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A Brief History of Seven Killings

Kei Miller The Guardian
The Man Booker prize, given annually for best English language novel published in the United Kingdom, was awarded this week to Marlon James, for his novel, A Brief History of Seven Killings. He is the first writer from Jamaica to win the prize. The novel is a tale of 1970s-1980s Jamaica, CIA plots, and violence. It is "a story about Jamaica that doesn’t only take place in Jamaica," says Kei Miller, who reviewed the novel late last year.

More than Economics: TPP, Empire and Common Security Alternatives

Joseph Gerson Common Dreams
Of course we need international trade negotiations and agreements. But, they must be arrived at via inclusive, democratic, open, and transparent processes. They must be designed to reinforce the security and dignity of the world’s peoples and environmental sustainability.

The Campaign Against Rasmea Odeh

Mark Mondalek Jacobin
With the US government pressing for prison and deportation, Palestinian activist Rasmea Odeh needs our solidarity now more than ever.

These 8 Cities Just Abolished Columbus Day

Dylan Sevett US Uncut
In the past two months, eight cities got rid of Columbus Day in favor of adopting Indigenous Peoples’ Day. Three of those cities adopted Indigenous Peoples’ Day last week.

Beyond Abbas and Oslo

Rashid Khalidi The New Yorker
The Oslo Accords have been a disaster for Palestinians and a boon to those who wish to maintain Israel’s nearly half-century-old occupation of the West Bank, East Jerusalem, and Gaza. In his U.N. speech, Abbas, one of Oslo’s architects, declared that he would no longer abide by its terms unless Israel stopped running roughshod over them. This declaration won’t mean much unless it’s translated into concrete action.

 The Presidential Debate Question No One Is Asking: ‘Are You a Capitalist?’

John Nichols The Nation
 Despite the best efforts of political and media elites to dismiss and diminish socialist ideas, polls show that Americans are increasingly open to the ideology. Polls of millennials in recent years have found slightly higher levels of approval for socialism than capitalism. Although Bernie Sanders is asked "Are you a socialist?" The other contenders are not asked "Are you a capitalist?"

As Cities Give Columbus the Boot, Indigenous Peoples Day Spreads Across US

Lauren McCauley Common Dreams
The movement dates back to 1990 when South Dakota became the first state to address the controversy over Columbus Day when they renamed the holiday Native American Day. Two years later, Berkeley, California introduced the first Indigenous Peoples Day. And while workers in 23 U.S. states enjoyed a paid day off in his honor, people across the country rallied online under the banner of #IndigenousPeoplesDay to call attention to the atrocities committed by Columbus.

HDP: Call to the International Community Following the Ankara Massacre

Selahattin Demirtas & Figen Yüksekdag, HDP Co-chairs The Kurdistan Tribune
In making this call, we wish to underscore that the Ankara massacre and the previous attacks are international in scope, and to make clear that we see the potential for such events to open the way to regional insecurity. AKP’s policy of relying on radical groups as proxies, . . . such groups as ISIS, Al-Nusra, and Ahrar Al-Sha, used particularly against Kurds in Rojava—is at the heart of today’s tragedy.