Portside

Hoosiers must also understand that this latest transgression of workers' rights - the Restoration of Freedom of Religion Act - is just the latest round in a sustained Indiana effort to undermine the entire working class. It shifts further wealth and power from the vast majority to the minority, while deepening the human misery that more and more Hoosiers experience; whether they are straight, gay, white, Black, Asian, Latino, Christian, Jewish, Muslim, or atheist.

Wisconsin has joined a host of other states whose right-to-work laws emulate "model legislation" produced by the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC). The Center for Media and Democracy (CMD) describes ALEC as a "bill mill" supported by several conservative foundations and dozens of high-profile corporations, like Koch Industries and ExxonMobil. So-called 'Right-to-Work" favors corporations at workers' expense.

There’s a comforting myth in the United States that suggests African-Americans steadily moved from absolute slavery to complete freedom following the Civil War. This, however, obscures how hard many Americans of every race had fought against racism since the Revolution. It was a struggle that went deeper than slavery and right to the core of who was an American.

In an escalating dispute with President Obama, Republican in the United States House of Representatives passed a bill to cut any funding to the Department of Homeland Security for suspending the deportation of undocumented people. This bill rescinds Obama's 2014 orders for DHS to defer the deportation of undocumented immigrants with US-born children (who are US citizens) as well as suspend the deportation of undocumented young people brought to US as children.

The Republican rising star struggled for two days to get clarity with regard to his appearance at a "white pride" - Ku Klux Klan event in 2002. Initially, his office tried to keep things vague, suggesting it was "likely" Scalise attended. He was a veteran state legislator then, elected from the same precincts where David Duke once ran strong. When it became clear he was not just present but a presenter, Scalise started spinning scenarios that might explain it all away.

“Since the election of Barack Obama, the Republicans have been more serious about trying to showcase the diversity within the Republican Party. And Mia Love is potentially the poster child for diversity in the party.”

Southern Democrats, meet your future: No more Republican Lite.

In many ways, Brownback’s term has been a perfect experiment in Republican governance. Take a crusading conservative governor, give him a legislature with Republican super-majorities so he can do pretty much whatever he wants, and let him implement the right’s wish list. The result was supposed to be a nirvana of economic growth and budgetary stability. But the opposite happened.