Bloomberg: ‘Plain and simple,’ Congress caused the mortgage crisis, not the banks  —  Photo via British Prime Minister's Office flickr stream.  — Owners of the park at the center of the Occupy Wall Street protests are losing patience, but what can they do?  —  11:03 am Nov. 1, 20111Add a comment

Herman Cain now recalls ‘couple of other’ items in accuser's complaint  —  Herman Cain once again revised his account of the sexual harassment allegations he battled in the 1990s, saying in a TV interview he recalled there were additional “ridiculous” items in his accuser's complaint, beyond the single incident he detailed Monday.

Wow, Jon Corzine — Way To Fly Your Company Into A Mountain  —  Well, this one's right up there with the most spectacular CEO disasters ever.  —  Yesterday, 18 months after Jon Corzine took over the helm of MF Global with the goal of building it into a real investment bank, he flew the company into a mountain.

Europe Markets Drop on News of Greek Referendum  —  ATHENS — European markets slid dramatically on Tuesday after Prime Minister George A. Papandreou stunned the continent's leaders with a surprise announcement late Monday that his government would hold a referendum on a new aid package for Greece.

BofA Calls Off Debit-Fee Plan  —  Bank of America Corp. is dropping its plan to charge customers $5 a month for making purchases with their debit cards, a person familiar with the situation said.  —  The move is a dramatic retreat following decisions by several rivals in recent days to drop customer tests of the new fees.

Chick-Fil-A Donated Nearly $2 Million To Anti-Gay Groups In 2009  —  Earlier this year, Chick-fil-A became embroiled in a controversy surrounding its donations to anti-gay groups.  Though Chick-fil-A president Dan Cathy denied having an “agenda against anyone,” an Equality Matters investigation discovered …

Bullet train project nearly triples in cost — $98.5 billion — from earlier projections  —  Faster than a speeding bullet train, the cost of the state's massive high-speed rail project has zoomed to nearly $100 billion — triple the estimate given to voters and more than enough to run the entire state government for a year.

Rick Perry on Viral Video: ‘I Felt Good, Felt Great’  —  DES MOINES, IOWA - Texas Governor Rick Perry said he he “felt good, felt great” during a weekend event in New Hampshire.  Video of Perry giving the freewheeling speech went viral this week and was parodied on late night TV …

Exclusive: Romney Family Investment Group Partnered With Alleged Perpetrators Of $8 Billion Ponzi Scheme  —  Mitt Romney and his son Tagg Romney.  Tagg is the managing partner to Solamere Capital, a firm that invested in a new company employing brokers accused of taking part in the Allen Stanford Ponzi scheme.

Israel and the Apartheid Slander  —  THE Palestinian Authority's request for full United Nations membership has put hope for any two-state solution under increasing pressure.  The need for reconciliation between Israelis and Palestinians has never been greater.

Brooklyn Detective Convicted of Planting Drugs on Innocent People  —  The New York Police Department, already saddled with corruption scandals, saw its image further tainted on Tuesday with the conviction of a police detective for planting drugs on a woman and her boyfriend.

Exclusive: Group forms inside debt panel in quest for deal  —  (Reuters) - Six members of a congressional “super committee” have struck out on their own in a new effort to come up with a plan to slash America's huge deficits before a November 23 deadline.  —  The three Republicans …

The Wrong Inequality  —  We live in a polarizing society, so perhaps it's inevitable that our experience of inequality should be polarized, too.  —  In the first place, there is what you might call Blue Inequality.  This is the kind experienced in New York City, Los Angeles, Boston …

U.S. Justice Department seeks injunction against S.C. immigration law  —  The U.S. Department of Justice has challenged South Carolina's new immigration law in federal court, saying it undermines federal authority.  —  The justice department has asked for an injunction that would prevent the state's law from taking effect in January.

The Only Thing Missing From “The New Declaration of Independence”: Any Sense That Adults Are Responsible for Their Choices  —  I linked to it yesterday, but there was something about Salon.com's “New Declaration of Independence,” something reminiscent of a lot of Occupy Wall Street-inspired commentary, that stuck in my craw.

And Congress' Rich Get Richer  —  Net Worth of Lawmakers Up 25 Percent in Two Years, Analysis Demonstrates  —  Members of Congress had a collective net worth of more than $2 billion in 2010, a nearly 25 percent increase over the 2008 total, according to a Roll Call analysis of Members' financial disclosure forms.