Portside

The Rapid and city engaged in “Witch-Hunt” to silence students, workers

"Pay no attention to that man behind the curtain. The great Oz has spoken," the actor Frank Morgan thundered in the famous 1939 movie. If you believe in what an outside expert drafted for you to say to your employees, if you were willing to pay the outsider to help you say it, then open the curtain and reveal who scripted the message and managed its delivery.

Cuba stands at a historic crossroads. Down one path lies strict adherence to the revolutionary legacy of the Castros. Down another path lies a revival of Cuba as a playground of rich moguls and shadowy criminal types, as it was just before the revolution. Are there any other paths that Cuba can take?

Yesterday the Bernie Sanders campaign released the speech Sanders would have given to AIPAC had the presidential hopeful been allowed to show a pre-recorded message at the pro-Israel lobby’s annual policy conference.

Our postal service can deliver the sustainable infrastructure of the next economy: postal banking that finances green energy, services for seniors, farm-to-table food delivery, coast-to-coast charging stations for electric cars, and much more... An equitable, climate-friendly economy is in sight. Our post office can deliver it.

Saudi Arabia’s relentless war in Yemen is a destructive failure. The U.S.-backed military intervention that began one year ago has killed an estimated 6,400 people, half of them civilians, injured 30,000, and displaced 2.5 million. According to the UN, 80 percent of the population (20 million people) is now in need of some form of aid. This week the Saudis agreed to a cease fire and peace talks, but will the Obama Administration press them to end the carnage?

New York Gov. Andrew announced his support for a $15 minimum wage for state employees on the same day that fast-food workers across the country demonstrated for better pay and union representation. All told, 10,000 New York pubic employees will receive a pay bump. In July, Cuomo increased the minimum wage for fast-food workers in New York through a state wage board.

Rock and Roll Hall of Famer and Grammy-winning musician, AllenToussaint, passed away while on tour in Spain. Toussaint played a pivotal role of formulating a unique style of soul, funk and R&B that became emblematic of New Orleans.

The Socialist leader, António Costa, 54, is now expected to become prime minister in the coming weeks with a broad, leftwing coalition government, which hopes to ease austerity while still adhering to European Union rules. “The taboo has ended; the wall has been broken,” he said after the vote. “This is a new political framework; the old majority cannot pretend to be what it stopped being.”

Here is the list of demands drawn up by the Legion of Black Collegians and those in alliance with them. The protest at the University of Missouri which included weeks of demonstrations, the threatened strike by black football players, and a hunger strike by a student on the campus of the University of Missouri led to the resignation of the President, Tim Wolf, and also the Columbia campus chancellor Bowen Loftin.