Portside

The AFL-CIO’s Solidarity Center has a long history of working hand in glove with the US government in undermining democracy and left labor movements throughout the world.

Gangs of sheriff’s deputies, violent cliques who glorify “aggressive” policing, have operated out of Los Angeles County stations and jails for decades. Their criminal behavior has been so egregious it has resulted in $55 million in legal payouts.

COVID 19 is but a harbinger of worse plagues to come. The US cannot plan for these inevitable crises if it returns to normal. Normal led to this. To avert another catastrophe, the US needs to grapple with all the ways normal has failed us.

India and China’s confrontation over a border in Himalaya is actually about energy and water. Britain’s colonial legacy is part of the problem; but military posturing and arms races won’t solve the extremely delicate diplomatic issues in the region.

The artists in this show, were truly avant-garde in their social values, championing the underdogs of history when it was unfashionable to do so. Their politics and style became, in the late 1940s, the subject that dared not speak its name.

Always recall that we win nothing because we are right, or just, are smarter, or have a better analysis of the crisis. We win with solid and powerful organizing led by a guiding and time-tested set of Socialist principles.

Bernie Sanders delegates and their allies are fighting for a Democratic Party platform that will be able to inspire voters to defeat Donald Trump, and to lay a basis for the political revolution in the years ahead. Here three long-time progressive and socialist activists address the question of what comes next. How do we build and shape a post-election multi-racial politics. Read what Mark Solomon, Joseph Schwartz and David Wilson have to say.

While a sharp contribution to discussions of women's oppression and liberation, the book under review is faulted for not demonstrating the actual radical connection between class and other forms of oppression. While rejecting a tendency to reduce Marxism to a one-dimensional critique of class, the book's author is faulted for downplaying the limits of intersectionality as not articulating--but instead fudging--the existing gulf between identity politics and Marxism.

Striking Mexican teachers are fighting for justice in the classroom - and against Mexico's violent neoliberal order. The violent repression of striking teachers in 2006, ordered by the state governor, launched a social movement - called the "Oaxaca Commune" by supporters - that grew to encompass much more than the local teachers' union. The teacher's movement is also more widespread than in 2006.

Conscientious objector Tair Kaminer, 19, was sentenced to another 45 days in military prison on Sunday for refusing to serve in the Israel Defense Forces. The sentence will be the sixth term served by Kaminer. She has already served some 125 days in lock-up. By the time Kaminer completes her latest sentence, she will have spent almost 170 days in military detention. She has served more time in military prison than any conscientious objector before her. (Haaretz*)