Review of The Burglary: The Discovery of J. Edgar Hoover’s Secret FBI, by Betty Medsger (Alfred A. Knopf, 2014. 596 pages. Notes, Index. Hardcover $29.95; paperback $16.95).
Place: North America
Exposing the FBI
A Herstory of the #BlackLivesMatter Movement
I created #BlackLivesMatter with Patrisse Cullors and Opal Tometi, two of my sisters, as a call to action for Black people after 17-year-old Trayvon Martin was post-humously placed on trial for his own murder and the killer, George Zimmerman, was not held accountable for the crime he committed. It was a response to the anti-Black racism that permeates our society and also, unfortunately, our movements.
"Class, Race, Gender and U.S. Policing"
The white supremacist policing practices behind the murder-by-cop epidemic is really a capitalist, white supremacist, heteropatriarchal policing system that must be analyzed and fought as such.”
The Faults of American Criminal Justice Run Deeper than Race
For those continually exasperated by the spate of white denials of racism in the face of blatantly racist police murders, the #CrimingWhileWhite stories on Twitter were a gratifying rebuttal.
OUTRAGE, PROTEST, AND REBELLION OVER REFUSAL TO INDICT MICHAEL BROWN’S KILLER
Pain and anger at the police killing of Michael Brown became transformed into protests that swept across America just before Thanksgiving. Thousands of people in the town of Ferguson, Missouri, and tens of thousands in cities throughout the country reacted with indignation, anger and in Ferguson with violent protests after the grand jury failed to indict Officer Darren Wilson in the shooting death of 18-year-old Michael Brown.
How Labor Can Save Itself
Review of The Death and Life of American Labor: Toward a New Workers’ Movement,
By Stanley Aronowitz, Verso, 2014.
Midterm Elections, Direct Democracy, and Legitimacy
If any group of United States citizens can claim a mandate in the midterm elections than it must be the millions of eligible voters who abstained from voting. It is a common excuse when discussing U.S. midterm elections to argue that voters do not participate in the numbers that accompany elections in a presidential election year. However, blaming the low 2014 election turn-out on a historical trend is incomplete and deceptive.
Obama’s Failure Leads to Crushing Conservative Victory; Some Signs of Hope on the Left
The failure of President Barack Obama and the Democratic Party to lead a fight for many of the major social issues on which he had campaigned—jobs and wages, African Americans’ civil rights, immigration, labor union power, and the environment—led to a sweeping victory for the Republican Party and a crushing defeat for the Democrats in the midterm election.
Response to Jay and Sustar & Bean
The following article by Adolph Reed, Jr. responds to an article that appeared on the New Politics website a week ago. Sadly, since then we have learned that Karen Lewis has been afflicted with brain cancer. We offer our sympathy to her, her family, and her friends and wish for her rapid and full recovery.
Indiana Moral Mondays
Moral Mondays has been established in Indiana. At a founding meeting in Indianapolis in mid-September, the organization adopted a “five-point agenda” similar to those of Moral Mondays movements in other states:
Karen Lewis and the Long Arm of Lesser Evilism
The article by Scott Jay that follows was published on our website several days before the public learned that Karen Lewis was suffering from brain cancer. We are sorry to hear of her illness and offer our sympathy to her and to her family and friends. We leave the article on our website as a matter of public record and because the political issues that it raises remain important, even though she has now decided not to run for mayor. We wish Ms.Lewis a rapid and full recovery. – Editors
A Challenge to Occupiers and Unionists
Where have all the occupiers gone? We have scattered, enmeshed in an economic system we loathe, faced with the dismal realities of the prolonged "Great Recession" and a jobless recovery that only benefits the ruling class. With our future prospects bleak and our hopes for creating a more just economy diffused, we are left with only our collective will, experience, and values.
Betty Reid Mandell, at 89; longtime advocate for the poor
Long after retiring as a professor of social work at Bridgewater State, Betty Reid Mandell kept putting her teachings into practice in her 80s by lending assistance to the homeless who were seeking help from the state Department of Transitional Assistance.
When she stopped by to volunteer, she recalled in an essay, the homeless section of Boston’s welfare offices reminded her of the front line in an endless conflict.
Climate Convergence Moves Us Forward, but Challenges Us to Create a Strategy
The Climate Convergence with its more than one hundred workshops, its large plenary sessions, and its miles-long mass march of more than 300,000 people, the largest climate protest in American history, represents a turning point for the environmental movement. The gigantic and passionate parade of indigenous people, ethnic groups of all sorts from everywhere in the country, students by the tens of thousands, neighborhood organizations by the dozen, several major national labor unions, and every conceivable sort of ecological cause tramping through New York City carrying huge banners and giant puppets, striding and dancing to the tunes of 29 marching bands, put the issue of the environment and climate change on the national agenda as never before. The national climate movement has arrived—now what will it do?
Climate Convergence Opens with a Prayer and a Call to Action
The Climate Convergence—an opening session on Friday, a hundred meetings on Saturday, a huge march and Occupy the U.N. Climate Summit on Sunday, and other actions on Monday such as #FloodWallStreet (Stop Capitalism. End the Climate Crisis.)—began in New York City on Friday night with an indigenous prayer, speeches from climate activists, and a powerful call to action to save the planet. Organizers have worked to make this a turning-point event.
The Climate Convergence has come to New York to challenge, protest, and attempt to change the climate policies of the corporations, national governments, and the United Nations which is holding its Climate Summit this week in New York.
Greening the Union Label
Zero Carbon Future Could Be a Jobs Bonanza
From teachers to transit workers, civil servants to electricians, the People’s Climate March will have more organized-labor participation than any environmentalist effort in U.S. history.
The Tragedy of Being Michael Brown
Did Brown have to be a college-bound angel to have his death matter?
Michael Brown, an unarmed African-American teenager, was shot dead by police in Ferguson, Missouri on August 9.
Why Socialists need to be at the Peoples Climate March
Defying Apocalypse
Image by Ricardo Levins Morales
Today it often feels as though we are hopelessly mired in apocalyptic thinking, both in our social movements and in popular culture.
Chicago Teachers Union President Launches Campaign for Mayor
The likely candidacy of the president of the Chicago Teachers Union, which led one of the most important strikes in recent years in the USA, against the incumbent Democrat Rahm Emanuel, formerly the chief-of-staff of the White House and a champion of the privatization of the school system, is a major political event.
Authors dynamite neoliberalism's ed reform narrative
Review of
This is Not a Test: A New Narrative on Race, Class and Education
By José Luis Vilson
Haymarket Books, 2014
Badass Teachers Unite: Reflections on Education, History and Youth Activism
By Mark Naison
Haymarket Books, 2014
