Religion and Politics

Mission of the Black Church (James Cone) / Black Liberation Theology (Defined by James Cone)

Political Action Forum Index

Global News:Politics—Literature & the Arts / Bill Moyers and James Cone (Interview)

Send contributions to: ChickenBones: A Journal / 13219 Kientz Road / Jarratt, VA 23867 -- I became aware of Rudy Lewis’ labor of love a few short months ago during a visit to Kalamu ya Salaam’s e-drum listserv. As soon as I saw the title of the journal I knew it was about Black folks, and the power of the written word. A quick click took me into a journal that’s long on creativity, highlighting well-known, little known, and a little known writers, and commitment to the empowerment of Black folks. I contacted Rudy to ask if he’d consider publishing some of my work. His response was immediate, and a couple of days after I’d forwarded some poems to him—they were part of ChickenBones. What I didn’t know was that this journal has been surviving for the last five years with very little outside financial support. . . If we want journals like this to “thrive” we need to support them with more than our website hits, praise, and submissions for publication consideration.

—Peace, Mary E. Weems (January 2007)

BLACK CLASSIC BOOKS

BCP Digital Printing

Black Studies in the Age of Obama

By Dr. Muhammad Ahmad
Conference Co- Convener, Chairman, PCIAS Inc.

What credibility is there in Geneva's all-white boycott?—What do the US, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, the Netherlands, Germany, Poland, Italy and Israel have in common? They are all either European or European-settler states. And they all decided to boycott this week's UN conference against racism in Geneva – even before Monday's incendiary speech by the Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad which triggered a further white-flight walkout by representatives of another 23 European states. In international forums, it's almost unprecedented to have such an undiluted racial divide of whites-versus-the-rest. And for that to happen in a global meeting called to combat racial hatred doesn't exactly augur well for future international understanding at a time when the worst economic crisis since the war is ramping up racism and xenophobia across the world. . . .The dispute was mainly about Israel and western fears that the conference would be used, like its torrid predecessor in Durban at the height of the Palestinian intifada in 2001, to denounce the Jewish state and attack the west over colonialism and the slave trade. Guardian

President Barack Obama has achieved a great victory over Republican opposition with his The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, which was signed in Denver, Colorado, Tuesday, 17 February. Mr. Obama sketched out his achievement in a speech. This stimulus package includes investments, aid to states, and tax cuts. How quickly the nearly $800 billion can be infused into the economy is uncertain. But that problem can be righted in months. In any case Mr. Obama should be greatly applauded for this extraordinary legislation. ChickenBones Editorial

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An $80 Billion Start—Wrapped inside the economic stimulus package is about $80 billion in spending, loan guarantees and tax incentives aimed at promoting energy efficiency, renewable energy sources, higher-mileage cars and coal that is truly clean. As a stand-alone measure, these investments would amount to the biggest energy bill in history. NYTimes

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Obama Unveils $75 Billion Plan to Fight Home Foreclosures—President Obama announced a plan on Wednesday to help as many as nine million American homeowners refinance their mortgages or avert foreclosure, saying that it would shore up housing prices, stabilize neighborhoods and slow a downward spiral that was “unraveling homeownership, the middle class and the American Dream itself. NYTimes

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The Destructive Center—Paul Krugman—I blame President Obama’s belief that he can transcend the partisan divide — a belief that warped his economic strategy. After all, many people expected Mr. Obama to come out with a really strong stimulus plan, reflecting both the economy’s dire straits and his own electoral mandate.

Instead, however, he offered a plan that was clearly both too small and too heavily reliant on tax cuts. Why? Because he wanted the plan to have broad bipartisan support, and believed that it would. Not long ago administration strategists were talking about getting 80 or more votes in the Senate. NYTimes (9 February 2009)

An Open Letter to President Obama (Lewis)

Remembering Malcolm X (May 19, 1925 – February 21, 1965) by Junious Ricardo Stanton

"I might point out here that colonialism or imperialism, as the slave system of the West is called, is not something that is just confined to England or France or the United States. The interests in this country are in cahoots with the interests in France and the interests in Britain. It's one huge complex or combine, and it creates what's known not as the American power structure or the French power structure, but an international power structure. This [racist western] international power structure is used to suppress the masses of dark-skinned people all over the world and exploit them of their natural resources."—Malcolm X

Big Little White Lies / Luqman Dawood Translation / Religion and Society Contents

A Black Imam Breaks Ground in Mecca—Two years ago, Sheik Adil Kalbani dreamed that he had become an imam at the Grand Mosque in Mecca, Islam’s holiest city.

Waking up, he dismissed the dream as a temptation to vanity. Although he is known for his fine voice, Sheik Adil is black, and the son of a poor immigrant from the Persian Gulf. Leading prayers at the Grand Mosque is an extraordinary honor, usually reserved for pure-blooded Arabs from the Saudi heartland.

So he was taken aback when the phone rang last September and a voice told him that King Abdullah had chosen him as the first black man to lead prayers in Mecca. Days later Sheik Adil’s unmistakably African features and his deep baritone voice, echoing musically through the Grand Mosque, were broadcast by satellite TV to hundreds of millions of Muslims around the world. NYTimes Amin Sharif

Muslim Imam Warithdin Muhammad Makes Transition (Marvin X )

Tributes Obituaries Remembrances      Dope, Mamas, and Preachers   Love and Spirituality / Plato on Obama Drama

Defining Religion: Religion is a search for meaning when you don't have it in this world. So, while they might have controlled the black people physically and politically and economically, they did not control their spirit. That's why the black churches are very powerful forces in the African American community and always has been. Because religion has been that one place where you have an imagination that no one can control. And so, as long as you know that you are a human being and nobody can take that away from you, then God is that reality in your life that enables you to know that. . . . : Even though you're living under the shadow of the lynching tree. Because religion is a spirit that is not defined by what people can do to your body. They can kill your body, but they can't kill your soul. We were always told that. There is a spirit deep in you that nobody can take away from you because it's a creation that God gave to you. Now, if you know you have a humanity that nobody can take away from you, they may lock you up. They may lynch you. But, they don't win. James Cone Bill Moyers Journal
A Lively, Living Word

By Ralph Garlin Clingan

An Annual Clingan Christmas Letter Against Cheap Grace

Congressional Black Caucus Monitor Report Card, October 2008 by Leutisha Stills and the CBC Monitor Team

Radical in Pursuit of Peace and Justice

Cynthia McKinney Presidential Candidate

Seize this Opportunity for Change

Text of Al Gore DNC Speech

Speeches & Sermons Table Letter to Sister Cynthia McKinney

New York Times Attempts to Define and Dictate Black Politics (Glen Ford)

Is Obama the End of Black Politics? Lord, No (Mel Reeves)

Forward Is Where We Have to Go (Amiri Baraka)

Philip Dray. Capitol Men: The Epic Story of Reconstruction Through the Lives of the First Black Congressmen. Houghton Mifflin Company 2008 -- Philip Foner Review

In this grand and compelling new history of Reconstruction, Pulitzer Prize finalist Philip Dray shines a light on a little known group of men: the nation's first black members of Congress. These men played a critical role in pushing for much-needed reforms in the wake of a traumatic civil war, including public education for all children, equal rights, and protection from Klan violence. But they have been either neglected or maligned by most historians -- their "glorious failure" chalked up to corruption and "ill-preparedness."

In this beautifully written, magnificently researched book, Dray overturns that thinking. He draws on archival documents, newspaper coverage, and congressional records to show that men like P.B.S. Pinchback of Louisiana (who started out as a riverboat gambler), South Carolina's Robert Smalls (who hijacked a Confederate steamer and delivered it to Union troops), and Robert Brown Elliott (who bested the former vice president of the Confederacy in a stormy debate on the House floor) were eloquent, creative, and often quite effective -- they were simply overwhelmed by the brutal forces of reaction. Covering the fraught period between the Emancipation Proclamation and Jim Crow, Dray reclaims the reputations of men who, though flawed, led a valiant struggle for social justice.—Publisher's note

The Challenge of the Changing Face of America—

• The highest rates of poverty are among children, especially children of color. The poverty rate for white children is 10 percent, while it is 28 percent for Latino children, 27 percent for Native-American children, and 33 percent for African-American children.

• African Americans, Latino Americans, and Native Americans are about three times as likely to live in poverty as are whites. While the poverty rate for non-Hispanic whites is 8 percent, the rate for African Americans is 24.1 percent, for Hispanics, 21.8 percent, and for Native Americans, 23.2 percent.

• The most extreme poverty in the United States is concentrated in specific geographical areas such as the urban cores of major cities and Native American reservations. These areas of concentrated poverty are the result of decades of policies that confined the impoverished to these economically isolated areas.

• Finally, we also noted the stark racial disparity in the distribution of wealth in the United States. White families not only have on average 10 times the net worth of families of color, but also between 1998 and 2001, their wealth grew by 20 percent, while the net worth of African American households actually declined during that same period. CatholicCharitiesUSA

A national mood swing—˜We can end a war.—We can save the planet.—We can change the world.'—All of a sudden, Democrats are on the offensive. 'Change' isn't just this year's most ubiquitous campaign slogan, it seems to be something that's already happening out there in the real world, in small towns, on college campuses and yes, even at Super Bowl parties. Who knows just what caused the shift in mood? Iraq? Katrina? Global warming? Rising income inequality? Disgust with Bush and Cheney? Whatever the causes, Americans seem eager to reclaim a spirit of idealism that many thought ended with the 1960s, to embrace a heritage that acknowledges conflict and struggle but also hope and progress. Obama's Super Bowl ad represented a gamble: a bet that the symbolism of past social movements is now more likely to give Americans a thrill than a chill. And the matter-of-factness with which his ad was greeted - and Obama's electoral success so far - suggest that his campaign correctly read the national mood. LATimes

Rev. Jackson’s Not Down for the Count, Yet
By Mel Reeves

"And while Austin and folks from her generation rush to condemn Jackson and call him a "Grandpa" who is "off his meds," they also owe him and others who fought the good fight against racist discrimination a little bit of gratitude."

Act Like We Know The Parade of Anti Obama Rascals

Baraka Message: Taking Up Obama's Mantle—My line at Black Left meeting & Black Radical Congress is solidify a political line, with that admitted united front as broad leadership and then mobilize masses of Black and Progressive people to descend on Denver for Dem convention with demonstrations, signs, petitions, literature and strategy and tactics for influencing what is sure to be the attempt at the crookedest of all conventions. The people are already excited by the primaries and the crude tricks of the bourgeoisie. We shd take up Obama's mantle, both serving as his defense (the defense of democracy) and using this presence to make impact on the campaign. The Rev Wright "flap" was actually positive, now the race question is squarely in the campaigns and the bourgeoisie will push and push it, but it should serve to further inflame the masses, who have real ties with the Black church and know what Wright said is historically true. Amiri Baraka. I will raise this at a meeting in Harlem next week.

American Fascists: The Christian Right and the War on America—The f-word crops up in the most respectable quarters these days. Yet if the provocative title of this exposé by Hedges (War Is a Force That Gives Us Meaning)—sounds an alarm, the former New York Times foreign correspondent takes care to employ his terms precisely and decisively. As a Harvard Divinity School graduate, his investigation of the Christian Right agenda is even more alarming given its lucidity. Citing the psychology and sociology of fascism and cults, including the work of German historian Fritz Stern, Hedges draws striking parallels between 20th-century totalitarian movements and the highly organized, well-funded "dominionist movement," an influential theocratic sect within the country's huge evangelical population. Rooted in a radical Calvinism, and wrapping its apocalyptic, vehemently militant, sexist and homophobic vision in patriotic and religious rhetoric, dominionism seeks absolute power in a Christian state. Hedges's reportage profiles both former members and true believers, evoking the particular characteristics of this American variant of fascism. His argument against what he sees as a democratic society's suicidal tolerance for intolerant movements has its own paradoxes. But this urgent book forcefully illuminates what many across the political spectrum will recognize as a serious and growing threat to the very concept and practice of an open society.—Publishers Weekly

Tear Down the Ghetto: The Price is Wrong (Glen Ford) / Alvin K. Brunson Passes Over

Gook: John McCain’s Racism and Why It Matters

By Irwin A. Tang

Book Review by Kam Williams
Jesse Jackson on Obama and the Paulson Plan
Kam Williams Interviews Reverend Sharpton

Murder in Black and White (New Television Show)

Premiering Sunday, October 5th
17 Poets Reading Series (October 2008 Schedule)

Spike Lee and Miracle at St. Anna

New Film Interview by Kam Williams

Voting is not enough—If voting was that effective, to quote the activist Philip Berrigan, it would be illegal. And voting in an age when elections are stolen by rigged ballot machines and a stacked Supreme Court willing to overturn all legal precedent to make George Bush president, will not work. I am not saying do not vote. We should all vote. But that has to be the starting point if we want to reclaim America. We must lobby, organize, and advocate for the dissolution of the World Trade Organization and NAFTA. The WTO and NAFTA have handcuffed workers and consumers and stymied our efforts to create clean environments. These agreements are beyond the control of our courts and have crippled our weakened regulatory agencies. . . . If these pension funds, worth trillions of dollars, were in the hands of workers, the working class would own a third of the New York Stock Exchange. America's Democratic Collapse

Setting the Record Straight

Letter from Reverend Jeremiah Wright

Obama 2008 Table / Interview with Jeremiah Wright / Jeremiah Wright with Bill Moyers

Snapshots of life in Baghdad— Dutch photographer Geert van Kesteren, who collected 388 pages of photographs for his book Baghdad Calling, wanted to catalogue the tragedy of the tens of thousands of Iraqis who are the largely ignored victims of our demented 2003 invasion and occupation. . . . The refugee statistics are so appalling that they have become almost mundane. Four million of Iraq's 23 million people have fled their homes—until recently, at the rate of 60,000 a month—allegedly more than 1.2 million to Syria (a figure now challenged by at least one prominent NGO), 500,000 to Jordan, 200,000 to the Gulf, 70,000 to Egypt, 57,000 to Iran, up to 40,000 to Lebanon, 10,000 to Turkey. Sweden has accepted 9,000, Germany fewer – where an outrageous political debate has suggested that Christian refugees should have preference over Muslim Iraqis. With its usual magnanimity – especially for a country that set off this hell-disaster by its illegal invasion – George Bush's America has, of course, accepted slightly more than 500. Independent News

With the Lost Boys in Southern Sudan

Nuba-Darfur-South Sudan Table Obama 2008 Table

It's too little and too late to overcome the bursting housing bubble—Research has estimated that the next recession could increase unemployment by 3.2 million to 5.8 million people, and poverty by 4.7 million to 10.4 million, with at least 4.2 million also losing health insurance. . . . Hard times ahead highlight the need for structural changes such as universal health care and labor law reform. These and a bigger, "green" fiscal stimulus that would reduce carbon emissions should be pushed to the top of the political agenda.—Charlotte Observer

Hallmark of a totalitarian state—Before they seize power and establish a world according to their doctrines, totalitarian movements conjure up a lying world of consistency which is more adequate to the needs of the human mind than reality itself; in which, through sheer imagination, uprooted masses can feel at home and are spared the never-ending shocks which real life and real experiences deal to human beings and their expectations. The force possessed by totalitarian propaganda—before the movements have the power to drop iron curtains to prevent anyone's disturbing, by the slightest reality, the gruesome quiet of an entirely imaginary world—lies in its ability to shut the masses off from the real world—Hannah Arendt

History in the Making Barack Obama's Speech at First AME Church of Los Angeles (Tananarive Due)

Our Sad State of Democracy A Portrait of Michigan Governor Jennifer Granholm By Scott Kurashige

Mildred Loving of Loving vs Virginia Dies

(1939-2008)
By Norman Faria

U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development plans to tear down more than 4,600 public housing units in four complexes across the city -- while replacing them with private, mixed-income developments that will set aside only 744 apartments for low-income people. The decision to demolish these public complexes, which suffered only relatively minor damage during Hurricane Katrina, comes as rents across the city have doubled since the storm -- as has the homeless population. The activists are asking concerned citizens across the country to join the actions in New Orleans or to take action at home. According to a statement from Kali Akuno, director of the Stop the Demolition Coalition: What is at stake with the demolition of public housing in New Orleans is more than just the loss of housing units: it destroys any possibility for affordable housing in New Orleans for the foreseeable future. Without access to affordable housing, thousands of working class New Orleanians will be denied their human right to return.— Southern Studies / Bill Moyers and James Cone (Interview)

Congressional Black Caucus

Grades Plummet on War, "Terror" and Trade Bills

By Leutisha Stills, CBC Monitor

The Wages of Peace—There is no longer any doubt that the Iraq War is a moral and strategic disaster for the United States. But what has not yet been fully recognized is that it has also been an economic disaster. To date, the government has spent more than $522 billion on the war, with another $70 billion already allocated for 2008. With just the amount of the Iraq budget of 2007, $138 billion, the government could instead have provided Medicaid-level health insurance for all 45 million Americans who are uninsured. What's more, we could have added 30,000 elementary and secondary schoolteachers and built 400 schools in which they could teach. And we could have provided basic home weatherization for about 1.6 million existing homes, reducing energy consumption in these homes by 30 percent. But the economic consequences of Iraq run even deeper than the squandered opportunities for vital public investments. Spending on Iraq is also a job killer. Every $1 billion spent on a combination of education, healthcare, energy conservation and infrastructure investments creates between 50 and 100 percent more jobs than the same money going to Iraq. Taking the 2007 Iraq budget of $138 billion, this means that upward of 1 million jobs were lost because the Bush Administration chose the Iraq sinkhole over public investment. The Nation

Cancer in the Congressional Black Caucus

By Glen Ford, Black Agenda Report

When NOT to Vote Black (at least in Memphis ( Glen Ford ) / Reverend Yearwood on YouTube

King Archive at Morehouse—After years at the Sotheby's auction house in New York, a collection of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.'s papers has come home to Atlanta. The papers had been scheduled for sale last year when an anonymous group ponied up a reported $32 million to buy the roughly 10,000 documents and books. The documents have been entrusted to the library at King's alma mater, Morehouse College. . . The collection features 7,000 papers written by King, including drafts of his 1963 "I Have a Dream" speech and his 1964 Nobel Peace Prize acceptance address. They also include a 1946 college examination on the Bible, his earliest surviving theological writing, and papers he was working on just before he was killed in 1968. CNN MLK Papers

Martin Luther King Jr. vs The New World Order

By Junious Ricardo Stanton

Obama Wins Super Tuesday: Wins Most States, Wins Most Delegates—Obama won majority of delegates (908 to 884, Time Delegate Count) and majority of states (Alabama, Alaska, Connecticut, Delaware, Georgia, Idaho, Kansas, North Dakota, and Utah), and tied in New Mexico.— "It's a choice between going into this election with Republicans and independents already united against us, or going against their nominee with a campaign that has united Americans of all parties, from all backgrounds, from all races, from all religions, around a common purpose," he said. "It's a choice between having a debate with the other party about who has the most experience in Washington, or having one about who is most likely to change Washington, because that's a debate that we can win." WashingtonPost

Barack Obama Speaks at Dr. King's Church

Remarks of Senator Barack Obama: The Great Need of the Hour

Atlanta, GA | January 20, 2008

The Fierce Urgency of Now Martin Luther King Birthday Celebration 2008 (Grace Lee Boggs)

Debate '08: Obama Girl vs Giuliani Girl (video)

"I Got a Crush...On Obama" By Obama Girl (video)

Chris Rock's 2008 Election Analysis (video)

Luis Alvarez. The Power of the Zoot: Youth Culture and Resistance during World War II. (2008). -- Flamboyant zoot suit culture, with its ties to fashion, jazz and swing music, jitterbug and Lindy Hop dancing, unique patterns of speech, and even risqué experimentation with gender and sexuality, captivated the country's youth in the 1940s. The Power of the Zoot is the first book to give national consideration to this famous phenomenon. Providing a new history of youth culture based on rare, in-depth interviews with former zoot-suiters, Luis Alvarez explores race, region, and the politics of culture in urban America during World War II. He argues that Mexican American and African American youths, along with many nisei and white youths, used popular culture to oppose accepted modes of youthful behavior, the dominance of white middle-class norms, and expectations from within their own communities.

"Luis Alvarez has quite simply crafted a magnificent first book--one that tells a national story from African American and Mexican American youth in New York and Los Angeles to Nisei, Filipino, and Euro-American zooters and the wartime race-based violence that erupted in Detroit, Beaumont, and Mobile."--Vicki L. Ruiz, author of From Out of the Shadows: Mexican Women in Twentieth-Century America

Obama Defeats Clinton in 3-State Sweep—Senator Barack Obama won the primary in Louisiana (53 % to 39 %) and the caucuses in Nebraska (68% to 32%) and Washington (68% to 31%) on Saturday, defeating his rival, Hillary Rodham Clinton, as the two scrambled for delegates in their fiercely contested battle for the Democratic nomination.— "We won in Louisiana, we won in Nebraska, we won in Washington State," he said. "We won north, we won south, we won in between, and I believe we can win Virginia on Tuesday if you're ready to stand for change." Before today, Clinton held a slight edge over Obama in the delegate count—1,055 to 998—with 2,025 delegates needed to claim the Democratic nomination. . . . Obama stood to pick up as many as 170 delegates tonight. Washington Post

The Big End of the American Economy?

By Richard Lawson

Mortgage Crisis Lesson: Ostentatious Display Ain't Black Power

Obama Close Second in New Hampshire—With 91 percent of the electoral precincts reporting, Mrs. Clinton had 39 percent of the vote, Mr. Obama 36 percent, and John Edwards 17 percent. On the Republican side, Mr. McCain had 37 percent, Mr. Romney 32 percent and Mike Huckabee 11 percent. NYTimes

President Robert G. Mugabe's UN Speech

62nd Session New York, 26 September, 2007

Defining Religion: Religion is a search for meaning when you don't have it in this world. So, while they might have controlled the black people physically and politically and economically, they did not control their spirit. That's why the black churches are very powerful forces in the African American community and always has been. Because religion has been that one place where you have an imagination that no one can control. And so, as long as you know that you are a human being and nobody can take that away from you, then God is that reality in your life that enables you to know that. . . . : Even though you're living under the shadow of the lynching tree. Because religion is a spirit that is not defined by what people can do to your body. They can kill your body, but they can't kill your soul. We were always told that. There is a spirit deep in you that nobody can take away from you because it's a creation that God gave to you. Now, if you know you have a humanity that nobody can take away from you, they may lock you up. They may lynch you. But, they don't win. James Cone Bill Moyers Journal

Immigrants of African Descent Should Remember

the Shoulders We Stand On

Remembering Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and the Civil Rights Movement

By Patricia Jabbeh Wesley

Grace Boggs: Crime Among Our People Conversation about Religion Give Detroit Schools a Fresh Start Organizing Comes Before Mobilizing

Jesse Helms, White Racist –In 1984, when Helms faced his toughest opponent in Democratic Gov. Jim Hunt, the late Bill Peterson, one of the most evenhanded reporters I have ever known, summed up what "some said was the meanest Senate campaign in history." "Racial epithets and standing in school doors are no longer fashionable," Peterson wrote, "but 1984 proved that the ugly politics of race are alive and well. Helms is their master." A year before the election, when public polls showed Helms trailing by 20 points, he launched a Senate filibuster against the bill making the birthday of Martin Luther King Jr. a national holiday. Thurmond and the Senate majority were on the other side, but the next poll showed Helms had halved his deficit. All year, Peterson reported, "Helms campaign literature sounded a drumbeat of warnings about black voter-registration drives. . . . On election eve, he accused Hunt of being supported by 'homosexuals, the labor union bosses and the crooks' and said he feared a large 'bloc vote.' What did he mean? 'The black vote,' Helms said." He won, 52 percent to 48 percent. In 1990, locked in a tight race with an African American Democrat, former Charlotte mayor Harvey Gantt, Helms aired a final-week TV ad that showed a pair of white hands crumpling a rejection letter, while an announcer said, "You needed that job and you were the best qualified. But they had to give it to a minority because of a racial quota." Once again, he pulled through. That is not a history to be sanitized. WashingtonPost

The Dropout Challenge Food Future Past Organizing Comes Before Mobilizing Boggs Center: Going Beyond Black and White /

Protesters Pepper Sprayed, Tasered, Arrested

New Orleans Resisting Demolition

By Carl Dix

Destroying Homes for the Holidays in New Orleans

New Orleans City Council Shuts Down Public Housing Debate (video) The TRUTH About Christmas (video)

Bill Quigley:

Leaving the Poor Behind Again New Orleans a Ghost Town

A Message from New Orleans Eighteen Months After

The Seven Principles of Kwanzaa (12/26 to 1/1)

(The Nguzo Saba)

Umoja (Unity) / Kujichagulia (Self Determination) / Ujima (Collective Work and Responsibility) / Ujamma (Cooperative Economics) / Nia (Purpose)

Kuumba (Creativity) / Imani (Faith)

Obama Wins Iowa --A record outpouring of Democratic voters gave Obama a victory last night with 38 percent support, while John Edwards, with 29.8 percent, barely edged out Clinton, who finished third at 29.5 percent. Obama's Iowa Win Bolsters Bid for New Hampshire

DAILY CONGRESSIONAL QUARTERLY 2008 ELECTION MAP CQ Politics

CONGRESSIONAL BLACK CAUCUS: EARMARKLESS CQ Politics

GUESSES ON THE REPUBLICAN FRONTRUNNER CQ Politics

CANDIDATE PROFILES CQ Politics

Harold Washington Remembered—When Harold Washington, Chicago’s first black mayor, died on Nov. 25, 1987, many of us understood that his death marked the passing of a great man. But while we lamented the negative impact of his loss, few of us had any inkling of the vast political vacuum he would leave behind. As time passes, the vacuum expands. Back then, it seemed likely that Washington’s powerful presence could propel the formation of progressive alliances across the country. However, as we grope around in the political darkness he once illuminated, it seems clear that his unique personality was a major reason for his success. . . . Washington’s initial election occurred in 1983, when progressive forces were mired in the gloom of the Reagan administration. He found mayoral success using a formula that was part campaign and part crusade. But Washington was no political neophyte, full of naïve idealism. He had already served many years as a state legislator and a member of Congress, and was well versed in the nuts and bolts of pragmatic politics. Salim Muwakkil

Appeal to African Heads of State Malcolm X Videos Another Look at Israel Table African American Faiths

Books by W.E.B. Du Bois WEB Du Bois Table

The Suppression of the African Slave Trade (1896) / The Philadelphia Negro: A Social Study (1899)

The Souls of Black Folk: Essays and Sketches (1903) / John Brown (1909) / The Quest of the Silver Fleece (1911)

Darkwater: Voices Within the Veil (1920) Gift of Black Folk: The Negroes in the Making of America (1924)

Dark Princess: A Romance (1928) / Black Reconstruction in America (1935) / Black Folk, Then and Now (1939)

Color and Democracy: Colonies and Peace (1945) / The World and Africa: An Inquiry (1947) / In Battle for Peace (1952)

A Trilogy: The Ordeal of Monsart (1957) Monsart Builds a School (1959) nd Worlds of Color (1961)

An ABC of Color: Selections (1963) / The Autobiography of W.E.B. Du Bois:(1968)

The whole truth about Barack Obama—Barack Obama has repeatedly made it crystal clear that he is pro Zionist, pro the interests of big business corporations over common people, pro widening the US military/industrial complex through increasing the US military and its budget, and last but certainly not least—he is not opposed to using unilateral US military force to insure what he refers to as "US interests" in other parts of the world. . . . Barack Obama's being biologically an African American is absolutely no legitimate reason to discard honest and in-depth coverage of where he really stands and has stood on life and death economic and military matters affecting this nation and the entire world. Blindly supporting the candidacy of Barack Obama is in fact inverse white racism, and there is nothing in the least bit progressive about that. Barack Obama and those who support him need to be asked the hard and tough questions, not "coddled". . . . Putting a biologically Black face on imperialism and empire as if that changes or ameliorates its horrible affects is entirely unacceptable. As a member of the human family, a Black person, and a US citizen, I am deeply disappointed with Democracy Now, but sadly, not surprised.—Larry Pinkney

Congressman John Lewis Stands Up Against Iraq War
"I cannot in good conscience vote for another dollar or another dime to support this war."

The Black Presence in the Bible: A Selected Bibliography

Compiled by Runoko Rashidi

Global News:Politics—Literature & the Arts

Maryland Group Looks to Bolster Black Support of Gay Marriage— Maryland Black Family Alliance, an organization unveiled today at Morgan State University in Baltimore that consists primarily of heterosexual African-American leaders who are pledging their support for marriage for same-sex couples. . . . [Elbridge] James, a former political action chairman for the Maryland National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, told the Baltimore Examiner in another interview, “We are here to say, ‘No, the black community is not homophobic. Civil rights belong to everyone. We are saying no to those who want to bigot us, divide us.” The group’s organizers hope not only to change the minds of African-Americans in general, but African-American elected officials in particular. "Our voice is very important to this movement,” founding member Lea Gilmore told the Baltimore Sun. “African-Americans, perhaps more than another other group in the U.S., understand discrimination. So we are natural allies in this movement." James said he understands it will be a tough pill for some politicians to swallow at first. GayWired

In Defence of Humanity—we take a stand against the unrestrained and undemocratic power, which the mainstream media wield with total impunity, as they try to impose their viewpoints and values. These oligopolies only serve to defend the political and economic interests of shareholders, financiers and advertisers. . . . In the words of President Hugo Chávez, we are not fighting against freedom of the press, rather we are re-establishing it. In Defence of Humanity, as a network of networks, underscores the right to information and communication as a fundamental human right. To that end, the illegitimacy of the current system within which media are only serving the powerful must be emphasized. We point out that this has resulted in an incredible, anti-democratic media concentration overwhelmingly controlled by financial capital. The media allies and enemies of the people need to be identified. We denounce all intellectual mercenaries who have sold out their ideas to transnational corporations. We also denounce communication groups and institutions that in the name of a distorted idea of the freedom of expression are serving economic and imperialist structures, such as Reporters Without Borders and the Inter-American Press Association. The Declaration of Cochabamba - In Defence of Humanity—5th Conference of Intellectuals and Artists in Defence of Humanity—May 22nd & 23rd, 2007 in Cochabamba, Bolivia latinlasnet Kwanzaa Candles by Chuck Siler>>>>>

Security Guards Beat School Teen over Cake Spill (why?) / School Security Guards Beat Teen over Cake Spill: Palmdale / We All Live in Jena-

Cynthia McKinney Confronts Corporate Media Malice in Court

By Glen Ford, BAR executive editor

Rev. T.D. Jakes’ and Mega Churches—Churches are building apartment buildings and a wide range of other businesses. An investigative report last month in the Buffalo News concluded that Black churches in that city “are utilizing resources from government and non-profits to create economic engines.” The Business Journal of Milwaukee headlined this past Friday that African American churches in that area were undergoing “a construction boom.” And the National Association of Black Hotel Owners, Operators and Developers (NABHOOD) concluded a July conference in Atlanta suggesting “Black churches are an increasing source for partners …in the [hotel] business and cause for progress.” The Black church revenue estimate is based on a 1998 study reported by the Interdenominational Theological Center which found 70,000 Black churches in America with median yearly revenue of $200,000. Assuming only a modest growth in the number of churches and contributions which have at least kept pace with inflation, Black churches at the end of 2006 would have stood at $17.1 billion. The revenue estimate may be an under statement because at the time of the 1998 study, the growth of so-called Black Mega Churches (congregations of 5,000 to 30,000) was just beginning. FreeWebs

A White Person's Meditation on the Jena 6 Students—I would ask that white people who may be “doubters” on the issue of dropping all the charges, study the situation more, and reflect more on the racism surrounding the issue. I feel strongly that the only proper role for white people in this situation is to either join the demand for all the charges to be dropped, or stand aside while others struggle to do.Of course, as with any injustice labeled as “racism”, someone is going to proclaim that it is not truly based on racism. Race is a hard word to swallow, especially for white people, who unlike most black people in America, can sometimes go for whole days, weeks, months or even years, without having to acknowledge racism. Racism is scary to admit to. And, often hard to prove. Since the Jena 6 students did do something wrong, and since that something included violence, it is easy for white peace activists and progressives to believe that the system is just running its course. It is easy to want to believe that there was no racism, because this time, it might appear the black young men involved actually “deserve” the punishment they are receiving from the criminal justice system.—Kimberly Wilder Graphic left (Chuck Siler, "American Necktie")

Bring the Troops Home: "A time comes when silence is betrayal." A Time to Break Silence by Rev. Martin Luther King 4 April 1967 / Securing my homeland (JS)

Rudy I want to know....

A Post-Imus Discussion

on Race, Gender, & Corporate Power in America

Mackie Blanton

Books by and About C.L.R James

Minty Allen (a novel, 1936) / World Revolution, 1917-1936: The Rise and Fall of the Communist International (1937) / A History of Negro Revolt (1938)
   The Black Jacobins: A Study of Toussaint L'Ouverture and the San Domingo Revolution (1938; 1963)
Mariners, Renegades, and Castaways: Herman Melville and the World We Live In (1953), Party Politics in the West Indies (1962)

Beyond a Boundary (1963) / A History of Pan-African Revolt (1995) / Facing-Reality (2006) / C.L.R. James on the Negro Question (1996) /

Marxism-Our-Times-Revolutionary-Organization   (1999) / State Capitalism & World Revolution (1986) / Nkrumah and the Ghana Revolution (1978)

A Majestic Innings: Writings on Cricket (2006) / C.L.R.James: A Life (2001) / Beyond Boundaries: C.L.R. James: Theory and Practice (2006) /

The Letters of C. L. R. James to Constance Webb, 1939-1948 (2007) / Rethinking Race, Politics and Poetics: C.L.R. James' Critique of Modernity (2007)

Death of the American Republic—In years to come, historians may look back on U.S. press coverage of George W. Bush’s presidency and wonder why there was not a single front-page story announcing one of the most monumental events of mankind’s modern era – the death of the American Republic and the elimination of the “unalienable rights” pledged to “posterity” by the Founders. The historians will, of course, find stories about elements of this extraordinary event—Bush’s denial of habeas corpus rights to a fair trial, his secret prisons, his tolerance of torture, his violation of Fourth Amendment protections against unreasonable searches, his “signing statements” overriding laws, the erosion of constitutional checks and balances. But the historians will scroll through front pages of the New York Times, the Washington Post and every other major newspaper – as well as scan the national network news and the 24-hour cable channels – and find not a single story connecting the dots, explaining the larger picture: the end of a remarkable democratic experiment which started in 1776 and which was phased out sometime in the early 21st century. Robert Parry, Bush's Mafia Whacks the Republic (consortiumnews.com)

The Tavis Smiley Presidential Forum

"Showtime At The Apollo!"

By Leutisha Stills, senior correspondent, CBC Monitor

Do Mercenaries Determine War & Peace?: Since the launch of the “global war on terror,” the administration has systematically funneled billions of dollars in public money to corporations like Blackwater USA , DynCorp, Triple Canopy, Erinys and ArmorGroup. They have in turn used their lucrative government pay-outs to build up the infrastructure and reach of private armies so powerful that they rival or outgun some nation’s militaries. “I think it’s extraordinarily dangerous when a nation begins to outsource its monopoly on the use of force and the use of violence in support of its foreign policy or national security objectives,” says veteran U.S. Diplomat Joe Wilson, who served as the last U.S. ambassador to Iraq before the 1991 Gulf War. The billions of dollars being doled out to these companies, Wilson argues, “makes of them a very powerful interest group within the American body politic and an interest group that is in fact armed. And the question will arise at some time: to whom do they owe their loyalty?” Precise data on the extent of U.S. spending on mercenary services is nearly impossible to obtain — by both journalists and elected officials—but some in Congress estimate that up to 40 cents of every tax dollar spent on the war goes to corporate war contractors. At present, the United States spends about $2 billion a week on its Iraq operations. Jeremy Scahill The Mercenary Revolution

Indelible Images of People of Color Crying Out from Rooftops

Global News:Politics—Literature & the Arts

Heroes and Hypocrites -- More than two-thirds of the Congressional Black Caucus signed on as members of the Out of Iraq Caucus, but when House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and her Democratic corporate cohorts turned up the fire, all but four melted into the mass of hypocrisy that joined the U.S. war machine while pretending to resist it. The heroes are mostly heroines: Reps. Maxine Waters, Barbara Lee, Diane Watson, and the only man in the bunch, John Lewis. The collapse of the CBC is not a morality play, but the story of a power play. The lesson: the CBC will not stand up to Power, and is a politically spent force as presently constituted. The same must be said of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, only four of whose non-Black members stuck by their guns. Black Caucus Shattered on Iraq BlackAgendaReport

Freedom's Journal

The First African-American Newspaper

By Jacqueline Bacon

Book Review by Kam Williams

We Want Freedom: A Life in the Black Panther Party (Mumia Abu-Jamal)

What Lies Beneath: Katrina, Race and the State of the Nation (South End Press Collective)

Clarence J. Munford -- (files) N'COBRA / Atlantic Slave Traffic / Race and Reparations / Benefits of Whiteness / Atlantic Slave Traffic / Boukman and His Comrades   // (Books) -- Production relations, class and Black liberation: A Marxist perspective in Afro-American studies (1978) / The Black Ordeal of Slavery and Slave Trading in the French West Indies 1625-1715 (1991) / Race and Reparations: A Black Perspective for the 21^st Century   (1996) / Race and Civilization: The Rebirth of Black Centrality (2003)

Jackson Incident Revives Some Blacks' Concerns About Obama—Andrea, Why Obama decided to tackle in a middle-class church, that which should have been avoided, I do not know. It was not so much "airing dirty laundry." Everybody knows that poverty and incarceration create instability in black households. One does not need to be reminded by a presidential candidate of such internal problems unless there are real solutions in his programs. Moreover, Obama's statements were gender divisive—black women are heroic and black men irresponsible—from a person who claims to be a "unifer." Though I am not a father, my enthusiasm for Obama eroded quickly. His "story" became rather old hat for me. The racist jibes FOX are making on him, I will not come to his defense. Obama thought he had the black vote in his pocket and thus could say anything about blacks and they would enthusiastically continue to support him. Well, he does not know black folk. His advisers miscalculated the backlash from many black men and from many progressives. The win at any cost strategy is a sore spot with me. That he's more concerned with appeasing the gun lobby and hunters in Montana to the neglect of black male sensibilities and the black hardships of those on the margins in urban centers and rural areas troubles me.—Rudy

Luqman -- In the Name of Allah, the Compassionate, the Merciful / The Name of Allah Be Round About Us / Seven Last Words of Jesus / Sermon on the Mount

Obama's Community Roots—After a transient youth and an earnest search for identity, Obama also found a home—a community with which he continued relationships, a church and a political identity. He honed his talent for listening, learned pragmatic strategy, practiced bringing varied people together and developed a faith in ordinary citizens that still influences his campaign message. He discovered the importance of personal storytelling in politics (and wrote short stories that refined his style). Later, as a politician, he worked closely with community groups (though not as ardently as another community organizer turned politician, the late Senator Paul Wellstone). As a presidential candidate, he frequently refers to his community organizing, asking supporters to treat his campaign as a social movement in which he is just "an imperfect vessel of your hopes and dreams." David Moberg The Nation
Speeches of Al Sharpton and Barack Obama Wow Democratic National Convention (2004)

The Saga of Cornell West: Cornel West Moves to Princeton West Cites Reason For Quitting Cornel West: An Editorial Pass the Mic Responses to Pass the Mic

Seven-Year-Old Black Child Arrested, Cuffed, Fingerprinted

in Baltimore, a City with a Black Mayor, Sheila Dixon

After the Mayor apologizes for the arrest of Gerard Mungo Jr., City Police arrest Gerard's mom

“If they want war, they’ll have war,” said Marvin “Doc” Cheatham, president of the NAACP Baltimore Chapter outside Central Booking

Gregory Kane, "It's a crime that police arrested dirt-bike kid." / Black leader calls for Baltimore boycott /
Angry questions confront mayor, police

Frustration with being regarded as "a marginal voice" often encourages clergy to embrace the language of the modern state. Preachers begin to talk like politicians, and while gaining some credibility as political power brokers, in the process they tend to lose the prophetic edge that they could and should bring to the political debate and to the process of imagining a better society.

This is a temptation to which Dr. King never yielded. He consistently employed theological concepts and language to challenge the modern state to be more just and inclusive. He opined on practical and concrete political matters, but only insofar as they were outgrowths of the theological and ethical principles he espoused.

It is humbling, hopeful, and empowering to consider that preachers, church women, and Sunday school children led a revolution in our lifetime. They marched, prayed, voted, and challenged the nation to, in the words of Arthur Schlesinger, Jr., "conform America's political reality to her political rhetoric." They have passed the baton to us. -- Robert M. Franklin, "Awesome Music, Great Preaching, and Revolutionary Action: The Mind of Martin Luther King, Jr.," The Princeton Seminary Bulletin, XXIII (2), 2003.