Commentary by dopper0189, Black Kos Managing Editor
We have come to an end on another great year here at Black Kos. Unfortunately we have come to the time when we the editors take our annual holiday break, we won't be returning until Tuesday January 4th 2011. I would like to once again thanks everyone who reads and participates in Black Kos for continuing to support us.
Putting these diaries together takes a lot of work and it really is a blessing that they are so well received. But don't be surprised if some of us editors use our break to publish some of our own diaries :-) Speaking for myself this is one of the few times of the year I have the the time to do so.
We covered a lot of ground on Black Kos this year, from Haiti to history, politics to poetry, great black scientist to vile right-wing racist. I always like to spend a little time each year looking back at the great work this teams has put together.
Here are some of the highlights from this years edition of Black Kos. I would also like to give "shout outs", thank you and acknowledgements to our many guest contributers this year. It's only when I looked back that I realized how many folks helped out this year with some great guest commentaries. Thank you Bev Bell, Shanikka, Seeta08, aaraujo, ThisIsMyTime, and allie123!
So on behalf of sephius1, Deoliver47, Justice Putnum, and myself, thank you for all our guest writers. Thank you to all our readers. Have a safe Holiday season, and a happy new year. See you all in 2011!
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Some highlights of Black Kos 2010
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Jan 19th 2010 Haiti and the Caribbean; the history and the historians
Commentary by Deoliver47, Black Kos editor
"The transformation of slaves trembling in hundreds before a single white man into a people able to organize themselves and defeat the most powerful European nations of their day, is one of the great epics of revolutionary struggle and achievement."
C.L.R. James, Black Jacobins, ix
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January 29th 2010
Commentary
by Black Kos Editor, Sephius1
One of the things that really urkes me is that we will never truly know all the inventions by blacks who couldn't protect there work because patents were not given out, and in some cases the inventions were stolen by whites that the black people worked for. This has so many ramifications since innovation leads to entreprenuership and wealth building. However some freed blacks were able to punch some holes in the system. One such man is Thomas Jennings
Thomas Jennings stands in history as a noteworthy figure for being the first Black person to ever receive a patent, but his life should serve as an example of what was, and what could have been, for Black people in the earliest years of the United States.
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Jan 26th 2010 To Be Young, Jobless, and Black...
Terrell Collins, of Detroit, pauses while checking employment on a laptop computer while attending a job fair in Livonia, Mich. — AP PHOTO/PAUL SANCYA
Commentary by Deoliver47, Black Kos Editor
I was remembering a song today. A song that was sung by the late great artist Nina Simone, written as a memorial tribute to her dear friend Lorraine Hansberry. A song that was one of the anthems of the Civil Rights Movement.
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March 30th, 2010 "FACE, FRONT, and RESPECT!"
Shanikka,
Tuesday's Chile Guest Contributor
When I was growing up in on the Crown Heights/Bed Stuy line in the Brooklyn ‘hood, long ago, we used to answer when asked what we wanted by someone who was getting in our face and getting on our nerves – "Face, Front & Respect, Brother (Sister!)" It wasn’t so much an answer as a retort. It is a retort that has been on my mind quite a bit this past week as we have watched President Obama make sausage and end up with what is now known as America’s Affordable Health Choices Act.
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March 26th, 2010 Rastafari
On Tuesday I started exploring the religious history of the Rastafari. Today I will complete this look into the Rastafari, looking at their traditions and ceremonies.
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March 19th, 2010 "As much as things change, things remain the same." "Those who forget history are doomed to repeat it."
Justice Putnam, Black Kos Poetry Contributor
How many times have we heard those refrains? Yet, are they any less true if we had heard them but once? Or a lifetime's worth? It may be human nature that requires us to be constantly reminded of that which went before; or it may be the affliction Gore Vidal coined, "American Amnesia".
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March 2nd, 2010 The NAACP Does the Right (Left) Thing
Commentary by Black Kos Editor Deoliver47
Last Friday, the NAACP gave Van Jones its highest award, "The President's Award", and Benjamin Todd Jealous, President and Chief Executive Officer, explained it in advance, calling Jones "An American Treasure".
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April 6th, 2010 Commentary, dopper0189 Black Kos, Managing Editor
Ira Berlin one of America's leading historian offers a sweeping new account of the African American experience over four centuries title: The Making of African America: The Four Great Migrations
Four great migrations defined the history of black people in America: the violent removal of Africans to the east coast of North America known as the Middle Passage; the relocation of one million slaves to the interior of the antebellum South; the movement of more than six million blacks to the industrial cities of the north and west a century later; and since the late 1960s, the arrival of black immigrants from Africa, the Caribbean, South America, and Europe. These epic migrations have made and remade African American life.
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June 1st, 2010 Reconstruction Redux?
KKK March Washington DC, 1925
Commentary by Black Kos Editor Deoliver47
The photo above was 1925...over 85 years ago.
As a 62 year old black person raised by parents and grandparents who lived during those years, 1925 is not so long ago and far away.
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May 21, 2010 The Urban Educational System
Sephius1, Black Kos Editor
Last week we took a look at the people resources that an inner city kid comes in contact with. We also looked at the family dynamics, and school dynamics, pointing to how different links along a child's development, if broken, can cause irreparable harm to a child psyche.
This week we'll take a look at solutions for the 3 areas covered over the past weeks.
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Apr 27, 2010 Show your papers or be arrested. Carry them with you at all times
Commentary by Deoliver47, Black Kos Editor
As the outrage swells over the passage, and signing of the draconian Arizona law, in many comments to the numerous diaries calling for action this law has been likened to apartheid in South Africa, when people of color had to carry passbooks.
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May 7th, 2010 ON MOTHER’S DAY, REMEMBERING HAITIAN WOMEN
Commentary Bev Bell, Black Kos Guest Contributer
On the day in which we remember and celebrate mothers and women in the U.S., we can do the same for Haitian mothers and women. We can use the occasion to honor the dead and raise up the living.
As for how to raise up the living, Haitian women who survived the January 12 earthquake need all the support and solidarity that we can rally toward their rights, social equity, safety, and dignity. In a survey by this writer, women’s organizations articulated the following priorities: permanent housing; the fulfillment of social needs such as health care, food, and water; employment; protection from rape and violence; trauma recovery; and decision-making in the rebuilding.
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July 23, 2010 THE STILL UNFULFILLED PROMISSORY NOTE
Guest Commentary, Seeta08
With America's citizenry becoming increasingly diverse, a predominantly white male judiciary at both the state and federal levels is a fundamental threat to judicial fairness in a democratic society, given the judiciary's lack of cultural knowledge and experience in a pluralistic society, and wholesale acceptance and belief that white male heterosexuality is the benchmark of normativity.
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July 27, 2010 The Color of Netroots
dopper0189 aka "Chief"
Commentary by Black Kos Editor Deoliver47
Glad to be back home and safe on our front porch. I'm still jet-lagged and feel drained from lack of water due to the well over 100 degree temperature in Las Vegas, so this won't be a very long commentary today, but wanted to recap a bit of what happened at NN10 and some thoughts and suggestions for next year in Minneapolis.
Thanks to Sis Navajo for permission to re-post some of her pics of our panel. You can see/hear the full stream here:
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July 16, 2010 Songhai Empire
dopper0189, Black Kos Managing Editor
The Songhai Empire is a medieval civilization thought to have been started in the 9th century as a small principality (in West Africa) located on both banks of the Niger River referred to as Al-kaw kaw by Islamic scholars. In the 16th century it became the largest empire ever to have been created in tropical Africa. The kingdom arose from a fertile area which was very suited for livestock rearing and agriculture. The river was also very suitable for fishing. As early as 800 A.D. the indigenous people of the area made full use of the natural resources of their region and by the time they entered into recorded history, they were already divided into two specialised professional groups, the Gabibi who were agriculturalists and the Sorko who were fishermen. Its borders extended from the central area of Nigeria to the Atlantic coast and included parts of what are now Gambia, Senegal, Mali, Burkina Faso, Niger, Guinea and Mauritania. Its capital was the city of Gao, on the bend of the Niger River in present day Niger and Burkina Faso where a small Songhai state had existed since the 11th century.
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June 15, 2010 Juneteenth and not July 4th
Commentary by Black Kos Editor Deoliver47
As we move into summer, lots of folks I know celebrate the 4th of July as Independence Day. Not me.
I actually commemorate the 4th as Louis Armstrong's birthday.
Freedom day for me and mine will always be the nineteenth of June. Known to many as "Juneteenth"
Promoting People of Color in the Progressive Blogosphere
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Oct 08, 2010 Are you your brothers and sisters keeper?
By ThisIsMyTime, Black Kos Guest Editor
Brother thinks Black folks are truly tolerant in this country. All 40 millions of us less the 1 million. The 1 million are incarceratedso they don't have any option except to be patient.
It has been almost 50 years since the passage of the Civil Rights Act but Black folks are still victims of inequality. In job. In housing. In building wealth. In Health Care. In Education. In getting Justice. Name it and you got it. Black folks are at the bottom. Still.
Forgive me I am speaking the truth and my sentiment ain't a reflection on you today but on our collective weakness to fixing institutionalized racism and our lack of vigor in fighting for a strong anti-racist system. Nor should anyone need to feel you are a target of supremacy just because you are White since I am mostly speaking of the supremacist system we live in, the people that aid it and why these stories must end.
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August 27, 2010 Cape Verde Islands
Commentary aaraujo, Black Kos Guest Commentator
Cape Verde is pronounced like Cape Verd (rhymes with herd). The language is Cape Verdean Creole (Portuguese mixed with African).
We call ourselves Creole and define our race as mostly mulatto (a centuries old biracial mixture of white Portuguese and black West African - mostly from Portuguese speaking Africa and Senegal) . The vast majority are Roman Catholics. Most Cape Verdeans live outside of Cape Verde in the Diaspora and the majority of those are in the US (and most of those in Southeastern New England).
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November 16th, 2010 Tears for Haiti
allie123 Black Kos, Guest Contributer
Ten months after the catastrophic earthquake that devastated Haiti on January 12, 2010 and after billions of dollars donated the conditions for the 1.3 million Internally displaced people (IDPs) remains dire, and they now face a cholera epidemic. It is easy to get discouraged, throw your hands up and walk away. There are programs that work.
I asked a Haiti expert if we (Daily Kos) could interview him. He graciously agreed. I collected questions from Daily Kos members, and I am posting the questions and responses in this diary. There is also an Action Alert.
Thank you Daily Kos for not abandoning Haiti and especially Black Kos, dopper0189 and Deoliver47. So thank you again! Long after Haiti has fallen out of the news and largely been forgotten Daily Kos hasn't forgotten.
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November 12, 2010 Commentary: African American Scientists and Inventors
by Black Kos Editor, Sephius1
Frederick Jones (1893-1961) was one of the most prolific Black inventors ever. Frederick Jones patented more than sixty inventions, however, he is best known for inventing an automatic refrigeration system for long-haul trucks in 1935 (a roof-mounted cooling device). Jones was the first person to invent a practical, mechanical refrigeration system for trucks and railroad cars, which eliminated the risk of food spoilage during long-distance shipping trips. The system was, in turn, adapted to a variety of other common carriers, including ships. Frederick Jones was issued the patent on July 12, 1940 (#2,303,857).
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August 20th, 2010 Missing Black Woman? Who cares?!?!
Commentary, dopper0189, Black Kos Managing Editor
To the right is a picture of Mitrice Richardson, a year after the LA Sherrifs department released her at 1:00 AM with no purse, no cell phone, no money, and several miles away from her car. Matrice's body was recently discovered.
Haven't heard of her? Maybe it's because cable news is obsessed with something that can't be put any other way: Missing white woman syndrome
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August 10th, 2010 A Message to our sister Maxine Waters – Keep up the fight!
Commentary from Black Kos Editor Deoliver47
You all are aware of the fact that Maxine Waters, Congresswoman has vowed to fight the charges being leveled against her in Congress. I say – fight on my sister!
Perhaps it’s time to remind the progressive community about just who she is and why her voice is not only needed in the House – but in this nation.
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Nov 19, 2010 Voices and Soul
by Justice Putnam
Black Kos Poetry Editor
I was involved in a rather spirited discussion recently, with some former classmates whose brains have been consumed by the ghastly TeaBircher walking dead; and have become mouth-gnawing-bone-breaking-mindless-shuffling-toward-any-loud-noise-or-smell-of-blood Zombies themselves.
It was sad to see once beautiful and sexy women reduced to spittle-flecked, red-eyed rage; and once lithe and athletic men now gray and bloody and mad; frantically tearing at corpses long void of any discernible nourishment.
These weren't Zombies from some Caribbean Mythic conjuring though; so I had no choice but to retreat to the high ground to gain some better bearings.
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[] Obama, African-Americans and Economic Policy by bruh1
[] Hey kids, it's a white privilege checklist! by kyeo
[] This Diary Will Make Heads Explode on This Site...Race and Racism are Discussed by mka193
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See everyone in 2011 - the front porch is now on vacation - Boyz II Men - It's So Hard To Say Goodbye To Yesterday