Portside

How ConocoPhillips overcame years of resistance from courts, native Alaskans, environmental groups and several federal agencies is the story of how Washington really works.

On December 17, 2014, the U.S. and Cuba announced the restoration of diplomatic relations, and the U.S. abandoned its 55-year effort at regime change through political isolation and economic sanctions. One year later, however, difficult questions regarding relations with Cuba remain unanswered and unaddressed. And how will relations be normalized when what has constituted “normal” for 200 years has been the presumption of U.S. entitlement to impose its will on Cuba?

Each case, in its own way, has demonstrated both the potential of electoral engagement and the limits of democratic control. The left is finally developing the strategic skills to gain office; it has yet to work out how to exercise power in the interests of those who put it there.

This paper was presented at "Color Revolution and Cultural Hegemony," the 6th World Socialism Forum in Beijing, China, October 16-7, 2015. "The best defense is an offence. We need to struggle against dictatorship ourselves -- the dictatorship of capital. To really fight against the color revolutions, we need a color revolution -- a color revolution of a different color. A red revolution. Remember that red is the primary color of the rainbow."

Bathtub manufacturer's new contract retains two tiers, but workers and union say fight achieved vital goal of reducing pay gap.

"Half of American voters say they'd be embarrassed to have Donald Trump as their Commander in Chief and most Americans think he doesn't have a good chance in November, but there he is still at the top of the Republican heap," said Tim Malloy, assistant director of the Quinnipiac University Poll. "Hillary Clinton tops him. Sen. Bernie Sanders hammers him and Sen. Ted Cruz is snapping at his heels.

A nasty and incurable fungus has spread through the banana-producing countries around the world, and it could be making its way straight toward banana heartland: Latin America, which produces 80 percent of the world's exports, threatening to drive the most popular variety of banana to extinction. So scientists are focusing on building a better banana to withstand the fungal assault.

After World War II, the Red Scare built the careers of redbaiters like Joe McCarthy and Richard Nixon while undermining the legacy of Franklin Roosevelt’s New Deal and stifling prospects for progressive politics in America, a tale touched on by the movie, “Trumbo.”

There’s no getting around the fact that climate change is a bummer. The planet is warming, ice is melting, oceans are acidifying and, well, you get the point. While the bad news is important — it lets us know what we’re getting into with this whole climate change thing — it’s also worth remembering there’s reason for hope.

Unlike most other countries, the United States doesn’t control drug prices. It leaves pricing up to the market, which enables drug companies to charge as much as the market will bear. So what, exactly, did Martin Shkreli do wrong, by the standards of today’s capitalism? It’s easy to go after bad guys, much harder to go after bad systems.