February 20, 2024
As a work of social history, Jazz and Justice traces the origins of Jazz in the northern part of this hemisphere, but the issues it raises are quite contemporary. As his reviewer notes, "the now-common expression 'gig work' originated in the jazz world. The near-endless list of Black jazz musicians who have died early deaths is testimony to the overwork the gig economy forced on them."
February 20, 2024
"I thought to myself, 'I've never heard any of this really,' and I (came of age during) the anti-war movement, I'm a historian of this time period." If you think you've heard enough about the Vietnam War, just wait.
February 20, 2024
Federal criminal defense attorney David Oscar Markus periodically interviews famed trial lawyers about their most fascinating cases for his podcast, "For the Defense." This week, he featured Michael Tigar, published several times by Monthly Review. Markus introduces the episode: "Michael Tigar is exactly what action is all about... I mean, in 1999 there was a vote for lawyer of the century: Clarence Darrow was #1, Thurgood Marshall was #2, and you know who was #3?"
February 20, 2024
Author Rob Wallace made a decision: His new book Dead Epidemiologists would take a personal approach. How could it not? While he introduces his work through this intimate lens, Wallace's perspective is global, tracking "the implications of capitalist agricultural production, distribution and consumption that is harming the web of life...."
February 20, 2024
"Foster and Clark show that the exploitation of wage labor in the capitalist production process is essentially tied to the expropriation of the natural world, the refusal to socially acknowledge care labor as socially necessary labor, the privatization of our common cultural heritage, the treatment of non-white communities as places where the social pathologies of capitalism (unemployment, poverty, and so on) can be concentrated, and so on. From this perspective workers, environmentalists, feminists, community activists, and anti-racists have good reason to make common cause."
February 20, 2024
From Modi’s India to Erdogan’s Turkey neofascist autocratic regimes have taken hold...The result: widespread immiseration and discontent. In its wake, demagogues exploit the situation. They are coming to power by scapegoating, instigating violence against minorities, coupled with loud calls for 'getting our country back,' and lots of flag waving...
February 20, 2024
In a recent review of Rob Wallace' latest work, we are reminded that "If the virus has a source it is not Yunnan but the boardrooms of giant corporations." The review takes the time to name the culprits..
February 20, 2024
Comparing the health systems of Cuba and the United States, Don Fitz' book "Cuban Health Care" presents a startling statistic: The cost of healthcare per person in Cuba is one twentieth that of the US. "Why?" Peter Arkell asks, and Fitz answers: “Poor countries simply cannot afford such an inefficient health system"...
February 20, 2024
"...the United States government understands that China's scientific and electronic developments, particularly in robotics, in telecommunications, in "green technology," and so on, has far surpassed that of U.S. and European companies, and this is an existential threat as far as the United States is concerned."
February 20, 2024
Just after January 6th, Gerald Horne was one of the first to remind us that "mobocracy," generally driven by settler colonialist impulses and schemes, has been a potent force throughout this country's history...
