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The OccupyUSA live-blog at TheNation.com tracks the movement across the country and the world with updates often every 5 minutes: it’s the work of GREG MITCHELL – he has a new book out, 40 Days That Shook the World: From Occupy Wall Street to Occupy Everywhere.

Also: REBECCA SOLNIT says “If you ever doubted whether you were powerful or you mattered, just look at the reaction to people like you (or your children) camped out in parks from Oakland to Portland, Tucson to Manhattan”—the militarized police attacks on Occupyers from Manhattan to UC Davis. Rebecca wrote for TomDispatch.com.

Plus: Newt Gingrich’s cruelest campaign: replace school janitors with child labor.  JOHN NICHOLS talks about the current Republican front-runner – he’s Washington correspondent for The Nation and blogs for TheNation.com.

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Monday night the Occupy Wall Street camp in Manhattan was destroyed by the NYPD; today the activists are back, but barred from camping overnight.  RICHARD KIM, executive editor of The Nation will comment on what Occupy has accomplished and what’s next – his report, “The Audacity of Wall Street,” has been posted on 3,400 Facebook pages, and he was a guest on MSNBC last week.

Today’s show is part of the Pacifica National Archives annual fundraiser – we will be asking listeners to support the Archives’ Campus Campaign, to place audio collections in high schools and colleges across the country.  Please call and pledge during the show 800-735-0230 or online here.

Special feature: RY COODER’s new song for the Occupy movement, “Wall Street Part of Town”–world premiere!

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Voters yesterday rejected right-wing overreach with an unbroken string of Democratic and progressive victories: HAROLD MEYERSON comments on the defeat, 61-39, of the Ohio law stripping public employees of collective-bargaining rights, and the defeat in Mississippi, 57-43, of a sweeping antiabortion initiative.  Harold writes for the Washington Post and The American Prospect.

Also: TOM WAITS has an amazing new CD out, “Bad as Me” – SASHA FRERE-JONES of The New Yorker will comment.  SEE the “Visibile Tom Waits” HERE.

And FRANCES FOX PIVEN says Occupy Wall Street “has already made the concentration of wealth at the top of this society a central issue in American politics.  Now, it promises to do something similar when it comes to the realities of poverty in this country.” Piven, “the professor Glenn Beck loves to hate,” wrote about it for TomDispatch.com; her latest book is Who’s Afraid of Frances Fox Piven?

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Occupy Wall Street made a stunning showing over the weekend – we’ll talk about the different manifestations around Southern California with ALAN MINSKY, KPFK program director.  My personal favorite: Occupy Irvine – more than 500 people marched on Saturday.  Who would have thought?

Also: It’s time to abolish the death penalty in California – with an initiative on the November ballot.  JAMES CLARK, southern California coordinator for the SAFE California Campaign, will explain the strategy—and the need for volunteers to help gather signatures.

Plus: RY COODER has a book out: Los Angeles Stories is a collection of  noir-ish tales of  L.A. in the late forties, and the outsiders and oddballs in the old downtown neighborhood Bunker Hill  and out  in Venice Beach.  Los Angeles Stories is our featured thank-you premium, along with Ry’s new CD, “Pull Up Some Dust and Sit Down.”  Today’s NYTimes suggests Ry Cooder’s Song “No Banker Left Behind” as an anthem for the “Occupy” movement: watch “No Banker” HERE.
Please call and pledge during the hour: 818-985-5735 — or at kpfk.org.

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Last night Senate Republicans blocked Obama’s jobs bill, which would have taxed millionaires to fund infrastructure construction, repair schools, and rehire cops, teachers, and firefighters who have been laid off.   Meanwhile,  Occupy Wall Street grows.  JOHN NICHOLS will comment–he writes “The Beat” blog at TheNation.com.

Big Bill Broonzy – he left the Mississippi Delta to become a leading Chicago bluesman of the 1930s, singing about racial injustice alongside Pete Seeger and Studs Terkel; then traveling to Europe to ignite the British blues-rock revival of the 1960s with Eric Clapton and Pete Townshend. BOB REISMAN explains – his new book is I Feel so Good: the Life and Times of Big Bill Broonzy.
Playlist: “Black, Brown, and White,” “This Train,” “I Feel So Good.”

Also: Whatever happened to the American left?  MICHAEL KAZIN says socialists. anarchists and communists never won much political power, but nevertheless their utopian spirit brought far-reaching cultural change.  And then there were the Abolitionists: we could learn a lot from them.  Michael’s new book is American Dreamers: How the Left Changed a Nation.