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Broken promises of a just recovery in the Gulf Coast
September 13, 2010
On the fifth anniversary of Hurricanes Katrina and Rita, Gulf Coast residents are still trying to rebuild their lives after years of broken promises and government neglect. The Gulf Coast Civic Works Act to provide hundreds of thousands of jobs languishes in Congress. Affordable housing eludes both survivors and those displaced by the storm.
After Katrina, New Orleans cops were told they could shoot looters
September 5, 2010
In the chaotic days after Hurricane Katrina, an order circulated among New Orleans police authorizing officers to shoot looters. “We have authority by martial law to shoot looters,” Capt. James Scott told a few dozen officers. Warren Riley, then the department’s second-in-command, said to “take the city back and shoot looters.”
Another world defined by community not corporations
July 3, 2010
A small group of poverty and indigenous scholars from POOR Magazine, bleeding internally from our own wounds of eviction, landlessness, budget genocide, racism, po’lice brutality, incarceration and violence, arrived in Detroit on a hot Saturday in June to attend the U.S. Social Forum. Leaving, again we passed the empty homes, silent neighborhoods and shuttered businesses and yet this time I saw something else: real change and land reclamation not rooted in capitalist ownership.
Shirley Q. Liquor: Freedom of speech or hate speech?
June 14, 2010
Some members of the lesbian, gay, bi-sexual, transgender and queer (LGBTQ) community would rather divide than build bridges between communities. For instance, Charles Knipp, a racist and culturally insensitive White gay male, dons a Black face, becoming Shirley Q. Liquor and telling jokes that reinforce stereotypical images of Black women and Black culture.
This will be worse than Katrina
June 14, 2010
When the now infamous offshore BP oil rig first blew up, some called it another Katrina and many of us took that as an insult. The pain and suffering caused by Hurricane Katrina (August 2005) were biblical and were fanned by the slow response of our own federal government. But the BP oil spill is a monster that is growing exponentially by the day.
Right to Return Weekend: Housing IS a human right!
June 5, 2010
The Right to Return Weekend challenges the forced removal of all public housing residents following Hurricane Katrina and the discriminatory policies of the government to permanently displace low-income Black communities from the “new” New Orleans.
New clues emerge in post-Katrina vigilante shooting at Algiers Point
May 27, 2010
Three days after Hurricane Katrina turned New Orleans into a ghost town, somebody shot Donnell Herrington twice in Algiers Point, ripping a hole in his throat. Herrington, who is African-American, says he was ambushed by a group of armed white men who attacked without warning or provocation.
Fire on the bayou: Non-stop river of oil heads to Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama and Florida
May 4, 2010
The Coast Guard estimates 5,000 barrels of crude oil a day, 210,000 gallons a day, are pouring out of a damaged British Petroleum well in the Gulf of Mexico. Plans to set parts of the Gulf on fire have been pushed back by bad weather. In 1975, the New Orleans group, The Meters, released their album, “Fire on the Bayou.” In 2010 the idea of a fire on the bayou may well be coming true.
Haiti help or Haiti hoodwink?
April 18, 2010
Not since the levees exploded in New Orleans and caused the devastation attributed to Hurricane Katrina have the people of the U.S. been so committed to relieving the suffering of Black people. So how is all this money being spent?
Katrina victims see their reflection in Haiti, offer help
April 17, 2010
Many survivors of Hurricane Katrina, which struck New Orleans and the U.S. Gulf Coast in August 2005, have been seeing their own reflection in media images of Haiti earthquake victims and feel personally driven to help organize assistance for the people of Haiti.
New Orleans’ heart is in Haiti
March 21, 2010
Many New Orleanians have roots in Haiti. The 500 enslaved people who participated in the 1811 Rebellion to End Slavery – the largest armed uprising against slavery in the U.S. – were directly inspired by the Haitian revolution. We are also linked by first-hand understanding of the ways in which oppression based on race, class and gender interacts with disasters.
Cop pleads guilty to massive murder cover-up during Katrina
March 21, 2010
Fighters for justice welcomed the guilty plea by a New Orleans police lieutenant Feb. 24 that he spearheaded a massive cover-up of the police shooting of six unarmed Black civilians as they walked across the Danziger Bridge Sept. 4, 2005, in the wake of Hurricane Katrina.
The Red Cross collected $255 million for Haiti relief effort but only sent $80 million!
March 5, 2010
The latest figures for Haiti are $333 million donated to the Red Cross but only $106 million spent, while thousands of Haitians are dying preventable deaths and only half of the 1.3 million homeless have even a tarp as the rainy season begins. Send YOUR donations to the Haiti Emergency Relief Fund at HaitiAction.net! And protest at UN headquarters Wednesday, March 31, 9:30 a.m. and 1:30 p.m., at Dag Hammarskjold Plaza, 47th & First, NYC.
Who dat? Dat’s the Super Bowl champs!
February 7, 2010
The New Orleans Saints won Super Bowl 44. I can’t believe I’m even typing the words. Four and a half years ago, after the levees broke, the concern was not whether there would be a Saints, but whether there would even be a New Orleans.
Are they that sick? Did U.S. weather weapon destroy Haiti?
January 29, 2010
Immediately following the “earthquake” that hit Haiti on Jan. 12, 2010, I started seeing reports that the earthquake was not a random occurrence or happenstance. These were the same rumblings I heard following Hurricane Katrina. After the devastation of Katrina I started seeing reports about HAARP, High Frequency Active Auroral Research.
From Cynthia McKinney: An unwelcome Katrina redux
January 19, 2010
“From the very beginning, U.S. assistance to Haiti has looked to me more like an invasion than a humanitarian relief operation,” says McKinney. The SF Bay View, Block Report Radio, POCC and Haiti Action Committee are preparing to send a media-medical team to Haiti to serve the people most in need. Come to the fundraiser Sunday, Jan. 24, 7 p.m., at the Black Dot Café, 1195 Pine St. in West Oakland. Bring medical supplies. Spread the word!
The right testicle of hell: History of a Haitian holocaust
January 17, 2010
Defense Secretary Robert Gates wouldn’t send in food and water because, he said, there was no “structure … to provide security.” For Gates, appointed by Bush and allowed to hang around by Obama, it’s security first. That was his lesson from Hurricane Katrina. Blackwater before drinking water.
Shades of Katrina: No help for Haitians who need it most
January 16, 2010
“Rescue efforts were stalled today in Port-au-Prince with foreign rescue workers overwhelmed and unprepared to deal with impoverished people. Crews arrived with neither vehicles, nor gas, nor translators, nor guides.” Make your tax-deductible donation to the Haiti Emergency Relief Fund through www.HaitiAction.net, an organization that will use your gift wisely, for the people who need it most.
King’s legacy serves as a call to arms on crisis in Haiti
January 15, 2010
Today provides a moment for reflection on the life and legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., born 81 years ago on this day. It is also a moment of intense anguish for the survivors and those continuing to suffer in the wake of the tragic earthquake in Haiti.
Lebanon rebuilds, New Orleans still waits
November 1, 2009
In the U.S, the richest country in the world, Washington is coordinating the recovery effort. In Lebanon, a tiny poor and war-torn nation, Hezbollah, a grassroots resistance movement that Washington called “terrorist,” organizes most of the reconstruction. Hezbollah receives substantial aid in this effort from Syria and especially Iran, countries Washington also calls “terrorist.”