Those are the words of Chokwe Antar Lumumba, the mayor-elect of Jackson, Mississippi, and my new hero.

"This is Chokwe Antar Lumumba celebrating his general election victory with supporters."

MAYOR-ELECT CHOKWE ANTAR LUMUMBA: Free the land!
SUPPORTERS: Free the land!
MAYOR-ELECT CHOKWE ANTAR LUMUMBA: Free the land!
SUPPORTERS: Free the land!
MAYOR-ELECT CHOKWE ANTAR LUMUMBA: By any means necessary. I need you to stand strong as we go forward. There are people who doubt your resolve, doubt that this city can be everything that it will be. And so, you can’t give up now. I say, when I become mayor, you become mayor. So that means y’all got some work to do.

And speaking, "just a few weeks ago, at the People’s Summit in Chicago."

MAYOR-ELECT CHOKWE ANTAR LUMUMBA: I bring greetings from Jackson, Mississippi, where I have recently been named mayor-elect of Jackson, Mississippi. In this process, we defeated a field of 16 people. We were able to secure the general election with 94 percent of the vote. And more important than that, we did so on a people’s platform, on a people’s platform where, from the moment we announced, we did so saying that we were running on an agenda of social justice, of economic democracy and—and working with people, making certain that people had a voice. And that’s our story, and we’re sticking to it.

(Emphasis added.)

There is a new article about Chokwe Antar Lumumba at DemocracyNow: Jackson, Miss. Mayor-elect Chokwe Lumumba: I Plan to Build the "Most Radical City on the Planet", that I find somewhat disappointing. (So don't visit the DemocracyNow article, there's better stuff coming up.) Coinciding with my deteriorating view of DemocracyNow, and the writers there, is my deteriorating view of Amy Goodman.

Goodman manages to ask about where this black man's name comes from, and talk about the prestige of hobnobbing at the Peoples Summit, where she met Lumumba, and asked about immigrants, and police violence, all click bait quality questions and comments, but there is no mention in her interview of cooperatives, worker ownership, democratically self-made enterprises, democracy at work, equitable distribution of income, or any of the dozens of other features and ethics of Lumumba that make him my hero. Ms. Goodman does not seem in the least bit interested in democracy or economics, just more of the horse-race politics BS, exactly what is afflicting this nation in the first place. (Oh, Goodman and DemocracyNow probably don't even consider democracy at work as actual democracy, while I feel that is where democracy will build its base, because just voting every now and then isn't democracy, Lumumba wants us to live and breath democracy on a daily basis.)

The Chokwe Lumumba Center for Economic Democracy and Development is named for Chokwe Antar Lumumba's father and previous Mayor of Jackson. The elder Chokwe Lumumba understood that equitable economics underlies actual democracy, that the concepts are intertwined. To work at an authoritarian, hierarchical, corporation, benefits only absentee shareholders and deprives the workers human dignity. Building worker owned cooperatives is Lumumba's reason for stating Jckson will be radical, he wants to mount a frontal assault on capitalism, and absentee shareholders extracting wealth from the community, wealth that was created there in the community. (Cooperation Jackson will hold its next meeting at the Chokwe Lumumba Center for Economic Democracy and Development on Saturday, May 6th at 2 pm.)

So, while the article is a month old, I would suggest an article over at the Nation, Meet the Radical Workers Cooperative Growing in the Heart of the Deep South, (subtitled Cooperation Jackson is trying to build an alternative economy for the city’s majority-black residents) if you want a bit of background on the work being done in Jackson, or a short article over at The Progressive, In the Belly of the Beast: Economic Self-Determination in Mississippi, with Chokwe Antar Lumumba.

'In the Belly of the Beast.' I like that.
'Economic Self-Determination'. I would like that even more. That would be radical! That would be democracy!

By any means necessary. Power to the people. ... Ahhh, they're calling my tune ...

"Beg, Steal or Borrow" - Ray LaMontagne
[video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R_kuywKxKcM]

So your home town's bringing you down
Are ya drowning in the small talk and the chatter
Or you gonna step into line like your daddy done
Punching the time and climbing life's long ladder

You've been howling at the moon like a slack jawed fool
And breaking every rule they can throw on
But one of these days it's gonna be right soon
You'll find your legs and go and stay gone

Young man, full of big plans and thinking about tomorrow
Young man, going to make a stand
You beg, steal, you borrow
Ya beg, ya steal, ya borrow

Well all the friends that you knew in school
They used to be so cool now they just bore you
Well look at them now, already pulling the plow
So quick to take to grain like some old mule

Young man, full of big plans and thinking about tomorrow
Young man, going to make a stand
You beg, steal, you borrow
You beg, you steal, you borrow

Dreaming of the day
You're gonna pack your bags
Put the miles away
Oh, just grab your girl and go
Where no one knows you
What will all the old folks say?

So the home town's bringing you down
Are you drowning in the small talk and the chatter?
Or you gonna step into line like your daddy done
Punching the time and climbing life's long ladder

Young man, full of big plans and thinking about tomorrow
Young man, going to make a stand
You beg, steal, you borrow
You beg, you steal, you borrow