The Tuesday after the Martin Luther King holiday promises to be a very black Tuesday, as stocks fell sharply worldwide Monday following declines on Wall Street last week and amid investor pessimism over the U.S. government’s weak stimulus plan to prevent a recession.

U.S. markets were closed for Martin Luther King Jr. Day, but the downbeat mood from last week’s market declines there circled through Europe, Asia and the Americas. Britain’s benchmark slumped 5.5 percent, France’s Index tumbled 6.8 percent, and Germany’s blue-chip plunged 7.2 percent.

In Asia, India’s benchmark stock index tumbled 7.4 percent, while Hong Kong’s blue-chip index plummeted 5.5 percent, its biggest percentage drop since the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks.

Canadian stocks fell as well, with the composite index on the Toronto Stock Exchange down 4 percent in early afternoon trading. In Brazil, stocks plunged 6.9 percent on the main index of Sao Paulo’s Bovespa exchange.

Investors dumped shares because they were skeptical that an economic stimulus plan President Bush announced Friday would shore up the economy that has been battered by problems in its housing and credit markets. The plan, which requires approval by Congress, calls for about $145 billion worth of tax relief to encourage consumer spending.

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A line of severe thunderstorms continued making its way across the South into Tuesday night as the New Hampshire primary votes were coming in, causing some power and Internet outages. Experts say it’s best to shut down high speed broadband modems when lightening passes overhead.

Earlier in the day, the same storms fed by warm weather continued spinning off unusual January tornadoes, killing a man in Arkansas and carrying a cow close to a mile, according to the Associated Press.

More Tornadoes Interrupt A Warm January

Meanwhile in science, scientists have discovered genetic information that helps explain how monarch butterflies find their way from Canada to winter nesting grounds in the mountains of Mexico in a study published online Tuesday in the PLoS Biology Journal and the Public Library of Science, which found that the butterflies’ biological clocks help them use the sun as a compass.

Inner Clock May Lead Monarch Butterflies

PloS Biology Journal

Benazir Bhutto is the latest victim of the deadly mix of George W. Bush’s wishful thinking and his obsession with Iraq.

U.S. officials encouraged the former Pakistani prime minister to return to her homeland to help counter Islamic extremists when there was no way the over-stretched U.S. intelligence agencies could give her much protection.

To read the full story, go to the independent ConsortiumNews.Com

Disgraced former Attorney General Alberto Gonzales may be the choice of the American Bar Association for top news maker lawyer of 2007, but watch out for Alabama’s Jill Simpson in 2008.

Alberto Gonzales

“The most talked-about attorney this past year by a mile, according to the ABA Journal, “was Gonzales, 52, who rose from being the grandson of illegal immigrants to the first Hispan­ic attorney general of the United States.

“George W. Bush appeared to be grooming the man he affectionately calls “Fredo” for the U.S. Supreme Court. But after Gonzales appeared veracity-challenged when testifying before the Senate Judiciary Com­mittee, he resigned in August.

“Gonzales went from ‘Latino Lawyer of the Year’ in 1999 to become the subject of several investigations involving use of the Justice Department as a political tool.

“Before becoming attorney general, Gonzales authored - or at least authorized as White House general counsel - a memo describing the Geneva Conventions as “quaint” and presided, at least nominally (see David Addington), over what now appears to have been a stealth campaign to reinstate pre-Watergate presidential authority.

“His determination to do so is epitomized in a now-infamous hospital-room meeting with an incapacitated John Ashcroft in an unsuccessful effort to gain approval for a secret wiretapping program. The highlight: Ashcroft’s wife sticking her tongue out at Gonzales and his entourage as they retreated from Ashcroft’s bedside.”

New Attorney General Michael Mukasey also made the list for 2008, but here’s what the journal says about our own…

Dana Jill Simpson

“As a Republican party activist and attorney, Simpson worked on Alabama Gov. Bob Riley’s gubernatorial campaign, but later shocked her GOP friends by accusing Karl Rove, President Bush’s former top political adviser, of instigating and influencing the prosecution of Riley’s chief Democratic adversary.

“Simpson’s claim, made under oath, has thus far stayed out of the national media spotlight. But that could well change if Dem­o­crats pursue, as threatened, hearings about the firing of eight U.S. attorneys. Simpson’s allegation links the White House to the corruption case against former Democratic Gov. Don Siegelman, who is now serving an 88-month sentence.

“In a 143-page sworn statement to the House Judiciary Committee, Simpson says she learned of Rove’s involvement during a campaign conference call, and also alleges that Riley helped stack the deck against the former governor by assigning a hanging judge to oversee Siegelman’s case. Riley has denied her allegations, telling Time magazine last fall: “Ms. Simpson’s statements have gone from being not only untrue to absurd and ridiculous.” Whatever the case, Simpson could be telling her story before the white hot lights of a congressional hearing.

“She will be talked about, whether or not she is believed,” the journal editors conclude.

But of course they also honor Lewis “Scooter” Libby.

ABA Journal: Lawyers of the Year 2007 and 2008