How demographic change is fracturing our politics. By Ezra Klein, Vox — In 2008, Barack Obama held up change as a beacon, attaching to it another word, a word that channeled everything his young and diverse coalition saw in his rise and their newfound political power: hope. An America that would elect a black man president was an America in which a future was being written that would read thrillingly different…
By Robin D. G. Kelley, Boston Review — Cedric Robinson was fond of quoting his friend and colleague Otis Madison: “The purpose of racism is to control the behavior of…
Vantage Point Vignettes Comments and Commentary by Dr. Ron Daniels — How many Black men and women must be murdered under Florida’s infamous “stand your ground law” before Black people…
By Vincent Joos, The Conversation — At least seven people are dead and Haitian Prime Minister Jack Guy Lafontant has resignedafter weeks of violent protests in Haiti that were sparked by a sudden increase of fuel prices. Demonstrations began on July 6, when the Haitian government said that gas prices would go up 38 percent to US$4.60 per gallon because the International Monetary Fund, a major Haitian creditor, recommended ending petroleum subsidies. The average income in…
What’s the real size of Africa? How Western states used maps to downplay size of continent By Sophie Morlin-Yron, CNN — On a typical world map, Canada is a vast…
Vantage Point Vignettes Comments and Commentary by Dr. Ron Daniels — Much of the immigration reform debate is understandably focused on the separation of children from their parents, the plight…
Vantage Point Vignettes Comments and Commentary by Dr. Ron Daniels — It is critically important that all people of conscience and goodwill continue to condemn the horrifying, uncivilized policy of…
By Ahmed Reid, The Gleaner — In a recent article published in The Gleaner titled ‘Caribbean expats mean much to Britain’, Lord Tariq Ahmad, the British minister of state with responsibility for the Caribbean, Commonwealth and the United Nations, took the opportunity to highlight the sterling contribution of the Windrush Generation to the UK’s post-World War II development. Lord Ahmad’s history lesson should not be discounted. We recall that on his visit…
By Neil J. Young, HuffPost — It was his first day on the job. A 12-year-old kid with a newspaper route, that rite of passage for so many American boys and girls. Uriah Sharp gathered the pile of newspapers he was to deliver and set out with his mother and older brother to their assigned neighborhood of Upper Arlington, Ohio, an affluent Columbus suburb. That’s where Sharp, a young African-American boy…
Could it trigger a long-awaited “Jock Spring”? By Robert Lipsyte, The Nation — Snatching immigrant babies may have scored some points for President Trump with his base, but it was never going to light up the scoreboard like tackling black jocks. That one really played to the grandstands. The complicated combination of adoration and resentment so many white males feel for those rich, accomplished über-men is a significant but rarely…
The true story is that the United States has a well-documented history of breaking up non-white families. By Jeffery Robinson, Common Dreams — Children are crying for their parents while being held in small cages. The attorney general tells us the Bible justifies what we see and the White House press secretary backs him up. Be horrified and angered, but not because this is a new Trump transgression against real…
By Chantal Da Silva, Jessica Durham and Alexis Wierenga, Newsweek — Black Lives Matter. It has been five years since Patrisse Khan-Cullors, now 34, first shared those three words on Facebook, reminding Americans that black lives do matter at a time when it felt like they did not. News that George Zimmerman, 34, had been acquitted of all charges in the fatal shooting of 17-year-old Trayvon Martin sent shock waves across the U.S. on…