Black Agenda Report 4 August, 2010: Mongrel / White Citizenship / Invisible Negroes / Persecuting Maxine Waters

4 August, 2010 — Black Agenda Report

“Mongrels”: Historically, and from Obama’s Mouth by BAR executive editor Glen Ford

Barack Obama behaves as if he has no historical or cultural knowledge of “the nation over which he presides.” The president’s labeling of African Americans as “mongrels” reveals an astounding and fundamental disrespect for Black Americans as a distinct people. As an epithet, “mongrel” is an even “more powerfully shaped political charge than the ubiquitous ‘nigger!'”

Freedom Rider: White Citizenship by BAR editor and senior columnist Margaret Kimberley

After all is said and done, what much of the so-called Tea Party wants is a return to America as a White Man’s Country. There are a few obstacles in their way, including the U.S. Constitution, but that’s not insurmountable. “On a daily basis pundits and politicians rear their ugly heads to say that the children born of undocumented persons should no longer be given American citizenship.”

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Please sign up to the The Coalition of Resistance statement against the attack on the welfare state

4 August, 2010 — Coalition of Resistance

As you are no doubt aware, the welfare state is under enormous threat from the current government. A new broad-based Coalition of Resistance has been formed to resist the cuts, and put forward an alternative agenda. The Coalition of Resistance has today issued a statement calling for a mass campaign against the Con-Dem cuts and associated attacks on the welfare state, and has already been signed by dozens of trade unionists and activists (see below for a list of the signatories). We are now asking others to join us.

Please add your name to the statement, including any position you hold. Please get others to sign. Join the fight against the cuts locally, and come to the national conference at the Camden Centre in London on 27 November 2010. The conference will propose radical alternatives to the austerity threatening millions, and will plan the fightback to defend the living standards and services of the majority.

To sign up please send an email to coalitionofresistance@mail.com and include your name.

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On Wikileaks (III): “We’d like his cooperation…” By Arthur Silber

1 August, 2010 — Once Upon a Time…

Within the next few days, I will publish a detailed analysis of the criticisms of Wikileaks and the latest release of Afghanistan documents offered, not by conservative/rightwing bastards like Varadarajan (discussed in the last section of this article), but by what we might call the “radical left.” As I will be explaining, I find the left’s criticisms more incoherent and occasionally more offensive than those put forth by the right. The longer I consider the left’s critique, the worse it gets in my view. (You’ll find a brief summary of some of this left critique in the opening of Part I.)

At the moment, I want to mention one particular response by some warriors of the left — those brave souls who, like their counterparts on the right, demonstrate their peerless courage on a daily basis by repairing to their keyboards and pounding out another blog post, and frequently not even that: simply a comment to someone else’s blog post. I hesitate to question the bravery of those who put life and limb in danger by moving fingers to keys, as they imperil the fate of nations by possibly spilling a few drops of coffee on their desks — but I will screw my own courage to the sticking point and tell certain motherfuckers to go straight to hell.

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Wikileaks, Resistance, Genuine Heroes, and Breaking the Goddamned Rules (II) By Arthur Silber

29 July, 2010 — Once Upon a Time…

Life and Death in the Obedience Culture

I have sometimes described America today as an “obedience culture.” The phrase refers to the fact that, beneath the specifics of the largely pointless debates on any topic you care to name, those who purport to speak on behalf of the values of “civilization” and “order” — that is, those who contend they and only they are the true defenders of Western civilization generally — insist on the primacy of one virtue above all others: obedience to authority.

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Wikileaks, Resistance, Genuine Heroes, and Breaking the Goddamned Rules (I) By Arthur Silber

27 July, 2010 — Once Upon a Time…

The other day, I offered some observations about the Wikileaks story and the latest release of a huge number of documents. My comments were focused very narrowly: I wanted to highlight the great heroism of those who run Wikileaks and are otherwise involved in these continuing leaks and offer my thanks for their invaluable work, while contrasting their immense courage with the loathsome, murderous behavior of the rulers of the American imperial state.

Oh, the emails I’ve received! Oh, the posts I’ve seen! Among other charming critiques, I was informed that I’ve proven to be a witless dupe. Don’t you see, my detractors inquired with iron fist delicately wrapped in, well, iron fist, oh, Arthur, don’t you see that this is yet another subterfuge by the endlessly duplicitous ruling class? Don’t you see how all the talk about Iran and Pakistan aiding the resistance in Afghanistan only helps the warmongers in their quest for another chapter (or two, or five) in the neverending war? Don’t you see that the U.S. government has been incredibly clever in using Wikileaks itself for its latest propaganda campaign? Oh, oh, oh, Arthur, don’t you see? [Added in response to inquiries and some pushback: later in this extended essay, I’ll explain in detail why I find this theory extremely problematic and unsatisfactory.]

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THE BIG DEBATE: ENERGY/ENVIRONMENT

3 August, 2010 — The Real News Network

The Dinokeng scenarios: 35 South Africans with different perspectives debate the shape of their future in five videos.


http://widgets.vodpod.com/w/video_embed/Groupvideo.6464663

http://widgets.vodpod.com/w/video_embed/Groupvideo.6464677

http://widgets.vodpod.com/w/video_embed/Groupvideo.6464693

http://widgets.vodpod.com/w/video_embed/Groupvideo.6464703

http://widgets.vodpod.com/w/video_embed/Groupvideo.6464731

VTJP Palestine/Israel Newslinks 3 August, 2010: Scores injured in days of Israeli attacks on Gaza

3 August, 2010 — VTJP

News

International Middle East Media Center

Israeli Military Injures One Gazan Worker
IMEMC – 3 Aug 2010 – Tuesday August 03, 2010 – 17:21, Israel shoots another man as he attempts to gather construction materials.

3 Lebanese Killed in Cross Border Fire
IMEMC – 3 Aug 2010 – Tuesday August 03, 2010 – 15:08, Three Lebanese have been killed in cross border fire with Israel. Hezbollah have claimed that one Israeli has been killed, also, but no conformation has come from the state of Israel.

40 New Settlement Units Approved For East Jerusalem
IMEMC – 3 Aug 2010 – Tuesday August 03, 2010 – 12:14, Israel, on Monday, approved construction of forty new settlement housing units in the Pisgat Ze’ev settlement in occupied East Jerusalem.

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If I needed something to confirm I am going in the right direction: an interview with Yonatan Shapira By Jesse Bacon

3 August, 2010 — The Only Democracy?

I interviewed about Yonatan Shapira of Boycott from Within and Combatants for Peace after he was called in for an interrogation by the Israeli Security Services.

Part 1: Yonatan talks about his activism with the Boycott Divestment Sanctions movement, and how the Gaza War changed his mind.

http://theonlydemocracy.org/wp-content/uploads/2010/07/Yonatan-Shapira_00.00-08.12.mp3

Part 2: Backlash against Israelis and the interview by Israeli security services, and people who have been treated even worse. “I would have been still there.”

http://theonlydemocracy.org/wp-content/uploads/2010/07/Yonatan-Shapira_08.12-16.23.mp3

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The Haiti story you won't read By Laura Wagner

3 August, 2010 — Salon.com

Months after I was trapped under the rubble, I returned to the place we don’t want to think about

When I came back to Haiti in early April, after having been injured during the earthquake and evacuated a few days after, I was prepared to be shocked by the transformation of a city I once knew. Instead, what struck me was how quickly I adjusted to empty lots and mounds of broken-down rubble where landmarks used to be. Well-pressed and coiffed schoolgirls still gossip and giggle in the scant shade while waiting for tap-taps to drive them to class. People sleep under tarps and in tents in sweltering, unseasonable heat but still manage, somehow, to look professional and neat. A teenage amputee lies in her hospital bed, drumming her fingers to Miley Cyrus’ “Party in the U.S.A” and wondering when she’ll go back to school, and when the American missionaries will deliver on their promise to take her lòt bò, to the “other side,” the United States. On the street and on crumbled porches, people slap mosquitoes and make jokes, even jokes about the earthquake. And these things are lovely retentions, a heartening sign that the everyday humanity did not die even when so many people did.

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Bradford can’t afford the EDL

4 August, 2010 — Hope Not Hate

“The EDL are coming here to provoke further trouble – trouble this city cannot afford.”

That’s the warning from Ian Greenwood, the leader of Bradford Council. He knows his city. He knows that the English Defence League’s march of hate will hurt Bradford. Over the last few days, over 17,000 people have co-signed our letter to the Home Secretary asking that the march be banned, including almost 10,000 from Bradford itself.

Our focus is on Bradford, and to run the necessary campaign to stop the EDL we need more leaflets, posters, stickers and banners. To take our campaign to the next level, we need to raise £6,500 in the next 6 days – can you donate?

http://action.hopenothate.org.uk/6500

We can – and will – oppose the EDL every time they try to march. But we are only going to put an end to the EDL threat by changing Government and policing policy.

Over the summer, the EDL will stir up hate across the country. Their vicious lies about the Muslim community is an attempt to divide us all.

We’re planning to step up our campaign to expose the EDL. We’ll be lobbying the Government and the police, demanding that they take the EDL more seriously and recognise the threat they pose.

And we’ll be producing national literature to expose the EDL’s extremist agenda and challenge the Islamaphobia they pump out.

The EDL are the number one threat to community cohesion in Britain. To stop them, we need your help. We need an extra £6,500 in our campaign fund to step things up, can you donate £15 now to play your part?

http://action.hopenothate.org.uk/6500

When local Council leader Ian Greenwood wrote to me earlier this week, he said, “Thank you again for everything you are doing and I am sure that by working together we can stop the EDL’s march of hate.”

He’s right. This time, if we build a big enough campaign, we do have a real possibility of stopping the EDL. Let’s show him how powerful our movement is.

Nick