Racism
Myriam Gurba Publishes Another Book
Myriam Gurba has just published another book – Creep, a collection of essays – so it’s a good time to reprint my creative feature “Who’s Myriam Gurba?” which originally appeared in October 2020. Gurba is a feisty, talented, and photogenic writer and social activist. Whether or not readers agree with her opinions, she entertains with…
Read MoreThe Ali Legacy
He told you in the sixties he wasn’t going to Vietnam to help the white man continue to oppress people of color around the world. You saw where that led. The United States killed a million people in Southeast Asia and maimed more than that and lost fifty-seven thousand American lives. For what? Martin Luther…
Read MoreEldridge Cleaver has Changed
There were confrontational people in the crowd and they hurled invectives at a speaker created for confrontation. A young curly-haired fellow, smirking, waved a sign that projected insulting remarks about the man on the platform, and he shouted, “You’re in the FBI.” “First of all, you can take that sign and shove it,” said the…
Read MoreEmotions and Statistics from Ferguson
The usual suspects right and left are respectively railing that police are always justified in using force in ghettoes or they’re never justified in so doing especially if the alleged criminal descended from slaves. There’s no need to refute Al Sharpton, race baiter and riotous agitator extraordinaire, or columnist Leonard Pitts, a self-proclaimed introvert who’s…
Read MoreFrench Antisemitism
Husky librarian lectured members of historical society about vast news and photo archives and then discussed college background, emphasizing in grad school had researched paper about nineteenth century French anti-Semitism. As author of “Hitler Here” I approached and said, that’s obscure subject. Yes, but fascinating, he replied. I focused on Edouard Drumont, Adolf Hitler of…
Read MoreJohn Wilkes Booth Today
We mustn’t permit deed of John Wilkes Booth to stand and therefore shall remove from time and place and raise today in theatrical family thriving in Manhattan and nod when Hollywood beckons splendid Booth who becomes movie star in early twenties making millions while he drinks and snorts and occasionally crashes cars but fires only…
Read MoreUpdate Martin Luther King Speech
a million die by 1966 day i deliver “beyond vietnam a time to break silence” declaring poverty inevitable in “society gone mad on war” and still i see america attacks to feed “giant triplets of racism materialism and militarism” Editorial Note: This is revised and reduced from the original post in January 2012.
Read MoreHigh School Grades of Earl Warren
enter archives at bakersfield high school look left at long glass case displaying handwritten grade book note highlighted name earl warren read four years reports revealing history his best subject and three times earned his top grade in final quarter many students before and since doubtless had similar trajectories only didn’t become three term governor…
Read MoreJohn Wilkes Booth Today
mustn’t permit deed of john wilkes booth to stand instead remove from that time and place and raise today in theatrical family thriving in manhattan and nod when hollywood beckons splendid booth becomes movie star in his early twenties making millions while drinks snorts and occasionally crashes cars but fires only slurred words To see…
Read MoreInterned American Recalls World War II
doing pretty well for old man twenty years ago i retired as gardener at seventy-five i was in twenties when pearl harbor hit and things got bad in california for people like me i was born here you know that didn’t matter they sent my wife three kids and me to internment camp and made…
Read MoreNat Turner Now
you’re no longer nat turner but a different color cracker
Read MoreThe NCAA Confesses
What’s in that syringe? Untie me. You’ll go to jail. This won’t work. I’m not talking. I hope I won’t. I know I shouldn’t say as a kid I was a white wimp and still am and therefore perfect to work for the NCAA. I loathe my athletic superiors and all the media and fan…
Read MoreHistorian Offers to Write Screenplay about Hitler Here
How pleased I recently was to receive an email with the subject “Screenplay” and addressed to “Illustrious Sir”. The correspondent introduced himself with news he’d been reading my biographical novel Hitler Here and thought it was “great” and “what an ordeal (I) must have gone through to produce it.” Since the book took twenty years…
Read MoreFive Youths Attack Old Man
On Father’s Day at a church in Chicago, Barack Obama preached that “of all the rocks upon which we build our lives…family is the most important.” And we must “recognize and honor how critical every father is to that foundation…They are mentors and role models. They are examples of success…But if we are honest…we’ll admit…
Read MoreRev. Al Sharpton in the Pulpit
Later on we’ll talk about Al Sharpton the bold political activist and brazen race baiter, the man who strives to build communities and the one who’s addicted to public controversy. Right now it’s Sunday morning and none of that matters. Reverend Al has come to Bakersfield and is somewhere in the church. The pews are…
Read MoreAfrican American Activist Denounces Hate Crimes Trial
I hope you’ve been reading about the typical white racist attempt to just about lynch those ten black juveniles, including nine girls, falsely accused of stomping three young white women outside a haunted house last Halloween night in Long Beach, California. When they were surrounded by a group of taunting, crotch-grabbing African Americans, the white…
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