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President Barack Obama recently defied Republican threats to file suit against him for his use of executive orders. "If House Republicans are really concerned about me taking too many executive actions, the best solution to that is passing bills," the president said. "Pass a bill, solve a problem."

In pledging $50-million to strengthen America’s "flailing democracy," the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation has stirred criticism among liberal groups that in doing so it has jettisoned some of its core values.

In its three-year "Madison Initiative," named after James Madison, an American founder who warned against the "mischiefs of faction," the foundation says it will support groups looking to make adjustments to the legislative process so Congress can perform its basic tasks like passing annual spending bills, says Daniel Stid, who will lead the effort for Hewlett.

Citibank settled the Justice Department’s mortgage market investigation yesterday, agreeing to pay $4 billion in civil penalties, $500 million in penalties to various states and $2.5 billion in “soft dollars” to aid consumers damaged by their pre-financial crisis shenanigans. To reach agreement, the bank was also absolved of any liability for credit default obligations, derivatives that fueled the crisis. Attorney General Holder offered up a verbal slap to the face, writing, “the bank’s conduct was egregious.”

So why did Citigroup share prices close 3.1% higher on the market?

Nathan Kelly is an associate professor of political science at the University of Tennessee. His book, The Politics of Inequality in the United States, examines how politics affects the market distribution of income, as well as government redistribution. Kelly and I discuss the implications of his work at the intersection of economic and political inequality.

In his HBO show last night, John Oliver had an astute segment on the growth of inequality in our democracy. His segment echoes our Stacked Deck analysis, hitting on American attitudes toward class and echoing our argument about the striking political saliency of repealing the estate tax. He even hits, albeit briefly, on the stark racial breakdown of economic elites.

After popularizing luxury groceries for the well-off, Whole Foods is trying to take the concept to the masses. But amid growing inequality and a sluggish recovery, those masses have gone missing.

Voter ID laws are back in the news this week after a group of college students joined a lawsuit challenging North Carolina's new restrictive rules.

Last week Maria Shriver posted a tribute to California's groundbreaking, decade-old paid family leave. In her Huffington Post column, she wrote:

Last month, IndexCreditCards.com asked, "Are you embarrassed by your credit card balances and credit score? " The question was prompted by a survey from the National Foundation for Credit Counseling that found three times more consumers being ashamed of their card balances than their weight.