Portside

In Germany heads fall - Lenin's head still needs to be kept buried, and Berlin's once-popular gay mayor bows out. Another head featured in the press belongs to a man who is certainly not gay nor a Lenin. Sadly, current references to Vladimir Putin, evoke all too sharply recollections of German language used against every Russian leader since the start of World War I a hundred years ago.

The recent surge of minors at the border is a symptom of our current failed immigration policy. We need to continue our work with labor and the immigrants' rights movement toward a fair and comprehensive immigration reform for the U.S. - a better bill than the one passed last year in the Senate, which among other things called for doubling the current border patrol by hiring an additional 20,000-plus border agents.

Recent policy developments, primarily the Affordable Care Act's Medicaid expansion, have the potential to improve access to health care for women who aren't eligible for Medicaid under current requirements. But 19 states, including most in the South where maternal mortality rates are higher, have opted out of Medicaid expansion. Georgia, for example, has 838,000 uninsured women, more than 25 percent of whom are African American.

Our aim is to build an independent base of political power that can put forward our progressive, populist values and mean it. America actually needs a political movement that can say that increasing union density is a good thing, without blushing. One that knows that declining wages and eroding retirement security are not a “new normal” we must adjust to; that market solutions are not always wise; and that an increasingly financialized economy only benefits the top.

Born into a poor, mixed-race Amazon family, Marina Silva is on the verge of a stunning election win after taking over her party

Eric Hoffer was a conservative who only had the time to write because he was represented by a powerful leftist union.

Born into a poor, mixed-race Amazon family, Marina Silva is on the verge of a stunning election win after taking over her party

Fast food workers are planning to hold civil disobedience actions on Thursday calling for a $15 an hour wage.

In largest planned protests to date, fast-food workers to escalate tactics and embrace beleaguered home care workers.

The number of police department reviews the Justice Department has initiated under Holder for possible constitutional violations is twice that of any of his predecessors. At least 34 other departments are under investigation for alleged civil rights violations.