Like Diamond, Bernstein wanted to make a difference from inside  -- but he left the administration this April in order to work more effectively on the nation's priorities. We spoke June 7th at his new perch, the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities..  The full interview will be seen on The Laura Flanders Show, coming this fall, to public television stations nationwide.

Chris joins Laura in studio for a conversation about the death of Bin Laden and the continuing concern over terrorism, the end of empathy in the U.S., and what avenues are left for progressives to fight back.  "The elites are not going to help us," he warns, "We're going to have to help ourselves."

We first met the steelworkers from Metropolis, Illinois in Madison, Wisconsin early this spring, where workers from all over the country gathered to defend the right to collectively bargain.  Until their lockout in June of last summer, these workers ran Honeywell's uranium conversion plant, the only one of its kind in the country, and they depended on their collectively bargaining rights to defend the health and safety of themselves and their small community.

A few weeks back, United Steelworkers Local 7-669 came to Morris New Jersey to exercise another right--their rights as shareholders of the very company that has locked them out.  Our own Danya Abt traveled there to get the story with cinematographer Zac Halberd.

Finally, three years ago today GRITtv first went on air, and on our birthday Laura says goodbye, for now, and introduces you to the next chapter for our organization--a new weekly program on public broadcasting stations.

It's the anniversary of the oil spill that became America's biggest, and news reports tell of BP's involvement with the decision to go into Iraq and their intent to control the research around the Gulf Coast recovery to help clear their name, we check in with Mike via Skype to give us the latest on BP's shady dealings.

"The real issue here is that modern humanity looks at nature as a great big resource for our pleasure, profit and convenience, and we do whatever we want with it. We're in trouble," says Maude Barlow of our current relationship with the our natural world. She and Shannon Biggs have spearheaded the discussion over the legal rights of nature, a discussion that has gone all the way to United Nations, where arguments are now being heard.

"I think that what we’re trying to do here is take a step forward and realize that we’re not just damaging the earth, but we’re damaging people," says Shannon. A year after the Deepwater Horizon explosion claimed the lives of 11 and destroyed the livelihoods of many others, the link between respecting the earth and protecting the rights of humans should be clear. However, since the Deepwater disaster, the U.S. government has failed to pass a single law regulating oil and gas drilling. Shannon and Maude join us to talk about what's at stake for both the natural world and the people who benefit from it--and which American cities have taken the lead in officially recognizing the rights of nature.

Finally, Laura has some thoughts about the recent news that China's sovereign wealth fund chair thinks the US needs to invest at home--for the health of the whole global economy.

China's pension fund head recently said that the U.S. government needs to reduce not just its fiscal deficit, but its trade gap, in order to maintain the dollar's stability. US average levels need to be closer to those of developing nations and emerging markets, the manager of China's Sovereign Wealth fund advised.

In other words, even China, which sends so many of its goods here, is worried about our imbalance between imports and exports. And there's another problem. When the US rich used stimulus money and Federal Reserve help, not to hire here, but to seek to maximize profits by hiring abroad, and to gamble on commodity markets, that cash not only failed to boost the US economy as it was intended, it drove up commodity prices and the inflation risk in China and elsewhere.

And that, say the Chinese, is not only bad for most Americans, but also destabilizes the global economy. Not exactly the message we've been hearing stateside.

The piece the Chinese remember but our media tend to ignore is that ours is a global world. Our so-called “jobless recovery” is no great news for anyone. Outsourcing, high unemployment and rock bottom wages for those with jobs that can't be outsourced leaves even those with full-time work in no mood to spend on Chinese products or anyone else's.

And less faith in the US economy and its currency abroad will likely make our national debt bigger, not smaller, as the value of Treasury bonds teeters downwards.

GRITtv guest Bob Herbert had it right when he wrote that the US needs a better ruling class after this one "stopped being concerned with the health of society and became almost entirely obsessed with money."  The Chinese apparently agree. Now what can we do to get Washington to become a responsible partner for Beijing?

After 20 years of working the at the Times' op-ed desk, Bob left for greener pastures--and a longer word-count. Bob is now working on a new book that will tackle, in depth, some of the issues that he covered in his nearly 20 years of working the "beat of left-out people". Bob joins us today to talk about his career as a journalist, why he left the Times, media, race, and more.