Grabbing Africa's Seeds: The New Commercialization Agenda

Stephen Greenberg & Oliver Tickell Ecologist
There is renewed interest in the potentially huge profitability of African agriculture - and seed systems are a key target. The Gates Foundation and the US Agency for International Development are working with Monsanto, Syngenta, Yara and others, to impose seed regulations friendly to multinational corporations that will reduce the role of Africa’s public sector, and marginalize the small farmers whose seeds and labor feed the continent.

Grassroots Movement Blocks Mexican Water Privatization Scheme

Alfredo Acedo The Caucus: The Politics and Government Blog of the Times
Mexico’s ruling Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI), and its allies, suffered a major setback March 10th, when a law to privatize Mexico’s water resources was shelved. President Enrique Peña Nieto had attempted to “fast track” approval of the General Water Law, but the rapid mobilization of grassroots opposition forced the indefinite postponement of a vote on the legislation that would place water distribution under private sector control.

Failing Workers Most in Need: Record Number of Unemployed Without Benefits

Freddie Allen Black Press USA
According to the Economic Policy Institute, Congress’ refusal to extend unemployment benefits in 2014, coupled with cuts in benefits at the state level, has reduced the percentage of people receiving unemployment insurance to the lowest level in more than three decades. And, despite higher unemployment rates for Black workers, unemployed Black workers are even less likely to receive unemployment benefits than their white counterparts.

Non-Profits Demand Museums Oust Koch For Funding Misinformation on Climate Science

Neela Banerjee Inside Climate News
Fifteen non-profits launched a petition on March 23 calling on the Smithsonian's American Museum of Natural History and the Natural History Museum of New York to remove David Koch from their boards of trustees because "he bankrolls groups that deny climate science." Serious questions are being raised about institutions that accept money from donors whose business and political dealings are in direct opposition to the institutions' missions.

Prosecutor Apologizes for Sending Innocent Man to Death Row

A.M. "Marty" Stroud III Shreveport Times
Attorney "Marty" Stroud was the prosecutor in the 1984 murder trial of Glenn Ford, who was sentenced to death for the murder of Isadore Rozeman. Ford was released from prison in 2014, after the state admitted new evidence proving Ford was not the killer. Stroud denounces the state’s attempt to deny compensation for Ford’s wrongful conviction, speaks of his role in creating the “horrors” Ford suffered, and denounces the death penalty as an "abomination."

Friday Nite Videos -- March 27, 2015

Portside
Tom Lehrer -- We'll All Go Together When We Go. Detroit Man Beaten by Police Speaks Out. Boom Bust Boom Trailer. New York Subway's Danny Small. SEC's Andrew Bowden at Stanford – A Regulator for Sale?

Boom Bust Boom Trailer

Monty Python star Terry Jones co-wrote and co-directed this completely serious economics documentary, whose experts include Nobel Prize winners Daniel Kahneman, Robert J. Shiller and Paul Krugman.

New York Subway's Danny Small

Mitchell Hughes, aka Danny Small, originally from South Carolina, singing in the NYC subway station at 14th Street and 6th Avenue -- one cell in the musical lifeblood of a city.