9 June 2021 — Black Agenda Report

Freedom Rider: The Truth About Defunding Police 

Margaret Kimberley, BAR senior columnist
“Defunding” the police has often turned out to be an accounting trick, but community control of police – a righteous demand – must also ensure that all government functions address human needs.

Corporate Think Tank Reveals How Profit-Driven Motives Drive New Cold War against China

Danny Haiphong, BAR Contributing Editor
The same report paradoxically acknowledges the failure of the economic model the U.S. has tried to impose on the rest of the world.

TRANSCRIPT: Gerald Horne: Haiti and African Liberation in the Americas

Editors, The Black Agenda Review
The Haitian Revolution was not only a victory for the millions of enslaved Africans in the Americas, it was a victory for all working class people.”

Prelude to War? The US/NATO, Egypt, and Ethiopian Sovereignty 

Ann Garrison, BAR Contributing Editor
Ethiopian American activist and community organizer Benyam Kitaw tells Ann Garrison that US hostility toward Ethiopia could lead to further sanctions, economic pressure, and perhaps even war.

Ladee Blu: Another Monroe Doctrine delivery system / Raytheon’s Craven Raven  

Raymond Nat Turner, BAR poet-in-residence

Co-signing for mass murder
‘Mowing the grass…’
Ladee Blu dissemenating
The Monroe Doctrine—this is what
Black faces in high places looks like:

From Black Wall Street to Black Capitalism 

Too Black
Contrary to the Black capitalist myth, most Greenwood residents were low wage working people employed by whites and living in substandard housing.

How to Wreck a Black Nation In the Age of “Black Lives Matter” 

Taytu Bitul
Today’s colonialists recruit Black politicians and Black terrorist groups who are willing to play along.

“New Bones” Abolitionism, Communism, and Captive Maternals 

Joy James
Joy James uses poet Lucille Clifton’s image of “new bones” to reflect on a series of revolutionary anniversaries in 2021 and the nature of political leadership.

BAR Book Forum: Rachel Afi Quinn’s “Being La Dominicana” 

Rachel Afi Quinn
Dominican racial logic frequently contradicts what US scholars think they know about how race works.

BAR Book Forum: Tiffany N. Florvil’s “Mobilizing Black Germany” 

Tiffany N. Florvil
Black History Month strengthened Black German claims of kinship with their nation and the larger diaspora..

Israel Aides Repression in Colombia 

Black Agenda Radio with Margaret Kimberley and Glen Ford
The Zionist state is helping the government of Colombia violently suppress a national strike against austerity, said Ajamu Baraka, national organizer for the Black Alliance for Peace and 2016 Green Party vice presidential candidate. Speaking on Sputnik radio, Baraka said Israel “works hand in hand with the US” in providing “training and political support to the various rightwing governments throughout the region.” Israel has long trained US police departments in political suppression techniques.

Bethesda, Maryland Desecrates Black Bodies and History 

Black Agenda Radio with Margaret Kimberley and Glen Ford
“I’m describing crimes against humanity,” said Dr Marsha Coleman-Adebayo, a leader of the fight to save Moses Macedonia African Cemetery from further destruction by developers. The older section of the cemetery was “looted” of artifacts, while the post-Emancipation section has been paved over for a parking lot. Bethesda, a suburb of Washington, DC, and one of the richest localities in the nation, wants to obliterate evidence of its past as a “slave breeding” state where young Black girls were subjected to “sexual torture,” said Dr. Coleman-Adebayo, a founder of the No Fear Coalition.

The Democrat-Republican Symbiosis 

Black Agenda Radio with Margaret Kimberley and Glen Ford
Like Democratic administrations before them, the Biden-Harris White House “needs the Republicans to give them cover” for failing to serve the needs of the people, said Dr. Johnny Williams, a professor of sociology at Trinity College, in Hartford, Connecticut. Joe Biden’s “moderation leans towards the right,” while Vice President Kamala Harris has “always been a cop,” said Williams.

The Great “Awokening” and Ruling Class Uses for Racial Grievance Discourse  

Pascal Robert
The Black political class is wedded to the centrist Democrats for its “fatback and biscuits” patronage.

Jail Populations Back Up After COVID-19 

Weihua Li, Beth Schwartzapfel, Michael R. Sisak and Camille Fassett
Judges, prosecutors and sheriffs in many states sent people home instead of to jail last year, but new data suggests the change is not lasting.

Exposing the Motive for the Sudden Wave of Attacks on Schools That Teach Critical Race Theory 

Jeff Bryant
What appears to be a dispute about academics is really a political tactic in the ongoing campaign to privatize public schools.

Leftist Anti-Anti-Imperialism: Supporting Imperialism but with Caveats 

Roger D. Harris
The phony Left dabbles in R2P interventions and claims the world is plagued by a plethora of imperialisms, thus letting the superpower and its allies off the hook.

AFRICOM Military’s Exercise: The Art of Creating New Pretexts for Propagating US Interests 

Pavan Kulkami
An AFRICOM-sponsored military exercise in the Mediterranean Sea, ostensibly to combat “irregular migration” and trafficking, is really about further militarizing Africa.

New Investigation Reveals Role of Israeli Operatives in Colombia’s “Political Genocide” 

Dan Cohen
Known as the “Red Dance,” the systematic murder of the Patriotic Union in Colombia was apparently concocted by one of the most decorated spies in Israeli history.