Portside

No one should take what Donald Trump stands for this election year less seriously because the man with the bouffant hairdo is the most fragile of creatures, and that the illusion of a campaign he had so singlehandedly created might dissolve at any moment. He may not be ultimate messenger; serious human being or candidate; but those he’s rallied to his side couldn’t be more human, serious, or needy. The messenger might not last; the message is another story entirely.

In June the Japanese island of Okinawa saw one of the biggest demonstrations in two decades, involving at least 50,000 people who protest against heavy US military presence after a local woman was murdered by an ex-Marine and a string of other incidents.

“There’s clearly a different Constitution being employed in poor neighborhoods where most of the people are black and brown than in our white neighborhoods, On an absolute regular basis police are stopping and searching people of color in this city with no legal justification to do it.”

It shows the limits of party politics—and the necessity of social movements to challenge those limits.

Fifty years on geophysicists have progressed from believing continents never moved to thinking that every movement may leave a lasting memory on our Earth. By discovering the secrets of our past, we may be able to predict the motion of our plate tectonic future.

A combination of better jobs and pensions will remove one political obstacle to a green transition—and it’s the right thing to do.

On both sides of the English Channel, politics should now be directed at understanding how, in a democracy, the political establishment could have done so little to address the concerns of so many citizens. Every EU government must now regard improving ordinary citizens’ wellbeing as its primary goal. More neoliberal ideology won’t help.

What was intended to be a rule protecting workers’ rights has been stopped from taking effect by a judge’s order that was solely focused on the rights of union-busters.

One of the most compelling undercurrents of the show is how it's developed a kind of “against the grain” feminism with its female characters. This came to a head in Season 6, arguably Game of Thrones' most feminist season yet.

When it came time to fight, the Sanders forces tried two tactics. The first was an amendment to the compromise plank, tweaking it to say "and that's why we oppose the TPP." The second was a separate amendment that would have put the party on record against a TPP vote this year.