With the sequester now beginning, I find myself thinking about Robert F. Kennedy — and 46 years ago when I was an intern in his Senate office.Kennedy speaking to a civil rights crowd in front of the Justice Department on June 14, 1963.
1967 was a difficult time for the nation. America was deeply split over civil rights and the Vietnam War. Many of our cities were burning. The war was escalating.
Some of America's most powerful corporate plutocrats -- including Bill Gates, Michael Bloomberg, Eli Broad, and the Walton family (heirs to the Walmart fortune) -- want to take over the Los Angeles school system and Steve Zimmer, a former teacher and feisty school board member, is in their way. So they've hired Kate Anderson to get rid of him. No, she's not a hired assassin like the kind on The Sopranos.
In the controversy over the financial future of Detroit, uncertainty seems to be the most oft repeated term. This uncertainty is attributed to the fact that no other major American city has faced the same kinds of structural problems confronting Detroit. From loss of population, abandonment of capital, to nearly half the property owners’ delinquency on taxes, we have little money to support essential services. Additionally, we are burdened with long standing debt and an array of tax breaks that were long ago granted in hopes of spurring never to happen developments.
Workers at the former Republic Windows & Doors have been much celebrated in the press for their victory over Bank of America. Their story is an inspiration, and a precious victory that we will continue to cheer. True to the cooperative movement, their transition to become New Era Windows was supported by a network of allies who propelled the workers into the limelight and helped them overcome those banks that were deemed too big to fail.
Venezuela's recent devaluation has sparked quite a bit of discussion in the international press. The Venezuelan opposition has naturally framed it as desperate move to head off inevitable economic collapse.
Centennial reenactment of women’s suffrage protest at the White House. (WNV/Nadine Bloch)One hundred years ago today was the watershed 1913 women’s suffrage march in Washington, D.C. Plus, Friday is International Women’s Day. It’s therefore the perfect moment to reflect on the strategies and tactics of several generations of amazing women.
John Davis was roughly 5,500 miles into his 2011 trek from Southern Florida to the Gaspe Peninsula in Quebec when he passed through the Adirondack Mountains, where he has lived for the last 18 years. He spent a couple of days sailing and hiking around the southern shore of Lake Champlain, including the Split Rock Wild Forest. The 4,000-acre bloc of state forest land is the centerpiece of what Davis hopes will one day be a wildlife corridor – the “Split Rock Wildway” – linking Lake Champlain with the Adirondack High Peaks farther west.
The political calculus behind immigration reform was supposed to have changed after the elections of 2012. The outcome of the elections, along with some basic economics, were supposed to have made the logic of legalization all but inevitable, setting the stage for the passage of comprehensive immigration reform early this year.
