Column Archive

The Fight to Save Stan Tookie Williams

Jim Brown: NFL hall of famer actor activist. He has mediated truces between the toughest gangs in Los Angeles and fought racism from South Central to Soweto. But today he is involved in a different kind of fight: the race to save Stan Tookie Williams, who now awaits execution on California's death row. Williams is due to be executed December 13, and Brown has linked arms with a motley crew of activists from Archbishop Desmond Tutu to hip-hop artist Snoop Dogg demanding that Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger spare his life. Schwarzenegger, who has set a clemency hearing for December 8, recently told reporters he is "dreading" the decision he is about to make.

The Champ Meets the Chump

When George W. Bush met Muhammad Ali at the White House last week, the Champ had one last rope-a-dope up his sleeve. You don't have to guess who won this match.

The Soccer Star and the President

If there were a Mount Rushmore of international soccer, Diego Maradona

Sheryl Swoopes - Out of the Closet And Onto The Court

What

How Major League Baseball Strip-mines the Dominican Republic

This piece is in the November 14, 2005 issue of the Nation magazine with the title 'Say It Ain't So, Big Leagues.'

When Fists are Frozen: The Statue of Tommie Smith and John Carlos

Trepidation should be our first impulse when we hear that radical heroes are to be immortalized in fixed poses of bloodless nostalgia.

The Meeting That Never Was: Pat Tillman and Noam

Barry Bonds Laughs Last

Etan Thomas Electrifies Anti-War Washington

Every generation the wide world of corporate sports produces an athlete with the iron resolve and moral urgency to step off their pedestal and join the fight for social justice. A century ago, it was boxer Jack Johnson, flaunting, as WEB DuBois put it,

Redeeming the Olympic Martyrs of 1968

Opening Graph: On October 2, 1968, right before the start of the games, Mexican Security police murdered as many as 400 students and workers at La Plaza de las Tres Culturas in Tlatelolco, Mexico City. Today we remember that violent echo of 1968. We remember those put down like dogs for the crime of peaceful assembly. We can remember at long last, without tears, because of news Monday that a measure of closure may finally be coming for the families that have waged a 37-year quest for truth, justice, and a pound of flesh.