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 December 23, 2012
27 Dec 2012
🖨️ Print Article

 

Bill to Head Off U.S. War Against Syria

“It has actually reached the point that presidents don’t give a darn about the Congress,” said Harlem Democrat Charles Rangel, one of six congressional signatories to a letter urging President Obama to ask Congress’s authorization before waging war on Syria. Rangel appeared at a Capitol Hill press conference held by North Carolina Republican Rep. Walter Jones, author of legislation calling for impeachment for unauthorized presidential war-making. Patrick Lang, a former head of Defense Intelligence Agency operations in the Middle East and North Africa, said “the government of the United States has embarked on a course which, if followed, will lead to military intervention in Syria.”

American Revolution was a Racist Revolt

Dr. Gerald Horne, professor of History and African American Studies at the University of Houston, said, the American revolt of 1776 against British rule “was basically a successful revolt of racist settlers. It was akin to Rhodesia, in 1965, assuming that Ian Smith and his cabal had triumphed. It was akin to the revolt of the French settlers in Algeria, in the 1950s and 1960s, assuming those French settlers had triumphed.” Dr. Horne explores the racist roots on the American Revolution in his new book, Negroes of the Crown. “It was very difficult to construct a progressive republic in North America after what was basically a racist revolt,” said Horne. “The revolt was motivated in no small part by the fact that abolitionism was growing in London…. This is one of the many reasons more Africans by an order of magnitude fought against the rebels in 1776, than fought alongside them.”

Black Soldiers Crucial to American War of Independence

Black soldiers “were the most experienced fighters” at Yorktown, comprising a quarter of the soldiers under General George Washington’s command in the decisive battle, said Alan Gilbert, author of Black Patriots and Loyalists: Fighting for Emancipation in the War for Independence. Gilbert disputes estimates that only 5,000 Blacks fought for American separation from Britain. However, far more Blacks served with the British, who promised freedom, while Washington’s Continental Army did not.

 

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


  • Map of the Horn of Africa
    Black Agenda Radio with Margaret Kimberley
    Trump Administration Continues U.S. Destabilization of Somalia
    21 Feb 2025
    Abayomi Azikiwe, is the editor of Pan-African Newswire. He joins us from Detroit to discuss U.S. policy towards the Horn of Africa nation, Somalia. The Trump administration recently carried out…
  • Margaret Kimberley, BAR Executive Editor and Senior Columnist
    The Fall of Eric Adams
    19 Feb 2025
    Eric Adams has a multitude of legal and political problems that have ended any political ambitions he may have had. Donald Trump may have kept him from going to jail, but in seeking a lifeline from a…
  • ​​​​​​​ Ajamu Baraka, BAR editor and columnist
    Malcolm X Presente!
    19 Feb 2025
    Every year, people around the world honor Malcolm X. Though he was taken from us prematurely, his memory and impact remain. With that memory, there is a mandate that we accept and carry on the legacy…
  • Editors, The Black Agenda Review
    POEM: Where will you be? Pat Parker, 1978
    19 Feb 2025
    Pat Parker warns us that cowardly acquiescence to fascism is deadly for us all.
  • Ann Garrison, BAR Contributing Editor
    Congo Activists to NBA: Black Lives Matter in DRC, Cut Ties with Rwanda
    19 Feb 2025
    As Rwandan troops tightened their grip on the capitals of DRC’s Kivu Provinces, activists protested the National Basketball Association’s close collaboration with the Rwandan regime.
  • Load More
Subscribe
connect with us
about us
contact us