Portside

Given the pressing worldwide realities of disinvestment, land grabbing, rent increases, evictions and displacement; a class analysis applied to housing and urban issues is more urgent than ever. Gentrification is the neighborhood expression of class inequality. Its positives are only felt by those who profit from the loss of housing opportunities of others. And there is nothing remotely natural about it.

Hundreds of Public Defenders from Alameda, Contra Costa, San Francisco, Santa Clara and Solano counties held unprecedented Black Lives Matter protests at their county courthouses December 18th. They demanded body cameras for officers; the investigation of police-involved shootings by outside agencies, not District Attorneys; and no grand juries for police-involved shootings. “We need those three things,”Alameda County Public Defender Brendon Woods said.

Colbert once described his character as a "well-intentioned, poorly informed, high-status idiot." Colbert has resonated because Fox News is currently filled with closed-minded millionaire hosts who perfectly mirror the buffoonery Colbert projects every week.

A coordinated campaign by the Motion Picture Association of America follows a trend of lobbyists funneling money and gifts to state attorneys general, who are subject to fewer restrictions and disclosure requirements than elected officials at the national level. Google is the target today, but the real target is the open Internet, which depends on free and uncensored platforms to survive.

Exercise, a new study finds, changes the shape and functioning of our genes, an important stop on the way to improved health and fitness. More than 5,000 sites on the genome of muscle cells are altered by exercise.

Is this the beginning of the end of the road for the sometimes semi-official US belief that Cuba is really Washington’s?

Millions March NYC (Time Lapse). Best of the Colbert Report. Stormscapes 2. Samuel L Jackson: 'Call Out Racist Police Violence.' Top 10 Cutest Animals of Science of 2014.

Last chance! This is your last chance to respond to Portside's 2014 fund appeal. We won't ask again this year, and we won't ask again for another year. During that time we'll be working hard to keep you informed and to empower you with the most insightful, entertaining and challenging news, analyses and debates that we can find. Please do help us to keep it coming.

Reader Comments: Congress Plots to Undermine Retiree Pensions; Is It Bad Enough Yet?; Angela Davis: the unbroken line of police violence; James Baldwin on Racism; LAWCHA's Teacher/Public Sector Initiative; #BlackLivesMatter Takes the Field; They Fear and The Kill; Thousands March to Protest Police Brutality; Torture - Senate Report, Lessons from Latin America; Trade; Chanukah 2014; CELEBRATING CHARLIE HADEN memorial and celebration of his life - New York - Jan. 13

Yesterday Vermont Gov. Peter Shumlin declared "now is not the right time" to proceed with any fundamental overhaul of health care financing and delivery in Vermont. He claimed the latest cost estimates for what's known locally as Green Mountain Care (GMC) were higher than originally projected, in a period when "slower recovery from the great recession has tightened the state budget. What Shumlin has championed for nearly five years was "just not affordable" anymore.