Robert Kuttner’s Debtors’ Prison ties together many of the individual fights progressives are battling over into a general argument for why our economy is broken 5 years after the Great Recession began. There are those fighting both Republicans and some Democrats on topics ranging from austerity to foreclosure relief and financial sector accountability, while there are fellow activists in Europe fighting against the European Central Bank’s policy of tight money and anti-democratic takeovers of local policy.

Adding insult to injury, many of the checks sent out to victims from the fraudclosure settlement have bounced. The terms of the fraudclosure settlement are bad enough but now it seems the victims will have to wait a little longer after trying to deposit their meager, grossly insufficient check only to have it bounce.

A year ago this week, the original Occupy Wall Street camp in Zuccotti Park was evicted. The camps served as a focal point for a vibrant protest movement that shook up the country, but they galvanized the anger and fear of working people around the country, struggling to make it through the Great Recession.

The mainstream press often did its best to portray the movement as simply a bunch of unwashed kids without a message, without demands. Yet if one ever doubted that the movement’s message got through, the collection of letters in The Trouble is the Banks, from Occupy the Boardroom and n+1 serves as proof.

Ah, so much fraud and conflict of interest packed into such a small package!

All I can say is it’s about damn time somebody in Illinois stepped up to the plate to hold banks accountable for their criminal activities! St. Clair County Recorder Mike Costello and State’s Attorney Brendan Kelly on May 21st filed a civil suit for fraud and deception against 22 banks for allegedly using MERS to “sidestep recording fees” and creating “a scheme to evade county fees and shield property transfer records from the public.” As State’s Attorney, Mr. Kelly works with and advises government at the county level, while the Attorney General provides the same services at the state level.

This is about as outraged I’ve seen a straight news article get about the foreclosure crisis, with particular scorn reserved for Bank of America.

Occupy Delaware made its march to Spencer Plaza in the heart of downtown Wilmington, Delaware on November 6, 2011. It pitched its first tents on November 10, 2011. With the help of the ACLU, it secured its right to remain in the Plaza by taking its case to Chancery Court where judge Vice Chancellor Sam Glasscock III issued a restraining order against the City of Wilmington on behalf of the protesters. In an effort to avoid a court case involving First Amendment freedom of speech issues that it mostly likely would have lost, the City then offered the protesters a deal, which in effect gives Occupy Delaware the right to remain as an encampment in Spencer Plaza as long as it chooses.

I am in Tucson, Arizona for the huge gem, mineral, fossil and precious stones and whatever else expos/shows, and to visit Occupy Tucson which is staging several anti-bank rallies this week. I love gems and minerals, geodes, agates, and fossils, but it kinda bums me out to see so much of Nature’s beauty churned for a buck.

The members of the Twin Cities branch of the Occupy movement might be under near-constant official harassment, but that certainly doesn’t mean they’ve given up their efforts on behalf of those of us in the 99%. Just as they worked earlier to get another foreclosure victim the needed time and aid to move her and her disabled father to a new home, they’re now, with Nick Espinosa taking a key role, working to keep a Minneapolis university professor in her home.

The big question for banks like Peter Orszag’s Citigroup then becomes “what do we do with all that property?” For them, these are “non-performing assets” that have value but produce no revenue and in fact will even cost them money to maintain like mowing the lawn, paying the taxes, etc. Repairs and such make them even more expensive to hold.