Politics & Globalization
International trade agreements force the U.S. and other participting countries to "harmonize" food and envrironmental safety standards to the lowest common denominator. Often these agreements are negotiated behind closed doors, shutting out Congress and the public, while granting corporations and trade associations a seat at the table. It's no surprise that these agreements give transnational corporations "special rights", allowing companies to challenge individual countries' environmental, worker and food safety laws and regulations.
-
ronnie-rose-oca-2784.jpg
Rose and Ronnie· Joe volunteer© 2008
Ask most organic egg and poultry consumers what they imagine organic chickens’ lives are like and they’ll probably describe a bird scratching in the soil, digging for bugs, and kicking up a dust bath on a quaint farm pasture.
However, in reality, many organic chickens are subjected to the same factory farm horrors as conventional birds — their entire lives spent crammed with tens of thousands of other hens in barren, fluorescent bulb-lit sheds with little access to soil or sunlight.
Read more
Could the city best known as the home of Wall Street divest from major corporate banks and start its own public bank? That’s the vision that a new network of activist groups hope see in the near future.
Read more
Fifty years ago, in the dust and fire of global youth activism, everything seemed possible. The political world was a cloud filled with chaos and opportunity, pain and promise. The young were a powerful force, even a world-changing one.
Could they become that force again?
Read more
The federal government has placed thousands of unaccompanied immigrant children in the homes of sponsors, but last year it couldn't account for nearly 1,500 of them.
Read more
A close examination of campaign finance disclosures and other data reveals that Koch-tied entities are spending big on behalf of candidates in races for the U.S. House of Representatives and U.S. Senate, and other state races in 2018.
Read more
As Facebook sought to become the world’s dominant social media service, it struck agreements allowing phone and other device makers access to vast amounts of its users’ personal information.
Read more
Provisions inside the delayed House farm bill would roll back restrictions on the wealthy obtaining federal farm subsidies, as well as allow extended family members to receive lucrative payments.
Read more
One year ago today, Trump announced his intention to withdraw America from the Paris climate deal, which now has support from every country except the United States. Three years ago, Pope Francis wrote his encyclical — a papal letter sent to all bishops of the Roman Catholic Church — on the importance of addressing climate change, a first in the church’s history.
Read more
You’re not reading all those updated data policies flooding your inbox. You probably haven’t even looked for your privacy settings. And that’s exactly what Facebook, Google and other tech giants are counting on. Call it the Rule of Defaults: 95 percent of people are too busy, or too confused, to change a darn thing.
Read more
In late April, magistrates’ courts in Brownsville suddenly turned into “zero tolerance” factories for criminalizing migrants, many of whom have no prior criminal record. Many are from murderously violent countries in Central America and have fled to the U.S. seeking asylum, and they often arrive with children in tow.
Read more
for Politics & GlobalizationSIGN UP FOR NEWS & ALERTS
Get Local
Cool the planet.
Feed the world.