by John Stafford
THE MEANING OF TRUMP
There are a variety of interpretations regarding the meaning of the rise of Donald Trump in the 2016 GOP presidential primary. Perhaps the most common is that this is an anti-establishment election, reflecting voter frustration with partisan gridlock. This narrative holds that Trump and Sanders are two (very different) sides of the same coin – outsiders working against the establishment. Continue reading Trump And the Immoral Policy of The Republican Party
by Tammy Morales
Tonight Mayor Ed Murray will be at Redwing Café in Rainier Beach to discuss a proposed pilot project he’s calling Acoustic Gunshot Locator System. It’s a microphone system that triangulates a location when the sensors are triggered by the sound of gunfire. While you enjoy a grilled hummus sandwich at Redwing, ask the Mayor if this is the best use of public money – local or federal. Continue reading Shooting Down the Mayor’s Gunshot Locator Proposal
by Michael “Renaissance” Moynihan
As a local organizer, I keep hearing over and over that people agree with the issues we are protesting, but that they disagree with our methods of protest. To me, and to anybody else who knows the history of Civil Rights and Black Power in the United States will recognize this as something right out of Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s Letter from a Birmingham Jail (1963). While sitting in jail in Birmingham, Alabama after being arrested for yet another peaceful demonstration during Project C (for confrontation), King wrote a letter in response to many of the white clergy who chastised King for the methods the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) were employing. It is interesting that these clergy members chose to chastise King and SCLC, instead of Bull Conner and his police department for unleashing firehoses and attack dogs upon peaceful protestors; or for the segregation and discrimination that was rampant in the Birmingham at the time. The clergy were not writing to chastise the federal government and the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) for sitting idly by and watching Freedom Rider buses be bombed and the Freedom Riders beaten within inches of death. No, they chastised the oppressed for challenging their oppression in one of the only manners left for them to do so. These people that I am hearing agree with our message, but disagree with our methods sound and feel to me as being no different than the white clergy that King was responding to. Continue reading Op-Ed: Agree With Our Message, But Not With Our Methods?
by Cynthia and Marcus Harrison Green
Life is so defiant.
Tragedy can attempt to smother it, pain can try to extinguish it, disaster can struggle to overwhelm it, but it remains indomitable. Continue reading The Life and Legacy of Michael Flowers
by Polly Trout
On the evening of January 26, three homeless teens killed two people and wounded three more. The shooting took place in The Jungle, a homeless encampment that stretches on the west side of Beacon Hill, in the greenbelt and under I-5. Their mother was also homeless, and their father in prison. They had been placed in the foster care system, which had failed to find them places to live that they were willing to stay. The news of the shooting interrupted a press conference that the mayor was giving about homelessness, in which he complained that homeless advocates are expecting too much from the city. Continue reading Seattle’s Homeless Problem: Enough Already
by Amir Islam
Ours is the story of two young men who grew up just miles apart similar in many ways, but with different paths. I have known Ben Haggerty a.k.a. Macklemore since our childhood days. We grew up together, and although not the best of friends we shared childhood memories, busted raps together, ran in some of the same circles, and later on in life we would keep up with each other, even crossing paths on our road to recovery from drug addiction. Continue reading “Macklemore, White Privilege 2, White Allies, and Black Liberation”
