Rick Santelli's Chicago Tea Party

Obama’s 30% millionaire tax
Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner Will Not Serve a Second Term
DNA sample to be taken from students before allowed to take SAT college entrance exams
Obama Signs Global Internet Treaty Worse Than SOPA
Unborn babies at risk of arsenic poisoning
Ron Paul Slams Obama’s SOTU As “Campaign Speech”
New GOP challenger to Rep. Nancy Pelosi — Ron Paul’s organizer
Al Sharpton Ignores Tea Party Congressman Repeatedly Asking ‘What’s Your Income?’
States’ Drive to Collect Taxes on Internet Sales Is a Blow to Marketers

Posted: 26 Jan 2012 05:38 AM PST

By Jeanne Sahadi, CNN Money

President Obama this week defined what he believes should be the minimum “fair share” for millionaires and billionaires to pay in taxes. His answer: At least 30% of their income.

“If you make more than $1 million a year, you should not pay less than 30% in taxes,” Obama said during his State of the Union address.

The 30% marker is the first real detail Obama has offered since proposing the so-called Buffett Rule last September. That rule is a guideline intended to ensure that the very wealthy don’t pay a lower percentage of their income in taxes than anyone in the middle class.

It’s named, of course, after billionaire investor Warren Buffett, who has repeatedly asserted that he pays a lower percentage of his income to the IRS than his secretary.

The Congressional Research Service this fall estimated that a quarter of millionaires don’t pay enough in federal taxes to satisfy the Buffett Rule. The CRS arrived at the number after considering what filers pay in federal income, payroll and corporate taxes combined.

Billionaires with 1% tax rates

It’s not clear, though, whether the president wants the rich to pay a minimum of 30% in federal income taxes alone or on a broader swath of taxes like CRS measured. Nor is it clear how he defines $1 million in income. Is it gross, adjusted gross, modified adjusted gross or taxable income?

Obama also called for an end to tax deductions for millionaires on home, health care, retirement and child care. It’s not clear how that might work in conjunction with the 30% rule.

Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner Will Not Serve a Second Term

Posted: 26 Jan 2012 05:35 AM PST

By Matt Egan, FOXBusiness.com

Tim Geithner, one of President Barack Obama's closest economic advisers, has no intention on staying on as Treasury secretary if Obama wins a second term.

Geithner, who was one of the chief architects of the government's response to the financial crisis, told Bloomberg Television he's "pretty confident" Obama won't ask him to stay on.

"I'm confident he'll be president. But I'm also confident he's going to have the privilege of having another secretary of the Treasury," Geithner said.

The comments, which were confirmed by the Treasury Department, mean a second four-year term in the White House would be led by an entirely different economics team than the one Obama started with. Other high-profile advisers like Larry Summers and Christine Romer have already left the White House.

Geithner, 50, declined to say what he plans to do next, but said it will be "something else."

Before being tapped to lead the Treasury Department during the depths of the Great Recession, Geithner served as president of the New York Federal Reserve under President George W. Bush.

DNA sample to be taken from students before allowed to take SAT college entrance exams

Posted: 26 Jan 2012 05:32 AM PST

From: NaturalNews.com

Standardized testing is a common method by which colleges and universities evaluate the competency of applying high school students. But an increasing amount of students are cheating on such tests, which has caused lawmakers in New York to consider actually harvesting “digital DNA” from students and applying it to special ID cards that students would be required to furnish both before and after taking the SAT or ACT exams to prove their identities.

The digital DNA card idea was birthed after a major cheating scandal at Great Neck North High School on Long Island. Students struggling with their studies and the standardized test protocol apparently hired Sam Eshaghoff, a former student who performed well on his own SAT exam, to take the test for them in exchange for cash.

Dr. James Hayward from the applied DNA sciences lab at Stony Brook University, which is currently working on perfecting digital DNA technology, claims it is “absolutely unbreakable for securing the identity of a student taking the SAT exam.” He explained to lawmakers in Albany, NY, recently that a student’s identity code is wirelessly uploaded to an IT “cloud,” which allows test proctors to remotely access it and verify that it matches both that student’s digital DNA card and his or her actual image.

Currently, students are required to show their normal photo IDs before being admitted to the SAT or ACT testing room. But IDs can relatively easily be forged, say many, which means that an imposter could easily slip in and take the test for someone else. On the other hand, requiring students to submit to forensic image analysis in order to digitally encode their identity may be going way overboard, as it represents a huge step towards authoritarian encroachment into the lives of individuals.

On the same token, the technology has the potential to be widely abused by the government, as it could eventually be used to force compliance with totalitarian dictates like forced medication or vaccination. If a student is not up to date with his or her recommended vaccinations, for instance, he or she could one day be barred from certain opportunities, including the freedom to go to college. There is really no limit to the type of control that could be exerted over individuals is such technology becomes the norm.

Obama Signs Global Internet Treaty Worse Than SOPA

Posted: 26 Jan 2012 05:28 AM PST

By: Paul Joseph Watson, Infowars.com

Months before the debate about Internet censorship raged as SOPA and PIPA dominated the concerns of web users, President Obama signed an international treaty that would allow companies in China or any other country in the world to demand ISPs remove web content in the US with no legal oversight whatsoever.

The Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement was signed by Obama on October 1 2011, yet is currently the subject of a White House petition demanding Senators be forced to ratify the treaty. The White House has circumvented the necessity to have the treaty confirmed by lawmakers by presenting it an as "executive agreement," although legal scholars have highlighted the dubious nature of this characterization.

The hacktivist group Anonymous attacked and took offline the Federal Trade Commission's website yesterday in protest against the treaty, which was also the subject of demonstrations across major cities in Poland, a country set to sign the agreement today.

Under the provisions of ACTA, copyright holders will be granted sweeping direct powers to demand ISPs remove material from the Internet on a whim. Whereas ISPs normally are only forced to remove content after a court order, all legal oversight will be abolished, a precedent that will apply globally, rendering the treaty worse in its potential scope for abuse than SOPA or PIPA.

A country known for its enforcement of harsh Internet censorship policies like China could demand under the treaty that an ISP in the United States remove content or terminate a website on its server altogether. As we have seen from the enforcement of similar copyright policies in the US, websites are sometimes targeted for no justifiable reason.

The groups pushing the treaty also want to empower copyright holders with the ability to demand that users who violate intellectual property rights (with no legal process) have their Internet connections terminated, a punishment that could only ever be properly enforced by the creation of an individual Internet ID card for every web user, a system that is already in the works.

Unborn babies at risk of arsenic poisoning

Posted: 26 Jan 2012 05:25 AM PST

From: NaturalNews.com

New scientific evidence has emerged, linking rice to harmful levels of arsenic. A recent study coming from Darmouth University and published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences sheds new light on arsenic sources in the diets of healthy pregnant women.

Arsenic effects on health

Arsenic is a naturally occurring mineral that is highly toxic to all multicellular organisms. It works by interfering with enzyme production within cells, and disrupting their natural energy system. Consequently, arsenic poisoning can induce a vast array of medical conditions, including headaches, confusion, hypertension, cancer, stroke, as well as skin, liver and kidney toxicity that may cause the organs to shut down. Arsenic can commonly be found in groundwater, with numerous cases of arsenic contamination having been reported across the world over the last few years. According to data provided by the Darmouth Medical School, in the United States alone, as much as 20% of all wells in some areas may be contaminated with yet unknown levels of arsenic.

While the World Health Organization (WHO) has set a limit of 10 micrograms per liter of drinkable water, there is scientific evidence that even at low concentrations, arsenic can have devastating effects on human health. A Johns Hopkins University study showed that low levels of inorganic arsenic may play a role in type II diabetes incidence, while a Michigan study managed to link low levels of arsenic to 23 kinds of diseases.

Rice – source of fetal arsenic exposure

Rice is currently under scientific scrutiny because of its ability to draw arsenic from contaminated soil. Dr. Margaret Karagas, head of the Darmouth science team, warns us about the far reaching implications of arsenic contamination. “Arsenic exposure during pregnancy is a public health concern due to potential health risks to the fetus,” she explains.

Dr. Karagas is also head of the Children’s Environmental Health and Disease Prevention Center at Dartmouth and has studied the impact of arsenic on human health for over 15 years. During her vast experience in the field, she has been able to link arsenic to bladder cancer and other potentially fatal conditions. Data from other studies reveals that arsenic plays a role in infant mortality, reduced birth weight, poor immunity, and the likelihood of developing cancer at later stages in life.

Ron Paul Slams Obama’s SOTU As “Campaign Speech”

Posted: 26 Jan 2012 05:22 AM PST

By: Steve Watson, Infowars.com

Describing president Obama's State Of The Union Speech as "rhetoric" and "bragging", GOP presidential candidate Ron paul said in a statement today that "Instead of offering solutions to the problems our country faces, the President was intent on delivering a campaign speech."

The Congressman added that Obama's speech dealt "in the typical Washington political gamesmanship that has gotten us exactly nowhere close to improving the lives of the American people."

Paul noted that Obama seemed to be "bragging" about job creation when his "universal" health care plan was actually "job-destroying". The Congressman also noted that the Dodd-Frank bill "guarantees future taxpayer bailouts of large institutions."

Responding to Obama's comments on "an economy where everyone gets a fair shot, everyone does their fair share, and everyone plays by the same set of rules" Paul said "Yet he remains committed to the same old system of debt, deficits, bailouts, and cronyism that created our economic problems."

"The President speaks of giving us energy independence from unstable nations, yet he refuses to allow the type of development needed to achieve this goal, while at the same time his administration hands out favors to the politically connected – those given to the likes of Solyndra, who fail to produce jobs or energy but succeed in ripping off the taxpayers." Paul urged.

Pointing out that Obama failed to address the need to balance the federal budget, Paul added that the president "…refuses to even mention the role the Federal Reserve plays in creating an economic system where some are denied a fair shot or even to support my efforts at bringing transparency to the Federal Reserve."

New GOP challenger to Rep. Nancy Pelosi — Ron Paul’s organizer

Posted: 25 Jan 2012 08:03 PM PST

By Carla Marinucci, The San Francisco Chronicle

House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi – who said she thinks Democrats will take back Congress in 2012 — is now facing a challenge in her own district from Republican John Dennis, a major organizer for GOP presidential candidate Ron Paul.

Dennis told us Wednesday he will announce he's running against Pelosi at a Log Cabin Republican event in San Francisco tonight.

"It's important that liberty candidates, in particular, keep running and keep building the market for our ideas," Dennis said in a phone interview.

This isn't his first time the businessman and Ron Paul organizer — who's campaigned and organized grassroots support for the Texas Republican in Iowa and throughout California — has challenged the powerful San Francisco Democrat in CD8. He was endorsed by Paul himself the last time he ran in 2010.

"We should have done a lot better last time," Dennis told us. "We have a different strategy this time….we're going to raise money and put it into name recognition. And we'll see how much abuse San Francisco can take when it comes to Nancy Pelosi. I'll keep putting the pressure on."

Al Sharpton Ignores Tea Party Congressman Repeatedly Asking ‘What’s Your Income?’

Posted: 25 Jan 2012 07:56 PM PST

By Frances Martel | Mediaite.com

Mitt Romney's tax returns provided at least one commentator plenty of fodder to feed his theory that the tax rates are unfair in this country: Al Sharpton, who invited on his program today Tea Party Congressman Rep. Tim Huelskamp for a spirited debate on social justice. It was the sort of debate where short questions were thrown in each other's general direction but went, as ships passing in the night, equally unanswered. The two main questions: from Rev. Sharpton: "Is it fair?" after a number of statistics on tax rates that Rep. Huelskamp labeled untruths; and from Rep. Huelskamp: "What's your income?"

"Is it fair that millionaires pay a lower tax rate than their own secretaries?" was the first variation of Sharpton's question, to which the Congressman replied that he had seen the State of the Union address and "what we heard last night was a campaign speech." Sharpton called his reply "talking points" and asked the question again. "They actually don't, according to the IRS," Rep. Huelskamp replied. Asked again, with a 30% number for the average American taxpayer, the guest died it, once again. Sharpton finally gave up trying to assert the statistics as true and simply asked, "if those statistics that I reported are true, is it fair?" "It's not true." This gridlock continued for a bit.

"What I'm trying to bring home to the American people is that you guys can't discuss fairness," Sharpton finally argued. Sharpton then turned to the Congressman's district in Kansas, and noted that most people there make less in a year than Romney would make in a day, and insisted again that Romney paid less than average taxes. "He's paying 14%. We're not guessing– he released it," Sharpton said of Romney, and Rep. Huelskamp responded that "fairness isn't the end result, it's the opportunity," so what rich people pay in taxes should not particularly matter.

States’ Drive to Collect Taxes on Internet Sales Is a Blow to Marketers

Posted: 25 Jan 2012 05:15 AM PST

By IAN MOUNT, NYTimes.com

On a dreary day last April, Tim Storm, the founder of FatWallet, and his 54 employees formed a convoy of some 30 cars, three moving trucks and a trailer laden with two fiberglass cows (one purple, one black), and drove five miles north from their old corporate home in Rockton, Ill.. to the new FatWallet headquarters in Beloit, Wis.

The move certainly seemed to be an odd business decision: it cost $100,000, and the company left behind a $5 million, three-year-old, custom-built office building in Rockton, whose maintenance would continue to cost $30,000 a month until it finds a tenant. But Mr. Storm felt he had to do it for his business to survive.

One of the country's biggest bargain hunter Web sites, FatWallet publishes coupons and deals from about 1,000 companies that range from small shops like PennyWise.biz to retail giants like Amazon. Since 2005, the company has acted as the middleman in more than $1.2 billion in Internet sales. (It says its own revenue was $12 million in 2010.)

But last March, Gov. Pat Quinn of Illinois signed House Bill 3659, a so-called affiliate nexus tax that would require out-of-state retailers that advertise through Illinois-based Internet marketing "affiliates" like FatWallet to collect and remit Illinois sales tax.

Mr. Storm, 43, calculated that he had until last April 15 to move his business or risk losing as much as 40 percent of his revenue when big Internet retailers like Amazon.com and Overstock.com would cut off FatWallet to avoid the expense and irritation of handling Illinois sales tax. "We didn't really have a choice about relocating the business," Mr. Storm said. "It was relocate or become irrelevant."

It is hardly surprising that states are taking it upon themselves to increase their sales tax income. Residents are supposed to declare and pay sales tax on goods they buy from out-of-state retailers, but few do, which deprives states of tax revenue and gives Internet retailers an advantage over physical stores. California hoped to collect some $200 million the first year after passing an affiliate nexus tax, and the large brick-and-mortar retailers that support nexus bills hope that the bills will level the playing field with Internet competitors.

Rick Santelli's Chicago Tea Party

Thursday, January 26, 2012

Rick Santelli's Chicago Tea Party

Rick Santelli's Chicago Tea Party

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