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Reproducing State Violence: Planned Parenthood, the Hyde Amendment and Indigenous Struggle

Kelly Hayes Truthout
Reproductive care has always been a complex topic for people of color in the United States. Since the beginnings of colonization - through the horrors of slavery and the forced sterilization efforts of the last century - our ability to control whether or not we bring life into the world and how we are allowed to interact with our offspring once they are born has been either challenged or completely wrenched from our grasp.

Bombing Hospitals All in a Day's Work

Phyllis Bennis Common Dreams
The destruction of the Doctors Without Borders (MSF) hospital in Kunduz, with 22 dead so far, including doctors, other staff and patients, capped a week that also saw the bombing of​ another hospital in Afghanistan, plus the U.S.-backed Saudi Arabian bombing of a wedding party in Yemen set up in tents far out in the desert, away from anything remotely military. (What IS it about wedding parties that U.S. and allied bombers keep hitting them?).

Having the Hard Conversations

Jane McAlevey & Michal Rozworski Jacobin
Jane McAlevey on Fight for 15, labor’s crisis of strategy, and the difference between organizing and mobilizing.

Trump’s Racially Divisive Politics Must Be Exposed and Opposed !

Duane Campbell DSA - Democratic Socialists of America
While English speaking media moved on from the racists anti-immigrant statements of Trump, on Spanish language media the immigration issue remains preeminent. This was illustrated by the confrontation between Trump and journalist Jorge Ramos, a star anchor-journalist in this media, who says,“ When they attack one of us, they are attacking all of us.” “On Election Day, we will remember who was with us and was against us. This is generating intensive voter registration.

US Workers Sue Monsanto Claiming Herbicide Caused Cancer

Carey Gillam Reuters
A U.S. farm worker and a horticultural assistant have filed lawsuits claiming Monsanto Co.'s Roundup herbicide caused their cancers and Monsanto intentionally misled the public and regulators about the dangers of the herbicide.

Could Pension Attack Provoke Another Chicago Teachers Strike?

Samantha Winslow Labor Notes
Three years after their nine-day strike that humiliated Emanuel and won national headlines for the idea of teachers fighting for students, the new attack on pay and pensions is angering teachers, paraprofessionals, and clinicians.

The Rise of Buffy Studies

Katharine Schwab The Atlantic
Scholarly interest in Joss Whedon’s cult classic points to the growing belief that TV shows deserve to be studied as literature.

After Obama: Clinton vs. Sanders

John Feffer Foreign Policy in Focus
Hillary Clinton just laid out a hawkish foreign policy vision in a major speech. How do her views stack up against those of Bernie Sanders, her challenger from the left?

The Prominence and Plight Of Girls in the Juvenile Justice System

Joe Sexton ProPublica
Despite decades of attention, the proportion of girls in the juvenile justice system has increased and their challenges have remained remarkably consistent, resulting in deeply rooted systemic gender injustice. The literature is clear that girls in the justice system have experienced abuse, violence, adversity, and deprivation across many of the domains of their lives—family, peers, intimate partners, and community.

That Stinky Cheese Is a Result of Evolutionary Overdrive

Carl Zimmer The New York Times
By comparing the genomes of different species of molds scientists have reconstructed their history. On Thursday, the scientists reported that cheese makers unwittingly have thrown their molds into evolutionary overdrive.They haven’t simply gained new genetic mutations to help them grow better in cheese. Over the past few centuries, these molds also have picked up large chunks of DNA from other species in order to thrive in their new culinary habitat.