Portside

Jurors never knew what a possible sentence might be. Finally freed from a ban on researching the case, including potential punishments, some are shocked to learn they just consigned Cecily McMillan to a sentence of up to seven years in prison. "They felt bad," said the juror, who did not wish to be named. "Most just wanted her to do probation, maybe some community service...now what I'm hearing is seven years in jail? That's ludicrous. Even a year in jail is ridiculous."

New leadership, a Membership Action Team organizing plan, and a 22 month contract campaign that included two strikes, produce a strong bargaining agreement covering 22,000 hospital and campus workers at the University of California. The new contract offers protections against subcontracting, limits on temporary workers, wage increases, and "strong benefits," among other items.

By law, a company can’t hire H-2A guest workers if it is in a labor dispute with its US workforce. But that is exactly what this Washington State berry grower is trying to do.

It is exactly 39 years since the Vietnam war ended, with the seizure of Saigon by the National Liberation Front of South Vietnam and the People's Army of Vietnam - time to consider the legacy of this long US war.

Cecily McMillan Trial Update - Sentencing May 19; Reader Comments-Neanderthal Intelligence; Artificial Intelligence, Algorithms, Bitcoins; Charter Schools - their massive fraud; What's a Union For; Paul Robeson Jr.; Cesar Chavez film; Food - Toxic?; Announcements - Building Up the Peace Movement From the Grassroots - New York-May 12; May 15 strike - Low Pay is Not OK; Help save the Haymarket Monument; The Charley Richardson Guide to Kicking Ass for the Working Class

Sociologist Theda Skocpol tells what drives the angry right -- and what comes after the government shutdown. The Right in this country, over the last half century, has recognized that fighting across many localities and states is worth it. And they've developed mechanisms for doing that, and that turned out to have a big payoff in Congress. The real problem that you've got right now on the Left is how to defeat this stuff, how to contain it, how to beat it.

Reader Comments- Mexico teachers; Social Security; Israel; Gen. Vo Nguyen Giap; McDonald's; Grad Student unions; Jobs; Unemployment; Announcements- NYC - Full Employment and the Right to a Job: (Oct 18); Film showing - Anne Braden-Southern Patriot(Oct 24); D.C - Government Surveillance in Communities of Color; So.Calif - Government Spying, Immigrant Detention Policies(Nov 12); Louis E. Burnham Award Welcomes Applicants Today in History-Salt of the Earth

On the heels of recently report showing that taxpayers lose when fast food workers, who receive low wages, are forced to seek public assistance (Univ. of California), fast food workers and their allies rallied in cities across the country. Front-leading New York mayoral candidate Bill de Blasio called for not only supporting efforts to raise the minimum wage, but to also help these workers organize.

UAW leadership views latest effort to organize auto plants in the right-to-work South as key to the union's future. This story focuses on the current campaign to organize a Nissan plant in Canton, Mississippi.

The mass assault on this social order is eviscerating the soul, spirit and vision of a country that by decree but not sustainable policies and leadership could have been an inclusive and viable Democracy. ...founded in treachery and structured on the bones of colonialism, there were so many components from which a real Democracy could have been forged and sustained. For the sake of our grandchildren we can't be held hostage by Tea Party terror.