Portside

Beyonce breaks out; Jews of color convene; A Prince; A farewell to red-baiting; Market feminism; The segregation of rock

The government has not responded to repeated requests for an independent investigation of Berta's murder. Rather, they interrogated COPINH members repeatedly as suspects.. This outraged Marleny. "She was our mother, our sister! How could we turn against her!" Thousands turned out in Tegucigalpa on April 15 for a demonstration honoring Berta.

No war crime, says the Pentagon. We say we need an independent investigation of the brutal U.S. attack on a Doctors Without Borders hospital in Afghanistan, which killed 42 people.

What if we defined ourselves – to the movement, the public, and the courts – not as criminals but as law-enforcers trying to halt governments and corporations from committing the greatest crime in human history?

The actions by the Verizon workers show that it is possible to fight back against the power of employers to dictate the terms of the employment relationship. They remind us that the supremacy of big corporations, like technological changes and market forces, are not inevitable but reflect political and managerial choices. It appears workers are finally finding a way to counter the corporate strategies that have defined—and held back—the U.S. economy in recent decades.

 At the root of Father Berrigan’s teaching was a faith in the prospect that great masses of people—and, perhaps, a few of their leaders—might yet be awakened from the slumber of inaction before it was too late. He never stopped preaching a gospel of action that risked arrest in order to challenge militarism and inequality.

"It is clear that [C8] contamination is not a state problem or a regional problem," the governors of New York, Vermont and New Hampshire wrote in a March letter addressed to EPA Administrator Gina McCarthy, "it's a national problem that requires federal guidelines and a consistent, science-based approach."

The argument against Sanders is that the one "comparative advantage" poorer countries have is their supply of low-wage workers, so use of sweatshop labor to produce for export is the best way for these countries to expand their economies. And it works, global trade has been "the driving force behind historic declines in poverty," in Weissmann's words. Sanders' call for higher wages and better environmental standards stymies progress for these countries.

In a stunning piece on an unforgettable set of American crimes, TomDispatch regular Rebecca Gordon catches the nightmarish quality of those years, now largely buried, in the grim case of a single mistreated human being. It should make Americans shudder. She has also just published a new book, American Nuremberg: The U.S. Officials Who Should Stand Trial for Post-9/11 War Crimes, that couldn’t be more relevant.

A massive repression of the most militant but peaceful peasant movement--the Anjman Mozareen Punjab (AMP)--is underway. Most of its leadership has been arrested under false anti-terrorist laws. Dozens are missing while over 50 remain behind bars.