
Ishmael Reed is one of the most read writers of his generation, along with Toni Morrison and Amiri Baraka, living in America. In 1962, Reed co-founded “East Village Other,” a well known underground publication at the time, and was a member of the Umbra Writers Workshop, which helped to give rise to the Black Arts Movement. He has published nine novels, four collections of poetry, six plays, four collections of essays and a libretto. He currently lives in Oakland, and I approached him one day while he was visiting KPFA’s studios to ask him what he thought about the state of affairs between the police and Oakland’s Black community, with the backdrop of the police murder of Oscar Grant and, in a separate incident, the police murder of Lovelle Mixon, after Mixon allegedly killed four Oakland police officers.
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African Americans,
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anti-Chinese riots,
BART police officers,
California,
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Gaelic,
Gitmo,
Hispanics,
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“Blues City: A Walk in Oakland”,
“Califia”,
“East Village Other”

“Due to the media blockout, Americans may not realize that a rise in the price of gas at the pump is related to bloodshed in the Niger Delta,” said Daphne Wysham, a fellow at the Institute for Policy Studies. “As one of the largest consumers of Nigerian crude, the United States government cannot stand idly by and watch innocent civilians being killed, starved and maimed.”
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Chevron,
Daphne Wysham,
gas companies,
Gbaramatu region of Delta State,
Global Information Network,
humanitarian supplies,
impoverished,
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Justice in Nigeria Now,
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Tunde Okorodudu,
war,
water