Portside

Blood type is dictated by genes that determine which kinds of molecules, called oligosaccharides, are found on the surface of your red blood cells. Norovirus and a few other viruses use these oligosaccharides to grab onto and infect intestinal cells

After the fall of the Soviet Union, the U.S. is returning to its post-World War II U.S. vision of a Pax Americana. This is embedded in its nuclear doctrine, its strategic vision of controlling all theaters of war.

Studies show that doulas help reduce the rate of caesarean surgeries, which is higher among black women, and other costly interventions. They can even alleviate some socioeconomic factors that contribute to poor maternal health.

The study notes that most Medicaid recipients are on private managed care plans and about one third of Medicare enrollees now have Medicare Advantage plans. Both of these types of plans have higher overhead costs than the publicly administered plans.

The series is a long, poisoned bath in male toxicity. It was one of the best new dramas of the year.

Employment-based Health Care Has Become an Anchor Around the Neck of the U.S. 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.

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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.