After a few more amendments to the Wall Street reform bill this evening (and a defeat for the Whitehouse amendment to allow states to cap interest rates on credit cards), Harry Reid set up a vote for cloture for today. He expects Arlen Specter to be on hand, and to vote for cloture, so that brings him within one vote of getting to 60. But Russ Feingold and Maria Cantwell, the two Democrats who voted against invoking cloture, are digging in. They want changes to the bill that would strengthen it, particularly around derivatives. Will this day devolve again into “Lord of the Flies” on the Senate floor?

Duck, weave, dodge.

The Dean of the Village has spoken, and it is about what you would expect.

Featuring new videos from Nigel Hall and Grace Potter and The Nocturnals. What’s on your mind tonight?

This morning our very own Dr. B. Texan had a bit of a chuckle over the right wing pre-spinning of the inevitable crushing victory of the gee-oh-pee candidate in the Pennsylvania-12 special congressional election. Why, according to perhaps the sharpest ball-bearing in the Republican toolbox, this triumph would clearly mean that “you’re going to see [...]

OK, this is just bullpucky. The government is doing all sorts of handwringing about how it can’t force BP to disclose information about what’s actually going on in the gulf. From McClatchy BP, the company in charge of the rig that exploded last month in the Gulf of Mexico, hasn’t publicly divulged the results of [...]

Faisal Shahzad rather suddenly got arraigned and got a lawyer yesterday. Josh Gerstein noted that the arraignment happened on the 15th day since Shahzad’s arrest–the lower range of time the Obama Administration has floated for its changes to Miranda. But the LAT reports that Shahzad decided he no longer wanted to be questioned by interrogators.

The LA Times has an interesting portrait of the survivors of the Deepwater Horizon explosion in the Gulf of Mexico – the topic that has distracted me from keeping up with content over here at Work in Progress – about the risks of their jobs.

The conversations with offshore oil workers seem remarkably similar to those with coal miners. The risky work environment brings with it a lucrative paycheck, for far more pay than these workers could make working on land. At the same time, workers know every day they’re out in the middle of the ocean, dealing with potentially explosive materials that can put their lives at risk at any moment.

Senators Feingold and Cantwell explain their votes against cloture on the Wall Street reform bill in the Senate.

Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse corners the Department of Interior yesterday as to why British Petroleum had been exempted from doing an Environmental Impact Study on the site of the Deepwater Horizon rig at leasehold Mississippi Canyon 252. Although the DOI was a little defensive, it’s clear BP really gave environmental concerns little more than a passing thought.