Portside

This week 35 Congressional Democrats demanded the Obama Administration act to protect children laboring on U.S. tobacco farms. The U.S. Representatives announced their support for a letter to Labor Secretary Thomas Perez September 23rd from U.S. Representatives David Cicilline (D-RI) and Matt Cartwright (D-PA), calling for the Department of Labor to close the loophole in U.S. labor law Labor which allows children over the age of 12 to work in tobacco fields.

A new report from Yesh Din, Volunteers for Human Rights, denounces the Israel Defense Force's (IDF) privatization of law enforcement in the occupied territories. The Israeli Human Rights group accuses the IDF of transferring the power to arrest, search, question, and detain West Bank Palestinians to settler militias "who are motivated by an aspiration to seize additional Palestinian land and who refuse to recognize Palestinian land rights.".

Complexity and uncertainty create extra difficulty for experts in explaining their results, and for non-experts in understanding them. Climate science is not sound bite science.

The Fed encourages its employees to keep their heads down, to obey their managers and to appease the banks. That is, bank regulators failed to do their jobs properly not because they lacked the tools but because they were discouraged from using them.

Over the past two seasons, 306 players have suffered a combined 323 concussions, according to team injury reports. As Concussion Watch kicks off for a third straight season, 15 players have already been added to the list for head injuries from the preseason and Week 1.

Researchers noted a correlation between clinical signs of metabolic disorder — such as increasing weight or decreasing efficiency of glucose metabolism — and consumption of artificial sweeteners. The findings could cause a headache for the food industry.

The Redskins' Name -- Catching Racism. Johnny Cash -- Hurt. Forward 13: Waking Up the American Dream. Emma Watson at United Nations: This Is Feminism. John Oliver: Miss America Pageant.

After more than a year of labor protests and strikes, eight major clothing brands committed this week to pay more for goods made in Cambodia in order to guarantee garment workers a higher wage. The eight clothing companies made their pledge on the eve of wage talks between the Cambodian government and the garment workers union scheduled for October. Cambodia's garment sector generates one-third of the country's gross national product.

Brazil's incumbent President Dilma Rousseff has regained a slight lead in her bid for re-election October 5, in one of the most important elections in the Western Hemisphere. Brazil's Workers Party, which has held the Presidency for 12 years, has implemented wide ranging reforms to benefit Brazil's poor. Former President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva served for two terms, and current President Rousseff is seeking election to her second term.

Reader Comments - People's Climate March, Greening of the Labor Movement, What Next; ISIS, Syria, Iraq, Muslim Fundamentalism; Ongoing War in Middle East; Elizabeth Warren and Israel; Theodore Roosevelt; Emmett Till, Michael Brown - Ongoing Struggle for Racial Justice; Guns and the Southern Freedom Struggle; Texas School Text Books; Military Weaponry in Schools - WTF?; Socialism, Worker Cooperatives; Today in History; Abraham Lincoln Brigade celebrations