• Carlos Lazo of the Puentes de Amor (Bridges of Love) project and others at an event in Minneapolis

    Race hustling at George Floyd square: a valuable teaching moment

    Only “niggers” have the right to employ the example of George Floyd to fight oppression.   And, “there are no niggers in Cuba!”  So proclaimed someone who identified himself as a “nigger” to a group of us at George Floyd Square on Saturday afternoon, July 31.

  • A mirror with Reflect painted on it by the group Visual Black Justice was installed in front of the Hennepin County Government Center in Minneapolis, Minnesota on the morning when Derek Chauvin's trial in the death of George Floyd was set to begin. (Flickr: Lorie Shaull)

    The Chauvin verdict: A historic victory that points the way forward

    For the very first time in United States history, therefore, a jury composed of people of whom half identify as white convicted a white cop for the second-degree murder of a Black person, the most serious charge to date. If there is an exception, it certainly is not as visible as this instance. Thus, a historic milestone—a victory to be celebrated, a victory, more importantly, that points the way forward.

  • African American soldiers from the 54th Massachusetts Volunteer Infantry on guard duty

    Bourgeois fear of revolution means disowning the Civil War

    Sixteen months into the Civil War Karl Marx—as if anticipating apologists like Brooks 160 years later—criticized Lincoln for “trying to conduct it along constitutional” lines. It pleased him to no end, then, when Lincoln issued his Emancipation Proclamation more than a month later.

  • Ta-Nehisi Coates

    The meritocratic myopia of Ta-Nehisi Coates

    A question that might sound ludicrous to some: what do Trump and liberals have in common? Answer: a penchant for discussing anything other than class and capitalism—seriously.

  • The Graveyard of Progressive Social Movements

    When first encountering the “Impeach Bush” movement in 2007 I responded, almost flippantly, “why not impeach the system that gave us Bush?” Otherwise, I said, “we risk having someone in the White House who’ll make us long for Bush.” If prescient, my response was admittedly formulaic and evidentially deficient.

  • The Rapist Returns: More Lessons from Katrina’s Aftermath

      In the big business media’s “two years after Katrina” coverage, there was one glaring omission — the story of the utter bankruptcy of the so-called Black leadership, in particular, the Black Democratic Party establishment.  Nothing confirms that story better than the brief appearance in New Orleans on August 29 of President George W. Bush.  […]

  • Cuba and the Lessons of Katrina

      What explains why the “dictatorial regime” of Fidel Castro can do a vastly better job of saving the lives of its citizens from hurricanes while the “democratic” government in Washington has proven to be so apparently inept? In 2004, Hurricane Ivan, a category five storm, slammed Cuba with devastating force. Yet there was not […]