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An Underground College for Undocumented Immigrants

Jonathan Blitzer The New Yorker
In Georgia, undocumented students are barred from the state’s top public schools. Together, students and professors decided to start a freedom school to help fill the academic void. By consensus, the group chose the name Freedom University. It recalled the activism of the past, and, on T-shirts, it also made for a gratifying taunt: “F.U. Georgia.”

The Unexpected Afterlife of American Communism

Sarah Jaffe The New York Times
The Communist Party U.S.A. had its greatest successes as the country reeled from the Depression. Today, as we are still picking our way out of the rubble left by the crash of 2008, left-wing ideas have gained new purchase.

The Return of Workplace Immigration Raids

David Bacon The American Prospect
At the end of February immigration agents descended on a handful of Japanese and Chinese restaurants in the suburbs of Jackson, Mississippi, and in nearby Meridian. Fifty-five immigrant cooks, dishwashers, servers and bussers were loaded into vans and taken to a detention center about 160 miles away in Jena, Louisiana.

The Ministry of Utmost Happiness by Arundhati Roy

Natasha Walter The Guardian
The acclaimed Indian novelist and essayist whose first novel, The God of Small Things (1997) was a prize-winning, international sensation, has just published a new novel that reviewer Walter describes as "a bright mosaic."

What’s Hidden Behind the Walls of America’s Prisons

Heather Ann Thompsom The Conversation
It is only when there is a particularly dramatic abuse, or a death that can’t be hidden, that the public gets any glimpse of what life on the inside is like for so many Americans. When ordinary citizens learn of atrocities committed behind bars, most are appalled, but the sad reality is that the public has few tools to gain access to those behind bars. Not knowing is what makes it possible for unimaginable suffering to take place in the name of safety and security.

How Trump Made Wage Theft Routine

Eric Cortellessa The American Prospect
“The Trump administration’s rhetoric on immigration and its approach to enforcement have made immigrant communities obviously fearful in a new way,” says Laura Huizar, a staff attorney with the National Employment Law Project. “This is going to prevent a lot people from filing wage complaints that they otherwise would have.”

Worthless Balm for “Vietnam’s Unhealed Wounds”

Howard Machtinger Vietnam Full Disclosure
What is the appropriate response to the banality of the Op-Ed: “Vietnam’s Unhealed Wounds” by Ken Burns and Lynn Novick in the 2017 Memorial Day edition of The New York Times? Such a trite pronouncement is surely destined for the dustbin of history. But already accompanied by much media hype, Burns and Novick are set to launch their PBS documentary: THE VIETNAM WAR, a ten-part, 18-hour series in September 2017.