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Black Misleadership Class Pretends It’s Ready to Fight the Power

Wed, 12/12/2012 - 17:01 — Glen Ford

 

by BAR executive editor Glen Ford

Established Black organizations now claim they are ready to make demands of the First Black President. But are they serious? “What Marc Morial of the Urban League, Ben Jealous of the NAACP, Al Sharpton and others have outlined are issue-based suggestion boxes for the president’s perusal.” They're not about to “demanding” anything.

Listen to Black Agenda Radio on the Progressive Radio Network, with Glen Ford and Nellie Bailey – Week of October 8, 2012

Tue, 10/09/2012 - 08:16 — Glen Ford

 

College Admissions Must Consider Race

The U.S. Supreme Court should reject a challenge to affirmative action at the University of Texas, at Austin. “Removing race from consideration in admissions is impractical,” said Inimai Chettiar, of the Brennan Center for Justice, at the New York University School of Law. “I don’t see how you can divorce race from who a person is.” The University of Texas “has followed the Supreme Court’s mandate in previous cases to the letter.”

Myth of Black Progress

The exclusion of incarcerated persons from many data sources “calls into question claims about Black progress” over the past 35 years, said Becky Pettit, author of Invisible Men: Mass Incarceration and the Myth of Black Progress. For example, there has been “no improvement in the high school dropout rate among young Black men since at least the 1990s,” and “young Black males dropouts are more likely to be in jail or prison than to be employed.” Dr. Pettit is a sociologist at the University of Washington.

Two Parties: One Vision

“What the debate showed is how similar the two parties are,” said Arun Gupta, co-founder of The Occupied Wall Street Journal and The Indypendent. “We heard nothing about the most important issues.” President Obama “could not commit himself to stand for one thing that the vast majority of the people of this country need,” said Gupta, who is covering the campaign for Alternet, Truthout and The Guardian.

ObamaRomneyCare

President Obama made the most honest statement of the debate, when he said “Romneycare and Obamacare are, effectively, the same” and a “Republican idea,” said Russell Mokhiber, editor of the Corporate Crime Reporter. Another gem: Romney, trying to act like a populist, challenged “corporatist Obama” on his support for too-big-to-fail banks. “And, because Obama is taking cash from the same sources, he’s not able to respond.”

NDAA May Lead to Mass Lockups

“The assault on civil liberties by the Obama administration has been worse than under Bush,” said veteran reporter Chris Hedges, a plaintiff in a suit against the preventive detention bill signed into law by Obama, last New Year’s Eve. A federal judge this summer declared the law unconstitutional, but an appeals panel put it back in effect, pending a final ruling. “This opens the ability of the state to classify an entire group of people – and, probably, American Muslims will be the first one – who can be just rounded up,” said Hedges.

Wal-Mart Walkouts

Workers walked off the job at Wal-Mart stores in Los Angeles, while employees from Europe, Latin America and Africa flew into the city under the banner of the Wal-Mart Global Union Alliance. The retail giant’s prices are low “because they’re taking from us,” said Wal-Mart “associate” Dan Hindman. “We’re paying for these low prices.” Alke Boessinger, a union organizer from Switzerland, said: “Unless workers unite as one, Wal-Mart will do whatever it can to silence people.”

Detroit Water Strike

AFSCME Local 207, in Detroit, claimed victory in a brief strike by water workers. Union official John Reihl said Michigan’s governor is determined to seize the mostly Black city’s water resources through “a combination of suburban control and privatization.”

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Listen to Black Agenda Report on the Progressive Radio Network, with Glen Ford and Nellie Bailey – Week of October 1, 2012

Mon, 10/01/2012 - 22:10 — Glen Ford

 

U.S. Tries to Bully Iran Into Submission

Iran poses no threat to the world, said David Swanson, publisher of WarIsACrime.org. The real “source of tension” with Washington is that “Iran, since its revolution, has insisted on remaining independent of U.S. control. The Pentagon wants an Iran that cannot strike back” if it is attacked by the U.S. or Israel.

Obamacare Provides “Inferior” Protection

President Obama’s health care law is “an agreement between the federal government and big business” that “doesn’t protect Americans from bankruptcy and premature death,” said Dr. Reginald Clark, a health issues scholar who lectures at California State University, in Los Angeles. Most people will only be able to afford “inferior” levels of federally mandated health care coverage, he said.

U.S. Election Duopoly

“Both Republican and Democratic presidential candidates are deep in the pocket of ‘clean coal,’ as they are in the pockets of Big Ag, Big Insurance, military contractors, Wall Street and other centers of real power,” said BAR managing editor Bruce Dixon. For a progressive analysis of the debates between the two business parties, go to www.occupythedebates.org, beginning October 3.

Federal Employees’ Due Process Rights Threatened

Provisions of the Whistleblower Protection Enhancement Act pending before Congress would allow judges on federal workplace boards to deny due process to employees that complain of discrimination, said worker rights activist Dr. Marsha Coleman-Adebayo. “This really does harken back to Jim Crow, when our cases were considered amusement for the Bubba crowd,” said Coleman-Adebayo, whose battle against discrimination at the Environmental Protection Agency led to passage of the NO FEAR whistleblower protection legislation, in 2002.

Paramilitaries on the Rise in Haiti

With the encouragement of the U.S.-backed government, paramilitaries are occupying 20 former Haitian Army bases, according to Jeb Sprague, author of Paramilitarism and the Assault on Democracy in Haiti. The militiamen want to become part of a new national military. The U.S. also favors bringing back the Haitian Army, which was disbanded under deposed president Jean Bertrand Aristide. “They want it there in place if the UN force eventually leaves, to beat down the people,” said Sprague.

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Why Obama Health Care Act Should Be Named “Obamacare for the Few and ObamaDon’tCare for the Majority”

Mon, 09/24/2012 - 15:29 — Dr. Reginald Clark

 

by Dr. Reginald Clark

President Obama uses the term “universal” to describe his health care plan. But “well over 100 million American citizens will NOT be covered with a health insurance Plan that makes their health care costs “affordable” when they get sick.” There is only one solution: “a publically-led, single payer, Health Care system that takes the profit-motive out of providing access to quality health care.”

Deadly Fallout: How Obama’s Healthcare Law Provides Unaffordable Access to Health Insurance and Fosters Preventable Deaths

Tue, 08/21/2012 - 23:17 — Dr. Reginald Clark

 

by Dr. Reginald Clark

Despite the hype from Democrats, “the high rate of premature deaths in California and throughout America will continue” even after the Obama health plan is fully implemented, in 2020. “A poverty-level working California citizen… will personally be charged $7,200 for an average hospital stay” – far more than she can afford.

Freedom Rider: Nixoncare Finally Wins

Wed, 07/11/2012 - 06:10 — Margaret Kimberley

 

by BAR editor and senior columnist Margaret Kimberley

The euphoria in the Obama camp over their health care victory at the U.S. Supreme Court shows “the Democrats of the 21st century are akin to the Republicans of forty years ago.” Back then, Richard Nixon proposed a health care plan very much resembling – and, in some ways, superior to – Obamacare. When the Obama plan goes into effect in 2014, “there will still be nothing to prevent health insurance companies from manipulating the market place and giving Americans access to inferior coverage with high deductibles.”

Obama Bound for Mount Rushmore?

Wed, 07/04/2012 - 14:38 — Glen Ford

 

by BAR executive editor Glen Ford

President Obama’s healthcare plan, now vetted by the U.S. Supreme Court, is the spawn of Republican reactionaries, “based on the principle that people should pay for their own bodily maintenance.” It bears no resemblance to world-class healthcare systems, “expanding the healthcare compact only for those who are destitute, while turning everyone else into profit-centers for corporations.” Obama has locked in the past, and put up a roadblock to the future – just as the right-wingers that invented the “individual mandate” intended.

What's Really In House and Senate Health Insurance Bills

Tue, 11/24/2009 - 20:30 — Anonymous

pharmaBy Ida Hellander, MD

It's not universal health care.  It's not even close.  Insurance companies will be bailed out and millions forced to purchase crappy insurance with government subsidies.  Drug costs will soar, the existing safety net wil be slashed and none of the uninsured will be covered till 2013 in the House version, or 2014 in the Senate version.  The devil lurks in the details, and there are lots and lots of details....

Obamacare A Bonanza For Drug Companies, A Pain For the Public

Tue, 11/17/2009 - 19:45 — Glen Ford
expensive drugs
A Black Agenda Radio commentary by Glen Ford
Click the flash player to listen to or the mic to download an audio in MP3 format.

Why are the drug barons planning a $150 million ad campaign boosting Obama's health care scheme? They've got $21 billion worth of reasons – bonus earnings from record price hikes while wheeling and dealing with the White House. Everything the president touches turns to cash – for the corporate sector.

Poll Shows Public Wants Medicare for All

Wed, 09/30/2009 - 00:44 — Glen Ford
medicare for all?by BAR executive editor Glen Ford
President Obama attempts to depict proponents of Medicare for all as lefty health care “extremists.” But that’s precisely the kind of “robust” public plan favored by two-thirds of Americans, according to a recent poll. Obama is to the Right of the people, and the GOP is off the map.
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