The LA Times is reporting that the Deepwater Horizon oil rig that exploded in the Gulf "was built in South Korea. It was operated by a Swiss company under contract to a British oil firm. Primary responsibility for safety and other inspections rested not with the U.S. government but with the Republic of the Marshall Islands — a tiny, impoverished nation in the Pacific Ocean.

A new report by an environmental group claims that BP may not be able to pay all of the damages from the BP oil spill without the giant oil company being dissolved and all its assets sold off. It found that BP could potentially owe between $330 billion and $1.3 trillion if the BP oil spill completely decimates the area, an amount that could equal or even exceed the entire value of the company.

The tea party and their corporate-funded backers FreedomWorks complained that the individual mandate in the new health care law was an unlawful. Now, local chapters of the tea party and FreedomWorks are collaborating to plan a protest in Gwinnet County, Georgia, to voice their latest grievance against a serious, excessive, and oppressive exercise of massive governmental power — mandatory home trash collection. Yes, seriously.

Late last month, Mississippi state House Speaker Billy McCoy (D) and Lt. Gov. Phil Bryant (R) started a select committee to look into the BP oil spill and would hold hearings this week.

Ben Smith with Politico reported that a White House official called to tell him, "Organized labor just flushed $10 million down the toilet on a pointless exercise." in trying to beat Blanche Lincoln, Obama's candidate, in Arkansas.

Quote: “An election cannot give a country a firm sense of direction if it has two or more national parties which merely have different names but are as alike in their principles and aims as two peas in the same pod” -- Franklin D. Roosevelt

Hour One - Election results - the big winners were sneaky Republicans and big money

Pro Publica is reporting internal investigations over the last 10 years show BP systemically ignored its own safety policies from Alaska to the Gulf of Mexico to California and Texas. The classified documents show management neglected aging equipment, put pressure on employees not to report problems and cut short or delayed inspections to reduce production costs.

As the president again visited the Gulf, reports that come up that President Obama was first briefed in April on how bad the spill would be and how difficult it would be to plug the hole. Largely Republican critics have pummeled President Obama for being too slow to seize the political responsibility for combating the BP oil spill in the Gulf Coast, now widely thought to be the worst environmental disaster in U.S. history.

BP CEO Tony Hayward told the Financial Times that It now is looking like BP did not have all the equipment it needed to stop the leak from its Macondo well in the Gulf after the oil explosion six weeks ago. Hayward said, "What is undoubtedly true is that we did not have the tools you would want in your tool-kit,” and added it was “an entirely fair criticism” to say BP was not fully prepared. Meanwhile, Gov.

The Obama administration announced yesterday that it has started civil and criminal investigations into the volcanic oil spill in the Gulf. AG Eric Holder says he will "prosecute to the fullest extent of the law" any people or companies that have broken the law. BP’s market value plummeted $21.1 billion yesterday as the Florida panhandle is bracing for oil slick expected to hit shore today.

On Thursday, Democrats on the House floor were debating the jobs bill and what to do about the vote being several days late, when word came through to the House that the Senate had adjourned and left for Memorial Day break. Rep. Gerry Connolly (D-Va.) said, "People were astounded. I mean stunned. We're in the midst of this debate and trying to find a path to doing the right thing and the Senate went out on recess?

While the Senate approved $60 Billion for more war, the House slashed $24 Billion for the unemployed Workers and state aid to those in trouble. The Afghanistan war is about to go beyond two milestones, with the American death toll surpassing 1,000 this week, and on June 7 it will break the record of the war in Vietnam to become America’s longest-ever war. George W.

The Financial Times is reporting on their front page today that nine people at a giant manufacturing facility in southern China where Apple, Dell, and Hewlett-Packard manufacture their products for the US market have committed suicide.

The factory is in Shenzen and both employs and houses 300,000 people. Our cheap labor - our slave labor overseas - are starting to protest.

Thursday
KPOJ's morning hosts Carl Wolfson and Christine Alexander are filling for Thom today www.620kpoj.com

Friday
Thom is "Live" from Northampton, Mass - Joining Thom in studio are: Tim Carpenter, Executive Director - Progessive Democrats of America, www.pdamerica.org, David Pakman, host of "Midweek Politics" www.midweekpolitics.com and Jo Comerford, Executive Director - National Priorities Project, www.nationalpriorities.org

A shocking memo discovered by The Daily Beast shows that BP, in the Texas City explosion five years ago where 15 workers died and 170 were injured, put those workers who died into cheap portable trailers next door to highly explosive facilities purely to save money.