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This week on Uprising:

* Burma’s Aung San Suu Kyi Facing Trumped-Up Charges
* Empire Notes on Obama’s War
* New Efforts to Expand American Sick and Vacation Leave
* Black Agenda Report on Torture Lawyers and Disbarment
* Book of Rhymes: The Poetics of Hip Hop

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Burma’s Aung San Suu Kyi Facing Trumped-Up Charges

Nobel Prize Laureate and Prime Minister-Elect of Burma, Aung San Suu Kyi was on Thursday just two weeks before her current house arrest was due to expire. The arrest was apparently prompted by what the ruling military junta considers a violation of her house arrest as a result of an American man swimming across the lake near her house and entering her house. Taken to the notorious and squalid Insein prison Suu Kyi faces a secret trial today on what are considered trumped up charges aimed at keeping her under lock and key to ensure the junta’s election victory in 2010. Daughter of the martyred Burmese hero who gained the country’s independence, Aung San Suu Kyi led the National League for Democracy and in a 1990 election won a landslide victory. The military junta refused to hand over power, changed the name of Burma to Myanmar and placed Suu Kyi under house arrest. They have repeatedly extended her detention for a total of more than 14 of the last 20 years. Known to everyone in Burma as The Lady, Suu Kyi has been charged with subversion of government and faces three to five years in prison. Overnight visitors are illegal in Myanmar and the American who swam across the lake in his second attempt to visit with Suu Kyi, has also been charged. President Barack Obama extended US sanctions against Burma for another year.

GUEST: Jeremy Woodrum, Director of the US Campaign for Burma

For more information, visit www.aappb.org, and www.uscampaignforburma.org.

Empire Notes on Obama’s War

Empire Notes are weekly commentaries filed by Rahul Mahajan, author of Full Spectrum Dominance and The New Crusade. Today’s commentary is about Obama’s War.

GUEST: Rahul Mahajan, author of Full Spectrum Dominance and The New Crusade.

Visit www.empirenotes.org for more information.

New Efforts to Expand American Sick and Vacation Leave

During the recent scare over Swine Flu, working Americans were encouraged to stay at home to rest and recover from illness. But it is estimated that “at least 20 million Americans go to work sick because of a lack of paid sick leave.” A new study by the Center for Economic and Policy Research found that the United States is the only nation out of the 22 rich countries without a national policy that guarantees paid sick days and leave for its workers. Low-income workers in particular, are affected disproportionately when absent from work, as they fear losing wages or their job itself when taking time off to take care of their health. In California, a bill was introduced into the Assembly earlier this month, mandating at least 72 hours of paid sick leave for all workers whose companies employ 10 or more staff. A similar bill was introduced on the Federal level called the Healthy Families Act. Meanwhile Congressman Alan Grayson of Florida plans to introduce the Paid Vacation Act of 2009, this Thursday. The first paid vacation bill in U.S. history was announced at a news conference in Washington D.C. If passed, the bill will at minimum “require one week of paid vacation for employees of companies with at least 100 employees” after one year on the job.

GUESTS: Jody Heymann, Director of the Institute for Health and Social Policy at McGill University, lead author of the report Contagion Nation: A Comparison of Paid Sick Day Policies in 22 Countries, John De Graaf, Executive Director of the Take Back Your Time.

For more information, visit www.cepr.net, www.mcgill.ca/ihsp, www.timeday.org, www.right2vacation.org.

Black Agenda Report on Torture Lawyers and Disbarment

The Poetics of Hip Hop

An editor of a popular Canadian hip hop website called for a ban last week of rapper Cam’Ron’s new “comeback” album saying that his lyrics glorify violence. The editor of Hiphossip.com, singled out the song, “I Hate My Job” off therapper’s latest record entitled, “Crime Pays,” in urging the Best Buy store chain not to carry the title and has also call for Canadian immigration officials not to allow Cam’Ron into the country for any potential tour dates. This recent controversy over rap and its lyrics has been an ever present one for much of hip hop’s history. However, a new scholarly work by Adam Bradley, an assistant professor of Literature at Claremont McKenna College, is challenging the conventional conversation by appraising hip hop lyrics as a revolutionary innovation in contemporary poetry. “Book of Rhymes: The Poetics of Hip Hop,” analyzes rap though its rhymes, similes, storytelling, and wordplay in constructing the argument that the genre has changed a generation’s relationship to the spoken word. Dr. Cornel West has called Bradley’s work, “a marvelous exploration into the poetic genius of rap and the cultural gravity of hip hop. His analysis is subtle, sophisticated and soulful!”

GUEST: Adam Bradley, author of “Book of Rhymes: The Poetics of Hip Hop,” assistant professor of Literature at Claremont McKenna College.

Sonali’s Subversive Thought for the Day:

“Music and rhythm find their way into the secret places of the soul.” — Plato