Portside

One overlooked aspect of the response to Hurricane Sandy can give us reason for optimism. The backbone of the knowledge presented in scientists' Draft Climate Assessment Report arises from efforts of unsung (and unwitting) heroes: people who collect weather data. The coordinated, cross-generational, collective nature of the public data-collection efforts reveals an unexploited strength in our society.

NYC restaurant workers sing and dance for $9 minimum wage. Supreme Court takes on the Voting Rights Act. Wealth inequality: it's worse than we think. Deer hunter to McConnell: "I'd be a pretty bad shot if I needed an assault rifle." We Are Wisconsin: The story of a citizen driven uprising that changed a state and the nation.

No Backdoor to Iran War - sign the petition; Reader Comments on Labor's Turnaround; Keystone XL Pipeline; Happy Birthday, Dear Income Tax; Cutting the Military Budget and Palestinian Prisoners; Bradley Manning; labor cartoons; Portside's new email format. Announcements - Vieques Forum (New York); LaborArts Celebrates Women's History Month (online); Rachel Corrie - Ten Years After her Murder (actions around the world). Phillip Bonosky Presente!

Iraq itself remains a dangerous and unstable place. And so, happy 10th anniversary, Iraq War! A decade after the invasion, a chaotic and unstable Middle East is the unfinished legacy of our invasion.

Today, some people believe that Social Security will not be there for them even though there are equitable solutions that will fully fund Social Security for the foreseeable future. In planning for the future of Social Security, Social Security is not a private opt-in or -out choice like the decision to fund an IRA. Instead, for decades, it has involved employees and employers providing secure retirement benefits generation after generation.

You don't have to look far to see the connection between workplace and housing struggles. People lose their homes or get evicted from rentals because of unemployment, underemployment, low wages, or health care bills. Organizing works: activists consistently force the banks and mortgage lenders to back off specific homes.

The late Venezuelan president's Bolívarian revolution has been crucial to a wider Latin American philosophy - "History will affirm, justifiably, the role Hugo Chávez played in the integration of Latin America, and the significance of his 14-year presidency to the poor people of Venezuela" former Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva

Historian Mark Solomon looks at the prospects for a new socialist left.

Alleging unpaid wages and repeated retaliation, McDonald’s workers in central Pennsylvania launched a surprise strike at 11 this morning. The strikers are student guest workers from Latin America and Asia, brought to the United States under the controversial J-1 cultural exchange visa program. Their employer is one of the thousands of McDonald’s franchisees with whom the company contracts to run its ubiquitous stores.

Labor Arts celebrates Women's History Month with an exhibit on women firefighters in New York City.