Welcome to this episode of the award winning Best of Left Podcast.

James Baldwin's 100th birthday passed by recently and reusing the occasion to draw on his moral clarity and eloquence while we assess the state of race in America.

Sources providing our top takes in about 50 minutes today include 1A, throughline Democracy Now, the Tom Hartman program, Woke

AF Daily, the majority report, and a speech by Corey Bush. Then in the

additional deeper dives half to show there will be more

on Baldwin the Writer, Race in America, The White Lie, and Global Connections. and global connections. James Baldwin is one of the most celebrated American writers of the 20th century.

He wrote novels, essays, short stories, poetry, even

a screenplay. He's best known for his affecting prose, his depth of thought, and his clear

moral vision for the country. He was also a bit of a character.

In interviews he's often smoking a cigarette with his legs crossed, casually calling

the interviewer baby with a grin. But Baldwin is perhaps best known for his philosophies on race.

I don't believe in white people. I don't believe in black people either for that matter.

But I know the difference between being

black and white at this time. It means that I cannot fool myself about some things, but

I could fool myself about if I were white.

As an openly gay man, Baldwin spoke about sexuality in a time when it was unheard of for

many black men to do so.

Homosexual is not a noun. It might be a perb transitive. It is certainly an adjective that it is not a noun.

You ask the question means you don't know anything about

human experience, where it can take you, what it can do.

Nearly 40 years after his death,

much of what he had to say about the U.S. continues to resonate.

...