Rick Santelli's Chicago Tea Party |
- Biofuels, Speculation Blamed for Global Food Market Weirdness
- Senate Democrats Propose 5% Surtax on Millionaires
- Pizza delivery guy calls cops on customer who smoked marijuana
- Iraq Militants Brag: We’ve Got Robotic Weapons, Too
- Stress ‘is top cause of workplace sickness’
- Breast Cancer Survivor Endured ‘Humiliating’ Pat-Down By TSA
- IRS Hits Pot Shop With $2.4M Tax Bill
- September Layoffs Highest in 2 Years
- Perry’s poll plunge continues as tea party support erodes
- Tea Party criticizes Occupy Wall Street actions
| Biofuels, Speculation Blamed for Global Food Market Weirdness Posted: 06 Oct 2011 02:00 AM PDT By Brandon Keim, Wired A new analysis of sudden rises in global food prices puts the blame on biofuel policy and mortgage-meltdown-style speculation, which may have fundamentally changed how food markets function. Many other explanations have been proposed, and the latest analysis — a series of mathematical models and statistical evaluations that seem to match theory with real-world patterns — is not conclusive. But it does make a strong case. "There's a literature of a hundred-plus articles, saying this might be the cause, or that might be the cause," said network theorist Yaneer Bar-Yam of the New England Complex Systems Institute. "We looked quantitatively, and found two important factors. Speculators cause the bubbles and crashes, and ethanol causes the background rise." Bar-Yam and the NECSI team, whose analysis was published Sept. 21 on arxiv, work at the intersection of social phenomena and network analysis. In earlier research, they've explored the global economy's changing structure and early-warning signals signals that may precede crashes. More recently, they've studied how social unrest may have been fueled by food price spikes in 2008 and again in 2011. It's not only the rise in food prices that's proved troubling, but the rapidity. Shifts have been big and sudden, in stark contrast to the generally slow fluctuation of food prices since the mid-20th century. Among the possible causes put forward by economists are drought, meat-intensive dietary habits and market hypersensitivity to supply and demand. Another is corn-based biofuel: In less than a decade, some 15 percent of the world's corn production has been converted from food to fuel. Perhaps most controversially, some economists have blamed a flood of speculators betting on the rise or fall of food prices. To read more, visit: http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2011/10/food-price-rises/ |
| Senate Democrats Propose 5% Surtax on Millionaires Posted: 06 Oct 2011 02:00 AM PDT By COREY BOLES, The Wall Street Journal WASHINGTON—Senate Democrats proposed a 5% surtax on people earning more than $1 million a year to pay for the $447 billion cost of President Barack Obama’s job-creation bill, in a move designed to shore up their party’s support for the measure. The proposal would replace the range of tax deductions for wealthy people, oil companies and other businesses that the president had proposed to end to offset the cost of the job-creation initiatives in his plan. Democratic leaders said they hoped to bring the revised plan to the Senate floor next week for debate. But assuming they keep all of their votes, they would need at least seven Republicans to vote in favor of any effort just to start debate on the legislation. It’s also not clear that the changes would win over all the Democrats who have been opposed to the package. Sen. Joe Manchin (D., W.V.) has voiced objections to the spending portion of the bill, so changing how it is paid for would be unlikely to sway him. Sen. Ben Nelson (D., Neb.) has repeatedly said he would oppose any tax increases given the current economic malaise. Sen. Charles Schumer (D., N.Y.) said the surtax would impact any income earned by people above $1 million annually. It would also impact dividends and capital gains, he said. The New York Democrat initially said it would be in place for 10 years, but an aide to the lawmaker later said the measure would be implemented permanently. If agreed to, the surtax would take effect from Jan. 1, 2012, the aide said. To read more, visit: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970203476804576612930412626412.html?mod=WSJ_hp_LEFTTopStories |
| Pizza delivery guy calls cops on customer who smoked marijuana Posted: 06 Oct 2011 02:00 AM PDT By Will Ripley, InformationLiberation AURORA – A man says he got much more than a large pizza when he called Papa John’s for delivery – he got a visit from Aurora Police. The man was smoking medical marijuana just before the pizza arrived on Friday evening. The delivery driver smelled the marijuana and called the cops. The Papa John’s employee, who was not identified, was concerned because the customer’s 9-year-old daughter was in the house. Officers performed a child welfare check and left without filing any charges. To read more, visit: http://www.informationliberation.com/?id=36780 |
| Iraq Militants Brag: We’ve Got Robotic Weapons, Too Posted: 05 Oct 2011 09:22 AM PDT By Noah Shachtman, Wired.com U.S. forces used a combination of spy drones and bomb-handling robots to help beat back Iraq's insurgents. Now, those militants have a warning for those American troops still remaining in Iraq: We've got robots, too. In a slick new online video just released by the Ansar al-Islam extremist group, kafiya-clad engineers brag about their skill in designing and making weapons of their own. They show off homemade silencers, fire custom-built rockets, and solder their own circuit boards. But the climax to the nearly four-minute clip comes when the camera focuses on a car driving in the desert; there's no one inside the vehicle. Then a tripod-mounted machine gun fires off a few rounds; there are no fingers on the trigger. The car and the gun are remotely-operated — crudely robotic. "This field of technology is a science developed and excelled in by the West," one of the militants says. "However, a new era is coming on the horizon, and the mujahideen are now real competitors in this field." The upgrade in insurgent technology couldn't come at a worse time. The last of the American troops are supposed to be out of Iraq by December. Meanwhile, extremist attacks are growing more regular — and more bloody. A car bomb killed 17 and injured 70 more on Friday. On Monday, insurgent gunmen seized control of a police station in western Iraq, taking four lives and dozens of hostages. To read more, visit: http://www.wired.com/dangerroom/2011/10/militants-got-robots/ |
| Stress ‘is top cause of workplace sickness’ Posted: 05 Oct 2011 09:18 AM PDT
Stress has become the most common reason for a worker being signed off long-term sick, a report reveals today. Experts said the psychological condition had become so widespread that it was the '21st century equivalent of the Black Death'. Stress has even eclipsed stroke, heart attack, cancer and back problems, according to the report from the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development. Jill Miller, an adviser to the institute, says the report 'highlights the heightened pressure many people feel under in the workplace as a result of the prolonged economic downturn'. Stress was found to be especially common at firms that have announced redundancies. Long-term absence is defined as taking four weeks or more off at one time because of sickness. To read more, visit: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-2045309/Stress-Top-cause-workplace-sickness-dubbed-Black-Death-21st-century.html |
| Breast Cancer Survivor Endured ‘Humiliating’ Pat-Down By TSA Posted: 05 Oct 2011 09:15 AM PDT
NEW YORK – Although October is Breast Cancer Awareness month, it seems some Transportation Security Administration agents aren't very aware when it comes to compassion. Breast cancer survivor Lori Dorn says she was subjected to a humiliating public pat-down at John F. Kennedy airport even though she offered to produce documentation about her medical implants. Dorn wrote in her blog that the patdown at JFK added "insult to injury and caused me a great deal of humiliation." Dorn was heading to San Francisco last week when a full-body scanner detected her prostheses. Dorn said she explained she had recently undergone bilateral mastectomy and had tissue expanders implanted for future breast reconstruction. A TSA agent refused to let her retrieve documentation from her wallet "that explains the type of expanders, serial numbers and my doctor's information," she said. "I had no choice but to allow an agent to touch my breasts in front of other passengers," Dorn said. In a tweet on her Twitter account Monday, Dorn said she received an apology from a JFK official "who agreed that proper policy wasn't followed." To read more, visit: http://newyork.cbslocal.com/2011/10/04/breast-cancer-survivor-lori-dorn-says-she-endured-humiliating-patdown-at-jfk/ |
| IRS Hits Pot Shop With $2.4M Tax Bill Posted: 05 Oct 2011 09:12 AM PDT By AP, MyFOXNY SAN FRANCISCO – The federal government has found a new weapon in its war on marijuana — the tax man. A San Francisco Bay area medical marijuana dispensary that promotes itself as the world’s largest has been hit with a $2.4 million tax bill following an audit by the Internal Revenue Service, the dispensary founder said Tuesday. The back taxes, penalties and interest levied against Harborside Health Center came after the IRS examined its returns for 2007 and 2008 and determined a 1982 tax code prohibiting cost deductions for businesses that traffic in illegal drugs applies to the dispensary. Harborside is a spa-like fixture on Oakland’s waterfront with 94,114 registered customers and 84 full-time employees that offers an average of 30 varieties of medical marijuana every day and has $22 million in annual sales. “What kind of drug trafficking organization actually files a tax return? None of them do,” said Harborside CEO Steve DeAngelo, who gave his auditor a personal tour of his posh apothecary. “The very fact that we filed a tax return and told the IRS all the details of what we are doing proves we are not a drug trafficking organization.” The IRS said the agency does not comment on individual audits. DeAngelo, the subject of an upcoming Discovery Channel reality show, said the write-offs disallowed by the IRS included standard operating costs such as rent, payroll, employee health insurance and licensing fees. Government auditors did not dispute, however, that Harborside had properly deducted its biggest expense — the millions of dollars it spent buying pot to sell to people who use it under California’s medical marijuana law. To read more, visit: http://www.myfoxny.com/dpps/news/irs-hits-oakland-pot-shop-with-24m-tax-bill-dpgapx-km-20111004_15331274 |
| September Layoffs Highest in 2 Years Posted: 05 Oct 2011 09:10 AM PDT From Reuters Service sector activity growth slowed in September, but other data on Wednesday showed private employment up modestly for the month, suggesting that overall the economic recovery is sluggish. Service sector activity slowed as a contraction in employment eclipsed a jump in new orders, but a second report showed private-sector employers overall added more jobs than expected, while a third report showed a jump in planned layoffs in the month. “Beneath the surface, it’s actually a fairly mixed report,” said Tom Porcelli, chief economist, at RBC Capital Markets, in New York. “The hard data are not pointing toward a recession yet. Financial markets are telling you a completely different story. Copper, equities, Treasuries — they’re all pointing in the direction of a downturn.” The data comes ahead of Friday’s monthly report on total U.S. nonfarm payrolls from the U.S. Labor Department which is expected to see a gain of 60,000 payrolls last month, according to a Reuters survey, after being unchanged in August. U.S. SERVICE SECTOR GROWTH MODERATES The Institute for Supply Management said its services index dipped to 53.0 last month from 53.3 in August. A reading above 50 indicates expansion in the sector. Economists polled by Reuters had expected a reading of 52.9 in September. To read more, visit: http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/10/05/us-usa-economy-idUSTRE78C33C20111005 |
| Perry’s poll plunge continues as tea party support erodes Posted: 05 Oct 2011 09:07 AM PDT BY DAVE MONTGOMERY, THE FORT WORTH STAR-TELEGRAM AUSTIN — A precipitous drop in tea party support is contributing to Gov. Rick Perry’s plunge in the polls, undercutting expectations that he would amass a hefty following from the conservative grassroots movement. The latest Washington Post-ABC News poll showed Perry, the former GOP front-runner, tied for second with Atlanta businessman Herman Cain at 16 percent, with former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney atop the Republican field with 25 percent. Public Policy Polling of Raleigh, N.C., released a three-state survey that described a “collapse” in Perry’s overall support in North Carolina, Nebraska and West Virginia. Perry’s supporters, as well as independent analysts, point out that the Republican nomination battle remains unpredictable, saying that Perry, who has never lost an election, still has plenty of time to turn things around. Perry fund-raisers, eager to portray a campaign on the move, are reportedly preparing to announce quarterly donation totals that exceed expectations. Politico, quoting a source, placed the figure at $15 million — above the campaign’s minimum goal of $10 million — but Perry campaign officials declined to confirm the figures. President Barack Obama stayed away from direct attacks on the Republican governor Tuesday during an appearance in the Dallas suburb of Mesquite, but Ron Kirk, the president’s trade ambassador and Dallas’ first black mayor, suggested to reporters that Perry’s presidential bid is running aground. “Too often the brightest stars are comets. But they flame out the fastest because they consume themselves on their own energy,” Kirk told reporters on Air Force One. “I think there are some lessons to be learned there in life and in politics. How quickly and how brightly we burn.” To read more, visit: http://www.miamiherald.com/2011/10/05/2439425/perrys-poll-plunge-continues-as.html |
| Tea Party criticizes Occupy Wall Street actions Posted: 05 Oct 2011 09:04 AM PDT
York, PA – The Independence Hall Tea Party Association issued the following statement in a news release Wednesday: The Independence Hall Tea Party Association, a group dedicated to free enterprise and respect for the U.S. Constitution, announced today that while it supports the free speech rights of all, including Occupy Wall Street and Occupy Philadelphia, it roundly deplores illegal behavior, including sit-ins that block the free movement of people and cargo. “Was it really necessary for Occupy Wall Street to takeover the Brooklyn Bridge–and interfere with the rights of others to travel freely–in order to get their point of view across to the general public?” asked Association President Teri Adams. “The Tea Party rejects such behavior and challenges Occupy Philadelphia to consider the rights of others when it protests tomorrow.” “The idea that Wall Street is the root of all evil is also an anathema to us. Like any other institution, Wall Street has its corrupt figures–and such individuals should be dealt with accordingly,” said Ms. Adams. “But to condemn Wall Street, en masse, is akin to condemning our entire free enterprise system. “Our Association deplores corporate bailouts (GM), corporate subsidies (Solyndra), and corporate welfare. At the same time, however, we recognize the contributions and achievements of America’s chambers of commerce. “If Occupy Philadelphia wishes to reform a corrupt corporation let it start with the world’s largest, the United States government, which routinely wastes billions of taxpayers dollars and seeks to interject itself into every aspect of our lives–threatening our very freedoms,” she said. “Currently, the federal government, led by the Obama Administration, is stifling the American economy with its reckless deficit spending and zealous over-regulation of the private sector economy. “The result has been a disastrous three-year-plus recession (which many are now calling a depression) that has devastated American families with its high unemployment rate and its built-in cost of living increases.” To read more, visit: http://www.ydr.com/politics/ci_19045205 |
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