Portside

Reviews of The Watchdog That Didn’t Bark: The Financial Crisis and the Disappearance of Investigative Journalism By Dean Starkman and The Divide: American Injustice in the Age of the Wealth Gap By Matt Taibbi.

Why does a millionaire mayor and a billionaire hedge fund CEO team up to attack public pensions? Because that's where the money is.

If the Supreme Court upholds a police officer's right to search your smartphone without a warrant, the door is opened to the use of arrests on petty offenses to justify fishing expeditions of those computers we carry in our pockets.

The leaders of AAAS and the Cuban Academy of Sciences have signed a landmark agreement to advance scientific cooperation by Cuban and U.S. scientists, in key areas of mutual interest to both countries.

A fun problem to work on before you take your child to see Spidey 2: Clearly it looks cool when Spider-Man swings around on his webs. However, does this really save him time?

A reader's response by Matthew Hallinan to "Neanderthals Were Not Less Intelligent Than Modern Humans, Scientists Find" read the original article at portside May 2, https://portside.org/2014-05-02/neanderthals-were-not-less-intelligent-modern-humans-scientists-find

The insurgents are convinced that all they need to do is to hold out for a certain time, and Russia will then come to their aid; if this does not take the form of direct military intervention, some other mechanism will be found. Unfortunately, every passing day since the beginning of the revolt has shown how illusory these hopes are.

Democracy is not only the right to vote: participation, social justice and equality are fundamental to the democratic ideal and are widely absent throughout India.

Big money groups like Justice for All NC could reshape how justice is carried out in North Carolina. This year, seven top state judicial seats are up for election, including four on the seven-member NC Supreme Court, which is now ruled by a narrow 4-3 conservative majority.

In 2011 the transit authority cut its budget by 15 percent, eliminating 29 bus routes. It laid off 180 workers and reduced hours for more. The cuts continued the following year, and the region lost tens of thousands of bus riders. Some switched to cars, if they had one, or carpooling. Others walk now.