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Dollar Meals and Diabetes

Elizabeth Oram Alliance for Sustainable Communities
The world’s healthiest societies are those with the lowest inequality—societies where leftwing forces are strong.

Jobs, Jobs Everywhere, But Most of Them Kind of Suck

Eric Levitz New York Magazine
Gallup asked 6,600 U.S. workers what they saw as the defining characteristics of a “good” job, then used their answers to construct a “job-quality index.” As measured by the index only 40 percent of Americans currently have “good” jobs.

Rap Brown Law Today

Michael E. Tigar Monthly Review
The Rap Brown Law is based on the idea that one person, crossing a state line with the intent to participate in mischief, ought to be prosecuted based on his or her writings or speech, duly intercepted, or by the compelled testimony of his comrades.

Criminal Justice Fees and Fines Don’t Work

Michael Crowley, Tim Lau, Matthew Menendez Brennan Center for Justice
Courts have grown more dependent on fees and fines for revenue. But enforcing them is expensive — and we don’t even know the true costs.

In Wisconsin, the Teamsters Faced a Revolt from Below

Alice Herman In These Times
Sampson and her colleagues ran a campaign to elect a new slate of officials to head the Teamsters local. The slate, which called itself Rebuild 695 and was comprised mostly of Madison Metro Transit employees, came 96 votes short.

Hire Power: Los Angeles Employment Program Breaks New Ground

Bobbi Murray Capital & Main
The Los Angeles Black Worker Center was founded seven years ago to increase access to quality jobs for African-Americans. Rather than focusing solely on job training, the Center is working to connect people with actual jobs through programs like the LA Local Hire program.

The Big Lie About California’s Housing Crisis

Deepa Varma, San Francisco Tenants Union San Francisco Examiner
As California stands at the height of the worst housing crisis the state has ever seen, hundreds of tenants across multiple cities are taking matters into their own hands by confronting corporate landlords to demand a freeze on rent increases. The tenants and organizations leading this are part of a new, broad-based coalition, Housing Now!, to fight for the repeal of the statewide restrictions on rent control - established by the Costa Hawkins Rental Housing Act.

Transgender Liberation Won't Be Found in the Military

Sydney Roberts Truthout
Contrary to the rhetoric dominating the news cycle right now, trans liberation doesn't look like gender non-conforming bodies in military uniforms killing civilians overseas. It doesn't include rallying for entrenchment into the military-industrial complex that furthers the imperialist aims of the United States, or assimilating in hopes that a country that has never cared for trans lives will begin to.

Many Bridges, One River: Organizing for Justice in Vietnamese-American Communities

Thuan Nguyen and Vy Nguyen, Editors Asian Studies Center UCLA
Many Bridges, One River is the first published collection of interviews with organizers and activists who have been working in Vietnamese American communities throughout the United States, starting in the 1970s. These interviews document the strategies and lessons learned in the fight for social justice and progressive social change by Vietnamese Americans with powerful insights dealing with red-baiting, inter-generational differences and sustainable activism.