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The Birth of a Holiday

Eric Hobsbawm Jacobin
The late Marxist historian Eric Hobsbawm recounts the origins of International Workers' Day.

In North Carolina, Pigs Don’t Fly but Their Feces Do

Amy Goodman and Denis Moynihan Democracy Now!
Billions of gallons of pig feces and urine are collected in lagoons, mixed with blood and rotting pig body parts. To keep these fetid ponds from overflowing, the toxic liquid is pumped skyward with enormous spray devices, aerosolizing the waste, which is carried away by the wind.

How Crossing the Border From Mexico Became a Crime

Kelly Lytle Hernandez The Conversation
Unauthorized entry into the U.S. wasn’t always a crime and Mexican immigrants didn’t always fear prosecution. Congress’ early efforts to include Mexicans in its “whites only immigration policy” were stymied by Western agribusiness, which wanted unfettered access to Mexican laborers. Up stepped a white supremacist South Carolina Senator with a compromise. Coleman Blease’s Immigration Act of 1929 dramatically altered the story of crime and punishment in the United States.

Puerto Rico Files for Bankruptcy

AJ Vicens Mother Jones
The Day After Trump Admin Brags About Blocking Funds "They wanted a bailout. We wouldn't give it to them."

The NC Legislature's Curious Anti-Union Project

Rob Christensen Raleigh News & Observer
The advantages for Republicans to weaken labor are obvious. Not only are they disarming a political adversary, but they are helping their business donor base in a state that already has some of the stingiest unemployment benefits for laid-off workers, one of the lowest minimum wages, and so forth.