Portside

They lost 1.4 million votes and ceded "safe" seats in their east German stronghold to Angela Merkel's conservatives, but the radical Left are smiling about an election outcome that may finally upgrade them from pariahs to the political mainstream.

New leadership elected in American Postal Workers Union. President-Elect Mark Dimonstein's slate won seven of the nine positions they contested. Their goal is to unite with the other postal unions, community groups and others in a fight to save the Post Office.

Democratic Congress members, labor leaders and immigration advocates are arrested at a protest outside the Capitol calling for the House to vote on immigration legislation.

Mexican leftists have flocked to support teachers’ unions in their protests against proposed education reforms. But by overlooking the unions’ undemocratic features and lack of popular support, the left weakens the fight against neoliberalism.

Those of us on the far left (particularly those of us with well-worn armchairs) should cast off the cynical approach of simply waiting for these campaigns to collapse due to the “inevitable” betrayal of the labor bureaucracy. . . Our go-to slogan shouldn’t be “I told you so,” but “organize or die”--because that’s the reality of the labor movement in the US today.

The billionaire conservatives join the ranks of business interests trying to rein in the GOP's base, but it has turned into an unstoppable force.

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There is a growing impatience with austerity among public-sector workers, as the government prepares a budget for 2014 that will inflict a seventh year of spending cuts and tax increases. Irish governments have sought to control costs in response to the country's worst-ever property and banking crisis that started over five years ago. The country is obliged by its bailout with the European Union and International Monetary Fund to public sector spending and jobs cuts.