Rev. Edward Pinkney, the Benton Harbor, Michigan, activist who spent two and a half years in prison for allegedly tampering with signatures on an election recoil petition. At his trail before an all-white jury, Rev. Pinkney had argued that the charge was baseless, but it took 30 months in prison for him to get the State Supreme Court to agree with him. Nevertheless, he’s a happy man.
The Democratic National Committee last month brought a multimillion dollar law suit against Wikileaks, the Russian government and the Trump administration, blaming all three for Hillary Clinton’s defeat in the 2016 election. The suit against Wikileaks is especially disturbing, because it could cripple the ability of journalists to report on government wrongdoing in the United States. In Washington, we spoke with Chip Gibbons, of Defending Rights and Dissent.
The South African liberation movement lost one of its most militant advocates with the death of Winnie Mandela, last month. The former wife of Nelson Mandela was a leading figure in the more radical wing of the African National Congress, the party that came to power with the end of apartheid but now rules in close collaboration with white corporate forces. Black Agenda Report editor and columnist Marsha Coleman-Adebayo hosts a radio program titled “What’s At Stake” on Pacifica station WPFW, in Washington DC. Coleman- Adebayo took an in-depth look at Winnie Mandela’s life and struggle, which was sometimes at odds with her former husband and his political allies.
Prison slavery Abolitionists are planning a nationwide prison strike from this coming August 21st to September 9th. The inmates have put forward a list of ten demands, including an end to work without wages behind the bars. Black Agenda Radio producer Kyle Fraser spoke with two of the organizers. Brother Akin Yele works with the inmate group, Unheard Voices OTCJ, based in South Carolina, where fighting among inmates at the Lee Correctional Facility left seven dead and many injured, last month. Brother Dee is a member of Jailhouse Lawyers Speak.