Portside

A Shell icebreaker in Portland turned back Wednesday, avoiding a showdown with protesters dangling from a bridge. The company hasn't announced its next move.

In anticipation of their current contracts expiring on August 1st, CWA and IBEW recently announced that an overwhelming majority of their members voted to authorize a strike in case labor and management fail to reach fair contracts.

The national organizing day, which featured more than 3,500 events and house parties across the country, centered around a technological infrastructure that uses text-messaging sign-ups and a deep database of volunteers. Attendees at the house parties were asked to text a number to opt in and show interest.

The massive $3.2 trillion destruction in financial value hasn’t sparked a broader financial crisis in China — an illustration of how China’s financial system is different from other major powers. While the People’s Bank of China has sufficient firepower to reverse a crash of several trillion dollars (far more than most other countries), China’s financial system is also comparatively isolated relative to both global finance and China’s own domestic population.

Max Blumenthal, whose book The 51 Day War: Ruin and Resistance in Gaza allows the young men and women of Gaza to speak, offers a gripping and unembellished look at the misery on the ground in the Gaza Strip during the Israeli government’s homicidal Operation Protective Edge in summer 2014, the third war in this tiny stretch of land in the last six-and-a-half years.

"Humans are the most curious among animals," writes Caspar Henderson in this review of Alberto Manguel's meditation on inquisitiveness. "Even very young humans are better" than other animals, even the smartest ones, "at noticing the novel, the accidental and the serendipitous and at using that experience to imagine new opportunities.' Henderson's review is a kind of "three-cheers" for this special quality that is among those that distinguish our species.

"This report presents an urgent call for justice that must not be ignored. The combined analysis of hundreds of photos and videos, as well as satellite imagery and testimony from eyewitnesses, provides compelling evidence of serious violations of international humanitarian law by Israeli forces which must be investigated."

Judge Gee also decried the “deplorable” conditions of the temporary holding centers along the border dubbed “hieleras” or ice boxes. Testimony from recent detainees said that the overcrowded rooms sometimes held as many as 100 people “which forced children to sleep standing up or not at all.”

This open letter was announced July 28 at the opening of the IJCAI 2015 conference on July 28. Journalists who wish to see the press release may contact Toby Walsh. Hosting, signature verification and list management are supported by FLI; for administrative questions about this letter, please contact tegmark@mit.edu.

"It's a warehouse for kids the school system doesn't want or know how to deal with," a parent told the Justice Department of the program. The Justice Department detailed its findings in a letter earlier this month to Georgia's governor and attorney general.