Milwaukee Road Diner (photo: Univ. of Washington / flickr)

Only after the last tree has been cut down. Only after the last fish has been caught. Only after the last river has been poisoned. Only then will you realize that money cannot be eaten. Cree Nation Tribal Prophecy

  • “A little over two years ago, Stephanie Rawlings-Blake had never heard of Libor. The mayor of Baltimore had plenty of other things to keep herself occupied. Elected in 2010, she was dealing with the aftermath of a financial crisis that had left her city with the budget deficit of $120m and the cost of cleaning up the worst two-day snowstorm in the city’s history. And then she found out the credit crunch had come back to take another bite out of the city’s finances.”
  • “Tens of thousands of public employees, trade union members and other Spaniards are marching in 80 Spanish cities to protest the latest batch of austerity measures approved by the government. The ruling conservative Popular Party used its majority in parliament to push through the measures on Thursday. They include a rise in sales taxes and a wage cut for civil servants.”
  • “This is the way old Wall Street ends: with a whimper. Ask the man in the street if banking and bankers have changed since the credit crisis and you’ll certainly get the answer: no. You can blame JPMorgan Chase chief executive Jamie Dimon’s genetic inability to sound contrite, and the $6bn blow-up in his bank’s trading operation, for that. And the Libor scandal. And revelations about how the industry is lobbying to water down reforms. And – the list goes on.”
  • “The Guardian has announced the addition of Glenn Greenwald, the renowned political commentator and bestselling author. In his new role, Greenwald will write a daily blog and weekly column appearing in the Guardian’s Comment is Free section.” Gee, the Guardian regularly carries articles by Noam Chomsky, Richard Wolff and others who couldn’t get printed in US newspapers on a bet. Wonder why that is.
  • “Russia and China yesterday blocked a crucial UN Security Council resolution on Syria while events on the ground raced ahead of the grinding diplomacy as the rebels appeared to be nearing a turning point in the conflict, announcing key strategic advances.”
  • “Fourteen bodies have been recovered following a mudslide that ripped through the construction site of the massive Baihetan Dam on June 28. According to Chinese state media, rescue teams are still searching for 26 missing workers and their relatives near the site in southwest Sichuan province.”
  • “Authorities in Texas have defended the state’s first execution of a death row inmate using a single lethal injection of the sedative pentobarbital, instead of the cocktail of three drugs used in the past, saying it went ‘without incident’.”
  • “A Wisconsin judge has found that the state’s American Legislative Exchange Council-inspired voter ID restriction imposes an unconstitutional burden on the right to vote, writing that the law ‘tells more than 300,000 Wisconsin voters who do not now have an acceptable form of photo identification that they cannot vote unless they first obtain a photo ID card’.”

The truth will set you free but first it will piss you off.