After 40 years as a Congressman, Charlie Rangel will stand trial on 13 counts of ethics violations after his attorneys failed to negotiate a settlement with the House Ethics Committee. Such trials are rare, the last being held in 2002.

It also increases the possibility that Rangel's fellow Democrats will call for his resignation. If found guilty, he faces everything from expulsion to censure. Either way, Rangel's legacy has been scarred because of the charges.

A somber-sounding Rangel could not hide his emotions. "Sixty years ago, I survived a Chinese attack in North Korea and have said that I haven't had a bad day since," Rangel said. "But after today, I may have to revise that statement."

The trial and charges represent a remarkable turn of events for a man regarded as one of the deans of Democratic politics. Rangel coveted the chair of the House Ways and Means committee and waited decades to get it before these charges forced him to step aside.

Rangel is being investigated for his use of four rent-controlled apartments in Harlem, using Congressional letterhead to raise money for a New York City College center for public service bearing his name, not reporting income and assets and preserving a tax loophole for a group that donated to the City College center.

Democrats have been pushing for a settlement to avoid the spectacle of a trial months before the November mid-term elections. Some have begun calls for Rangel's resignation.

Rangel was apparently unwilling to admit to the terms of a deal which would have required him to admit to multiple and serious ethics violations.

Last time we had anything to say about conservative blogger Andrew Breitbart we just dumped on him the way many websites have over the past week or so. He deserved it, so we tore him a new one, but that's probably going to stop now because he's about to get kicked in the family jewels.

Former Agriculture Department employee Shirley Sherrod, who Breitbart consciously chose to make an enemy out of, said today that she plans to sue him for targeting her, when he posted a video to his website that was edited to look like she discriminated against a white Georgia farmer.

Truth be told, she may have a damn good case.

Jesus, where do we begin? The latest testimony/embarrassment to American democracy comes to us by way of Basil Marceaux , the Republican candidate for governor of Tennessee.

It seems that a renewed interest in the political process and easy access to the internet is spawning the most bizarre crop of candidates for office this country ever did see. The latest comes by way of Chattanooga, Tennessee. And he's a doozy. Let's just say he makes Alvin Greene look like Barack Obama.

He recently began a Youtube Channel spreading his message of lunacy freedom all over the world.

Marceaux is a former marine who wants to be the governor of Tennessee, and like every good politician, Basil has a platform consisting of issues that he will address if the good kinfolk people of Tennessee are wise enough to elect him as governor.

One of his campaign promises is "VOTE FOR ME AND IF I WIN I WILL IMMUNE YOU FROM ALL STATE CRIMES FOR THE REST OF YOU LIFE!" OK, that would be kind of awesome. But what else is Basil offering...?

When slavery ended, Philip Haynie says his great-grandfather was the first black to purchase land in Northumberland County, Virginia.

Farming became the family profession, and today, Haynie, 56, and his son represent the fourth and fifth generations of farmers in the family.

But between Haynie and his son, most of the 800 to 900 acres they use to grow soy beans and wheat is leased. That's because they can't afford the $6,000 per acre it now costs to purchase land. When Haynie first started farming in the 1970s and land was selling for $500 per acre, he couldn't access the same low-cost government loans and financing that were being extended to white farmers:

"My great-grandfather was doing better than I was and he was coming out of slavery. I feel like I've been in economic slavery or prison for a crime that I did not commit," Haynie told Aol. Black Voices in an interview.

"We can't buy the land here, and that's the real problem. I should have been buying land back then and my wealth would be growing now, but because I missed that opportunity, I'll only be able to afford to lease land."

That's the story that thousands of other black farmers tell and the reason that black farmers like Haynie brought a successful lawsuit against the government for years of discrimination. The USDA slowed black farmers' loans, making them miss planting opportunities, and denied them equipment grants and other subsidies that were readily available to white farmers.

A 2007 study found that black farmers only received between one-third and one-sixth the crop subsidies allocated to white farmers.

In February, President Barack Obama, who also introduced legislation when he was a senator, announced the settlement.

But since then, the U.S. Senate has failed to fund the $1.25 billion settlement, stripping it from the confines of other bills on three different occasions, even though it has passed twice in the House.

John Boyd Jr., himself a farmer and president of the National Black Farmers Association, told Aol. Black Voices that frustration is mounting and time is running out for some black farmers, after a meeting to lobby legislators on Capitol Hill:

"For a farmer who can't pay his light bill, that money can be a shot in the arm as far as making a difference in the lives of a person who lost their farm. This may not put them back in business but it will bring some comfort to older black farmers who have worked all their lives and been mistreated by the government."

Our most dapper President, Barack Obama, sat in the "hot" seat on ABC-TV's "The View" earlier today. As always, our prez was calm, cool and oh-so-collected and ready to face the firing squad of five women, Barbara Walters, Whoopi Goldberg, Sherri Shepherd, Joy Behar and Elisabeth Hasselbeck.

The world has been swept up in the large scale images of death and grief from Haiti since the January earthquake devastated the poor island nation, where 200,500 people were killed, 1.5 million people were displaced and billions of dollars are needed for recovery.

But the tragedy of the Haitian situation comes in small doses as well. Like when two children in a refugee camp were killed after heavy rains caused a wall to tumble down on tarp-covered shanties.

Kesnel Joseph, 8 months, and Kika Leus, 2, were killed, when rain caused the wall to collapse at the Terrain Acra camp in the Delmas neighborhood. Enrique Joseph, a police officer and father of Kesnel, mourned his child, saying he would have moved had he known the wall was so unstable.

Fellow Democrats may begin calling for Charlie Rangel's resignation if he can't reach a plea deal that would prevent a public trial on ethics charges.

Up until now, only Republicans have called for Rangel's resignation. If Democrats begin making the call it will surely be a slap in the face to the 40-year Democrat and former chair of the Ways and Means Committee.

Today is likely the last day to make a deal. Although the charges Rangel could face have been widely speculated about, a formal reading of the charges is set for 1 p.m. EST today.

Rangel is being investigated for his use of four rent-controlled apartments in Harlem, using Congressional letterhead to raise money for a New York City College center for public service bearing his name, not reporting income and assets and preserving a tax loophole for a group that donated to the City College center. If a trial were to take place and he were to be found guilty of ethics violations, Rangel could face everything from a written reprimand, censure or expulsion.

An ethics trial is rare and could be embarrassing.

Democrats have been pushing for Rangel to settle the charges in light of the upcoming mid-term elections. The fear is that the ethics charges against one of the longest-serving and most powerful Democrats will be used against other Democrats as they fight for re-election and fight to maintain control of the House.

As investigators continue to probe the circumstances surrounding the death of pop phenom Michael Jackson, California State Attorney General Jerry Brown's Bureau of Narcotic Enforcement has not filed charges against seven of the doctors who treated the entertainer.