Portside

South African President Jacob Zuma's reshuffling of Cabinet members without consulting the ANC has created a crisis. The trade union federation Cosatu and the South African Communist Party, have called upon him to resign. Zuma's opponents charge that he has disrespected the ANC and the country and that those who still protect him do so out of their own self-interest. He won’t go of his own volition and needs to be made to do so.

50 years ago today, King blasted militarism, racism and poverty in his “Beyond Vietnam” speech. The new Beyond the Moment campaign carries forward his radical vision.

After compiling a five-year, 50-state, 30-issue database of corporate-backed legislation, political scientist Gordon Lafer has come to believe that business groups are waging a coordinated campaign in state legislatures to impose a deeply unpopular agenda on America.

Noreen Farrell, director of the anti-sex discrimination law firm Equal Rights Advocates, said Trump went "on the attack against workers and taxpayers." "We have an executive order that essentially forces women to pay to keep companies in business that discriminate against them, with their own tax dollars," said Farrell. "It's an outrage."

Jack London, who died 100 years ago last November, was one of the most prominent socialist writers of the early 20th century. Here is a look at some of his political writings.

Socialists are torn between seemingly incompatible goals—to build genuinely democratic international governance; to preserve space for regulation of economic life; to advance the interests of the particular national constituency we are accountable to; and to address pressing global needs like climate change and inequality.

It’s easy to dismiss Kim Jong-un as a madman. But there’s a long history of US aggression against the North, which we forget at our peril.

In 2012, California amended its "Three Strikes" law--one of the harshest criminal sentencing policies in the country. The passage of Prop. 36 marked the first time in U.S. history that citizens voted to shorten sentences of those currently incarcerated. Within days the reintegration of thousands of "lifers" was underway. The Return examines this unprecedented reform through the eyes of those on the front lines--prisoners suddenly freed.

"When machines and computers, profit motives and property rights are considered more important than people, the giant triplets of racism, extreme materialism, and militarism are incapable of being conquered.” MLK, Jr. from "Beyond Vietnam"

‘Get Out’ breaks a barrier; Globe bloviates; Climate claptrap; Lefties have more fun; Public radio in the hood