Portside

Does everyone deserve a second chance?

Two thousand telecommunications workers walked off their jobs in New Hampshire, Vermont, and Maine on October 17 after FairPoint Communications imposed its final bargaining table proposal.

As “now it can be told” theater, TimeLine’s Chicago premiere, the second coming of this angry work, works equally well as an exercise in conspiracy-theory paranoia, journalistic sleuthing at its most dangerous, and a cumulative plea for transparency in foreign policy, banking, and law enforcement (Edward Snowden anyone?).

According to a report released October 20th by the National Coalition for the Homeless at least 21 cities have passed ordinances designed to restrict where and how nonprofits and individuals can share food with the hungry. Increasingly, local governments are passing laws designed to keep the homeless and hungry "out of sight, out of mind." The United States Department of Agriculture estimates that 50 million Americans are struggling with food insecurity.

Pine trees, brought to Palestine with the establishment of the State of Israel, symbolize the varied means of “ethnic cleansing” directed at the Palestinian population. Used to cover-up the past destruction of Palestinian villages and neighborhoods, and the present displacement of Bedouins, these pine forests are now presented as Israel’s “green lungs.”

Last week the New York Times reported the Obama Administration is considering reaffirming the Bush-era position that the ban on cruel treatment doesn't apply when the United States is operating abroad. The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) demanded the Obama Administration "close the oversees torture loophole." The ACLU said the ban on torture and ill-treatment is universal and applies everywhere the U.S. is holding people in detention.

The Hong Kong government and student protest leaders remain far apart following the first face to face talks between protesters and government officials over demands to democratize the process for the 2017 election of the Chief Executive of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region. No date has as yet been fixed for future talks, and student protest leaders resisted government calls for an end to the mass sit-ins.

Cuba’s commitment of 461 doctors and nurses to combat Ebola in West Africa is the largest single-country offer of healthcare workers to date to combat the crisis. But, this is not the first example of Cuba’s “unprecedented medical solidarity.” Cuba has also sent medical teams to assist the peoples of Guatemala, Pakistan, Indonesia, and Haiti in this past decade. And Cuba has a lot to teach the world about disaster relief and epidemic control.

At the end of each day, all the workers were required to pass through a security clearance checkpoint where they had to remove their keys, wallets, and belts, pass through a metal detector, and submit to being searched. The whole process could take up to 25 minutes. Should these workers be paid for the time they spend being searched?

For the very first time, the Left Party may lead a coalition -- by the narrowest of margins -- with the Social Democrats and Greens that governs a German state. But forming that coalition would require difficult compromise and reversals on the part of all the coalition partners.