Black Agenda Radio

Black Agenda Radio - 06.03.19

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. This week we are going to dedicate the entire program to the issue of so-called Black Identity Extremists, the term the FBI invented to justify its permanent witch-hunt against Black individuals and organizations that fight for Black people’s rights and interests in the United States. Human rights activists regard the Black Identity Extremist label as the part of the FBI’s attempt to repackage, for the 21st century, its old and discredited Cointelpro dirty war against Black and Left Wing organizers.

Some of those activists recently formed an umbrella group to coordinate the resistance to the FBI’s latest offensive against Black people. It’s called the Black Identity Extremist Abolition Collective. The Collective plans to hold political education and organizing events in cities across the nation. The first session was held at the People’s Forum, in midtown Manhattan, New York City. Five organizers, representing key human rights groups, were unexpectedly joined by Mumia Abu Jamal, the nation’s best known political prisoner. They discussed the threat posed by the FBI’s attempt to demonize and neutralize radical politics in the Black Lives Matter era. Ajamu Sankofa is one of the founders of the Black Identity Extremist Abolition Collective.

Myaisha Hayes is with the Center for Media Justice, which has challenged the FBI’s reincarnation of Cointelpro. Hayes knows all too well that the Bureau’s aim is to turn Black activists into political prisoners.

The New York-based Center for Constitutional Rights has been in the forefront of the resistance to the FBI’s attempts to criminalize political organizing and speech, especially in Black and Muslim communities. Aya Saed represented the Center at the People’s Forum event, in New York.

Fifty years ago, the FBI designated the Black Panther Party the greatest domestic danger to U.S. national security, and tried to destroy the organization through a campaign of assassination and imprisonment. Johanna Fernandez is with the Campaign to Bring Home former Panther Mumia Abu Jamal. She’s also a professor of History and African American Studies at Baruch College. Fernandez provided an historical context to the FBI’s Black Identity Extremist offensive.

 

Black Agenda Radio - 05.27.19

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: Ever wonder why the U.S. has such a close relationship to the countries that are number one in cocaine and heroin? Author Doug Valentine says its because the CIA IS organized crime. And, And, author Tamura Lomax explains how the Black church has labeled Black women and girls, Jezebels.

the nation’s most prolific Black political writer, Dr. Gerald Horne, has released a new book. It’s titled, “White Supremacy Confronted: U.S. Imperialism and Anti-Communism Versus the Liberation of Southern Africa From Rhodes to Mandela.” Horne is a professor of history and African American studies at the University of Houston. He’s written a sprawling, 800-word tour of the African liberation movement and its global supporters and enemies.

Where there is regime change, political murder and subversion, the CIA must be nearby. Douglass Valentine has been studying the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency for decades. He’s author of “The CIA As Organized Crime,” and “The Phoenix Program,” an exploration of the CIA assassination war in Vietnam. The CIA prefers to overthrow governments in secrecy, but President Trump seems to enjoy telling the world who he’s out to get.

The term “Jezebel” has come to be associated with women and girls of easy sex and loose morals. Independent scholar Tamura Lomax is author of the book, “Jezebel Unhinged: Loosing the Black Female Body in Religion and Culture.” Lomax says the Black church has preserved and fostered views of Black female sexuality that are rooted in slavery and racist European concepts, causing Black women and girls to be labeled “Jezebels,” even in their own houses of worship.

Black Agenda Radio - 05.20.19

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: Brazil has the largest concentration of people of African descent in the western hemisphere, but it is a country that slaughters young Black people by the tens of thousands every year. We’ll hear from a member of the Brazilian Black Movement. And, we’ll speak with a writer who has researched the assassination of Black Brazilian politician Marielle Franco.

The death of Black people at the hands of police is a constant flashpoint of U.S. politics. But increasingly, private security guards use lethal force against unarmed Blacks. In Philadelphia, Diop Olugbala, of the Black Is Back Coalition, says private security guards have been empowered to kill with impunity.

Last year, the murder of Black Brazilian politician Marielle Franco focused world attention on the deep racism that permeates Brazilian society. Then, later that year, Jair Bolsonaro, an openly racist right-winger, won election as president. Stephanie Reist is a freelance writer and researcher based in Rio de Janiero. Reist wrote an article for Jacobin magazine, titled “Finding Marielle Franco’s killers.”

Jaime Alves is a member of the Brazilian Black Movement and assistant professor of Anthropology at the College of Staten Island, in New York City. Alves maintains that the racist President Bolsonaro won last year’s election because of deep fears of Black people. Brazil, says professor Alves, is a killing field for Black youth.

Black Agenda Radio - 05.13.19

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: the stand-off at the Venezuelan Embassy in Washington, continues; African Liberation Day will be marked by protests against the ongoing sanctions against Zimbabwe; and, we’ll get an African feminist perspective on women’s roles in secessionist movements on the continent.

Lots of people know that Chicago recently elected its first Black woman mayor, but the elections also created a sharp change in the city council. Before the people went to the polls in February, only one alderman out of 50 on the council supported community control of the police. However, community activists take credit for changing that equation at the ballot box. After the election, 17 Chicago council members say they’ll vote to establish CPAC, the Civilian Police Accountability Council. Aislinn Pulley is the founder and Co-leader of Black Lives Matter, Chicago. We asked Pulley what effect the victories in the city council will have on movement strategy.

Activists with Code Pink, the Answer Coalition and Popular Resistance continue to occupy the Venezuelan Embassy, in Washington, keeping it out of the hands of supporters of Juan Gauido, the Venezuelan opposition leader who appointed himself president. The United States has recognized Guaido, and has been confiscating Venezuelan property, in addition to imposing punishing sanctions on the country. The American activists inside the embassy were invited to keep watch on the place by the elected government of Venezuela. Last Friday, we asked Code Pink co-founder Medea Benjamin how she and the others in the embassy are holding up.

African Liberation Day is May 25, and Zimbabwe is o top of the agenda. We spoke with human rights lawyer Roger Wareham, of the Brooklyn New York-based December 12th Movemet.

Not all people in Africa are satisfied with the borders that were drawn around their countries by European colonizers. Jacqueline Bethel-Mougoue is a feminist scholar and professor of history at Baylor University who’s been studying the roles that women play in secessionist movements in Africa.

Black Agenda Radio - 05.06.19

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 former New York City cop writes a book on why police brutality matters, and what to do about it; the President of The Congo says he faces a threat from ISIS, even though his country has very few Muslims; and, the United States has already succeeded in killing at least 40 thousand Venezuelans, through sanctions.

During the Obama administration, shortly after the Black rebellion in Ferguson, Missouri, federal officials mounted a campaign against what they called “Black Identity Extremists.” Soon, federal agents were also claiming that ISIS was somehow involved in the Black liberation struggle. Some of the best reporting on government political surveillance has been done by Alice Speri, of The Intercept. She says there’s nothing paranoid about Black activists who think Uncle Sam is spying on them.

Former New City cop Joe Ested has written a book, titled “Police Brutality Matters.” Ested says new laws are needed, to rein in the lawmen. He suggests that Congress pass a Bad Cop Bill.

The new president of the Democratic Republic of Congo is asking for United States help for a problem that may not exist. President Félix Tshisekedi fears that ISIS might target his country, which is already beset by internal and foreign-supported armed groups. We spoke with Maurice Carney, of Friends of Congo, in Washington, DC, and asked Carney, How could ISIS be a problem for the Democratic Republic of Congo, where only two percent of the nation is Muslim?

Also in the nation’s capital, a progressive think tank released a study that showed U.S. sanctions against Venezuela have already led to massive deaths, especially among vulnerable groups like dialysis and diabetes patients who are now cut off from adequate treatment. Mark Weisbrot is co-founder of the Center for Economic and Policy Research.

Black Agenda Radio - 04.29.19

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: Mumia Abu Jamal speaks on the U.S. war against fellow political prisoner Julian Assange; a noted writer and anthropologist ponders why so many people that claim to be leftists can’t help bad-mouthing the Wikeleaks founder; and, a Black doctor in Canada says her profession is in denial about racism.

Black women are the fastest-growing part of the U.S. prison population, which gives new meaning to Mothers Day in Black America. In Greenville, South Carolina, the Malcolm X Center for Self-Determination is part of a coalition that is raising bail money for Black women and girls facing incarceration. Malcolm X Center director Efia Nwangaza explains.

Wikileaks founder Julian Assange is locked away in a British jail, as he prepares to fight extradition to the United States. Assange was recently evicted from his sanctuary in the Ecuadorean embassy in London, where he had spent seven years. Black American political prisoner Mumia Abu Jamal has spent 37 years incarcerated in Pennsylvania. He files this report for Prison Radio, titled “The Wars Against Assange.”

Maximilion Forte is a professor of anthropology at Concordia University in Montreal, Canada. In a recent article, Professor Forte wrote that the U.S. campaign against Julian Assange is really a war against free speech. In addition to the U.S government’s vendetta against Assange, lots of Americans that claim to be part of the Left can’t seem to resist expressing their personal disdain for the whistleblower.

Recently on Black Agenda Radio, Black Canadian journalist Eternity Martis said a “health crisis” exists among Black people in Toronto, Canada, and that anti-Black bias in the medical profession is a big part of the problem. One of the doctors quoted in Martis’s article is Onye Nnorom, a community health specialist on the Faculty of Medicine at the University of Toronto. Dr. Nnorom says the problem with Canadian health care is that doctors are in denial about racism.

Black Agenda Radio - 04.22.19

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: It’s been a great month for Mumia Abu Jamal. For the first time in decades, there’s a chance for a real legal path to freedom for the nation’s best known political prisoner. We’ll hear from Mumia and leaders of the movement to release him from a Pennsylvania prison.

The Meuller Report has been a disappointment to Democrats and most of the  U.S. corporate media. For more than two years, they have been spinning a tale of “collusion” between Wikileaks, the Russian government and the Trump campaign. But Special Counsel Robert Meuller’s verdict was that there was no collusion. Coleen Rowley is a former FBI agent and whistleblower who exposed the Bureau’s failures leading up the 9/11 attacks. Rowley has closely followed the Russiagate saga. Both Meuller and most of the news media continue to accept as Biblical Truth that Russians hacked the Democratic National Committee emails and gave them to Wikileaks. But, Rowley agrees that there’s still no proof that that’s the way it happened.

The prospects for freedom for Mumia Abu Jamal, the nation’s best known political prisoner, changed radically this month, 37 years after he was found guilty in the death of a Philadelphia policeman. Larry Krasner, the district attorney of Philadelphia, announced that he would not try to reverse a local court decision allowing Abu Jamal to appeal his conviction. Noelle Hanrahan is a producer and founder of Prison Radio, where Abu Jamal has for decades been a journalist – which was his profession before his arrest in 1982. Hanrahan explains how the legal breakthrough happened.

Johanna Fernandez is a professor of history at Baruch College, in New York, but she spends much of her time as an organizer with the Campaign to Bring Mumia Home. We asked Fernandez if she’s talked with Mumia since the good news arrived.

Abu Jamal was in great spirits even before he got word that the district attorney would not stand in the way of his appeal. Mumia’s supporters held a gala fundraiser in Berkeley, California, featuring Angela Davis, Alice Walker and Judith Ritter. From imprisonment in Pennsylvania, Abu Jamal spoke to the crowd at the Evening for Justice and Freedom.

Pam Africa is with the MOVE organization, in Philadelphia, and a key member of the International Concerned Family and Friends of Mumia Abu Jamal. She spoke at the gala, in Berkeley, and paid respect to Mumia’s prison-mates.

 

Black Agenda Radio - 04.15.19

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: Howie Hawkins, a possible Green Party presidential candidate, talks about one of his original ideas, the Green New Deal; the Black Is Back Coalition explores the possibilities of electoral politics under late stage, imperial capitalism; and, South Carolina activists pay respect to those killed in a prison disturbance.

It’s taken a while to count all the votes, but it appears that community control of the police has made a giant leap forward, in Chicago. Activists ran a full slate of candidates in support of CPAC, the proposed Civilian Police Accountability Commission. Frank Chapman is with the National Alliance Against Racist and Political Repression. He says community control of the police is now backed by a substantial bloc of new members of the Chicago city council.

The Green New Deal -- a plan to transform the way the nation uses energy while at the same time ensuring adequate incomes for all and addressing the historical wrongs against minorites – has won the support of supermajorities of Democrats, under the sponsorship of New York Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, commonly called “AOC.” But the Green New Deal originated in the Green Party, more than a decade ago. And a key player in formulating the original Green New Deal was Howie Hawkins, its former candidate for governor of New York. Hawkins is now exploring a bid for the presidency, under the Green Party banner. We asked Hawkins, what’s GOOD about the Democrat’s version of the Green New Deal?

The Black Is Back Coalition for Social Justice, Peace and Reparations, held the third of its electoral politics schools in St. Petersburg, Florida, earlier this month. Black Is Back chairman Omali Yeshitela greeted the participants.

Nellie Bailey is with Harlem Fight-Back Against War at Home and Abroad. She told the Black Is Back Coalition electoral school that U.S. imperialism’s arsenal of war includes the weaponization of the U.S. dollar.

Ajamu Baraka is a former Green Party vice-presidential candidate and now lead organizer of the Black Alliance for Peace. Baraka was in Venezuela when it was plunged into darkness, last month, by a suspected U.S. cyber weapons attack. He says the Black and brown populations of that country support the socialist government

This weekend, anti-mass Black incarceration activists in South Carolina commemorated the deaths of at least seven inmates during disturbances at the Lee County state prison, a year ago. Efia Nwangaza is Director of the Malcolm X Center for Self-Determination, in Greenville, South Carolina, and a key link between prison inmates and their supporters on the outside.

 

Black Agenda Radio - 04.08.19

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: Canada is possibly best known to those of us who live south of its border as place where everyone has access to single payer health care. However, racism is killing disproportionate numbers of Black Canadians, just like in the U.S; And, we’ll talk with a talented artist and intellectual from Kenya, whose current project is using comic books to help African girls navigate the terrain of sex, health and patriarchy.

Russiagate has consumed the U.S. corporate media for the past two years, but the “no collusion” verdict of the Mueller investigation has caused the once-superheated scandal to finally fizzle. In Philadelphia, Duboisian scholar Anthony Monteiro says the implosion of Russiagate lays bare the deep crisis afflicting U.S. empire.

Eternity Martis, is an award-winning Black journalist from Canada, whose work focuses on issues of race and gender. She’s author of a recent article on The Health Effects of Anti-Black Racism in Canada. Martis says Blacks in Toronto face a variety of health challenge, directly related to race. However, when people in the United States think of Canada at all, it’s often with admiration for their single payer health care system.

Thousands of young girls in Canada are illuminating their own lives through the lens of comic books. Ann Moraa is a writer, editor, and performer who is dedicated to telling compelling stories through an African feminist lens. For the last five years, she’s been developing comics and magazines targeting girls in her east African country.

 

 

Black Agenda Radio - 04.01.19

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: The whole basis for the millions of words  and two maddening years of Russiagate has collapsed, but the near-state of war between the two nuclear superpowers continues; We’ll speak with a reearcher who studies African women at war; and, a Haitian activist explains why the people want their U.S.-backed government to step down.

Anti-war forces have converged on the nation’s capital to denounce the aggressive policies of NATO, the North Atlantic Treaty organization that links the militaries of the United States and Europe. Official Washington is staging an elaborate 70th birthday party for NATO on April 4th. That’s also the anniversary of the assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King, who more than half a century ago indicted the United States as the greatest purveyor of violence in the world. We spoke with Ajamu Baraka, the lead organizer of the Black Alliance for Peace. Baraka says the NATO birthday party is a celebration of state violence.

David Swanson is an activist with World Beyond War, and publisher of the influential web site “War Is A Crime.” Swanson says Russiagate has dramatically increased tensions between the two nuclear super-powers.

Haiti has been occupied by foreign militaries ever since the United States overthrew its elected government in 2004, and was the victim of several U.S. military invasions and occupations in the 20th century. Haitians have been taking to the streets by the hundreds of thousands, demanding that their U.S.-backed government step down. Daoud Andre is a Brooklyn-based radio host and an activist with the Committee to Organize Against Dictatorship. We spoke with him, last week.

Mumia Abu Jamal, the nation’s best known political prisoner, is also an acclaimed author who has written extensively on the violence inherent in the U.S. State. U.S. warmakers have long had their eyes on Venezuela.

Selinka Makana is a scholar at the Institute for Research on Women, Gender and Sexuality at Columbia University. Makana was born in Kenya, and specializes in studying African women at war. She’s author of a recent article titled “Contested Encounters: Towards a 21st Century African Feminist Ethnography.” Dr. Makana says the social science of ethnography must be de-colonized.