Dear Progressive Reader,
I begin this week’s newsletter with an apology. Words matter. And I used an incorrect word last Saturday. In describing an author’s piece, I said: “Thinking of Jacob Blake’s young children, who witnessed his murder . . . ” Many readers wrote to point out that Jacob Blake was not murdered. He was shot seven times in the back by a Kenosha police officer and remains, as of this writing, in a local hospital, paralyzed from the waist down, and may never walk again. I am very sorry for my error. (I guarantee that our magazine and website articles are much more thoroughly proofread and fact-checked than my Saturday morning musings). But, we are currently in the midst of a time of national recognition of the fact that too often encounters between African Americans and police result in death. In fact, we do not even know how often because there is no official tracking of these statistics.
In 2018, I wrote about DeRay Mckesson, the activist who was galvanized by the police killing of Michael Brown in 2014 in Ferguson, Missouri. Mckesson went on to co-found the anti-police-violence group Campaign Zero, and helped develop the first-ever national database of police violence. According to that website, so far in 2020, police have killed 765 people. Since 2014, various media organizations, including The Washington Post and The Guardian, have developed similar databases. According to the Post, more than 1000 people were killed in 2019. (That is about 35 per 10 million inhabitants of the United States – as compared to 9.7 per 10 million in Canada, and 0.5 per 10 million in the United Kingdom). In mid-July, when I interviewed Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison, also a former member of Congress, he said, “It is absurd that we really can’t even count up how many deadly force encounters with police are going on. We don’t know. Because even though we passed a law, we still don’t [report and tally these encounters].” This must change.
Last week both presidential candidates visited Kenosha, Wisconsin, where Jacob Blake was shot. The Trump campaign accused Joe Biden (who met with family members and spoke by phone with Blake in his hospital bed) of making the trip to sow “more political division.” Donald Trump’s trip, on the other hand, was a typical Trump visit. Meanwhile, as concerns over a free and fair election in November continue to rise, Amazon is releasing a new film on September 18. All In: The Fight for Democracy features voting rights activist and former gubernatorial candidate Stacey Abrams, who was interviewed in The Progressive last June. “I believe in building systems. I believe in building infrastructure that continues,” she told John Nichols. One of those systems is a truly fair electoral system that allows everyone “to practice the most fundamental act of democracy, and that is casting their vote.”
Monday is Labor Day, and as Kathy Wilkes reminds us this week, “Labor Day 2020 doesn’t have much for us everyday wage earners to celebrate. We’re struggling to pay bills and keep safe as COVID-19 runs its odious course. Our nation has bungled its response to the crisis, and we are paying the price.” But, as Wilkes points out, “America’s rich never got over the fact that workers gained some labor rights.” In a cover story for the December 1920 issue of our magazine (at that time called La Follette’s Magazine after its founder), Fighting Bob La Follette wrote, “The object is two-fold. First of all, organized capital would destroy organized labor because of its growing political power. . . . Second, organized capital would destroy organized labor in order to deprive the wage earner of the collective bargaining strength which he derives from his organization.” This year, on Labor Day, let’s remember that history. As Wilkes writes, “It’s time to get our power back.”
Finally, next Friday is the 19th annual Fighting Bob Fest, a tradition that Jim Hightower calls “the best political party in America!” This year, due to the pandemic, it will be a little different. But, neither rain, nor sleet . . . Fighting Bob Fest will go on this year - however, just like last month's political conventions, it will take place as a virtual gathering for 2020.
Please join U.S. Senator Tammy Baldwin, U.S. Representative Mark Pocan, Wisconsin Lieutenant Governor Mandela Barnes, Ruth Conniff, John Nichols, Jim Hightower, Laura Flanders, Greg Palast, and more - plus, special musical segments from Joan Baez, Si Kahn, Jake Blount, The Cactus Blossoms, and Daniel Libby. The 19th annual Fighting Bob Fest will be streamed on the Internet via FaceBook Live at www.facebook.com/theprogressivemagazine from 7:00-9:00 p.m. on Friday September 11th, 2020. Please join us!
Keep reading, and we will keep bringing you important articles on these and other issues of our time.
Sincerely,
Norman Stockwell
Publisher
P.S – our new 2021 Hidden History of the United States calendar is now available for purchase through our website. They make great gifts and hang well on walls and refrigerators.
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