Portside

The subtext is that unions are on their way out, and that taking actions like agitating for pay and benefits will only hasten their disappearance. Recent events, however, are pointing in the opposite direction. Labor organizations are starting to show new creativity and militancy in attaining their goals.

Palestinian children dying of hypothermia, 90% of water undrinkable and other daily realities resulting from Israeli criminal occupation and blockade are reviewed by Chris Gunness, spokesman for the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestinian Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA), as he discusses the causes and consequences of the fact that only about 5% of pledged donations have reached Gaza.

As of last week we lifted the ban on selling drones to foreign countries. Arms merchants have neither allies nor enemies. They have only customers. We are a country locked in a permanent war economy. To feed that economy we must have permanent war. And we have never been more successful at securing that combination than we are right now. Our endless wars with Iraq and Afghanistan destabilized the entire region.

Social justice activist Ruth Gilmore challenges four opportunist tendencies within the criminal justice movement - with lessons for ALL progressive movements.

Radical science fiction written by organizers, change makers and visionaries is collected and co-edited by Walidah Imarisha into an anthology Octavia's Brood: Science Fiction Stories from Social Justice Movements. Imarisha links her editing efforts to her work as a prison abolitionist and larger social movements' on-going need for envisioning our revolutionary futures.

As CAPITAL & MAIN's “State of Equality” series has documented, economic inequality poses a grave threat to California’s future. Conditions would be far worse if not for progress made by activists, community leaders and lawmakers. In the last several years, California has generated some of the nation’s most innovative and effective strategies to reverse inequality. Here Judith Lewis Mernit lists 10 landmark achievements worth celebrating,emulating and strengthening.

Pete Seeger tribute. Abiyogo. We Shall Overcome. Waist Deep in the Big Muddy. If I Had a Hammer. Worried Man Blues. This Land Is Your Land.