Portside

Baltimore, not at all uniquely, has experienced a century of public policy designed, consciously so, to segregate and impoverish its black population.

The trigger for the protest was the video that was made public last week, showing police officers beating an Ethiopian-Israeli man, a young man serving in the Israel Defense Forces and in uniform, but it was preceded by years of frustration. “It’s a pressure cooker that exploded. There are hundreds of young Ethiopians the police open case files against for no reason, and that ruins their lives."

Pleas from Simon, Andre Royo and Wendell Pierce, among others, are an acknowledgement of the real-world authority we’ve granted to “The Wire,” one of the most venerated shows ever to air on American television.

When workers feel collectively trapped in poorly performing unions that do not properly represent them, the most union-minded among them often believe that changing unions is their only hope. If switching to another union is not a viable option because of AFL rules or incumbent union manipulation of Labor Board procedures, the result will be more workplace anger, frustration, and resentment.

300 years ago, on the 3rd of May 1715, a rare solar eclipse occurred over England. It was an opportunity too good to miss for those promoting new astronomical theories – and their own careers.

Illinois de-institutionalized nearly 35,000 people in the 1960s and 1970s and never fully invested in a community-based mental health treatment system and affordable housing.

The key to understanding the rise in inequality is not technology or globalization. It is the power of the moneyed interests to shape the underlying rules of the market.

April 26th marked the 29th anniversary of the Chernobyl catastrophe, the worst nuclear disaster in history. And, according to a new Greenpeace report, preventing further major releases of radioactivity into the environment seems to be a race against time. There are more than 1.5 million tons of radioactive dust inside the ruins. And a collapse of the sarcophagus and other structures, which could lead to their release into the environment, cannot be ruled out.

Last month, when Pope Francis described Ottoman Turkey’s slaughter of between 1 and 1.5 million Armenians during World War I as “the first genocide of the 20th century,” the Turkish government predictably denounced his characterization. However, those who assert the first genocide in the 20th century was carried out by Germany against the Herero and Nama peoples of Namibia (South-West Africa) have also raised concerns about the Pope’s statement.

On nearly all indicators of mortality, survival and life expectancy, the United States ranks at or near the bottom among high-income countries. Pick almost any measure of social cohesion over the last four decades and you will find the United States took a wrong turn along the way. The bloated incarceration rates and rock-bottom life expectancy, the unraveling families and the stagnant college graduation rates amount to an existential threat to the nation’s future.