Portside

Rahm Emanuel is vulnerable. True, he cleared the snow in the winter, the Chicago equivalent of making the trains run on time. But beyond that, his neoliberal policies have made him a lot of enemies. The ramifications of an Emanuel defeat go beyond Chicago. He has been central to the Democratic Party's rightward swing since the Clinton years. The potential for a Lewis victory is as yet unclear. The election is just five months away - she has yet to declare her candidacy.

Voter suppression is not new. We've seen grandfather clauses, poll taxes, and literacy tests as historical barriers to the vote. Now, we see a reduction in voter flexibility, with more ID requirements, fewer early voting days, and stricter rules about voter registration.

After a long absence organized labor is attempting to unionize workers in Silicon Valley. The teamsters have aimed their campaign Facebook drivers. Previous campaigns in 1992 and 2008 ended in failure.

Did East Germany fall because it was totally foul? Was it given an outside push or two? And did that downfall represent simply the glorious revolution of a folk yearning for freedom - or is the matter more complicated? This is still very relevant, for many similar uprisings have since occurred - and are still occurring.

This is not the first time that Americans For Prosperity has been embroiled in a controversy about misleading voters. It has faced similar accusations in at least three other states:

Outside Science Leadership, Juliana Concepcion, 16, a sophomore from South Philadelphia, held a handmade sign that read: "Students 4 Teachers." "The teachers already do so much for us," she said. "It's just not right for the teachers to have their benefits cut like this."

Griffiths says the easiest way to organize the day laborers, and create a system that protects their rights, is what’s called a “worker center”: A place where contractors pick up laborers in an orderly fashion, on a first-come-first-serve basis, and negotiate contracts that both sides have to honor.

Leftists and trade unionists should look to the energy and strategic intelligence of the Lorain labor movement, which has stayed strong despite substantial changes in the community and economy because of its commitment to struggling for strong contracts, organizing new shops, and building solidarity across industry, union, race, and gender.

Philadelphia teachers and their union were surprised today when they learned that the School Reform Commission had decided to unilaterally cancel their contract.

Inside the American Terrordome, the chorus of hysteria-purveyors, Republican and Democrat alike, nattered on, as had been true for weeks, about the "direct," not to say apocalyptic, threat the Islamic State and its caliph posed to the American way of life. The media, of course, continued to report it all with a kind of eyeball-gluing glee. The result by the time I met that woman: 71% of Americans believed ISIS had nothing short of sleeper cells in the U.S.