Portside

In advance of President Barack Obama’s historic visit to Cuba on March 20, there was speculation about whether he can pressure Cuba to improve its human rights. But a comparison of Cuba’s human rights record with that of the United States shows that the US should be taking lessons from Cuba.

The war on terror’s methods of mass surveillance and remote warfare are not unique. The US is also addicted to covert tools in its ‘war on drugs’, with disastrous consequences.

The savior; The gangster; The conservatives' nightmare; Facing the base; Speech rights defeat; Voting rights victory

It’s a hundred years since some 750 men and women threw up barricades and seized key locations in downtown Dublin. They would be joined by maybe 1,000 more. In six days it would be over, the post office in flames, the streets blackened by shell fire, and the rebellion’s leaders on their way to face firing squads against the walls of Kilmainham Jail. Yet this “failure” that would reverberate worldwide and be mirrored by colonial uprisings almost half a century later.

While the battle rages for the soul of the Republican Party, Frank sees Democrats in the throes of their own identity crisis. The one-time party of the working class has been co-opted by a hyper-educated elite, he argues in his just-published Listen Liberal.

Unlike Clinton, and all the Republican presidential candidates who spoke at AIPAC, Sanders called attention to Palestinian human rights issues. He said security meant “achieving self-determination, civil rights, and economic wellbeing for the Palestinian people.” Sanders also said peace meant ending the “occupation of Palestinian territory.”

Today’s terrorist attack in Brussels is an unspeakable tragedy, and the victims should never be forgotten. However, seeking vengeance through a militarized response will only create more terrorists.

Evelyn T. Butts and Joseph A. Jordan challenged Virginia's poll tax. The case made it to the US Supreme Court and in March 1966, Justices voted 6-3 to end the poll tax in all elections. Following the decision, African Americans were elected to state and local offices for the first time since Reconstruction.

This is not a problem that journalists or panel organizers can solve on their own. It has to be shared by the vast institutions that help create this problem in the first place, and are perhaps also better positioned to correct it.

Experiments in evolution are exploring what would happen if we rewound the tape of life.