WEEKEND READING 1-23-15

Come to Jesus, or I'll beat him into you ... Pastor admits to knocking out kid who didn't believe in God (Uniladmag).

Five-year-old misses friend's birthday party and gets invoice for £15.95 (The Guardian).

Drone carrying meth crashes in Mexican supermarket parking lot (Christian Science Monitor).

30-year-old son, and a Princeton graduate, kills his hedge fund manager dad after being told that his allowance was going to be cut (NY Post).


SOMETHING SERIOUSLY WRONG HERE
Banking on death: Banks profiting off of current and former employee deaths helps explain why a slain MassMutual executive's murder should raise eyebrows (Wall Street on Parade).

The U.S. Corporate State has become the monarch our Founding Fathers despised (Nation of Change).

The perfect financial storm: Why we're headed for a future global economic crisis (Salon).

Derivatives: The unregulated global casino for banks (Demonocracy).

Oxfam study finds that richest 1% likely to control half of global wealth by 2016 (NY Times).


WHY WE HAVE INEQUALITY
Why wages won't rise (Robert Reich / Nation of Change).

Idea for tackling inequality Number 27,653: Stop subsidizing it (Truth Out / Dean Baker).

How America's wealthy stole the American Dream and cashed it at an offshore bank (Alternet).

Ivy League's meritocracy lie: How Harvard and Yale cook the books for the 1 percent (Salon).


OIL SLICKS

Each year billions of dollars don't make it to the U.S. Treasury because it stays in the pockets of the oil and gas industry in the form of subsidies and tax breaks. Cool interactive shows what it really costs (Big Oil Giveaways).

Keystone XL could face lawsuit from Nebraska ranchers (Nation of Change).


POST-STATE OF THE UNION CHATTER
State of the GOP is broken: I thought Joni Ernest was bad. Then I watched Ted Cruz (Salon).

Senator Joni Ernst's family received almost half a million dollars in federal subsidies (Salon).


JUST SILLY STUFF
Can a man resist a beautiful woman? Yes, they can (Elephant Journal).

23 solutions to the most mind numbing and self-absorbed First World life challenges (Stumbleupon).

Laziness on another level (Stumbleupon).


OUR IGNORANCE CUP RUNNETH OVER
You will be shocked at how ignorant Americans are: What Americans don't understand is an obstacle to progress (Salon).

Fox News host claims President Obama will alter First Amendment to align with Sharia law (Crooks & Liars @ 4:10).

Paul Krugman on the real reason reality doesn't make the slightest dent in the right-wing brain (Alternet).


MISCELLANEOUS
20 Years Later: NAFTA has delivered on practically none of its promises (Foreign Affairs / Jorge Castaneda).

The U.S. House, not so representative (Washington Post).

Guess who poses the biggest threat to legalizing pot in California? Hint: It ain't the man (Mother Jones).

President Obama breaks with historic Cuban policy; implements dramatic changes (COHA).

- Mark