26 May 2016 — Black Agenda Report
New This Week at Black Agenda Report
Seats on the 2016 Democratic Platform Committee Are NOT a “Political Revolution”
by BAR managing editor Bruce A. Dixon
The Sanders campaign named Cornel West, James Zogby and 3 others to the 15 member Democratic party 2016 platform committee. But platform promises to Democratic voters have always been worthless. Bill Clinton’s platform promised investment in inner city job programs, reinvestment of military spending and much else. Obama’s platform promised relief to homeowners in the middle of the foreclosure crisis and a lot more. The Democratic party has captured Brother West to leverage his credibility to make promises the neither the platform committee nor Democratic voters can enforce, promises which Hillary has no intention of keeping.
by BAR executive editor Glen Ford
Mass Black incarceration wound up ensnaring too many white people in the gulags, bringing forth calls from within the establishment for “reform” to spare those undeserving of imprisonment. Digital science came to the rescue. “The U.S. criminal justice system now deploys algorithm-based technology to predict who will be criminalized in the future, and to systematically push whites out of the path of the New Jim Crow juggernaut.”
by BAR editor and senior columnist Margaret Kimberley
If ever there was a clear path to reparations for the descendants of slaves, it is in compensation to the progeny of the 272 men and women sold South to save the Jesuit school that became Georgetown University. The institution’s $1.5 billion endowment is at least partially owed to an identifiable group of Black people. “If Georgetown pays up like it ought to they can go to any college or make whatever financial decisions they choose.”
A Black Agenda Radio commentary by executive editor Glen Ford
The prosecution in Baltimore wanted the cop that arrested Freddie Gray to be convicted of assault, because Gray had done nothing illegal. But “the judge seemed to think it would be ridiculous to treat every arrest as criminal just because there were no grounds for arrest.” The officer was acquitted, affirming the American criminal justice principle that nothing is illegal – including murder – when the cops do it.
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by Danny Haiphong
These are exciting – and frustrating – times. “The crisis of US empire has created ripe conditions for a revolutionary movement, yet no such movement exists.” Social forces opposed to capitalism’s predations multiply, yet too often fail to unify. “The task from here is to engage those who have been propelled into action by the crisis of US Empire, whether it is the Sandernistas or Black Lives Matter activists.”
by Sam Husseini
The only two Muslim members of Congress, Keith Ellison and André Carson, both Black, seem oblivious to Hillary Clinton’s history of distancing herself from Muslim Americans, and share her militaristic vision for the Middle East. U.S. discussions of Islamophobia “largely excludes discussion of U.S. foreign policy, the dehumanization of Muslim lives lost, especially in U.S. attacks.” The only good Muslim is one who supports U.S. imperial policy.
by Jaan Laaman
Like many political prisoners, the author’s freedom of speech rights are routinely curtailed. “While prisoners do have a legal right to express their thoughts and report on issues and abuses, actually getting your words out is often very hard or impossible.” U.S. prisons operate their own “kangaroo courts” that often shut down inmate communications “even if the prisoner ultimately wins appeal and has his or her communications restored.”
by Abayomi Azikiwe
African Liberation Day is always a cause for celebration – but also for sober assessment of how far off the goal of continental liberation remains. The great pan-Africanist Kwame Nkrumah warned that, if Africa did not unite, “imperialists would reverse the minimal gains made by the national liberation movements and political parties.” More than a half-century later, U.S. troops operate in the vast majority of African nations.
by Solomon Comissiong
Cuba is a hero nation, and “Commandant Fidel Castro’s legacy can never be undone; his internationalist and revolutionary history will serve as an inspiration forever.” The island nation and its leader confronted – and triumphed against – a giant neighbor whose wealth “comes directly from the plunder and theft.” However, “in the case of Cuba and Fidel Castro, their attempts to break the island nation failed miserably, time and time again.”
The New Dark Age 
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