By Bryant Harris WASHINGTON (IPS) — Seventy-five economists, including seven Nobel Prize laureates, sent an open letter to President Barack Obama and the U.S. Congress on Tuesday, urging them to raise the federal minimum wage.The same day, the president formally endorsed legislation that would incrementally raise the minimum wage to 10.10 dollars by 2016."When you’re […]

By Gareth Porter WASHINGTON (IPS) — Criticism in the memoirs of former secretary of defense Robert M. Gates of President Barack Obama’s lack of commitment to the Afghan War strategy of his administration has generated a Washington debate about whether Obama was sufficiently supportive of the war.But the Gates account omits two crucial historical facts […]

By Jesse L. Jackson, Sr. The 50th anniversary of Lyndon Johnson’s declaration of a war on poverty brought long overdue attention to his commitment. Today, with one in five children in America still raised in poverty, an accounting is vital as part of a renewed commitment.But largely absent from the debate around the war on […]

By Lee A. Daniels Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. hasn’t been this alive since 1968.He’s no longer that visually distant, two-dimensional figure, limited to speaking a single sentence taken out of context and shorn of its true meaning. Instead, the honest scholarship and media commentary considering what King faced and what he did have broken […]

By George E. Curry, NNPA Editor-in-Chief  PRETORIA, South Africa (NNPA) — A month after his death, there is a bitter struggle to define —and, in many instances, re-define — the legacy of Nelson Mandela, South Africa’s first democratically elected president.“There is an attempt to do in his death what they could not do in life […]

By Jim Lobe  WASHINGTON (IPS) — If U.S. President Barack Obama conceived his foreign policy prospects for 2014 as a popular child’s board game, the snakes he will have to jump over significantly outnumber the ladders that can propel him to success.As they have since he took office five years ago, the most dangerous “snakes” […]

By Freddie Allen, NNPA Washington Correspondent WASHINGTON (NNPA) –The downturn in the economy and a lack of local resources have forced more Americans to live under bridges, in their cars and on the couches of other family members, according to a recent report on hunger and homelessness.The 25-city survey, conducted by the United States Conference […]

By Carey L. Biron WASHINGTON  (IPS) – The U.S. wind industry looks set to enter a period of uncertainty, with an important government subsidy expiring at the end of the month and no clear plan for lawmakers to work towards an extension.Because of the way the subsidy, known as the wind production tax credit (PTC), […]

By Jazelle Hunt, Washington Correspondent WASHINGTON (NNPA) —Nearly three decades ago, a handful of prominent Black activists began organizing a movement that would eventually help break the back of apartheid in South Africa and force the U.S. government and American companies to end their support of White minority rule on the continent.What was called  the […]

By Carey L. Biron WASHINGTON (IPS) —The U.S. Congress is being urged to pass “urgent” legislation that would make issues of violence against women and girls a key focus in all U.S. diplomatic efforts.The last such proposal, in 2010, was voted down on conservative concerns. But on Thursday lawmakers, activists and development workers kicked off […]