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Monday Apr 07, 2014
Monday Apr 07, 2014
The National Urban League on April 3 released its 2014 “State of Black America Report,” its 38th year-to-year portrait of Black life in the United States. Titled “One Nation Underemployed: Jobs Rebuild America” the report—essentially a statistical analysis of issues and trends having inordinate impact on Black communities--was generally predictable in its findings, but had greater clout this year because it also included for the first time a statistical portrait of Latino America.
The NUL’s annual reports, while impressive (certainly to its board of directors and donors), nonetheless are careful to avoid any suggestion of culpability for the myriad systemic inequities they’ve been citing for years on end. It’s no news that African Americans and Latinos “are losing economic ground;” such statistics are available literally by the week. But the NUL could make a major contribution as an organization speaking in behalf of these beleaguered communities by being very specific about the relationship between the real-life situations within these communities and the policies that produce them.
The NUL is too politically compromised to do this. It’s been dodging the issue for far too long, preferring instead to hide behind the oxymoronic practice of “neutral” advocacy. Leid Stories explains the NUL’s peculiar affliction.
Friday Apr 04, 2014
Friday Apr 04, 2014
It’s Friday—either the end of a rough week (good), or the start of an even rougher weekend (not so much). Which do you choose? Do you remain mentally mired in media muck, or do you cut the chain around your brain?
Excellent choice! Let it go, and reap the reward of some quiet time to reconstitute yourself. Call 888-874-4888 and share with likeminded folk the thoughts about major news events that you’ve been holding on to all week. Yes, that’s why there’s “Free Your Mind Friday.”
Thursday Apr 03, 2014
Thursday Apr 03, 2014
Detroit: Hundreds File Legal Objections to Bankruptcy Exit Plan
Attorney Stanley L. Cohen: ‘Always Against the State’
Detroit’s state-appointed emergency city manager, Kevyn Orr, filed an amended bankruptcy-exit plan with the federal court on Monday, as ordered by Judge Steven Rhodes. Yesterday, federal court again was the venue—this time for massive opposition to the plan. Inside the courtroom, hundreds of legal objections to the city’s plan formally were filed, while outside on the street hundreds more protested steep cuts to pensions and city services and the sale of city assets Orr’s plan calls for.
Abayomi Azikiwe, editor of Pan-African News Wire and Detroit organizer for the Workers World Party, reports.
It was a victory for prosecutors March 26 when, after a three-week trial, a federal jury in Manhattan convicted Sulaiman Abu Ghaith, the son-in-law of Osama bin Laden, on three counts of terrorism. For Ghaith’s attorney, Stanley L. Cohen, it was a not-surprising outcome.
Cohen’s legal career, spanning more than 30 years, has been fraught with controversy but based, he says, on a simple maxim: “I defend the individual against the state.” His practice is global; his clients, an assortment of major players in high-stakes social, political and environmental and justice struggles; and his reputation—well, let’s just say his website has a page for “haters.”
In a wide-ranging interview, Cohen discusses his life, the law, the “war on terror,” and the universality of struggle.
Wednesday Apr 02, 2014
Wednesday Apr 02, 2014
Leid Stories Debuts “FYI” – Peer-to-Peer Teaching and Learning
Making Callaloo In Detroit: Author Tells How Culture Sustains Her Spirit
Leid Stories proudly presents the first edition of “FYI,” a mini-lecture series designed to encourage further independent research and inquiry into various subjects and issues. “Essentially, it’s peer-to-peer teaching and learning,” says Utrice Leid, host of Leid Stories.
“Harvey from Berkeley,” as he identifies himself on call-ins to the show, does an FYI titled: “Fracking: A Vector for Disease.”
The collapse of the auto industry in Detroit caused Lolita Hernandez, a 33-year worker at General Motors, to fully immerse herself into the craft of writing. Her newest book, Making Callaloo in Detroit, is a tribute both to her Caribbean lineage and the city where she was born and raised and still lives.
Against the backdrop of hard times that Detroiters have been experiencing, Hernandez discusses the ways in which her hybrid culture sustains her spirit.
Tuesday Apr 01, 2014
Tuesday Apr 01, 2014
It was a victory for prosecutors March 26 when, after a three-week trial, a federal jury in Manhattan convicted Sulaiman Abu Ghaith, the son-in-law of Osama bin Laden, on three counts of terrorism. For Ghaith’s attorney, Stanley L. Cohen, it was a not-surprising outcome of a rigged trial that he’ll now appeal.
Cohen’s legal career, spanning more than 30 years, has been fraught with controversy but based, he says, on a simple maxim: “I defend the individual against the state.” His practice is global; his clients, an assortment of major players in high-stakes social, political and environmental and justice struggles; and his reputation—well, let’s just say his website has a page for “haters.”
In a wide-ranging interview with Leid Stories, Cohen discusses his life, the law, the “war on terror,” and the universality of struggle.
Monday Mar 31, 2014
Monday Mar 31, 2014
The stakes are high for the Democratic and Republican parties in this year’s midterm elections in which all 435 seats in the U.S. House of Representatives and 33 U.S. Senate seats are up for grabs, and seismic shifts also may occur in 46 state and four territorial legislatures, 36 governorships and 28 mayoral races in key cities.
This level of political activity would have captured the attention and interest of voters years ago, but not so much now, with polls showing increasing voter distrust, anger and disillusionment with politics and government.
Among progressives, how are political attitudes changing, and how would these changes affect their political choices in upcoming midterm elections and in the general elections in 2016? Leid Stories poses these and related questions to listeners, asking particularly for their own assessment of where in the political spectrum they now place themselves.
Friday Mar 28, 2014
Friday Mar 28, 2014
The word is out about you. Even your dog knows. Instead of winding down from the woes of the workaday world so you can enjoy your weekend with those who truly matter in your life, you’re starting the weekend all wound up. A shame and a pity in the big city.
Reclaim your weekend, worn-out warrior. Take advantage of this free offer to defrag your brain of mainstream snooze—er, news. Call in (888-874-4888) and say what’s on your mind. Your whole outlook on life instantly will improve, and we’ll rejoice.
Thursday Mar 27, 2014
Thursday Mar 27, 2014
Media Literacy: Obama’s U.S. and World History Redux in Belgium;
Detroit Update: Massive Courtroom Battle Over Bankruptcy Exit Plan
President Obama is cutting a wide swath through Europe, urging European Union and North Atlantic Treaty Organization allies to stand fast in unity against Russia’s military aggression against Ukraine and its annexation of Crimea, actions he says are grave violations of world order.
In a speech he delivered yesterday at the Hague in Brussels, Obama warned that Europe will experience past calamities if its leaders do not move to check Russia’s desire to expand its empire. Economic and trade sanctions should be implemented by the EU to isolate Russia, Obama said, adding that EU and NATO allies also should be prepared to “deepen” actions against Russia.
Obama’s speech, however, was revisionism personified. Leid Stories uses it as a study in media literacy.
Retirees, city workers, union leaders and a coalition of grassroots groups are putting the final touches on a sheaf legal objections to the state-appointed emergency city manager’s fiscal plan to dig Detroit out of bankruptcy. Federal bankruptcy judge Stephen Rhodes will hear their objections on April 1.
Abayomi Azikiwe, editor of the Pan-African Newswire and a Detroit organizer for the Workers World Party, gives the details.
Wednesday Mar 26, 2014
Wednesday Mar 26, 2014
Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 (MH370), with 12 crew members and 227 passengers on board, literally goes off the radar screen en route from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing on March 8, and hasn’t been located since. Prime Minister Najib Razak of Malaysia grimly announced 17 days after a search by a multinational team that the plane likely had crashed in the turbulent waters of the southern Indian Ocean.
This is, of course, both a mystery and a tragedy. But for the U.S. media, it was a frenzied, ruthless game of one-upmanship. CNN, the undisputed winner, went into single-subject marathon-coverage mode. As a test in media literacy, Leid Stories listeners are asked to explain why CNN went mad.
A very cogent Howard Dean, 2004 presidential candidate, former chairman of the Democratic National Committee and physician by training, explains the myth and the math of Obamacare (the Affordable Care Act)—which, he says, could have been a sensible program, were it not for Wall Street and insurance-industry greed and misguided politicians who have no idea of how the health-care system actually works.
Tuesday Mar 25, 2014
Tuesday Mar 25, 2014
We return to and conclude yesterday’s discussion--gender politics essentially as a reflection of internecine conflicts within the white world, between white women and white men, over the power to rule all others.
Hence, Leid Stories held, the apparent agreement to ignore race, class and culture—factors that would unnecessarily complicate what both sides understand and accept as the primary reason for adversarial engagement.
What does it mean to be a woman in today’s society? What informs our notions of womanhood? Has feminism/womanism/gender politics devolved into the flip side of the zero-sum, patriarchal paradigm?