Portside

Science nowadays often starts from the assumption of continuity between humans and animals, while shifting the burden of proof to those who insist on differences. Anyone who asks me to believe that a tickled ape, who almost chokes on his hoarse giggles, is in a different state of mind than a tickled human child has his work cut out for him.

Branch Rickey certainly deserves credit for confronting his fellow owners and their racist attitudes by signing Jackie Robinson and, in doing so, advancing the cause of civil rights. However, there is more to this story than Rickey and Robinson. In fact, the desegregation of baseball came after a decade-long campaign by black and left wing journalists and activists.

After Occupy in 2011, and the wave of fast-food strikes the following year in New York City, the movement to raise wages took a new turn and a bolder stance: $15 an hour and a union. When the campaign first began, that pay demand seemed like a pipe dream. Yet the call for $15 resonated. Now, the movement has scored victories in two of the biggest states in the country.

Bernie Sanders delivered one of his most sweeping indictments of modern capitalism and unchecked market forces on Friday at an address at the Vatican. He called for a focus on "the common good" as a moral imperative, drawing on the teachings of the Catholic Church for insights into the plight of the most vulnerable members of society.

Berning Ted and Donald on 'NY Values.' Burning Issues: The Money Hidden In Shell Companies. Street Music | Hotel California. The Dirtiest Trade Deal And What's In It. "Because I’m Latino, I can’t have money?" Kids on Race.

Reader Comments: Panama Papers fallout; Controversy over whites as part of the working class; Mine Safety and Blankenship Jail Sentence; Minimum wage hikes discussion; Bernie and labor, Wisconsin victory; Wall Street and Glass-Steagall; Hillary and labor, Wall Street and fracking; Pope Francis; Announcements: Gerald Horne book signings - Baltimore, Washington and New York; China Labor Relations; Communists in the Civil Rights Movement

It is no exaggeration to suggest that the legitimacy not only of President Jacob Zuma and the ANC, but also the notion of the liberation struggle itself is in shreds. For some of us, it was unthinkable that such an alliance of forces could degenerate into a moneymaking, lawless and violent operation represented by people who were prepared to trample on the values that we understood the movement to embody. Certainly, this did not happen overnight.

With Bernie in the USA, Corbyn in Britain and various kinds of leftist opposition in Ireland, Spain and Portugal, resistance to billionaire-led governments has been growing, most dramatically last year in Greece until German "austerity" smashed it (though perhaps not permanently). Germany already has the LINKE party, with 64 seats in the Bundestag (out of 630). But it has failed to fill that gap of anger, worry and distrust among working people...

I stand against the government's saber-rattling, against ruling over and harming a civil population. It's important to me to say: No more! I'm not willing to take part in that. I want to represent a different path, to show that there's a choice and that it's possible to resist. Through my refusal I choose to represent a path of solidarity and peace, and I believe this path will create a more secure life for us all.

Paul Krugman is not a Political Scientist. Krugman's "brand" is that he is a "brilliant, Nobel Prize winning economist." In fact, much of his early research was brilliant; and, to be sure, Krugman did win the Nobel Prize. BUT, the misleading discussion of economics contained in his piece, "Sanders Over the Edge" does raise this question in my mind: Is Paul Krugman still qualified to write an economics opinion column for the New York Times?