In this episode of Voices from the Frontlines, Eric Mann talks with Jonah Raskin, a long-time comrade and friend, marijuana author and advocate. Raskin is a veteran of the Civil Rights Movement, the Ban the Bomb Movement, the environmental movements, the anti-imperialist movements. Eric and Jonah were both active with the Weather aboveground organization and discuss the lessons from their own perspective in support of Black Liberation and against the Vietnam War and U.S. imperialism. Jonah wrote “Out of the Whale: Growing up in the American Left and Eric wrote Comrade George: An Investigation into the Life, Political Thought, and Assassination of George Jackson.

Eric Mann also discusses the Bus Riders Union's organizing actions to stop the LA Metro Board's anti-Black proposal to expand the police budget by $110 million. Due to public pressure, led by the BRU, the MTA Board vote has been postponed until March 2021.

"We frame a lot of our work around two kind of framing slogans: We want the Social Welfare State, not the police state. We want the Climate Justice State, not the warfare state. And that allows us to deal with pretty much everything. Because the United States is a police state. It is a warfare state. And it is a climate criminal."

Support the Strategy Center's Campaign for Urban Reconstruction

1. FREE Public Transportation

2. STOP MTA Attacks on Black Passengers

3. NO Police on MTA Buses and Trains

4. NO Police in LAUSD Schools

5. NO Cars in LA

"We want a world without cars, without police pretty much. With a lot of Black and Latino people being able to breathe politically and biologically, as well.""