Portside

Shared living spaces and the emancipation of women from domestic drudgery were at the forefront of the Narkomfin’s groundbreaking design. So why was this building rejected almost as soon as it was completed?

As Saudi Arabia continues its air assault on Yemen’s Houthi insurgents, supporters and opponents of the Riyadh monarchy are reconfiguring the political landscape in a way that’s unlikely to vanish once the fighting is over. The Saudis have constructed what at first glance seems a formidable coalition consisting of the Arab League, the monarchies of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC), Turkey, and the United States. Except that the “coalition” isn’t as solid as it looks.

The stages of grief depend on narrative closure, the shoveling of dirt on the casket, eulogizing the dead. But for African-American parents whose children were slain by law enforcement, the stages of grief grind to a halt. The dead cannot be laid to rest because the cop who murdered them is not held accountable, and his violence is condoned.

"The Fast Track train went off the rails today," cheered Lori Wallach, director of Public Citizen’s Global Trade Watch. "The U.S. Senate vote was supposed to generate momentum for Fast Track in the U.S. House of Representatives, where it's in deep trouble, with almost every House Democrat and a significant bloc of GOP opposing it." Democracy for America warned, "We know the forces pushing the job-killing TPP won't stop here, and they should know, neither will we."

Evil champ; Banksy in Gaza; Siege at the Goog; Art against lynching; Jazz for justice; Kid schools Scholastic

Each term my film students watch Spike Lee’s Do the Right Thing (1989). And each term they react similarly to the scene in which Mookie (Spike Lee) throws a trash can, igniting a neighborhood riot by breaking the window of the pizzeria where he works. Most students of color feel Lee’s character did the right thing while the majority of white students cannot understand why Mookie would do such a thing to his boss. Why this reaction—term after term, year after year?

Are the machines coming for our jobs? Dean Baker argues that we need to get beyond the fear of robots and address the real causes of inequality, low wages and changes in the labor market.

Study published in Journal of Nutrition finds fruit, not veggies, associated with lower risks of obesity.

Beginning in the 1930s, the LAPD pioneered the use of stop-and-search policing whereby officers flooded an area after a reported crime to question persons found on the street. This was the anti-Friday dragnet — indiscriminate, racist, and the reality for urban, black communities after World War II.

Scientists estimate that the first eukaryotes evolved about 2 billion years ago, in one of the greatest transitions in the history of life. But there is little evidence of this momentous event, no missing link that helps researchers trace the evolution of life from simple microbes to eukaryotes. On Wednesday, a team of scientists announced the discovery of just such a transitional form.