Workers and Wage Slaves, Maximum Age, Minimum Wage, On the Job; Banks and Wall Street, Taxes, Class Warfare, Antiestablishmentarianism, Homeless; Chinese Exodus; Tau Day; Science Under Siege; Earth and Moon, Space Travel; Universe

Workers and Wages Slaves

• Meet 204 Republicans Who Don't Want to Punish Companies That Steal Workers' Wages
• Days After Decrying Flat Wages, McConnell Proposes Lowering Wages by $13 Billion
• How Walmart's Low Wages Cost All Americans, Not Just Its Workers
• Canada: Walmart wrong to fire unionized workers, high court says—"Supreme Court rules 5-2 in favour of 190 Quebec who lost jobs after first unionized Walmart shut its doors."
• Unions Fear This SCOTUS Case Could Bring Their 'Final Destruction'
• American Workers Need Overtime Protections
• Qatar police respond to fight at Sheraton Doha hotel

Maximum Age

• Tech industry job ads: Older workers need not apply
• Faygo accused of age discrimination - by founder's grandson
• Miss Delaware, 24, loses crown for being too old
• Singer sued for being too old and ugly for Pink cover band

Minimum Wage

• Zillow's Rich Barton on the $15 minimum wage, Uber regulations, and why the U.S. is filled with entrepreneurial 'freedom fighters'
• Ikea to raise its average minimum hourly wage to $10.76 LA Times
• Massachusetts: Minimum wage increase doesn't add up to a living wage—"The state's new $11 minimum wage –the highest in the nation -- will make low-wage workers' lives a little more stable, and less stressful. But not necessarily comfortable."
• A Minimum Wage That Makes More Sense—"Accounting for regional price differences is sound strategy when setting state or local minimum wages." NYT

On the Job

• Your Lifestyle Has Already Been Designed (The Real Reason For The Forty-Hour Workweek)
• Taking a Vacation May Actually Save Your Career—"Workaholism is hurting the American economy."
• Unblinking Eyes Track Employees: Workplace Surveillance Sees Good and Bad—"Abundant data, smart software and cheap sensors are beginning to make it possible to measure and monitor employees as never before." NYT
• An Employee Dies, and the Company Collects the Insurance—"Many companies insure their employees’ lives with themselves as beneficiaries, a practice some deride as immoral. But companies say the policies, for which they get tax breaks, help them bolster pensions and health care." NYT
• Obama Says US Should Offer Paid Maternity Leave—Right-wingers say no [Salon]
• North Dakota coffee shop has no employees, runs entirely on the honor system…and it's working
• Job interviews reward narcissists, punish applicants from modest cultures

Banks and Wall Street

• Ex-Goldman Trader Calls $8.25 Million Bonus Unfair, Told Mom He'd Get More—They really are too big to jail.
• New York attorney general accuses Barclays of 'dark pool' fraud
• Grassley's Hunt For An Obama Insider Trading Scandal Backfires On GOP
• House GOP Staffer Allegedly Changed His Story In Insider Trading Probe
• House Passes Bill To Aid Koch Brothers, Deregulate Wall Street
• China's commodity-lending fraud just got $15 billion bigger

Taxes

• Krugman: Sympathy for the Trustafarians NYT
• Higher taxes do not kill jobs—"County-level BLS data tell the true story about job growth."
• Tax cuts in Kansas have cost the state money — and job creation's been terrible WaPo
  

Class Warfare

• Robert Reich on America's Koch Problem
• In US, over 75 per cent of conservatives say the poor 'have it easy'
• Elizabeth Warren says the U.S. economy is rigged. Many conservatives agree. WaPo
• Conspiracy of the plutocrats: Secrets of the wealth-inequality explosion revealed Salon
• Detroit's Water War: a tap shut-off that could impact 300,000 people—"A right-wing state and corporate push to cut off water is economic shock therapy at its most ruthless and racist, but resistance is growing."
• Debtors Prisons Are Taking the US Back to the 19th Century—"In recent years, more and more cells have been filled with poor individuals who are caught in a vile trap, unable to pay court fines."
• What wealth gap? Danish welfare narrows disparity WaPo

Antiestablishmentarianism

• The open source revolution is coming and it will conquer the 1% - ex CIA spy—"The man who trained more than 66 countries in open source methods calls for re-invention of intelligence to re-engineer Earth."
• Nick Hanauer: The Pitchforks Are Coming… For Us Plutocrats Politico
• The United States Of Cruelty—"We are cheap. We are suspicious. We will shoot first. It does not have to be this way. Like Lincoln before us, it is time to do something about it."

Homeless

• 73-year-old veteran loses his job for allegedly giving a muffin to a homeless man
• Chinese tycoon's free lunch for homeless New Yorkers backfires—"Controversial businessman Chen Guangbiao angered homeless people in New York after promising them $300 each and failing to deliver."
• Flipside: Woman launches mobile showers for the homeless—"A San Francisco woman creates a "shower bus" to help accommodate the city's 3,500 homeless people. Vanessa Johnston reports."

Chinese Exodus

• Disappointed Immigration Applicants Sue Canada—"More than 1,400 Chinese plaintiffs have filed a lawsuit against the Canadian immigration authorities after Canada announced it was canceling its immigrant investor program along with tens of thousands of outstanding applications." NYT
• Mainland Chinese line up for Australia's 'millionaire visa'
• Cashed-up Chinese students turn to Australia
• China targets officials who sent families abroad—"China's anti-graft campaign is now targeting officials who have sent their spouses and children abroad, where they can create channels to potentially funnel illicit gains and establish footholds for eventual escape from the mainland."

Tau Day

• The brain injury that made me a math genius—"Twelve years ago, Jason Padgett had never made it past pre-algebra. And then a violent mugging changed everything." Salon
• Notation, notation, notation: a brief history of mathematical symbols—The symbols we use every day have fascinating and surprisingly recent origins, explains author Joseph Mazur in his new book."
• The secret history of numbers: How math shapes our lives in amazing, unpredictable ways—"The relationship between people and numbers is so much more fascinating than simple dollars and cents." Salon

Science Under Siege

• Universities 'get poor value' from academic journal-publishing firms—"Research finds secrecy over contracts has stopped some institutions realising they are paying too much for journals."
• The U.S. Should Invest In Science, Not War
• Neil DeGrasse Tyson: US need not lose its edge in science—"The famed astrophysicist says there's a reason some chemical elements are named for places in the US -- and that we don't have to leave those glory days in the past."
• Asia's Cult of Intelligence—"With its 'cult of ignorance and anti-intellectualism' the U.S. risks falling behind rivals in Asia."
• xkcd: People are stupid

Earth and Moon

• Largest Active Volcano on Earth Rumbles Back to Life—"Recent quake swarms signal that magma is squeezing into Mauna Loa's magma storage chambers in the same spots below where the 1984 eruption occurred."
• Earth and Moon Are 60 Million Years Older Than Previously Believed
• Traces of another world found on the Moon—"Researchers have found evidence of the world that crashed into the Earth billions of years ago to form the Moon."
• The Moon is Now a Wi-Fi Hotspot
• Strange New World Discovered: The 'Mega Earth'

Space Travel

• A Klingon is currently commander of the International Space Station
• Astronaut Sally Ride and the Burden of Being The First
• The Curiosity rover has been on Mars for one Martian year. It celebrated by taking a selfie. WaPo

Universe

• Big Bang blunder bursts the multiverse bubble—"Premature hype over gravitational waves highlights gaping holes in models for the origins and evolution of the Universe, argues Paul Steinhardt."
• Light from huge explosion 12 billion years ago reaches Earth
• NASA detects mysterious signal ​240 million light years away from Earth
• The Timey Wimey Spacey Wacey Explanation of Relativity
• Avoiding "Sagan Syndrome." Why Astronomers and Journalists should pay heed to Biologists about ET.
• Star Within a Star: Weird Stellar 'Hybrid' Discovered—Red supergiant replaced its core with a neutron star.workers
• Collection of three supermassive black holes detected
• Mystery object in lake on Saturn's moon Titan intrigues scientists—"Nasa's Cassini probe took image last year as it passed by planet's largest moon – nothing seen when other images taken."
• Titan's Atmosphere May be Older than Saturn, a New Study Suggests

Workers and Wages Slaves, IT Crowd, Minimum Wage; Banks and Wall Street, Class Warfare, Corporatocracy; Tea Party, Obamanation, Politics and Partisanship, Vote Machinations, Campaign Finance Deform, Christie, Hillary; IRS; Redskins

Workers and Wage Slaves

• The Economy May Be Improving. Worker Pay Isn't. NYT
• The Downward Ramp—"The jobs crisis has begun to affect even highly skilled college graduates, who are taking jobs that once went to people with fewer skills." NYT
• I got my Master's, couldn't find a job and lived on food stamps. Now stop calling me a 'welfare queen'
• 5 reasons US workers hate their jobs more than they used to
• Young workers hate their jobs WaPo
• It's Official: The Boomerang Kids Won't Leave—"One in five young adults lives with his or her parents. It might be a recessionary blip — or the dawn of a whole new economic age." NYT
• Elizabeth Warren on creating jobs: 'This isn't magic, we actually know how to do this'

IT Crowd

• This IT worker had to train an H-1B replacement—"U.S. workers protested job losses to foreign workers by displaying American flags in their cubicles."
• Should tech workers settle "no-poach" case for $324M? Judge has real doubts—"One plaintiff says the deal isn't fair to workers, and the judge is listening."
• Robot doctors, online lawyers and automated architects: the future of the professions?—"Advances in technology have long been recognised as a threat to manual labour. Now highly skilled, knowledge-based jobs that were once regarded as safe could be at risk. How will they adapt to the digital age?"

Minimum Wage

• IMF urges U.S. to raise minimum wage
• Massachusetts approves $11 minimum wage
• Obamas Want Daughters To Get Taste Of Life On Minimum Wage
• 'Subminimum wage' for disabled workers called exploitative—"Critics of program that pays disabled workers 'subminimum wage' say it should be abolished. Others say it's an important tool to provide training and employment."

Banks and Wall Street

• Wikileaks: Secret Trade in Services Agreement (TISA) - Financial Services Annex—"Despite the failures in financial regulation evident during the 2007-2008 Global Financial Crisis and calls for improvement of relevant regulatory structures, proponents of TISA aim to further deregulate global financial services markets."
• City of Miami sues JPMorgan, claims mortgage discrimination
• Ex-Goldman director goes to prison, still owes $13.9 million fine
• Senate hearing examines flaws in stock markets
• Why a guy making $100,000 a year can't get a bank account WaPo
• Greenpeace suffers $5.2-million loss after rogue employee's currency investment flops
• Master Currency Counterfeiter Prints Millions, Says 'Screw You' to US

Class Warfare

• Class in America: The Fault Lines
• Reich: Real Business Leaders Want to Save Capitalism
• Arizona GOPer Went Birther, Compared Poor To 'Lazy Pigs' In Anonymous Blog Comments
• No, The Poor Aren't Poor Because They Refuse To Work
• America's Dying Factories Are Widening Income Inequality
• Justice Sotomayor: Inequality Could Trigger 'Unrest' In U.S.
• U.S. appeals court overturns L.A. ban on homeless living in vehicles
• British public wrongly believe rich face highest tax burden, new research shows—"Study shows poorest 10% pay eight percentage points more of their income, prompting calls for more progressive system."
• Australia's richest 1% own as much as bottom 60%, says Oxfam—"Income inequality has risen since mid-1990s and nine richest people now have greater net worth than poorest 4.54 million."

Corporatocracy

• How America became uncompetitive and unequal—"How corporate mergers contribute to economic inequality." WaPo
• The Corporate Daddy: Walmart, Starbucks, and the Fight Against Inequality—"Walmart, the world's largest public corporation, is a big part of the income-gap problem. It could be a big part of the solution." NYT
• The True Cost of Hidden Money—"A Piketty Protégé's Theory on Tax Havens." NYT
• Medtronic Is Biggest Yet to Renounce U.S. Tax Citizenship
• Legislation Introduced to Stop American Corporations from Pretending to Be Foreign Companies
• EU launches attack against corporate tax avoidance—"The EU has taken steps to curb tax avoidance by global corporations. In recent months, criticism in the budget-strapped bloc has mounted over tax loopholes exploited by companies such as Apple, Google and others."
• Thrown Out of Court—"How corporations became people you can't sue."
• Halliburton Ruling Could Be A Big Win For Big Pharma, Wall Street

Tea Party

• Eugene Robinson: Overdosing on tea—"The Republican Party's reliance on tea party support is like an addict's dependence on a dangerous drug: It may feel good at first, but eventually it eats you alive." WaPo
• Teatopia—"What would actually happen if Tea Partiers controlled Congress and Rand Paul was president?"
• Unwitting tea party folk do the bidding of big business LA Times
• David Brat's Success Due to 19,000 new primary voters
• Reince Priebus After Eric Cantor Loss: I Don't Think GOP Is Divided
• Muslim reporter describes being ridiculed at the Texas GOP convention—"Republican chairman: 'Would the state party ever condone that? Absolutely not.'

Obamanation

• Krugman: Yes He Could—"Health Care and Climate: President Obama's Big Deals" NYT
• GOP Rep: Obama Impeachment 'Probably Could' Pass The House
• Conservatives Uncover Obama Plot to Destroy Phil Mickelson—"According to the latest conspiracy theory, Obama sent the FBI and SEC to investigate the pro golfer because he once complained about high tax rates."
• Here's every presidential executive order going back to George Washington

Politics and Partisanship

• Poll: Congress historic midterm low Politico
• America prepares to reelect the Congress it loathes WaPo
• Congress is making a lot of history! (By being so unpopular) WaPo
• The shocking numbers: Americans are dangerously ignorant on politics—"The scary thing about the man who upset Eric Cantor last week is how familiar his brand of ignorance is." Salon
• Time to Stand Up and Fight for a More Perfect Union—"The irony of American politics is that the right is far weaker than it appears and the left far stronger than it asserts."

Vote Machinations

• End Polarization. Make Everyone Vote.
• Middle Class Squeeze: As incomes slide, voters check out
• AZ Candidate Who Changed His Name To 'Cesar Chavez' Thrown Off Ballot
• Fox News paid Scott Brown $136,000
• Alaska's Don Young violated US House ethics—"The House Ethics Committee has found that U.S. Rep. Don Young of Alaska violated House rules by using campaign funds for personal trips and accepting improper gifts."
• Shadowy Obama Megadonor Indicted On Fraud And Manslaughter Charges
• SCOTUS Rules For Anti-Abortion Group In Case About Campaign Lies

Campaign Finance Deform

• Prosecutors: Walker's Campaign 'Tacitly Admitted' Breaking The Law
• Gov. Scott Walker's Campaign Violations—"There clearly is plenty to fear from independent spending groups that raise unlimited dollars." NYT
• The Koch brothers may spend $290 million on this election. That's how much 5,270 American households make in a year. WaPo
• Campaign-Finance Reform Has to Be Cross-Partisan—"Democrats love to talk about cutting the influence of money in politics, but are they actually any more eager to fix it than Republicans?"
• After Lindsey Graham met billionaire, supportive super PAC secured donation an hour later
• Cronies, corruption and cash: Lawrence Lessig on why we need a super PAC to end all super PACs Salon

Christie

• Despite budget gap, Christie holding firm that business tax cuts are off-limits
• Chris Christie to GOP donors on bridge scandal: 'You'll get over it' LA Times
• Prosecutor Is Closing In on Gov. Christie—"Indictments against four cronies are near certain, sources say. Only question is if David Samson, Christie's longtime mentor, will flip."

Hillary

• The GOP's weapon against Hillary? A giant squirrel
• Clinton: Matt Drudge, Karl Rove Planting 'False Information'
• Man who beat NSA in T-shirt parody case wins against Ready for Hillary

IRS

• Lawmakers fume over lost emails in IRS probe
• Congressman asks NSA to provide metadata for "lost" IRS e-mails
• Attkisson On Missing IRS Documents: If The Emails Really Are Lost, 'That's Quite A Story In Itself'
• IRS Commissioner To Testify About Lois Lerner's Lost Emails
• Republicans, at Hearing on Lost Emails, Accuse I.R.S. Chief of Lying NYT
• Drum: Yet Another IRS Scandal That Isn't

Redskins

• Federal agency cancels Redskins trademark registration, says name is disparaging WaPo
• Retired Native American Chief Would Be Offended If Redskins Did Change Name
• What About the Celtics?
• The Onion: Redskins' Name Only Offensive If You Think About What It Means
• The Onion: Redskins' Kike Owner Refuses To Change Team's Offensive Name
• The Onion: Washington Redskins Change Their Name To The D.C. Redskins
• The Onion: Washington Redskins Ease Tensions With Native Americans By Adding Bottle Of Booze To Logo
• Last Week Tonight with John Oliver: The Washington Redskins
• The Daily Show: Thursday Night Law

Flag Day; Iraq'd; Politics, Cantor; Vote Machinations, Campaign Finance Deform; Immigration, Race and Racism; Economy; Workers and Wage Slaves, Occupational Hazards, Minimum Wage, On the Job; Homeless; Banks and Wall Street

Flag Day

• Why Are Flags So Cheap? -- Red White and Screwed: How Wal-Mart is Killing the American Flag Business—"The American flag-making business is dying. But those cheap, Chinese-made stars and stripes? They're not to blame."
• Pennsylvania Flag Desecration Case Heads to Court
• 'The Star-Spangled Banner' in a Minor Key Is More Dramatic Than Ever

Iraq'd

• Obama says no combat troops to Iraq; U.S. weighs airstrikes
• Wait, McCain was wrong on Iraq? Yup.
• Fareed Zakaria: Who lost Iraq? The Iraqis did, with an assist from George W. Bush WaPo
• Shep Smith: The Same People Who Were Wrong About Iraq Now Want Us To Go Back
• Opinion: Bush's toxic legacy in Iraq
• Jon Stewart Wonders 'What The F*ck Is Going On' In Iraq?

Politics

• We Hate Each Other, We Really Hate Each Other—This is why you can't have nice things [WaPo], America
• The 3 Things Republicans and Democrats Agree On—"Voters are more split along partisan lines than ever—but there's something like consensus on immigration, national security, and gay rights."
• Conservatives Are So Conservative They Think the Congressional GOP Are Moderate Squishes
• Rand Paul: Moderates aren't GOP's future Politico
• Tea party candidates have lost five times as much as they've won WaPo
• For tea party Republicans, House leadership hopes turn into disappointment—Democrats say, GOP leadership can't get worse. WaPo
• The tea party in Congress: Talking loud, doing nothing WaPo
• Seriously Out of Touch: GOP Uses Live Elephants As Party Props In Downtown Dallas

Cantor

• Eric Cantor's Legacy Is One Of Economic Destruction—"From day one — literally, the night of President Obama's first inauguration — Cantor was leading the charge to not just oppose Obama, but to delegitimize him — denying him the conciliatory, bipartisan policy style he campaigned on, and turning even policy successes into the kind of grueling partisan battles that voters dislike."
• Real lesson in Eric Cantor's loss: Beware conventional wisdom
  
• Krugman: The Fix Isn't In—"The surprise primary defeat of Eric Cantor is the unraveling of an ideological movement."
• The New Nihilism Threatens GOP's Growth—"Cantor's defeat signals deep problems for a party being pushed further to the right by the antigovernment wing."
• Eric Cantor's Loss Was a Fluke, But It Still Reshapes 2014
• Everybody Hates Eric Cantor: A Roundup
• Blast from the Past: Bullet That Hit Eric Cantor's Office From Random Gunfire —He allegedly lied about being shot at, probably to garner sympathy and instill fear.

Vote Machinations

• Alabama GOP struggles to find voter fraud despite $1,000 reward
• A federal judge reminds Ohio Republicans that fettering the right to vote violates the Constitution
• Bill Clinton stresses voter turnout at annual Ohio Democrats' dinner

Campaign Finance Deform

• Krugman: The Koch Cycle of Endless Cash—"The wealthiest Americans are using their fortunes to lobby Congress against any limits on their ability to buy elections." NYT
• Unlimited Dark Campaign Money Is 'The American Way,' Says Terri Lynn Land
• Billionaire's Campaign Contribution Among Biggest In Recent History—Griffin, well known for saying the very wealthy have an 'insufficient influence' in politics, is the richest man in Illinois...."
• The Dark Money Machine That Beat Eric Cantor
• Cuomo Has Raised Millions Through Loophole He Pledged to Close—"The governor has called for closing a gap in the state's campaign finance laws, but he's taken far more through the loophole than his predecessors, much of it from real estate developers."

Immigration

• Cantor Loss Hurts 2016 Republicans Seeking Hispanic Votes
• Immigration Does Matter in GOP Primaries, But It's Not Clear Why
• Influx of minors across Texas border driven by belief that they will be allowed to stay in U.S. WaPo
• Palin: Immigration Debate 'Just About Driving Me To Renounce My Republican Ties'

Race and Racism

• White People Think One Black Person's Success Proves Racism Is Over
• Inside The KKK's Plan For Expansion—"A group of Ku Klux Klan members says it is planning military style combat training for the first time in KKK history."
• A Library of White-Supremacist Hand Gestures—"The Anti-Defamation League has published an online catalog of the symbols, flags, and slogans used by hate groups. Is this an educational tool or a portal for perverse curiosity?"
• Ku Klux Klan hood-wearer to get $215,000 from Los Angeles—"Black resident wore KKK hood and T-shirt emblazoned with racial slur to protest city during 2011 parks commission meeting."
• Ditch 'Old Hickory' and Put Martin Luther King on the $20 Bill—"The civil-rights leader helped America to realize its founding ideals as surely as any president, and ending the run of exclusively white faces on bank notes is long overdue."

Economy

• Recession 'led to 10,000 suicides'
• House GOP approves more tax breaks without paying for them
• America's middle class: Poorer than you think
• Then and now photos of Detroit reveal the real frontline of the Global Financial Crisis
• Rich got 14.6% richer in 2013—"Number of Chinese millionaires jumps as Asia-Pacific region leads growth."

Workers and Wage Slaves

• Why Newport restaurant has 'no tipping' policy—"Packhouse servers earn $10 per hour or 20 percent of their individual food sales per shift, whichever is larger – almost always the 20 percent. And servers have to meet certain goals – sales and service targets, for example – to get their 20 percent."
• Waffle House denies NC waitress a $1,000 tip from 'angel'
• La Porchetta owner who paid young workers in pizza fined $335k

Occupational Hazards

• US: NY firm made workers pray, say 'I love you'—"A federal agency says a New York healthcare firm forced employees to join prayer circles, thank God for having jobs and say 'I love you' to co-workers and managers."
• The Dangers for Women Who Negotiate—"Contrary to the advice of “Lean In,” for women, asserting a strong position in negotiations can backfire."
• Noncompete Clauses Increasingly Pop Up in Array of Jobs—"Once largely limited to the technology and sales sectors, the agreements are entering a range of fields; even camp counselors and hairstylists are being required to sign." NYT
• Facing massive strikes, mining corporations may soon use weaponized drones to control workers
• Amazon warehouses under scrutiny after worker deaths
• Revealed: Asian slave labour producing prawns for supermarkets in US, UK
• India steel plant gas leak kills six in Bhilai

Minimum Wage

• Obama Moves On Minimum Wage Without Congress
• Vermont To Raise Minimum Wage To $10.50
• Seattle: Business adds 'living wage surcharge' after minimum wage hike—"A locally-owned parking business is adding an unusual charge that customers are just starting to notice."
• Industry Group Files Lawsuit Seeking To Kill Seattle's Minimum Wage, Claiming It Violates Their Free Speech
• Why Are Rhode Island Democrats Blocking Minimum-Wage Increases?—"With friends like this, who needs Republicans."

On the Job

• Why You Hate Work—"Excessive demands are leading to burnout everywhere." NYT
• Google Has Started Hiring More People Who Didn't Go To College—Shades of Silicon Valley?
• European court: Death doesn't end holiday benefits—"Dying for a holiday, but can't fit one in? Not to worry — a new European court ruling says vacation benefits are still valid after death." WaPo
• The Onion: More Office Workers Switching To Fetal Position Desks
• PVP Online: Workaholics

Homeless

• Boris Johnson calls for removal of anti-homeless spikes
• More US Cities Are Cracking Down on Feeding the Homeless
• Sarasota leaders help homeless veterans

Banks and Wall Street

• NYC Settles With 14 Occupy Protesters for $583K
• Cop who punched Occupy Wall Street protester gets tax-free disability pension—"Deputy Inspector Johnny Cardona has been granted three-quarters tax free disability pension of roughly $120,000 a year for injuries suffered during his violent encounter with Felix Rivera-Pitre n the Financial District in October 2011."
• How House Democrats Are Caving On Key Mortgage Rules
• U.S. to Sue Citigroup Over Faulty Mortgage Bonds: Sources—"The U.S. Department of Justice is preparing to sue Citigroup Inc on charges that the bank defrauded investors on billions of dollars worth of mortgage securities in the run-up to the financial crisis, after talks to resolve the probe broke down, people familiar with the matter said on Friday." NYT
• Judge considers dismissing U.S. fraud case against Bank of America—"DOJ may not have the evidence to try this as a fraud case."
• Senator to SEC: Stop granting waivers to law-breaking companies
• Australia: Government grabs $360 million from idle household bank accounts

Workers and Wage Slaves, Unemployment, Minimum Wage, On the Job; Banks and Wall Street, Accountability, Credit Suisse, Taxes, Class War; Corporatocracy, Amazon.com, Reviews

Workers and Wage Slaves

• The Republican War on Workers' Rights—"State legislatures have favored employers over their employees." NYT
• Here's The Painful Truth About What It Means To Be 'Working Poor' In America
• Walmart Warehouse Contractor To Pay $21 Million To Settle Wage Theft Allegations
• Medical residents' pay: Doctors in training are organizing for collective bargaining
• McDonald's vacates headquarters due to worker protests —Over 100 arrested.
• For Chevron, $6 a day is apparently too much pay for Cambodian workers

Unemployment

• Poll: 47% of Unemployed Have 'Completely Given Up' Looking for a Job
• Cutting Off Emergency Unemployment Benefits Hasn't Pushed People Back to Work
• Unemployment: It's Not Personal NYT
• More Gloom for the Long-Term Unemployed, from Alan Krueger WSJ

Minimum Wage

• The fight for a global minimum wage
• Show This To The Next Person Who Says High Minimum Wages Kill Jobs
• Michigan: Bill boosting minimum wage to $9.20 an hour to get hearing in state House
• Swiss voters reject $25 minimum wage

On the Job

• No matter what the boss says about flextime, get to work early
• Why Are We So Busy?—"Since the 1930s, U.S. G.D.P. has grown, in real terms, by a factor of sixteen. Why hasn’t that wealth translated into more leisure time?"
• Man Asks Mike Rowe for "Life Advice"

Banks and Wall Street

• "It's total moral surrender": Matt Taibbi unloads on Wall Street, inequality and our broken justice system—"Matt Taibbi, author of 'The Divide,' tells Salon about Geithner's excuses, Piketty's success and Nixon's cronies." Salon
• Krugman: Springtime for Bankers—"The government saved Wall Street but left the real economy behind." NYT
• Occupy activist Cecily McMillan sentenced to three months in jail—"McMillan to also serve five years' probation for deliberately elbowing a New York police officer at a protest in 2012.

Accountability

• Convicted of Felonies, Banks Are Allowed to Stay in Business NYT
• Merrill Lynch, Charles Schwab Accounts Linked To Mexican Drug Cartels: SEC
• Barclays Bank fined £26m for gold price failings
• JPMorgan, HSBC and Credit Agricole accused of euro rate-fixes
• JPMorgan Ex-CEO for China Investment Bank Arrested, Caixin Says

Credit Suisse

• Credit Suisse pleads guilty to U.S. criminal charge in tax probe—"Swiss bank Credit Suisse on Monday pleaded guilty to a criminal charge for its role in helping Americans dodge taxes, U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder said, and will pay more than $2.5 billion as part of an agreement with U.S. authorities."
• Credit Suisse still too big to jail despite guilty plea
• Big fine 'won't do much damage': Credit Suisse CEO
• Why Is Credit Suisse Still Allowed to Do Business in the United States?—"The conventional wisdom is that revoking a large bank's license can trigger potential systemic consequences. But that's not the case here."

Taxes

• Federal Judges Are Cutting Rich Tax Cheats Big Sentencing Breaks
• IRS: 318,000 fed workers owe $3.3B in back taxes
• Why Republicans Love Taxing the Poor
• To Lift the Poor, You Can't Avoid Taxing the Rich—"It would be nice if we could tackle inequality with a growth approach and without some sacrifices from the wealthy, but that path simply doesn't exist." NYT

Class War

• Billionaire Home Depot Founder Is Not Really Sorry For Nazi Comparison
• Protesters angry drunken Ferrari driver got work release sentence—More affluenza at work.
• Martins Beach billionaire evades questions on stand
• As Court Fees Rise, The Poor Are Paying The Price
• Pope Demands 'Legitimate Redistribution' Of Wealth—Also: The Piketty pontiff: How Pope Francis is bringing Catholicism back to its anti-inequality roots Salon
• 'Stunning' Data Proves, Yet Again, Housing The Homeless Would Actually Save Taxpayers Big Time
• Tony Abbott's daughter was given scholarship for $60,000 design degree—"Frances Abbott was awarded a chairman's scholarship for bachelors degree at prestigious Sydney institute where a donor to her father sits as chair of board of governors."

Corporatocracy

• One dollar, one vote—"When it comes to setting policy, the views of businesses and the rich seem to count for more."
• Thanks to the Roberts Court, Corporations Have More Constitutional Rights Than Actual People
• Public Justice's Paul Bland Explains What Media Should Know About Class Actions And The Pro-Business Roberts Court
• Looks Like Patent Trolls Have Won This Round As Even Weakened Patent Reform Likely To Die—US Senate wusses out.
• GM to pay $35 million over delayed recall—No arrests?

Amazon.com

• Hachette Says Amazon Is Delaying Delivery of Some Books—"Amazon, which controls more than a third of the book trade in the United States, is marking many books published by Hachette Book Group as not available for at least two or three weeks." NYT
• Goodbye, Amazon: We're through!—"I quit Amazon because of its monopolistic tactics. Is it impossible for book publishers to do the same?" Salon
• Amazon Loses Bid for ".Amazon" Domain Name—In the tradition of WWF forcing WWE to submit.

Reviews

• Lawyers threaten redditor over negative router review on Amazon—Streisand Effect leads to Amazon rescinding Mediabridge's selling priveleges.
• Utah couple win against company that charged for bad online review—Kleargear responds and gripes.
• California: Bill would create new protection for shoppers who write online reviews
• When Rave Reviews Become Risky Re: Internet Reviews
• Docs get Yelped! 1 in 4 patients now read online physician reviews
• Lincoln City hotel sues for defamation after anonymous person posts scathing TripAdvisor review
• Italian antitrust watchdog investigates TripAdvisor reviews, Expedia pricing deals
• Rating or Defaming?

Workers and Wage Slaves, Millenials, Occupational Hazards, Economy; Obamacare; Class Warfare, Politics, GOP, Bridgegate, Corruption, Taxes, Vote Machinations, Campaign Finance Deform, Plutoligarchy, Koch Suckers

Workers and Wage Slaves

• Loss Of Unemployment Benefits Has Now Cost Almost $5 Billion As Congress Dithers
• Robert Reich: Blame big money for our dysfunctional economy—"Former secretary of labor weighs in on our latest underwhelming jobs report and the implications of 'McCutcheon.'" Salon
• Nearly 90% of fast-food workers allege wage theft, survey finds
• McDonald's ex-managers sound off to Salon: Non-existent breaks and illegal overtime—"Former managers says the giant chain's employees were illegally denied their pay - and the corporation's to blame." Salon
• Walmart Realizes It's Losing Billions Of Dollars By Denying Workers More Hours
• Walmart living wage: If the company paid its employees more, how much would prices go up?
• Politicians violated VW workers' rights—"[Tenn. Gov.] Haslam, according to the documents, essentially offered Volkswagen $300 million in taxpayer dollars for plant expansion — but only if the plant remained union-free."

Occupational Hazards

• This GOP House Candidate Proposed Eliminating the Weekend
• UPS Fires 250 Employees For Staging A 90-Minute Protest To Defend Co-Worker
• Woman allegedly fired for checking her email during maternity leave Salon
• Four More Shipbreaking Workers Die in Bangladesh
• Labour markets: A mighty contest—"Job destruction by robots could outweigh creation."

Millenials

• The First Person to Talk to Millennials Like Human Beings Will Run the World—"A new study says Millennials will put an end to the two-party system in America. Will the people currently in power learn to talk to them like people before it all happens?"
• Millennials Mired in Wealth Gap as Older Americans Gain: Economy
• 260,000 graduates in minimum wage jobs

Economy

• Wider U.S. trade deficit to weigh on first-quarter GDP
• Pro-Democrat group says 9 of the 10 poorest states are Republican—Politifact says: Mostly true.
• If homeless people had a safe place to live, taxpayers could save millions—"By providing housing to its homeless, Charlotte, N.C., saved $1.8 million, research at the University of North Carolina–Charlotte found."

Obamacare

• TV Networks Denied Obama Airtime To Tout Obamacare Enrollment
• Facing Obamacare deadline, more young people signed up in March WaPo
• Medicaid boosted by 3 million, bringing 'Obamacare' sign-ups to 10 million—"The numbers may boost Democrats' assertion that 'Obamacare' is working."
• Paul Ryan: We Can Totally Still Repeal Obamacare
• Paul Ryan's honesty problem: How he just exposed GOP's true Obamacare intentions—"Golden boy inadvertently admits GOP doesn't agree insurers should be prohibited from discriminating against the ill." Salon
• Paul Ryan: Popular parts of Obamacare too costly to keep, alternatives needed—It's called single-payer. WaPo
• GOP Candidate Touts Fake Phone Call From Obama In New Ad—Sad.
• The next GOP scheme to manufacture Obamacare "horror stories" WaPo

Class Warfare

• Sen. Sanders: Democracy vs. Oligarchy—"The great political struggle we now face is whether the United States retains its democratic heritage or whether we move toward an oligarchic form of society where the real political power rests with a handful of billionaires, not ordinary Americans."
• There's a Class War Going On and the Poor Are Getting Their Butts Kicked
• The Shocking Rise of Wealth Inequality: Is it Worse Than We Thought?
• You'll Never Guess What Just Happened to Paul Ryan's Promise to Tackle Poverty
• Ryan Unsuited to Lead 'Adult Conversation' About Poverty
• Paul Ryan's budget: Even more austerity
• Judge said du Pont heir 'will not fare well' in prison—"A Superior Court judge who sentenced a wealthy du Pont heir to probation for raping his 3-year-old daughter noted in her order that he 'will not fare well' in prison and needed treatment instead of time behind bars, court records show."
• The heir, the judge and the homeless mom: America's prison bias for the 1%

Politics

• Pro-Pot, Pro-Gay, Anti-NSA… and Running for Senate—"Meet Shenna Bellows, Maine's former ACLU chief who's looking to unseat Susan Collins with a mix of left and right issues that might appeal to millennials." This is how the Tea Party can be effectively countered.
• Tea Party Aims at Incumbents, but Falls Short—"The Tea Party has nudged Republicans to the right in Congress, but falls short when it comes to recruiting good challengers to take out incumbents." NYT
• Honey Maid ad features two father family, single father, military family and more in 'This is Wholesome' campaign

GOP

• 'Imperial Presidency' Becomes a Rallying Cry for Republicans—"While criticizing President Obama as weak, Republicans are also uniting behind a message of government overreach." NYT
• The Shame of American Politics: GOP Presidential Hopefuls now Trek to Las Vegas seeking Adelson Blessing
• Documents reveal secretive Hollywood group's shady donations to conservative politicians
• How the Right Hijacked Arizona—"Ultraconservatives have seized the state's Legislature—and the middle-of-the-road electorate has only its own apathy to blame."
• Once disgraced, Mark Sanford is unopposed—South Carolina, 'nuff said.
• The GOP's Amazing Doublespeak On Medicare And Social Security
• Senate Resolution To Honor Cesar Chavez Dies After Republican Tries To Add Border Security Language—"Senator Bob Menendez introduced a resolution to honor Cesar Chavez legacy but it was scuttled after Senator David Vitter tried to add language about border security and illegal labor."

Bridgegate

• Christie is innocent, says Christie-ordered internal review
• 'Daily Show' Has A Field Day With Christie's Self-Exonerating Report
• Chris Christie update: New Jerseyans think guv's lying about Bridgegate—"Plus: A new report shows the ways that the Christie administration used public employees to secure endorsements." Salon
• Grand Jury Convened in Christie Bridge Scandal Probe
• Why Christie isn't out of the woods just yet

Corruption

• $6 Billion Goes Missing at State Department
• Rick Scott Fundraiser Founded Drug Clinic Closed Due To Abuse Reports
• Charlie Crist: Rick Scott was 'stealing from sick people' as CEO

Taxes

• The Trillions of Dollars U.S. Companies Are Hoarding Overseas—"And a tax repatriation holiday is no way to get them to bring it all back home."
• Senate report claims Caterpillar avoided $2.4bn in US taxes—"Carl Levin's subcommittee on investigations says the equipment-maker routed money through a Swiss subsidiary."
• Congress Should Keep Lights Off on Tax Package That Nets GE Billions in Tax Breaks
• An "Army of Lobbyists" Is Quietly Fighting for Budget-Busting Corporate Tax Breaks
• Congress once again moves to extend 'tax extenders'—"Analysis: The lucrative tax breaks take billions out of the budget, at great reward to lobbyists and lawmakers."
• NY's millionaires getting hefty tax breaks

Vote Machinations

• Here's The Exact Plan The Cheating GOP Is Using To Steal The 2014 Elections
• How Republicans Rationalize Voter Suppression—"The GOP's claims of defending 'voter integrity,' 'fairness,' and 'uniformity' are complete nonsense."
• Appeals Court Finds Florida's 2012 Voter Purge Broke The Law
• State elections officials seek tighter security—"State elections officials said Wednesday that they're investigating hundreds of cases of voters who appear to have voted in two states and several dozen who appear to have voted after their deaths."
• A Well-Informed Electorate Is a Prerequisite for Democracy—Not a coincidence that public education has been constantly attacked and degraded, and substituting information with Fox-News propaganda.

Campaign Finance Deform

• Supreme Court Strikes Down Aggregate Limits On Campaign Contributions
• McCutcheon Decision Campaign Finance - The American Government Is Open For Corruption
• Critics attack Chief Justice John Roberts' opinion that the Internet will safeguard against campaign corruption
• The Supreme Court's Faulty Reasoning In McCutcheon v. FEC
• There Are No Gods on the Supreme Court—"The Supreme Court just made it easier to buy a vote in America today. So why are we still taking them so seriously?"
• Justice Roberts Hearts Billionaires—"The chief either doesn't believe, or doesn't care, that money corrupts politics."
• Justice Roberts Defends the Embattled Rich in McCutcheon
• Nancy Pelosi Slams Supreme Court's McCutcheon Ruling: 'Is This Supposed To Be A Money War?'
• I stood up to the supreme court. It just struck down democracy. What now?—"We should've seen the McCutcheon decision's blow coming. But we must still fight to get big money out of politics."
• Obama signs ban on public funding of presidential campaigns into law—"White House enacts Gabriella Miller Kids First Research Act, day after supreme court removed cap on campaign contributions."

Plutoligarchy

• The Court's Decision on 'McCutcheon' Will Empower the Oligarchs, Say Reformers
• Thanks to the Supreme Court, the US Just Moved One Step Closer to Full Oligarchy
• With 'McCutcheon' Ruling, An Activist Court Opts for Full-On Plutocracy
• History Shows Capitalism Begets Plutocracy

Koch Suckers

• The Koch Brothers and the Danger of American Plutocracy
• Greediest family on earth: Proof Koch brothers have just one political principle—"The Koch brothers like to pretend they're high-minded free marketers. Here's proof it's a scam." Salon
• Koch brothers vs. a bus: Why two billionaires hate a transit project in Nashville—"A bus rapid transit project is imperiled because a couple of rich guys love meddling." Salon
• Chuck Schumer: If People Know Who The Koch Brothers Are, We're Doing Something Right
• Politifact: Harry Reid says Koch brothers are richest family in the world—Mostly true.
• Charles Koch blasts "collectivists" in Wall Street Journal op-ed—"The billionaire industrialist and GOP donor says he's being unfairly maligned by for believing in liberty." Salon
• To Strike at Kochs, Democrats Revive Tactic That Hurt Romney NYT
• How to Vote Against the Koch Brothers

Workers and Wage Slaves, Class Warfare; Mortgage Fraud, Banks and Wall Street; GOP, Koch Suckers, Corporatocracy, Obamacare; Vote Machinations; Politics and Economy; Making Money; World Water Day

Workers and Wage Slaves

• Reich: The 'Paid-What-You're-Worth' Myth
• GOP Lawmaker Says Sick Leave, Equal Pay Bills Make Women 'Look Like Whiners'
• Low-Wage Workers Are Finding Poverty Harder to Escape—"For those at the low end of the hourly wage scale, even meeting basic household needs can be a stretch, and roads out of poverty are scarce." NYT
• Bill Gates: Yes, robots really are about to take your jobs—"As for what governments should do to prevent social unrest in the wake of mass unemployment, the Microsoft cofounder said that they should basically get on their knees and beg businesses to keep employing humans over algorithms."
• This J.C. Penney Worker Was Fired For Telling The Truth About Its 'Fake' Prices
• Revealed: Apple and Google’s wage-fixing cartel involved dozens more companies, over one million employees

Class Warfare

• Krugman: That Old-Time Whistle—"American conservatism is still, after all these years, largely driven by claims that liberals are giving money away to 'those people.'" NYT
• Krugman: High Fallutin' Nazis—"Here comes another billionaire who thinks that anyone who talks about income inequality is a Nazi; this time it's Ken Langone, co-founder of Home Depot." NYT
• Dems hit back after House Speaker Boehner accuses N.Y. and other states of 'cheating' food stamp rules—"House Speaker John Boehner accused New York and four other states of 'cheating' and 'fraud' for sidestepping federal cuts to food stamps through what critics call a 'loophole' in the laws. But Democrats say the states had to step in to keep people from going hungry."
• Paul Ryan's Irish Amnesia—"Talking the familiar, heartless language of hunger economics." NYT
• Tax-Hating States Totally Fine With Taxing The Poor
• The Missing White Poor—"Guess who makes up a plurality of America's poor?"

Mortgage Fraud

• Sen. Elizabeth Warren and others question lack of prosecutions for mortgage fraud
• Despite Promises To Fight Mortgage Fraud, DOJ Basically Ignored It, Then Claimed Success With Faulty Stats
• Wells Fargo foreclosure manual under fire—"A lawsuit claims it is an elaborate guide telling lawyers how to produce key documents that are missing."

Banks and Wall Street

• The Tea Party and Wall Street Are Friends After All
• The 1% have gained back their recession losses and then some
• 'Then They Fight You' -- Why The 1 Percent Is In Full Panic Mode
• Former bank employee pleads guilty to stealing over $2 million from customers
• Appeals court upholds Fed's debit card 'swipe fee' limits
• Oakland to pay Iraq War vet $4.5 million for Occupy shooting
• The FBI Is Hiding Details About An Alleged Occupy Houston Assassination Plot

GOP

• Why the GOP Won't Change—"A year after their "autopsy," the recommendations haven't been—and won't be—followed."
• Groucho Marx's Republican Party—"Why the GOP is in more trouble than you think." Politico
• Tea Party Candidate Gets Turned Away By The GOP For Spreading Racist Views
• Republican House Candidate Who Said Autism Was the Result of God's Anger Over Gay Marriage Just Won Her Primary
• GOP Lawmaker Thinks Businesses Ought To Be Able To Deny Service To Black People
• AL Republican outraged at teaching of 'The Crucible' because 'McCarthy was right'
• Republicans Versus an Informed Public—"Answering the American Community Survey is the civic duty of everyone, yet some House Republicans seem to think it should be voluntary. That would make the survey's data useless." NYT
• John Oliver Teases New HBO Show By Mocking GOP's 'Millennial' Ads

Corporatocracy

• Bill Maher: Most GOP Voters 'Just Corporate America's Useful Idiots'
• Corporate America Is Hiding $2 Trillion In Profit From The IRS
• The great corporate cash-hoarding crisis—"Companies are sitting on mountains of liquidity, thanks to government policies; the losers are the economy and all of us."

Koch Suckers

• Koch Group, Spending Freely, Hones Attack on Government—"Americans for Prosperity, backed by the Koch brothers, is using a data-driven approach as it pursues its overarching goal of changing the way voters think about government." NYT
• David Vitter defends Koch brothers—"Sen. David Vitter stepped up this week to defend the billionaire Koch brothers from Democrats' repeated attacks [NYT], concluding that they are 'two of the most patriotic Americans.'" Politico
• The biggest lease holder in Canada's oil sands isn't Exxon Mobil or Chevron. It's the Koch brothers. WaPo

Obamacare

• The House has voted 54 times in four years on Obamacare. Here’s the full list. WaPo
• This guy knew when Obamacare enrollment would hit 5M before anyone else. Now he's predicting 6.2M. WaPo
• The House GOP's Obamacare Alternative Won't Curb Health Care Costs—But It Will Enrich the Insurance Industry
• Koch Group Yet Again Fails Fact Check On Obamacare Horror Story
• Politifact: Americans for Prosperity claims people are getting less at a higher cost under Obamacare—False.
• The real goal of all those anti-Obamacare ads—"A new report suggests they're all about protecting the Koch brothers' bottom line." WaPo
• South Carolina lawmakers fail in attempt to undo Obamacare
• Paul Ryan Gets An Earful From Constituent Who Will Save Hundreds Under Obamacare
• Fox News's Bret Baier corrects Obamacare mistake WaPo

Vote Machinations

• Kane shut down sting that snared Phila. officials—"The Pennsylvania Attorney General's Office ran an undercover sting operation over three years that captured leading Philadelphia Democrats, including four members of the city's state House delegation, on tape accepting money.... Yet no one was charged with a crime." The money was for a "vote against a bill that would require voters to show identification at the polls, the sources said."
• Wisconsin Voters Under Attack—"Wisconsin's legislature approved a bill to limit absentee ballots." And early voting.
• Ohio Mistrusts Democracy—"Republicans again pass restrictive new laws making it harder for their opponents to vote." NYT
• Federal Judge Hands Republicans In Kansas, Arizona A Big Win In Voting Rights Fight—All about suppressing the vote [NYT].
• Right-Wing Extremists in Montana File for Legislative Races as Democrats
• Ga. Congressman slams door on Ch. 2 reporter when asked about campaign coach
• Former offender acquitted in Iowa voter fraud case—"A former drug offender who believed her voting rights had been restored when she cast a ballot last year was acquitted of perjury Thursday, a public rebuke of Iowa's two-year investigation into voter fraud."
• Who's Buying our Midterm Elections?—'In the coming weeks, the Supreme Court is expected to issue another big decision on campaign finance, one that could further open the floodgates to unfettered and anonymous contributions, just as the Citizens United case did four years ago."
• Scalia's looming fiasco: Obscure new SCOTUS case may be worse than Citizens United. Salon
• Nate Silver: What the Fox Knows

Politics and Economy

• Paul Gosar Wants To Ban Members Of Congress From Flying First Class On 'Taxpayer Dime'
• Personal FBI flights for Holder and other Justice officials went unreported—"Personal FBI flights for Holder and other Justice officials went unreported." WaPo\
• After Casino Mogul Throws Him Big Money Fundraiser, Graham Seeks Internet Gambling Ban
• Government's Empty Buildings Are Costing Taxpayers Billions
• Are Malls Over?

Making Money

• Obama Proposes the End of Pennies—Nickel for your thoughts?
• Federal Reserve to Unveil a Redesigned $100 Bill—"The new $100 bill will have modern and colorful anti-counterfeiting features, overcoming problems that postponed its debut for more than two and a half years." NYT
• Laundering money — literally — could save billions of dollars
• How the U.S. Mint Made Its First-Ever Domed Coin
• UK's new 12-sided £1 said to be the world's most secure coin

World Water Day

• Facing drought, California farmers rally against regulations limiting water supplies
• Brazil drought raises concerns about World Cup water supply
• Fracking and water pollution: what we can learn from the US experience
• North Carolina to withdraw Duke Energy settlement over coal ash spill—"North Carolina regulators say they have asked a judge to withdraw a proposed settlement that would have allowed Duke Energy to resolve environmental violations by paying a $99,000 fine with no requirement that the $50bn company clean up its pollution."
• Hog Wild: Factory Farms Are Poisoning Iowa's Drinking Water—"Millions of pigs are crammed into overcrowded barns all across the state, being fattened for slaughter while breeding superbugs—all to feed China's growing appetite for Spam."