Nina Simone sings Randy Newman’s Baltimore

• Baltimore – For this week’s Plus One Podcast we take a closer look at a song that seems to be on a lot of people’s minds this week: Nina Simone’s cover of Randy Newman’s “Baltimore.”
• Black Culture Is Not the Problem – It is policy and politics, the very things that bind together the history of Ferguson and Baltimore and, for that matter, the rest of America. Specifically, the problem rests on the continued profitability of racism. Freddie Gray’s exposure to lead paint as a child, his suspected participation in the drug trade, and the relative confinement of black unrest to black communities during this week’s riot are all features of a city and a country that still segregate people along racial lines, to the financial enrichment of landlords, corner store merchants and other vendors selling second-rate goods. The problem originates in a political culture that has long bound black bodies to questions of property. Yes, I’m referring to slavery.
• Jo Brand stars in new Labour Party Election Broadcast – Comedian Jo Brand stars in the Labour Party’s latest election broadcast which puts the spotlight on the Conservative Party’s record on the NHS. This is exactly what a party election broadcast should be.1. It’s single-minded.2. The language used by the talent feels vaguely authentic.3. The delivery isn’t forced.
• An Unending Refugee Tragedy: Europe’s Path to Deadly Partition – Germany and its European Union partners want to prevent further refugee dramas in the Mediterranean Sea. But a look back at the policies adopted after the 2013 tragedy in Lampedusa shows they have made a terrible situation even deadlier.
• Pope Francis Calls Gender Pay Gap A ‘Pure Scandal’
• The Trans-Pacific Partnership is great for elites. Is it good for anyone else?
• The joke was that Obama wasn’t joking
• Norway’s sovereign oil fund earns more than government spends – The Government Pension Fund Global, which invests Norway’s oil wealth, made more money in the first three months of the year than the government spent in the same period — and then some.
• A Better Way to Rein In Lobbying – It’s easy to get depressed about the state of American democracy. But we don’t need to be. The solutions are not overly complicated: Give government the resources it needs to think for itself and to develop policy without having to depend almost entirely on outside lobbyists. Make sure all sides have the resources to make their best case. The politics of checks and balances can do the rest.
• Gay Marriage: Unthinkable or Inevitable? – Twenty-five years ago, same-sex marriage was for all practical purposes unthinkable. Today, it seems close to inevitable. This remarkable shift highlights the particular difficulty of the marriage equality case that came before the Supreme Court on Tuesday—but also points to the right result. On the one hand, the petitioners are asking the Court to recognize a constitutional right to something that until recently few Americans even deemed conceivable, and the Court is not the usual forum for radical change. On the other hand, once the question began to be asked, it turned out states had no good reason to deny recognition to gay and lesbian couples who seek to marry, as has become ever more clear over the past two decades. At this point, the Court has only two choices: to vindicate the demands of equality and liberty, or to validate discrimination. There is no third way.