The California state legislature is late in approving the state’s latest budget — as of today, 70 days late. Typically, this would be a minor bureaucratic matter confined to partisan squabbling in Sacramento. But Julie Small, state Capitol reporter for KPCC radio, says the delay is now having human costs, with community colleges and hospitals feeling a pinch.

Congress is back in session today, wrapping up the summer holiday and both of the parties conventions. Capitol News Connections Todd Zwillich talks to John Hockenberry about what Congress has to get done in this upcoming appreciated three week session.

Asian markets rallied today [Monday] on news of the U.S. government bailout of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. But Peter Stein, Hong Kong bureau chief for The Wall Street Journal, says Asia may be overreacting--there are still big problems with the housing market and the U.S. economy...He also wonders how the U.S. will continue to advocate liberalization of markets in Asia while practicing such a massive intervention at home.

Forget Red State - Blue State politics. But don't forget that all politics is local. The Christian Science Monitor's Patchwork Nation project is redefining political geography based on social and economic data, and in the process is clarifying the issues that will matter to Americans come November. Project leader Dante Chinni returns to The Takeaway to talk about another Patchwork Nation community, "Evangelical Epicenters."

What seemed unlikely has happened: On Sunday, the Bush Administration took control of mortgage heavyweights Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac in an effort to stabilize the housing market and U.S. economy.
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Guest: Peter Morici, economist and professor at the University of Maryland School of Business
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Guest: Andrew Walker, BBC economics & business correspondent
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Monday brought the hurricane, Tuesday teenage pregnancy, Wednesday an anxiously awaited Alaskan VP speech, and Thursday a town hall style declaration announcing John McCain as the official candidate for the Republican Party. It could have been -- perhaps should have been -- a disaster, but the RNC pulled through. So now what are the Democrats to do? The Takeaway talks strategy with Jeff Zeleny, New York Times reporter on the trail with Obama camp.
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The lust that once lured prospectors to California is today drawing countless thousands to remote tropical rainforests on a quest for gold. It’s a valuable source of income in developing nations. But Smithsonian scientist William Laurance says the thirst for gold and other metals is fueled by both illegal and legal trade that carries heavy social, environmental and public health costs.
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Oil refineries and rigs along the Gulf Coast escaped the major damage that followed Hurricane Katrina, and oil prices dropped to a five-month low. But Kevin Kerr, MarketWatch contributor and editor of the trading newsletter Global Commodities Alert, reminds us that this is just the start of a busy hurricane season. He says we’ll feel the effects of Gustav: the hurricane has caused evacuations and power outages, and that means oil production slowdowns well into next week.
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About half of the year, actor and comedian Harry Shearer lives in the French Quarter of New Orleans. He’s been watching Gustav’s wrath from afar, via satellite feeds from his other home in Southern California.
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College kids heading to school are also heading for sticker-shock when they discover the costs of this semester's textbooks. But Rich Baraniuk believes he has a solution: free, collaborative textbooks.
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Guests: Bob Hennelly, WNYC reporter; Ben Calhoun, Chicago Public Radio
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When it comes to sports, fans and non-fans might see it as a nothing more than a form of entertainment, but in the hands of sports writer Dave Zirin it’s anything but. In his new book, "A People’s History of Sports in the United States," Zirin points out that it is often in the boxing ring, or on the court where the societal conflicts of the day are played out literally and figuratively. Zirin joins the Takeaway for a conversation on sports, politics and American history.
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The news yesterday morning of McCain’s VP pick Sara Palin’s daughter was not a complete surprise; blogs had been tossing rumors around all last week. But how did Gov. Palin’s home state of Alaska respond to the news of her 17-year-old daughter’s pregnancy?
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Last week, The Takeaway spoke with New York Times columnist David Leonhardt about Barack Obama’s unorthodox fixes for economic woes. Leonhardt joins us today to talk about John McCain’s economic plans, which he says fall into two categories: McCain the Senator and McCain the Candidate. Leonhardt sees contradictions between the two and suggests that McCain's strategies could increase the deficit even more than Obama's.
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Guest: James Politi, Financial Times reporter
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Last week Barack Obama taunted the media with the promise of finally letting us know who he had chosen to complete his ticket. But this week it’s John McCain’s term to tease us. The political blogs have been spinning out prospects from months now. To brief us on the candidates who have been short listed is Elisabeth Bumiller, reporter for the New York Times.
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“Nickel and Dimed,” author Barbara Ehrenreich takes to the Takeaway stage against the backdrop of the Presidential convention and new economic figures that bear bad news for American workers. Ehrenreich has blazed a trail as the “voice” of the declining middle class and the growing underclass.
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US consumers have been paying 5.2 percent more for their food over the past year. So the BBC world service embarked upon a little global experiment to see how much consumers were being affected. Every week reporters from eight cities around the world visit the same store, buying the exact same items to compare how the price of food fluctuates over time. Richard Collings joins us with the World Service Food Price Index, next on The Takeaway
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Forget Red State - Blue State politics. But don't forget that all politics is local. The Christian Science Monitor's Patchwork Nation project is redefining political geography based on social and economic data, and in the process is clarifying the issues that will matter to Americans come November.
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With only months left in the term, the Bush Administration is taking a hard look at the legacy they are about to leave. But President Bush’s place in history entirely depends on who you ask. Will he be remembered as the man who misled the country, squandered our savings and endorsed torture tactics? Or will he be the man who freed 60 million people in Afghanistan and Iraq, Left No Child Behind and comforted the nation after September 11? These are the questions Peter Baker put to former and current advisers to the President and to the President’s father for his upcoming piece “The Final Days” in this weekend’s New York Times Magazine.
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In the world of fashion, you get what you pay for, and that’s exactly the point Britain’s House of Lords has taken issue with. Clothing chains like H and M, or Forever 21 epitomize this trend of “Fast Fashion”- where it’s in one day and out the next. Does this simply foster a culture of irresponsible waste- or is this what being “fashion forward” means in the year 2008. The Takeaway talks to their own personal shopper of sorts, The Takeaway contributor Mary Elizabeth Williams.
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Three years after Hurricane Katrina slammed into the gulf coast; thousands of folks remain in trailers or are still homeless. The barriers to recovery are complex but the struggles exist for the poorest of folks, particularly in the area of housing and jobs. Sharon Hanshaw, a lifelong resident of Biloxi, Mississippi was and remains one of those thousands of Americans still struggling with recovery.
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Caitlin McNally

I drove from Minneapolis to Minot, North Dakota, this year as a late spring snowstorm was brewing. Interstate 94, near the state line, closed down and the two lane highways and farm roads snaking westward were covered in hard ice and occasional, demonic flurries of drifting snow. I concocted a route around the storm with some helpful farmers at a gas station. My car limped west then north, west then north, on a maze of empty back roads.

Times Picayune reporter Lolis Eric Elie says that Hurricane Katrina has lessons for the nation. From a frail infrastructure, to a flawed emergency response system, to a society divided along race and class lines, Katrina pulled back the curtain on issues that have long plagued the country. As we mark the third year anniversary of Hurricane Katrina, we check in with Lolis Eric Elie on the state of New Orleans and what the nation can learn from this disaster.
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With energy prices soaring, the economy slumping and global warming fears taking center stage, there is no end of innovative responses to this new world order. But today, hybrid cars, compact fluorescent lights and low-flow shower heads seem old school compared to the latest energy saving trend: the four-day work week.
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Soaring oil prices, coupled with climate change, is making commercial aviation not only unpopular but maybe impossible. Is the mile-high club about to end for good?
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