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Worid News at Six
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America's #1 Populist - Jim Hightower On Air
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Mark Fiore Animated Political Cartoons
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Video | Dark Humor | Bill Maher Blasts Tea Baggers For Ignoring Defense Spending
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Related | Tea Party Fear in Europe
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Video | Cyber War
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NEW | Video - Senator Bernie Sanders - Wall Street Accountability - Stand Up, Shout and Yell
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New | Video -Senator Sanders Unfiltered Commentary
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Note-- The symbol ^ indicates that a full version of the item is available at the link. Archive of recent issues is available in column to the left.

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Breaking News

US | Call to Action: Showdown on Wall Street Tomorrow - Rally and March
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When: The rally starts at 4:00 p.m. and march to Wall Street begins around 5:00 p.m.
Where: Start at City Hall, 1 Centre Street, New York, NY, 10007. See map at link.

Related Item - Special Issue of Homosapiens.ki
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Opinion | A Geezer's Challenge to President Obama: How About a Revolution at the Top?
A Cry from the Remote, but Thinking Far Northwest
Atlantic Free Press - By Richard W. Behan - April 25, 2010
Richard W. Behan lives and writes on Lopez Island, off the northwest coast of Washington state.
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Atlantic Free Press was founded in September 2006 by Publisher Richard Kastelein of V.O.F. Expathos, in the Netherlands and Editor and Journalist Chris Floyd of Oxford, UK.

The mission of AF Press is simple: to dig out nuggets of truth from the slag-heap of lies, ignorance and witless diversion that has buried public discourse today. AF Press provides a new venue for disseminating hard news and insightful, fact-based analysis of the harsh realities too often ignored or distorted by the mainstream press.

US | Sen. Dick Durbin hits GOP, says 'filibusters have to end'
CNN Political Ticker - By Charles Riley - April 26, 2010
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Washington - Just hours after Senate Republicans succeeded in blocking debate on a Wall Street reform bill Monday, Democratic Sen. Dick Durbin slammed the GOP for refusing to act, saying "the filibusters have to end." Durbin expressed his frustration during an interview with CNN Chief National Correspondent John King, listing effort after effort made by Senate Democrats to include Republicans in the legislative process. But even at this late hour, the Illinois Democrat said he is still open to Republican input.

GOP Drops Opposition To Debate On Banking Bill
National Public Radio - By David Welna - April 28, 201
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Republicans have dropped their objections to Democratic efforts to begin debate on a sweeping overhaul of financial regulations, ending GOP tactics that had stalled the bill for three days. Republicans said they would attempt to change the bill on the Senate floor after reaching an impasse with Democrats on efforts to compromise in private talks.

Analysis? / Fact? | Republicans Are So Drunk on Wall Street Money They're Driving Off a Political Cliff
The Huffington Post - By Robert Creamer, Political organizer, strategist and author - April 27, 2010
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You see it all too often -- a grisly news story about a kid who runs his car off a cliff. We ask, "How could he have done it, how could he have been so reckless?" The answer invariably comes back: because he was drunk.
The same thing just happened to the Republicans in the Senate. Last night, to a person, like lemmings, every Republican Senator followed their leadership over a political cliff. They all voted against even debating a bill to hold the big Wall Street banks accountable. And the reason: they were drunk on Wall Street money.

Opinion | Commentary | Editorials | Op-Eds | Polls

Commentary | The only surprises are the history we do not know."
-- Harry Truman
The Huffington Post - By Gary Hart - April 26, 2010
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Students of American history find it remarkable how struggles of the founding days continue to repeat themselves down through the decades and centuries. That is because so many of the founding disputes were based on differing views of human nature, and human nature seems to change very little.

Currently, we are locked yet again in one of our recurring half-century battles over the size of banks. In this case, size matters because size equals power. Here again we see Thomas Jefferson and Alexander Hamilton head-to-head. Hamilton wanted a very large and powerful national bank, and banking system, to foster large-scale investment, economic expansion, and competition with older European systems. Jefferson opposed this scheme because he anticipated the inordinate political power such concentrated wealth would have within the democratic process.

Jefferson saw a handful of bankers controlling vast economic power, encouraging speculation, manipulating investments and currency values, and warping the political process to its own ends. He knew that money equaled power and that it distorted political systems, including republican ones, throughout history. What a surprise!

Yet, here we are now, two and a quarter centuries later, and, though Jefferson was clearly right, Hamilton has won... yet again. Now the few giant banks, combinations of traditional banking and rampant, largely unregulated speculation, not only too big to fail -- and thus guaranteed against collapse by everyday taxpayers -- but also too big to be brought under public regulation. An army of lobbyists, upwards of 1,500 or more, many former members of Congress and their families, swarming the halls of the peoples' Congress, warning of apocalypse if they are required to be transparent, even with public money, protecting astronomical bonuses (distributed as a nose-thumbing thank you to those of us who bailed them out), and trading campaign contributions for influence.

Expecting the predictable tut-tutting about how I've traded my chance for statesmanship for populist ranting, my response is: Jefferson, once again, was right, and I'm proud to be on his side.

Commentary | Obama Rejects Bipartisan Bank Deal
The Huffington Post - By Robert Kuttner - April 26, 2010
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Although Senate Banking Committee Chair Chris Dodd and his sometime Republican ally Richard Shelby continued to make noises on the Sunday talk shows about a possible bipartisan deal, both President Obama and House Financial Services Chairman Barney Frank have personally urged Dodd not to cut a deal with Republicans. I asked Frank point blank why Dodd would want such a deal, and he said--on the record--"I have no idea, but both President Obama and I have urged him not to."

This is a welcome sign that Obama realizes that public opinion is moving in the direction of tougher banking reform, and that he learned from the health debate that bipartisan compromise on key reform issues is a snare and a delusion. Kudos to Chairman Frank and to the President.

Op-Ed | US Financial Health | Don’t Cry for Wall Street
the New York Times - By Paul Krugman - April 22, 2010
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Quotes

Video and article | McCain on Goldman Sachs: "There Is No Doubt" Behavior Was "Unethical"
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At video click on photo links for other clips from congressional hearings.

United States Government

"In my many years I have come to a conclusion that one useless man is a shame, two is a law firm and three or more is a congress."
-- John Adams

"Suppose you were an idiot. And suppose you were a member of Congress. But then I repeat myself."
-- Mark Twain

"It's not the size of the dog in the fight, it's the size of the fight in the dog."
-- Mark Twain

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Topical News

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Activism at the Ground Level

"The strength of a democracy is, as in nature, in the roots, not in the flamboyant leaves that wither and die after two seasons or so in public office."
-- Homosapiens.ki Editor

Action
US - Stop Racial Profiling - Tell Arizona's Governor that SB 1070 is wrong
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A new Arizona law makes racial profiling legal and means that police will stop and question people for no other reason than that they are brown-skinned or speak Spanish. It's wrong. Our community knows all too well what it's like when police treat an entire community as potential criminals based on skin color and prejudiced assumptions. Please join Color of Change in telling Gov. Brewer of Arizona, President Obama and Secretary of Homeland Security Napolitano that racial profiling is wrong, no matter who it targets.

US | Urge Your Reps to Support a Timetable for Withdrawal from Afghanistan
Just Foreign Policy - Current
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US | Say No to Mandate for GE Crop Research
Contact your Senators and tell them to oppose the Global Food Security Act until the clause mandating support for GE crop research is removed.
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Arts & Culture

Musicians mix Coldplay and Taylor Swift together - Enjoy
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Music Video | "Democracy Is Coming to the USA" - Leonard Cohen
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Corruption, Criminality and Questional Practices in the Corpocracy
The Toxic Relationship Between Government and Corporate America . . . and Beyond

What Is "White Collar Crime"?
Expert Law - Current
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Controlling Corporate Criminality: Penal Sanctions and Beyond
First Published in Web Journal of Current Legal Issues in association with Blackstone Press Ltd. - By James Gobert, Professor of Law, University of Essex
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US | Wall Street and the Financial Crisis: The Role of Investment Banks
The Huffington Post -By Sen. Carl Levin - April 27, 2010
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Today the Subcommittee holds the fourth in our series of hearings to explore some of the causes and consequences of the financial crisis. These hearings are the culmination of nearly a year and a half of investigation.

The freezing of financial markets and collapse of financial institutions that sparked our investigation are not just a matter of numbers on a balance sheet. Millions of Americans have lost their jobs, their homes and their businesses in the recession that the crisis sparked, the worst economic decline since the Great Depression. Behind every number we cite are American

Goldman Sachs and other investment banks, when acting properly, play an important role in our economy. They help channel the nation's wealth into productive activities that create jobs and make economic growth possible, bringing together investors and businesses and helping Americans save for retirement or a child's education.

That's when investment banks act properly. But in looking at this crisis, it's hard not to echo the conclusion of another congressional committee, which found, "The results of the unregulated activities of the investment bankers ... were disastrous." That conclusion came in 1934, as the Senate looked into the reasons for the Great Depression. The parallels today are unmistakable.

US | Big Oil Fought Off New Safety Rules Before Rig Explosion in Gulf of Mexico
The Huffington Post - By Marcus Baram - April 27, 2010
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As families mourn the 11 workers thrown overboard in the worst oil rig disaster in decades and as the resulting spill continues to spread through the Gulf of Mexico, new questions are being raised about the training of the drill operators and about the oil company's commitment to safety.

The massive $600 million rig, which holds the record for boring the deepest oil and gas well in the world -- at 35,050 feet - had passed three recent federal inspections, the most recent on April 1, since it moved to its current location in January. The cause of the explosion has not been determined.

Yet relatives of workers who are presumed dead claim that the oil behemoth BP and rig owner TransOcean violated "numerous statutes and regulations" issued by the Occupational Safety and Health Administration and the U.S. Coast Guard, according to a lawsuit filed by Natalie Roshto, whose husband Shane, a deck floor hand, was thrown overboard by the force of the explosion and whose body has not yet been located.

Editor - The failure of government inspections of private sector operations to detect faulty procedures or equipment involving public safety is more than disturbing. One can cite the safety failure of skyscraper exterior platforms for work on the facade of buildings in New York City as one example. Now, in NYC this week, it has been revealed that a city inspector of possible asbestos presence in buildings under rehabilitation ( in which the disimination of this material in its removal is a serious danger to the workers and occpants of the building after 'removal' ) never inspected over 200 buildings during the past decade for which he filed reports stating no presence of asbestos was found. He has now admitted this irregularity. Officials are now investigating the possibility that this nefarious practice may have been more widespread during the past ten years involving, possibly, building owners, investors, contractors, workers and city inspectors as the cost of asbestos removal is notoriously expensive and an attractive target for those who want to avoid it. If the city investigation of possible law and/or building code violations proves valid, lawyers will have an assured income for a number of years.

Economy and Finance

"I contend that for a nation to try to tax itself into prosperity is like a man standing in a bucket and trying to lift himself up by the handle." -- Winston Churchill

"Government's view of the economy could be summed up in a few short phrases: If it moves, tax it. If it keeps moving, regulate it. And if it stops moving, subsidize it." -- Ronald Reagan (1986)

Bloomberg Economic News
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Bloomberg Current Worldwide Financial NewsLINK

Greek Debt Downgraded to Junk Status. Uh-Oh
WSJ Blog - By Iain Martin - April 27,2010
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As I was saying earlier… Away from the British election — where it’s not the done thing for politicians to mention the economy, the deficit, the U.K. national debt or the markets — the Greek meltdown and the related crisis in the euro zone is worsening rapidly.

Media and Journalism

"If you don't read the newspaper you are uninformed, if you do read the newspaper you are misinformed." -- Mark Twain

Political Issues

"Giving money and power to government is like giving whiskey and car keys to teenage boys." -- P.J. O'Rourke, Civil Libertarian

Real clear Politics Daily Rundown
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The Revolution Will Be Commercialized
Sarah Palin is already president of right-wing America—and it’s a position with a very big salary.
New York Magazine - By Gabriel Sherman - April 25, 2010
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The Printed Page

Book by Ralph Nader | Only the Super-Rich Can Save Us
What problems do you think the Super-Rich should unite to solve?

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This extraordinary story, written by the author who knows the most about citizen action, returns us to the literature of American social movements—to Edward Bellamy, to Upton Sinclair, to John Steinbeck, to Stephen Crane—reminding us in the process that changing the body politic of America starts with imagination.

The Surprising Reason Why Americans Are So Lonely, and Why Future Prosperity Means Socializing with Your Neighbors
Excerpted from the book EAARTH: Making a Life on a Tough New Planet by Bill McKibben
Alternet - April 27, 2010
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Access to cheap energy made us rich, wrecked our climate, and made us the first people on earth who had no practical need of our neighbors -- that has to change.

Science and Technology

Bloomberg Index of Current Science News
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The Icelandic Cauldron
ENN - By Andy Soos - April 19, 2010
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Reading on the Brain

The Nation - By Ange Mlinko - March 2, 2010
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The incus, malleus and stapes are the three bones of the middle ear. They were formed before mammals existed, and still exist in their original setting--a reptile's jaw. Nature is a great recycler of its own designs. The neuroscientist Stanislas Dehaene, a professor of cognitive psychology at the College de France, wagers that our brain performs a similar trick: it recycles its own neuronal pathways in response to new cultural objects. In Reading in the Brain: The Science and Evolution of a Human Invention (Viking; $27.95), Dehaene offers a theory about the evolution of reading and writing that suggests that, while humans did not evolve to read (writing is too young a technology, and took hold too swiftly, for that), we did invent a system that both conforms to pre-existing circuits and utterly revamps them. This contradiction points to the innate difficulty of reading. Learning to read laboriously reorganizes the brain. Dehaene has the neuroimaging to prove it.

Social Issues

"Government is the great fiction, through which everybody endeavors to live at the expense of everybody else."
-- Frederic Bastiat, French Economist (1801-1850)

US | Not All Jobs Are Created Equal: Why Wall Street's Gain Has Been America's Loss
The Huffington Post - By Ariana Huffington - April 27, 2010
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Jobs -- everybody is in such total agreement that we need more of them that the word is in danger of becoming meaningless, of going from tangible policy to talking point. In Washington, saying you're for jobs has become just another obligatory, perfunctory throat-clearing preamble.
At a fundraiser last week, Joe Biden pledged, "Some time in the next couple of months we're going to be creating between 250,000 jobs a month and 500,000 jobs a month."

That sounds great, if it's true -- a very big "if". But, even if it is true, the vice president didn't say what kind of jobs these are. And make no mistake: not all jobs are created equal.

Since the recession began in late 2007, we've lost 8.4 million jobs. Over 2 million of those were manufacturing jobs, the kind of jobs that have traditionally delivered American families into the middle class -- and kept them there. We lost 1.2 million manufacturing jobs in 2009 alone. And while job numbers go up and down, the loss of these blue-collar jobs has been going on for decades.

In 1950, manufacturing accounted for more than 30 percent of non-farm employment. As of last year, it's down to 10 percent. Indeed, one-third of all our manufacturing jobs have disappeared since 2000. This devastating downward trend has contributed greatly to the erosion of the middle class.

The Paper Page

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Book Review | Supercapitalism: The Transformation of Business, Democracy, and Everyday Life
Publishers Weekly - Current
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In this compelling and important analysis of the triumph of capitalism and the decline of democracy, former labor secretary Reich urges us to rebalance the roles of business and government. Power, he writes, has shifted away from us in our capacities as citizens and toward us as consumers and investors. While praising the spread of global capitalism, he laments that supercapitalism has brought with it alienation from politics and community.

The solution: to separate capitalism from democracy, and guard the border between them. Plainspoken and forceful, if somewhat repetitious, the book urges new and strengthened laws and regulations to restore authority to the citizens in us. Reich's proposals are anything but knee-jerk liberal: he calls for abolishing the corporate income tax and labels the corporate social responsibility movement distracting and even counterproductive.

As in 2004's Reason, Reich exhibits perhaps too much confidence in Americans' ability to think and act in their own best interests. But he refuses to shift blame for corporations' dominance to the usual suspects, instead pointing a finger at consumers like you and me who want better deals, and from investors like us who want better returns, he writes. Provocatively argued, this book could help begin a necessary national conversation. (Sept. 6)

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