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

Anthem of Banksters & War Profiteers
Raymond Nat Turner, BAR poet-in-residence
07 Sep 2016
🖨️ Print Article

by BAR poet in residence Raymond Nat Turner

Why does San Francisco quarterback Colin Kaepernick choose to sit when the Star Spangled Banner is played before football games? Evidently he is one of many who know the real intention and import behind those bombs bursting in air...

Anthem of Banksters & War Profiteers…

by BAR poet in residence Raymond Nat Turner

“I spent most of my time being a high-class muscle man for Big Business, for Wall Street and the bankers. In short I was a racketeer, a gangster for capitalism.”
—Marine General Smedley Butler at his retirement, 1933

I.

No Iroquois or Seminole National Anthem,

No Hawaiian or Mexican National Anthem,

Before bombers fly over stadiums schools and

social services were sacrificed for on altars of austerity;

No Ohlone or Navajo National Anthem,

No Iroquois or Seminole National Anthem,

No Hawaiian or Mexican National Anthem,

Before rockets red glare/bombs bursting in air

Over Hiroshima, Nagasaki, Bosnia, Libya,

Panama, Somalia, Iraq, Afghanistan, Yemen…and

Others, soon to be announced…

II.

The bleeding baby with blown off arms and stumps for legs

Dies in a ‘surgically struck’ hospital while you drain kegs?

Commander’s quarterback, bloody band wrapping his wrist,

Running old red zone, war-profiteer plays from his kill list?

Are other peoples’ children ‘collateral damage expendable—

Like leftovers lost when your fridge became undependable?

Why’s the fight for ‘our freedom’ usually where there’s oil?

Why’s it where mineral wealth’s buried beneath foreign soil?

How about freedom fighting without tanks, planes and boats—

Freeing: Fitzgerald, Peltier, Gilbert, Bell, Jamal, Shoatz…?

Ain’t ‘Incarceration Nation’ Slave State, by its other name—

Ain’t it the darker side of a barbaric, brain-damaging game?

Black players: interception, sack, fumble, loss from N-word

Inches from lynching by the intoxicated mob, the racist herd—

Of Hitler-loving, hair-trigger thugs, masquerading as fans…

Always seconds away from true team colors of their klan’s!

Raymond Nat Turner © 2016 All Rights Reserved
Raymond Nat Turner is an acclaimed poet and performance artist. Find more of his work at http://upsurgejazz.com.

Do you need and appreciate Black Agenda Report articles? Please click on the DONATE icon, and help us out, if you can.


More Stories


  • Carlos Ron
    “We will blow you out of existence”: Trump’s Caribbean spectacle
    08 Oct 2025
    What is being carried out against Venezuela is not an operation against drug trafficking but rather a regime change operation.
  • Ajamu Baraka interview
    ​​​​​​​ Ajamu Baraka, BAR editor and columnist
    Trump's Gaza plan is 'pure fantasy'
    08 Oct 2025
    Ajamu Baraka joined RT News on October 3, 2025, to discuss Donald Trump's Gaza "peace plan."
  • BAR Radio Logo
    Black Agenda Radio with Margaret Kimberley
    Black Agenda Radio October 3, 2025
    03 Oct 2025
    In this week’s segment, we discuss a lawsuit on behalf of the Shabazz family, seeking information on law enforcement coverups and possible involvement in the assassination of Malcolm X. But first, we…
  • Protests
    Black Agenda Radio with Margaret Kimberley
    UK Politics: Immigration, Racism, and Economic Crisis
    03 Oct 2025
    Roger McKenzie is the international editor of the UK-based Morning Star, the only English-language socialist daily newspaper in the world. He joins us from Oxford to discuss the politics of a growing…
  • Ilyasah Shabazz
    Black Agenda Radio with Margaret Kimberley
    Shabazz Family Lawsuit Against the FBI and NYPD
    03 Oct 2025
    The investigation of the 1965 assassination of El Hajj Malik El Shabazz, Malcolm X, was compromised by the NYPD and the FBI from the very beginning by informants, coverups, false testimony, and the…
  • Load More
Subscribe
connect with us
about us
contact us