July 31 - The House Sues Obama Over His Executive Orders which are at a Historic Low; Millions of Argentines Must Satisfy an American Billionaire's Greed; The U.S. Hands Venezuela a Propaganda Gift

Full Program

Part 1

We begin with an assessment of the lawsuit against President Obama that the House just voted to proceed on even though the GOP’s charge of executive over-reach concerns the implementation of the Affordable Care Act, a law House Republicans have voted 50 times to repeal. John Woolley, a Professor of Political Science at U.C. Santa Barbara and Gerhard Peters, a Professor of Political Science at Citrus College, both of whom direct the American Presidency Project, join us to discuss the constitutionality of executive orders and how few executive orders President Obama has issued compared to his predecessors.

Part 2

Then we discuss the default by Argentina on its debts that had previously been settled from an earlier default by 93% of Argentina’s creditors. But due to a U.S. Appeals Court ruling in favor of a few speculators known as vulture funds, who bought the debt at pennies on the dollar and insist of full payment, the deal has unraveled and an entire country has been thrown into economic hardship to satisfy the greed of a couple of Wall Street billionaires. Joining us is Mark Weisbrot, the co-director of the Center for Economic and Policy Research, who along with a hundred economists around the world, have sent a letter to the Congress to mitigate the damage to the international financial system by forcing Argentina into a default. He recently wrote an article for the New York Times, "The Supreme Court Declines to Review Widely Opposed Ruling on Argentine Debt: Why?"

Part 3

Then finally we go to Caracas, Venezuela to speak with Virginia Lopez who covers Latin America and Venezuela for the U.K. Guardian, and discuss the sanctions by the U.S. State Department against 24 high- ranking Venezuelan officials, ostensibly for suppressing anti-government protests that took place months ago. We discuss the more likely prospect that the sanctions are in response to the hero’s welcome afforded a Venezuelan general accused of drug trafficking who the U.S. hoped to extradite from Aruba, until Dutch authorities allowed him to return to Venezuela because of diplomatic immunity.