Charlottesville, White Terrorism and History — a Black Man’s Viewpoint

President Donald Trump’s difficulty with specifically denouncing the “Unite the Right” rally and White terrorist violence committed in Charlottesville, Virginia this past weekend confirms what many people of color already felt about the Trump regime: it’s Al-Qaeda or Islamic State in khakis and polo shirts, hiding behind perverse and ancient renderings of a noble religion […]

The MLK Speech You’ve Heard Before (But Not Really)

I’m recognizing the 49th anniversary of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr’s assassination by posting his final speech — better known to many as “I have Been to the Mountaintop” — since many of us only know two minutes of it. Along with the media-saturated “I Have a Dream” speech by MLK, just playing the climax of […]

Charles M. Blow to Trump Cheerleader I’m Not Your Petting Zoo Animal

I love Charles M. Blow. I may not always agree with him, but he’s on point most of the time and his fiery writing reflects a constant synchronization of signals with the African diasporic struggle. If you have no idea of what I just said, watch how the NY Times columnist regulated President Trump supporter and […]

Trump’s Alternative Black History: Endorsement of White Terrorism

After watching President Donald Trump get his talking point wrong about Frederick Douglass’ current status on earth, I percolated the idea of creating daily posts of the humorous sort about Trump’s Alternative Black History — but ultimately decided against this route. First — mentalunrest’s (deliberate lowercase M here) editorial policy tells me to cover topics […]

Trump’s Immigration Ban is Code for Coming War

President Trump’s despicable immigration ban against seven Muslim countries in the Middle East and Africa presents have clear evidence — in case any of you had doubts — that Trump has found common ground with the nutty neocon wing of the Establishment. I think that Trump still has barriers to cross in solidifying his relationship […]

The Error of Trump’s Weapons-Chasing Ways

Wassup with President-elect Donald Trump’s fixation with the 80s and ramping up military spending? Even if you cast aside the confusing media cycle of Trump tweeting about how the US needs new nukes (as an aside, President Obama proposed spending $1 trillion to upgrade America’s nuclear arsenal), doubling down with a declaration to MSNBC’s Mika Brzezinski and […]

Fidel Castro — a Different Kind of Bastard

With former Cuba President and revolutionary icon Fidel Castro’s passing, it’s a good moment to quote an insightful response US President Franklin Delano Roosevelt supposedly gave about a decade prior to Cuba’s revolution, after Roosevelt’s Secretary of State called then-Nicaragua President Anastasio Somoza Garcia a bastard: “Yes, but he’s one of our bastards.” Explains a […]

POST-ELECTION MEDITATIONS: WE’LL SURVIVE TRUMP

We lived under the leadership of a Ku Klux Klan-loving President who broadly rejected Japan’s 1919 Treaty of Versailles amendment that would view all races and countries as equals — likely because this President had more colonial ambitions to chase that involved nations of color. We lived under a president whose treatment of Black Mississippi […]

SUNDAY SMACK: DID US GOVERNMENT COMMIT CRIMES AGAINST HUMANITY?

I just completed my second reading of John A. Williams’ novel Clifford’s Blues — a well-written but far from feel-good story of a black, gay jazz musician imprisoned in Nazi Germany. The book frequently mentions the gruesome medical experiments performed on prisoners by Nazi physicians — which made me think of the 1932–1972 Tuskegee, Alabama syphilis […]

SUNDAY SMACK: TREASON OR SLAVERY?

This week’s Sunday Smack inspiration comes from reading Eric Foner’s Gateway to Freedom: The Hidden History of the Underground Railroad, where I was reminded of how the British promised Africans enslaved in America their freedom in return for fighting against George Washington’s patriots during America’s war for independence. That would mean any slave who fought […]