Rick Santelli's Chicago Tea Party |
- Obama to pitch lower corporate tax
- Criminal probe trail going cold at MF Global
- Catholic Bishops: Obama’s Solution ‘Is Unacceptable’
- Agent Orange Maker Monsanto Seeks Return to Vietnam for GMO Crops
| Obama to pitch lower corporate tax Posted: 11 Feb 2012 10:54 AM PST By Kim Dixon, Yahoo News Canada WASHINGTON (Reuters) President Barack Obama will call for cutting the top 35 percent corporate tax rate as early as this month, according to two sources close to the administration. The president is likely to propose a rate closer to an average of that seen in peer nations, the sources said. This would jibe with remarks made last year by Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner, who suggested the United States should be moving to a rate more in line with its major trading partners in the high 20-percent range. Obama outlined tax measures – including closing tax loopholes for companies that move facilities and jobs overseas – in his State of the Union speech in January, and will lay out principles for revamping corporate taxes by the end of February, a senior administration official said. “We will talk more before the end of the month on what corporate tax reform would look like,” the official said on Friday, confirming that it would include a call for “lower rates.” Facing a potentially tough presidential re-election challenge this November, Obama will propose cutting the rate following the release of his 2013 budget plan on Monday, February 13, according to the sources, who were not authorized to speak on the record. To read more, visit: http://ca.news.yahoo.com/exclusive-obama-pitch-lower-corporate-tax-sources-222544743.html |
| Criminal probe trail going cold at MF Global Posted: 11 Feb 2012 10:49 AM PST By Grant McCool and Nick Brown, YahooNews.com When commodities brokerage MF Global imploded, the FBI and federal prosecutors were quick to launch an investigation to pursue what seemed obvious to outspoken regulators and lawmakers: laws were broken and crimes were committed. More than three months later, it is far from clear that anyone will face criminal charges over the disappearance of more than $600 million in customer money as MF Global spiraled towards bankruptcy in the brokerage’s final, frantic days in the last week of October. So far, the MF Global investigation is not tracking the early progress of other high-profile financial scandals such as RefCo, where former Chairman Phil Bennett was arrested within days of the disclosure that the futures firm had been hiding losses for years. Lawyers and people familiar with the MF Global investigation of the firm that was run by former Goldman Sachs head Jon Corzine say that even though the hunt is still on to find out whether or not officials at MF Global intended to pilfer customer money in a desperate bid to keep the brokerage from failing, the trail at this point is growing cold. To date, scant evidence of criminal intent has emerged in company emails, no former or current employees have sought to cut a deal to provide testimony about potential wrongdoing and seasoned defense lawyers say they are not seeing the tell-tale signs of a hot criminal investigation. A source familiar with the work of Louis Freeh, trustee for the MF Global holding company that filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection, says investigators have yet to find evidence of fraud in the multi-faceted and complex investigation. |
| Catholic Bishops: Obama’s Solution ‘Is Unacceptable’ Posted: 11 Feb 2012 10:46 AM PST By Terence P. Jeffrey, CNSNews.com The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops issued a statement late on Friday declaring that the small alteration President Barack Obama had announced earlier in the day to a regulation that would force all health-care plans in the United States to cover sterilizations and all FDA-approved contraceptives–including those that cause abortion–is ‘unacceptable” because, among other things, it does not protect the freedom-of-conscience rights of secular for-profit employers, or secular non-profit employers, or religious insurers, or self-insured religious employers, or individual Americans. The alteration President Obama described Friday says merely that insurance companies providing coverage to employees of religious institutions that object to sterilization, contraception or abortifacients will have to provide free coverage for these things to the employees rather than explicitly include them among the benefits covered by the premiums charged to the religious employer. The regulation will still require individual Americans and private-sector employers to buy, and insurers to provide, insurance coverage that pays for sterilizations, contraception and abortifacients–even if doing so violates their religious beliefs. The bishops expressed their hope that the new regulatory mandates the president described today “appear subject to some measure of change.” “But,” they said, “we note at the outset that the lack of clear protection for key stakeholders—for self-insured religious employers; for religious and secular for-profit employers; for secular non-profit employers; for religious insurers; and for individuals—is unacceptable and must be corrected.” [The bolded text is in the original.] Here is the entirety of the bishops’ statement explaining their continuing objections to the Obama administration’s mandate that all heath-care plans must cover sterilizations, artificial contraception, and abortifacients–all of which the Catholic Church teaches are morally wrong: The Catholic bishops have long supported access to life-affirming healthcare for all, and the conscience rights of everyone involved in the complex process of providing that healthcare. That is why we raised two serious objections to the “preventive services” regulation issued by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) in August 2011. To read more, visit: http://cnsnews.com/news/article/catholic-bishops-obamas-solution-unacceptable |
| Agent Orange Maker Monsanto Seeks Return to Vietnam for GMO Crops Posted: 11 Feb 2012 10:42 AM PST By: Mike Barrett, NaturalSociety.com Vietnam here we come! At least that is what biotech giant Monsanto is saying. The multinational agricultural corporation most known for creating the hazardous chemical Agent Orange, which led to thousands of deaths and birth defects due to its widespread use within the country, is now attempting to begin providing Vietnam with their genetically modified foods. During the Vietnam War, Monsanto's Agent Orange was used as a part of the United States' 'herbicidal warfare program'. Having killed an estimated 400,000, deforming 500,00, and sickening 2 million, even 30 years after the war people are still suffering from the health effects induced by the chemical. Agent Orange has been shown to cause cancer, birth defects, liver damage, and other major health problems. Although the damage is great, US courts have protected both Monsanto and Dow Chemical from liability and criminal prosecution. The US government has shielded Monsanto and Dow from the massive cost of medical treatment for victims and environmental remediation cleanup costs that would spell out bankruptcy for the corporations. Despite enormous opposition, now Monsanto is making further attempts to profit from Vietnam by selling their genetically modified creations. It would be completely outrageous to see Vietnam accept Monsanto's GMO's, as they have already ruined hundreds of thousands of lives with their toxic Agent Orange. Given the well-known human and environmental destruction behind GMOs, Vietnam would only be inviting back tragic health complications. The Thanh Nienn News in Ho Chi Minh City reports: No biotech company has yet got the official green light for selling genetically modified organisms (GMOs), but it does not assuage the fears that Vietnam could end up with another tragic legacy from a company that once caused many deaths in the country, environmental activists say. The alleged purpose of using Agent Orange was to deny the enemy cover in forested areas through defoliation. However, the US Army did contract studies in 1943 of the effects of 2,4,5-T and 2,4-D (the other ingredient of Agent Orange) on cereal grains, including rice, and developed the concept of using aerial herbicide spraying to destroy enemy crops to disrupt the food supply. It seems that poisoning the enemy, farmland and civilians was a chemical warfare strategy. To read more, visit: http://naturalsociety.com/outrageous-agent-orange-maker-monsanto-seeks-return-to-vietnam-for-gmo-crops/#ixzz1m0SytcKz |
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