Official Images Of The Air Jordan 1 Mid SE Green Python – Sneaker News

Posted on by

The Air Jordan 1 Mid especially in the past few years has offered a number of colorways far more bold, more daring than that of the Retro High OG. And back in February, it was revealed that the silhouette would be forgoing its usual leathers for Green Python.

Showcased in better detail courtesy of official images, the colorway swaps outs its overlays for the titular material. Scales are chiseled into these exterior panels, which are then dressed a vibrant Vivid Green in complement to the tread and Jumpman logo. Elsewhere, the construction is par for the course: white leathers outfit the leather base as well as the adjacent Wings logo, midsole, lining, and lace unit.

For a closer look at the Green Python, take a look at the official images below. Currently, no release date has been set, but these will likely hit Nike.com and select retailers some time this May.

In other news, a Knicks Dunk High is landing this year as well.

Where to Buy

Make sure to follow @kicksfinder for live tweets during the release date.

Womens: N/AStyle Code: DV2959-113

More:

Official Images Of The Air Jordan 1 Mid SE Green Python - Sneaker News

U.S. Rep. Jim Jordan, back in Richland County, remains on the attack – Richland Source

Posted on by

Country

United States of AmericaUS Virgin IslandsUnited States Minor Outlying IslandsCanadaMexico, United Mexican StatesBahamas, Commonwealth of theCuba, Republic ofDominican RepublicHaiti, Republic ofJamaicaAfghanistanAlbania, People's Socialist Republic ofAlgeria, People's Democratic Republic ofAmerican SamoaAndorra, Principality ofAngola, Republic ofAnguillaAntarctica (the territory South of 60 deg S)Antigua and BarbudaArgentina, Argentine RepublicArmeniaArubaAustralia, Commonwealth ofAustria, Republic ofAzerbaijan, Republic ofBahrain, Kingdom ofBangladesh, People's Republic ofBarbadosBelarusBelgium, Kingdom ofBelizeBenin, People's Republic ofBermudaBhutan, Kingdom ofBolivia, Republic ofBosnia and HerzegovinaBotswana, Republic ofBouvet Island (Bouvetoya)Brazil, Federative Republic ofBritish Indian Ocean Territory (Chagos Archipelago)British Virgin IslandsBrunei DarussalamBulgaria, People's Republic ofBurkina FasoBurundi, Republic ofCambodia, Kingdom ofCameroon, United Republic ofCape Verde, Republic ofCayman IslandsCentral African RepublicChad, Republic ofChile, Republic ofChina, People's Republic ofChristmas IslandCocos (Keeling) IslandsColombia, Republic ofComoros, Union of theCongo, Democratic Republic ofCongo, People's Republic ofCook IslandsCosta Rica, Republic ofCote D'Ivoire, Ivory Coast, Republic of theCyprus, Republic ofCzech RepublicDenmark, Kingdom ofDjibouti, Republic ofDominica, Commonwealth ofEcuador, Republic ofEgypt, Arab Republic ofEl Salvador, Republic ofEquatorial Guinea, Republic ofEritreaEstoniaEthiopiaFaeroe IslandsFalkland Islands (Malvinas)Fiji, Republic of the Fiji IslandsFinland, Republic ofFrance, French RepublicFrench GuianaFrench PolynesiaFrench Southern TerritoriesGabon, Gabonese RepublicGambia, Republic of theGeorgiaGermanyGhana, Republic ofGibraltarGreece, Hellenic RepublicGreenlandGrenadaGuadaloupeGuamGuatemala, Republic ofGuinea, RevolutionaryPeople's Rep'c ofGuinea-Bissau, Republic ofGuyana, Republic ofHeard and McDonald IslandsHoly See (Vatican City State)Honduras, Republic ofHong Kong, Special Administrative Region of ChinaHrvatska (Croatia)Hungary, Hungarian People's RepublicIceland, Republic ofIndia, Republic ofIndonesia, Republic ofIran, Islamic Republic ofIraq, Republic ofIrelandIsrael, State ofItaly, Italian RepublicJapanJordan, Hashemite Kingdom ofKazakhstan, Republic ofKenya, Republic ofKiribati, Republic ofKorea, Democratic People's Republic ofKorea, Republic ofKuwait, State ofKyrgyz RepublicLao People's Democratic RepublicLatviaLebanon, Lebanese RepublicLesotho, Kingdom ofLiberia, Republic ofLibyan Arab JamahiriyaLiechtenstein, Principality ofLithuaniaLuxembourg, Grand Duchy ofMacao, Special Administrative Region of ChinaMacedonia, the former Yugoslav Republic ofMadagascar, Republic ofMalawi, Republic ofMalaysiaMaldives, Republic ofMali, Republic ofMalta, Republic ofMarshall IslandsMartiniqueMauritania, Islamic Republic ofMauritiusMayotteMicronesia, Federated States ofMoldova, Republic ofMonaco, Principality ofMongolia, Mongolian People's RepublicMontserratMorocco, Kingdom ofMozambique, People's Republic ofMyanmarNamibiaNauru, Republic ofNepal, Kingdom ofNetherlands AntillesNetherlands, Kingdom of theNew CaledoniaNew ZealandNicaragua, Republic ofNiger, Republic of theNigeria, Federal Republic ofNiue, Republic ofNorfolk IslandNorthern Mariana IslandsNorway, Kingdom ofOman, Sultanate ofPakistan, Islamic Republic ofPalauPalestinian Territory, OccupiedPanama, Republic ofPapua New GuineaParaguay, Republic ofPeru, Republic ofPhilippines, Republic of thePitcairn IslandPoland, Polish People's RepublicPortugal, Portuguese RepublicPuerto RicoQatar, State ofReunionRomania, Socialist Republic ofRussian FederationRwanda, Rwandese RepublicSamoa, Independent State ofSan Marino, Republic ofSao Tome and Principe, Democratic Republic ofSaudi Arabia, Kingdom ofSenegal, Republic ofSerbia and MontenegroSeychelles, Republic ofSierra Leone, Republic ofSingapore, Republic ofSlovakia (Slovak Republic)SloveniaSolomon IslandsSomalia, Somali RepublicSouth Africa, Republic ofSouth Georgia and the South Sandwich IslandsSpain, Spanish StateSri Lanka, Democratic Socialist Republic ofSt. HelenaSt. Kitts and NevisSt. LuciaSt. Pierre and MiquelonSt. Vincent and the GrenadinesSudan, Democratic Republic of theSuriname, Republic ofSvalbard & Jan Mayen IslandsSwaziland, Kingdom ofSweden, Kingdom ofSwitzerland, Swiss ConfederationSyrian Arab RepublicTaiwan, Province of ChinaTajikistanTanzania, United Republic ofThailand, Kingdom ofTimor-Leste, Democratic Republic ofTogo, Togolese RepublicTokelau (Tokelau Islands)Tonga, Kingdom ofTrinidad and Tobago, Republic ofTunisia, Republic ofTurkey, Republic ofTurkmenistanTurks and Caicos IslandsTuvaluUganda, Republic ofUkraineUnited Arab EmiratesUnited Kingdom of Great Britain & N. IrelandUruguay, Eastern Republic ofUzbekistanVanuatuVenezuela, Bolivarian Republic ofViet Nam, Socialist Republic ofWallis and Futuna IslandsWestern SaharaYemenZambia, Republic ofZimbabwe

Read more from the original source:

U.S. Rep. Jim Jordan, back in Richland County, remains on the attack - Richland Source

The Next Jordan Brand Air Max Shoe, The Air 200E, Is Revealed – Sneaker News

Posted on by

Nikes revolutionary Air technology has been part of the Jordan Brand line of footwear since #23s debut in the NBA. Beginning with the Tinker Hatfield-designed Air Jordan 3, the Oregon-based companys game-changing Air Max cushioning solution has delivered a peek behind the midsole, exposing Air technology to the world. Over the last few decades, Michael Jordans eponymous label has blended basketball heritage and running-informed cues for models that promise comfort and style.

The latest in the expansive line of visible Air-donning propositions from Team Jumpman is the Jordan Air 200E. Unlike some predecessors, the upcoming Jordan Air Max silhouette doesnt overtly reference any of the earliest Air Jordan styles. Mesh base layers are overlaid with nubuck panels along the profiles, which boast perforations at the mid-foot surely derived from some Air Max running sneaker from the 1990s. Fuse reinforcement appears at the toe box and along the tongue, giving the Jordan Air 200E aesthetic and functional benefits. Midsoles underfoot arguably call the most attention given their angular arrangement and Air Max 200 unit at the heel, a popular choice among Jordan Brands lifestyle models. Accompanying traction further blends running and basketball heritage as tread underneath the forefoot opts for a waffle pattern while tread towards the heel boasts a herringbone finish. Together, each aforementioned component advances both Nike and Jordans legacies into the next few decades.

Enjoy official images of the models debut colorways ahead, and anticipate a Nike.com release date soon.

For more from Team Jumpman, check out all remaining Jordan release dates 2022.

Where to Buy

Make sure to follow @kicksfinder for live tweets during the release date.

Mens: N/AStyle Code: DC9836-060

Where to Buy

Make sure to follow @kicksfinder for live tweets during the release date.

Womens: N/AStyle Code: DH7381-146

After MarketAvailable Now

Where to Buy

Make sure to follow @kicksfinder for live tweets during the release date.

Mens: N/AStyle Code: DC9836-086

After MarketAvailable Now

Where to Buy

Make sure to follow @kicksfinder for live tweets during the release date.

Mens: N/AStyle Code: DC9836-110

After MarketAvailable Now

Where to Buy

Make sure to follow @kicksfinder for live tweets during the release date.

Mens: N/AStyle Code: DC9836-261

Womens: N/AStyle Code: DH7381-261

After MarketAvailable Now

See the original post here:

The Next Jordan Brand Air Max Shoe, The Air 200E, Is Revealed - Sneaker News

Hey Jerry Krause, can Michael Jordan and the rest come back in 1999?: When Dennis Rodman revealed his… – The Sportsrush

Posted on by

Dennis Rodman revealed on a podcast that he wishes him, Michael Jordan, and the rest of the Bulls lobbied for Jerry Krause to keep the team together.

Dennis Rodman made it to the Chicago Bullsroster in 1995 after it was clear Michael Jordan and company needed help on the boards after getting eliminated by Shaquille ONeal and the Magic in the 95 ECSF.

Getting Rodman was a particularly tough decision given the history he had with both MJ and Scottie Pippen. Rodman was on the Bad Boy Pistons teams that beta up on the Bulls for 3 straight postseasons before getting swept in 1991 and it was difficult for Pippen to accept Denniss apology.

Also read: Allen Iverson really fought Dennis Rodman his rookie season: When the Sixers legend didnt back down against The Worm in a heated game against the Bulls

However, a couple private meetings later and getting reassurance from Phil Jackson that he could handle The Worm was all Jerry Krause, the Bulls infamous General Manager, to give the go-ahead to bring Rodman on board from the Spurs.

Fast-forward a little less than 3 years and the Bulls had 3 championships to show for that decision they made to bring perhaps the most prolific rebounder of all time on the team.

The Last Dance shed light on how Jerry Krauses increasing level of disdain for Phil Jackson led to the inadvertent disbandment of the Bulls championship core. More so than inadvertent, Krause knew that firing Phil would mean Michael Jordan retiring or at the very least, leaving the Bulls. If MJ, left, the rest would too.

Also read: Dennis Rodman and Bill Laimbeer try to live up to their image as a**holes: When Michael Jordan expressed his disdain for the Pistons bruisers

That is exactly what happened as Scottie Pippen found himself on the Houston Rockets, Dennis Rodman on the Lakers, and the Bulls posted a wretched 13-37 record during the lockout 1999 season. The San Antonio Spurs with a sophomore Tim Duncan and veteran David Robinson would win the NBA championship that season.

Dennis Rodman however, believes that the Bulls wouldve easily won if they had been together in the 1999 season. Jordan is on record saying he wanted to ride the Bulls out until they were dethroned and Rodman wishes that him and the rest of the core players lobbied for keeping the team together. [at the 7:46 mark]

Original post:

Hey Jerry Krause, can Michael Jordan and the rest come back in 1999?: When Dennis Rodman revealed his... - The Sportsrush

Official Images Of The Air Jordan 4 Military Black – Sneaker News

Posted on by

It my seem like were inching ever-farther from the return of the Air Jordan 4 Military Blue, but Jordan Brand is still keeping spirits high with an impressive and vast collection of Air Jordan 4 Retro footwear. This upcoming Military Black is almost cruel given how close it is to the original blue shade from 1989, but despite the brand dangling that long-awaited re-issue, these are quite a consolation prize.

Dubbed the Military Black for sharing the exact same color-blocking as the Military Blue, this looming June release swaps out that signature shade for a black on the midsole, heel-clip, and lace eyelets, as well as the tongue logo, tongue interior, and the inside base beneath the netting. These brand photos also reveal a similar density of the suede at the toe-guard as well. These are most certainly a clean addition to any summer rotation, but we can also envision what a Jordan 4 Military Blue would look like in terms of quality.

Again, the Air Jordan 4 Military Black is currently expected to release in June 2022 for $200; stay tuned for further updates. In the meantime, check out other Jordan 2022 release dates to prepare for whats dropping this summer.

Where to Buy

Make sure to follow @kicksfinder for live tweets during the release date.

Mens: $190Style Code: DH6927-111

Continue reading here:

Official Images Of The Air Jordan 4 Military Black - Sneaker News

Michael Jordan Confirms LeBron James Didn’t Call Him After They Met In His Rookie Year: "He May Have Called A Couple Of Times, But Nothing To The…

Posted on by

Michael Jordan and LeBron James have never had the closest relationship, with LeBron chasing the GOAT for most of his career to become the greatest of all time himself. NBA insider Jackie MacMullan revealed earlier this year that MJ gave a rookie LeBron James his number but LeBron never really ended up callinghim to get his guidance.

Michael Jordan has now elaborated on LeBron not calling him on the Icons Club podcast, something that was seemingly in stark contrast to his relationship with another superstar in Kobe Bryant. Kobe, who always looked up to Michael and also wanted to surpass him, developed a mentor's relationship with the GOAT, but LeBron it seems wasn't quite as interested (via Sportskeeda).

"To his credit, he never called," Jordan said. "I mean, he may have called a couple of times, but nothing to the magnitude of Kobe."

Jordan went on to explain that there were no hard feelings between him and LeBron over the situation, suggesting that it would make more sense for LeBron to get advice from Magic Johnson instead anyway, as LBJ's game has resembled Magic's throughout his career a lot more than Jordan's.

"He should call Magic Johnson," Jordan said. "His basketball talent is more Magic Johnson than Michael Jordan."

LeBron James has done excellently for himself and put himself in the conversation to be considered the greatest player to ever do it, although many would still say that the title still firmly belongs to MJ.

Considering that the main knock against LeBron has been a lack of 'killer instinct' after making it to the biggest stages, perhaps a little guidance from Jordan wouldn't have hurt him on that front. MJ was known for being ruthless, and it was a large part of what drove him to the heights he went on to achieve. Regardless, LeBron has made his way in the league, and there can be no disputing the fact that he's made himself an icon as well.

View original post here:

Michael Jordan Confirms LeBron James Didn't Call Him After They Met In His Rookie Year: "He May Have Called A Couple Of Times, But Nothing To The...

University of Utah report paints a picture of homelessness along the Jordan River – KUER 90.1

Posted on by

Standing on a bridge over the Jordan River on Salt Lake Citys west side, Tom Kalaher, 56, feels melancholy. The wind rustles tree branches while a crow squawks above him. A handful of tents are pitched on the riverbank where Kalaher used to live for about eight months last year.

It was a good, safe place to go, Kalaher said. You're a little bit more remote from other people. We'd formed a little family group of about seven people that were pretty solid. We didn't have any problems. Everybody pulled their weight.

A new report from researchers at the University of Utah, called Drivers of Unsheltered Homelessness and Conservation along the Jordan River, Salt Lake County, Utah, paints a clearer picture of homelessness along the river. After conducting 60 surveys and 16 interviews with people over multiple months and seasons, they found the average time people spent living at the river was nearly two years.

Researchers found the sense of security and community that Kalaher described was a common response to why people set up camp at the river. The analysis also shows many moved here after their previous encampments were taken down by city and county officials.

Jeff Rose, the principal investigator for the project, said anxiety about future camp abatements was another major thread in the study.

These are barriers for people who are trying to find a job, trying to find some sort of long-term housing situation, Rose said. If you can't leave your tent because you're afraid that you're going to lose your tent anytime you might leave it, then that just creates all these additional layers of insecurity in people's lives that are already pretty insecure.

But as camps get larger, city officials say the problems associated with them do, too.

Michelle Hoon, who oversees Salt Lake Citys homeless engagement team, said they try to provide outreach to people along the river, but they can be a particularly tough group of people to engage because of how long theyve been unsheltered.

We really tend to try to focus abatement resources on the biggest camps because they tend to be associated with the most public health and public safety risks, Hoon said. You see far more heavy drug use in large camps, you see a lot more violence in large camps.

As part of the analysis, researchers also recommended including the experience of unsheltered people in future management plans for the river. Rose said its about recognizing there will likely always be some level of homelessness there.

I think we can make some small steps that would make encampments much more sustainable, [like] providing restrooms and providing nearby trash services, providing nearby clean water for drinking, he said. Those are relatively small investments that municipalities can make that would have a huge impact on people's lives and ultimately make these encampments much more sustainable, much more humane.

Go here to read the rest:

University of Utah report paints a picture of homelessness along the Jordan River - KUER 90.1

Scottie Pippen Was Happy When Michael Jordan Retired For The First Time: Michael, I Love You, But Im Glad To See You Go." – Fadeaway World

Posted on by

Credit: The Guardian

Michael Jordan and Scottie Pippen created arguably the greatest duo in NBA history in Chicago, winning six championships together in the 90s. They had to work hard to reach the glory, losing many series in the 80s against the teams that ruled the league at that time.

Once they got past the Detroit Pistons, it was over for the rest of the league. Jordan and Pippen went at it, destroyed opponents, and collected six championships in eight years. They won two three-peats while leaving a little window for Hakeem Olajuwon and his Houston Rockets, who won the NBA title in 1994 and 1995, respectively.

During those seasons, Michael Jordan was retired, trying his luck as a baseball player, joining a Chicago White Sox's minor-league team to pursue this new goal. At the time of his departure from the Chicago Bulls, Scottie Pippen had some things to say about him, showing his happiness of seeing his teammate give him the keys to the car.

Pippen knew he was the leader of the team after MJ left the game for the first time, and he was really enjoying that experience, even saying he was glad that His Airness retired.

Via The Athletic:

On Oct. 28, 1993, Scottie Pippen took what was his.

That was the night of Pippens first game without Michael Jordan, a meaningless preseason exhibition game against the Los Angeles Clippers. Before the game, with reporters in the locker room, Pippen emptied Jordans spacious double locker, combing through the detritus of a legend to comedic effect.

Pippen pulled out a Jordan T-shirt and asked the media, Here, anyone want to dry their tears? He found some old candy bars, musing that he might have to try them to see if he could get blessed with magical powers.

But mostly, he seemed happy to take over the prime real estate afford to a sporting king. The throne now belonged to Pippen.

Michael, I love you, but Im glad to see you go, he said with a laugh, according to former Bulls beat writer Melissa Isaacsons book on the post-Jordan Bulls, Transition Game.

Knowing how Pippen felt about Jordan after all these years, it's interesting to see how he reacted after his teammate and supposed friend retired from the game. Pippen had strong feelings about Mike and didn't hesitate to call him out and the way he treated teammates in his book. Moreover, Pippen said that he didn't like being called Jordan's sidekick.

During the 1993-94 season, with Jordan trying to solve the mysteries of baseballs slider in the Southern League, Pippen earned his locker, taking the Bulls to the brink of the NBA Finals, finishing third in MVP voting and winning the All-Star Game MVP. The Bulls were a Hue Hollins phantom foul call on Pippen away from making a sixth-straight trip to the Eastern Conference finals. But Pippen also combusted at the worst possible time, earning him a black mark on a reputation he bristles at today.

Pippen thrived and suffered in that brief window of time where he had the spotlight to himself. Those who observed him saw the tension in Pippens world. He was, at times, resentful of Jordans imperious persona, but he played his role as the perfect partner dont say sidekick to his more talented teammate.

God, I hated that term and being referred to as Robin to his Batman, he wrote in the prologue to his recent book, Unguarded.

It seems like Pippen had these feelings towards MJ for a long time, while the rest of the world was convinced they loved each other. Well, even though many people think things went wrong after The Last Dance premiered two years ago, it looks like Scottie hold a big grudge against Michael even before that.

In one and a half seasons with the Bulls, Pippen couldn't lead them to the NBA Finals, and it wasn't until MJ returned that they went back to their old level, winning three more consecutive championships, confirming they were one of the greatest dynasties in NBA history. Just like he was happy to see him go, Pippen must have felt relieved after Jordan announced he was back.

Read more here:

Scottie Pippen Was Happy When Michael Jordan Retired For The First Time: Michael, I Love You, But Im Glad To See You Go." - Fadeaway World

Trimble to divest four businesses to The Jordan Company – GPS World magazine

Posted on by

Trimble announced today that it has entered into a definitive agreement to sell its Time and Frequency, LOADRITE, Spectra Precision Tools and SECO accessories businesses to Precisional LLC, an affiliate of The Jordan Company (TJC).

The divestiture is in line with Trimbles strategy to focus on areas core to its long-term growth and strategic product roadmap. The global transaction is subject to a number of customary closing conditions and is expected to close in the second quarter of 2022. Financial terms were not disclosed.

We are continually evaluating our product portfolio as we work on the execution of Trimbles Connect and Scale 2025 strategy, said Rob Painter, president and CEO of Trimble. Trimble is focusing its efforts on the companys connected industry platforms and digital transformation capabilities, making Precisional and TJC an ideal fit for the growth of the businesses.

TJC, a private equity firm, is completing the acquisition in partnership with industry executive Drew Ladau to form Precisional LLC, a global platform focused on precision measurement and data solutions driving efficiencies in demanding infrastructure end markets.

The Trimble businesses, which will join Precisional, have a long heritage of innovation, and each is a leader in the markets it serves, said Drew Ladau, CEO of Precisional. Im excited to build upon this strong foundation alongside the dedicated employees that have served their customers so well over the years. In addition, we plan to accelerate the pace of innovation and growth with the focus of resources and investment on these core businesses supported by TJC.

The acquisition of four industry-leading businesses from Trimble by Precisional forms the foundation of a new platform focused on precise measurement and analytical insights to improve productivity across a broad range of applications that rely upon accuracy and reliability, said Erik Fagan, partner at TJC. By supporting existing management to make investments in Precisionals operations and product development to integrate precision measurement with data solutions and enhanced connectivity, we intend to accelerate growth opportunities while also pursuing synergistic acquisitions.

The Time and Frequency products use the accuracy of GNSS clocks to provide precise time, synchronization and frequency reference signals for many industries and applications. Communication systems, data centers, financial networks, utilities, factory automation, security and other infrastructure rely on precise timing for synchronization and operational efficiency.

The Spectra Precision Tools business designs and manufactures high-quality leveling, positioning and alignment instruments used for general, exterior and underground construction. The instruments incorporate laser and optical technology for general contractors and specialty contractors serving large and small commercial jobsites as well as residential builders and remodelers.

The LOADRITE business offers accurate scales for loaders, excavators, conveyor belts, tractors, refuse trucks and forklifts that connect with payload-reporting and monitoring systems for the waste, quarry and aggregates industry. The products improve user efficiency by weighing products while they are on a vehicle or belt, eliminating the need for a separate trip to a fixed-scale location.

The SECO business designs and manufactures a wide variety of accessory products used in conjunction with surveying and construction instruments. The portfolio of accessory products includes tripods, telescopic poles, prisms, carrying cases, GPS antenna poles, safety vests and leveling rods.

LOADRITE, Spectra Precision Tools and the SECO businesses have been reported as part of Trimbles Buildings and Infrastructure segment. The Time and Frequency business has been reported as part of Trimbles Geospatial segment.

Orrick acted as legal advisor and Lincoln International acted as financial advisor to Trimble. Mayer Brown acted as legal advisor and BMO Capital Markets acted as financial advisor to TJC.

Link:

Trimble to divest four businesses to The Jordan Company - GPS World magazine

DJ Khaled Reveals The Air Jordan 5 We The Best Collection – Sneaker News

Posted on by

DJ Khaleds sturdy relationship with Jordan Brand has not only given the Miami-based producer an unprecedented level of access to footwear, but also the rarified opportunity to design his own shoes. In conjunction with his WE THE BEST platform, DJ Khaled has revealed a new Air Jordan 5 Retro in a 305-friendly mix of colors that include a pink/orange hue, bright purple, aqua teal, and a bone white with colorful interiors and accents and an opaque outsole, sail tints on the midsole, and the traditional silver big tongue of the AJ5.

Revealed through a promo video on his Instagram, which reveals detailed shots of the shoes in multiple colorways, matching apparel, and DJ Khaled doing his absolute best with a basketball, these Air Jordan 5s are according to the caption releasing to the public. Some pairs use just the Nike Air logo on the heel, while others feature Khaleds We The Best logo, which may denote which is the retail pair and which is for friends and famiily. Those friends and family pairs could be available through a giveaway similar to how his earlier Air Jordan 3 We The Best was dropped. Detailed photos and information will likely follow, so check out a closer look at the shoes via the video ahead.

Continued here:

DJ Khaled Reveals The Air Jordan 5 We The Best Collection - Sneaker News

Ben Simmons is walking around practice like hes Michael Jordan: NBA insider reveals that Nets star… – The Sportsrush

Posted on by

Ben Simmons has never been at and will never be at the level Michael Jordan ever was, but as he eyes a return, he may just be feeling like the NBA GOAT.

Simmons is a former number one overall pick by the Philadelphia 76ers, and he was instrumental in helping revive that franchise alongside co-star Joel Embiid.

He won Rookie of the Year, and with Embiid, he looked to be forming one of the NBAs most dynamic duos for years to come. The 76ers would reach the playoffs, finish as the #1 seed in the conference, and so much more in Simmons tenure there, but the lack of a championship (even an appearance) lingered like a dark cloud above both Embiid and Simmons.

Simmons lack of shooting seemed to bite the 76ers when they most needed it as teams would simply lay off the guard on the perimeter, choosing to double Embiid instead.

Those issues were put on the spotlight in last years playoffs when a series of miscues by Simmons cost the 76ers a series against the underdog Atlanta Hawks.

The team, including head coach Doc Rivers, did not show Simmons much support, and as a result, frustrations boiled to the point where Simmons refused to play this season under the 76ers. He was eventually traded to the Nets for James Harden where he waits to make his debut.

Also Read: Didnt Kevin Durant suffer from Luka Doncics injury before his Achilles tear?!: NBA Redditor brings forth horrifying potential of Mavericks star ahead of 2022 playoffs

While the Nets are gearing up for a play-in game against the Cavs today, the focus is on something much better. The Nets know that when theyre healthy, they can be perhaps the best team in the league, and so everyone (including themselves) is expecting a deeper run from them.

If thats the case, there is a chance we could see Ben Simmons make his Nets debut in the playoffs, sometime potentially in the first round, or if the Nets make it past the first round, the second.

Simmons has been a regular in Nets practices, and apparently, his whole attitude has changed. Hes walking around practice like he has something bigger to prove.

Its incredible to see Simmons regaining his confidence after the turbulent year hes had with the 76ers, and itll be even more exciting if he returns for the playoffs. Having a Michael Jordan like swagger may be a bit too much, especially for a player whos never quite reached those levels, but if it works for him, thats all that matters.

Of course, we still need to see Simmons on the court. If his previous issues resurface, then there will be no excuse for him. Simmons needs to make a dedicated effort to work on his shooting if he wants to make a significant impact on any team he plays on.

His size at his position gives him a significant advantage, but theres only so far that size can take you, as demonstrated repeatedly.

We have no idea how well hell gel on the Nets, but he offers great defensive potential as well as a reliable playmaking option. For now though, its still a waiting game with him.

Also Read: If LeBron was fighting, everybody would be f**ked When Joe Rogan told MMA fighters they were lucky LeBron James wasnt a fighter

Read the original here:

Ben Simmons is walking around practice like hes Michael Jordan: NBA insider reveals that Nets star... - The Sportsrush

Jordan Spieth and Rickie Fowler practise together ahead of RBC Heritage – Golfmagic.com

Posted on by

PGA Tour fan favourites Jordan Spieth and Rickie Fowler teed it up together in a practice round ahead of the RBC Heritage this week.

Both players were filmed by the PGA Tour working on their games ahead of what will be a competitive week with a strong field at Harbour Town Golf Links.

Spieth, who has only made one top-10 at this tournament in his career, missed the cut for the first time at The Masters last week and this is a sign of his inconsistencies in 2022.

He finished tied 35th at the Valero Texas Open earlier this month, an event which he won in 2021. So far this season, he has made one top-10 and missed three cuts in 10 starts.

His putting used to be immense and it was an attribute that led him to three major titles. Currently, he is ranked 180th in strokes gained in putting.

As you can see in the footage, Spieth is still working on recent swing changes and his new pre-shot routine as he aims to win his 13th PGA Tour title.

Fowler is on an even worse trajectory. Ranked 138th in the world, the 33-year-old has missed five cuts in 11 events so far in 2022.

For the second consecutive year, Fowler missed out on The Masters and he is winless on the PGA Tour since picking up his fifth career victory at theWaste Management Phoenix Open in 2019.

He pushed Rory McIlroy close in the CJ Cup at the start of the season, but this wasFowler's only top-10 to note.

Despite recent struggles, Spieth and Fowler found time in their practice round to sign some souvenirs for a pair of young golfers in South Carolina.

The rest is here:

Jordan Spieth and Rickie Fowler practise together ahead of RBC Heritage - Golfmagic.com

Jason Garrett, Cameron Jordan will be analysts for USFL on NBC – NBC Sports

Posted on by

Getty Images

The USFL is set to return to action this weekend with a Saturday game between the New Jersey Generals and Birmingham Stallions that will be simulcast on NBC and FOX and Tuesday brought announcements about who will be calling the action for both networks this season.

NBC announced that former Cowboys head coach Jason Garrett, Saints defensive end Cameron Jordan, and former 49ers and Seahawks fullback Michael Robinson will be serving as analysts this season. Jac Collinsworth and Paul Burmeister will handle play-by-play duties.

None will be working this weekend as FOX will produce the game coverage while NBC does pregame, halftime, and postgame coverage. Curt Menefee and Joel Klatt will be one of their broadcast teams with Kevin Kugler, former Jets quarterback Mark Sanchez, and Brock Huard also in the mix.

NBC will be providing coverage of two games on Sunday, April 17. One will air at Noon ET on NBC and Peacock with the other at 4 p.m. ET on USA Network.

Zora Stephenson and Corey Robinson will do sideline reporting for NBC and Sara Perlman will host halftime and postgame coverage.

See the rest here:

Jason Garrett, Cameron Jordan will be analysts for USFL on NBC - NBC Sports

Jordan Chiles Talks Filling In For Simone Biles In Tokyo, Silver Medaling, And More – Yahoo News

Posted on by

Jordan Chiles is as driven as they come and during the summer of 2020, her drive and preparation paid off. As a member of the US Olympic Gymnastics team, Chiles filled in for Simone Biles who was unable to compete citing mental fatigue. Jordan Chiles helped lead the US Gymnastics team to a silver medal in Tokyo, and she has been on a tear ever since.

Blavity spoke with Jordan Chiles about her career thus far. On her time in Tokyo and preparing to fill in for Simone Biles she said You have be prepared for anything in that moment. We were a very strong team but it was definitely a huge adjustment when Simone wasnt able to perform. Let it be known that Simone Biles is a legendary talent and immediately makes us a better team. On any advice that she received prior to filling in, Chiles said Theres a lot of advice and encouragement that we give one another. Some of it is making sure that we try to stay calm. We always tell each other that we got this, we know how to do this. We also remind each other that we had been waiting to be on a huge stage like this our entire lives. We just needed to go out there and have fun. She went on to say that we knew we has Simones support behind us the whole way through.

After the Olympics in Tokyo, Chiles enrolled at UCLA and has immediately made an impact on on their womens gymnastics team.

In February of this year, UCLA took on Utah, and Jordan earned a perfect floor score of 10.000. This was another great accolade for her to add to her litany of accomplishments.

You know, as somebody who just came from the realm of the Olympics and went into college, it was something that I was really excited about. During that competition, I really just wanted to go out there and have fun with everything. It wasnt because we were going against Utah or that I had a competitor that Ive been teammates with on the Utah team, it was about all of that combined. It really made the experience fun. Getting a perfect floor score was simply icing on the top and a testament to my training.

Story continues

Courtesy: JSquared Photography

Jordan is an athlete that really covers all of the bases in gymnastics. When asked about her favorite apparatus she said I actually dont have a favorite. Its rare that you hear that all gymnasts like all the disciplines the same, but I train to really excel on each apparatus at the highest level.

With as many years as Jordan has been doing this, you also experience your fair share of lows and lessons. In an interview with the LA Times, Chiles shared that she felt like she failed her team and family after faltering on the bars during the Olympic trials.

Today she seems to have gotten some more perspective saying I dont like disappointing people. But I shouldnt have put all of that pressure on myself. She went on to say I learned in retrospect that I shouldnt doubt myself because Im literally at the Olympics on the biggest stage I could ever be on. Im doing what I know Ive always wanted to do, I have to give myself grace.

When she isnt practicing, Jordan is chasing her other goals as well as following some of her favorite artists. One of her favorites is budding star Normani, who surprised Jordan on Access Hollywood with a video message last summer.

On getting a video message from the Wild Side singer, and how important sisterhood is to her, Jordan said Sisterhood plays a huge role in my life. Ive always been be able to lift others up in a way so Normani sending that video over was a dream come true for me. It felt like reciprocity and it was really a dream come true. Ive been following her since X Factor, she has been a consistent source of inspiration for me, especially since she is also a former gymnast. She went on to tout how much Normanis individuality encourages her saying Shes not the next Beyonce or Mary J Blige, or Missy Elliott. Shes the first of her kind, and thats what I aim to be as well.

With as much as Jordan has accomplished thus far, its amazing to think that this is still only the beginning. But it is, and she has some goals shes looking to smash saying Competing and helping UCLA win is a huge focus for me as well as excelling academically. I grew up having an entrepreneurial mindset instilled in me and I seek to get businesses off of the ground as I continue to ascend in gymnastics. As for international competition, I definitely hope to compete at the World games this summer and I still have my eyes set on the 2024 Olympic games, but its important I put in the work every day and not lose sight of the goals at hand.

If we know anything about Jordan Chiles, this do list will be checked off and itll be just another perfect score for the star.

Read the original here:

Jordan Chiles Talks Filling In For Simone Biles In Tokyo, Silver Medaling, And More - Yahoo News

Wild’s Jordan Greenway expected to miss at least two games with upper-body injury – Yardbarker

Posted on by

The Minnesota Wild defeated the Edmonton Oilers 5-1 on Tuesday but endured a frustrating setback during that victory.

Per Jessi Pierce of the NHL's website, Minnesota coach Dean Evason told reporters that forward Jordan Greenway is expected to miss at least the next two road games due to an unspecified upper-body injury he suffered in the first period of Tuesday's encounter.

The Wild play at the Dallas Stars on Thursday and are then at the St. Louis Blues on Saturday. Minnesota returns home to host the San Jose Sharks on Easter Sunday, and Greenway's status for that matchup is understandably up in the air.

"Obviously it's quick turnaround flying out tomorrow," Evason said of Greenway. "He'll likely stay home and get treatments and will heal and rest him right up. Anytime you don't finish a game, you're not going to get on a plane and then go. Maybe he could but, there's no rush to get him in there. We want to make sure that he's healed right up. So we'll make sure of that."

Per ESPN stats, Greenway has tallied eight goals and 15 assists across 59 games this season.

Minnesota, meanwhile, is battling with St. Louis for second place in the Central Division standings. Both the Wild and Blues have tallied 96 points and, thus, hold seven-point leads over the fourth-place Nashville Predators.

Original post:

Wild's Jordan Greenway expected to miss at least two games with upper-body injury - Yardbarker

Capitalism and Slavery – book review – Counterfire

Posted on by

Over seventy years since publication, the first British edition of Eric Williams classic Capitalism and Slavery remains vital, despite establishment critics, argues John WestmorelandEric Williams, Capitalism and Slavery (Penguin 2022), 304pp.Blood at the root

The republication of Eric Williams classic account of Britains role in the slave economy of the Americas and the Caribbean comes at a time when there is a renewed interest in Britains role in the slave trade, stimulated by the Black Lives Matter protests that rocked cities across the UK and USA.

Williams thesis, first published in the USA in 1944, has rightly been hailed by discerning scholars as a masterpiece. For some reason you will have to guess - the book has not been published here in the UK before. Williams argument has come to be known as the Decline Thesis because it links the decline of the slave economy in the Caribbean with its eventual abolition.

In 1944, Capitalism and Slavery provided a starting point for a new generation of students interested in the history of slavery and the civil rights of Black Americans. Written in an elegant and persuasive style, the book postulates an analysis that owes much to Marxs writings about the origins of capitalism, and where the capital that financed the system that bears its name came from.

In short, Williams argues that the trade in slaves and the profits from the plantations on which they laboured provided the capital that funded the industrial revolution in England and Scotland, and built the great port cities connected with the triangular trade. Glasgow, Liverpool, Bristol, and London were at the northern tip of a trade triangle connecting the coast of Africa with the Caribbean and American colonies. Manufactures left Britain for the west African coast where they were traded for slaves, a human cargo that was shipped to Britains colonies to be traded in turn for the valuable commodities of cotton, tobacco, rum and sugar.

Sugar was the commodity that enriched investors in the City of London. The sugar barons were renowned for preposterous wealth, and many stately homes were built and furnished through sugar wealth. The insatiable appetite for sugar in Europe exacted a terrible toll on the slaves who worked the plantations. The demand for sugar generated the demand for slaves.

However, as capitalism matured, the capitalists started to favour the free market views expressed by Adam Smith and turned against the mercantilist slave system that protected an inefficient and insatiable planter class. Free markets favoured an expanding empire where British finance outmatched foreign competition. This shift in thinking was prompted by the decline of the slave economy in Britains Caribbean possessions that set in after the American colonies gained their independence in 1776. The steps to the abolition of the slave trade and slave emancipation in the colonies thereafter link closely to the development of British capitalism.

Firstly, when the slave trade was abolished in 1807, economic considerations loomed large. In market terms British colonial sugar production lagged behind that of Saint Domingue (Haiti) and Brazil. Indeed Saint Domingue produced more sugar than all the British colonies combined, and the growing market in North America, freed from the obligation to buy British sugar, meant the protection of British sugar from cheaper suppliers made little economic sense.

The economic case for the abolition of the slave trade was strengthened by the calculation that the slave population in the West Indies could be replenished naturally and the navy could be put to more useful tasks than policing the Caribbean.

Secondly, after the capitalist class confirmed its political ascendency in Britain after the passing of the so-called Great Reform Act in 1832, it was swiftly followed by the Slavery Abolition Act of 1833 that emancipated slaves in the Caribbean. By this time the sugar supply was boosted by production in India and European grown sugar beet. Again the market triumphed over protection. The only negative economic aspect was that the slave owners had to be paid compensation for their loss of property.

The final nail in the coffin of mercantilism came in 1846 when the protective sugar duties were finally abandoned. At this point British pre-eminence in the world saw them commit wholeheartedly to the free market where they held sway. The protective Corn Laws, a constant annoyance to free-market ideologues, were also repealed at this time.

Therefore Williams established a clear connection to the development of capitalism and the move to slave emancipation. This connection of capitalism to the barbarities of the slave trade and slave production continues to enrage conservative thinkers. And its not just that the capitalist system is shown to be rooted in the blood and misery of enslaved Africans. Even more infuriating is Williams exposure of the real reasons for abolition as being in the economic interests of capitalists rather than the evident determination and humanitarianism of the abolitionist movement.

A good many national myths had been developed concerning William Wilberforce and his abolitionist saints, and these are myths that the Tories are out to preserve.

That the publication of Capitalism and Slavery has produced an instant reaction (and condemnation) on the Conservative Home page says something about the likely effect it will have on a new readership.

Tory MP David Davis has taken up the cudgels against Williams and brought all his intellectual might to bear. His argument, the less hyperbolic part, is a regurgitation of arguments first used by the American historian Seymour Drescher in the 1970s. Drescher challenged the data used in Williams economic analysis, which will be dealt with later. What is more novel is that Davis tries to reframe the narrative in a way that not only restores the virtue of Wilberforce and the saints, but tries to claim that British abolition was a moral endeavour that set an example to the rest of the world.

Our history with slavery is a lot more nuanced than many would have you believe, he says. It is doubtful if those experiencing the horrors of the middle passage or performing back breaking work under brutal slave masters and tropical heat would find solace in his nuanced history, much of which seems to have been downloaded from Wikipedias entry on Britains West Africa Squadron.

Deflection, rather than nuance, is what Davis is about. His attitude to Britains role in the slave trade is to acknowledge the shame without explanation of cause or content in order to shift the focus. For thousands of years, humanity had been characterised by the enslavement of one people by another. Over 550 years ago, Europeans began the transatlantic slave trade. While Britain was not the worst practitioner of this evil, we must acknowledge our part; we can no more re-write history than those who tear down statues.

The Tories are keen to turn the history curriculum into a fable about British values, and for Davis the act of ending the slave trade and slavery in the Caribbean is a cause for celebration. So he doesnt dwell on the horrors Britain imposed on foreign subjects, he moves quickly to explain how Britain became the worlds leading force in the emancipation of slaves.

Perhaps Black Lives Matter should take the knee in gratitude to their white emancipators! The history of Britains West Africa Squadron, if the Tories get their way, will no doubt gain a place in the curriculum so that the good parts of the British Empire can be learned. Davis says:

Founded in 1808, the West Africa Squadron of the Royal Navy had the singular purpose of stopping transatlantic slave ships. For over 60 years, the force patrolled international waters, captured 1,600 slaver ships and rescued 150,000 slaves.

And (wiping a tear from his patriotic eye): It was an astonishing tale of derring-do and heroism, of great deeds done solely for the purpose of destroying a great evil.

This line of argument might absorb some undefended minds in academia, but not many. Setting the record straight on the West Africa Squadron isnt too difficult. More importantly it is part of the history of imperial expansion with solid capitalist motives.

The idea that Britain was a force for decency in the world in the nineteenth century is laughable. Britain was a capitalist force for profits. A list of British ruling-class crimes in search of profits across the globe is too long to go into. Historians like Eric Williams have their counterparts across the globe in former British colonies, and it is better to let them recount their own tales of British heroism and decency. If the British hadnt wiped out the peoples of Tasmania man, woman and child, perhaps they could join in the chorus of approval.

The West Africa Squadron came from the 1807 Act abolishing the slave trade. The thinking was that if Britain had just closed off a market to British subjects they were damned if French, Spanish or Portuguese traders would benefit. For Davis, Britain was all about upholding justice on behalf of conquered peoples in the same way as the USA has considered itself a world policeman in our times. In reality, Britains desire for international justice, as with the USA, was closely linked to the imperial project of gaining British naval supremacy. Britain ruled the waves and waived the rules.

Michael Jordan has successfully debunked Britains honourable abolitionist claims in The Great Abolition Sham (The History Press 2005). Jordan shows that the Act abolishing the slave trade in 1807 contained provisions that pleased the anti-abolitionists. Slaves seized by the navy were treated as prizes by the terms of the Act. They were often dragooned into Caribbean regiments that had been decimated by disease. They were indentured in the same way as apprentices, but without pay. The Act therefore maintained plantation slavery.

Britain waived the rules by turning a blind eye to ships flagged with countries with whom a mutual trading interest was established. At the Congress of Vienna, where the chance to abolish slave trading was on the agenda, the British, represented by Castlereagh, consented to allow the Bourbon regime in France to continue trading to restock French colonies.

Stopping the slave trade took up only a small number of ships but was an important part of the assertion of British naval supremacy. Britains domination of the Atlantic and West African shipping lanes was to have a massive pay-off when European nations partitioned Africa in a frenzy of imperialist robbery after 1875. Britain secured all the most profitable parts of Africa and ruled their new subjects as racist overlords. Apartheid in South Africa is just one such example from many.

The final point in this debate was made by Eric Williams himself. Emancipation meant little for the freed slaves without their being given some means of support that would help them make an independent living. The former slaves were plantation workers in the main. They were trapped on islands dominated by plantation agriculture. Abolitionist freedom meant the triumph of the free market, an imperialist economic victory. The former slaves were not made economically equal and therefore remained unfree.

Racism, the most obvious British value in the Caribbean, was the ideological cement of British rule. In 1865 at Morant Bay in Jamaica the former slaves rose in rebellion. British troops crushed the rebellion in what came to be known as the Morant Bay Massacre. Whole villages were burned. Those who could not vouch for their innocence were shot, hanged and flogged. Women were hung from trees and some were flogged by British soldiers.

David Davis MP chose not to mention Morant Bay. Too much nuancing obviously spoils a good yarn.

Williams thesis is a major challenge to the history taught in schools and universities. The challenge is dealt with in the time honoured liberal fashion of misrepresenting Williams through omission and exaggeration, and attacking what is left.

For example, A level students studying the abolition of the slave trade are informed by the exam board textbook that:

The weakness of [Williams] argument lies in the definitive assertion that economic considerations were the primary motive for abolition and that every action is motivated by it. This polemical approach reduces the importance of other factors and therefore by focussing so intently upon one feature, opens itself up to criticism.i

This conclusion is offered to students after one introductory paragraph and a selected quotation. It is an example of liberal historical training. Williams sophisticated historical argument is disempowered by reduction that itself amounts to assertion, and this is followed up by considering an array of liberal historians to dissolve any lingering sympathy in a sea of considered liberal opinion.

And thus liberal balance is counter posed to Marxist dogma. And who would aspire to be an unbalanced dogmatist? There is not the space here to consider the liberal critics of Williams in great depth but we can counter some of the major criticisms. Williams could only be accused of focussing so intently on one feature of abolition by someone who has never read Capitalism and Slavery.

Firstly, critics of Williams have argued that the industrial revolution in Britain was not financed by the profits of slavery, rather capital was generated by developments here. The agricultural revolution, for example, freed labour for industrialisation that in turn generated labour saving inventions like steam power.

However, Williams does not argue that slavery begat capitalism, just the opposite; capitalism begat slavery. He writes:

When by 1660 the political and social upheavals of the Civil War came to an end, England was ready to embark wholeheartedly on a branch of commerce whose importance to her sugar and her tobacco colonies in the New World was beginning to be fully appreciated (p.27).

This takes Williams onto an analysis of the mercantilist system, which his critics accuse him of positing as a completely different entity to market capitalism. In chapter 2, The Development of the Negro Slave Trade, Williams shows that the mercantilist system, protected from foreign competition, was an early capitalist method of securing the European market for slave produced commodities.

Williams makes it clear that slavery suited plantation agriculture because free labour abhorred it, and this is a consideration in line with modern corporate investors who have their commodities produced by child labour that is nothing less than modern slavery. Slavery provided an abundance of labour that could be worked to death and replenished. Therefore it made economic sense, and was politically acceptable in Britain too.

In chapter 3, British Commerce and the Triangular Trade, Williams shows exactly how the industrial revolution was stimulated and paid for in good part by slavery. The reductionist criticism of Williams implies that the capitalists here waited for the profits to roll in then invested it, but his approach is far more persuasive than that. Williams shows how the triangular trade stimulated industry, agriculture and further imperial trading opportunities. It developed major seaports like Liverpool, Bristol and Glasgow. In these cities industrial capitalism got a boost as well as the docks. Ship building and design, dock building and civil engineering, metal working, rope making, crane design and manufacture all took off. In these great cities industrial capitalism leapt forward contributing to the development of the system as a whole.

The implications for further imperial expansion should be obvious. It led to Britain being the workshop of the world in the nineteenth century as well as the dominant imperialist power.

The second important attack on Williams thesis comes from the American historian Seymour Drescher.

Drescher researched Williams sources and found them wanting. He reversed the Decline Thesis by showing that the abolition of the slave trade was not in line with capitalist reasoning as Williams claimed. For Drescher, the slave economy was not declining, but was actually reaching its full potential. Therefore abolishing the slave trade in 1807 dealt a death blow to a vital economic area, whether slavery was inherently evil or not. Drescher did agree that economics played a part, but not in the way Williams claimed - or in the way that Drescher claims he claimed.

Dreschers argument centres on his oft quoted view that slavery was aborted in its prime and this is the theme of his book, Econocide, published in 1976. But it is not the devastating demolition of Capitalism and Slavery that his supporters think. In the first place, recent research done by the Centre for the Study of the Legacies of British Slavery at UCL supports the economic arguments of Eric Williams. And Capitalism and Slavery is about much more than economics. Williams shows capitalism to be a form of political economy, not just an economy.

This is why Dreschers analysis falls flat in my view. He worships at the altar of classical economists who see capitalism as rational and virtuous. Capitalists do not always make decisions that ward off crisis and they have a long history of doing the opposite. So to say that abolition was somehow contrary to the advice offered by modern economic analysis based on new data crunching techniques is meaningless in explaining why it happened.

For example, Drescher argues that the value of plantations in the Caribbean were rising at the time of abolition, and therefore there was still profit to be made. But isolating economic data in this way exaggerates the importance of it, and by decontextualizing it, distorts it. House prices in Doncaster are rising at the moment, but the reason is not because Doncaster is booming, trust me.

Politicians and campaigners alike fight for change because of how events in the immediate past prompt them to think about the future. As Williams explains, in a quarter of a century Britain had lost American colonies, intensified the exploitation of a vast market in India, and entered into a war with another great imperialist power that would impact upon the world. Britains fortunes no longer relied on its West Indian trade. And the trajectory of British capitalism certainly went against the idea of Econocide.

The final critique from which Williams should be defended flows from the incorrect assumption that his analysis is a form of economic determinism that leaves out the actions of individuals, their courage and tenacity. When people like David Davis and William Hague eulogise William Wilberforce and the saintly Clapham Sect upon which the British abolitionist movement was largely founded, they are in fact following a tradition begun in 1807.

The abolition of the slave trade produced an astonishing volte face in the British establishment. Having spent thirty years blocking all attempts at abolition of the slave trade, once the act of abolition was passed they celebrated it as a triumph for the whole nation. Amid the outpouring of articles, engravings and plates depicting Britannia trampling on the emblems of slavery, the Duke of Norfolk opined that abolition was, the most humane and merciful Act which was ever passed by any legislature in the world.

In chapter 10, The Saints and Slavery, Williams deals with something Marxists are well acquainted with: appearance and reality. Williams intention is not to deny the many commendable attributes of the abolitionists, rather he seeks to set their actions in a changing economic and political world. He writes of the abolitionists: The humanitarians were the spearhead of the onslaught which destroyed the West Indian system and freed the Negro (p.169).

He goes on: The British humanitarians were a brilliant band. Thomas Clarkson personifies all the best in the humanitarianism of the age. His praise is limited to a few of the brilliant band, perhaps too few, but his intention is to reveal what lies beneath.

The abolitionists were not radicals. In their attitude to domestic problems they were reactionary. The Methodists offered the workers Bibles instead of bread and Wesleyan capitalists exhibited open contempt for the working class. Wilberforce was familiar with all that went on in the hold of a slave ship but ignored what went on at the bottom of a mineshaft (p.170).

Williams doesnt write this maliciously. He correctly locates the limited space that humanitarianism enjoyed. The arguments for abolition never strayed into anti-capitalist sentiment even though there was huge popular support for abolition in working-class districts. To connect chattel slavery with wage slavery in mine and mill never entered their heads. Their strategy was purely parliamentarian.

In the abolitionist propaganda and petitions that roasted the planter class, there was no condemnation of their racism. Rather they were fellow Christians who had strayed into cruelty. The humanitarians regularly played on anti-mercantilist sentiment too.

In the call to abolish slavery in the Caribbean many abolitionists supported boycotting West Indian sugar in favour of Brazilian and Indian sugar. Did they know nothing of the appalling conditions suffered by free labour there?

The fact is that the abolitionists pursued a moral cause with determination. When their appeal coincided with favourable economic arguments for abolition, the establishment, at the time and since, chose to seize on the moral arguments to deflect from the economic reasons. This was done to present capitalism as virtuous, and is in substance exactly the same as presenting a war for oil as a war for democracy.

Capitalism and Slavery is a must read book and is the essential starting point for a new readership. It is a book that will hold the readers attention, and presents a powerful analysis in a persuasive and easy to understand way. Reading it is a pleasure.

There are certainly aspects of this topic that Williams does not cover in great depth; it is a relatively short book. One area that students will want to explore further is the role of slaves in freeing themselves, and a good place to follow this up is through the work of C.L.R. James. James was Williams mentor and his book, The Black Jacobins: Toussaint LOuverture and the San Domingo Revolution, is a masterpiece.

i Challenges to the authority of the state in the late 18th and 19th centuries (Pearson 2015), p.121

Counterfire is expanding fastas a website and an organisation. We are trying to organise a dynamic extra-parliamentary left in everypart of the country tohelp build resistance to the government and their billionaire backers. If you like what you have read and youwant to help, please join us or just get in touch by emailing [emailprotected] Now is the time!

Originally posted here:

Capitalism and Slavery - book review - Counterfire

From Slavery to Freedom: Keeping Israel at the Seder Table – Jewish Journal

Posted on by

The Seder is the ultimate Jewish celebration of freedom. We sit (or recline) with our families and friends around the table recounting the story, as if each of us was a slave who witnessed the terrible plagues and then suddenly, at midnight, marched upright with clenched fists and unleavened bread on our backs, out of Egypt.

Different generations and communities celebrate the Seder according to their own customs and interpretations, adding references to the embodiment of Pharaoh as the main tormentor of the Jews of that time. After the Holocaust and the rebirth of Israel, these events were interpreted as a strong parallel to the transition from slavery to freedom.

In recent years, as those memories faded, some politically liberal Jews have shifted the emphasis from the core Jewish experience, first in Egypt and then in subsequent generations, to a universalist version embracing the downtrodden of the world. I first encountered this as a student in Berkeley in 1969, in the form of a Freedom Haggadah, which sought to draw comparisons between the events of the exodus and the burning political issues of the day in Americaspecifically civil rights (as it was known then) and the womens liberation movement. Egypt, Israelites and slavery were still part of the text, but were no longer the primary or only focus. Armed with my copy of that Haggadah, I went home for our non-liberal particularist family seders.

In the decades since, successors to these activists of the 1960s moved the emphasis further away from Jewish history, culture and identity and towards universalism in the form of identifying with all victims, many real, and but also some that are imagined. (Todays edition would focus on the war against Ukraine, with Putin in the role of Pharaoh.)

In the progressive versions of the Haggadah that I have seen, the traditional four cups of wine are reinterpretedwith no mention of the traditional symbolism of the fourth cup, associated with Gods promise to bring the Israelites to the land of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob (Exodus 6:8). Leaving Egypt was never considered an end in itself, but rather the first step in a complex process of redemption, via Sinai and the commandments, and ending with the arrival (forty years later) in the Land of Israel.

By deliberately disconnecting the two, the revisionists are deleting this core dimension. In their political spin, this cup, in a paraphrase of the others, is supposed to represent a world where no one is held in slavery a world without sweatshop laborers, where all workers are able to make a fair wage (A Haggadah for Justice Truah). The particularism of Jewish existencethe Promised Land and Land of Israelare censored out of existence.

Similarly, in every generation for 2000 years in exile and Diaspora, our ancestors ended the seder by singing Next year in Jerusalem. But in another manifestation of intersectionality and self-assimilation, this statement and all mention of Jerusalem and Jewish self-determination are erased from progressive seders. This is part of the wider assault on Jewish history and identity, in which Zionism is presented as a form of colonialism and, according to the NGO industry and the United Nations, apartheid. To the degree that Israel is presented at all in these versions of the Haggadah, it is through this hostile and distorted filter, envisioned not as the homeland of the Jewish people, but rather as a country of all its inhabitantsthe catch-phrase for dismantling the Jewish state. Far from the celebration of Jewish freedom and deliverance from oppression, the intersectional Haggadah highlights the need for grappling with the realities of Jewish power, Palestine solidarity, and the sense of Jewish complicity with Palestinian suffering and white supremacy.

Like the wicked child in the Haggadah, the radical universalists and inter-sectionalists are excluding themselves, their lost and uninformed followers, and their children from the Jewish community.

Like the wicked child in the Haggadah, the radical universalists and inter-sectionalists are excluding themselves, their lost and uninformed followers, and their children from the Jewish community.

These distortions and interpretations go far beyond the student-led Freedom Haggadah of 50 years ago. The earlier versions added universal concerns without erasing the traditional Jewish interpretations and themes, including the celebration of our freedom in the Land of Israel, and the right of the Jewish people to determine our own destiny.

Just as the exodus from Egypt necessarily led to the arrival in the Land of Israel, the founders of Zionism understood that to escape from the oppression of the diaspora, the Jewish people must be anchored in our homeland.

In contrast, the marginal Jews and anti-Zionists of today are marching backwards from freedom into a world of assimilation and slavery.

In contrast, the marginal Jews and anti-Zionists of today are marching backwards from freedom into a world of assimilation and slavery. By prohibiting all particularism, and specifically attacking the centrality of Israel to the Jewish people, they are tearing down our identity.

For generations upon generations, the texts and collective rituals of the Passover seder were primary expressions of Jewish continuity and the everlasting yearning for our own freedom, which every family taught to their children. This continuity is the essence of our identity as a people and a nation, and the key to our survival.

Next year in Jerusalem.

Gerald Steinberg is emeritus Professor of Political Science at Bar Ilan University and president of NGO Monitor. His latest book is Menachem Begin and the Israel-Egypt Peace Process: Between Ideology and Political Realism (Indiana University Press).

See the rest here:

From Slavery to Freedom: Keeping Israel at the Seder Table - Jewish Journal

Appeal Court rejects tougher sentence bid in shed slave case | News and Star – News & Star

Posted on by

THE suspended jail term handed to a Carlisle man who was convicted of a modern slavery offence after a vulnerable man was found living in a shed will not be increased, top judges have ruled.

The Court of Appeal was asked to review the sentence after a suggestion that it was 'unduly lenient'.

At the original sentence hearing in February, Judge Richard Archer was told that the prosecution accepted Peter Swailes junior was unaware of the squalid conditions in which the victim was kept.

READ MORE: Newly restored lighthouse vandalised within one day

The court heard that the victim endured appalling conditions for up to 40 years, at times living in a horse box. The shed which was his home was unheated, dirty, and damp.

The defendants elderly father, also called Peter, who lived next to the shed on at site at Brampton Old Road, north of Carlisle, died before his case came to trial.

Solicitor General Alex Chalk today failed to persuade Appeal Court judges that the sentence given to Swailes junior, who admitted helping to exploit the victim by paying him below minimum wage for dangerous roof work, was too lenient.

Swailes junior, of Low Harker, Carlisle, Cumbria, admitted conspiring with his father, also called Peter, to financially exploit the man from July 2015, when the Modern Slavery Act came into law.

READ MORE: Visas issued for Ukraine families to live in Carlisle

Prosecutors accepted Swailes guilty plea on the basis that, although he had known the victim for many years, he was unaware of his living conditions.

A barrister representing Mr Chalk told a hearing in London that the sentence was unduly lenient.

Peter Ratliff told Lord Justice Holroyde, Mrs Justice Farbey and Sir Nigel Davis that a longer sentence should have been imposed and the jail term should not have been suspended.

But Lord Justice Holroyde said judges had concluded that neither the length of the term, nor the suspension, was unduly lenient, given the basis of Swailes guilty plea.

He said the case was complicated and difficult.

The vulnerable victim, who had a very low IQ of 59, was used and exploited during that period by Swailes father, who was his boss at the various accommodations over the years, judges heard.

Swailes father, who was 81 and died last year while awaiting trial after being accused of modern slavery offences, approached the man when he was aged about 18 and invited him to work with him doing various jobs.

In October 2018 the man was discovered by police living in a rotting, leaky shed near Carlisle, with no heating, no lighting and no flooring.

Swailes accepted that, from time to time, his father would contact him and arrange for the victim to undertake work with him, and that, on occasion, he paid him less than his minimum entitlement.

The case came after a three-year investigation by the Gangmasters and Labour Abuse Authority, supported by Cumbria Police and the National Crime Agency.

The victim, in his 60s, now lives in supported accommodation outside Cumbria and has been helped by City Hearts, a charity providing long-term support to survivors of modern slavery.

The defendant's father had denied the modern slavery charge he was accused of. The court heard that his dog lived in more comfortable conditions that the man found living in the shed at the caravan park on Brampton Old Road, Carlisle.

READ MORE: Thugs assaulted victim because he looked different

Continue reading here:

Appeal Court rejects tougher sentence bid in shed slave case | News and Star - News & Star

‘Atlanta’ Reminds Viewers Why Reparations For Slavery Are Overdue – Junkee

Posted on by

The episode asks the question: What would white people do if they finally had to pay the rent?

Season 3 of the award-winning series Atlanta is here and its once again reminding viewers why its one of the best shows on television.

The latest episode, titled The Big Payback, tells its own contained short story rather than following the series main characters. Written byFrancesca Sloane, the episode imagines how society might change if Black people could sue white people for reparations relating to slavery.

Activists in the United States have been advocating for slavery reparations for many decades, and only recently have made some steps forward. A landmark task force was assembled in January of this year to recommend reparations payment schemes after a bill was passed through the California state government in 2020. Reparations put so-called Australia in world news over the last few years too:in 2021, a fund of $280 million dollars was set up to be established to compensate Mob affected by the Stolen Generations.

Its in this slow, very recent trickle of social reckoning with colonial injustices against Black folks that Atlantas latest episode establishes itself. The episode centres on Marshall Johnson (Justin Bartha), a working middle-class white man on the verge of divorce. When we meet him hes listening to an NPR podcast, detailing a recent case in which a wealthy Tesla investor has been successfully sued out of millions by a Black man whose ancestors were enslaved by the investors ancestors. We hear on the podcast that the man won by arguing the investors wealth was a direct result of the enslavement of his ancestors.

Our protagonist Marshall shrugs off the news and its potential social ramifications, and even waves away his daughters anxiety over being called a racist at school. But the new reality catches up with him. A Black woman namedShaniqua Johnson(Melissa Youngblood) issues Marshall with a court document proving that his ancestors enslaved her own, and is now seeking compensation. Its worth noting here that her last name being the same as his reflects the real phenomena of Black families sharing the surnames of their ancestors owners. Marshall refutes the claim, but its a brave new persistent world.

Shaniqua persues Marshall, camping outside his workplace and taking over his house. Its over the top maybe, but a satirical nod to how a lot of people imagine reparations involve hostile homewrecking. Marshalls wife divorces him to save her personal finances from taking a hit along with Marshalls. Im Peruvian! This never would have happened to me! she says as justification, but Marshall baulks at this. You were white yesterday! he shouts. Its a great gag throughout the episode, white people scrambling to know their exact ethnicity as if it somehow makes them less complicit in enjoying the benefits of a society built on chattel slavery.

The episode comes to a climax as we find Marshall dejectedly drinking away his sorrows in the lobby of a cheap hotel. There he meets a fellow white man called Earnest who admits hes in the same boat. Its a meta sort of comment, as Earnest appears in the cold open of the seasons first episode as a fisherman. Turns out [my grandad] had a lot of help and a lot of kids, Earnest says to Marshall, explaining how the reparations shed light on the lie that his family was self-made.Maybe its only right, he says.

But Marshall doesnt agree. Im being fucked by some shit I didnt even do, he insists, saying neither of them deserves this.What do they deserve? Earnest replies. For them, slavery is not past It is not a mystery. It is not a historical curiosity. It is a cruel unavoidable ghost, he says, and its here that the central tenet of the episode is made clear.

It would be easy to write off the episode as an oversimplified thought experiment. In the final sequence, Marshall is working as a waiter and paying a portion of his wage to restitution taxes, which doesnt offer acknowledgement of how mass individual reparations claims would complicate existing systems of debt. Indeed it would be almost unreasonable for any episode to achieve such an explanation in 30ish minutes.

Instead, The Big Payback very specifically illustrates the white reactionary pushback against reparations.

Instead, The Big Payback very specifically illustrates the white reactionary pushback against reparations. And most importantly, the episode uses the voices of white people to explain exactly why such pushback is just another example of entitlement. When Earnest combats Marshalls resentment at having to pay Shoniqua with the simple question, and what do they deserve? he reminds Marshall andthe Atlantaaudience that reparations are compensation for unimaginable undeserved harm and ongoing disenfranchisement of Black people.

Atlanta has a large audience that includes white folks like Marshall Jackson who dont think of themselves as racist on a day-to-day basis. People who, nevertheless, would still likely baulk at the prospect of paying reparations and actually reckoning with the ramifications of slavery. This episode of Atlanta is for those people. It is taking the hands of those who believe theyre removed from a nebulous history and shows them that, regardless of their day-to-day beliefs, those hands are bloodied.

The Big Payback makes a show of white guilt, fragility and entitlement, portraying almost bombastically how Black folks claiming reparations would feel like horror for white people. But then, from white peoples own mouths, reminds audiences that the real horror is why reparations are owed in the first place.

Atlanta is streaming on SBS on Demand.

Merryana Salem (they/them) is a proud Wonnarua and LebaneseAustralian writer, critic, teacher and podcaster on most social media as@akajustmerry. If you want, check out their podcast,GayV Clubwhere they yarn about LGBTIQ media. Either way, they hope you ate something nice today.

The rest is here:

'Atlanta' Reminds Viewers Why Reparations For Slavery Are Overdue - Junkee

Workers at five Connecticut nursing homes threaten April 22 strike – Yahoo News

Posted on by

Nearly 450 workers at five nursing homes in Hartford, Rocky Hill, West Hartford, Bloomfield and Windsor will begin a strike April 22 to resolve what they describe as unfair labor practices, their union announced Tuesday.

Many of the caregivers, dietary, housekeeping and laundry workers we represent have received poverty-level wages, have spent weeks or days without pay, and have worked in some cases 16 hours a day for weeks on end, said Jesse Martin, vice president of SEIU District 1199 New England.

The union announced that its membership had overwhelmingly authorized a strike for April 22 starting at 6 a.m. at Bloomfield Health Care Center, Hebrew Center for Health & Rehabilitation in West Hartford, Maple View Health and Rehabilitation Center in Rocky Hill, Windsor Health and Rehabilitation Center and Avery Heights Senior Living in Hartford.

These employers have committed significant violations of federal labor law, Martin said. In one case at Windsor Rehab, they hired unlicensed staff, required them to work for two to three weeks without wages in exchange for the employer possibly taking the CNA licensure this is modern day slavery.

The union said those nursing homes are also among the last stragglers to reach new labor contracts; it said it has successfully negotiated multi-year agreements with about 90 percent of Connecticuts nursing homes.

It wants minimum wages of $20 for certified nursing assistants, $18.50 for other workers, more affordable health insurance, retirement and pension contributions, and what it called measures to address racial discrimination.

National Health Care Associates, which owns the nursing homes in Rocky Hill, West Hartford and Bloomfield, countered that it has been bargaining in good faith all along.

The company has agreed to increases of 15.5 percent to 20.5 percent for minimum wage employees starting next summer, and a 4.5 percent raise for anyone earning more than minimum wage, it said.

Story continues

We also have committed to using monies from the state to fund a defined contribution employer pension plan, and to make improvements to the health plan and/or make it more affordable, spokeswoman Christina Fleming said in a written statement.

By contrast, the union made an initial proposal on Feb. 21 and, with one exception, has not modified its position, Fleming said.

National Health Care will continue negotiating and believes a strike isnt the right answer, she said, but added it is doing everything necessary to limit disruption to our residents and ensure patient care is in no way affected.

At Avery Heights, Administrator Bill Thompson offered a similar response.

We will continue to negotiate in good faith in hopes of reaching a settlement that is fair and equitable to the team members represented by NEHCEU, he wrote. If no agreement can be reached before the April 22nd deadline, Avery Heights will continue to ensure the ongoing care, safety and wellbeing of our residents.

Windsor Health and Rehabilitation did not respond to a message Tuesday.

The union said its members have filed grievances and that at least 10 National Labor Relations Board complaints are pending, but claimed it must strike to prevent further losses to workers.

It said some members have been threatened and harassed for union membership, and that some of the nursing homes have refused to pay new employees for their first two or three weeks of work.

As part of a COVID 19 mitigation package, the companies all received state aid to help pay workers - but some have refused to spend it even while theyre shortchanging employees, Martin said. He said the union is concerned that when the state department of social services audits those grants, it will reclaim the money and the workers will never get what theyre owed.

Several certified nursing assistants from the homes attended the morning press conferences at 1199s Hartford office, and told of long-time workers still making substandard wages - despite the demands of the pandemic and the shortage of health care workers.

We have worked consistently and are tremendously tired through the COVID (pandemic). We should be paid fairly for the work we have done and are still doing, said Annamaria Parsons, a CNA at Avery Heights. The boss is making lots of money and doesnt want to share.

Yvonne Foster said she has worked at Windsor Health for 21 years and still doesnt make $20 an hour, has no retirement account and cant afford health insurance.

Marcia Armstrong, a CNA at Bloomfield Health, said coworkers whove put in 30 and 40 years are being treated unfairly, and accused her employer of making promises that go unfulfilled.

Weve been told for two years that were essential, yet I still cant pay my bills or afford health care with the low wages Im being paid, Nadine Lawrence, a CNA at Bloomfield Health Care Center, in a statement. Im at my breaking point.

See original here:

Workers at five Connecticut nursing homes threaten April 22 strike - Yahoo News