Black Crack In Iran

Creating an accurate picture of daily life in Iran is a difficult endeavor. Due to strict religious and moral codes, even photographing a woman inside her home without a scarf covering her head is all but impossible. Evidence of the censure of media in Iran has always been visible to Western nations, and has been brought to the forefront in the wake of the recent elections held there. But, Tehran has a drug problem. On the streets, in back alleys, and in small, crumbling, low-cost apartments, Iranian crack addicts are finding their fix in steadily rising numbers. The crack-a term used to describe many types of crystallized narcotics-currently flooding the streets of Tehran is different from that found in the West in a significant way: the "black crack" in Iran is made from heroin, not cocaine. Intent on documenting the plight of these masses of addicts, Aslon Arfa struck out into the underbelly of modern Tehran, camera in tow. The results of his mission, compiled here in Black Crack in Iran, are devastating images of men and women in the midst of a downfall. Some, including a young man with glazed eyes and infected burns stretching across his torso, are closer to the bottom than others. Further complicating the documentation of the epidemic are the shame of addiction, the misunderstanding and disapproval of drug use by outsiders, and the lack of trust from suffering people whose sickness is also a crime punishable by death. Yet, after months spent in the trenches, Arfa has succeeded in bringing the closed-door activities of Iran's most unseemly citizens to light in Black Crack in Iran.

In Misagh Parsa’s view, the outlook for democracy in Iran is stark. Gradual reforms will not be sufficient for real change: the government must fundamentally rethink its commitment to the role of religion in politics and civic life. For Iran to democratize, the options are narrowing to a single path: another revolution.

Many Americans believe that their own government is guilty of shocking crimes. Government agents shot the president. They faked the moon landing. They stood by and allowed the murders of 2,400 servicemen in Hawaii. Although paranoia has been a feature of the American scene since the birth of the Republic, in Real Enemies Kathryn Olmsted shows that it was only in the twentieth century that strange and unlikely conspiracy theories became central to American politics. In particular, she posits World War I as a critical turning point and shows that as the federal bureaucracy expanded, Americans grew more fearful of the government itself--the military, the intelligence community, and even the President. Analyzing the wide-spread suspicions surrounding such events as Pearl Harbor, the JFK assassination, Watergate, and 9/11, Olmsted sheds light on why so many Americans believe that their government conspires against them, why more people believe these theories over time, and how real conspiracies--such as the infamous Northwoods plan--have fueled our paranoia about the governments we ourselves elect. This 10th Anniversary Edition includes a new epilogue on conspiracy theories and the 2016 election and its aftermath.

Major Motion Picture based on Dark Alliance and starring Jeremy Renner, "Kill the Messenger," to be be released in Fall 2014 In August 1996, Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Gary Webb stunned the world with a series of articles in the San Jose Mercury News reporting the results of his year-long investigation into the roots of the crack cocaine epidemic in America, specifically in Los Angeles. The series, titled “Dark Alliance,” revealed that for the better part of a decade, a Bay Area drug ring sold tons of cocaine to Los Angeles street gangs and funneled millions in drug profits to the CIA-backed Nicaraguan Contras. Gary Webb pushed his investigation even further in his book, Dark Alliance: The CIA, The Contras, and the Crack Cocaine Explosion. Drawing from then newly declassified documents, undercover DEA audio and videotapes that had never been publicly released, federal court testimony, and interviews, Webb demonstrates how our government knowingly allowed massive amounts of drugs and money to change hands at the expense of our communities. Webb’s own stranger-than-fiction experience is also woven into the book. His excoriation by the media—not because of any wrongdoing on his part, but by an insidious process of innuendo and suggestion that in effect blamed Webb for the implications of the story—had been all but predicted. Webb was warned off doing a CIA expose by a former Associated Press journalist who lost his job when, years before, he had stumbled onto the germ of the “Dark Alliance” story. And though Internal investigations by both the CIA and the Justice Department eventually vindicated Webb, he had by then been pushed out of the Mercury News and gone to work for the California State Legislature Task Force on Government Oversight. He died in 2004.

Black men in general and specifically in America are survivors. In the twenty-first century, strategies are needed to overcome the petulant and devious psychosocial racist hurdles yet remaining. A guide or handbook employs the "how to" in recognizing obstacles and the steps required to circumvent and overcome them. Black men must begin assuming responsibility and accountability for the chains of stagnation—spiritually, socially, psychologically—some are bound by. Black men have proven we can survive and thrive. But there yet remain many who need the assistance and how-to instructions and encouragement that this book enlists. Quoting the Bible, the sacrosanct word of God, God's word will not return unto him void of the purpose for which He sent it. He sent His Son, now it's time he sent you, survivor. Rise up, black man.

DE-MISEDUCATION is the culmination of eight years of research that sought to focus on objectivity while balancing breath and conciseness. Its focus is on black America as a people and as a part of greater America. It begins with the Black Golden Age (just after the start of WWII) and explores the civil rights movement from several optics, the black militancy era, the decline of the black family, cocaine America, crack and incarceration nation with reference made to the CIA and the DEA, the schism between the black male and female, the Tuskegee Airmen, the ladies of NASA and Hidden Figures, the destruction of the black family, the great exodus of blacks out of the ghetto, the plight of fatherless boys and much, much more. The work ends with proposals and prognostications for the future of blacks in America. There is a very strong analysis of the 1960's, especially 1968--America's most volatile year ever. Those having come of age in the 60's will have many a remembrance; those who were socially active in the 60's will have never-to-be-forgotten memories.

In Revolutionary Iran, Michael Axworthy offers a richly textured and authoritative history of Iran from the 1979 revolution to the present.