Portside

Viewing war as an engineering problem focuses on technology (which benefits contractors) and destructive physical effects, but ignores and is offset by the fundamental truth of war: Machines don’t fight wars, people do, and they use their minds.

For the next week, we can concentrate on basketball and marvel at the remarkable athletes playing their hearts out and set politics aside. But perhaps, maybe during the commercials, we can reflect on the fact that the vast majority of these games are being played by teams from public universities in states whose governments are hostile to public universities and whose policies increase the already considerable financial burden on the students at these universities.

Attorney "Marty" Stroud was the prosecutor in the 1984 murder trial of Glenn Ford, who was sentenced to death for the murder of Isadore Rozeman. Ford was released from prison in 2014, after the state admitted new evidence proving Ford was not the killer. Stroud denounces the state’s attempt to deny compensation for Ford’s wrongful conviction, speaks of his role in creating the “horrors” Ford suffered, and denounces the death penalty as an "abomination."

Fifteen non-profits launched a petition on March 23 calling on the Smithsonian's American Museum of Natural History and the Natural History Museum of New York to remove David Koch from their boards of trustees because "he bankrolls groups that deny climate science." Serious questions are being raised about institutions that accept money from donors whose business and political dealings are in direct opposition to the institutions' missions.

According to the Economic Policy Institute, Congress’ refusal to extend unemployment benefits in 2014, coupled with cuts in benefits at the state level, has reduced the percentage of people receiving unemployment insurance to the lowest level in more than three decades. And, despite higher unemployment rates for Black workers, unemployed Black workers are even less likely to receive unemployment benefits than their white counterparts.

Mexico’s ruling Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI), and its allies, suffered a major setback March 10th, when a law to privatize Mexico’s water resources was shelved. President Enrique Peña Nieto had attempted to “fast track” approval of the General Water Law, but the rapid mobilization of grassroots opposition forced the indefinite postponement of a vote on the legislation that would place water distribution under private sector control.

There is renewed interest in the potentially huge profitability of African agriculture - and seed systems are a key target. The Gates Foundation and the US Agency for International Development are working with Monsanto, Syngenta, Yara and others, to impose seed regulations friendly to multinational corporations that will reduce the role of Africa’s public sector, and marginalize the small farmers whose seeds and labor feed the continent.

At the 104th anniversary of the Triangle Fire in New York City, poet Tom Karlson reminds us that factory tragedy remains a real issue in the global garment-making industries.

With baseball's opening day this week, Malik Abduh's "Barnstormers" evokes the days when race prejudice barred great athletes from the major leagues.

Scientists know that we have taste receptors for fatty acids in our mouths and intestines. They are studying if fat meets the criteria to qualify as a primary taste along with sweet, salt, sour, bitter and umami.