Portside

Bill Fletcher's post on the recent midterm elections and what progressives need to do, in order to win, sparked a number of reader responses. Fletcher drew on lessons from the elections, and past elections, putting forward a call for progressives to effect politics that can improve the lives of the majority in our country. Below is a long post from Jonathan Nack, a response from Ed Hunt, further comment from David Schwartzman, and a note from Portside Moderator.

This past weekend, COSATU, South Africa's labor federation voted to expel NUMSA, the National Union of Metal Workers. To give readers a better understanding, Portside is posting many of the relevant documents (sorry for length of this post): Tyotyo James (COSATU deputy president) interview prior to expulsion; COSATU official statement; NUMSA response to the expulsion; ANC Secretary General Gwede Mantashe on Developments in COSATU.

After the pity party's through, let's get organized. There was one exception to the dearth of Democratic leaders who championed populist proposals. Sen. Elizabeth Warren crisscrossed the country attempting to galvanize the electorate in key Senate races. One thing has not changed: "The stock market and gross domestic product keep going up, while families are getting squeezed hard by an economy that isn't working for them." Now is the time for Warren or Bernie Sanders.

New Volkswagen policy likely to allow labor groups, including the United Automobile Workers, to represent workers in Chattanooga, Tennessee.

Democrats still understand themselves as the majority party despite controlling nothing but the presidency. They have captured the high ground of American politics, but lost the crucial farmland.

The left always talks a good game of workers unite black and white but the last thing most liberals do is actually talk to overtly racist white folks. Shirking this movement duty leaves our nation vulnerable to a neo-fascist future paid for by the Koch Brothers and their clone, Art Pope of North Carolina.

The solution to malnourishment isn’t to produce more food. The solution is to eliminate poverty.

"At its core I believe the issue is really about what a great country we have that a song like this can be performed in a setting like Concert for Valor."

Life for student-athletes is no longer the quaint Americana fantasy of the homecoming bonfire and a celebration at the malt shop. It’s big business in which everyone is making money — everyone except the eighteen to twenty-one-year-old kids who every game risk permanent career-ending injuries.

On Friday, November 7, COSATU (the Congress of South African Trade Unions), the country’s main federation of trade unions and organisations of the working class, has expelled one of its founders, the militantly socialist National Union of Metalworkers of South Africa (NUMSA). This has major implications for political movements in South Africa.