Portside

But if AJAM gave us one thing in its brief life in the United States, it was a dedication to covering economic inequality and the growing opposition to it in the wake of Occupy Wall Street.

Last month a majority of Republicans said they would rather see their habitat destroyed by rising sea levels than agree with President Obama.

Candidates can get easy applause by lambasting journalists. Nevertheless, as a scholar concerned with the critical functions journalism fulfills in a democracy, the author argues that the highest imperative for journalists is to serve the needs of audiences and the democratic process for critical information. Journalists moderating presidential debates must function as journalists.

Despite the widespread use of the scanners, the amount of contraband found is low. Some school officials believe the daily security checks actually lead to behavior problems among the students. The metal detectors send a message to the students, says one principal, that “we don’t trust you. And even if we trusted you, we don’t necessarily trust the guy behind you.” That message, she said, runs counter to what her school is trying to teach and “it’s alienating.”

Perhaps more important than Sanders’s gain in the polls is how it happened: by patiently hammering on his message, regardless of what other candidates said.

Get Up Stand Up | Live in Brazil. The Legend of Bernie Sanders. Fortunate Son -- Creedence Clearwater Revival. The Great Of The Union. Oscars' Voting Is Biased Toward Bland Movies.

Reader Comments: Deportations and Anti-Latino Racism; Flint Poisonings - Ordered by Gob. Snyder; Attack on Public Sector Unions; Bernie; Oregon; Support BDS; Susan Sarandon Supports Bernie; Help Support UAW Local 2865, which democratically voted to endorse the BDS campaign; Robert Rhodes; Speaking Out Against the Madness - Ruth Horowitz; Concussions? - Drink Chocolate Milk; Lots of announcements - Lafayette (IN); New York; Washington, DC; activist scholarships...

The Portside moderators send our heartfelt thanks to our readers, for coming through in response to our annual appeal! We don't do a lot of fundraising -- just this annual appeal. We are grateful, and gratified, that the response allows us to keep to this bare minimum. Again, many thanks from the left side of the ship - the portside. Full speed ahead in the new year.

Pete Seeger, folk singer and activist for peace, civil rights, labor rights and the environment, left us just two years ago - January 27, 2014. Recently, Seeger's FBI file has been released. Included in the file is Pete's correspondence with Victor Grossman. The Editors of The Volunteer, founded by the Veterans of the Abraham Lincoln Brigade, asked Grossman if he had any recollections of Pete's visit to East Berlin in 1967. Here's his story.

The Working Families Party has pushed the political debate to the left in the states where it's already active. Now-in the era of Occupy and Bernie Sanders-it's ready to take that fight nationwide. The WFP's agenda-frankly redistributionist and devoted to social equality-targets a class of Democratic elected officials who, in the view of many liberals, seem to listen more to their moneyed donors than to the left-wing rank and file.