Tag: Bernie Sanders

Online progressive activists with The Digital Left are announcing a campaign to draft and elect Representative Barbara Lee to be the next speaker of the House. Within 48 hours of polls closing in the midterm elections, the group, alongside The Humanist Report, has gathered more than 5,000 signatures on an online petition calling on Democratic members of the 117th Congress to elect Rep. Lee as speaker of the House.

Nov. 6 is election day. If you haven’t done it already, register to vote. Encourage others to register and vote. Most of your ballots will be filled with local or state issues and candidates. Voters in the United States need more choices than Democrats and Republicans. If you see the name of a Green Party candidate, I hope you will check them out. Greens believe that people and the health of the planet should be more important than corporate profit.

In California’s top-two primary system, only the top two vote getters advance to the general election, meaning that only two names will be on the ballot for each race in November. Since California is a very blue state, that often means that two Democrats advance. However, three Green Party candidates for the U.S. Congress advanced in California races this year. Among them is Laura Wells, whose name will appear alongside that of incumbent Barbara Lee in the East Bay’s District 13 race.

The answers to the problems are all wrapped together in the beautiful writing of Coates, a man whose politics are still forming, but on such a large scale that these criticisms must come with an urgency, as West delivered them. I respect West magnificently for his actual work in activism, both historically and currently. If Coates is to continue being called the voice of my people, he has to move from being a traditional intellectual who walks the line of academic and objective writer into the space of organic intellectual that he likely sees himself as, who is activistic in nature.

Some 400 people packed a special city council meeting here on June 20 to demand that the city end its “shameful collaboration” with federal police and spy agencies. But the council, while widely hailed as “progressive,” ignored the near-unanimous popular opinion and voted to renew three controversial police programs: participation in a Regional Intelligence Fusion Center, participation in the Urban Areas Security Initiative and acquisition of a bulletproof armored personnel carrier.

We find ourselves in a moment with a great deal at stake. Our communities are fighting to define and create sanctuary spaces, while enduring a dangerous presidential administration that has emboldened white supremacist and xenophobic action. The Trump agenda has caused increased harassment, fear and even death. In the movement for abolition of policing, imprisonment, surveillance and the entire prison industrial complex, now is our time to be bold.

“I was born in 1916,” Iris whispered into the camera in her last hours of life. “Peter, I can’t believe you did me like this.” Her eyes were pools of sacred time. Sacred, like a prayer. Sacred like things you hold lightly to protect and dream about and kneel to. Not evict and harass and drag to court and intrude and disrespect and eventually kill. Iris Canada joined the ancestors on Monday, March 27, one month after being evicted. Iris was murdered by the people and the systems that rule this stolen land. Iris was killed by landlord Peter Owens, the sheriff, the DA, the mayor, the judge and everyone who protects them.

An African proverb says: “When spiders unite, they can tie down a lion.” In this very critical election year, we must unify to defeat the forces that conspire against us. It is for that reason that I invite you to join me this November in healing Richmond by supporting Melvin Willis and Ben Choi for the Richmond City Council. The 2016 election is right around the corner. Some may say there’s not much that they can do to create the change we need locally, let alone nationally. I beg to differ.

Read the perspectives of Spoon Jackson, serving a sentence of Life Without the Possibility of Parole (LWOP), “the other death penalty,” at Lancaster State Prison near Los Angeles, and Tim Young, on San Quentin’s Death Row near San Francisco. Spoon calls LWOP “as hideous as Death Row” and recommends “no” on Prop 62. Tim says vote “yes”: “With LWOP, we live to fight another day.”

Cheers and chants filled the room at the Green Party Convention at the University of Houston, where physician and activist Jill Stein was named as the Green Party’s presidential candidate with human rights activist Ajamu Baraka as her running mate. Stein said that too much is at stake this election for people to be voting out of fear. Stein said that if people had the courage to vote for the greater good rather than the lesser of two evils, it would be numerically possible for the Green Party to win.

On Saturday, July 9, Socialist Alternative and Movement4Bernie held the first of a series of forums titled “Beyond Bernie: We Need a United Party for the 99%.” Socialist Alternative is a nationwide membership organization which initially endorsed Bernie Sanders but has now endorsed Green Party candidate Dr. Jill Stein in all 50 states and Washington, D.C.

It’s not some grand conspiracy, but it’s grand theft nonetheless. Sen. Bernie Sanders’ voters will lose their ballots, their rights, by the tens of thousands. The steal is baked into the way California handles No Party Preference – “NPP” voters – what we know as “independents.” There are a mind-blowing 4.2 million voters in California registered NPP – and they share a love for sunshine and Bernie Sanders.

The California Democratic Primary is Tuesday, June 7. Whatever “The Movement” means to you, if you care about human decency and international human rights, we need a Sanders victory and a Clinton repudiation in California on June 7 – and beyond. I admire and support Sen. Sanders for his courageous challenge to the American Israel Political Action Committee, his support for human rights and fair treatment for the Palestinian people, and his open challenge to Hillary Clinton on Israel and Palestine.

TODAY, MONDAY, MAY 23, is the LAST DAY TO REGISTER for the June 7 primary election. Rarely in my lifetime has the choice been so clear. As U.S. president, Bernie Sanders would definitely make Black lives better. He is “unbought and unbossed” in the tradition of Shirley Chisholm. A big win in the California primary June 7 could give him the leverage to win the nomination – and the presidency. To vote for Bernie, you must be registered either as a Democrat or No Party Preference, and the last day to register for the primary election is Monday, May 23.

I have been consistent in my advocacy for improving the lives of Richmond residents, especially the disenfranchised. Bernie Sanders’ growing popularity shows us that the people want candidates with integrity. When Sen. Sanders visited Richmond, he did so because he knew that Team Richmond – Gayle McLaughlin, Eduardo Martinez and Jovanka Beckles – were candidates who were and will continue to be of the people, for the people and by the people.

Bernie Sanders’ defeats in the East Coast primaries have triggered a flurry of conversation about what the 25 to 35 percent of Sanders supporters who’ve told pollsters they will not vote for Hillary Clinton will do instead. Seattle-based Socialist Alternative has called for Sanders to run as an independent or join the Green Party ticket. Ann Garrison spoke to Georgia Green Party activist and Black Agenda Report Editor Bruce Dixon.

As an African American, I have struggled to understand why so many of my Black brothers and sisters seem to prefer Hillary Clinton over Bernie Sanders. Hillary’s record on civil rights is indeed extensive, albeit inconsistent and often ignoble. By contrast, Bernie has a long, proud, consistent record on fighting inequality – often far ahead of the Democratic Party in this regard – and always far, far ahead of Hillary Clinton.

For the second consecutive year, the ILWU Local 10 will be withholding its labor for eight hours to commemorate May Day. This May Day, Local 10 is calling for a “National Day of Mourning” for Black and Brown unarmed victims of police killings across the country. Democratic presidential candidate and U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders has been invited to speak May Day. Danny Glover will appear at one of the rallies.

This is how bad things are getting: Iris Canada could lose her home of more than 60 years, despite a lifetime lease. CALL TO ACTION: Rally for Iris Canada, a 99-year-old African American woman in the Fillmore threatened with eviction. At a hearing Tuesday, April 19, 8:30 a.m., in the Courthouse, 400 McAllister, San Francisco, her lawyers will argue to make her temporary stay permanent. Join the two-to-three-hour rally outside.

Bernie Sanders made headlines this week by declining to attend the American Israeli Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) Policy Conference held this week in Washington, D.C. High on AIPAC’s agenda were bills designed to stop the nonviolent BDS movement to “boycott, divest or sanction” Israel for its mistreatment of the Palestinian people. KPFA’s Ann Garrison has more.