“Earlier this year, Hagler successfully helped worked towards the [United Church of Christ] Church passing a divestment and boycott resolution on Israel. Hagler today said: ‘It’s ironic that so many are focusing on Palestinian knives given the massive scale of Israeli attacks on Palestinians.'”

“While the Obama White House Keystone XL decision has been touted by most environmentalists and criticized by Big Oil and its front groups, the truth is much more complex and indeed, dirty. That’s because for years behind the scenes the Obama Administration has quietly been approving hundreds of miles-long pieces of pipeline owned by pipeline…

“Tensions between rising and declining powers are inevitable, but they can be transformed and overcome through common/shared security trade and military-related diplomacy. We would do well to learn from history and to pursue win-win diplomacy rather than self-defeating zero-sum challenges.”

“The text released this morning clearly demonstrates what we have long feared: The TPP’s investor-state dispute settlement (ISDS) provisions would enable investors from any of the TPP countries to challenge environmental and public health laws, regulations and court decisions in international tribunals that circumvent the U.S. and any other country’s judicial system. Right now, a…

“Electoral reform played a big role in the 2015 elections this year. Ohio voters overwhelmingly passed a state constitutional amendment requiring that redistricting be done according to certain criteria by a bipartisan commission, and advocates of public financing of campaigns had big wins in Seattle and in Maine.”

“Stung by Vladimir Putin’s military intervention, Obama last week foreswore his previous refusal to put boots on the ground, announcing he’s sending a small contingent of U.S. special operations commandos to help America’s close allies, the Syrian Kurdish rebels. But to scant notice, the Kurds are receiving increased support from Russia as well — and…

“Forced arbitration clauses impact virtually every aspect of your life, from buying a car to credit card agreements to your employment. They even wipe out the right to go to court for many civil rights violations. The constitutional right of a citizen to sue has been fundamentally taken away.”

“We examined the retirement assets of the Fortune 500 CEOs. … One CEO, David Novak from YUM Brands (Taco Bell, Pizza Hut, KFC), has $234 million in his retirement account, yet hundreds of thousands of YUM’s low-wage restaurant workers have no retirement at all.”

“The USPS doesn’t spend taxpayer money, and would run at a profit but for the poisonous provision of the Postal Enhancement and Accountability Act of 2006, which requires it to fund its pensions decades into the future. Postal banking, for extremely low fees and lending rates, would make the USPS financially solvent while providing a…

“Unfortunately the Department continues to call for annual testing and for making high-stakes decisions based on student growth (gains in test scores), including evaluations of teachers and teacher-preparation programs, despite the critique by researchers that such use of ‘value-added modeling’ has proven to be neither valid nor reliable for such decision-making. Giving states some flexibility…