The New Dark Age

29 August 2019 — Black Agenda Report

Is Warren Talented Enough to Betray the People as Masterfully as Obama?

Glen Ford, BAR executive editor
Elizabeth Warren is seen as a counter Bernie Sanders, but she will melt (like Joe Biden and Kamala Harris) if she stops raising Democrats’ expectations to bust corporate power.

Jeffery Epstein, Jay-Z, and the Miserable World Created by the Billionaire Ruling Class

Danny Haiphong, BAR contributor
Epstein and Jay-Z are representatives of the class responsible for much of the misery on this planet.

Black Alliance for Peace Demands All Elected Officials Stand Against Militarism

Black Alliance For Peace
Politicians must not be allowed to escape accountability for US militarism, both on foreign shores and US streets.

Slick Willy Rides Again!

Raymond Nat Turner, BAR poet-in-residence
I NEVER Trusted that M$%#-F@!*… / that silvery-Tongued, false-fingering saxophonist/ From Arkansas

Black Agenda Radio for Week of August 26, 2019

Black Agenda Radio with Nellie Bailey and Glen Ford
Venezuelan Embassy Defenders Need Support / Jay-Z Speaks, Raps and Cuts Deals for Himself / FBI Targets Blacks and Left, Not White Supremacists

California Lawmakers Consider Ethnic Studies Mandate For Nation’s Largest University System

Jeffrey Cawood
The mandate would affect a system of almost half a million students, 74 percent of them minorities.”

The Great Land Robbery

Vann R. Newkirk II
A war waged by deed of title has dispossessed 98 percent of black agricultural landowners in America.

Letters from Our Readers

Jahan Choudhry BAR Comments Editor
This week’s letters discuss African-Americans and immigration, Bernie Sanders and the criminal justice system, and Jay-Z’s relationship to the NFL and Colin Kaepernick.

BAR Book Forum: Zhun Xu’s “From Commune to Capitalism”

Roberto Sirvent, BAR Book Forum Editor
The author argues that decollectivization served as the political basis for the capitalist transition in China.

BAR Book Forum: Cheryl R. Rodriguez, Dzodzi Tsikata, and Akosua Adomako Ampofo’s “Transatlantic Feminisms”

Roberto Sirvent, BAR Book Forum Editor
It is critical for Black feminists to be passionately involved in creating a global community of voices.

The Low to No Cost of Killing a Black Man

Glen Ford, BAR executive editor
New York’s feeble slap on the wrist for Eric Garner’s murderer-in-blue is yet more proof that US policing cannot be reformed.

FBI Targets Blacks and Left, Not White Supremacists

Black Agenda Radio with Nellie Bailey and Glen Ford
The FBI has plenty of powers but chooses not to use them against violent white supremacists, said Chip Gibbons, of Defending Rights and Dissent. “If the FBI gets more domestic terrorism powers, who do you think they’re going to use them against?” Gibbons asked, and then answered: dissidents and Blacks. “If anything, the FBI’s power should be restricted.”

Jay-Z Speaks, Raps and Cuts Deals for Himself

Black Agenda Radio with Nellie Bailey and Glen Ford
Entertainment billionaire Jay-Z’s collaboration with the NFL to “move past” Colin Kaepernick’s “take a knee” initiative is another example of the rapper “positioning himself as an authoritative voice” for “the Black masses, without getting their opinion,” said writer and doctoral candidate James Hill, Jr. Hill wrote an article for BAR titled, “Kneeling and the (Re)Signification of the Black Fantastic.”

Venezuelan Embassy Defenders Need Support

Black Agenda Radio with Nellie Bailey and Glen Ford
Supporters of the four activists facing a year in prison and heavy fines for protecting the Venezuelan embassy from being handed over to pro-coup forces by the Trump administration are “using this case to organize people against the coup and in favor of international law,” said defendant Kevin Zeese, who expects the case to go to trial “in the spring.” Zeese and co-defendant Margaret Flowers are founders of Popular Resistance.

The Quiet Death of the “White Bernie Bro” Attack

Carl Beijer
A majority of Sanders supporters are non-white, in contrast to all the other top tier candidates, including Kamala Harris.

An Axis of Hope, Dignity and Defiance stands up to the Triumvirate of Evil

Gerald A. Perreira
The #No More Trump campaign is a defiant appeal to stand with the people of Venezuela, to oppose Trump’s war of attrition against this heroic sovereign nation.

The Precarity of Black Motherhood

Tao Leigh Goffe
Jordan Peele’s “Us” depicts the terrors faced by Black mothers in a way that owes as much to Toni Morrison’s “Beloved” as it does to classic Hollywood horror.

Neoliberal Capitalism at a Dead End

Utsa Patnaik and Prabhat Patnaik
Donald Trump’s resort to protectionism is recognition of having reached this cul-de-sac.

Perpetual Debt in the Silicon Savannah

Kevin P. Donovan and Emma Park
Kenya’s poor were among the first to benefit from digital lending apps; now they call it slavery.

“Dirtbag,” “Savages,” “Subhuman”: A Border Agent’s Hateful Career and the Crime That Finally Ended It

A.C. Thompson
The agent joked about how tasty Guatemalan migrants can be if they are properly “fried” through the use of Tasers.