New Ancestor and Honorable Warrior for the People, Baba Abdul Jabbar Caliph.

Sunday, November 18 was the date for the Pan-Afrikan Memorial and Ascension Ceremony for prison activist and freedom fighter Bro. Abdul Jabbar Caliph.  “Jabbar”, as he was commonly called, was a leader in the National Jericho Movement for the freedom of Political Prisoners until joining the organization Release Aging People in Prison, now known as the Aging People in Prison Human Rights Campaign (APPHRC) several years ago.

Mama Tomiko Shine and Baba Tyronne Morton, leaders of APPHRC.

Bro. Jabbar was also an integral member of the Ujima Peoples Progress Party, building a Black worker-led independent political party in the state of Maryland. 

Bro. Nnamdi Lumumba of the Ujima People’s Progress Party with his Queen.

The following is a short tribute from the memorial program.  We will add more to this post in the near future.

Four strong warriors who fought alongside Baba Jabbar for truth and justice: Bro. Kelly (UJIMA), Bro. Brandon Walker (UJIMA), Baba Jihad Abdulmumit (Chair, National Jericho Movement), Baba Tyronne Morton (APPHRC)

Abdul Jabbar Caliph departed this physical world taking his last breath on October 8, 2018. In the context and ritual of the 40 day Ascension ceremony his transition falls on November 18, 2018. In the story of African people this is a most important date. Why? On November 18, 1803 over 200 years ago the Battle of Vertieres took place on the small island of Haiti against the imposing and powerful European armies; liberating the Haitians from slavery and European domination.

Group picture from the Ascension Ceremony, with Baba Jabbar’s Family front and center.

Thus Abdul Jabbar Caliph is ancestrally aligned within the pages of African history and cosmology. Considering the character of the man with Jabbar meaning strong and mighty, he always spoke about and to the need of liberation for people of African descent across the globe. He fought to the end for the liberation of African people mind, body, and soul. He went to the people because he was not afraid of the people, and recognized he was the people. His dedication, works, and brilliance of mind is etched in the memory of all he touched. Thus he moves on to continue his work on the ancestral plane; available to us Africans in America as we become ready to liberate ourselves and our future.
 
“African people are going to have to fund their own liberation”
“Only black people can free black people”
— Abdul Jabbar Caliph

Bro. Jabbar at a meeting with Mama Pam Africa of MOVE.

EDITOR’S NOTE: Justice Initiative, founded by Heather Gray, regularly releases announcements, analyses and commentaries in the area of social justice, particularly racial justice and American racism.  Here, she shares a press release pertaining to a biotechnology conference occurring in South Africa which is supported by several multinational biotech agribusinesses and the response of several on-the-ground Afrikan civil society organizations and activists.  Ms. Gray can be reached at hmcgray@earthlink.net.

Note: For additional information on the disruption and the desire for corporate agribusiness to control all of the world’s food systems and seeds, as they are insidiously attempting to do throughout Africa as described below, please read the interview with organic farmer Rashid Nuri entitled: Rashid Nuri on “Seeds of Destruction”. 

Heather Gray
August 28, 2018
Justice Initiative

Media release: Civil society responds to BioAfrica Convention

For immediate release:
African Centre for Biodiversity
28 August 2018

BioAfrica Convention: Open for the business of profit; closed to the questions that matter

This week the biotechnology industry meets at the Durban International Convention Centre. Themed “Africa – Open for business” the Convention will explore various ways in which African biodiversity can be exploited for agriculture, industry and health by providing a platform for stakeholders in the biotechnology environment.  The Convention is co-hosted by AfricaBio, the Technology Innovation Agency and the South African Department of Science and Technology, with primary sponsorship from DuPont, Syngenta and MSQ Health.  (See https://bioafricaconvention.com/ for details)

What is clear from the programme and exorbitant participation fees is that they will not be building the Bio-Economy together with the communities whose resources and knowledge will be exploited.  There has been no attempt to open the content or participation to civil society voices that might challenge the neo-colonial agenda, or the neoliberal approach to commodifying and privatising nature and traditional knowledge, an approach which also contravenes the essence of African belief systems which centralise communal ownership and benefit.

In co-hosting the event with industry mouthpiece AfricaBio – whose membership includes global biotech giants such as Bayer-Monsanto, Syngenta and DuPont – the South African government is ensuring that critical social, environmental, ethical, health and economic concerns are swept under the carpet.  These include concerns about genetically modified crops and related herbicides that have already been foisted on farmers and the public.  They include concerns about the obdurate belief that technological solutions are a “silver bullet”.  And they include concerns about the lack of imagination for alternative and decolonial agricultural futures that build on farmers’ knowledge rather than supporting Trojan Horse projects such as the Water Efficient Maize for Africa (WEMA) Project, which present false solutions for drought tolerance.

In so doing, South Africa is complicit in pressuring other African governments to accept technology packages that ultimately benefit these multinationals, while society, the farmer and consumers bear the brunt of negative impacts.

We, the undersigned civil society organisations and individuals, reject this agenda to commodify our natural resources and traditional knowledge while displacing these with increasingly risky and untested technologies for the benefit of global capital.

ORGANISATIONS

• Biowatch SA
  For more information: Vanessa Black Cell: 082 472 8844
  Email: vanessa@biowatch.org.za

• African Centre for Biodiversity
  For more information: Mariam Mayet
  Cell: 083 269 4309
  Email: mariam@acbio.org.za

NETWORKS

• No GMO South Africa
• Seed Freedom SA
• Seed sovereignty South Africa
• Resistance is fertile SA
• Toxic Free community

INDIVIDUALS

• Busisiwe Mgangxela – agroecology farmer
• Rushka Johnson – small-scale farmer, environmental activist and seed guardian

The recent apparent escalation of insanity in the Trump Administration has led many pundits to speculate on the set of circumstances that could possibly have led to the current sad state of affairs in the capital city of the so-called Leader of the Free World.  Never before have they seen such audacious, boldfaced corruption in defense of a hypocritical and incompetent regime, they say.  They insist that the United States has reached a new low in mendacity with the criminal actions of members of the Trump Administration, possibly leading all the way to Trump himself.  Only impeachment, they say, followed by a pair of “extra-small handcuffs”, will tell.

These people have not been paying attention.

At least from Day One of the Trump Administration, it was clear that truth and competence were not highly valued, despite Trump’s claims during his campaign that he would find “the best people”.  His then-press secretary, Sean Spicer, would angrily insist that the public coronation of his president was the largest to ever witness such an event ever, “period”, in spite of clear visual evidence to the contrary.  The only thing that was perhaps more shocking than that assertion was the fact that, before the year was out, Spicer would be replaced by someone who appears to be even more comfortable angrily dispensing disinformation to the public in Sarah Huckabee Sanders.

Rudolph Giuliani, formerly (and improperly) dubbed “America’s Mayor” merely because he happened to be entrenched in New York’s City Hall when the September 11 terrorist attack took place, was long known to Pan-Afrikan activists and Black communities in New York as a racist mayor who never thought twice about enabling the brutality of his police, from the Abner Louima attack in a police station bathroom to the Amadou Diallo murder by police in the vestibule of his own home to the repressive tactics used against the 1998 Million Youth March in Harlem.  Giuliani had used the month leading up to the Million Youth March to turn up the heat in New York’s racial drama, threatening march organizer Dr. Khalid Muhammad and lying about Dr. Muhammad’s intentions right up to the immediate aftermath of the march, insisting that he had exhorted followers to “go out and murder people” during the march when in fact no such statement was ever made (I personally made tapes of everything that was said, and there was no such exhortation at any time during the march).  He had used these false assertions to justify the use of his riot police to attack the march organizers as they were ending the march three minutes late.  Thus, Giuliani’s current antics in support of an unlawful “law-and-order” president were anticipated by his critics who knew of his behavior as Mayor of New York City.

Alt-right enthusiasts have been discussing the racist credentials of former adviser Steve Bannon and current adviser Stephen Miller since they emerged from the shadows and joined the Trump campaign.  From Miller’s first public words that Trump’s edicts “will not be questioned”, we were duly informed that his boss was nothing if not a megalomaniac, and that he had in Miller a willing acolyte who seemed to relish any opportunity to lead the Stormtroopers forward into the “lawless rabble”.

Omarosa Manigault-Newman, his once-loyal “Apprentice” reality-star adviser, has recently come out to acknowledge her own (allegedly unwitting) complicity in enabling Trump’s destructive policies (perhaps the only one to have done so, at least until onetime Trump attorney Michael Cohen finally turns State’s evidence), but she has been known as an opportunist for years, one who was more than ready to embrace a man whose historical image is that of an unrepentant racist, and to whom she had bragged that his opponents would be forced to “bow down” after he was elected president.

Trump’s choices for the Department of Energy (Rick Perry, who could not even remember the name of the agency as he was campaigning on eliminating it four years earlier), Housing and Urban Development (the apparently narcoleptic Ben Carson, whose commitment to increase rents in federal housing for poor people caused many to wish he had stuck to brain surgery), Environmental Protection (the anti-environment Scott Pruitt, followed by the equally anti-environment Andrew Wheeler), Education (Betsy DeVos, whose lack of public school experience has led some to question whether she ever went to school at all) and Homeland Security (Kristjen Nielsen, who claims not to have known that Norway was a White country and whose incompetence and heartlessness led to her public harassment at dinner one evening) have smacked of a level of cronyism that is the only possible explanation for the appointment of individuals who are so woefully unqualified for those positions.

It appears the only members of Trump’s Cabinet who are actually qualified to do their jobs are Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats and Secretary of Defense Jim Mattis, who ironically goes by the  nickname “Mad Dog”.

The United States Legislative Branch has completely failed to serve the American people as a “check” on the Trump Administration, from the obstruction of the Republicans to many Obama Administration policies, to their current efforts to obstruct all investigations into the crimes of Trump Administration and campaign officials, to their pushing of tax breaks for the wealthiest Americans at the expense of the working and underclasses, to the relative fecklessness of too many in the Democratic Party.  As a result of the Legislature’s dysfunction and even treachery (Congress, the opposite of progress), the Supreme Court now is composed of a majority that will likely back any Trump Administration excess, and thus all of the so-called “checks and balances” that we were so proudly taught were the hallmark of American governance and a guarantee against dictatorship are now gone.

And let us not forget the most egregious culprit of all, Donald Trump himself.  In the 1970’s, he and his father were consistently sued by Black residents of their apartment buildings for housing discrimination.  In the aftermath of the April 19, 1989 assault, rape and sodomy of the Central Park Jogger, Trisha Meili, Trump first called for the execution of the Central Park Five (Antron McCray, Raymond Santana, Kevin Richardson, Yusef Salaam, and Korey Wise), but then continued to insist on their guilt after they were cleared of the crime by DNA evidence and the detailed confession of the real attacker.  He embraced the “birtherism” conspiracy theory against Barack Obama from the time he had launched his 2008 candidacy for president.  His gleaming towers along the Atlantic City boardwalk loomed for decades over an inner city suffering from neglect and decay as his casinos flourished, apparently blissfully unaware and unconcerned about the public price being paid for their private success.  And his presidential campaign was replete with anti-Mexican, anti-immigrant, anti-disabled, anti-Muslim, anti-protester, anti-environment, racist and misogynistic screeds that only increased and were translated into official national policy when he was scandalously named president through an Electoral College victory that went against the actual popular vote.

Why are people so stunned and shocked about the loss of the soul of the US political system only now?

But this is not what is the most stupefying about all the hand-wringing that has been going on in analysts’ circles about the Trump Administration.  They speak as though this level of self-interested, incompetent opportunism is a new development.  This has been an ongoing trend for decades, centuries even. 

The 2000 Presidential election, with its politically-motivated “hanging chad” recount in the pivotal Florida polls courtesy of Catherine Harris, the Republican Secretary of State who had been an open supporter of George W. Bush, swung the election in Bush’s favor after a 5-4 Supreme Court decision that was made on partisan lines.  This, and Bush’s subsequent 2004 re-election (courtesy of fellow Bush supporter Ken Blackwell, the Republican Secretary of State in Ohio, through another contested process along partisan lines), were engineered, again in spite of losing the popular vote, with the assistance of the Electoral College and a systematic campaign of voter intimidation and vote-suppression in which Afrikan-American voters were disproportionately “scrubbed” from the voter rolls, robbing them of their Constitutionally-protected franchise.  During Bush’s presidency, Administration operatives used shadowy accomplices from private firms Blackwater (mercenaries) and the Corrections Corporation of America (jails and prisons) to extend a brutal war in Iraq that was largely considered illegal, expand mass incarceration in Iraq and the United States, raise the privatization of public resources to an art form and, as a result, rake in tons of illicit profits for their corporate cronies.  This was accomplished, again, through political strong-arm tactics and a relatively compliant Congress weakened by the growing-in-influence Tea Party.

Ronald Reagan launched the best-known War on Drugs when he was president in the 1980’s, aided by the importation of huge amounts of cocaine into South Central Los Angeles and other poor Black neighborhoods (all to help facilitate his “dirty wars” in El Salvador and Nicaragua).  His campaign to shrink government helped usher in a new wave of privatization that would enable the abuses of the George W. Bush Administration, and now Trump.

Bill Clinton, the once-dubbed “first Black president” because he picked up a saxophone on the Arsenio Hall Show, race-baited Sista Souljah and Jesse Jackson in his two presidential campaigns, and then set us all up for the increased privatization of public resources (such as water) as he helped lead the Democratic Leadership Council in a political Race to the Right.  And even though he has since apologized for the catastrophic impact of his policies on the people of Ayiti (“Haiti”), he never enacted any policies or embraced any initiatives to reverse the damage his administration had caused there. 

But, of course, all we remember about Clinton’s misdeeds boiled down to a blue dress.  No wonder people are so shocked by revelations that should have been intuitively obvious to the casual observer.

Even Jimmy Carter, the former president who has done the most for the cause of humanitarian work through his various charitable organizations, backed dictatorial presidents in Indonesia (Suharto) and Iran (Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi), perhaps his most visible and famous misdeeds (“mistakes”?) as Head of State.

In the late 1960’s, Richard Nixon perfected the “Southern Strategy” that exploited Southern White fears of a Black Planet and then, as president, launched the first systematic War on Drugs that started Black America on a manufactured plunge into the abyss of mass addiction and mass incarceration. 

George Wallace openly campaigned on racial hatred before an assassin’s bullet magically seemed to transform him into a civil rights supporter.  His status as a Democrat reflects the onetime position of the Democratic Party as the party of the Ku Klux Klan during Reconstruction.

Indeed, when one goes all the way back to the founding of the United States on the mass murder of the Indigenous First Nations, the building of the new country’s economic base on the backs of enslaved Afrikans, the repeated broken treaties with the survivors of the genocide brought on by the Westward Expansion, the backing of slave states in the Caribbean and the subsequent support and rule of dictatorial regimes in South America, Afrika and Asia, and the dropping of not one, but two nuclear bombs on the two most heavily populated cities of Japan during World War II, killing 220,000 civilians (when Japan was retreating on all fronts and trying to find a way to surrender without losing face or sacrificing their Emperor), one can hardly miss the unifying thread of exploitation, genocide and terror that has supported the prosperity and the might of the United States to this day.

Those among us who continue to tout the fantasy that this is the “greatest country in the history of the world” conveniently overlook these mortal sins that were committed on the rest of the world to allow this nation to form and to prosper.  If it is to truly live up to the hype of its own self-proclaimed greatness, it has massive debts to pay, debts that were amassed by the same putrid, rotting soul that creates leaders such as Trump today. 

If, and when, the United States truly atones for those historic wrongs committed against so many around the world, it may finally earn the title “greatest nation on earth”, and then, finally, the shock many analysts proclaim upon seeing a regime as corrupt as this one may be justified.

EDITOR’S NOTE: Among the projects being developed by the Sixth Region Diaspora Caucus (SRDC), an Pan-Afrikan Diaspora organization dedicated to organizing the voice of the grassroots Pan-Afrikan Diaspora at the local level and merging them to take that voice to the World Stage through the African Union, United Nations and independent Afrikan Diaspora organizations, are a number of initiatives working toward the development of concrete institutions and services on the Afrikan Continent.  One of these is the Liberian Library Book Donation Project, being led by the South Carolina SRDC Organization and its State Facilitator, Mr. Joseph “Kumasi” Palmer.

As of this writing, there are no Public Libraries in Liberia, according to Mr. Palmer.  This comes as a surprise to many of us, partly because of our assumptions in the United States that a Library is so routine that we often ignore them, as well as the documented progress that Liberia has made since the removal of Charles Taylor as President in 2003 and the election of Ellen Johnson Sirleaf as Afrika’s first woman head of state in 2006.  Mr. Palmer and several associates from South Carolina have met with Liberian officials to advance work on the development and supply of the first Public Library in Liberia.

Below is the public letter that has just been released by the South Carolina SRDC Organization concerning the project and the criteria for donating books.  Contact information for the South Carolina SRDC Organization is also included below.  If you have gently used books that you would like to donate, please feel free to contact them to arrange your donation.

July, 2018

Dear Friends and Associates,

The South Carolina branch of the Sixth Region Diaspora Caucus (SRDC) is embarking on a project to help establish a public library in Monrovia, Liberia, West Africa. We have endeavored to collect book donations, create a working inventory and database, and ship books to Liberia. The key to the success of this type of project is a good and dedicated ‘on the ground’ partner with a proven track record. We have that in SEHWAH, a local and international Liberian organization. The Director of SEHWAH, the Hon. Ms. Louise W. McMillan-Siaway, was the Assistant Minister for Culture (Ministry of Information, Cultural Affairs and Tourism) under the former Ellen Johnson Sirleaf administration. Ms. McMillan-Siaway is working closely with the current Liberian government to obtain a proper space and furnishings for the library.

“In America there is a public library in every community. How many public libraries are there in Africa? Every day there are new books coming out and new ideas being discussed. But these new books and ideas don’t reach Africa and we are being left behind.”
-George Weah, President of the Republic of Liberia, West Africa

This initiative though absolutely necessary, is not without its challenges. Still, SRDC considers it a major responsibility and is excited to be the pioneering element of this project. Public libraries are essential in the process of providing citizens access to knowledge. It is certain that a well-stocked public library will have a positive impact on Liberian literacy and development. For this reason, we are taking a grassroots approach and are reaching out to you to donate and/or purchase books to donate. Grassroots interest and involvement is a way to ensure that the library is solidly developed, sustainable, accessible and well-used.

SUBJECTS NEEDED
History (World History/African History/African American History/Caribbean History/History of Blacks in Europe, etc.); Political Science; English (Grammar/Writing); Music; Arts; Literature/Novels; Geography; Education; Math; Finance; Banking; International Trade; Health; Hygiene; Wellness; Science; Ecology; Medicine; Nursing; Farming; Gardening; Agriculture; Animal Husbandry; Law; Business; Computer Technology; Construction and Building Technology; Electrical; Plumbing; Engineering; Electronics; Photography; and Children/Young Adult books.

We will accept “For Dummies” book titles (e.g., Digital Photography for Dummies).
See link for list of titles: https://www.dummies.com/store/All-Titles.html

GUIDELINES
•We seek gently used books – books that are in good condition.
•Books or novels that have “explicit” sexual content (pornography) will NOT be accepted and/or shipped to Liberia.
•Books that evangelize/proselytize/promote a particular religion will NOT be accepted and/or shipped to Liberia, unless we can determine historical value.
•Books will be accepted through December 31, 2018.
•Please send a listing of all books, along with your name, organization, email address and contact phone number to the email address listed below.
•Pack books carefully and deliver or mail to our warehouse:

Mr. Joseph Palmer
901B Long Point Road
Mount Pleasant, SC 29464
Phone: 843.452.4880
Email: ProjectLiberiaLibrary@gmail.com

In the future, we will need to set up a Board in order to oversee the development and supervision of staff and interns for the library; to create a proper atmosphere and establish methods to measure and maintain the progress of the library. Contact us with any questions or concerns. We will keep all of our book donors posted on all developments pertaining to the library (so please send us the list of books you are donating as well as your name and contact information).

Monetary donations in any amount can be made via PayPal at www.yaaba.org. YAABA is our 501c(3) charitable partner organization. Any donated funds will be used to defray costs and materials needed to ship the books to Liberia.

Please remember, A library is not a luxury but one of the necessities of life, so kindly assist us by becoming a benefactor of this important initiative.

Sincerely,
Joseph Palmer
Facilitator
SRDC – South Carolina
www.srdcinternational.org

Exactly how is it that Voter Suppression is not considered a CRIME?

That is all.

“Democracy is two wolves and a lamb voting on what to have for lunch.  Liberty is a well-armed lamb contesting the vote.” – Benjamin Franklin, 1959

The Maryland primary election season is fully upon us, with early voting already underway in the state of Maryland.  Political races are often confusing to the public, part of the reason voting turnout is so low.  We hear and see so many contradictory messages from candidates for office, and those currently in elective office seem destined to become embroiled in one scandal or another (with a few notable exceptions), resulting in a level of cynicism that has inspired many citizens, young and old, to simply swear off the electoral process altogether.

We are thankful to research efforts like those of the organization Leaders of a Beautiful Struggle (LBS), who recently published their 2018 Maryland Legislative Report Card (see accompanying post on this Web site) to grade and assess the effectiveness of the current crop of Maryland State Delegates and Senators, concentrating on those legislators from districts with large Afrikan or Afrikan-Descendant populations.  Their efforts and those of other local activists, publishers, broadcasters and commentators like the National Black Unity News, the Black Think Tank, BMoreNews.com‘s Doni Glover, and David Johnson Sr. do much to help  inform the community and counter the confusion and resulting apathy that often allow feckless and mendacious public officials to maintain their illicit grip on power.  But even with these stalwarts sounding one alarm after another, the political landscape often remains unnecessarily clouded by disinformation and innuendo, usually from the candidates themselves.

Since this particular post is more or less off the top of my head, I won’t present much in the way of researched material here.  But there are two examples of political primary races in the state of Maryland that spring immediately to mind that seem to exemplify the circumstances that have had a chilling effect on the will of the people to accept, or even believe in, the leadership and integrity of elected officials and would-be candidates.  We’ve also made a brief comment below on the Maryland Senate primary in the 41st District.

Update: Who is the “People’s Champion”?

If you talk to most of the Baltimore area’s community activists, there is one candidate in this Democratic primary who has been a truly consistent presence at grassroots meetings and a regular supporter of what many would call the “people’s agenda”.  That candidate is Jill Carter (pictured, below), daughter of legendary Maryland civil rights leader Walter P. Carter and the current front-runner for the Maryland Senate in the 41st District.  She is looked to by some to bring a measure of sanity and commitment to grassroots community issues, particularly those that impact the Afrikan and Afrikan-Descendant community, to the Maryland Legislature.  (Examples include stands against mass incarceration of youth, advocacy for police oversight, and her opposition to the Maryland Comprehensive Crime Bill.)  Her candidacy is being contested by 27-year-old J.D. Merrill, a former local teacher and school administrator and son-in-law of former Baltimore mayor and Maryland governor Martin O’Malley.  A June 7 article in the Baltimore Sun and a June 21 article in the Baltimore Brew discuss some of the issues that have made this a contentious campaign.

Jill Carter has the backing of current Baltimore Mayor Catherine Pugh, current City Council president Bernard C. “Jack” Young, several members of the Baltimore area clergy such as Dr. Heber Brown III and most of the prominent grassroots activists in the Baltimore area, earning an “A” grade in the recently-released 2018 Legislative Report Card issued by Leaders of a Beautiful Struggle.  However, as Merrill professes that he will build coalitions among Baltimore area constituents (something Carter’s supporters insist she has already done), he has gained the support of a number of relatively powerful local foundations, former Baltimore mayor Sheila Dixon, Baltimore City Council member Brandon Scott and one nationally known local activist in former Black Lives Matter organizer DeRay McKesson.

McKesson’s decision to endorse Merrill has led to some critical reaction from some local activists who questioned his decision to back Merrill as well as his commitment to local issues.  Apparently, McKesson had worked with Merrill in the Education Department and was impressed with his energy and grasp of the issues.  But Merrill is seeking the nomination against perhaps the candidate with the strongest record of community commitment in Carter.  His relationship to former mayor and governor O’Malley, who, despite his Democratic Party credentials and image as a liberal, had initiated the “broken windows” policing model that led to thousands of “stop-and-frisk”-style encounters and arrests of Black youth by police, have revived concerns by some that he might mirror O’Malley’s political platform.

As this campaign has veered into increasingly negative territory with Merrill impugning Carter’s voting record and Carter’s supporters accusing Merrill of trying to stir up fights to mask his own inexperience, the tension between the Carter and Merrill campaigns has heated up, as well as some conflict between community activists who have taken sides.  What impact will this have on the race?  We shall soon find out.

A Very Litigious State’s Attorney Race

The first is to be found in the race for the Democratic nomination for State’s Attorney for Baltimore City.  The two front-runners are the incumbent, Marilyn Mosby (pictured, left), and her main primary challenger, attorney Ivan Bates.  I know of respected people in the community, and among activists, who back both candidates. 

Mosby is held in high regard by some in the community because they see someone they can trust, perhaps in part stemming from her highly touted effort to indict and convict the six Baltimore police officers involved in the death of Freddie Gray in April 2015.  Her detractors, however, have claimed that she had indicted the officers knowing the charges would not stick and result in all six going free, and others impugned her for appearing to target the three Black officers for greater responsibility for Gray’s death while the two White officers who chased him down on bicycles (immediately after which Gray appeared to have been seriously injured before even being placed in the police van) evaded the most serious charges.  Those detractors have implied that, in spite of the public repudiation of her efforts by the Fraternal Order of Police (FOP), the police union’s alleged financial contributions to her campaign had supposedly influenced her actions all along.

Meanwhile, supporters of Bates (pictured, right) note his decision to leave a prosperous legal career to become State’s Attorney as evidence of his selfless commitment to serve the people.  His campaign commercials tout the fact that he had “never lost a case” when he was a prosecutor, as opposed to Mosby’s lack of experience as a District Attorney.  However, some backers of Mosby and the third candidate in this primary, former Baltimore City and federal prosecutor and Supreme Court clerk Thiru Vignarajah (also the brother of Maryland gubernatorial candidate Krish Vignarajah), have claimed that cases in which Bates was a prosecutor that were dropped should count as losses.  Supporters of Bates have countered that when the defendant was determined to be innocent, and the District Attorney chose to drop charges as a result, these cases were a victory for the justice system.  (We agree with this last sentiment, but district attorneys have long been criticized by activists because they were often graded on their conviction rates, not on their success at finding the truth even if it meant the acquittal of a suspect.)

So, who is speaking the truth here?  Is Mosby a champion of the people for her pursuit of the officers in the Freddie Gray case, or do her detractors, some of whom say she had failed them in their own quests for justice, have a strong point against her?  Does Bates represent a positive change for the pursuit of criminals and the subsequent reduction of a murder rate that has been steadily increasing, or do those who have voiced their own reasons for distrusting him present a strong argument?  And what impact will be felt if Thiru Vignarajah, who is reportedly trailing both of them by a wide margin in the polls and who some have accused of working against Bates, chooses to throw support behind one candidate or the other?

Mud Slinging in Baltimore County

The other race that seems not to have provided any clarity from public campaign efforts is that for Baltimore County Executive.  Specifically, the apparent pissing match between candidates Vicki Almond and Jim Brochin.

Almond (pictured, below) appeared to strike first with ads claiming Brochin was, essentially, “trying to fool the voters” into seeing him as a progressive Democrat, despite the fact that he supposedly had voted against gun-control legislation up to ten times and had received an “A” rating from the National Rifle Association (NRA), along with significant campaign contributions from them.  Brochin’s campaign struck back with ads that first touted his support for gun control measures that led to his “proud” receipt of an “F” from that very same NRA, and then alleged that Almond’s campaign was attempting to distort his record (“trying to fool the voters”) because of the massive contributions her campaign supposedly is receiving from developers and other big businesses.

A commentary  by Vincent DeMarco in the Baltimore Sun (“Brochin has been a friend to the NRA”, April 6, 2018, available at the Sun’s Web site, http://www.baltimoresun.com/news/opinion/readersrespond/bs-ed-rr-brochin-guns-letter-20180406-story.html) seems to back Almond’s claim that Brochin is not the progressive that his campaign paints him to be, stating that his early votes on gun-control measures, votes that severely weakened many of the provisions, allowed him to finally vote in favor of the legislation as “window dressing” without alarming NRA supporters.  Firmin DeBrabander, however, in an April 5 commentary in the same Baltimore Sun (“Could the Baltimore County executive race come down to NRA support?”, at http://www.baltimoresun.com/news/opinion/oped/bs-ed-op-0406-brochin-olszewski-20180404-story.html) states that Brochin (pictured, right) had once been a backer of the NRA but that changed after the Sandy Hook shooting in 2012.  The same commentary claims that Johnny Olszewski Jr.’s support for the NRA continued even as Brochin was rejecting the NRA’s “increasingly reckless” positions against gun control.

Brochin’s attacks on Almond were bolstered for some by her support of the development of the Foundry Row shopping center in Owings Mills, as a number of community groups had opposed the rezoning of that area for what is now a shopping center anchored by a Wegman’s grocery store and features several other medium-sized chain stores and eateries.  Almond points to the success (so far) of Foundry Row and her re-election to the County Council as an indication that, in the end, the voters supported that project.  She also brushed off Brochin’s attacks (“Democrat Vicki Almond seeks to complete rise in politics by becoming Baltimore County executive”, http://www.baltimoresun.com/news/maryland/baltimore-county/bs-md-co-almond-profile-20180604-story.html).   

So, again, who is speaking the truth here?  Which one is the true “progressive”, if either of them is?  And will either of them do anything on behalf of the Afrikan and Afrikan-Descendant communities in Baltimore County?

These two campaigns, in particular, present a contrast to the Maryland gubernatorial race, which seems to have concentrated on the leading candidates — former NAACP Executive Director Ben Jealous (pictured, left) and Prince Georges County executive Rushern Baker (pictured, below) — and those seeking to catch them in later polling (former Michelle Obama aide Krish Vignarajah, author and former Obama administration official Alec Ross, state senator Rich Madaleno, and the Baltimore-based Jim Shea-Brandon Scott team) emphasizing their campaigns’ commitments to reverse the more objectionable aspects of current governor Larry Hogan’s direction for Maryland by backing gun control, legalization of marijuana, aid for the schools and improvements in the training and behavior of police rather than attacking each other.  But the odds are, even if the candidates for governor do not resort to negative campaigns against each other in the primaries, that tone could well change in the general election when the victor goes up against a Republican incumbent governor who has received an unusual amount of support from Democratic voters and Afrikan-American citizens and community activists.

The tone that had been set in the 2016 presidential campaign, replete with the name-calling, race-baiting, fear-mongering and hyperbole, apparently still has not worn off, with more and more candidates slinging mud at opponents in the apparent hope that the voters will stumble to the polling booth and cast a vote for them based on little more than confusion and the emotion-based decisions that spring from it.  While the race between Carter and Merrill seems to be swinging mainly on experience vs. youth and Carter’s respect among activists vs. Merrill’s connection to powerful local interests, both Bates and Mosby have followers and detractors among community organizers, those who see each of them as a hero or shero and those who have voiced distrust of their motives or outrage at their results in pursuit of justice.  Each of them can boast supporters from the ranks of community activists and community-based commentators and media personalities who have earned respect among the grassroots and from this Web site.  This only makes the task of assessing them more difficult without a healthy sum of hard and fast data that can be applied to both candidates.  Even in cases where one can research a candidate’s record, as with Brochin’s onetime status as an NRA favorite, one still emerges with some trepidation as to whether or not his post-Sandy Hook break with the gun lobby is a permanent one, or simply an expedient political calculation. 

It seems that, whenever the mud starts being slung, the primary casualty is clarity for the electorate.  Far too often in such cases, it is the principle of representative democracy that is the loser.  With each of the candidates accusing the other of trying to deceive the voters to “pump up” their effectiveness as fighters for the people, which in the end is just to win at any cost and to satisfy the big business and special interests that are allegedly bankrolling them, which, if either of them, can be trusted to tell us the truth once they are elected to a position of political power?

Saturday, April 21 was the memorial service for New Ancestor Reggie “Ruffmic” Logan, also known as Bro. Anpu Ptah Amen.  The event was held at the Towanda Center, the primary meeting space of the Pan-Afrikan Liberation Movement (PLM), one of the most important Pan-Afrikan organizations in the city, an organization with whom he had worked closely over the years, and the primary sponsors of the event.

Bro. Ruffmic and Bro. Heru Ptah “Freedomwriter” MeriTef had formed the Conscious Hip-hop group Precise Science and exploded onto the scene with their CD release “Everybody’s Not Gonna Make It” in 2007.  The fusion of Hip hop styled raps with spoken-word poetry, mad beats with classic riffs and samples, and street cred with Pan-Afrikan wisdom created a unique blend of the History of Black Struggle and the bright future that lay before us if we would simply heed their words.

Bro. Ruffmic’s journey was tragically cut short on March 8th  at the young age of 47 years by a fierce battle with cancer, but his spirit remains alive with the strong organizers of PLM and all those who remember and loved him.  A number of local Pan-Afrikan activists young and old, attended the Memorial Service to pay respects to Bro. Ruffmic and lend support to his family.  Our words pale in comparison to those of Bro. Ruffmic himself, so here we share several photos from the event, including the shrine to Bro. Ruffmic that was built for the memorial service.

The Memorial Service Program.

Baba Imhotep Asis Fatiu speaks about Bro. Ruffmic.

From one of Precise Science’s videos.

Nana Akua Akomfo Ngingha Nyamekye pays tribute to Bro. Ruffmic.

Two lyrics from the Precise Science song “Fear”, perhaps one of their better-known tracks.

The Shrine to Bro. Ruffmic.

Lyrics from Precise Science’s “Mixtape” and “Love and Sacrifice”.

The Family shares a moment.

This is a continuation of the report on the Saturday, April 14 Pan-African Town Hall Meeting of 2018, which was held at the historic Arch Social Club, located in the Penn-North neighborhood of West Baltimore. The Town Hall Meetings have been held since 2007 by the Sixth Region Diaspora Caucus to bring the grassroots Afrikan-Descendant community in Maryland together, hear their concerns, share SRDC’s plan for establishing the Diaspora’s voice in the international arena, and establish a representative delegation from the state of Maryland that would include State Representatives, Observers and a Council of Elders. In the year 2017, SRDC held five Pan-Afrikan Town Hall Meetings between June 24 and December 2, when a Maryland Council of Elders (MCOE) was nominated and confirmed. In 2018, there have been two Town Hall Meetings held, the April 14 session being the most recent as of this writing.

The April 14 meeting invited several speakers to make presentations. The part of the meeting that seemed to draw the most attention and concern was the discussion of the Maryland Legislature’s attempt to pass a relatively draconian Comprehensive Crime Bill and the community’s response. Bro. Thomas Ruffin’s discussion immediately followed that of Bro. Dayvon Love of Leaders of a Beautiful Struggle, and while Bro. Dayvon’s talk concentrated on the effort to defeat Senate Bill 122, the Maryland Comprehensive Crime Bill, and their continued challenges to Senate Bill 101, the “watered-down” version that took its place and was passed in the Maryland Legislature, Bro. Thomas was more critical of the community’s relatively disorganized response to that and other efforts by the Maryland Legislature that run counter to the interests of the Pan-Afrikan Community.

Bro. Thomas Ruffin

“I’m one of the members of the board of directors of the International Association of Black Lawyers, and I’m the legal counsel for a small group that’s called the Maryland Coalition for Justice and Progressive Change. One of your friends and colleagues, Rev. Annie Chambers, is the Chairperson for the Maryland Coalition for Justice and Progressive Change, over in East Baltimore. And I certainly appreciate the gathering of the Pan Afrikan Town Hall Meeting … and also the work of the Leaders of a Beautiful Struggle, and what Dayvon had to say.

“And one thing I want to disagree with Dayvon is, while he was putting a wonderful analysis over the struggle against the Maryland Comprehensive Crime Bill and the effort that changed it from Senate Bill 122 to a watered down version, what I believe to be Senate Bill 101, I want to say that we failed. I truly want to say that we failed. And I don’t want to talk about it as though we can live with the failure.

The “Browning of America” May Not Be As Rosy As We Think

“What I want us to think about is this: In about 28 to 37 years, the majority of the people in this country will be non-White people. In other words, White people, of European descent, will then be a minority compared to all the other races gathered together in this society. However, the genocide that’s being worked on us right now is such that, when we acquire the majority in terms of numbers in the population, we still won’t be in control of this society. White capitalist supremacy will be running it, and they mean to keep running it.

“Let me add on to that. If we think smartly about how we’re going to address that, and over the next 28 to 37 years we figure out how we’re going to oust White capitalist supremacy from being in power in this society, quite frankly, the way we’ve been so horribly oppressed and miseducated, we wouldn’t know how to run this society or its governance. I’m just being frank.

“Now, let me add on to that. If, in the next 28 to 37 years, we figured out all of that, that is, how to get rid of these devils, how to run the society, the economy, the health care system, how to provide for our well-being, how to provide for our uplift, these White capitalist supremacists wouldn’t stay here and be under our rulership. They will leave and go elsewhere.

“And so, then we have this other problem. Right now, the federal government — I’m not talking about the state government and municipal government, but the federal government in this society — has a debt of $21 trillion. In about 28 to 37 years, that debt could be double. It could be more than that. So, I’m actually estimating that it would be probably about $40 trillion, making a conservative estimate. So let’s say we oust them. We take control. We know how to manage the society, that is, how to govern. We know how to do it where they have failed us, or actually deliberately succeeded in oppressing us. We can turn that around. We would still be in trouble with this enormous debt that that they or some other society in the world would demand be repaid because they would be the holders of the debt. They would be the creditors.

“In other words, we would still be under their yoke, and — we were talking about South Africa. The society in South Africa, when they overthrew apartheid White supremacy, two things changed in that process. Just before that took place, the White people dismantled their nuclear weapons. In other words, they anticipated our taking control. So they did not want us to have nuclear weapons. And there’s a lot of different ways that can be interpreted but I’m just going to keep it to that one, because all this stuff they said that they thought that a new society ought to be cleansed of the evil of nuclear weapons didn’t apply to them when they were running the society, so I’m just saying they made sure we wouldn’t have nuclear weapons.

“Number two, the debt that they amassed in oppressing us stayed in place when we took over. That’s going to be our circumstance unless we figure out how to deal with it.

“Now, how can we deal with that, how can we figure it out, when they deliberately underfund our four historically Black universities in this state, and we argue about ‘well, why in the world are we freeing Black men who are thugs in prison?’, while they keep us divided so those men, who ain’t Black politically speaking, they get locked up, and then we get divided in our society between different groups that are struggling with each other, in competition for wealth and power, while they [White capitalist supremacists] maintain [the] wealth and power?

Twisting Fighting Crime into a Policy of Genocide

“So what I’m trying to say is … what we’re dealing with here, we’ve rhetorically described many times as genocide. But the truth is, that’s exactly what it is. In this state, there are about six million people. Twenty-nine percent of those people in this state are Black people of Afrikan descent. But we make up 71% of people in Maryland state prisons. See, that doesn’t make any sense. And when they talk about being tough in crime and tough on gun violence, let me add on to this.

“First of all, the greatest threat by way of killing in this society, when you take out warfare and you take out abortion … is suicide. It’s not ‘Black-on-Black crime’. It’s not even murder. As a matter of fact, when you break down suicide, the greatest threat in this society by way of killing is White male suicide. More White men each year killed themselves than all the homicides in the society put together. Yet, they come together smartly in oppressing us to aim us at fighting crime, which means fighting us, but they don’t address this White male suicide problem.” [Editor’s note: We looked up the official death statistics in the United States, and sure enough, the number of suicides is three times the number of murders in the United States every year.]

“As a matter of fact, just think about it. … If Dayvon was the Speaker of the House, and I was the President of the Senate, and the Governor started talking to us, I’d say ‘You know what we’re going to do? What we’re going to do is, we’re going to have a prophylactic, so whenever a man loses his wife to divorce, or loses his children in a child custody battle, or whenever he is about to lose all of his wealth through a financial collapse or the loss of his business, that man … is going to be put in a mental health facility for two months for observation. That’s going to be a prophylactic against suicide. Because we have a horrible problem in this state with male suicide. And by and large, most of the people who will be locked up … will be White men.  See, we don’t talk like that, but they do. They literally do.

“In that Senate Bill 122, [we say], ‘should we really fight against something like that? That’s fighting crime, and crime is right here on the street.’ Everybody’s seen it; people nodding on that heroin. If we came in here and parked our cars, we’re hoping our cars are still intact. We can go all through that. And, like I said, they are not, politically speaking, Black. But Governor Hogan ain’t Black. … Tom Miller ain’t Black. … These people never will prescribe an answer for our problems. This lady [in the audience] rhetorically said, we have to answer our problems ourselves. I’m saying for real, we literally have to answer our problems ourselves or these problems will beset us until the end of time. And that’s what’s prescribed for us, for us to suffer like this until the end of time.

“We Forgive Everybody”

“So let me go on, because I just want to be clear. When Dayvon said that the Leaders of a Beautiful Struggle were observing what the Maryland General Assembly might do before the General Session started, and then they saw all these Crime Bills and saw them flip up, where were the two members we know to be Black in the Senate Judicial Proceedings Committee? One was running for County Executive in Prince Georges County, and the other I believe is running for State Attorney General. Victor Ramirez — well, I call him Black — he’s running for State Attorney General. Anthony Muse is running for County Executive. And when they are running for a high ranking position in the police state, they’re not serving us. But even if they are … they should have been mobilizing, at the least, the Black and Hispanic Caucus against this. See, that’s where we fail. The Leaders of a Beautiful Struggle are in there fighting against this. They should have had more and we should have been there. … They should have brought us in, and we should have been chasing them down to be there. We ignore Annapolis every single year, and it’s only three months. We ignore it like it’s way away. I’ve seen people in Baltimore march at Town Hall over a problem that’s only resolved in Annapolis. And it doesn’t make sense. I’ve seen us get flipped by these fakes who are in the Black Caucus, whether it’s local or statewide — same thing happens nationally — and we keep getting flipped. And we act like that’s not the problem. No. It’s a serious problem. So, let me just take us to what I’ve passed out.”

Bro. Thomas now referred to a listing of the votes in the House of Delegates and the Maryland Senate on Senate Bill 101, which was the parts of the original Comprehensive Crime Bill (Senate Bill 122) that were repackaged and finally passed in the Maryland Legislature.

“If you look at it, the first page is the vote on Senate Bill 101. If I’m not mistaken, Senate Bill 122, the Comprehensive Crime Bill, ultimately became Senate Bill 101. That was a watered down version of what Dayvon was talking about earlier. And what Dayvon talked about earlier, he didn’t even touch on it. This thing is so dastardly, this is what they wanted to do. … They wanted to outlaw drug treatment for those who are locked up for a violent crime. Now, I want to get this straight. I beat you because I’m a heroin addict. I’m a fool on heroin. I’ve skipped ever being Black. I beat you. You survive. … I’ve got five years. For that whole five years, I’m in prison, and I don’t get drug treatment. I don’t even get diagnosed to see if I have a drug problem. And I’m walking in, asking for heroin. I’m looking for fentanyl. I’m begging for Vicodin. And you’re beat in bed. And they don’t address, what you say, the root cause of the problem. No, no, no, they ain’t doing that! … That piece of shit [bill] was just what it was, a piece of shit, and we got divided over their piece of shit, rather than planning for what we ought to put through the Legislature. And if the poor folk [in the House and the Senate] won’t put it through, we get them another job [by voting them out]. See, we don’t operate on that. We forgive everybody. Anthony Muse, Victor Ramirez, Catherine Pugh. We forgive everybody, and they mean evil to us.

“I’m going to be real clear. The Lieutenant Governor, we grew up together. We went to John Carroll High School together. He’s a wonderful Brother. Boyd Rutherford is a wonderful Brother. Now, I’ve said that. He and my brother were close friends, and by that and by our relationship, we became close friends. But — I’m not talking about him being a Republican, I’m not talking about him being Lieutenant Governor — I’m saying when he does not oppose the genocide directed against us, he’s no longer politically Black. Why do we forgive everybody? And they mean evil and genocide to us. That doesn’t make sense.

“How can we lift ourselves up when Coppin State is an inferior third-class university? Not because the talent’s not there, because it’s not funded. They put all the money — that’s supposed to go to Coppin State, Morgan State, Maryland Eastern Shore and Bowie State University — in College Park. And to University of Maryland Baltimore County. I mean, that school actually had a competitive basketball team. Towson University. University of Baltimore. How in the world have they got all the money, it’s always with White people, and we’re still loving White people so much we’re trying to give our money to them? And that’s what we do. We give our money to them.

Bro. Thomas distributed a listing of the recent votes in the Senate and the House of Delegates on Senate Bill 101, the watered-down version of the original Maryland Comprehensive Crime Bill, SB 122. “These are the people who voted against us, the ones who voted ‘Yea’ for the Crime Bill. This is the House of Delegates. Now, [Dayvon] was right. The Black Caucus in the House of Delegates basically turned [against the Crime Bill]. Why? Because they were on the job. Why? Because the Maryland Coalition for Justice and Progressive Change was on the job. Why? Because the Prince Georges County NAACP was on the job. If the whole Black Nation was on the job the [watered-down Crime Bill] wouldn’t have passed. … It wouldn’t have passed if we were about our work, but we’re not about our work. And that’s a horrible problem. So, let me lay out, basically, how I suggest we get about our work. I’m going to use Baltimore as the framework.”

Beginning to Take Control of the Local Politics in Our Community

“There are six legislative districts in Baltimore. Each legislative district should have a team, under the leadership of whatever it is. It could be this, our ‘Pan-Afrikan Medallion’ [pointing at the Spokes of the Wheel diagram], our Council of Elders, but it’s got to be competent. Each district should have at least 20 to 30 people, but it should have a few hundred. And what they do is watch Annapolis.

“House of Delegates, District 41. Angela Gibson, Samuel Rosenberg and Bilal Ali. There should be a team of people who do nothing but watch them and the Senator from that district. And before January starts, we should be imparting to them, in writing, what our legislative agenda is. And make it clear that they do not depart from that agenda. We can’t do that without unity. So when we talk about unity, there’s a meaning for unity and when we don’t have the meaning behind that unity, sometimes we fail. Sometimes we have the meaning, and then you run up to [someone like me who says], ‘I’m trying to make money as a lawyer. I don’t have time for that.’ … Okay, when we run up against that kind of handkerchief-head we’ve got a problem. And if I don’t understand that the wellbeing of the Black Nation provides for my prosperity — similarly, if the Black Nation doesn’t realize that if I’m working hard, like Dayvon and the Leaders of a Beautiful Struggle are working, and the Black Nation doesn’t patronize me — when we’ve got that kind of backwardness, we’re failing ourselves.

“So, let’s look at District 41. Samuel Rosenberg; he doesn’t serve us, and I’m not saying that because he’s White. … We need to target Rosenberg to get another job. Similarly, Nathaniel Oaks in the Senate. He did resign [after being indicted on nine counts of federal fraud and bribery], good enough. … We need to think on what Black man, or what Black woman [we can promote for public office] who is well-educated, dedicated to our wellbeing to the utmost, who can serve excellently in the Senate and follow our agenda. Jill Carter is a candidate. … Jill is extraordinary, but is she the one? There are thousands of people out here, and we’re going to start with her and just stop with her? No. Say if I … want to run, [but] you all never scrutinized me or came to me and said ‘Thomas, we want you to run’, you all hadn’t come to that and I just sought that for my [interests], you don’t know whether I’m doing that for my career uplift or whether I’m doing it for the wellbeing of the Black Nation. … So, Rosenberg needs another job, and we need to scrutinize Bilal Ali and Angela Gibson. … [District] 44A, we look at the same thing. Did Keith Haynes [or Curt Anderson] do enough for us? So, if he is a handkerchief-head, we get him another job. And that takes planning.

“There are six districts. Each district should have at least 30 working in unity. Not one group from one organization. All the organizations come in. That means you may even get the conservative-minded Black folks. But they’ve got to be dedicated absolutely for our uplift. They have to be radically for our uplift. They can be conservative, but radically for our uplift. … Also, we’ve got to have people who are going to study. I mean, study the legislature and the legislative process. …”

Campaign Contributions: Legalized Bribery

“[Baltimore City and Prince George’s County] are the two counties where we have a substantial majority. I mean, a kick-butt majority. But we don’t run either Baltimore City or Prince George’s County, not now, not ever, and we don’t run the agenda for the people who represent Baltimore City or Prince George’s County, not now and not ever. We have to change that. And that takes a long-term plan.

“[Senator Robert Zirkin, sponsor of the Maryland Comprehensive Crime Bill] received donations from 2,446 people, from about $50 to about $6,000. We don’t do that. Let me get this clear. If we don’t engage in ‘legalized bribery’ of these people, we lose. Bobby Zirkin was not flipping because that White Jewish community and the rest of White capitalist supremacy in that county were well behind just what Dayvon was saying — a program to exploit us for their satisfaction and wellbeing. We offer no defense, and we will never offer a defense, if we’re not engaged. … Don’t do it illegally. Understand that a campaign contribution is a bribe. You never use that word when you’re talking to a public official; then it becomes illegal. You never say, ‘I’m giving you this so you’ve got to do this.’ You never do that. What you do is you go to their meetings. We have to go to all these Delegates and Senators and tell them what our agenda is. We take one person from each of our districts and say ‘This is what we’re doing.’ … And we don ‘t go with 18 people. We go with two or three. And we rotate around. And we do the work. If you do the work, it begins to show.”

Unified Power

“And when the handkerchief-head doctors, lawyers, preachers, congregations and other business folk follow along, and when the community, that part that is not so dysfunctional that it cannot operate for its wellbeing, follows along, we begin to amass unified power that can rock and roll in Annapolis, when it’s only three months and one week. We do not work that three months and one week. White capitalist supremacy does. Because we don’t do that, we lose.”

Bro. Thomas reiterated his admonition that “you don’t trust people who have betrayed you before” in charging that most of our Black elected officials have, in effect, been White elected officials due to their failure to implement a Black Community-based agenda. “We have to do that in Baltimore here with the Mayor and the City Council. … When the Mayor is talking about giving beaucoup crazy money to Amazon, and nothing to us, we need to tell [her] we’ve got a problem. … We’ve got the same problem in DC. … These people have sold us out so mightily that we are sinking in our own failure. That stops when we unify smartly. Not just unify. … That stops when we’re not just smart but we unify, and that stops when the unity and being smart is on a smart program and agenda.”

On Saturday, April 14, the second Pan-African Town Hall Meeting of 2018 was held at the historic Arch Social Club, located in the Penn-North neighborhood of West Baltimore. The Town Hall Meetings were originally started in Maryland in 2007 by the Sixth Region Diaspora Caucus (SRDC) to bring the grassroots Afrikan-Descendant community in Maryland together, hear their concerns, share SRDC’s plan for establishing the Diaspora’s voice in the international arena, and establish a representative delegation from the state of Maryland that would include Representatives (from whom might come Diaspora Representatives to conferences of world bodies such as the African Union), Observers (who would take the place of Representatives in the event they are unable to continue) and a Council of Elders. Other states where this plan has been put into motion follow a similar procedure, holding their own Pan-African Town Hall Meetings as they are able.

From 2007 to 2016, the Maryland SRDC held Town Hall Meetings at a rate of approximately one or two per year. In the year 2017, SRDC picked up the pace in Maryland, holding five between June and December. At the December Town Hall, a Maryland Council of Elders (MCOE) was nominated and confirmed. In 2018, there have been two Town Hall Meetings held, the April 14 session being the second. They are now co-sponsored by SRDC and the MCOE, with the MCOE’s chair, Baba Rafiki Morris, presiding over the sessions.

The April 14 meeting invited several speakers to make presentations. Bro. Dayvon Love of Leaders of a Beautiful Struggle (LBS) spoke about the recent legislative effort around the 2018 Maryland Comprehensive Crime Bill which was largely defeated by opposition from activist organizations and the Legislative Black Caucus (though the Democratic Party leadership was able to “sneak” some key provisions into an unrelated expungement bill). Bro. Thomas Ruffin of the International Coalition of Black Lawyers also spoke about the Crime Bill, but also about the need to increase the pressure on local legislators and politicians to force them to enact policies that benefit the community instead of injuring it. Rev. Dr. Mankekolo Mahlangu spoke about her experience as an activist and freedom fighter in /south Africa in opposition to the apartheid regime and gave a tribute to recent Ancestor Winnie Mandela. And Baba Mukasa Dada (Willie Ricks) spoke about the history of revolutionary resistance.

This was perhaps the most successful Town Hall Meeting in the 11 years in which SRDC has worked to organize in Maryland, with members of a variety of neighborhood, civic and revolutionary organizations in attendance. This article will provide details on the presentation about the 2018 Maryland Comprehensive Crime Bill by Bro. Dayvon Love of Leaders of a Beautiful Struggle (LBS). Future articles will discuss some of the other presentations made that day.

Dayvon Love, Director of Public Policy, Leaders of a Beautiful Struggle (LBS)

“We are a grassroots think tank that explicitly advocates for the interests of Black people in the political arena.

“I’ll just talk a little bit about our fight against the Crime Bill … and I’ll talk a little bit about the work with the Baltimore City Youth Fund.

“In terms of the Crime Bill, this past summer, there was an effort in Annapolis, and a lot of our legislative work takes place in Annapolis. There was an effort in Annapolis in response to the high homicide rate in 2017 to develop this comprehensive package on crime. And one of the things we know throughout history, particularly in the 80’s and 90’s, is that the typical response to crime was to increase the length of time that folks are incarcerated, throw more people in jail. And we have essentially a couple of decades of data that shows that just throwing people in jail not only doesn’t solve the problem, but actually makes things worse.

“And we anticipated that there were going to be a bunch of ‘tough on crime’ measures that would come down through the political establishment and leadership, and so we knew that one of our legislative priorities this session was to fight back against any type of ‘tough on crime’ policies, particularly those kind of policies that focused on mass incarceration.”

The Original Comprehensive Crime Bill: SB 122

“So, what ended up happening, the session began, the Governor [Larry Hogan] introduced three pieces of legislation. One piece of legislation increased mandatory minimums from five years for a crime of violence with a gun … to a mandatory ten, and wanted to increase the maximums from 20 to 40. He also introduced a piece of legislation that made it so that juveniles were automatically charged as adults for a series of crimes. And he also introduced a piece of legislation that had what were called ‘gang statutes’. So, attempting to throw more time on folks who they thought were affiliated with a gang.”

The Promotion of the Crime Bill through the Maryland Senate

“So what ended up happening, we have a Republican Governor, but our Legislature, State Senate and House of Delegates, are controlled by the Democrats. So you have [Thomas V.] ‘Mike’ Miller who is in charge of the State Senate and you have Speaker Michael Busch who is in charge of the House of Delegates.

“What happened on the Senate side was that Bobby Zirkin, who was the chair of the Judicial Proceedings Committee — he is a Democrat who represents the area of Baltimore County that is Pikesville-Owings Mills. What he did was he took pieces of the Governor’s packet and mixed a bunch of other measures in. Measures that he thought might make folks like us and other organizations satisfied. So he included funding for programs like Safe Streets. But he combined that with some of the measures around increasing mandatory minimums. And so Zirkin created this bill that was Senate Bill 122. So the Governor supported it after they pieced it together. It was pieced together in a back room.

“So, every bill has to have a hearing when it comes from the Legislature. What [Senator Zirkin] did was that, after the Governor’s bills were heard, he took an unrelated bill — so Senate Bill 122, when it came into the Legislature, was a completely different bill. What he did was, he amended the bill to change the name and change what it did, so that by the time it got to the Senate floor, it was this Comprehensive Crime Bill. So we didn’t get a chance to actually speak out against the bill. We spoke out against the Governor’s bills, but he manipulated the procedure in such a way that we didn’t get an opportunity to testify against this particular bill. It flew off the Senate floor quickly, and so then it was in the House.”

Criticisms of SB 122

“So, there are a couple of problems I want to outline in terms of how we should address crime. Because, the thing that we kept getting was, if this isn’t the way then what is the way? And so, there are a couple of things that we put forward. One of the things was, we said, if you talk to a police officer, most police officers know who the people are that are driving by [and shooting]. The issue is that the police department is inept and corrupt in terms of their ability to actually get good charges on the people that folks know are committing violence in our communities. And as many of you are aware of the Gun Trace Task Force, they founded that unit within the police department that was robbing people, planting guns on people, selling drugs. And so, a part of what we said was, if you really want to address violence, you have to address the police and the ways in which, in many ways, they increase crime, contribute to it, and have a police force that can actually make people feel confident that witnesses will be protected. So those are the two things that we said, that plus investments in things like Safe Streets, community-based anti-violence programs.

“So our argument was, if you’re serious about addressing crime, those are the things that we should do. The other problem is [with] increasing mandatory minimums from five years to ten. What we argued was that increasing those sentences, you’re not going to get the people [who are] doing violence. You’re going to get the people on the periphery. The people that just happen to get caught up. And those are the folks that are better served outside of prison, outside of incarceration.

“So that was the big push in our criticism as to why this crime package was problematic. And again, what Zirkin preserved in his version was the increase in mandatory minimums from five years to ten, and increasing maximums from 20 to 40.”

SB 122 Meets Opposition in the House of Delegates

“So it got over to the House. It went through an arduous committee process. The Black Caucus — for those who don’t know, Maryland is a third Black — we have out of the almost 200 representatives, we have about 55 representatives. So there is a pretty substantial Black Caucus. To the Black Caucus’ credit, they took an official stance against the Crime Bill. And when they took an official stance against the Crime Bill, the Latino Caucus followed suit and took a stance against the Crime Bill. And so that functionally killed the Crime Bill in the House. So it was a big victory. It was one of the few times the Black Caucus used its power in order to do something in the interest of Black folks. We look forward to working with the Black Caucus in the future to cultivate that power.”

Democrats Sneak Pieces of SB 122 through the House

“What the leadership did was that this was the Thursday of the week before Session. The Democratic Party leadership had a closed-door meeting with the Black Caucus, trying to force them to change their vote. Fortunately the Caucus stood strong, and decided not to change their vote. So what the leadership did was that they took a piece of the mandatory minimums provisions in the bill that we killed, put it in an unrelated expungement bill, so the piece about increasing mandatory minimums from five years to ten years, they amended it onto an unrelated bill on the floor of the House and rushed it through, all in the same day. So there were legislators who had not even read the updated bill because they just pushed it so quickly.”

Pushing Back Against the House Maneuver

“And so, we’re going to approach some lawyers to try, because one of the things is that we think they’ve violated the Maryland Constitution. You’re not supposed to be able to amend a bill on the floor in a way that makes it different than how it comes into the Committee. So we’re going to try to have some litigation, at least to let the leadership know that they just can’t change bills around.

“So overall, we were successful in stopping Senate Bill 122 but they were able to get that one piece and provision in there. We were able to stop the increase in the maximums. But I think it was a really good show of force and power of the Black Caucus in the Legislature which typically they don’t use very often. But it just goes to show the kind of power that they have.”

The Baltimore City Youth Fund

“Quickly, on to the Baltimore City Youth Fund: the Youth Fund was voted in, by the voters, in November of 2016. Three percent of the City’s budget goes into a fund specifically for children and youth that amounts to about $12 million a year. Adam Jackson, who is the CEO of LBS, was the co-chair of the Task Force. The Task Force outlined the framework, because the voters who voted on the Youth Fund voted on its existence, but there wasn’t a specific structure that went along with it. So the Task Force was responsible for developing the structure by which the Youth Fund would be produced.

“We were very clear that we wanted these dollars to go to organizations that traditionally don’t get the dollars. One of the things that we’ve been very big critics of is the Nonprofit Industrial Complex in this town and the way that the White-led big-box nonprofits suck up all the money and create a dynamic where, unfortunately, a lot of folks that are doing the work don’t have the resources to sustain the work at a level that can properly serve our communities. So we just had a series of design sessions. We’re going to be in the process of recruiting folks in the community that are going to be a part of the process of making decisions about where money goes.

“And a Request For Proposals will be going out towards the end of May. The onboarding of residents for making decisions about the Fund will happen around June. Decisions about the resources will be made towards the middle to end of July. And money will start flowing in the fall.

“So those are the two major efforts that we’ve been working on.”

Questions and Answers

Q: How does LBS determine organizations to receive funds through the Youth Fund?

A: “A part of what the task force decided was, you have a lot of folks that are typically in the position of making decisions that are like non-profit professionals, people whose credentials come from whatever academic schooling they went through. Or their relationships to the corporate sector. What’s very explicit in the task force is that people who are making decisions about money are people that are practitioners, people that are in close proximity to the community, people that have immersed themselves in the community in such a way that they have an understanding of the assets and strengths that exist in the community and in the neighborhoods. So that’s the general frame that we’re looking at. Trying to challenge the way in which folks who have good ideas, who have been around for a while, people who understand the community … get shut out of the process. So that’s the overarching piece, but we’re still in the process of, and we’ll probably have it by the time the RFP comes out, we’ll have point by point, exactly what those criteria will be.”

Q: Why is the community so involved with Crime Bills but they don’t go to the root of the community? What about those of us who are seniors or others who are afraid of crime? Why not build a new police station at Pennsylvania and North Avenues to clear the criminal element from the very corner where this establishment, the Arch Social Club, is struggling to survive and thrive? Victims of murder, assault and home invasion are being overlooked. Problems that cause people to go to jail are not being dealt with. What about the “little person” who is a victim of crime and who is afraid to testify against criminals?

A: “Three things. The first is that when Martin O’Malley was elected mayor and there was a time of unprecedented violence, he ran on a tough-on-crime approach. Part of the problem wasn’t to address crime. The problem was that politically, he was giving our community two choices: more police or less police. So a big part of what we’ve advocated for are community-based anti-violence programs where you take people that were formerly involved in that, people who are credible messengers, and have them be at the front line in terms of resolving a lot of conflicts. I’ve been involved with a lot of young people who have been engaged in violence, but it wasn’t people who were hardened criminals. These are people that don’t have the networks, they don’t have the support system necessary to be able to address those conflicts before they escalate into what they become. And you just have a lot of young folks that don’t have mentorship, don’t have people in their lives. … So this isn’t to excuse folks who engage in those acts of violence but I think there’s one piece of it where police should be like the last resort. And a part of why it was important for us to do the Youth Fund work is to direct resources to people that will be better at getting people from committing these acts of violence. Safe Streets and other programs like that.

“So that’s one piece. Another piece is that, you mentioned witness protection. I testified in front of the [Legislative] Committee, saying that increased resources to witness protection would go a long way. So when I talk to police officers off the record, the thing that all of them consistently say is that, if they could just get witnesses to go to the [witness] stand [and testify], they would be able to put away a lot of the people they know are committing the murders. When I talk to the legislators about investment in witness protection, what they say to me is ‘Dayvon, that’s just a political fight that I don’t know that we can win.’ And of course, my response back to them is, ‘Well, if you’re serious about addressing violence, that’s part of the fight that has to be made.’ And they’re talking about dollars. Dollars that go to witness protection. … This year, the city of Baltimore is going to break half a billion dollars in investment in public safety. So to me, there’s no reason you can’t take some of that $500 million and put it towards witness protection so that you can get the folks who are actually committing the crimes.

“And then lastly, one of the things in Annapolis, you’re dealing with legislators [for whom] being in Penn-North is foreign to them, so they don’t really understand the dynamics. And so one of the things we try to explain to them is that we’re all concerned about crime and violence. Increasing the time a person has to spend in jail from five to ten, that doesn’t deter crime. What that does is, it produces more people that are exposed to the criminal element [in prison] longer. What the studies suggest is that the certainty of getting charged, arrested and incarcerated is a bigger deterrent to crime than the length of your sentence. So you can say that you’re going to get 15 years. that’s less of a deterrent than the certainty of getting caught. So one of the things we said to the Committee and to the Legislature is, if you really want to address crime, then you have to address the police ability to get the folks that are committing the crimes. And to be honest, what we said to them was, increasing the sentence is a political ploy to get the White folks in the County to feel good without actually addressing the problem.

“And one other thing I also want to note. The first quarter of this year, from [the first quarter of] 2017 … homicides are down 30%. And that’s important, because what’s going to happen is, the Legislature is going to try to claim credit for it [when crime goes down]. So it’s really important for people to know that the efforts that a lot of people in this room are engaged in are the efforts that are actually having an impact, not the efforts that the leadership is going to try to take credit for.”

Q: With regard to the strategy of the passage and resistance to the Crime Bill and the political strategy of developing programs to stop crime and prevent our children from becoming cannon fodder on the streets, how do you envision a “clean” way to ensure that our children are employed and have a vision of a future beyond what exists now? Especially since the oppressor does not want to discuss that? With some 50% of 18 to 24 year old Afrikan American males in Baltimore unemployed, how do we prevent that reality that our oppressors don’t want to discuss and is the real driver of crime? What kinds of programs, besides Safe Streets, are you talking about for our children?

A: “Two things. One, to the political part of the question. One of the adamant supporters of the Crime Bill was the Greater Baltimore Committee [GBC]. For those who don’t know, that’s the collection of corporate White power in Baltimore City. It’s interesting, because earlier last summer, we were fighting the City Council, [which was] trying to push through a bill where just the possession of a firearm gave you a mandatory one year [imprisonment]. That’s coming from the GBC. The GBC has their eye, as many people know, on gentrification. And the homicide rate last year, for them, was an inconvenience in terms of their efforts at trying to gentrify parts of Baltimore City. So that’s a big reason as to why it became such a big issue. What that also speaks to, to your point in terms of a comprehensive look at the problem, the GBC has been an opponent of major efforts around employing Black folks, and has been a major barrier in terms of sharing economic power.

“An example of that is that it took the [April 2015] Uprising [after the death of Freddie Gray in police custody] for them to even begin to discuss things like expungement for a lot of people that had criminal records. And one of the big barriers to getting gainfully employed is having that record. Nicole [Mundell] is the Executive Director of Our For Justice, who works directly with folks who have been through the criminal justice system, and who has worked for years to try to get the Legislature to consider expunging records. You think about someone who did something when they were in their teens, now they’re in their 40’s, still have this record and can’t get a job. And the GBC, it took the Uprising for them to even start discussing it, but expungement legislation is extremely hard to get passed down in Annapolis, because a lot of those lawmakers see that ‘those are criminals; why are we giving criminals another chance?’, instead of understanding that a lot of people who have records, if you think about what the Department of Justice, what a bunch of organizations have found, is that a lot of people get pushed through the criminal justice system and have a record, just because the police were over-policing. So really getting them to understand that is a big piece of it, dealing with folks that have criminal records.

“In terms of the larger picture, I think it’s really about sharing economic power. And taking it.  Which is a much bigger and larger fight. … And that’s why we did the Youth Fund, it’s a small example of taking resources and being able to control them and invest them in our community. Our hope is that we can take that model and it can be in other processes, other government agencies. So that, say, with [the Department of] Housing and Community Development, there are a lot of issues with Park Heights and the slots money, so taking that process and putting it there. Our hope is that this process will become a means by which other agencies will have to be able to spend money in a way that [resources] will actually get to the community.”

Q: Even with expungement, there will still be gaps in a person’s employment that will lead to questions from employers, so the discrimination will continue. Second, we have to get through the issues of relationships with legislators and lobbyists. Third, we need to address the underlying traumas, the “adverse child experiences” between the ages of 2 to 7 years, as well as traumas to families and family systems. Groups like the Center For Urban Families (CFUF) are also working to deal with these issues as progressive 501(c)3 nonprofit organizations that are [often excluded from the Nonprofit Industrial Complex and are] looking for funding. Who are you looking at partnering with and directing resources to in order to change the paradigm?

Q: How about the traditional Black Cultural Organizations like the Eubie Blake Cultural Center, the Great Blacks In Wax (GBIW) Museum and the Reginald F. Lewis Museum, which have been underfunded in this “separate-but-equal” government infrastructure in Maryland? Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs) had to sue because of unequal funding. Cultural organizations have also been denied millions of dollars in bond money every hear from the city and the state that has gone to the Baltimore Museum of Art, the Maryland Science Center, etc. Cultural tourism is a big part of economic development, particularly for the Black community to the extent that we can build up our cultural institutions and create jobs and economic opportunities, something many of us would be interested in working with you on through the task force and associated committees, as well as having you work with us in our efforts. Have you looked at a pathway for gifted and talented Black students in this city to pursue to actualize their talent through Black Cultural Organizations like Eubie Blake, Reginald F. Lewis and Great Blacks In Wax? There isn’t currently a pathway for students who are not coming out of the School for the Arts to actualize and realize their talents.

A: “In terms of the specific pathways, one of the things I’d be interested in talking to you further about, one of the things that happened at the beginning of the [Legislative] Session is that the Baltimore City delegation will look at capital improvement projects. On the budget, the governor usually gives delegations a certain amount of capital dollars for infrastructure development. Actually, in the 2017 or 2016 Session, I began to notice that they would have [funding for] Walters [Art Gallery], B&O [Railroad Museum], and Black institutions were absent from that list, and in fact there were some legislators that actually brought it up. So I met with the Director of Planning around that question. There’s a Sista that works in the Department of Planning. She and I have talked about, maybe next year, looking at how we can make sure things like Eubie Blake, Arena Players and others are in that list of entities that get capital improvement projects. Unfortunately, how it works is kind of an insider system, so the people who know who to talk to and have folks inside the legislative process automatically get stuff put on the list that get capital dollars. But I think it’s certainly something to explore, probably in the summertime, to establish a group of folks to look at what capital needs there are so we can go early to our legislators and have them put those things on the queue.”

Q: About the Crime Bill, the parole system in Maryland is really messed up. As you look at amending crime legislation, you also have to look at parole, because people can’t qualify for parole because of some of those felony convictions. The other issue is the “Ban The Box” legislation. It should also be part of the reform effort because you can’t even get an interview if you have to check that box that you’ve been incarcerated.

Q: How would you compare your work to that of the Lowndes County Freedom Party in terms of getting things done?

A: “I’m finishing a book where I’m talking about Ella Baker’s style of organizing. And one of the things that we encounter in our work is that we have two major paradigms: the Industrial Areas Foundation, more of a Saul Orlinsky-based organizing, and what we call the Ella Baker paradigm of organizing. One of the differences is that we, because of our relationships to folks in our community, identify strengths, identify institutions and organizations that are already currently doing work, and our methodology is to connect with folks that are doing work and to have our specific lane in the realm of Policy. So to that extent we’re different in the sense that we’ve picked a particular lane … in terms of addressing public policy, but we borrow a lot in terms of the idea of building connections and relationships to organizations that are in our community that already exist, not feeling the need to create new organizations all the time. But try to connect the folks that are already doing work and to build power based on the strength that already exists in our community as a way to expand to larger communities. So, that’s the 90-second version of a question that takes a long time to answer.

“I’ll give you an email address and a phone number. Our email is info@lbsbaltimore.com; that’s the best way to get us. Our phone number is 443-838-3773.”

Coming soon: Bro. Thomas Ruffin on Controlling the Politics in Our Community