Black Agenda Radio

Black Agenda Radio

MLK As “Captain of Capital” America’s rulers “seem to want to King a captain of capitalism,” said South Carolina political activist and writer Kevin Alexander Gray. MLK’s new memorial on the Washington Mall is “sponsored by every corporate interest that is against Black and working folk’s interests,” plus people like former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright “who ought to be prosecuted as a war criminal.” None of the movement of King’s era any longer exists, while the multi-cultural, coalition based movement that must replace it “is not fully formed,” said Gray. Economy Resembles 1930s “The world economy is grinding to a halt,” said political scientist Thomas Ferguson, amid economic indicators that look eerily like those that prevailed in the 1930s. “The only people for whom the recession clearly ended were some parts of business and the banking community,” said the University of Massachusetts at Boston professor. “Everybody is being reduced to begging. I have a feeling it may be too late for the Obama administration.” Libya Latest Victim of U.S. Power Grab The West is determined to re-colonize the Arab world, according to Nasser Arruri, professor emeritus of political science at the University of Massachusetts, Boston. “Libya is just another avenue for expanding U.S. influence in the region,” said Arruri. “Iraq was the precedent. Iraq was destroyed, just like Libya has been destroyed by the bombs of NATO.” Obama Shows True Colors in Garvey Pardon Denial The Obama administration’s refusal to grant a pardon to Marcus Garvey, convicted of fraud in 1923 and later deported to Jamaica, shows that the president “is not about Black empowerment, symbolic or otherwise, said Black Agenda Report editor and columnist Jemima Pierre. “Obama is making a clear political statement: Garvey is not the kind of Black leader he wants to memorialize.” In 2008, President George Bush posthumously pardoned an American convicted of violating the Neutrality Act by supplying military aircraft to Jewish fighters in Palestine. Honkala Runs Zero Evictions Campaign “If the politicians don’t have the backbone to step forward and keep families in their homes, and if the banks refuse to take the money that they’ve got and modify the loans, then damn it, I will refuse to throw any person in Philadelphia out of their homes,” said Cheri Honkala, a candidate for sheriff of Philadelphia. The veteran poor people’s activist spoke at the Convention for Democracy, in Madison, Wisconsin. Alabama Immigration Law Worst in Nation The Montgomery-based Southern Poverty Law Center considers HB 56 the “most draconian” of a rash of anti-immigrant laws recently passed in the South. The legislation would punish drivers who give undocumented people a lift, and revokes the business licenses of farmers that employ them. “HR 56 will devastate Alabama farmers,” said the Law Center’s Lecia Brooks. Tax Stock Trading, Say Nurses “The political parties have not really taken a side, but we’re telling them, Take a side, either Wall Street or Main Street,” said Theresa Harding, speaking for her union, National Nurses United. NNU held a nationwide day of action to demand that stock trading be taxed to pay for universal health care. “We believe that health care should be a right, not a privilege,” said Harding, a staff nurse at the University of Chicago Medical Center.

Black Agenda Radio

Bill Quigley - Libya Center for Constitutional Rights, New Orleans. The U.S. government and corporate media tell Americans the attack on Libya was both legal and just. Quigley disagrees. Mark Weisbrot - Haiti Center for Economic and Policy Research, Washington, Just returned from a trip to Haiti. Sees no progress in alleviating the people’s suffering, and many setbacks in the cholera and housing crises. Bahati Jackque - Congo Africa Faith and Justice Network Omali Yeshitela - BIB Chairman, Black Is Back Coalition Larry Hamm - BIB President People’s Organization for Progress, Newark. Monami Malik - BIB Immigrants Executive director DRUM, Desis Rising Up and Moving. Karen Lewis - Chicago Schools President, Chicago Teachers Union

Black Agenda Radio

Black Agenda Radio

Dhoruba Bin Wahada - Mass Incarceration Dhoruba bin Wahada, Malcolm X Grassroots Movement, speaking in Atlanta. Says mass Black incarceration is now a high profile topic. Marsha Coleman-Adebay The woman at the center of the movement that brought passage of the No FEAR Act to protect whistleblowers in the federal work force, is preparing to do battle, once again. Marsha Coleman-Adebayo says the man who fired her from the Environmental Protection Agency, and who was later promoted to head the agency’s civil rights office, Rafael DeLeon, is continuing to abuse women employees. Roger Wareham - Zimbabwe Roger Wareham, New York-base human rights lawyer, an organizer of the August 13 Millions Harlem March against the bombing of Libya and sanctions against Zimbabwe. Wareham says that, just as the U.S. and Europe have demonized Libyan leader Moammar Gaddafi, in the same way they have spread lies about Zimbabwe, over the years. Omali Yeshitela, chairman of the Black Is Back Coalition for Social Justice, Peace and Reparations. On August 20 International Day of Action Against the “Other Wars” – the ones waged against Africa and African people. How have preparations been going? Sanchez Garzoli - Colombia Free Trade Gemina Sanchez-Garzoli, Washington Office on Africa. A so-called “Free Trade” treaty with Colombia will likely come up for a vote in the U.S. Congress, in September. Sanchez Garzoli explains the many ways that the agreement will harm Colombians, especially Black and Indigenous people. Dr Finch - African Civilization Dr. Charles Finch III, scholar of African antiquity, medical doctor, and author, on Your World News with Solomon Comissiong, from College Park, Maryland. Dr. Finch is preparing for the second “Nile Valley Conference” at Morehouse College, in Atlanta. The first “Nile Valley Conference” was held 18 years ago, also at Morehouse. What would Dr. Finch says to those who claim civilization began, not in Africa, but in the “fertile crescent” of Asia?

Black Agenda Radio

Black Agenda Radio

Today's show focuses on: McKinney: NATO Bombs Libya Water Facilities August 20 Action on “Other Wars” De-Professionalizing Teachers Through Charter Schools Prison Hunger Strike Raised Consciousness Mass Incarceration Not Driven By Crime

Black Agenda Radio

Guest Commentary by: Dorsey Nunn, director of the non-profit organization Legal Services for Prisoners with Children, also an ex-inmate. Says the goal of the people who run the prisons is not to gather evidence on crime or to improve security; it’s to psychologically destroy the individual. Christian Parenti, journalist and author, “Tropic of Chaos: Climate Change and the New Geography of Violence.” To understand the disaster in the Horn of Africa, one must know something about the history of the region. Kevin Alexander Gray - Activist and writer, based in Columbia, South Carolina. On Obama’s quest for a “Big Deal” with the Republicans. Doug Henwood, Editor of Left Business Observer. Why are hedge funds so interested in charter schools? Efia Nwangaza, Black Is Back Coalition. Obama says the United States is not at war with Libya. Ben Manski, one of the Liberty Tree Foundation, one of the organizers of the Democracy Convention, August 24 to 28 in Madison, Wisconsin. What’s different about this gathering?

Black Agenda Radio

Comments today from : 1. CliveYoung - Prisoner Hunger Strike Solidarity Coalition 2. DonnaSmith - National Nurses United. The union is pushing for a tax on Wall Street stock trading, instead of cuts to Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security. Says it’s a no brainer. 3. Tonya Ward Jordan - Coalition4Change, a grassroots organization for Black federal government employees. Coalition has noted a marked increase in complaints of racial discrimination in the federal workforce – up 4 percent in 2010. 4. Sabrina Shupe - Educators and supporters of public education from around the country will converge on Washington, DC, on July 30, for a rally and march to “Save Our Schools.” Former teacher Sabrina Stevens Shupe says high stakes testing and assaults on teachers are a clear and present danger to American public schooling. 5. Sikivu Hutchinson - The same anti-abortion forces that put up posters targeting African Americans, declaring that the most dangerous place for a Black baby is the womb, have launched a similar campaign among Latinos. Sikivu Hutchinson, a frequent Black Agenda Report contributor, has followed those developments closely. 6. David Cobb - On August 24, a convention on and about democracy will be convened in Madison, Wisconsin. The event, which is billed as the first national democracy convention, will include no less than nine mini-conventions on subjects such as Economic Democracy, Media Democracy and Education for Democracy. David Cobb is one of the organizers. He says the convention is designed to attract the widest constituencies for radical change.

Black Agenda Radio

Welcome, to the radio magazine that brings you news, analysis and commentary from a Black Left perspective. Today commentary by great guests like: David Swanson, peace activist and publisher of the influential web site War Is A Crime. Joyce Schon, of BAMN’s Equal Opportunity Now Caucus of the NEA and AFT. George Washington, who argued the winning case for Coalition to Defend Affirmative Action (BAMN.) Tom Stephens an attorney and activist in Detroit. Andy Kroll, an investigative journalist in Washington, DC. Wrote an article titled “Racism is at the Root of the Black/White Jobs Gap.” What it all finally boils down to, is racism. Ed Mead, publisher of Prison Focus, former inmate. Explain “SHU” Eligah “Ricky” Byrd created the documentary “Byrd: The Life and Tragic Death of James Byrd.” Dragged behind truck by chain in June, 1998.

Black Agenda Radio

Comments today from : 1. CliveYoung - Prisoner Hunger Strike Solidarity Coalition 2. DonnaSmith - National Nurses United. The union is pushing for a tax on Wall Street stock trading, instead of cuts to Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security. Says it’s a no brainer. 3. Tonya Ward Jordan - Coalition4Change, a grassroots organization for Black federal government employees. Coalition has noted a marked increase in complaints of racial discrimination in the federal workforce – up 4 percent in 2010. 4. Sabrina Shupe - Educators and supporters of public education from around the country will converge on Washington, DC, on July 30, for a rally and march to “Save Our Schools.” Former teacher Sabrina Stevens Shupe says high stakes testing and assaults on teachers are a clear and present danger to American public schooling. 5. Sikivu Hutchinson - The same anti-abortion forces that put up posters targeting African Americans, declaring that the most dangerous place for a Black baby is the womb, have launched a similar campaign among Latinos. Sikivu Hutchinson, a frequent Black Agenda Report contributor, has followed those developments closely. 6. David Cobb - On August 24, a convention on and about democracy will be convened in Madison, Wisconsin. The event, which is billed as the first national democracy convention, will include no less than nine mini-conventions on subjects such as Economic Democracy, Media Democracy and Education for Democracy. David Cobb is one of the organizers. He says the convention is designed to attract the widest constituencies for radical change.