Portside

Protesters are levying a broad range of concerns about public policies that devastate Colombia's workers, indigenous, and Afro-Colombian communities. The US-Colombia Free Trade Agreement has forced small farmers to compete with subsidized US products, made them more vulnerable to market fluctuations, and eroded their protections and social safety nets through the implementation of neoliberal policies domestically.

Everyone who marched has their own special memory. Although the event comes down to us mainly as the Rev Martin Luther King's "I have a dream" speech to the huge throng standing in the sweltering heat or sprawled cooling their toes in the Mall's reflecting pool, I remember it as one big picnic with everyone in their Sunday best and on their best manners firmly clasping hands in King's "beloved community". But it wasn't all kumbaya.

Based upon the speeches during the main portion of today’s events there can be little doubt that the Dr. King who was murdered in Memphis in 1968 would not have been allowed to speak at this commemoration of his life. There was no discussion of the “evil triplets.” Instead, we had far too many speakers pay homage to the narrowest possible liberal agenda in broad abstractions with none of the searing material truths that make Dr. King’s speeches so bracing even today.