Skip to content
During This Economic Crisis, Capitalism’s Three Point Political Program: 1. Austerity, 2. Scapegoating Blacks, Minorities, and ‘Illegal Immigrants’ for Unemployment, and 3. The Iron Heel.
Democracy?: As the Capitalist Robber Barons Steal from the 99% — Only the 1% Voted For Austerity — The 99% Should Decide On Austerity — Not Just Those Who Profit From Austerity!
Under Austerity, All of the World Will Eventually Be Pauperized, Humbled, and Desecrated Like Greece and Puerto Rico!
Image of the Day:
That is the United States’ top “diplomat” saying that a democratically elected head of sovereign state, Venezuela’s president Nicolas Maduro, must leave office or “we” — the U.S. government that is — will reserve the right to remove him (absurdly described as “return[ing]” the Venezuelan government “back to their constitution.”) It is a declaration of the United States’ presumed entitlement to conduct internationally criminal regime change, confident that it is exempt from global sanction or prosecution. Because we own the world and what we say goes – especially in our hemisphere. Capice? Nobody should doubt that Tillerson is signaling Washington’s willingness to carry out a coup in Venezuela. The Bush administration tried and failed to do precisely that in April of 2002 – and Washington has never stopped waiting for its next best moment to depose the democratically elected socialist government there. That moment is now, perhaps, with Venezuela weakened by low oil prices and years of economic poaching and sanctions, and with U.S-fueled street protests led by a fanatical right wing racist and upper-class opposition to the Bolivarian Revolution. — RExxon Tillerson’s Petro-Imperially Perfect Regime Change Threat
In contrast, Sunday’s elections had the full weight of the electoral authorities behind them, over 12.000 voting centres and 24.000 voting booths, and the approval of international monitors. The main obstacle was the opposition’s violence, and so additional voting centres, such as the Caracas Poliedro pavilion, were set up for people who were not able to vote in their own neighbourhoods (1). Pictures showed voting queues forming since early morning and the voting deadline was extended so everyone could vote. It is also worth reminding how the Venezuelan voting system is as close to foolproof as it gets. Voters access voting machines using their fingerprints, exercise their vote electronically, and then a paper ballot is printed. The voter checks that it matches the vote he/she just made and places this paper ballot in a box. Once the voting is done, a random audit of voting centres is made to ensure that the paper ballot tally matches the electronic tally to a margin of 0.1%. In particular, a big discrepancy between the voting totals, paper and electronic, would stand out immediately. —Venezuela’s Elections: Resurgent Chavismo and Unrecognized Democracy
Video of the Day:
Bannon and Blackwater Want to Outsource Afghan War With the Afghan war in a violent stalemate, President Trump and his top advisers have considered proposals to outsource the anti-Taliban fight to private mercenaries
U.S.:
RExxon Tillerson’s Petro-Imperially Perfect Regime Change Threat It takes a lot for anything anybody in the Insane Clown Trump administration says to get my attention these days. The longtime Exxon-Mobil CEO and current United State Secretary of State Rex Tillerson did the trick with these 48 words two days ago: “We are evaluating all of our policy options as to what can we do to create a change of conditions where either Maduro decides he doesn’t have a future and wants to leave of his own accord or we can return the government processes back to their constitution.” by Paul Street
The Israelization of the Middle East Quagmire in the US Media The media’s role is to inform and enlighten, to be the eyes and ears of the people, and to monitor power. However, in their coverage of the Palestine-Israel quagmire they have consistently favored the partisan views of the United States and Israeli governments at the expense of the Palestinian experience. And they have failed the public in understanding this longest of Middle East conflicts, which is at the heart of so many of the problems in the region. by M. Reza Behnam
Black Liberation/Civil Rights:
The justice department’s latest memo is proof it’s not interested in equality Investigation of affirmative action really is about cordoning off educational opportunity from the working class, and the working class of color in particular By Douglas Williams
It’s Getting Real – Google Censors the Left. And Us. Conclusive evidence exists that Google is suppressing public access to socialist and left wing websites, almost certainly including Black Agenda Report. In fact, Black Agenda Report is by all accounts the ONLY black owned, run and oriented left web site so targeted. Not Blavity. Not theRoot, which are not left and in the case of theRoot not black owned either. Nobody else black but us. How did that happen and what does it mean? How can you dodge the block. by BAR managing editor Bruce A. Dixon
Tell Trump, and the Democrats, Too: We Demand Black Community Control of the Police Donald Trump’s outrageous incitement of police brutality serves the purposes of corporate reformers, who then set the bar of people’s demands even lower. If “anything is better than Trump,” then the people are urged to accept any crumb masquerading as “reform” that is offered. Instead of ‘Power to the People,’ the demand becomes, ‘Please don’t hurt us too badly.’” by BAR executive editor Glen Ford
Pascal Robert on the Project of Black Nationalism and the Black Misleadership Class BAR contributor Pascal Robert takes the mic at Dead Pundits Society to discuss the Haitian scene, his love-hate relationship to the project of black nationalism and its relationship to class struggle among the descendants of Africans, and the Black Misleadership Class.
New Afrikan Black Panther Party Co-Founder Located in Florida Prison Kevin “Rashid” Johnson has been bounced from prisons in Virginia, Oregon and Texas, and recently disappeared altogether, alarming his comrades in the New Afrikan Black Panther Party, which he co-founded. Johnson was finally located in a Florida prison, in solitary confinement. Florida prison officials have reportedly labeled the NABPP a “violent street organization.” Tito “Fist” Rivera, of the United Panthers Movement, told Black Agenda Radio producer Kyle Fraser: “Historically, whenever you are more than two people doing something that the system doesn’t want you doing, they consider that a gang.” by Nellie Bailey
Environment:
Just Released Docs Show Monsanto ‘Executives Colluding With Corrupted EPA Officials to Manipulate Scientific Data’ Four months after the publication of a batch of internal Monsanto Co. documents stirred international controversy, a new trove of company records was released early Tuesday, providing fresh fuel for a heated global debate over whether or not the agricultural chemical giant suppressed information about the potential dangers of its Roundup herbicide and relied on U.S. regulators for help. More than 75 documents, including intriguing text messages and discussions about payments to scientists, were posted for public viewing early Tuesday morning by attorneys who are suing Monsanto on behalf of people alleging Roundup caused them or their family members to become ill with non-Hodgkin lymphoma, a type of blood cancer. The attorneys posted the documents, which total more than 700 pages, on the website for the law firm Baum, Hedlund, Aristei & Goldman, one of many firms representing thousands of plaintiffs who are pursuing claims against Monsanto. More than 100 of those lawsuits have been consolidated in multidistrict litigation in federal court in San Francisco, while other similar lawsuits are pending in state courts in Missouri, Delaware, Arizona and elsewhere. The documents, which were obtained through court-ordered discovery in the litigation, are also available as part of a long list of Roundup court case documents compiled by the consumer group I work for, U.S. Right to Know. By Carey Gillam
Ongoing Big Energy Crisis:
Labor:
Message from the Network in Defense of Humanity to the Heroic Bolivarian People of Venezuela The Network of Intellectuals, Artists and Social Movements in Defense of Humanity want to congratulate the Venezuelan people for the lesson in democracy they gave during the vote for the National Constituent Assembly yesterday.
Venezuela after the Constituent Assembly elections, conciliation or revolution? Even before the National Election Council had announced the results of Sunday’s Constituent Assembly elections in Venezuela, the opposition and western imperialism had already declared there had been massive fraud and that they would not recognise the legitimacy of the Assembly. Since then, they have piled up pressure on all fronts. What is to be done? By Jorge Martin 
Cuba denounces efforts to silence the voice of the Venezuelan people This Sunday, July 30, 2017, during elections for the National Constituent Assembly in the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela, the people demonstrated to the world that they are in full possession of their sovereign rights, and are firmly on the side of peace, in defense of citizen security, of independence and self-determination in their homeland
Health, Science, Education, and Welfare:
Cuba has graduated 170 doctors from the United States Cuba has graduated 170 doctors from the United States through the project of the Latin American School of Medicine (ELAM), which was initiated by Cuban leader Fidel Castro in November 1999.
Quotes of the Day:
The war America can’t win: how the Taliban took back Afghanistan The Taliban controls places like Helmand, where the US and UK troops fought their hardest battles, pushing the drive toward peace and progress into reverse by Sune Engel Rasmussen
Ben Carson is no hometown hero for Detroit’s struggling families By Bankole Thompson
Should the Federal Reserve Be Doing the Nation’s Work with a Skeleton Crew? By Pam Martens and Russ Martens
Earnings Rise with Boost from Falling U.S. Dollar But Consumers Will Bear the Brunt of Rising Prices There seems to be an unlimited supply of methods in which the rich in America keep getting richer and the average Joe picks up the tab. (Think about the $16 trillion secret bailout of Wall Street by the Federal Reserve from 2007 to 2010 for the quintessential example.) By Pam Martens and Russ Martens
World: