29 February 2012 — Black Agenda Report – News, commentary and analysis from the black left
Like Bill Clinton, Obama Drives Crazy Republicans Even Crazier
Thu, 03/01/2012 – 16:01 – Bruce A. Dixon
by BAR managing editor Bruce A. DixonWhen a right wing Democrat occupies the White House it does stranger things to Republicans than the full moon does to werewolves. If history is any guide, it doesn’t do much positive for the rest of us either….
Obama’s Corporate Tax Scam
A Black Agenda Radio commentary by Glen Ford
President Obama would permanently reduce corporate tax rates, but claims he’ll get even more taxes from companies by closing loopholes. Even if you believe this fantasy, there’s nothing in it for the 99 percent, since “the president has already stated that the additional revenue will go right back into corporate pockets, in the form of new or existing tax breaks.” Have a happy billion dollar election year.
Freedom Rider: Obama Usurps the GOP
by BAR editor and senior columnist Margaret KimberleyIf the Republicans have been sounding particularly insane, this year, it’s because Barack Obama has staked out so much traditional Republican political territory, they have been forced into Loony Land. The GOP presidential contenders spend their time taking bizarre positions on social issues as “a direct result of Barack Obama having taken over every other Republican talking point.” Obama has traveled “as far to the right as Ronald Reagan but Democrats still see him as their savior, the facts be damned.”
NYPD Looks for Terrorists at Black Girls’ School in Newark
A Black Agenda Radio commentary by Glen FordThe NYPD recognizes no jurisdictional boundaries in its religion- and race-based dragnets. Funded partly with federal money intended to curb drugs, Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s secret police imposed hyper-surveillance on Muslims in nearby Newark, New Jersey and other out-of-state localities. “It is as if the police saturated every Italian-American neighborhood, restaurant, business, social club, church, school, and playground in order to find out more about the Mafia.”
Populism and the Two Bubbles That Went Pop – the Banks’ and Obama’s
by Paul StreetOccupy Wall Street has “performed the remarkable service of calling out the name and address of the nation’s true unelected masters: corporate-financial capital and Wall Street.” It was a truth whose mass acceptance was made possible, first by the meltdown of the banks, and then by President Obama’s refusal to deliver real “change.” The First Black President’s brazen service to the “1%” made clear the need for popular action outside the Democratic and Republican parties.
If ACE Was The Place
by Raymond Nat TurnerIf those who rule really wanted kids to be Aces in life, they wouldn’t rig the decks.
Infiltration to Disrupt, Divide and Mis-Direct are Widespread in Occupy – PART I
by Kevin Zeese and Margaret FlowersIt has become clear that political and police infiltration is having an effect on the Occupy movement, say two key activists. Whether the infiltration comes from police, civilian agents of the police, or from the Democratic Party, “it takes the Occupy off of its political agenda and turns people off to participating in the movement.” In a survey by the authors, “41% of respondents reported Democratic groups attempted to co-opt the occupation”
Bradley Manning, Solitary Confinement and Occupy 4 Prisoners
by Bill Quigley
The United States is the world leader in both mass incarceration and the systematic isolation of prisoners. President Obama has earned his own grotesque superlative, having “prosecuted more whistleblowers for espionage than all other presidents combined.” In the case of Bradley Manning, “much of what was published by Wikileaks was either not actually secret or should not have been secret.”
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Mass Incarceration + Silence = Genocide“The conditions that are being forced on the Black masses today come down to a slow genocide that could easily become a fast one,” organizer Carl Dix told an audience at New York’s Riverside Church. Dix is a founding member of the Revolutionary Communist Party and a leader of the Stop Stop-and-Frisk campaign. The logic of global capitalism, he said, “can not only take things further in a genocidal direction, but it could greatly accelerate the pace of the direction if it isn’t stopped.”
UNAC Peace and Social Justice Conference in CT
“If we are going to meet the challenge of confronting the new war budget of the Obama administration and the strategic plans of Washington, we have to organize to confront drone war, special ops and preparations for war in most of the theaters of the world,” said Chris Gavreau, of the United National Anti-War Coalition. UNAC holds a National Anti-War and Social Justice conference in Stamford, Connecticut, March 23-25. The organization’s action program supports “compensation and reparations to people of the world whose countries the U.S. has attacked, destroyed, occupied and impoverished” and “to the victims of the trans-Atlantic slave trade.” Gavreau said “mass incarceration, stop and frisk other attacks all have been designed to demobilize the Black community, to rip them out of the struggle for social change in the U.S.”
Left-Right Unity Over Preventive Detention?
“Our Bill of Rights liberties are being stripped away,” by the recently passed preventive detention law, said Christina Tobin, of Free and Equal. She believes imprisonment without charge or trial can be rolled back by “uniting grassroots Occupy Wall Street, grassroots Tea Party, and grassroots media across the spectrum, for electoral reform. We need to kick Republicans and Democrats out of office, and we the people need to run for office.”
U.S. Attempting a Replay of Libya Regime Change in Syria
“What is going on here, is an organized attempt to overthrow the legitimate government of Syria, that is being coordinated by the United States, France, Turkey, Qatar – a dictatorship – and Saudi Arabia – another dictatorship,” said Francis Boyle, renowned professor of international law. “They have no intention of finding a peaceful resolution of this dispute,” said Boyle. “Who gives Obama the right to say that the government of Syria should step down.”
Day 247 for Marathon Newark Demonstrations
In 134 days, the People’s Organization for Progress (POP) will have kept its vow to match the duration of the 1955 Montgomery, Alabama Bus Boycott. POP’s daily demonstrations are an extension of the struggle that has been going on in Newark, New Jersey, “since the Sixties, really,” said Dr. Akil Khalfani, director of Africana Studies at Essex County College. “I think this is an awareness campaign, trying to get different factions within the larger community active – to get students active, to get unions active, but to realize that their activity is most effective when they are working together.” Nearly 200 organizations have endorsed or joined in POP’s protests.
Dictatorship Reigns in Michigan
Activists hope they have gathered enough petition signatures to force a referendum on Michigan’s Public Act 4, which allows the governor to replace elected officials with Emergency Managers. The mostly Black town of Benton Harbor is one of the disenfranchised municipalities run by a state appointee. “If you ever saw a dictator, he’s one,” said community activist Rev. Edward Pinkney. “Every job that city employees worked on has been outsourced. Nothing is left. We are in worse shape than when he came.”
The New Dark Age 