Portside

"It is not the role of the Judiciary to second-guess the determination of the Executive, in coordination with the Legislature, that the interests of the US call for a particular military action in the ongoing War on Terror." Taking issue with the DC Circuit's application of the political question doctrine, it was queried, "if judges will not check this outsized power, then who will?" Our democracy is broken."

While all Southern states have laws disenfranchising people while they are incarcerated and on probation or parole, Florida stands out with one of the nation's most restrictive felony disenfranchisement laws — one of only four states that impose a lifetime ban on voting for anyone convicted of a felony. The others are Virginia, Kentucky and Iowa.

Ominous developments in three states this summer -- Oregon, Texas, New Jersey, and one city -- Chicago, provide a glimpse into the Pentagon's new playbook to recruit soldiers from high schools across the country. In brief, the military has been engaged in a robust lobbying campaign to lower academic standards to make it easier to recruit youth.

"Even if the sea does not swallow you," writes the poet Esther Kamkar (herself a migrant to North America) about the experience of migration, "your heart will be broken."

On the centennial of the Russian Revolution, John Reed's first-hand look at the uprising of workers, peasants, soldiers and sailors is fit reading about a mass movement that overthrew the old aristocracy and then the bourgeois class itself. An exposition on ordinary people making history for themselves, the book is a gripping account of events in Petrograd, when Lenin and the Bolsheviks lead the various workers councils in finally seizing state power.

Phillips Seafood is a Baltimore-based company famous for its crabs. Global and US unions want to make it infamous for its treatment of low-paid women workers. Phillips moved its Indonesian production from urban to rural mini-plants in order to inhibit access to labor law protections and unionization efforts. Closer to home, the company is a major opponent of attempts to raise the minimum wage.

Reader Comments: Memories of the Southern Freedom Movement - Mary Hamilton; The Right to Water - Trump Action Endangers Millions; Keeping Public Services Public; Fight for Health Care Access Continues; Sen. Gillibrand Takes Name Off Anti-Boycott Bill; The Crisis in Venezuela - U.S. Involvement, and The Left; Hate Speech; Questions about Israel and the U.S.; CEO Pay; Palestinian Rights curriculum; An American in China; Dissident Arts Festival; Next Up for Single Payer

On Friday, a group of members of Congress published a letter opposing the threatened sanctions. It began, “We write to express our deep alarm regarding the escalating political, economic and social crisis in Venezuela and urge you to work with our regional partners to help prevent a civil war. We strongly recommend that you support negotiations mediated by respected external actors such as Pope Francis, who enjoys credibility with broad segments of Venezuela’s people.

Against all odds, 122 countries agreed in July to ban nuclear weapons. At the heart of the United Nations treaty is an explicit ethical goal: to protect peoples of the world from the humanitarian catastrophe that would ensue if nuclear weapons were employed. Once 50 states ratify the treaty, it will enter into international law. The United States, the only country to use nuclear weapons, dropped the first atomic bomb on Aug. 6, 1945 at Hiroshima, and Aug. 9 on Nagasaki.

Trump seems determined to go forward with a very hostile program toward Iran, and, although a baseless U.S. pullout from the nuclear deal seems unlikely, even the so-called ‘adults in the room’ are looking for a pretext. The White House is committed to finding a way to claim Iran has violated the nuclear deal, regardless of the facts — just as George W. Bush did with Iraq.