Thursday, April 9 at 7:00 p.m.
at 5 State Street, Montpelier, VT
Author John Potash will be speaking about his new book, "The FBI War on Tupac Shakur and Black Leaders" (AK Press, 2008). Potash chronicles the use of COINTELPRO-style tactics by the FBI against a generation of political rap artists. Based on twelve years of research, the book contains over nine hundred endnotes, more than one hundred interviews, FOIA-released CIA and FBI documents, court transcripts, and sources from numerous mainstream media outlets to present evidence that U.S. intelligence employed similar tactics to assassinate Tupac Shakur, Robert F. Kennedy, environmentalist Judi Bari, and Filberto Ojeda Rios.
With a decade of activism behind him, John earned a masters in social work in 1998 at Columbia University, where he concentrated in community organizing. He was founding publisher/editor of "Social Justice Action Quarterly," a national social work school newspaper that lasted four years and won four honors in the Campus Alternative Journalism Awards. He also received a certification in acupuncture drug treatment at Mutulu Shakur's former clinic, Lincoln Detox, in the Bronx. While mostly working as an addictions counselor, he has published articles (in "Z," "Covert Action," and the "Baltimore Chronicle"), poems, and short stories, and is currently working on a political novel with some research that overlaps this book.
For more information, see:
http://www.fbiwarontupac.com