Portside

Reader Comments - Lots: James Baldwin: "I Am Not Your Negro"; Elizabeth Warren - Nevertheless, She Persisted; Know Your Rights guide from the ACLU; Readers debate role of Russia; Iowa's New Union Busting Law - what it means for the whole country; Lessons from the Japanese Internment for Today's Anti-Immigrant Hysteria; Exploiting Black Labor after the Abolition of Slavery; Resources; Announcements: and more...

She was warned. She was given an explanation. Nevertheless, she persisted...Last night, Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) spoke out against the nomination of Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-AL) for attorney general, reading a letter from Coretta Scott King. In a highly unusual move, Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) led a vote to silence Warren?-?a rebuke not extended to several of her male colleagues. It follows an old and very sexist playbook.

Of the hatred and bigotry currently on display, Haitian-American physician Jonel Daphnis, said, “It’s always been like this. It’s just that instead of cursing us out quietly, now they’re emboldened to curse us out loud. Now we can’t keep up delusion as a way of maintaining our mental and spiritual well-being. It’s out in the open."

A comprehensive database of events lets researchers explore potential causes.

In a country where nearly 93 million eligible Americans did not vote in the 2016 presidential election, government officials should be investigating how to make the nation’s electoral process more inclusive, rather than searching for ways to place additional burdens on eligible Americans’ access to the polls.

Reader Comments: Standing Against Trump - Defending Immigrants and the Massive Women's March; How Big Were the Marches - links to local stories; March Size and City Population - Who Had the Best Turnout?; Marching in Pensacola, Florida After the Hurricane; Elizabeth Gurley Flynn-The Rebel Girl; Announcements: Fighting Fascism-Remembering the Abraham Lincoln Brigade; The '60s-The Years that Changed America Carnegie Hall Festival; and more...

The women's marches in Washington DC and around the country were stunning, inspiring and the first of a million steps that will be needed to build the resistance to Trump. It might not have been as black, brown or working class as many might have liked. But criticizing it from the sidelines doesn't help anyone.

DOJ lawyers look to adjourn a hearing next week, and some expect them to wind up abandoning their argument that the Texas voter ID law discriminates against minorities.

We believe that Women's Rights are Human Rights and Human Rights are Women's Rights. We must create a society in which women - including Black women, Native women, poor women, immigrant women, disabled women, Muslim women, lesbian queer and trans women - are free and able to care for and nurture their families, however they are formed, in safe and healthy environments free from structural impediments. Marches in 616 cities - full list and information.

Honoring King's vision and legacy thus requires not simply remembering his most well-known dream: a racially inclusive society very different from the one that existed in his, or sadly, our own time. It requires recognizing the need to redistribute the power from the oppressive, exclusionary institutions, many of the same ones - housing, schools, criminal justice, the economy - he fought for until the day he was taken from us. What does honoring that vision mean today?