In the 1960s and 1970s, the US political police, mainly in the form of the FBI, infiltrated, spied upon, and violently attacked various social movement organizations. This effort, documented in Ward Churchill and Jim Vander Wall’s book, “The COINTELPRO Papers” was successful in helping to undermine poor people’s movements.

Jesse Jackson and Bruce Gordon are just two of many high-profile Black leaders who have expressed indignation at the description of those displaced by Hurricane Katrina as ‘refugees’. ‘It is just wrong’, Jackson said, ‘they are citizens displaced by a disaster’.

After 9/11, 2001, some victims of war and of bombing campaigns wondered, in writing, whether the experience of being bombed would increase America’s empathy towards the rest of the world.

Any category or concept is going to leave important things out. It’s the nature of abstraction. Using the term ‘Black’ to describe a group of people can obscure more than it reveals. As a biological category it is meaningless, as is the concept of race generally. There is no clear biologically relevant distinction between blacks and non-blacks. There are some genetic diseases, such as sickle-cell anemia, that are more prevalent among those with African ancestry compared to those with European ancestry.

ZNet commentary: http://www.zmag.org/Sustainers/Content/2004-11/18podur.cfm

Is there something wrong with using a bomb to destroy a building that might have civilians in it just because there might be an `insurgent' hiding there?

Is there something wrong with an assassination that `succeeds' in killing members of the resistance if, as the US promises, care is taken to minimize harm to civilians?

ZNet: http://www.zmag.org/content/showarticle.cfm?ItemID=6603