Portside

German-born co-founder of Lamaze International taught breathing and relaxation techniques to generations of expectant mothers

The world as seen by Jose Guerrero is a world full of injustice and violence, a gritty and reeling place where people nonetheless rise up in resistance, solidarity and joy; where even death itself is vanquished by the grinning skeletal calaveras who continue celebrating life on the other side.

Walmart is the latest company found to be sourcing its bottled water from drought-stricken California, as state residents push for greater regulation of the bottling industry. Last week a local television station revealed Walmart’s bottled water comes from Sacramento’s municipal water supply. There is little oversight or monitoring of water bottling plants in the state, which are operated by major corporations including Starbucks, Nestle, Coca-Cola and Pepsi.

Amid the highest voter turnout since 1997, Prime Minister David Cameron and his Conservative Party trounced the opposition to return with a majority 331 seats (out of 650). The Tory victory has annihilated multiparty coalition politics, provided Conservatives a free rein to advance their brutal politics of inequality, and emboldened Cameron to lead Britain further down the path of austerity, privatization, increased surveillance and jingoism.

When Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu signed the coalition agreement with the right-wing extremist settler party, Jewish Home, he also agreed to appoint Rabbi Eli Ben-Dahan as Israel’s deputy defense minister, responsible for the army’s “Civil Administration” of Palestinians in the Occupied Territories. Member of the Knesset (MK) Rabbi Ben-Dahan has publicly declared Palestinians “are not human.”

Attacks on public employee unions, especially teachers unions, have become a permanent feature of the political landscape. One glaring example is the lawsuit filed last month in federal court in Los Angeles against six California and national teachers unions. The lawsuit purports to defend the “free speech” rights of four California schoolteachers, but its real goal is to silence the collective voice of union members on political and educational issues.

The establishment US media’s backlash against award winning journalist Seymour Hersh for his report in the London Review of Books on the raid that killed Osama bin Laden has fueled a perception that it has been wholly discredited. Yet, a key part of Hersh’s report has now been corroborated by the New York Times’ Carlotta Gall, a Pakistan newspaper, and partly by NBC News. Hersh’s report challenges the Obama Administration claims on the capture of Bin Laden.

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