Tag: Barack Obama

Mumia Abu-Jamal’s eighth book written from prison cells in the state of Pennsylvania, USA, is a selection of 107 essays that date from January 1982 to October 2014. They cover practically the entire period of his incarceration as an internationally recognized political prisoner. Most of the pieces were written while he was on death row after being framed for the murder of police officer Daniel Faulkner on Dec. 9, 1981, in the city of Philadelphia.

Graduating from Antioch University’s PhD program in Leadership and Change on Aug. 1, 2015, Cynthia McKinney fulfilled a lifelong dream to complete her education with a terminal degree. In keeping with her interests in U.S. policy, Dr. McKinney wrote her dissertation on the leadership challenges faced by President Hugo Chavez as he asserted the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela’s right to sovereignty.

I’ve been drawing all my life, drawing with everything but paint, but most of my art had no meaning. Other artists I have seen in the Bay View and other publications have inspired me to create this piece, which carries a message: The baby in handcuffs represents the young boys torn away from their mothers or society to be eternally incarcerated in men’s penitentiaries – thus the “SB260” on the breast plate.

California District 13 Congresswoman Barbara Lee made it clear, on Friday, Aug. 31, that she sees no imminent threat to the U.S. from Syria and that the Constitution therefore requires President Obama to seek congressional authorization to launch a military strike. She has persuaded 64 members of Congress to sign a letter calling on the president to instead initiate a debate and seek congressional authorization before taking military action.

2013 marks the 43rd anniversary of Black August, first organized to honor our fallen freedom fighters, George and Jonathan Jackson, James McClain, William Christmas, Khatari Gaulden and sole survivor of the Aug. 7, 1970, Courthouse Slave Rebellion, Ruchell Cinque Magee. During these four decades, we’ve witnessed a steady revision of the meaning of Black August and its inherent ideology.

The mayoral contest in Jackson, the capital of Mississippi, is now widely reported to be very close as it heads for a conclusion on Tuesday, May 21. Jackson’s population is majority Black and Democratic, so Tuesday’s Democratic primary run-off, between Black Democrat Chokwe Lumumba and Black Democrat Jonathan Lee, will effectively determine who the city’s next mayor will be.

“Oakville” is a look at the interactions between an Oakland-based Black couple and a white couple as Barack Obama is selected to be the first acknowledged Black U.S. president in the history of the country. Check out “Oakville” filmmaker Lisbon Okafor in his own words. You can see “Oakville” at the Oakland International Film Fest on Saturday, April 6, 1 p.m., at the New Parkway Theater, 474 24th St. in Oakland.

It is time to call for and mobilize “People United to Combat Media and Government Emasculation of Martin Luther King Jr.” It must be recognized that by consistently imposing upon the public the image of a person who had a dream and was essentially innocuous, the U.S. government and the country’s commercial media are emasculating a man in death whom they could not weaken or intimidate in life.

In what is clearly a continuation of the Feb. 29, 2004, U.S. instigated coup d’etat against Haiti, former Haitian President Jean-Bertrand Aristide has been called before Martelly’s handpicked government prosecutor Lucmane Delile in what is widely believed to be an attempt by Martelly, the U.S. and France to wage a campaign of political persecution against Aristide, Fanmi Lavalas, and the democratic process and progress in Haiti.

The Obama administration was on the defensive about the U.S. relationship with Rwanda and its U.N. Ambassador Susan Rice at the Dec. 11, 2012, U.S. House Foreign Affairs Committee hearing on the conflict in the eastern Democratic Republic of Congo. Two days after the hearing, Rice withdrew her name from consideration to become secretary of state. In President Obama’s statement on Susan Rice, issued the same day, he praised her work but did not mention Rwanda, Uganda or Congo.

The rap group dead prez have by far some of the most radical politics of any artists in American music today. We caught up with M1 to talk music and politics for a minute, right before they come out here this Saturday, Nov. 24, and rap songs from their new album “Information Age” as a part of the Rebel Soul Fest, which is going down at Yoshi’s in San Francisco.

First, be more forceful about appointing federal judges. As a former constitutional law professor, you know better than most the importance of the federal bench. Second, please listen to Paul Krugman on economic policy. He was right early on in the economic crisis when he was adamant about the need to create jobs. Finally, do not abandon the needs of Black people because you will be seen as playing favorites. Black folks are out here on our own. We need you to stand up for us and to advance policies that will help us move upward, “lifting as we climb.”

Ann Garrison asks, “What do you think of the first four years of the administration of Barack Obama, the first African American president?” Silvio Michel of the Green Party of Mauritius' response is typical of conversations with people on the African continent, Green or not, though there are certainly exceptions who still admire Obama’s defeat of the color bar to become this country’s highest elected official.

Malcolm X is one of the best known figures of the human rights struggle and one of the most attacked by institutions that serve the elite. A new book – “A Lie of Reinvention” – defends his legacy against an attempted ivory tower assassination. Editor Jared Ball says Manning Marable's book on Malcolm "is a corporate product, a simple commodity to be traded, but for more than money; it is a carefully constructed ideological assault on history, on radical politics, on historical and cultural memory, on the very idea of revolution."

Voting empowers our communities to get what we want. If we don’t vote, we’re invisible. If we turn out in large numbers for this election, we’ll get respect – from City Hall to the White House. Here are the Bay View’s recommendations for Tuesday, Nov. 6, including candidates for San Francisco Board of Supervisors, School Board, College Board and BART Board. On state propositions, the Bay View recommends that you vote Yes on 30, No on 31 (LAST MINUTE CHANGE), No on 32, No on 33, No on 34, No on 35, Yes on 36, Yes on 37, Yes on 38, Yes on 39 and Yes on 40. But however you vote, VOTE! Voting is our most powerful right. Use it.

The Black community is in a world of trouble. And President Obama alone cannot fix it. This is where real leadership is needed: real, un-bought, unbiased leadership. Black America’s biggest challenge, truth be told, is itself. And Black pastors are at the center of the issue. If we can get our leaders to the table – political, business, academic and community – we could create our own salvation.

Cholera has broken out in the internally displaced persons camps growing again in eastern Congo, as Congolese people flee the war which, with backing from the Kagame regime in Kigali, Rwanda, resumed in April. The cholera outbreak has sparked fears of an epidemic. Now drenching rain is adding to the refugees’ misery. U.S. Special Forces are in the region, but not to hunt for Joseph Kony. It’s a military operation to secure oil and other African resources and limit Chinese access.

Summertime in the Bay Area is nothing without all of the music, food and film festivals. If you missed the Oakland International Film Festival, there is still time for you to catch the Bay’s biggest Black film festival, the San Francisco Black Film Festival, which runs June 15-17 at a number of theaters around San Francisco. This year Leo Sullivan will be in attendance. He is one of the cartoon visionaries who created Fat Albert and Looney Tunes. Digital Underground will also be a part of this year’s festivities, as well as Black Panther Party co-founder and chairman Bobby Seale.

Does the Obama administration plan an African continent-wide Plan Colombia? Why such a militarization of U.S. relationships all over the world – and even here at home? Will chaos and wars – like what is happening in Libya today – be created all over Africa and the rest of Asia? Please circulate this message widely so that maybe we can get some more responses from the administration about its policy direction. Tell the White House that you will cast your vote for peace – to stop the drones and bring our troops home.

A U.N. report says that the USA’s conflict minerals legislation, Section 1502 of the Dodd Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act, is increasing rather than decreasing criminality and conflict in the Congo and that Bosco Ntaganda is now in control of minerals smuggling from the Congo into Rwanda.