Black Agenda Report
Black Agenda Report
News, commentary and analysis from the black left.

  • Home
  • Africa
  • African America
  • Education
  • Environment
  • International
  • Media and Culture
  • Political Economy
  • Radio
  • US Politics
  • War and Empire

Listen to Black Agenda Radio on the Progressive Radio Network, with Glen Ford and Nellie Bailey – Week of 3/4/13
05 Mar 2013
🖨️ Print Article

Supreme Court Puts U.S. Spy Agency “Above the Law”

The U.S. Supreme Court’s dismissal of a suit against the National Security Agency’s wholesale spying on telephone and internet systems “essentially holds the NSA above the law,” said Shahid Buttar, executive director of the Bill of Rights Committee. Unless the plaintiffs can document that they, personally, have been monitored, they “have no right to appear in a federal court to challenge the program,” Shahid explained. But, since the program is secret, it is all but impossible for individuals to prove their case.

DNA vs. the Bill of Rights

The High Court is considering how police departments can collect and use people’s DNA. The case centers on Maryland’s DNA law, under which at least one victim of crime was later convicted of another, subsequent crime, based on his DNA. All 49 other states have filed briefs supporting Maryland’s law. Black Maryland state lawmaker Jill Carter, of Baltimore, who opposed the law when it was passed in 2009, said “every state in the country could be permitted to collect DNA from people who are not convicted of any crime.”

Detroit to Lose Control of Finances

Michigan’s Republican governor plans to name a financial manager to oversee the 83 percent Black city of Detroit, which would join five other Michigan municipalities and three school districts that have been stripped of local financial control. “Both Democrats and Republicans have had it in for Detroit ever since the 1967 uprising,” said Joyce Schon, of the activist organization BAMN, By Any Means Necessary. Resistance to the takeover must go beyond legal appeals, Schon said. “I think it’s got to be direct action, anything we can possibly bring to the streets.”

The Ruling Austerity Consensus

There is a consensus among both major political parties on the need for austerity, said Left Business Observer publisher Doug Henwood. “The only controversy among the ruling elite is, just how much and what kind” of austerity. Meanwhile, U.S. organized labor “has no independent politics, and no independent capacity for thought.”

Philly Schools Turn Back Clock on Equality

Philadelphia school authorities are calling for draconian changes in the system’s operations, including elimination of limits on class size – on top massive school closings. “I think that it’s turning the clock back on guaranteeing every child equalization of opportunity,” said State Rep. W. Curtis Thomas. Many schools don’t have libraries, safety officers, nurses, clean bathrooms, books, computers, or “teachers that are teaching in their areas of competency,” said Thomas, who wants Secretary of Education Arne Duncan, “along with the federal courts, to step in and straighten this situation out.”

 

Black Agenda Radio on the Progressive Radio Network is hosted by Glen Ford and Nellie Bailey. A new edition of the program airs every Monday at 11:00am ET on PRN. Length: One hour.


More Stories


  • Venezuela Thwarts Invasion Attempt by Mercenaries
    Peoples Dispatch Staff
    Venezuela Thwarts Invasion Attempt by Mercenaries
    06 May 2020
    Venezuelan officials reported that a group of mercenaries attempted to invade the country on Sunday but were stopped by the country’s army and police.
  • Black Agenda Radio for Week of May 4, 2020
    Black Agenda Radio with Margaret Kimberley and Glen Ford
    Black Agenda Radio for Week of May 4, 2020
    04 May 2020
    Black Agenda Radio for Week of May 4, 2020 Corporate Media Largely Decide Which Black Lives Matter
  • Black Ex-Felons Are Slow to Vouch for Other Former Offenders
    Black Agenda Radio with Margaret Kimberley and Glen Ford
    Black Ex-Felons Are Slow to Vouch for Other Former Offenders
    04 May 2020
    Contrary to the conventional wisdom, Black former offenders “need to see strong evidence" that the formerly incarcerated person has really changed, said Sandra Susan Smith, a
  • Dubois’ Views on “Veil” of Blackness Explains White Suburban Micro-Aggressions
    Black Agenda Radio with Margaret Kimberley and Glen Ford
    Dubois’ Views on “Veil” of Blackness Explains White Suburban Micro-Aggressions
    04 May 2020
    Upscale Black mothers who moved to Detroit’s white suburbs in search of better schools for their kids are suffering “battle fatigue” from constant struggles with their neighbors, according to 
  • Corporate Media Largely Decide Which Black Lives Matter
    Black Agenda Radio with Margaret Kimberley and Glen Ford
    Corporate Media Largely Decide Which Black Lives Matter
    04 May 2020
    A study by sociology professor Alicia Simmons, of Colgate University, found that corporate media journalists sometimes adopt an adversarial relationship with local police, but
  • Load More
Subscribe
connect with us
about us
contact us