Welcome to The Breakfast Club! We’re a disorganized group of rebel lefties who hang out and chat if and when we’re not too hungover we’ve been bailed out we’re not too exhausted from last night’s (CENSORED) the caffeine kicks in. Join us every weekday morning at 9am (ET) and weekend morning at 10:30am (ET) to talk about current news and our boring lives and to make fun of LaEscapee! If we are ever running late, it’s PhilJD’s fault.
This Day in History
Bomb strikes a West Berlin disco; Gen. Douglas MacArthur and billionaire Howard Hughes die; Educator Booker T. Washington born; Kareem Abdul-Jabbar sets an NBA record; Katie Couric to become CBS anchor.
Breakfast Tunes
Something to Think about over Coffee Prozac
The individual who can do something that the world wants done will, in the end, make his way regardless of his race.
Booker T. Washington
Breakfast News
Keystone XL’s Older Pipeline Twin Spills Oil In South Dakota
Pipeline operator TransCanada shut down a section of its Keystone pipeline Sunday after about 187 gallons of crude oil spilled from the line in South Dakota, an accident that environmental groups say highlights the dangers of shipping oil by pipeline.
So far, TransCanada has said that “no significant impact to the environment has been observed” and that the company “immediately began efforts to shut down the pipeline” when it received the report of the spill. The company also said it has notified landowners in the region.
The Keystone pipeline ships about 500,000 barrels of oil a day from Alberta, Canada to refineries in Illinois and Texas. The section of pipe running from Alberta to Cushing, Oklahoma has been shut down and will remain closed until Friday at the earliest, but the bottom portion of the pipeline — which runs from Cushing to Texas — is still up and running.
Icelandic PM faces no confidence vote over Panama Papers disclosures
Iceland’s prime minister is under fierce pressure to step down after leaked documents showed his wife owned a secretive offshore company with a potentially multimillion-pound claim on the country’s collapsed banks – representing what opponents said was a major conflict of interest.
As opposition parties called a vote of no confidence in Sigmundur Davíð Gunnlaugsson for later this week, as many as 10,000 protesters – in a country of 330,000 – gathered outside parliament in central Reykjavik for an evening protest, chanting, banging drums and barricades, and blowing whistles. Some waved bananas, symbolising the belief of many that they were living in a banana republic.
Helen Clark, former New Zealand PM, enters race for UN secretary general
Helen Clark, the former prime minister of New Zealand, has entered the race to succeed Ban Ki-moon as secretary general of the United Nations in a bid to become the first woman in the role of world’s top diplomat.
Clark, who was New Zealand’s prime minister from 1999 to 2008, threw her hat formally into the ring on Monday. Her high-profile entry into the competition is certain to increase pressure among the power brokers of the UN to appoint a woman as the leading face of diplomacy on the global stage.
California and New York governors sign bills raising minimum wage to $15
The governors of California and New York acted on Monday to raise their states’ minimum wages to $15 an hour – the highest in the nation – as Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders again seized on wage disparity and the plight of the working poor as a defining issue in the presidential race. [..]
In Los Angeles, Governor Jerry Brown signed a bill into law that will lift the statewide minimum wage to $15 an hour by 2022.
The efforts in New York and California mark the most ambitious moves yet to close the national divide between rich and poor. Experts say other states may follow, given Congress’s reluctance to act despite entreaties from Barack Obama.
Landlords who exclude ex-convicts may be breaking the law, HUD says
Landlords who use criminal convictions to exclude prospective renters may be breaking the law, according to new guidance from the US Department of Housing and Urban Development.
“A housing provider violates the Fair Housing Act when the provider’s policy or practice has an unjustified discriminatory effect, even when the provider had no intent to discriminate,” reads Monday’s release. The new rule advises landlords against imposing a blanket ban against tenants with criminal records, although it does permit case-by-case assessments of whether tenants could pose a threat.
JoAnne Page, president and CEO of the Fortune Society, which works with formerly incarcerated individuals, said she was thrilled by the announcement. “We’ve been fighting this issue for years and this is one of the most hopeful things we have seen.
Breakfast Blogs
Equal Representation Won a Qualified Victory at the Supreme Court Scott Lemieux, New Republic
Why There’s Never Any Progress in the War on Income Inequality Charles Pierce, Esquire Politics
Why Do They Call It Panama Papers, Anyway? emptywheel aka Marcy Wheeler, emptywheel
Sunday Morning Coming Down driftglass, Crooks ans Liars
Not ‘Going Dark’: 15 Out Of 15 Most Recent EU Terrorists Were Known To The Authorities In Multiple Ways Glyn Moody, Techdirt