Jamala Rogers

Dr. King challenged the Teamsters in his most eloquent but penetrating words. He started off by acknowledging the limited accomplishments of civil rights movements on segregation: �It will not be easy to accomplish this program because white America has had cheap victories up to this point. The limited reforms we won have been obtained at…

For most of us, we left 2011with mixed emotions. And while our individual situations and progress vary, it is important that we look at the bigger picture as the struggle over who government serves and how the social needs of a nation get met. It is painfully clear that most elected officials are either incapable…

In 1969, a black teenager at a St. Louis hospital died from baffling symptoms that doctors had attempted to treat over a fifteen month period. Almost 20 years later, it was confirmed that the patient known as Robert R. died of AIDS and was probably the first case in the U.S. Sample tissues had been…

The Occupy Wall Street Movement is now about a month old. It began way before people gathered at Zuccotti Park, which sits in the shadows of Wall Street. It began before the Canadian anti-capitalist maga zine Adbuster issued a call to spark an American “Tahrir moment” (in reference to the situation in Cairo that resulted…

There’s an African proverb that predicts “When elephants fight, the grass suffers.” I thought about the proverb as the gridlock on the debt ceiling issue continues in Congress and decided to change it up for the situation: When the elephant and donkey fight, the grassroots suffers. The showdown between the Democrats and the Republicans is…

In St. Louis, I remember vividly a community workshop put on by The Justice Institute to assess President Obama’s first 100 days. JI is a progressive organizing and training institute. It assessed Obama’s performance up to the 100 days in three areas: education, healthcare and peace. The new president received a few B’s, mostly C’s…

As President Obama was presenting the comprehensive vision of his Middle East policy, a contingent of St. Louis activists were landing in Tel-Aviv. The St. Louis Palestine Solidarity Committee (PSC) is composed of Jewish-Americans, Palestinian-Americans and other concerned Americans focused on bringing peace to the peoples of both countries. For the last several months, northern…

Billboards criminalizing black women started popping up in cities like New York and Atlanta. A few weeks ago, one of those billboards caught the eye of some politically conscious women in St. Louis, MO. A precious little brown face with big almond eyes is the first to catch your attention. Your eyes then move to…

Donald Trump has pandered to the most racist, backward sector of this country for the last few weeks. His eagerness to question the legitimacy of President Obama’s birth certificate underscored that being a birther transcends class and education; some believe that birthers are just white and uneducated. The Donald was relentless in his challenge of…