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UK:  "Facebook Addicts: Insecure Narcissists" [09/09/10] "Use Facebook a lot? Well then you're probably narcissistic, insecure, or both, according to a new study. Researchers had 100 young adults take tests designed to measure their narcissism levels, and asked them about their Facebook habits—and found a correlation: Those who scored higher on the test checked the site more often than those who did not. But the study also found that those lacking self-esteem checked their page more often than "normal," too. The two seemingly contradictory traits are actually thought to be related, the Daily Mail reports. Interestingly, the study also found that men tend to brag via written posts, while women do so through pictures. [...]" 

North Carolina Sheriffs want "lists of patients using painkillers" [09/09/10] "Sheriffs in North Carolina want access to state computer records identifying anyone with prescriptions for powerful painkillers and other controlled substances. The state sheriff's association pushed the idea Tuesday, saying the move would " help them make drug arrests" and " curb a growing problem of prescription drug abuse." [...]"  Related: Nightstick Empire  "“Law enforcement” in North Carolina is demanding the names of all patients on prescription pain medications, to harass and possibly cage them. There are many terrible parts of the drug war, but the targeting of sick people in great pain has to be among the worst. Already, good doctors worry about prescribing powerful painkillers, for fear of being destroyed by the FDA, the DEA, and the rest of the criminal alphabet. Of course, everyone in government, not just in North Carolina, lusts for control over others. But stamping their jackboot on the face of a cancer patient in torment must give them a special thrill. [...]"    Note: I don't expect this to fly ... 

Fires burn throughout Detroit [09/09/10] "Dozens of houses burned down in Detroit Tuesday as fires blazed through all parts of the city, overwhelming the local fire department. [...]"  Related:  Detroit fires expose criminality of DTE and Bing administration  "D’Artagnan Collier, the SEP’s candidate for Michigan state legislature, issued the following statement on the fires that swept through Detroit’s neighborhoods Tuesday evening. [...]"    

Trends: Global shortage of medical isotopes a concern [09/09/10] "A global shortage of radioactive isotopes used in medical scans and treatments could jeopardize patient care and drive up healthcare costs, scientists say. [...]"  

Trends: US Consumers cut back on credit card use again [09/09/10] "Consumer borrowing fell again in July as households cut back on their credit card use for a 23rd consecutive month, adding more drag on an economy struggling to mount a sustained rebound. [...]"   

Trends: UK Shoppers turning to card payments [09/09/10] "The number of cash machines in the UK has fallen and withdrawals have dropped as shoppers turn to cards, figures show. [...]"  

Concepts and Practices:  Cell Phone location data is a privacy intrusion, rules NY Judge [09/08/10] "A few weeks ago, we wrote about United States v. Maynard, a decision from the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit requiring the government to obtain a warrant when it uses a GPS tracking device to monitor someone’s movements. Last Friday, Judge James Orenstein in the Eastern District of New York recognized that Maynard‘s reasoning also applies when the government tries to retrace a person’s whereabouts using historical cell phone location information stored by cell phone carriers. Judge Orenstein rejected each possible factual difference between GPS vehicle tracking and historical cell phone tracking, and concluded that cell phone tracking is just as intrusive to Americans’ reasonable expectations of privacy in the details of their everyday lives as GPS tracking. We believe that Judge Orenstein got it exactly right. In coming to the decision, the court’s opinion noted: a growing recognition, at least in some courts, that technology has progressed to the point where a person who wishes to partake in the social, cultural, and political affairs of our society has no realistic choice but to expose to others, if not to the public as a whole, a broad range of conduct and communications that would previously have been deemed unquestionably private. Concluding that “[t]he Fourth Amendment cannot properly be read to impose on our populace the dilemma of either ceding to the state any meaningful claim to personal privacy or effectively withdrawing from a technologically maturing society,” the court denied the government’s application for almost two months’ worth of historical cell phone location information that it had sought to access just by showing that it was “relevant and material to an ongoing criminal investigation” — a standard far short of a warrant required by the Fourth Amendment. [...]"  Note:  the article continues. Worth reading.

 Poland: Workers Fired for not Wanting to Work for Free  [09/08/10] "ZEFAM stands for Zielona Gora Furniture Factory. Workers there had not received salaries for months. Some had not been paid for four months and nobody was receiving overtime payments. On August 19, the workers asked about this. The manager went to consult with the director of the firm, Marek Cierpka. Then he told the workers to "go home". They didn't want to, but the manager shut down the production hall. After some time of not knowing what to do, the workers went home. The next day, the manager was waiting for them at the gates of the factory with disciplinary dismissals. Most people refused to take them, but they were sent by post to 27 workers. In the dismissals it was written that they were being dismissed for leaving their work place without permission or justification. In Poland, all records of work are kept in your "work book". If you were fired, it stays on your record and basically creates a problem for you for years, if not the rest of your life. [...] 

Mafia Cash in on Lucrative EU Wind Farm Handouts – Especially in Sicily [09/08/10] "An ill wind is blowing over Italy’s green revolution, as the Mafia seek to capitalise on generous grants for renewable energy. hey rise up high above the sun-scorched countryside, looking out over hilltop villages, palm trees, neatly-tended vineyards and olive groves. But for all their promises of a clean, green future, Italy’s windfarms have now acquired a somewhat dirtier whiff – as the latest industry to be infiltrated by the country’s mobsters. [...]"  

2.5 million stage protests in France [09/08/10] "Protesters, estimated at 1.12 million to 3 million strong, turned out across France Tuesday to oppose the Sarkozy administration's pension reform plans. [...]" 

Mexico to 'ban payment in cash' [09/08/10] "Mexico says it is planning to tighten the noose around big-ticket cash purchases to curtail the flow of smuggled dollars and fight money laundering. President Felipe Calderon put forward the sweeping new measures Thursday to crack down on billions of dollars of the illicit money gained by the drug cartels and spent by them for more profit. “This illicit money is vital for the criminal. That is what they seek, this money. It is also vital to finance their activities,” said Calderon, The Washington Post reported on Thursday. If approved by the legislature, the legislation would not allow anyone to buy real estate in cash. Neither would it permit anyone to spend more than MXN 100,000 (USD 7,700) in cash on vehicles, boats, airplanes and luxury goods. [...]" 

IA: "Government Demands Poor Donate Bodies to Medical School" [09/08/10] "The bodies of poor and indigent people for whom Des Moines County would be required to pick up the bill for burial or cremation will soon be offered up to medical schools to use for educational purposes before being laid to rest at public expense. During a recent review of state law while helping update the county’s general assistance manual, Senior Assistant County Attorney Amy Beavers turned up an old law, previously unenforced by the county, requiring bodies being buried with taxpayers’ dollars must be offered for use by medical science. Once the college or medical school has finished with the body, it will be properly buried or cremated. [...]"   

Flashback: Netherlands to Close Prisons: Not Enough Criminals [09/08/10] 2009 "The Dutch justice ministry has announced it will close eight prisons and cut 1,200 jobs in the prison system. A decline in crime has left many cells empty. During the 1990s the Netherlands faced a shortage of prison cells, but a decline in crime has since led to overcapacity in the prison system. The country now has capacity for 14,000 prisoners but only 12,000 detainees. Deputy justice minister Nebahat Albayrak announced on Tuesday that eight prisons will be closed, resulting in the loss of 1,200 jobs. Natural redundancy and other measures should prevent any forced lay-offs, the minister said. The overcapacity is a result of the declining crime rate, which the ministry's research department expects to continue for some time. Belgian prisoners Some reprieve might come from a deal with Belgium, which is facing overpopulation in its prisons. The two countries are working out an agreement to house Belgian prisoners in Dutch prisons. Some five-hundred Belgian prisoners could be transferred to the Tilburg prison by 2010. The Netherlands would get 30 million euros in the deal, and it will allow the closing of the prisons in Rotterdam and Veenhuizen to be postponed until 2012. [...]"   

Commentary: "So Broke We Can't Pay Attention" LINK FIXED [09/08/10] "You spent the whole day yesterday worrying about today, and now that it's here, was it worth it? It's a scary feeling not being able to pay your bills. It can be so stressful that it consumes the entirety of our thoughts and emotions. We may fight with our spouses, or prematurely snap at our children over meaningless nonsense because we are constantly on edge over finances.  Day after day, week after week, month after month we live stressed to the max. If we're able to break our funk trance for a moment and look back, we just may realize that all of the agonizing was not worth it as, somehow, we made it to today in one piece. An excellent article this week on the Economic Collapse Blog decisively proved that is impossible for a family of four to survive in America on a middle-class income of $50,000 per year. Since more than half of the U.S. population makes less than that amount, and another 35% of American families make less than $100,000 per year; we can only assume that the overwhelming majority of the population lives with chronic financial-stress syndrome -- which Big Pharma will happily treat for us. This 85% of the population has little time or energy to think of much else. In other words, we're so broke we can't pay attention to the world around us -- which is what the system was designed to do. The system keeps us running on the rat wheel, terrified it will stop, or that our employers will kick us off.  We become so primal about defending our position, our sustenance, that we ignore our basic humanity. Who has time to think about such things like other people's problems? The system turns us against our neighbors in an ultra-competitive dog-eat-dog economy. And if that doesn't work they'll use religion, race, or politics to divide us. Scratch that; they use it all, all the time.  The public is kept in a constant state of dense negative energy, where we inevitably contaminate those around us with bad vibes, who then pass them on to their peers and so on. [...]"  

11th Circuit to Reconsider Homeless Feeding Permits [09/08/10] "The full 11th Circuit agreed to reconsider a challenge to Orlando's requirement that charities and churches get permits to feed the homeless in downtown city parks. [...]"  

Commentary: Chris Hedges: ‘They Kill Alex’ [09/08/10] "Military recruiters, who often have offices in high schools, prey on young men like Alex, who was first approached when he was 16. They cater to their insecurities, their dreams and their economic deprivation. They promise them what the larger society denies them. Those of Latino descent and from divorced families, as Alex was, are especially vulnerable. Alex’s brother Brian was approached by the military, which suggested that if he enlisted he could receive $60,000 in signing bonuses and more than $27,000 in payments for higher education. The proposed Development, Relief and Education for Alien Minors Act, or DREAM Act, is designed to give undocumented young people a chance at citizenship provided they attend college—not usually an option for poor, often poorly educated and undocumented Latino youths who are prohibited from receiving Pell grants—for at least two years, or enlist and serve in the military. The military helped author the pending act and is lobbying for it...And once they are recruited, these young men and women are trained to be killers, sent to wars that should never be fought and returned back to their families often traumatized and broken and sometimes dead. [...]"   

UK tax blunder rebellion: Experts urge 1.4m NOT to pay for taxman's mistake [09/07/10] "Around 1.4million Britons are being urged to stage an unprecedented revolt over plans to claw back up to £3.8billion in under-paid tax.   It follows the botched introduction of a new computer system by the taxman which has left millions of bills in chaos. The first batch of 45,000 letters demanding cash to be repaid will start to arrive on Tuesday - with the rest sent out over the next four months. But accountants said recipients should act swiftly to use a little-known loophole which forces HM Revenue and Customs to abandon 'out of the blue' demands and effectively write off the money. They also insisted many of those affected are entitled to argue that they or their employer have done nothing wrong and should not be penalised for someone else's blunder. The advice has been issued after last week's admission by HMRC - highlighted by the Daily Mail on Saturday - that it has claimed too little, or too much, tax from 5.7million individuals. [...]"  

Half of Union Members Live in 6 States [09/07/10] "Half of all union members in the U.S. live in just six states: California, New York, Illinois, Michigan, Pennsylvania and New Jersey.  Do you really want to be a long term creditor to these states after seeing what unions did the auto industry? [...]"   Related: Attitude toward unions key factor in campaigns  "In a year in which California unemployment hovers at 12 percent and the state confronts the worst recession in generations, Art Pulaski is wondering: How did his people - working people - become the bad guys of the 2010 election? "Working people are the heart and soul of this country," Pulaski, chief officer of the powerful California Labor Federation, AFL-CIO, said Monday at a Labor Day picnic with 800 union members on Oakland's waterfront. [...]"  Unions gear up to push agenda at the polls [Detroit]

UN: "No food crisis looms despite Russia wheat ban" [09/07/10] "A U.N. agency says no global food crisis is looming despite the Russian wheat shortfall. But it is cautioning that food markets will remain volatile for years.  A drought in Russia that prompted the country to restrict wheat exports has helped drive up food prices globally to their highest level in two years. But the Rome-based Food and Agriculture Organization stressed in a statement Tuesday that the elements for a food crisis, like the one whose high prices sparked violence in some countries in 2007-2008, do not appear to be there. Despite the drop in Russian wheat production, this year's cereal harvest was the third highest on record and grain stocks are high. [...]"  Note:  "Doublespeak in action -- there is no food crisis according to the overlords at the U.N. despite riots in Mozambique; the ban by Russia; in-depth studies that already show sizable food inflation; and the U.N. itself citing that "markets will remain volatile for years." This statement is akin to all Orwellian DoubleThink (shortage is abundance now) that comes from the mouths of those who are encouraging apathy when we should be doing our best to prepare. -- Activist Post"

Economic fault lines deepen in Europe [09/07/10] "Economic growth rates remain minimal for most European countries and are negative for many others. This will inevitably generate political and social tensions. [...]"   

Concepts and Practices: NY lawsuit seeks to halt suspicion-less searches [09/07/10] "NY lawsuit seeks to halt searches of international travelers' electronics without cause. Civil rights lawyers sued the government Tuesday to stop authorities from snooping in the laptops, cell phones and cameras of international travelers without probable cause. The lawsuit was filed in U.S. District Court in Brooklyn against the Department of Homeland Security as well as U.S. customs and immigration authorities. The government did not immediately return a message seeking comment. The lawsuit says more than 6,500 people have had their electronic devices searched as they crossed U.S. borders since October 2008. Nearly half of those searched were U.S. citizens. In May, a graduate student in Islamic Studies at McGill University in Montreal was detained for several hours as his electronic devices were searched, the suit says. The encounter badly frightened the student, according to the suit. "   

UK: Warning on fixed term parliaments [09/07/10] "The government's fixed-term parliaments bill could be vulnerable to legal challenge, the Commons' top official warns. [...]"  Note: They don't want 'term limits' in the UK either ... they want to make sure they're annoying forever. 

CA: Los Angeles County’s Monthly Welfare Tab For 'Illegal Aliens': $52 Million  [09/07/10] "As the mainstream media focuses on a study that reveals a sharp decline in the nation’s illegal immigrant population, monthly welfare payments to children of undocumented aliens increased to $52 million in one U.S. county alone.[...]" 

Trends:  Pension rallies hit French cities [09/07/10] "More than one million protesters join rallies across France and a national strike causes major disruption, amid rising anger over pension reforms. [...]"  

UK:  Tube strike brings major delays [09/07/10] "Millions of Londoners have been attempting to travel home amid a major Tube strike affecting nearly all its lines. [...]"   

Commentary: "Have you had a dream about the end of the world?" [09/06/10] Note: "end of world" page at the Dream Registry. Latest entries are at bottom.

Trends:  As Americans Celebrate Labor Day 2010, U.S. Factories Are Closing In Droves [09/06/10] "2010 comes in the midst of a stunning wave of U.S. factory closings that stretches from coast to coast. Once upon a time America was the greatest manufacturing machine that the world has ever seen, but now it seems as though the only jobs available for working class Americans involve phrases such as “Welcome to Wal-Mart” and “Would you like fries with that?” Even though the population of the United States has exploded over the last several decades, the number of Americans employed in the manufacturing sector today is smaller than it was in 1950. America has become a voracious economic black hole that ”consumes” as much as possible and yet actually produces very little. The United States is becoming deindustrialized at a blinding pace, and it is becoming increasingly difficult for blue collar American workers to find jobs that will actually enable them to support their families. The sad truth is that American workers don’t have a whole lot to actually celebrate this Labor Day. 14 million U.S. workers are “officially unemployed” and tens of millions of others have been forced to take part-time or temporary jobs that they are overqualified for just so they can survive. Unfortunately, this is not just a temporary situation for American workers. As millions of good jobs continue to get outsourced and offshored, Labor Day celebrations in coming years will be even more depressing. The following are just some examples of the recent factory closings that have been sweeping the nation.. [...]"

Concepts and Practices: "Government Extortion from Accident Victims" Bill Anderson [09/06/10] "The New York Times reports that police and fire departments are charging victims for responses. Before we call this “fee for service,” however, let us examine the following incident:  ABOUT a year ago Cary Feldman was surprised to find himself sprawled on the pavement in an intersection in Chicago Heights, Ill., having been knocked off his motor scooter by the car behind him. Five months later he got another surprise: a bill from the fire department for responding to the scene of the accident.   “I had no idea what the fire truck was there for,” said Mr. Feldman, of nearby Matteson. “It came, it looked and it left. I was not hurt badly. I had scratches and bruises. I did not go to the hospital.”   Nowhere does it say that Mr. Feldman called these agencies; they just showed up on their own, and then successfully extorted money from him later.  So, someone is forced to pay for services he did not need nor order. I believe this is what the ancients once called fraud and extortion. Murray Rothbard was right: we don’t need to “frame” government according to a mathematical “rent-seeking” model; government is much better understood as a form of organized crime. [...] New York Times reports: "There appears to be no group that tracks the jurisdictions charging such fees or the number of bills sent. But police or fire departments are charging in at least 26 states, said Robert Passmore, senior director for personal lines at the Property Casualty Insurers Association of America. The group has lobbied against the fees, saying they amount to double taxation. It also says on its Web site, “The role of police and fire departments should be to serve and protect, not serve and collect.”  But Regina Moore, the president of Cost Recovery, a billing company in Dayton, Ohio, that tries to collect the fees for municipal departments, said property taxes paid for fire crews to be “on ready standby” and for police to “protect property and citizens from crime.” She argued that “traffic crash response is outside the scope of the primary function of both law enforcement and fire services.” [...] "  

Badge-Toting Pyschotic Shoots Up Home, Gets Off Scot-Free [09/06/10] "This guy … just tried to run my husband over!” exclaimed Arkansas resident Cindy Nelson in a frantic 911 call on July 21. “Oh, my God — he’s shooting at us! Oh, my God!”  A few minutes later, Fred Ensminger — the deranged assailant — placed a 911 call of his own. “This is Diamondhead 1106…. I have been shot and I need medical at my front gate ASAP.” Ensminger, as we will see anon, is a recidivist criminal, but he is no run- of- the- mill psychotic. He is employed by the Police Department of Diamondhead Arkansas, a gated community located south of Hot Springs. A few minutes before Cindy Nelson told a 911 dispatcher that a “guy with a badge” was trying to murder her husband, she had passed Ensminger’s pickup truck, which was parked by the side of the road. As Nelson started to go around the truck, Ensminger pulled out in front of her. According to an eyewitness, Ensminger “stopped suddenly,” causing Nelson to slam on her brakes to avoid a collision. According to the witness, Ensminger climbed out of his pickup truck and began to harangue Nelson. She reacted by pulling around him and proceeding down the road. An infuriated Ensminger followed in close pursuit. With Ensinger’s pickup truck looming in her rear-view,  [...]"   

"Confessions of a Wal-Mart Hit Man"  [09/06/10]  Video clip [10:52]  Note:  Extended Bonus Scenes From Wal-Mart: The High Cost of Low Price, a Robert Greenwald Film

Trends:  Analysis: Taser-related deaths in US accelerating [09/06/10] "The rate of deaths in Taser-related incidents is rising as police forces increasingly adapt the conducted energy weapons, a Raw Story analysis finds. A 2008 report (PDF) from Amnesty International found 351 Taser-related deaths in the US between June, 2001 and August, 2008, a rate of just slightly above four deaths per month.  [...]"  

EU austerity policies risk civil war in Greece, warns top German economist [09/06/10] "“The policy of forced 'internal devaluation', deflation, and depression could risk driving Greece to the edge of a civil war. It is impossible to cut wages and prices by 30pc without major riots,” he said, speaking at the elite European House Ambrosetti forum at Lake Como.  “Greece would have been bankrupt without the rescue measures. All the alternatives are terrible but the least terrible is for the country to get out of the eurozone, even if this kills the Greek banks,” he said. Dr Sinn said Greece is an entirely different case from Spain and Portugal, which still have manageable public debts and can bring their public finances back into line with higher taxes. [...]" 

Police Caught by Their Own Dash Cam Framing Citizens For Another Cop's Crimes  [09/05/10] [2:11] " 21 years of DUI convictions by two officers now have to be reversed by the courts and millions of tax dollars now lays in waste. A cop's dashboard camera is supposed to catch criminals in the act. For four Hollywood cops, the dash cam may have foiled their plans to frame a motorist.  The four police officers -- three of them longtime veterans of the force -- were caught on one of the cop's dash cameras plotting to place the blame for a February traffic accident on a woman one of them had hit with their patrol car. The disturbing video shows the woman, Alexandra Torrensvilas, handcuffed in the back of the squad car as the officers get their stories straight on what they are going to say happened.  Officer Joel Francisco, 36, an 11-year veteran, crashed into the back of Torrensvilas' vehicle at a light on February 17 at midnight. The cop radioed to other officers who converged on the scene and hatched a way to bail Francisco out.  Officer Dewey Pressley, 42, arrives and questions Torrensvilas, who tells him that she has been drinking. The 21-year veteran officer seizes the opportunity and arrests her for DUI. But the plot thickens from there.  The cops begin to brainstorm believable excuses for the accident. [...] Throughout the tape, the cops acknowledged what they are doing is illegal, but when you are the law, there is nothing wrong with bending it for a fellow cop, one says. "I don't lie and make things up ever because it's wrong, but if I need to bend it a little bit to protect a cop, I'll do it," Pressley tells Francisco after reassuring him no one will ever find out. "She's freaking hammered anyway. [...] "  Note:  Worth reading. There's more to this story.

"Legal sparring over prayer still unsettled" [09/05/10] "An attorney predicted the long-running legal battle over the National Day of Prayer in the United States will probably end up at U.S. Supreme Court. [...]"   Note:  It will never fly.

Trends:  Companies Shift Health Costs to Employees [09/05/10] "Employers foisted a lot more health insurance costs onto their employees this year than last, even though premiums only inched upwards, according to an annual survey. Though premiums for businesses rose just 3% this year—their lowest increase in a decade—the cost the average employee was paying jumped 14%, the Wall Street Journal reports. “It’s the first time I can remember when employers have coped with costs by shifting it all to workers,” said the head of the Kaiser Family Foundation, which issued the survey.  [...]"  

FDA says toss Estrella Family cheeses [09/05/10] "The U.S. Food and Drug Administration Saturday warned people Estrella Family Creamery cheeses may be tainted with illness-causing Listeria monocytogenes. [...]"    

Satire: Report: 10 Million Killed Annually By Stepping Out Of Comfort Zones  [09/05/10] "A new report published this week by the Department of Health and Human Services revealed that more than 10 million Americans are violently killed each year while attempting to break away from their regular everyday routines and try something new. "We found that getting out of your comfort zone and facing your fears resulted in premature death nearly 78 percent of the time," HHS researcher Madeline Hersh said. "People always ask themselves, 'What's the worst that can happen?' Well, according to our research, anything from being bitten by a poisonous snake to dying in a hot-air balloon crash can happen." The report found that the safest individuals were those who surrendered to the soul-crushing monotony of habit and then convinced themselves that they had things pretty good. [...]"   

Commentary: US Pushing Drugged, Vaccinated, Chlorinated Chickens on the World [09/04/10] "After over half a billion eggs were recalled from two factory hen layer operations in Iowa,[1] New York lawmakers proposed mandating vaccines against salmonella. [2] Mainstream media then blasted this message across the world. As the world’s largest producer of poultry [3] and second largest exporter [4], the US continues to hammer Russia about its embargo of chlorinated chickens.[5] Home to the biggest pharmaceutical and chemical companies in the world, the US is fond of throwing drugs and chemicals at a problem instead of addressing the filth of factory farms. [...]"    

Missouri Police Taser Boy With Broken Back 19 Times  [09/04/10] [2:53]  "A boy is walking along a highway, and concerned motorists call the police, afraid he may be struck by a car. When the police arrive on the scene, the boy has apparently fallen off an overpass and broken his back on the ground below. The injured boy was supposedly saying "kill cops", and was "not complying", so he needed to be "subdued", 19 times, with 50,000 volts of electricity.  [...]"  Related:  14 yr old girl Tasered in the Head NM [2:53]  

 Commentary: "Waking Up in the 1930s" [09/03/10] "In the year 2010, America once again embraced the bread line. That distant, faded, iconic black-and-white image of the Great Depression has re-emerged across the nation, waiting to be updated fully into HD color. Just as we seldom see pictures of American war dead returning from Iraq and Afghanistan, we seldom see newscasts of the struggling, jobless masses lining up for handouts. But they are lining up, and the scene is not one we are inured to, that of the disheveled homeless, the permanent underclass being ladled turkey dinners by apron-clad celebrities at Skid Row kitchens at holiday time. Rather, neatly dressed, solidly middle class, once working folk fill these bread lines as they become reconciled to a stark new reality. At the same time, this generation of jobless and the underemployed has yet to embrace what is shaping up to be nothing but the 1930s redux, and their voices murmur inconsistent notes of doubt, disillusionment and hope.  They listen daily to banal statistics—consumer indices, home prices, housing starts, unemployment insurance claims—intoned by newscasters batting the cycle of adjectives for up and down, and they hope for no sound reason that these same talking heads that propelled them to invest in stocks and homes that would only appreciate will imminently announce a combination of factors that will dispel this economic morass. It’s as if those contentious, post-ironic Shepard Fairey “Hope” stickers that remain plastered across the nation continue to radiate hypnotic beams convincing the viewer that prosperity is just around the corner. And so here are some voices of that doubt, disillusion and hope, culled from a region especially hurting: the megalopolis of Los Angeles. [...]"  

 Commentary: "The Breakdown of Capitalism and the Fight for Socialism in the United States" [09/03/10]  "The Economic Crisis and its Social Impact [...]"  

UK: Probe as police crash seized car [09/03/10] "Two police officers are suspended from driving duties after crashing a car they had seized from a suspected drink-driver. [...]"  

Commentary: "College Students are Debt Slaves and Jobless" [4:02]  [09/03/10]   Related: America's 'Student Loan Debt' Ticks Past $848 Billion  Note: All based on the fraudulent implied promise of a better life ... for students and parents too unaware and naive to realize what's obvious to the astute observer. This 'debt' will never be paid back.  

Fears grow over global food supply [09/03/10] "Russia announced a 12-month extension of its grain export ban on Thursday, raising fears about a return to the food shortages and riots of 2007-08 which spread through developing countries dependent on imports. The announcement by Vladimir Putin came as the UN’s Food and Agriculture Organisation called an emergency meeting to discuss the wheat shortage, and riots in Mozambique left seven dead. The unrest in Maputo, in which 280 people were also injured, followed the government’s decision to raise bread prices by 30 per cent. Police opened fire on demonstrators after thousands turned out to protest against the price hikes, burning tyres and looting food warehouses. Although agricultural officials and traders insist that wheat and other crop supplies are more abundant than in 2007-08, officials fear the deadly Mozambique riots could be replicated. The 2007-08 food shortages, the most severe in 30 years, set off riots in countries from Bangladesh to Mexico, and helped to trigger the collapse of governments in Haiti and Madagascar. [...]"   

 Concepts and Practices: Gun Confiscation in Response to Emergencies [09/03/10] "On September 1, North Carolina’s governor, Bev Perdue, declared a state of emergency by executive order as Hurricane Earl approaches. Blogger John Jacob notes a possible sinister side to North Carolina’s declared state of emergency — citizens will not be allowed to carry weapons. In other words, the governor has in effect suspended the Second Amendment at a time when crime will almost certainly increase. Section 3 of the executive order, notes the No Lawyers – Only Guns and Money blog, delegates Perdue power under Article 36A of Chapter 14 of the NC General Statues to the Secretary of Crime Control and Public Safety “to such further action as is necessary to promote and secure the safety of populace in North Carolina.” NC Gen. Statues Section 14-288-7 bans transportation stipulates:  [...] In February, North Carolina outlawed carrying weapons in public during a snow emergency. North Carolina, however, is not alone — Pennsylvania’s Uniform Firearms Act outlaws possession of firearms during a government declared emergency and Colorado also considered enacting similar legislation. Georgia followed suit."   

UK:  Priest jailed for abusing sisters [09/03/10] "A Catholic priest convicted of sexually abusing three young sisters is jailed for four years. [...]" 

Man sues Marin sheriff after being Tased 3 times at home [09/03/10] "The deputy tells McFarland he is going to take him to the hospital because he may be suicidal. "We want to take you to the hospital for an evaluation, you said if you had a gun, you'd shoot yourself in the head," the deputy can be heard saying. McFarland says it was just hyperbole. He was tired and in pain. The deputy orders him numerous times to get up or else. "Stand up, put your hands behind your back or you're going to be Tased," the deputy says. "There's got to be a problem in terms of training and on supervising deputy sheriffs in the county; it's hard to imagine something so shocking could happen," McFarland's attorney John Scott said. McFarland says he never had any suicidal thoughts. In fact, he considers himself lucky to be alive. "I'm a survivor of pancreatic cancer; one of 4 percent in this country," McFarland said. Scott says his client was arrested, jailed and charged with resisting arrest. A judge later dismissed the charge. Scott says the deputies had no search warrant or legal reason to enter McFarland's home and even if they thought he was drunk and suicidal, Scott says the Tasing was excessive force.  [...]"  Related: Bay Area officers face stun gun lawsuits   "Two lawsuits involving law enforcement use of stun guns were filed in the San Francisco Bay Area this week. [...]"  Seattle Police TASER Man To Death For Refusing To Leave Apartment [09/03/10] Video clip [3:49]

Buying the Lie: "Cash is Dead" [09/03/10] "In her essay, Powerful Reasons to Use Cash, alternative financial consultant, Susan Boskey, details some of the benefits to be reaped from daring to fight the predatory banking system by using cash:   "When we use cash we can: # Deprive the banks the opportunity to make money from charging us interest. # Deprive the banks from using our deposits. # Deprive the banks of service and overdraft charges. # Ask for 5% vendor discounts for paying with cash. # Send an effective message of dissent and dissatisfaction. # End the taboo about talking about our finances and network with others to gain new strategies. # Use it as an opportunity to get more educated about money and wealth. # Learn fiscal self-discipline. # Stop a fantasy-mindset about money.  # Gain greater peace of mind. # Stop going into debt. # Pay as we go.  # Learn to live within our means." [...]"   

Canada: Vancouver bans smoking in public outdoors [09/03/10] "A new smoking law in Vancouver, Canada, bans lighting up in 244 parks and various other outdoor public places, records show. [...]"   

Concepts and Practices: "The Ruling Class: Scenes from the class struggle on the American Right" [09/03/10] "Few essays attracted as much attention from right-wing readers this summer as "America's Ruling Class—and the Perils of Revolution," an extended argument that an incestuous social set "rules uneasily over the majority of Americans." Written by Angelo Codevilla of the Claremont Institute and first published in The American Spectator, this very long article has now been expanded into a very brief book, called The Ruling Class. If you're interested in the state of the American right, it's an instructive document—a book that strives mightily to marry conservative cultural complaints to the libertarian case against an intrusive central government.  The book argues that most of America can be split into two categories, a ruling class and a country class. The ruling class is everyone, "whether in government power directly or as officers in companies," whose "careers and fortunes depend on government." The second category consists of civil society: all those businesses, families, and community groups that don't subsist on subsidies and privileges. [...]"  Audio MP3 version included on page, so you can listen.

Concepts and Practices: NY Warned of 'Electoral Chaos' in Transition to Electronic Voting [09/02/10] "In a hearing before the 2nd Circuit Court of Appeals, Nassau County Attorney John Ciampoli warned that the transition from lever-pull to electronic voting machines will cause "electoral chaos" in the primaries, and that all it will take to "fix" an election is a flash drive that anyone can buy at Staples. Ciampoli said a person with a flash drive would need "approximately 5 minutes of access" to fix an election. [...]"   

US: Financial Depression Spreads Among Seniors [09/02/10] " .... Among the hardest hit now are more than 2-million people age 55 and over, half of whom have been looking for work for six months or longer. For them, the Great Recession is a no-fooling, deepening Depression. [...]"  Note: From a larger observational perspective, this also means that in the US, there are almost 300 million people who won't help 2 million people out, but just leaves them like this. This happens because society is in a 'pre-sequential' state ... still un-coalesced in terms of a centrally managed system one would see on some sequential planet somewhere. This 'state' contributes to the intensity of the experience here.

PA: Harrisburg tense, on edge of bankruptcy [09/02/10] "Tension is mounting in Harrisburg, Pa., concerning the city's potential fall into bankruptcy, observers said. [...]"  

UK: Tube strikes on as talks collapse [09/02/10] "Thousands of Tube workers will strike next week as talks between London Underground bosses and two unions break down. [...]"  

"Australia: Garment company returns to 'profit' after axing jobs" [09/02/10] "Pacific Brands management paid tribute to the trade unions last week when it announced a 'profit' based on the closure of 11 plants in 12 months, and the destruction of hundreds of jobs. [...]"  Note: A perfect example of a parasitic corporation doing something that corporations were never originally intended to do -- harm the public. Once they dumped that idea and corporations became 'individuals' ... it had already gone too far ... 

 Trends: One million US public school students homeless [09/02/10] "A report released in July reveals that homelessness among public school students in the US increased by 40 percent from the 2006-2007 school year to 956,914 in 2008-2009. [...]"  

UK:  "School gender views 'start early'" [09/01/10] "Girls (ARE LED TO) believe they are cleverer, better behaved and try harder than boys from as early as the age of four, research suggests. [...]"  

 MN: "Kids swap DNA for fairground rides" [09/01/10] "Researchers' efforts to collect samples at a fair raise ethical questions. [...]"  Note: Sequential obsessions continue ... the DNA was stolen from the 'innocent' ... with an eye toward manipulation in the future ...

UK: Britain being "overrun" by street signs [09/01/10] "The British government has declared war on the profusion of unnecessary road traffic signs, railings and advertising boards, saying they blight towns' English character. When busy Kensington High Street in central London was stripped of excess road furniture, for example, it helped reduce accidents by 47 percent. The Department for Transport is reviewing traffic signs policy and new advice on how to reduce clutter will be published later this year. [...]"  Note:  So this predisposition of theirs is virtually doubling the number of accidents. Bossy, unsightly and ever-increasing in number, sequential control street signs in Britain ruin the quaint English atmosphere and need to come down, according to some city officials. Street sign manufacturing companies and control addicts won't be pleased. Sequentialization does not go hand in hand with retaining the quaint flavor of ye old merry England, and some people are taking notice. 

Philippines kicks off Xmas season [09/01/10] "Revelers in the Philippines have begun the world's longest Xmas season with the arrival of holiday decorations and other festive displays. [...]"  Note:  Didn't they just finish last years season a couple of months ago? They have no real lives, it would appear, just ones in which 3,500 pair of shoes would 'fix everything'.

Midwest survey suggests major recession fears [09/01/10] "More than a third of supply managers in nine Midwest and Plains states surveyed for a regional business index expect a recession in 2011.  As part of the Mid-America report released Wednesday, supply managers were asked their expectations for 2011, and 35 percent said a recession was likely or very likely. The August overall economic index dipped to 55.8 from 60.8 in July. The report uses a collection of indexes ranging from zero to 100. Any score above 50 suggests economic growth in the next three to six months, while a score below 50 suggests a contracting economy. The report is overseen by Creighton University economist Ernie Goss. States in the survey are Arkansas, Iowa, Kansas, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, North Dakota, Oklahoma and South Dakota. [...]"   

UK: Standard Life set to cut 500 jobs [09/01/10] "Edinburgh-based insurance and pensions giant Standard Life is to cut up to 500 jobs over the next 15 months. [...]"  Note:  Well, they're 'non-standard' lives now ...

 Trends: Global Youth Unemployment Reaches Record Levels [09/01/10] "The International Labour Organisation (ILO) has issued a report documenting the severe impact of the global economic crisis on employment prospects for the world's youth. The report, "Global Employment Trends for Youth", presents detailed statistics on the growing number of 15-to-24-year-olds who find themselves out of work. The most striking findings are those showing the rapid rise of youth unemployment from the eruption of the financial crisis in 2008 onwards. At the end of 2009, according to the report's introduction, global youth unemployment stood at 81 million. This was an increase of 7.8 million, or nearly 10 percent, from the end of 2007. In percentage terms, global youth unemployment rose from 11.9 percent to 13 percent during this period, an increase described as "sharper than ever before". [...]"  Related:  USA: Unemployment Rate for 16 to 24 Year Olds Pushing 50%   "The share of young people aged 16 to 24 who were employed this summer fell to 48.9 percent -- the lowest rate on record since 1948. Meanwhile, the raw number of youth who held jobs in July 2010 actually rose by 1.8 million from July 2009 to 18.6 million... [...]"  

Summer movie receipts lag behind 2009 [09/01/10] "With the summer movie season officially ending Labor Day, overall receipts in U.S. box offices lagged behind the same period last year, a review indicated. [...]"  Note:  The 'movie' of peoples lives has become more important.

People happiest/saddest from relationships [09/01/10] "Individual achievements like schooling or career may take most of one's effort but our best and worst experiences involve others, U.S. researchers say. [...]"    

U.S. Auto Sales May Hit 28-Year Low as Discounts Flop [09/01/10] "U.S. auto sales in August probably were the slowest for the month in 28 years as model-year closeout deals failed to entice consumers concerned the economy is worsening and they may lose their jobs.  [...]"   

Germany Bans Cultivation of GM Corn [09/01/10] "Germany has banned the cultivation of GM corn, claiming that MON 810 is dangerous for the environment. But that argument might not stand up in court and Berlin could face fines totalling millions of euros if American multinational Monsanto decides to challenge the prohibition on its seed. The sowing season may be just around the corner, but this year German farmers will not be planting gentically modified crops: German Agriculture Minister Ilse Aigner announced Tuesday she was banning the cultivation of GM corn in Germany. [...]"     

Davidowitz Says `Worst to Come' for U.S. Retail Sales [09/01/10] "Howard Davidowitz, chairman of Davidowitz & Associates Inc., talks with Bloomberg's Mark Crumpton about the outlook for U.S. retail sales. Davidowitz also discusses discount and luxury retailers, and speculation that Saks Inc. may receive a takeover offer from a private-equity group.  [...]"  

Border Sweeps in North Reach Miles Into U.S. [08/31/10] "The Lake Shore Limited runs between Chicago and New York City without crossing the Canadian border. But when it stops at Amtrak stations in western New York State, armed Border Patrol agents routinely board the train, question passengers about their citizenship and take away noncitizens... [...]"  Related: US arrests 370 immigrants in Midwest raids 

California Senate rejects open-carry gun ban [08/31/10] "The California Senate rejected a bill Monday that would have made it illegal to carry unloaded guns in public, but lawmakers will give the vote one more try.  Monday's 20-16 vote fell one short of the majority needed, but the Senate will reconsider the measure Tuesday. The bill, AB1934, was introduced after a series of demonstrations by gun-rights organizations during which they encouraged participants to openly carry unloaded weapons. California law lets gun owners carry a rifle or handgun in a holster if it is not loaded. The legislation would make it a misdemeanor to openly carry a handgun in any public place. Democratic Sen. Mark DeSaulnier of Concord, who carried the bill in the Senate, said people often call police when they see weapons in public, not knowing whether they are loaded. [...]"   

Homelessness Up 50% in New York City [08/31/10] "If you think you've been seeing more people sleep on city streets, statistics back up the perception. The homeless population living on New York City streets has gone up 50 percent in the past year, according to city statistics. The New York City Department of Homeless Services conducts a yearly survey of the streets of the city to count the number of homeless who are not in shelters. The HOPE survey was conducted in January 2010. The number of homeless in the borough of Manhattan was up 47 percent in the past year, according to the count. The 2010 count had 1,145 people living in the streets. That is up 368 from 2009. Brooklyn had the biggest increase of any borough. It saw a homeless increase of more than 100 percent in 2010. [...]"  

Trends: Cash-Poor Governments Ditching Public Hospitals [08/31/10] "Faced with mounting debt and looming costs from the new federal health-care law, many local governments are leaving the hospital business, shedding public facilities that can be the caregiver of last resort. [...]" 

 Trends: UK: College graduates warned of record "70 applicants for every job" [08/30/10] "The class of 2010 have been told to consider flipping burgers or stacking shelves when they leave university as leading firms in investment banking, law and IT are due to cut graduate jobs this year. [...]"  

Record number in government anti-poverty programs [08/30/10] "Government anti-poverty programs that have grown to meet the needs of recession victims now serve a record one in six Americans and are continuing to expand.  More than 50 million Americans are on Medicaid, the federal-state program aimed principally at the poor, a survey of state data by USA TODAY shows. That's up at least 17% since the recession began in December 2007. "Virtually every Medicaid director in the country would say that their current enrollment is the highest on record," says Vernon Smith of Health Management Associates, which surveys states for Kaiser Family Foundation. The program has grown even before the new health care law adds about 16 million people, beginning in 2014. That has strained doctors. "Private physicians are already indicating that they're at their limit," says Dan Hawkins of the National Association of Community Health Centers. [...]"    

Colorado Cops To Use Biometric Iris Scanners [08/30/10] [2:32]  "Colorado Police are now using Biometric Iris Scanners. As the police state continues to evolve, we will see biometric Iris Scanners in EVERY state, monitoring our every move. [...]"  

Commentary: "If You Think Your State is Broke Now, Just Wait Until The Public-Sector Pension Bomb Detonates" [08/30/10] "Unless you've been pulling a Rip Van Winkle for the past few years, you know that your state is more busted than Larry Craig in an airport toilet. The only possible exception is the state of Denial, and it closed its borders to new arrivals sometime in late 2008.  One of the main drivers of this sorry state of affairs is the massive disparity between public-sector and private-sector compensation, especially when it comes to benefits such as pensions. Various studies have found anywhere between a 70 percent and a 34 percent differential in total compensation, with public-sector employees getting not just more pay and benefits but near-absolute job security and early retirement. Consider California: [...]"  

Education secretary: 'Schools have been lying to students' [08/29/10] "School systems across the country have been misleading students and parents into thinking they are ready for college, the Secretary of Education said Sunday. Arne Duncan told ABC's Christiane Amanpour that the Obama administration's Race to the Top program had reversed the trend of schools lowering standards.  [...]"  Note:  That's beside the point ... students are also being misled that 'college will help them succeed in life'. That's a 1946-1970 social pattern which dropped off and was no longer valid years ago. 

 Cities slap fees on storm runoff [08/29/10] "New environmental regulations are prompting cities to impose fees on property owners for the cost of managing storm water runoff, the leading cause of water pollution in most of the nation.  The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has started issuing a series of limits on storm water pollution that will require local governments to spend large amounts of money on water quality and soon start slowly reshaping America's roads, housing developments and even the traditional lawn. The EPA for the first time is placing specific limits on how much storm water pollution can flow into the nation's streams, rivers, lakes and bays. Federal courts have ruled that the Clean Water Act requires more stringent regulations. [...]" 

U.S. schools grooming students for the surveillance state [08/29/10] "he increasing use of student surveillance and intrusion of school districts into students’ extra-curricular conduct should alarm us all. Whether it is a district surveilling students in their bedrooms via webcam, conducting random drug or locker searches, strip-searching students, lowering the standard for searching students to “reasonable suspicion” from “probable cause,” disciplining students for conduct outside of school hours, searching their cellphones and text messages, or allegedly forcing them to undergo pregnancy testing, student privacy is under increasing threat.  The other day I mentioned a Connecticut school district that wanted to require students to carry an ID card with an RFID chip so that they could track their location. The surveillance capability included locating the student if they were off school premises and in town. Today, I came across another news story from earlier this month that also involves tracking students. KTVU in California reported that the Contra Costa County School District began introducing a tracking system for preschool students that would alert staff when a student leaves school premises. In order to accomplish that, students will reportedly be required to wear a jersey that contains the RFID tag that uses Wi-Fi to send signals to sensors located throughout the school. [...]  Related:  California students get tracking devices [08/29/10] "California officials are outfitting preschoolers in Contra Costa County with tracking devices they say will save staff time and money. The system was introduced Tuesday. When at the school, students will wear a jersey that has a small radio frequency tag. The tag will send signals to sensors that help track children's whereabouts, attendance and even whether they've eaten or not. [...]"   

China's Looming Real-Estate Bubble [08/28/10] "Despite the global downturn, China's economic growth rate remains above 10 percent. But there is mounting evidence that Beijing has misallocated vast amounts of capital, touching off a real-estate crisis that could yet drag the world's second-largest economy down to earth. [...]  The problem is that government money is going to build homes not for occupancy but for ownership. Speculation, if you will. Andy Xie, a Shanghai-based economist formerly with Morgan Stanley, believes almost 25 percent to 30 percent of private commercial and housing stock in China is vacant. Entire cities, such as Ordos in inner-Mongolia, erected literally from scratch, stand empty. "Chinese treat homes like gold bars buying multiple units as a store of value," notes Chovanec. Chinese avoid the stock market because it is still volatile and risky, and banks and bonds offer a low yield. Hence, Chinese are content to buy homes and let them sit because, thanks to the absence of property taxes, holding costs are negligible. Having never experienced a housing slump since China privatized its housing market in the 1990s, they believe that home prices only rise. This can't last, but backers of China's stimulus believe there won't be any serious economic downside when the bubble bursts. Homeowners won't be thrown on the street because Chinese buy their first homes outright through their savings—not loans.  [...] "   

UK:  The Moneyless Man: One Man's Experiment in Living Without Money [08/28/10] "For most of us it seems that money makes the world go round. But not for Mark Boyle, who has turned his life into a radical experiment and pledged to live without cash, credit cards, loans or any other form of finance. The British economics graduate was inspired by Gandhi's call to be the change you want to see in the world. After six years working as the manager of an organic food company in Bristol, UK, he decided to strike out in a bold new direction. "I was sitting around with a friend one night in 2007 discussing the world's problems, and we were trying to work out which one to dedicate our lives to helping solve," he told CNN. "Then it hit me, at the root of it all was money, which creates a kind of disconnection between us and our actions, whether that's through sweatshops, industrial agriculture, or war, and so I decided to see if it was possible to do without." Mark sold his houseboat and set about preparing himself for his new life. He posted an advert on Freecycle asking for a tent, a yurt, a caravan or any other type of shelter and was immediately rewarded by his first taste of human kindness. [...]" 

Commentary: America's Mental Illness Epidemic: It Turns Out That the Drugs Are the Problem [08/28/10] "Tens of millions of innocent, unsuspecting Americans, who are mired deeply in the mental "health" system, have actually been made crazy by the use of or the withdrawal from commonly-prescribed, brain-altering, brain-disabling, indeed brain-damaging psychiatric drugs that have been, for many decades, cavalierly handed out like candy -- often in untested and therefore unapproved combinations of drugs -- to trusting and unaware patients by equally unaware but well-intentioned physicians who have been under the mesmerizing influence of slick and obscenely profitable psychopharmaceutical drug companies, a.k.a. BigPharma. That is the conclusion of two books by investigative journalist and health science writer Robert Whitaker. His first book, entitled Mad in America: Bad Science, Bad Medicine and the Enduring Mistreatment of the Mentally Ill noted that there has been a 600 percent increase (since Thorazine was introduced in the US in the mid-1950s) in the total and permanent disabilities of millions of psychiatric drug-takers. This uniquely First World mental ill health epidemic has resulted in the life-long taxpayer-supported disabilities of rapidly increasing numbers of psychiatric patients who are now unable to be happy, productive, taxpaying members of society. Whitaker has done a powerful, albeit unwelcome job of presenting previously hidden, but very convincing evidence to support his thesis, that it is the drugs and not the diagnosis that is causing the epidemic of mental illness disability.  [...]"  

Supporters of LaRouche, Critics of Obama, assaulted and arrested by police at Alaska State Fair [08/28/10] "This first day of the 2010 Alaska State Fair starts with sunny skies and a brutal assault by security personnel on a LaRouche supporter.  At about 5pm Alaska Time, Thursday, August 26, 2010, security personnel approach Sidney Hill, a lone man peacefully displaying an impeach Obama sign near Pioneer Plaza on the Alaska State Fairgrounds in Palmer. Minutes later, a crowd assembles, additional security forces arrive, and they physically assault the man holding the sign. He’s taken to the ground with force and detained. An unidentified Alaska State Trooper arrives to physically disperse the crowd, and at several points during the conflict, crowd members yell in support of the demonstrator’s right to speak his message. The demonstrator’s personal firearm is confiscated by fair security, and he is held captive until Palmer police arrive to escort the man away in cuffs. Sidney Hill was in jail awaiting a pre-trial at 1:00 pm on August 27, 2010 at the Palmer Courthouse. He has been charged with Assault 4-Cause Fear Of Injury, Disorderly Conduct-Challenge To Fight, and Criminal Trespass 2- Upon Premises. However, according to the Valley Frontiersman newspaper, “Assistant District Attorney Trina Sears said her office decided not to prosecute Hill on the assault charge [...]"  Note: Video clips and links to other related stories are included.

"Social-media use nearly doubles among people 50 and over" [08/28/10] "The phenomenal growth of Facebook, Twitter and other social sites has come in part because of a surge in adoption by older members, with a national poll released Friday saying that the share of Americans over 50 using social networks nearly doubled in the last year. [...]"  Note: In a larger sense, More hapless naive people preparing their own dossiers in an environment set forth by corporations and others .... because of abject loneliness and bitter disappointment that the 'social reality' presented as 'valid and viable' to the culture turned out to be exactly the opposite. Without the larger context of existence ... they are not left with much.

Why nobody wants to buy a house [08/28/10] "... Nobody wants to buy a house because in order to buy a house you have to have some bit of confidence in the future. And today there isn't much confidence in anything that has to do with the economy ... the only thing that will turn this mess around is jobs. Until this economy can put people back to work -- and put them back to work gainfully, full-time, using their skills and not merely temping in some capacity way beneath their experience -- it won't be able to instill any confidence that buying a house is a good idea. [...]"    

'Television: Unplug the Signal - The Truth Will Not be Televised" [08/27/10] "A flow of information is constantly streaming from the television set; a bombardment of words and pictures. The speed at which this information is communicated makes it easy for the signal to take control, switching the viewer's brain to stand-by as information is absorbed without analysis or question. Today the television's constant signal shapes the conclusions of the masses and produces the collective norm. The signal prescribes what is news and what is truth through the words of so-called experts and authorities, gelding the consciousness and independent thoughts of those subjected to it. Through television, the masses can be made to accept the most monstrous distortions of reality. The signal is a chill wind of continuous oppression over the minds of the masses. It controls the management of society and culture, creating uniformity across all subjects.  The fuel for this vehicle of mass deception is a technique known as perception management where an array of psychological techniques are used to alter the truth, leading the viewer to a desired conclusion. Some call this spin or propaganda while others know it as lying. According to Joseph Goebbels, Propaganda Minister for Adolph Hitler, "If you tell a lie big enough and keep repeating it, people will eventually come to believe it... It thus becomes vitally important for the State to use all of its powers to repress dissent, for the truth is the mortal enemy of the lie, and thus by extension, the truth is the greatest enemy of the State." Most of what can be found on the nightly news is nothing but advertisements selling more government and a false reality that benefits only those in control. Television is the dictator of information; newspaper and radio are the whisper campaign of the television's message. It is expected that Americans will consistently prescribe to the doctrine of the television. It is subtly communicated that one should stay within the collective and never challenge the message, for doing so may be considered an aggression towards culture. The message is, "Be a good consumer; always obey authority; you know nothing; listen only to experts; be content and never question or express new ideas." This signal is being broadcast across millions of screens, indoctrinating the unconscious minds of those who choose this as their only reality. Self-censorship occurs when these individuals become so deeply indoctrinated that they are afraid to discuss any information outside the paradigm of television-created culture; they police their thoughts to ensure they won't conflict with this culture. Sadly, many people's reality today does not allow any outside information to process, instead it is written off as conspiracy or blatant lies. Our consciousness has been destroyed so much that fiction has become reality. An entire lifestyle of poisonous foods, pharmaceuticals, and fluoridated water are accepted as safe and sold to us at the cost of our health and well being. Those of the establishment are using the incredibly powerful weapon of mass psychology as a method of controlling the minds of the masses and altering the behavior of individuals. Edward Bernays,[...]"  Video clip  [2:57] 

Congressman Takes On Invasive Vans That Peer Into Homes [08/27/10] "Utah Congressman Jason Chaffetz is speaking out against vans that carry scanning technology inside them that allows people to see through the walls of cars, trucks, and even into homes.  “These vans essentially can look through the walls of your home, look through the walls of a vehicle or a container and they can tell what’s inside. They can see through people’s clothes and give you some great detail about people’s bodies, much like they do at the airport. That’s pretty scary,” Chaffetz tells KSL Newsradio. Chaffetz says there are a few legitimate uses for the vans during a hostage situation or on the border to inspect trucks coming into the country, but he says other uses of the technology are an invasion of privacy that must be limited. “To think that a van can drive down the street and literally look through the walls of a home and see who is inside and what they are doing. It was cute and funny when we thought about it in the context of Superman but when you realize they have already sold 500 of these vans, I’ve got real concerns about how and where we are using these,” says Chaffetz. The congressman says he’s already working on legislation aimed at limiting what circumstances these Z Backscatter Vans, or ZBV’s as they are called, could be used for. [...]"   Related: Trends: Full-Body Scan Technology Deployed In Street-Roving Vans   "As the privacy controversy around full-body security scans begins to simmer, it’s worth noting that courthouses and airport security checkpoints aren’t the only places where backscatter x-ray vision is being deployed. The same technology, capable of seeing through clothes and walls, has also been rolling out on U.S. streets. [...]"   Video clip  [2:52] 

Trends: Public Protests Expand as GMOs and Biotech Wreak Havoc on Food Supply [08/27/10] "In the U.S., people spend proportionately the least amount of their earnings on food. However, the incidence of food-borne disease (FBD) there is the highest in the world. The closest example of another country in this regard is its northern neighbour and largest trading partner – Canada. The main source of food borne disease during the last 50 years traces to the misuse and abuse of the following five materials in food production: hormones, antibiotics, rendered slaughterhouse wastes, Genetically Modified Organisms (GMOs), and pesticides. The first three of these materials are banned in food production throughout the European Union. Yet the American and Canadian regulatory authorities insist that these substances pose no “significant” risk to public health. EU countries have also not approved GMO crops, and some Scandinavian members are undertaking to ban agricultural pesticides. The greatest threat to the security and sovereignty of any nation stems from the ongoing imposition of GMOs with their false claims of raising more abundant and nutritious food. The worst case in this instance is Iraq, where wheat was first cultivated 14,000 years ago. Modern farmers in Iraq are no longer permitted to save any wheat seeds for next year’s sowing – except for the American GMO variety. Similar bans which favour only the GMO seeds are underway in other countries, including India. This applies to Indian crops such as Bt-cotton and Bt-Brinjal (eggplant, one of India’s most important vegetables), without the necessary regulatory assessment of their harmful effects on public health. [...]"   

"10 Practical Steps To Ease The Effect Of The Coming Economic Collapse" [08/27/10] " ....So what can we each individually do to somewhat insulate ourselves from the economic problems that are coming? [...]"  Note: Some of these assume that functional social mechanisms that are now used to modify your situation are still in place, and that the general dynamic is more laid back. Probably not all good assumptions.

As Inmate Sexual Abuse Continues, Feds Stall On New Rules [08/27/10] "Inmates continue to experience sexual victimization in shocking numbers inside America's prisons and jails, even as Attorney General Eric Holder defies a congressional deadline to develop and enact national standards to address the problem. A new study released Thursday by the Department o

SPLC Propaganda: "Anti-Latino Hate Crimes Seen From Baltimore to Arizona" [08/27/10] "These incidents and others appear to be part of a general trend that has been in the making for several years. Anti-Latino crimes increased in each of the four years from 2003 through 2007, before dropping back slightly in 2008, according to FBI national hate crime statistics (2009 figures have not yet been compiled). In recent months, politicians and others have made statements that demonize Latinos and likely contribute to the atmosphere of violence. Two of the most outrageous recent examples: Texas Republican Congressmen Louie Gohmert and Debbie Riddle both claimed that pregnant terrorists plan to sneak into America to give birth to future terrorists who will automatically become U.S. citizens and eventually “help destroy our way of life,” as Gohmert put it. Both representatives claimed that former FBI officials divulged the terrorist baby threat to them. CNN asked Tom Fuentes, who served as the FBI’s assistant director in the office of international operations from 2004 to 2008 about the claims by Gohmert and Riddle. “There was never a credible report — or any report, for that matter … to indicate that there was such a plan for these terror babies to be born,” he said. [...]"  Note:  Louie Gohmert and Debbie Riddle are both idiots and control freaks, and so is the "Southern Poverty Law Center", who OPENLY specializes in using hate, used to socially terrorize and divide US society by the administration.

"Top 7 Insane Homeowners Association Rules" [08/26/10] "The astonishingly restrictive ways of homeowners associations (HOAs) came under scrutiny this month when a Sussex Square, Virginia, HOA demanded that a 90-year-old World War II vet remove an unapproved flag pole from his front yard. After receiving support from members of Congress, and even the Obama administration, Medal of Honor recipient Van T. Barfoot, who once single-handedly took on three Nazi tanks, triumphed in his quest to fly Old Glory. Other homeowners haven't been as lucky in their battles against their own HOAs' "fascist" rules. Here are seven of the most controversial commandments: [...]"  Note: More ways for people to give up their lives to the whims of control freaks, in order to get some 'benefit' as defined by the same control freaks.

Trends: Faced With Backlog, Feds Dismiss Deportation Cases Against Non-Criminal Immigrants [08/26/10] "About a month ago, Homeland Security began reviewing and moving to dismiss deportation cases against suspected illegal immigrants without serious criminal records, [...]"  

 Trends: Budget cuts force police to curtail calls for lesser crimes  [08/25/10] "Budget cuts are forcing police around the country to stop responding to fraud, burglary and theft calls as officers focus limited resources on violent crime.  Cutbacks in such places as Oakland, Tulsa and Norton, Mass., have forced police to tell residents to file their own reports — online or in writing — for break-ins and other lesser crimes.  "If you come home to find your house burglarized and you call, we're not coming,'' said Oakland Police spokeswoman Holly Joshi. The city laid off 80 officers from its force of 687 last month, and the department can't respond to burglary, vandalism or identity theft. "It's amazing. It's a big change for us.''  Jim Pasco, executive director of the Fraternal Order of Police, the nation's largest police union, said cutbacks are preventing many police agencies from responding to property crimes. "The chiefs are putting the best face on this they can," Pasco said. "But think of this: That next property crime could involve a junkie who killed someone the night before." In Tulsa, which lost 110 officers to layoffs and retirements, the 739-officer department isn't sending cops to the scenes of larceny, fraud or car theft.  Tulsa police spokesman Jason Willingham says some residents have said they won't bother to report those crimes anymore. "They think nothing is going to be done, so why mess with it," he said.  In the Boston suburb of Norton, police told residents there may be delays or no response at all to some calls, including vandalism. The department posted the new policy on its website.  "We wanted to let people know about this," Norton Police Chief Brian Clark said. "We didn't want people to be surprised."  Bernard Melekian, director of the Justice Department's Office of Community Oriented Policing Services, said the actions are a reflection of the hard economic times across the country. [...]"   

Uranium detected in New Mexico water wells [08/25/10] "Water wells in several New Mexico communities show uranium levels three to six times higher than federal recommended levels for drinking water, officials said. [...]"   

Motor vehicle crashes cost $99B a year [08/25/10] "Every 10 seconds, someone is treated in a U.S. hospital for a vehicle crash injury and 40,000 die each year from these injuries, health officials say. [...]"   

Africa:  Floods compound Niger's food crisis [08/25/10] "Recent floods have brought a fresh round of problems for Niger, a country already struggling to grown crops because of severe drought. [...]"  

Trends: The Renting Alternative Will Undermine The Housing Market For Years [08/25/10] "here is a far-reaching change occurring now which threatens housing markets around the country. A survey conducted by Harris Interactive for the National Apartment Association in May 2010 found that 76% of those surveyed now believe that renting is a better option than buying in the current real estate market, up from 71% in 2008. Especially sobering was the fact that 78% of those surveyed were homeowners. [...]"    

Lawyers 'Mad at Law Schools' Over Lack of Jobs [08/24/10] "As with most other professions, recent law school grads have met with a harsh employment market ... and some of them are mad at law schools for "misrepresenting" the wealth-producing, exciting, and glamorous careers they were expecting and don't have.  [...]"  Note:   (Students Forgot To Check Job Market Before Becoming Lawyers) So, they psychologically project responsibility onto the law school, instead of admitting they were dumb and short-sighted, and have no 'future' at all.

Germany to roll out ID cards with embedded RFID [08/24/10] "The production of the RFID chips, an integral element of the new generation of German identity cards, has started after the government gave a 10 year contract to the chipmaker NXP in the Netherlands. Citizens will receive the mandatory new ID cards from the first of November. The new ID card will contain all personal data on the security chip that can be accessed over a wireless connection. The new card allows German authorities to identify people with speed and accuracy, the government said. These authorities include the police, customs and tax authorities and of course the local registration and passport granting authorities. German companies like Infineon and the Dutch NXP, which operates a large scale development and manufacturing base in Hamburg, Germany are global leaders in making RFID security chips. The new electronic ID card, which will gradually replace the old mandatory German ID cards, is one of the largest scale roll-outs of RFID cards with extended official and identification functionality.  [...]"  

Food Alert: Nationwide meat recall announced [08/24/10] "Zemco Industries in Buffalo, New York, has recalled approximately 380,000 pounds of deli meat that may be contaminated with bacteria that can cause a potentially fatal disease, the U.S. Department of Agriculture announced Monday. The products were distributed to Wal-Marts nationwide, according to the USDA's website. The meats may be contaminated with Listeria monocytogenes, which was discovered in a retail sample collected by inspectors in Georgia. The USDA has received no reports of illnesses associated with the meats. "Consumption of food contaminated with Listeria monocytogenes can cause listeriosis, an uncommon but potentially fatal disease," according to the USDA. "Healthy people rarely contract listeriosis. However, listeriosis can cause high fever, severe headache, neck stiffness and nausea.  [...]"   

NY Gov Candidate: "Turn Prisons into Welfare Dorms" [08/24/10] "Republican candidate for governor Carl Paladino said he would transform some New York prisons into dormitories for welfare recipients, where they could work in state-sponsored jobs, get employment training and take lessons in “personal hygiene.” Republican candidate for New York governor Carl Paladino visits the Altamont Fair in Altamont, N.Y., on Friday, Aug. 20, 2010. Paladino greeted fairgoers during a one-hour visit. Paladino, a wealthy Buffalo real estate developer popular with many tea party activists, isn’t saying the state should jail poor people: The program would be voluntary. But the suggestion that poor families would be better off in remote institutions, rather than among friends and family in their own neighborhoods, struck some anti-poverty activists as insulting. [...]"   

Trends: U.S. Middle Class Vanishing [08/24/10] "The American middle class is on the verge of disappearing, while the United States, itself, is in danger of becoming a third world country, a leading German newspaper says.  According to an article appearing in the German newspaper, Der Spiegel, the negative consequences of the global financial crisis include a widened social class rift and the elimination of the middle class in the US.  The article states that many Americans are beginning to realize that the American Dream has now become a nightmare as people are having to face the bitter reality of a shrinking job market along with decades of stagnating wages and dramatic increases in inequality. More than a year after the official end of the recession, the overall unemployment rate remains consistently above 9.5 percent. But this is just the official figure. When adjusted to include the people who have already given up looking for work -- or are barely surviving on the few hundred dollars they earn with a part-time job and having to use their savings to supplement their income -- the real unemployment figure jumps to more than 17 percent. In its current annual report, the US Department of Agriculture notes that "food insecurity" is on the rise, and that 50 million Americans were unable to buy enough food to remain healthy at some point last year. One out of every eight American adults and one out of four children now survive on government food stamps. These are unbelievable numbers for the world's richest nation Last week, leading online columnist Arianna Huffington issued the almost apocalyptic warning that “America is in danger of becoming a Third World country.” [...]"  

Trends: The Next Global Crisis: Hungry Millions On The Move [08/24/10] "Floods in Pakistan, droughts in Russia, rising grain prices. According to award-winning Australian science writer Julian Cribb, these are warning signs of an impending disaster that will dwarf the financial crisis. In his new book "The Coming Famine: The Global Food Crisis and What We Can Do To Avoid It", he warns that looming scarcities of water, land, nutrients, oil and fish will leave us unable to feed ourselves within 50 years. [...]"  Note:  I suspect we'll be out of here way before it gets too bad in this way. 

UK:  Pay day loans in Britain increase by 400 percent [08/24/10] "A report by the Consumer Focus watchdog group states that the number of people using costly “pay day loans” has quadrupled in the last four years in Britain.  [...]"    

Interview: Public School: Turning Children Over to Strangers and State-Controlled Awareness  John Taylor Gatto [08/24/10] Video [34:08] "John Taylor Gatto is an American retired school teacher of 29 years 8 months and author of several books on education. He is an activist critical of compulsory schooling and the hegemonic nature of discourse on education and the education professions. He is a learned eloquent critic of the present school system all over the world. In this interview he exposes the hidden agenda that makes most of us hate school. I have written a book, "Sluta skolan!", on my own experiences and views and I have come to the same conclusions as Mr Gatto has. He exposes the dark and terrifying machinery behind the scenes.[...]"  [2003]       Turn down volume before viewing 

Lyme disease spreading in Massachusetts [08/24/10] "Tick-borne Lyme disease is being reported in areas of Massachusetts where cases were considered rare 10 years ago, health officials said. [...]"  

NV: Poverty Causing 5 Suicides A Week In Just One Town [08/24/10] "Hansen also said there are 50 delivered eviction notices in Pahrump each day. “Yes, we need jobs here. However, we are averaging five suicides a week. I don’t care about corporations — I care about the people we save.” [...]"  Note:  When the system turns on the people, some people won't turn on the system, but 'sacrifice' themselves to preserve it.

Man Mistaken for Muslim Harassed at NY Anti-Mosque Rally [08/24/10] [4:58]  "A man walks through the crowd at the Ground Zero protest and is mistaken as a Muslim. The crowd turns on him and confronts him. The man in the blue hard hat calls him a coward and tries to fight him. The tall man who I think was one of the organizers tried to get between the two men. Later I caught up with the man who's name is Kenny. He is a Union carpenter who works at Ground Zero. We discussed what a scary moment that was for him. I told him that I hoped it did not ruin his day. [...]"  Note:  "What a sad joke humanity can be, believing a reality based on lies for gullible morons. Just wait and see what a collapse of the dollar or increased unemployment will do to this bonehead mob. "    Turn down the volume before viewing

"Huge wall WILL protect New Orleans" (But they'll allow the city to be devastated, again, this year) [08/24/10] "The city of New Orleans is well on its way to getting the protection system that Congress ordered after Hurricane Katrina, engineers say. [...]"  Note: $15 billion project is a boon for contractors. It's slated to be complete by next year's storm season in July-Aug 2011. Another too-little-too-late, poorly planned project.

Housing Fades as a Means to Build Wealth, Analysts Say [08/24/10] "Housing will eventually recover from its great swoon. But many real estate experts now believe that home ownership will never again yield rewards like those enjoyed in the second half of the 20th century, when houses not only provided shelter but also a plump nest egg. The wealth generated by housing in those decades, particularly on the coasts, did more than assure the owners a comfortable retirement. It powered the economy, paying for the education of children and grandchildren, keeping the cruise ships and golf courses full and the restaurants humming. More than likely, that era is gone for good. “There is no iron law that real estate must appreciate,” said Stan Humphries, chief economist for the real estate site Zillow. “All those theories advanced during the boom about why housing is special — that more people are choosing to spend more on housing, that more people are moving to the coasts, that we were running out of usable land — didn’t hold up.”  [...]"  Note:  At least for the "home owner", another sly concept.

Food Alert: A ‘habitual offender’ unleashes nearly half a billion salmonella-tainted eggs [08/24/10] "The Occupational Safety and Health Administration last month fined Mr. DeCoster $3.6 million for violations in the workplace and at workers' housing. Federal investigators said they found workers, many of whom are immigrants from Latin America, handling manure and dead chickens with their bare hands, and living amid rats and cockroaches in the company's trailer park. Robert B. Reich, the then-Labor Secretary, denounced DeCoster Egg Farms as "an agricultural sweatshop,'' where "the workers are treated like animals," the Times reported. DeCoster's reputation hasn't improved since. By the mid-'90s, Decoster had already set up shop in Iowa. He opened Wright County Eggs in 1996, and also jumped into the state's then fast-growing hog-production market. His vast hog factories in Iowa quickly ran afoul of authorities. In 1999, the Iowa Supreme Court ruled against DeCoster Farms in its appeal of a $59,000 fine for "variety of water pollution and animal waste control violations at six separate hog facilities in Wright, Hamilton, and Hardin counties in north central Iowa." The complaint had originated in 1996, and DeCoster had dragged out the process with a series of appeals. By 2000, he was back in trouble again. The Iowa Attorney General declared him the state's very first "habitual offender" of water-quality laws, slapping him with a $150,000 fine. [...]"  Related: FDA commissioner says agency "needs more authority" Note: We saw that coming ... FDA uses massive egg recall to push for egg pasteurization "Amid the massive egg recall currently underway over potential salmonella poisoning, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has been working hard to push its pasteurization agenda. The agency recently made an announcement recommending that all grocery stores and restaurants begin stocking pasteurized eggs instead of raw ones. In typical FDA fashion, the agency has decided to ignore the actual cause of illness and contamination -- filthy, industrialized food production systems -- and instead call for all eggs to be cooked before being sold to consumers.  Other recent outbreak scares include both spinach and tomato recalls, after which the FDA made similar recommendations urging produce irradiation as the solution. But this philosophy fails to address the real problem with the current food system. [...]"  228 Million Eggs Recalled Following Salmonella Outbreak "An Iowa egg producer is recalling 228 million eggs after being linked to an outbreak of salmonella poisoning. .... The eggs were distributed around the country and packaged under the names Lucerne, Albertson, Mountain Dairy, Ralph's, Boomsma's, Sunshine, Hillandale, Trafficanda, Farm Fresh, Shoreland, Lund, Dutch Farms and Kemp. [...]"   

California May Jail Parents if Children Miss Too Much School [08/23/10] "Talk about parental responsibility. The California Senate just passed a bill that could send parents to jail for up to a year if their kids -- from kindergarten through eighth grade -- miss too much school. Senate Bill 1317 is actually a public safety measure, according to State Sen. Mark Leno (D-San Francisco), because children who don’t attend school regularly or drop out early are more likely to turn to crime. "Three-quarters of our state inmate population are high school dropouts," Leno was quoted as saying by the Fresno Bee. According to the Associated Press, parents whose kids miss too much school could be subject to up to a year in jail and a $2,000 fine, though judges could put the punishment on hold to give parents a chance to get their kids to class. The Fresno Bee reported that the bill would apply to parents or guardians of children age 6 or older in kindergarten through eighth grade.  [...]"  

Raytheon’s Directed Energy Pain Weapon Mounted from Ceiling in California Prison [08/23/10] "A high-tech ray gun built for the military that fires an invisible heat beam capable of causing unbearable pain will be tested on unruly inmates in the sheriff's detention facility in Castaic, officials said Friday at an unveiling event. The "Assault Intervention System" (AIS) developed by the Raytheon Co., could give the Sheriff's Department "another tool" to quell disturbances at a 65-inmate dormitory at the Pitchess Detention Center's North County Correctional Facility, said Cmdr. Bob Osborne, head of the technology exploration branch of the sheriff's Department of Homeland Security Division. The 600-pound, 7-foot-tall device won't replace traditional methods such as tear gas, rubber bullets and batons, Osborne said. "We're looking to see if we can exploit this science for the benefit of the Corrections Department," he said. AIS fires a directed beam of invisible "millimeter waves" that cause an unbearable burning sensation by penetrating 1/64 of an inch into the skin, where pain receptors are located, said Mike Booen, Raytheon's vice president of advanced security and directed energy systems. The beam, which is about the diameter of a compact disc, causes an instant and intolerable burning sensation when it touches skin, but the sensation stops instantly when the device is turned off or the target moves out of the beam.  Video clip  [0:27] Democracy Now clip [...]"  Related: Documentary: Torture Inc. America's Brutal Prisons  [10:01]  "Savaged by dogs, Electrocuted With Cattle Prods, Burned By Toxic Chemicals, Does such barbaric abuse inside U.S. jails explain the horrors that were committed in Iraq? They are just some of the victims of wholesale torture taking place inside the U.S. prison system that we uncovered during a four-month investigation for the UK's Channel 4 originally aired in 2005.  [...]"  Note:  Part 2 [10:02]| Part 3 [10:00]| Part 4 [10:00]| Part 5 [10:00]   These devices doesn't need to be 'tested' on anyone ... it was 'tested' by military contractors who created them ... that's just a 'linguistic segue' to the use of these devices to harass people without getting close to them.  

CA: Fingerprint check-in tried at 24 Hour Fitness [08/23/10] "...Corporate America has taken notice, as have privacy advocates, who say consumers ought to tread cautiously into a largely unregulated field. [...]"   

Isotope shortage evokes medical concerns [08/23/10] "U.S. doctors say they are concerned about a shortage of imported radioactive material used to diagnose heart conditions and other problems. [...]"   Related: Trends: Hospitals Grapple With Drug Shortages [08/19/10] "Hospitals in Indianapolis and across the country are dealing with critical shortages of key medications. The Food and Drug Administration’s drug shortage list includes 41 hospital-based medications, including dextrose 50 percent injections, used to raised a patient’s blood sugar; calcium chloride, used in code blue emergencies; and epinephrine, a common medication used to treat allergic reactions…… “It seems like every other month you see another drug shortage and supply running out,” said clinical pharmacist Bob Adler. “It’s interesting and kind of challenging for health care workers.” [...]"  Note: Is the government buying up all the main medical supplies? 

KS: How to Prolong a Recession: Tax Driveways [08/23/10] "Last night, the city of Mission passed a new tax on driveways. Yes, driveways. Home owners will pay $72 each year for having a driveway. [...]"  Note: Well, an after-the-fact tax like this is uncalled for, and will not fly if challenged. 

Soaring Teen Unemployment Could Have Lifetime Effects [08/23/10] "Thanks to dismal employment prospects and modern stress, teenagers today have reason to angst. [...]"  

US: 2011 Tax Increases – A Summary – [08/23/10] "In just six months, the largest tax hikes in the history of America will take effect. They will hit families and small businesses in three great waves on January 1, 2011: [...]"   Related:  McConnell: "Extend Bush-era tax cuts" 

UK:  "No Evidence Needed" -- Surge in Britons exported for trial [08/23/10] "In total 1,032 people – almost three a day – were detained and extradited by British police on the orders of European prosecutors in the 12 months to April, up from 683 in 2008-09. The Home Office expects a further 70 per cent rise, to 1,700 cases, next year. The increase will fuel growing political concern about the "unfair" and "disproportionate" nature of the warrants, which British courts have little power to challenge. It comes as the case of Christopher Tappin, a suburban golf club captain accused of arms smuggling, sparked separate controversy about "unbalanced" extradition arrangements with the US. David Blunkett, the former home secretary who introduced the European warrants, admitted he had been "insufficiently sensitive" about how they could be "overused". David Davis, his former Tory shadow, last night called for a "review and reform" of the extradition system. The number of European Arrest Warrant detentions in Britain has risen 43-fold since 2004, when there were only 24 across the year. Many of those detained are accused of relatively minor crimes such as possessing cannabis or leaving petrol stations without paying. They can spend long periods in jail – here and abroad – for crimes which might not even have been prosecuted in Britain. They can also be seized for offences which are not crimes in Britain. Foreign prosecutors do not have to present evidence to the British courts, just demand the person be "surrendered". [...]"  

 Trends: 401(k) Hardship Withdrawals Spike [08/22/10] "Hardship withdrawals from 401(k) retirement saving plans rose to the highest level in 10 years during the second quarter, Fidelity Investments said on Friday, in the latest sign of a dismal economy. [...]" 

Philadelphia Begins Charging Blogs $300 Per Year [08/22/10] "For the past three years, Marilyn Bess has operated MS Philly Organic, a small, low-traffic blog that features occasional posts about green living, out of her Manayunk home. Between her blog and infrequent contributions to ehow.com, over the last few years she says she’s made about $50. To Bess, her website is a hobby. To the city of Philadelphia, it’s a potential moneymaker, and the city wants its cut.  In May, the city sent Bess a letter demanding that she pay $300, the price of a business privilege license. “The real kick in the pants is that I don’t even have a full-time job, so for the city to tell me to pony up $300 for a business privilege license, pay wage tax, business privilege tax, net profits tax on a handful of money is outrageous,” Bess says. [...]"  Note: The extortion story of the day. It's time a class action suit got into motion to quash this concept ... people will simply move out of Philadelphia ... taxing free speech is abhorrent.

Young Afghan couple stoned to death [08/22/10] "Two young people who eloped against their families' wishes were stoned to death in Afghanistan by hundreds of men, relatives said. [...]"  Note: To be killed by ignorant fools, because of love ... it's this kind of stuff ... that underscores just how twisted the game truly is ... cultures are as they are .. but still. I can only hope that the planetary spirit will soon have had enough ... and leave ... and this local planetary game will be concluded.

Trends:  Professional investors move into flipping foreclosed homes [08/22/10] "Squeezing out amateurs, private equity funds and wealthy individuals are buying distressed properties at public auctions, refurbishing them and selling them for quick profits. [...]"  Note: Social parasites, at this point.

Concepts and Practices: "How to Be a Hobo" [08/21/10] "In a 1937 issue of Esquiremagazine, an anonymous writer penned an article called “The Bum Handbook.” Unlike most bums, he had chosen his vagabond lifestyle. And he was tired of seeing the sub-par job most other bums were doing. This was during the Great Depression, and many men found themselves homeless, lost, and ignorant of the art of bumliness. The author had being a hobo down to a science and claimed to enjoy 3 meals a day and a comfortable place to sleep each night. While he didn’t desire to return to regular society, he knew that most fellow hobos did, and so he offered these tips in hopes they could maintain confidence and a respectable look and thus find their way back to steady work. Although much has changed since the 1930′s, if you by chance find yourself a hobo during this Great Recession or desire to become a bum by choice, perhaps you can learn some tips from hobos of old. Enjoy these excerpts from the article and this fun peek into the past. [...]"  Note:  A whimsical piece.

Indianapolis GM workers face abysmal working conditions [08/21/10] "The Indianapolis General Motors stamping plant, where workers are being told to accept a 50 percent wage cut, is a run down and hazardous workplace, where sweltering heat, overwork, and the constant threat of injury are all part of the job [...]"  Related:   Ford's most advanced assembly plant operates in rural Brazil  "The Detroit News has a video from August of 2007 showing an advanced Ford car plant. The video ends with comments about the UAW's hostility to this kind of plant being built in the U.S. [...]" 

 Trends: Number of U.S. restaurants declines [08/21/10] "The number of restaurants operating in the United States has fallen for the first time in a decade as cash-starved diners stay home in droves, a report says. [...]"    

A License to Steal by Scott Horton [08/21/10] "In “The Forfeiture Racket,” an essay in the February issue of Reason, Radley Balko took a close look at the use of civil asset forfeiture cases. He starts with the story of a college student pulled over by traffic cops, searched, and found to have $17,500 in cash. The student was not charged with any offense, but the police thought his possession of the money was suspicious, and they decided to keep it, invoking vague asset forfeiture rights. In fact the money was part of some $50,000 that the young man had received in an automobile accident settlement, but it took him more than a year and several trips to court to get his money back. The case provides a perfect demonstration of the abusive civil asset forfeiture laws now used aggressively by police around the country. The asset forfeiture rules work hard to reverse presumptions of innocence and burdens of proof—effectively forcing citizens to prove that their money really is their money and establishing what amounts to a presumption in favor of the government’s right to take it. Viewed critically, it furnishes a legal aura to what is really no more than theft, by the government, of private property. [...]"   

Troops: "Refusing to attend Christian concert got us into trouble" [08/21/10] "The Army said Friday it was investigating a claim that dozens of soldiers who refused to attend a Christian band's concert at a Virginia military base were banished to their barracks and told to clean them up. Fort Eustis spokesman Rick Haverinen told The Associated Press he couldn't comment on the specifics of the investigation. [...] 

Pakistan floods: disaster of epic proportions raises the spectre of systemic collapse [08/21/10] "Given the initial reports about crop and other losses, it now appears that Pakistan’s economy may contract in the next twelve months and total output, property and other losses would exceed $10 billion and Pakistan could borrow as much as $8bn in new loans in the next six months. This would be another mistake. Pakistan’s lenders must start considering debt cancellation as a form of assistance because it might be a more effective and sustainable solution. Adding the debt burden is unlikely to prevent another default or restructuring in the next couple of years. The US and the European Union should also eliminate all tariffs on imports from Pakistan to help its hard-hit and critical textile exports. [...]"   Related: Pakistan Disintegrating: 30 Years of War Destroyed Ability to Deal With Flood Disaster [08/17/10] "Even as Pakistan is deluged by the most destructive floods in its recorded history, the nation has been rendered incapable of dealing with the disaster by three decades of British imperial warfare. Pakistan, with 170 million people and lying in one of the most strategic regions of the world, is in chaos. [...]"  Related: Pakistan floods affect 20 million people as disaster worsens |  Pakistan after the floods: “The situation is explosive” | 1/3 of Country is Submerged  2 Video clips included | Satellite tracks Pakistan floods

Trends:  Poll: TVs, land line phones less popular [08/20/10] "Many Americans are abandoning televisions and land line telephones, once fixtures in every household, considering them unnecessary, a U.S. poll indicates. [...]"  

Trends:  Dipping into dwindling nest eggs [08/20/10] Video clip "A record number of Americans without jobs and with nowhere else to turn are trying to ease their burden by withdrawing from their retirement funds--and they're paying dearly for it. NBC's John Yang reports. (Nightly News) [...]"  

Concepts and Practices: Sons to be caned for incest [08/20/10] "A Malaysian carpenter convicted with two of his sons of raping his disabled daughter escaped caning but was sentenced to 100 years in jail, authorities say. [...]"  

Saudi judge considers paralysis punishment [08/19/10] "Saudi judge asks hospital if it can damage convict's spine as punishment for paralyzing man A Saudi judge has asked several hospitals in the country whether they could damage a man's spinal cord as punishment after he was convicted of attacking another man with a cleaver and paralyzing him, the brother of the victim said  [...]  

Social Control: Facebook to Launch ‘Places’ [08/19/10] "Facebook’s 500 million-plus users will soon be able to track friends’ whereabouts across the United States, as the world’s largest Internet social network adds technology to increasingly tie its virtual world to everyday life. The new “Places” feature—which begins rolling out on Wednesday to some users and goes nationwide within weeks—is touted as a tool to help users share where they are, figure out who is in the vicinity, and check out happenings and services within the same locale. The addition of so-called location services to Facebook—a move that industry observers have speculated about for months—opens new revenue opportunities for the company, but also presents it with delicate privacy challenges. [...]"  Note:  Nothing like luring 500 million people to compile their own dossiers, hook up with twitter, and now reveal their whereabouts to each other, as social networks, created largely for the benefit of the intelligence and law enforcement communities, who depend on the naive nature of the bulk of the population. 

Trends: US Retailers to Be Using New Rules: Say You Pay Less If You Pay With Cash  [08/19/10] [1:15]  

US says it is not illegal for schools to spy on students at home [08/19/10] "It looks like prosecutors are not going to get involved in the bizarre case of the school which switched on laptops to spy on students while they were in their own bedrooms. US Attorney Zane David Memeger told USA Today, investigators had found no evidence of criminal intent by Lower Merion School District employees who activated tracking software that took thousands of webcam and screenshot images on school-provided laptops. A student and his family sued the district in February, claiming officials invaded his privacy by activating the software and the civil case is ongoing. The school has admitted that it captured 56,000 screen shots and webcam images mostly so it could find missing student laptops. But in the case of this student the school appears to have been using the laptops to investigate home drug use. [...]"   

Junk food-addicted rats chose to starve themselves rather than eat healthy food [08/19/10] "A diet including unlimited amounts of junk food can cause rats to become so addicted to the unhealthy diet that they will starve themselves rather than go back to eating healthy food, researchers have discovered. [...]"  

NY:12-year-old girl busted for selling crack [08/19/10] "A 12-year-old girl was charged with felony drug sales after being arrested for peddling crack cocaine and marijuana on a New York City street, police said. [...]"  

 Commentary: Greek Bonds Slump As Austerity Backfires, Country Enters "Death Spiral", And The Violent End Game Approaches [08/18/10] "Those patiently following the Greek Bond-Bund spread to its inevitable conclusion have been fully aware that the plan that Europe is betting its entire future on, is patently flawed: namely that austerity, by its definition does not, and will not work. In fact, instead of bringing stability, austerity will slowly but surely eat away at the economy of whatever country it is instituted in - in some cases slowly, in others, like Greece, very rapidly. Indeed, the Greek spread has now risen to levels last seen during the early May near-revolution in Athens, at well over 800 bps. And for the specific consequences of austerity, Germany's Spiegel has done a terrific summary of what it defines as a "death spiral" for the Mediterranean country: "Stores are closing, tax revenues are falling and unemployment has hit an unbelievable 70 percent in some places. Frustrated workers are threatening to strike back. A mixture of fear, hopelessness and anger is brewing in Greek society." Spiegel quotes a atypical Greek: ""If you take away my family's bread, I'll take you down -- the government needs to know that. And don't call us anarchists if that happens! We're heads of our families and we're desperate." All those who think violent strikes in the PIIGS are a thing of the past, we have news for you. The (pseudo) vacation season is over, and millions of workers are coming back. They may not have money, but they have lots of free time, lots of unemployment, and even more pent up anger. Things are about to get very heated once again, first in Greece, and soon after, everywhere else.  [...]"   

Federal Civilian Government is Lucrative "Industry"; Sixth Highest Paying Industry [08/18/10] "The Bureau of Economic Analysis latest release of industry compensation levels shows that the average federal worker ranks up at the top along with employees in the finance and energy industries.  The BEA presents compensation data for 72 industries that span the U.S. economy. Figure 1 shows the 20 industries with the highest levels of average compensation, which includes wages and benefits. It also shows the average for all U.S. private industries and the average for the industry with the lowest compensation. (The names of the industries have been simplified in some cases).  Federal civilian workers have the sixth highest average compensation of the 72 industries: [...]"   

KS: Grieving Man Can Sue Police Over His Arrest [08/17/10] " A grieving man who cussed out a police officer and paid a late-night visit to another officer's home can sue police and a county attorney for allegedly arresting and strip-searching him without probable cause, the 10th Circuit ruled. The federal appeals court in Denver rejected a motion to dismiss the civil rights claims of Daniel Stearns, who was arrested for disorderly conduct in the wake of traffic-stop argument during which Stearns said to an officer, "You're probably the mother fucker that shot my dad." Stearns was in Winfield, Kansas, in 2006 to attend the funeral of his father, who had been shot by local police while committing a crime. [...]"   

TX: La Villa Mayor Charged with Prostitution, Official Oppression [08/17/10] "Officials arrested La Villa Mayor Hector Elizondo on Monday morning as part of an ongoing investigation. Elizondo was arraigned on two counts of official oppression and two counts of prostitution by Judge Placido Rodriguez. Though the charging documents allege Elizondo solicited a prostitute, the official charge is prostitution. In a criminal complaint, a woman said Elizondo had supplied her with $10 worth of crack cocaine in exchange for sexual favors. Another said he paid her $30 dollars for oral sex several times over the past year, according to the complaint. The woman also said Elizondo would threaten to have her arrested if she didn't do what he asked of her. [...]"    

 Trends:  Homeless and hungry at college [08/17/10] "With official unemployment holding steady at 9.5 percent (real unemployment is much higher), and with the state budget cuts producing yet more tuition increases, a growing phenomenon is sweeping the nation: homeless and hungry college students. [...]"  

Netherlands consider national police [08/17/10] "Mayors and police are at odds in the Netherlands over a proposal to nationalize police. [...]"  Note:  Gestapo.

Austerity measures intensify social crisis in Romania [08/17/10] "The latest austerity measures introduced by the Romanian government will invariably intensify the social crisis in a country already ranked as one of the poorest in Europe. [...]"  Note:  'Austerity measures intensify social crisis' is what the 'playbook' is all about.

Former felons feel boxed in by crime question [08/16/10] "Former felons and their advocates are becoming increasingly assertive in the national debate about crime, claiming that they are being discriminated against not just in matters of voting but also employment and housing.  A movement called "Ban the Box" is urging lawmakers in the District of Columbia and elsewhere to limit or bar the "have you ever been convicted of a crime" question so that ex-felons' applications for jobs, housing and the like aren't rejected out of hand. They point out that "the box" makes it difficult for even well-intentioned ex-criminals to re-establish and integrate themselves into the social mainstream.  "If you can't get a job, you can't get a home, and if you can't either, you can't break the dependency. They can't care for themselves or their families," said Rhozier "Roach" Brown, who was released from prison in 1976 after President Ford commuted his life sentence for murder. The debate stretches from the halls of Congress to state and local legislatures, and the discussion follows two common threads. [...]"   

Border Patrol sees spike in suicides [08/16/10] "Suicides including these have set off alarm bells throughout the agency responsible for policing the nation's borders. After nearly four years without a single suicide in their ranks, border agents are killing themselves in greater numbers. Records obtained by The Associated Press show that at least 15 agents have taken their own lives since February 2008 — the largest spike in suicides the agency has seen in at least 20 years. [...]"  

Budgets Tight, School Supply List Goes Beyond Glue Sticks [08/16/10] "When Emily Cooper headed off to first grade in Moody, Ala., last week, she was prepared with all the stuff on her elementary school’s must-bring list: two double rolls of paper towels, three packages of Clorox wipes, three boxes of baby wipes, two boxes of garbage bags, liquid soap, Kleenex and Ziplocs. “The first time I saw it, my mouth hit the floor,” Emily’s mother, Kristin Cooper, said of the list, which also included perennials like glue sticks, scissors and crayons. Schools across the country are beginning the new school year with shrinking budgets and outsize demands for basic supplies. And while many parents are wincing at picking up the bill, retailers are rushing to cash in by expanding the back-to-school category like never before. Now some back-to-school aisles are almost becoming janitorial-supply destinations as multipacks of paper towels, cleaning spray and hand sanitizer are crammed alongside pens, notepads and backpacks. [...]" 

10 Signs The U.S. is Becoming a Third World Country [08/16/10] "The United States by every measure is hanging on by a thread to its First World status. Saddled by debt, engaged in wars on multiple fronts with a rising police state at home, declining economic productivity, and wild currency fluctuations all threaten America's future. The general designations of the ranking system for world status date back to the 1950s, and have included countries at various stages of economic development. Since the Cold War, the definition has come to be synonymous with repressive countries where a wealthy class of ruling elites segment society into the haves and have-nots, many times capitalizing on the conditions that follow an economic crisis or war. While much of the world is still mired in poverty, the reduced cost of innovative tools such as computing and connectivity ironically puts traditional Third World countries at the forefront of a new lean-and-mean economy that is based on ideas of empowerment for the disenfranchised. For better or worse, the world is leveling due to Globalism. However, America and other over-leveraged countries face this re-balancing of the globe at a time when they have dwindling resources. We can speculate about who and what is to blame for America's fantastic fall, but for the purposes of this article we shall focus on the obvious signs that the United States is beginning to resemble a Third World country. [...]"  

Reckless Europe beats reckless America at property bubbles [08/16/10] "Once and for all, let us nail the lie that the global credit crisis was basically a US sub-prime property bubble that went wrong, and that Europe was merely an innocent bystander hit by shrapnel. [...]"    

Jobless millions signal death of the American dream for many [08/15/10] "Just how badly the great recession has struck this fragile New Jersey city, which is currently the poorest in America, was recently spelled out to Gaines. In happier times – whatever that might mean for a city as destitute as Camden – local businesses on Haddon Avenue could at least rely on a bit of trade from those who made their money on the street. Young men bought flashy clothes and got sharp haircuts and always paid in cash. But no longer. The economy is now so bad in Camden that even the criminals are struggling and going short. "Even the guys who got money from illegal means really don't want to spend it," Gaines said. [...]"   

Grain price rise may fuel Mideast, Europe unrest [08/15/10] "Rising grain prices from Russia's drought and fires will pressure populations already hit by the financial crisis and could stoke unrest -- particularly in the Middle East, North Africa and parts of Europe. Wheat prices have risen by nearly 70 percent since June after Russia suffered its worst drought in 130 years and are at their highest since 2008, when the last major food price rally sparked protests and riots in a string of emerging nations. Analysts warn that if prices stay high then the threat of street violence will increase -- at least up to a point. "We could see some street riots but I wouldn't expect any governments to fall," said Jonathan Wood, global issues analyst for consultancy Control Risks. "On one level, we have much less of a problem than in 2008 because we have better food stocks. On the other hand, because of the financial crisis many countries are not in such a good position financially to deal with it." Particularly in emerging markets where food makes up a higher proportion of household purchases, the price rise could filter through in inflation, rate hikes and wider deficits. The Middle East and North Africa, particularly Egypt, are regarded as particularly vulnerable, as are emerging and southern European countries where discontent has already been fuelled by harsh cuts in public spending, benefits and pay . "Grain imports are particularly sensitive in the Middle East and North Africa -- bread is such a crucial staple of the diet," said Metsa Rahimi, analyst at security consultant Janusian. "Eastern Europe is also an obvious area of risk." [...]"  

Analysis: Extreme weather plagues farming, talks flounder [08/15/10] "Global wheat markets reeling from Russian droughts, thousands of cattle killed by heat in Kansas, and countless crop acres wiped out by floods in Pakistan are glimpses of what can be expected as the world struggles to battle climate change.  But as concerns mount over extreme weather hitting global food systems this year, governments are no closer to forging a pact to fight climate change. When temperatures rise as a result of smokestack and tailpipe emissions, droughts, heat waves, and floods become more frequent and more intense. The temperatures create "more and more hot extremes and worse unprecedented extremes and that's what we're seeing," said Neville Nicholls, a climate scientist at Monash University in Melbourne, Australia. As the number of extreme weather events mount, they will likely create havoc in agricultural markets and could lead to food riots in poor countries like those in 2007 and 2008 when prices hit records on rabid market speculation. [...]"   

Social Security Keeps 20 Million Americans Out Of Poverty, Report Finds [08/14/10] "As Social Security approaches its 75th anniversary on Saturday, the program is playing an especially vital role in reducing poverty across America during the worst economic crisis since the Great Recession. If benefits were to be significantly cut, 19.8 million more Americans would be thrust in poverty, according to a recent report by the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities. In addition to supporting the elderly, Social Security is currently keeping more than 1 million children and more than 5 million adults below the age of 65 above the poverty line. [...]"  

"Senate Bill S510 Makes it illegal to Grow, Share, Trade or Sell Homegrown Food" [08/14/10] "S 510, the Food Safety Modernization Act of 2010, may be the most dangerous bill in the history of the US. It is to our food what the bailout was to our economy, only we can live without money. “If accepted [S 510] would preclude the public’s right to grow, own, trade, transport, share, feed and eat each and every food that nature makes. It will become the most offensive authority against the cultivation, trade and consumption of food and agricultural products of one’s choice. It will be unconstitutional and contrary to natural law or, if you like, the will of God.” ~Dr. Shiv Chopra, Canada Health whistleblower It is similar to what India faced with imposition of the salt tax during British rule, only S 510 extends control over all food in the US, violating the fundamental human right to food. Monsanto says it has no interest in the bill and would not benefit from it, but Monsanto’s Michael Taylor who gave us rBGH and unregulated genetically modified (GM) organisms, appears to have designed it and is waiting as an appointed Food Czar to the FDA (a position unapproved by Congress) to administer the agency it would create — without judicial review — if it passes. S 510 would give Monsanto unlimited power over all US seed, food supplements, food and farming.' [...]"  

"Wheat is the new gold in time of plenty for America's breadbasket" [08/14/10] "Wildfires, floods, crippling droughts, and even a threatened plague of locusts have wrecked crops and ruined harvests around the world, raising fears of global food inflation shortage and food riots. But as they hose off the dust and chaff caked on their exhausted combine harvesters, farmers in America's plain states are adjusting to something possibly wonderful: a combination of unusually good wheat yields and suddenly soaring prices – thanks to disastrous circumstances elsewhere – has put them at the centre of a gold rush. "It feels like Christmas in August," admitted Darrell Hanavan, of the Colorado Wheat Administrative Committee, noting that the harvest just completed in his state seems to have been the most bountiful for 25 years. More importantly, the dollar value for the crop is almost sure to set a record.  [...]"    

 Commentary: Canada Has Regained All Jobs Lost in 2008-09 vs. U.S. Still Down By -8m [08/14/10] "How did Canada survive the global slowdown with fewer job losses than the U.S. (-2.3% reduction in employment vs. almost -6% in the U.S.), and how did Canada recover from the recession so much faster that the U.S.? Well, it sure wasn't because Canada raised taxes, like the U.S. is now considering during a fragile recovery. In fact, Canada has actually been aggressively cutting both taxes and government spending, with impressive results in economic performance. Here's more from the WSJ article "Canada, Land of Smaller Government":  "Canadian taxes have also come down at the federal and provincial level. They were reduced with the stated goal of improving incentives for work effort, savings, investment and entrepreneurship. Tellingly, the last three Canadian elections have all had key debates on tax relief—not whether there should be tax cuts but rather what type of tax cuts. Beginning in 2001 under a Liberal government, even the politically sensitive federal corporate income tax rate has been reduced. It is now 18%, down from 28%, and the plan is to reduce it to 15% in 2012. The U.S. federal rate is 35%." And what about government spending? Accoding to Jason, "If present trends continue, within two or three years Canada will have a smaller government as a share of its economy than the U.S." Jason concludes that "Americans can learn much by looking north," and maybe the lesson from Canada is that tax cuts along with cuts in government spending are the keys to both improved economic performance and greater fiscal responsibility.  [...]"  Note: Interesting series of comments after the article. 

Concepts and Practices:  CA town overpaid officials with $3 million in illegal property taxes [08/14/10] "The tiny blue-collar city that granted huge salaries to its top officials may have to repay nearly $3 million in illegal property taxes, a state official said Friday.  An audit showed that the Los Angeles suburb exceeded a state cap when it raised its property tax rate in 2007 to pay for pension obligations, California Controller John Chiang said. Chiang sent a letter Friday to the Los Angeles County auditor-controller, instructing the agency to reduce the tax rate. The drop would mean a $250-a-year reduction on the tax bill for a $275,000 home, Chiang's office said. The county apportions the property taxes collected by local governments. [...] The audit was prompted by revelations that the city of about 40,000 — which is one of the poorest communities in the county — was paying its chief administrative officer more than $1.5 million a year in salary and benefits. In addition, the police chief made more than his counterpart in Los Angeles, and the mayor and three City Council members were earning about $100,000 a year for part-time work. Carrillo's predecessor, Robert Rizzo, the police chief and another top official recently resigned and the council members voted to slash their pay by 90 percent. [...] "  

Commentary: Just 15,000 families win 'The American Dream' [08/14/10] "Most Americans do not know it. When they hear it, many people do not believe it. Since the early 1980s, in the U.S., most income gains have gone to the top one per cent of income earners. From 2002-07, two-thirds of new income went to one per cent of Americans. Going back further to measure the period from 1993 to 2008 and comparing, one-half of new income had gone to one per cent of Americans -- with 99 per cent of U.S. residents getting the same increase in income as the top one per cent (defined as those earning over $308,000 in 2008). Indeed, most new income has gone to the top one per cent within the one per cent (0.1 per cent, or about 150,000 families). Within that top 0.1 percent, the top one per cent (0.01 percent) of the U.S. population now gets one dollar for every US$17 earned by the entire population. So 15,000 families are the real beneficiaries of American capitalism. These statistical trends were first revealed by two economic researchers in 2003. Since then no one has been able to refute the work done by Thomas Piketty and Emmanuel Saez. Worse still, economists have been unable to explain why the rich got so much richer. Sociologists fare no better. Lane Kenworthy, a leading researcher, suggests that sociologists tend to focus on how the income is attained, not on why the structure of income has become so skewed to the benefit of so few [...]"   

Trends: Youth Unemployment Hits Record High [08/13/10] "Global youth unemployment has hit a record high following the financial crisis and is likely to get worse later this year, the International Labor Organization (ILO) said Thursday. The report from the ILO says 81 million out of 630 million 15-24 year olds where unemployed at the end of 2009, some 7.8 million more than at the end of 2007. Thursday marks the first day of the UN International Youth Year; the ILO warned these trends will have "significant consequences for young people as upcoming cohorts of new entrants join the ranks of the already unemployed." The world risks a crisis legacy of a "lost generation" of young people who dropped out of the job market, the organization added in its report. The report also points out that the unemployment rates of youth have proven to be more sensitive to the crisis than the rates of adults and that the recovery of the job market for young men and women is likely to lag behind that of adults. [...]" 

Russian Wheat Export Ban Hits Egypt Hard [08/13/10] [2:27]  "Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin said this year’s wheat harvest will be off more than a third, down to 60 million tons. Last year, the world’s third largest grain exporter harvested 97 million tons of wheat and exported 21.4 million tons. We are talking about many millions of tons that could have fed many millions of people so we can anticipate many millions going hungry next winter in the north. A lot of people are going to miss a lot of bread.  The world faces an inflationary time bomb as shortages of food threaten to push prices to fresh all-time highs. A variety of freakish weather conditions across the world has sent the price of staples including wheat, pork, rice, orange juice, coffee, cocoa and tea to new highs in recent weeks. Sometime in the very near future there will be a panic and those with any kind of wealth will bid the prices of food through the roof with China high on the list of those with resources to outbid everyone else. Free markets will collapse as countries with food declare, as Russia is doing now, bans on exports. When it comes to food and our bellies it’s every man and country for him/itself. [...]"  

Trends: "The Recession Hasn’t Hurt Everyone Equally" [08/13/10] "There’s very little commentary that I think needs to be added to this chart from the Bureau of Labor Statistics: [...]"  

Trends: Public Pension check may not be in the mail [08/12/10] "Illinois public employees who think the state constitution guarantees that they'll get all their pension benefits may have another think coming.  Politicians' and public labor unions' assurances aside, there's another, not-well-publicized school of thought that says if the pension funds go bust, the state has no obligation to step in to pay the benefits. This runs contrary to the popular view that the Illinois Constitution, on its face, guarantees that all public employee pension benefits will be fully paid. This belief is based on Article 13, Section 5 of the Illinois Constitution: "Membership in any pension or retirement system of the state, any unit of local government or school district … shall be an enforceable contractual relationship, the benefits of which shall not be diminished or impaired." Sounds solid, doesn't it? It's not, according to a legal opinion from the Chicago law firm Sidley Austin, [...]" 

Lake Mead near rationing levels [08/12/10] "Water levels in Lake Mead, the country's largest reservoir, are at a 54-year low, sparking rationing fears in Arizona and Nevada. [...]"   

Man held over US serial stabbings [08/12/10] "Atlanta police arrest a man as he tries to board a flight to Israel, after about 20 stabbings leave five people dead in three states. [...]"  Related: Reports ID Serial Stabber As Elias Abuelazam   "The man is an Israeli citizen who is in the U.S. legally, according to a law enforcement official who spoke on the condition of anonymity due to the ongoing investigation. The Israeli consulate in Atlanta was in touch with the U.S. government to get information about the case, spokeswoman Amanda Flaks said. [...]"    

UK:  Met officers face assault charges [08/12/10] "Four policemen face prosecution for actual bodily harm on a terror suspect in London in December 2003. [...]"   

A flawed system? U.S. boasts highest incarceration rates in the world [08/12/10] "The United States of America currently incarcerates the highest percentage of its own citizens when compared to any other country in the world. With it's harsh drug laws, minimum sentencing guidelines and repeated imprisonment of non-violent offenders, the country has literally thrown the shackles on millions of individuals. In fact, the great superpower has more than 2 million of it's citizens imprisoned at this very moment. (some suggest numbers closer to 2.5 million) Below, are several graphs and charts from the Center for Economic Policy Research depicting the most recent data obtained concerning incarceration levels in the United States. [...]" 

Freed Man Can Sue Police Over Withheld Evidence [08/12/10] "An Ohio man who spent seven years in prison for two rapes and a murder he didn't commit can sue police for allegedly withholding exculpatory evidence. [...]"   

Police Can't Use GPS Without a Warrant [08/12/10] "Police use of global positioning surveillance, or GPS, without a warrant violates the Fourth Amendment, the D.C. Circuit ruled in its decision to overturn a criminal conviction. [...]"  

Trends:  Handout Hysteria Spreads [08/12/10] "According to the Atlanta Journal Constitution riot police were dispatched to East Point, Georgia as 30,000 people gathered to apply for federal Section 8 housing benefits. A quick look at the scene in East Point: Video clip  [0:29] Over the last year we’ve seen similar crowds, though not as large, gather across the country in cities like Detroit, where thousands stood in line for food vouchers and federal assistance.  This morning, we learned that over 2 million New York food stamp recipients will be adversely affected because of new legislation that will divert some of the state’s funds from the food stamp program to prevent the layoffs of, or rehire, up to 8200 teachers. For now, the majority of those affected are of the lowest income classes in the US. Demographically, these are more than likely minority Americans. However, you can be certain that we will soon see similar situations spreading to those who currently call themselves the “middle class,” a demographic whose majority make up is Caucasion. As they lose jobs, savings, their homes and the way of life they have become accustomed to, they, too, will take to the streets.  As Gerald Celente of the Trends Research Institute has oft been quoted as saying, “When people lose everything, and they have nothing left to lose, they lose it.” We’re seeing thousands of Americans living in tent cities after losing their homes to foreclosure. Food pantries across the country are running out of food, as private donations are down significantly. Even those who want to donate can’t do it anymore. What happened in New York today proves, as we’ve suggested in prior writings, that the Federal government is going to have to begin cutting essential services. In this case, it was politically driven, because the poor are not as powerful and organized a force as teachers’ unions. Soon, we’ll see even more cuts. We can expect state health care programs, food programs, housing programs and utility assistance programs running out of money. Benefits and entitlements will be cut. The uneducated in our society, people like Peggy Joseph, will soon realize that what they have been told is a complete fabrication: Video clip  [0:26] The people will riot. What we see in Georgia today is quite mild to what we can expect in the near future. These types of gatherings in major cities across the US will become larger, likely turn to riots, and become very violent. The people will turn on eachother - whites against blacks against hispanics against muslims against jews against christians against democrats against republicans against tea baggers against gays against straights against the rich against the poor. All the while our benevolent politicians and their contributors will sip fine wines and dine on filet Mignon during a junket on Nancy Pelosi’s customized 757 C-32. Division is and will continue to be one of the most powerful weapons in their arsenal. [...]"    

Court cancels furloughs in California [08/12/10] "A judge in California has blocked Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's proposed government employee furloughs, citing undue hardship to workers. [...]"  

MSM: "Sovereign citizens spin history, reject government" [08/12/10]  Note: Interesting that the Associated Press would even be issuing this potential provocation.

Cops love iPhone data trail [08/11/10] "Detective Josh Fazio of the Will County Sheriff’s Department loves it when an iPhone turns up as evidence in a criminal case. The sophisticated cell phone and mobile computer is becoming as popular with police as it is with consumers because it can provide investigators with so much information that can help in solving crimes. “When someone tells me they have an iPhone in a case, I say, ‘Yeah!’ I can do tons with an iPhone,” said Fazio, who works in the sheriff’s department high-tech crimes unit. The iPhones generally store more data than other high-end phones — and investigators such as Fazio frequently can tap in to that information for evidence. [...]"   

The great American un-recovery: Banking failures and swindling the wealth  [08/11/10] "The economic profession and bankers on Wall Street have taken a hit to their credibility with missing the biggest recession since the Great Depression. It is understandable for the average person on the street to miss something as nuanced as a tiny recession but for a group of professionals whose mission statement involves understanding the economy and then to miss the biggest economic headwinds in a century is just inexcusable. This is no tiny recession. We have witnessed the unfortunate destruction of trillions of dollars and untold damage to the American working and middle class. Yet we are told from these same professionals that we are in a recovery. There is plenty of room to remain skeptical about this group. If we look at the wealth destruction of U.S. households it becomes obvious why there is little feeling of recovery going around: [...]"  

UK: Unemployment 'dips' to 2.46 million [08/11/10] "The UK jobless number fell to 2.46 million in the three months to June, the biggest drop in three years. [...]"   

TX:  Lawyer reassigned after advising employers [08/11/10] "An attorney with the Texas Workforce Commission has been reassigned, the agency said, after he publicly advised employers how to manipulate unemployment laws. The Houston Chronicle reported Wednesday that commission attorney Jonathan Babiak told employers in an agency-sponsored workshop that giving employees the option to resign, rather than face termination, would lower their unemployment benefit obligations because "chances are they won't file a claim." [...]"  

 Trends: New York Jumps Ahead of Feds With Law Holding Mortgage Companies Accountable on Mods [08/11/10] "New York regulators have crafted new laws to give the state authority to punish mortgage servicers -- something the Treasury Department, in administering its struggling mortgage modification program, has so far failed to do. The new rules set clear standards for how servicers must handle homeowners seeking a modification. "We will not hesitate to bring an enforcement action or to refer an enforcement action," said Richard Neiman, the New York superintendent of banks. "In fact, we'll be looking for that case in the event of any wrongdoing, because we know the message it will send to the entire industry."  The delays that hundreds of thousands of homeowners have encountered in the administration's mortgage modification program have highlighted the poor performance by many mortgage servicers -- the companies that process mortgage payments and foreclosures -- particularly the largest: Bank of America, JPMorgan Chase, Wells Fargo and Citigroup. Struggling homeowners seeking a modification frequently wait months, even years, for an answer. The New York laws, which go into effect Oct. 1, lay out how servicers should handle homeowners in danger of foreclosure. Within 10 days of a homeowner's applying for a modification, for example, the servicer is required to acknowledge the request and specify what additional information is needed. Within 30 days of receiving all of the required information, the servicer is required to render its decision and respond with either a written offer or a denial in writing. [...]"    

Activists destroy GMO cornfield in Italy [08/11/10] "Anti-globalization activists have destroyed a field of genetically modified corn near the northeastern Italian town of Pordenone, Italian authorities say. [...]"  

Battle Looms Over Huge Costs of Public Pensions [08/10/10] "There’s a class war coming to the world of government pensions.  The haves are retirees who were once state or municipal workers. Their seemingly guaranteed and ever-escalating monthly pension benefits are breaking budgets nationwide. The have-nots are taxpayers who don’t have generous pensions. Their 401(k)s or individual retirement accounts have taken a real beating in recent years and are not guaranteed. And soon, many of those people will be paying higher taxes or getting fewer state services as their states put more money aside to cover those pension checks. At stake is at least $1 trillion. [...]"  

 OP-Ed: Paul Krugman: America Goes Dark [08/10/10] "We’re told that we have no choice, that basic government functions — essential services that have been provided for generations — are no longer affordable. How did we get to this point? It’s the logical consequence of three decades of antigovernment rhetoric, rhetoric that has convinced many voters that a dollar collected in taxes is always a dollar wasted, that the public sector can’t do anything right. The antigovernment campaign has always been phrased in terms of opposition to waste and fraud — to checks sent to welfare queens driving Cadillacs, to vast armies of bureaucrats uselessly pushing paper around. But those were myths, of course; there was never remotely as much waste and fraud as the right claimed. And now that the campaign has reached fruition, we’re seeing what was actually in the firing line: services that everyone except the very rich need, services that government must provide or nobody will, like lighted streets, drivable roads and decent schooling for the public as a whole. So the end result of the long campaign against government is that we’ve taken a disastrously wrong turn. America is now on the unlit, unpaved road to nowhere. [...]" Related: Trends:  U.S. electricity blackouts skyrocketing " .... Experts on the nation's electricity system point to a frighteningly steep increase in non-disaster-related outages affecting at least 50,000 consumers. During the past two decades, such blackouts have increased 124 percent -- up from 41 blackouts between 1991 and 1995, to 92 between 2001 and 2005, according to research at the University of Minnesota. In the most recently analyzed data available, utilities reported 36 such outages in 2006 alone. "It's hard to imagine how anyone could believe that -- in the United States -- we should learn to cope with blackouts," said University of Minnesota Professor Massoud Amin, a leading expert on the U.S. electricity grid. Amin supports construction of a nationwide "smart grid" that would avert blackouts and save billions of dollars in wasted electricity.  ...]"

 U.S. Politics: Leading Republicans call for "partial repeal of 14th Amendment" [08/09/10] "A constituency within the political establishment has been consolidating in recent months for a repeal of the citizenship clause of the 14th Amendment to the US Constitution, which provides that every person born in the US is guaranteed citizenship. This reactionary proposal, ostensibly to combat “illegal” immigration, has broad and far-reaching consequences for democratic rights in the US. Various proposals for overturning the citizenship clause of the 14th Amendment have been festering in extreme right-wing circles for decades. Republican Congressman Elton Gallegly of California claims to have supported legislation to that effect for 20 years, having introduced a bill along similar lines in 1991. Nevertheless, this latest proposal, in the form of a constitutional amendment, has found significant support among top figures in the US political establishment and the media. Over the past week, leading Republican senators have publicly given consideration to introducing a constitutional amendment that would repeal the citizenship clause, including John McCain of Arizona, the 2008 Republican presidential candidate, Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, John Cornyn of Texas, Jon Kyl of Arizona, and Jeff Sessions, the highest-ranking Republican on the Senate Judiciary Committee. Mitch McConnell, the Republican leader in the Senate, indicated that he supported holding hearings on whether the 14th Amendment citizenship right should be abolished. [...]"   

Brussels ponders direct EU taxes [08/09/10] "The European Commission wants EU member states to consider allowing it to levy direct taxes - a move that could ease the burden on national budgets. [...]"    

Dry Pet Food Linked to Human Salmonella Outbreak [08/09/10] "Between 2006 and 2008, pet food sickened 79 people in 21 states."  Note: What's for dinner tonight? Kibbles again? Sigh...

UK:  "Police reform to create FBI-style national agency in Britain" [08/07/10] "Britain’s Conservative-Liberal coalition government is seeking to implement what has been described as the most “radical” reform of policing in 50 years. The government’s proposals, “Policing in the 21st Century: Reconnecting Police and the People”, have been described as efforts to “democratise” the police force and make it more accountable to local communities. But this is merely the cover for measures aimed at centralising and strengthening the police, particularly through the establishment of an FBI-style National Crime Agency (NCA). By 2013 it is proposed that the new NCA will replace the existing Serious Organised Crime Agency (SOCA) that was set up by Labour in 2006. The NCA will also take on many of the responsibilities of other agencies, such as the Association of Chief Police Officers (ACPO), which is set to lose its influence over operational matters at the national level. [...]"  Note:  This will never happen, as there is not enough time left.

Forced to retire, some take Social Security early [08/08/10] "It is one of the most striking fallouts from the bad economy: Social Security is facing its first-ever shortfall this year as a wave of people like Skidmore opt to collect payments before their full retirement age. Adding to the strain on the trust are reduced tax collections sapped by the country's historic unemployment - still at 9.5 percent.  More people filed for Social Security in 2009 - 2.74 million - than any year in history, and there was a marked increase in the number receiving reduced benefits because they filed ahead of their full retirement age. The increase came as the full Social Security retirement age rose last year from 65 to 66. In the annual report of the Social Security program released Thursday, the trustees said that pension and disability payments will exceed revenues for this year and 2011, reflecting the deep recession. The report forecast that the program would return to the black in 2012 through 2014, but that benefit payments will again exceed tax collections in 2015. For every year after 2015, the report projects that Social Security will be paying out more than it receives in tax collections as 78 million baby boomers begin retiring. The trustees did not focus on the growth of early retirees in their report, as they don't expect the early retirees to significantly drain funds over the long-term. Early opt-ins receive smaller monthly checks so that they aren't projected to receive any more money over a lifetime than they would if they had waited to collect Social Security until their full retirement age. [...]"  Note: Interesting how the Social Security program benefits those who 'live' long long lives ... 

Wheat rots in India as world prices at 2 year high [08/08/10] "A wheat stockpile in India that could feed 210 million people for a year is starting to spoil because the government lacks enough warehouses to store it — a lightning rod for local discontent that could send ripples through the world market for the grain... [...]"   

Commentary: Empathy and Psychopathy as Competing Value Systems in Politics and Economics [08/08/10] "Four to five percent of the population is born without a capacity for empathy. It is a neurological lack. A psychopath may be a genius and become a multimillionaire, but he will never be able to understand empathetic values. In fact, because of the grandiosity of these personalities and consequent intense denial they have toward their shortcomings, they are arguably less capable of understanding empathy than a congenitally deaf person is of understanding music. Their minds are closed. Psychopaths treat the empathetic majority as the defective ones and seek relentlessly to remake the world in their own image, to proselytize their viewpoint and values and to "teach" their "defective" empathetic fellows to think like them. Unfortunately, they can. A psychopath can never learn to think like an empathetic person. The functioning brain tissue is just not there. But people with a normal capacity for empathy can turn off that capacity and think like psychopaths. To a certain extent, the empathetic do this as a matter of evolution. As studies of war, racism and genocide indicate, humans draw what Martha Stout called circles of empathy. They behave empathetically toward those in the circle and psychopathically toward those outside the circle. However, we are not hardwired for xenophobic violence like chimps. For us it is a function of learning and culture. [...]"   

FL:  Pinellas and Pasco Counties Using Federal Stimulus Money To Kick 33,000 Families Out Of Their Homes [08/07/10] "Pinellas County is seeing more than 500 new foreclosure cases every month, adding to a serious backlog of cases.  The 6th Judicial Circuit hopes to speed up the process with the help of federal stimulus funding.  Under the summary judgment system, dozens of cases are heard in a couple of hours. Although summary judgements aren't new, the court has more resources dedicated to the process, thanks to stimulus dollars. Senior judges and temporary case managers have been hired to work on the backlog of cases. With the extra judges now handling cases the hope is more than half of the backlog will be depleted within a year.  The 6th Circuit received more than $300,000 to cover extra salaries and court expenses.  More than 33,000 mortgage foreclosure cases are currently open in Pinellas and Pasco Counties. [...]"  

Trends:  Governments Go to Extremes as the Downturn Wears On [08/07/10] "Plenty of businesses and governments furloughed workers this year, but Hawaii went further — it furloughed its schoolchildren. Public schools across the state closed on 17 Fridays during the past school year to save money, giving students the shortest academic year in the nation and sending working parents scrambling to find care for them. Many transit systems have cut service to make ends meet, but Clayton County, Ga., a suburb of Atlanta, decided to cut all the way, and shut down its entire public bus system. Its last buses ran on March 31, stranding 8,400 daily riders.  Even public safety has not been immune to the budget ax. In Colorado Springs, the downturn will be remembered, quite literally, as a dark age: the city switched off a third of its 24,512 streetlights to save money on electricity, while trimming its police force and auctioning off its police helicopters.  Faced with the steepest and longest decline in tax collections on record, state, county and city governments have resorted to major life-changing cuts in core services like education, transportation and public safety that, not too long ago, would have been unthinkable. And services in many areas could get worse before they get better. The length of the downturn means that many places have used up all their budget gimmicks, cut services, raised taxes, spent their stimulus money — and remained in the hole. Even with Congress set to approve extra stimulus aid, some analysts say states are still facing huge shortfalls.  [...]"  

 Concepts and Practices: Voters Reject Notion That “Government Can Do Anything It Likes” [08/07/10] "A Rasmussen poll indicates that an overwhelming eighty-six percent (86%) of voters nationwide say there should be “limits on what the federal government can do”, in response to recent comments from pro-Obamacare Congressman Pete Stark. Following criticism surrounding the constitutional basis of government run health care, Stark told an audience at a town hall meeting in Hayward California that the federal government had the power to do anything. [...]"  Video clip included.    

 US:  7.9 million jobs lost, many forever [08/07/10] [5:52]  "The recession killed off 7.9 million jobs. It's increasingly likely that many will never come back. The government jobs report issued Friday shows that businesses have slowed their pace of hiring to a relative trickle. "The job losses during the Great Recession were so off the chart, that even though we've gained about 600,000 private sector jobs back, we've got nearly 8 million jobs to go," said Lakshman Achuthan, managing director of Economic Cycle Research Institute. Excluding temporary Census workers, the economy has added fewer than 100,000 jobs a month this year -- a much faster and stronger jobs recovery than occurred following the last two recessions in 2001 and 1991. But even if that pace of hiring were to double immediately, it would take until 2013 to recapture the lost jobs. And the labor market very likely doesn't have years before it gets hit with the shock of the inevitable next economic downturn. [...]"  

Trends: UK: Food Prices On The Rise [08/07/10] "... But away from the special offers, having already made the switch from more up-market chains such as Sainsbury and Waitrose, Mr Gaffney says he has “noticed even in here prices have gone up ... It’s across the board, really, because the price of grain has gone up, which is used to feed the animals." [...]"    Wheat price fears hit food shares [08/06/10]  "Shares in brewers and food producers fall on fears that rising wheat prices could hit their profit margins. [...]" 

Drinking and driving banned in Russia [08/06/10] "A new zero-tolerance drinking and driving law is in effect in Russia, forbidding drivers from touching even a drop of alcohol before driving, officials said. [...]"    

Valedictorian Exposes Education Sham [08/06/10] "The following speech was delivered by top of the class student Erica Goldson during the graduation ceremony at Coxsackie-Athens High School on June 25, 2010 [...]"  Note:  Good job.

Court Upholds Missouri 'Obstruction' Ordinance [08/06/10] "The 8th Circuit has reinstated a Springfield, Mo., ordinance allowing police officers to jail a mother for berating them as they arrested her son outside her home. [...]"  Note:  Dogs in people suits.

 UK: Food Prices Warning as World Wheat Costs Rise [08/05/10] "Shoppers were warned today that food prices are set to soar further, after food inflation already jumped in July. Hovis group Premier Foods said it will have to pass the soaring cost of wheat on to retailers, leading to fears that the shelf price of a loaf of bread could rise by up to 10p. The warning comes as new figures showed food inflation already rising. The British Retail Consortium said food prices in July were 2.5% up on a year earlier, compared to a figure of only 1.7% in June. The BRC blamed higher animal feed and wheat costs, and strong rises in the global price of other commodities such as palm oil, cocoa and soya oil. And it warned that shoppers could be in for more expensive groceries as world commodity prices rise. [...]"  Related:  Russian, in drought, bans grain exports  "Russia said Thursday it would suspend selling grain abroad for at least five months because of a prolonged drought withering wheat and other crops in the field. [...]"     See 'Food Resources' link at the top of the Society and Living panel for related stories.

 UK: Special constable convicted of Wigan ex-soldier attack [08/05/10] [2:09] "A special constable from Greater Manchester Police (GMP) has been convicted of assaulting an ex-solider during an attempted arrest in Wigan. Former L/Cpl Mark Aspinall had been ejected from a nightclub in Wigan when special constable Peter Lightfoot and two officers tried to arrest him. Lightfoot was convicted by a jury at Manchester Minshull Street Crown Court of assault occasioning actual bodily harm. [...]"   

Food stamp use hit record 40.8m in May [08/05/10] "The number of Americans who are receiving food stamps rose to a record 40.8 million in May as the jobless rate hovered near a 27-year high, the government reported yesterday. [...]"  Note: Didn't Congress just cut some funding for the food stamp program?

US foreign aid to subsidize outsourced jobs in South Asia [08/05/10] LINK FIXED "Is American foreign aid being used to subsidize the creation of over seas jobs that replace US workers? A recent project announced by USAID suggests the answer may be yes. The US Embassy in Sri Lanka announced late last week that it will be funding a new program in the South Asian country that will help train workers to speak English and business managers to take advantage of business outsourcing. The program will be involved in "training companies to establish professional IT and English skills development training centers in each of the five districts in the Northern Province," the Embassy announced on its Web site. "Courses in Business Process Outsourcing, Enterprise Java, and English Language Skills will be offered at no charge to over 3,000 under- and unemployed students who will then participate in on-the-job training schemes with private firms." The program to teach Sri Lankans how to benefit from outsourcing joins three other projects that USAID, the State Department's foreign aid arm, is funding in the country. Another of these projects involved USAID helping "a major garment manufacturer to expand its operations to northern Sri Lanka. This alliance is expected to initially employ 750 full-time staff and market its finished apparel to such firms as Tommy Hilfiger, Polo Ralph Lauren, Columbia Sportswear, Next, Tesco, and Burberry." All told, the projects are expected to create 10,000 jobs in Sri Lanka. [...]"  Note: Talk about a country saying 'fuck you' to its own people.  

Senate breaks filibuster, passes $26B in aid to states [08/04/10] "Senate Democrats on Wednesday overcame Republican opposition and cleared the way for a $26 billion measure to help states ease their severe budget problems and save the jobs of tens of thousands of teachers and other public employees.  The bill advanced by a 61-38 tally that ensures the measure will pass the Senate on Wednesday or Thursday. The House may return early during from its August recess for a final vote that would deliver the bill to President Barack Obama, his larger jobs agenda curtailed by Republicans who argue against the spending it would entail. Moderate Republican Sens. Olympia Snowe and Susan Collins of Maine cast the key votes to break the GOP filibuster. The bill would extend programs enacted in last year's stimulus law to help preserve the jobs of teachers, police officers, firefighters and other public employees. The legislation is scaled back from versions that stalled earlier this summer as part of a larger tax-and-spend measure extending jobless benefits and a variety of expired tax breaks. The first piece is $16 billion to help states with their Medicaid budgets in the first six months of next year. [...]"   

Cross-dressers flogged in Sudan [08/04/10] "A group of men are flogged in Sudan after a court rules they broke strict moral codes by dressing and dancing in a "womanly" way. [...]"   

 UK: More than 70 countries make being gay a crime [08/04/10] "A comprehensive study of global lesbian, bisexual and gay rights, seen by The Independent on Sunday, reveals the brutal – and, in many instances, fatal – price people pay around the globe for their sexuality. The research, which was conducted by the charity network the International Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Trans and Intersex Association (ILGA), shows that 76 countries still prosecute people on the grounds of their sexual orientation – seven of which punish same-sex acts with death. On a global scale, the nations doing something positive for gay rights are dwarfed by those behaving negatively. While 75 countries will imprison you if you are gay, only 53 have anti-discrimination laws that apply to sexuality. Only 26 countries recognise same-sex unions. [...]"   

Government OKs $600M in housing aid for 5 states [08/04/10] "The Obama administration plans to send $600 million to help unemployed homeowners avoid foreclosure in five states.  The Treasury Department said Wednesday that mortgage-assistance proposals submitted by North Carolina, Ohio, Oregon, Rhode Island and South Carolina received approval. The states estimate their efforts could help up to 50,000 homeowners. The administration is directing $2.1 billion from its existing $75 billion mortgage assistance program to a total of 10 states. Each state designed its own plan. Treasury approved money in June for Arizona, California, Florida, Michigan and Nevada.  The Obama administration has rolled out numerous attempts to tackle the foreclosure crisis but has made only a small dent in the problem. More than 40 percent, or about 530,000 homeowners, have fallen out of the administration's main effort to assist those facing foreclosure. That program provides lenders with incentives to reduce mortgage payments. So far, it has provided permanent help to about 390,000 homeowners, or 30 percent of the 1.3 million who have enrolled since March 2009. In the latest package of aid, Ohio will receive $172 million — the largest amount of money. That could aid around 15,000 homeowners by helping borrowers pay their mortgage for up to a year while they search for jobs. It could also provide incentives for mortgage companies to reduce borrowers' mortgage balances. [...]" 

Arson and Foreclosures [08/04/10] "Cases of arson are on the rise as more and more homeowners turn to it as a tool to destroy their long time investments gone badly. Houses which people used to own are being burned on the orders of their previous owners who could not handle the grief of loosing their homes. Many do not have any alternatives in terms of residence ending up in rental homes or apartments. Grief sets in and even anger which triggers them to make irrational decisions such as burning their previous homes so no one else can benefit from all their hard work which went down the drain. [...]"  Related:  Iowa Couple Sentenced to Prison for Burning Foreclosed Home "The Associated Press recently reported that a LeClaire couple will spend up to 10 years in prison for burning down the house they lost in foreclosure and filing a fraudulent insurance claim. [...]" Foreclosed Beach Home goes up in flames  "A house on Water Oak Circle in Panama City was destroyed by fire on Tuesday. Authorities say humans are likely responsible. [...]" Fannie and Freddie's Foreclosure Barons  "How the federal housing agencies—and some of the biggest bailed-out banks—are helping shady lawyers make millions by pushing families out of their homes. [...]"  

Senate Cuts Food Stamps; Leaves Oil and Gas Subsidies Intact [08/04/10] "America's poor rarely catch a break these days. The Senate is expected to vote today for a bill that will cut food stamp benefits by $6.1 billion to help fund Medicaid and teachers' jobs, reasoning they were too high now that food costs are lower than predicted. Proponents essentially argued that poor people had too much money for food. As the Washington Post's Ezra Klein explains, last year's federal Recovery Act increased the amount of money for food stamps, or the Supplemental Nutritional Assistance Program (SNAP), to about $80 more per household each month. Amid the recession and high unemployment, about six million more people registered for the program in the past year alone, so program costs boomed from $20 billion to $65 billion. Meanwhile, food prices have deflated from last year's high rates. Now people are able to get more bang for their buck, hence the Senate's idea to cut payments. It's frustrating not only because America's poor, working, and middle class are suffering at record levels and could use this tiny leg up, but also because it's a really stupid cut for the overall economic picture: According to Klein, food stamps serve as one of the best forms of stimulus money, to the tune of $1.70 of activity for every dollar spent. In other words, our economy desperately needs this. [...]"   

World Heading For A New Food Crisis As Russian Wheat Crop Falters [08/04/10] "The danger of a major food crisis developing, underscores the need for NAWAPA projects not only in the U.S., but in Eurasia and Africa as well. This is reflected in a 50% increase in wheat prices over the last month, reportedly due to severe drought conditions in Russia, Ukraine, and Kazakhstan. [...]"    See 'Food Resources' link at the top of the Society and Living panel for related stories.

 UK: Food prices set to soar after "Perfect Storm' figures released [08/04/10] "The British food industry is preparing for a massive jump in food inflation in the wake of soaring animal feed prices, a shortage of silage and poor harvests. These key points could present ‘perfect storm’ conditions for sky-high food prices according to a new report. Experts predict food prices could be at least ten per cent higher by early next year as cost hikes in animal feed – the first link in the food chain – sent shockwaves through the industry, The Grocer reported.  BOCM Pauls, the UK’s biggest animal feed supplier, reported a 20 per cent increase in the price of raw material feed on last year, following a 30 per cent spike in feed wheat costs. The company warned selling prices to dairy, poultry, beef and pig farmers would have to increase by the same amount over the next three months. The National Farmers’ Union said the dry weather had added to problems for farmers by decimating yields of silage for winter feed by up to 50 per cent. Food producers are already reeling from the soaring cost of commodities such as palm oil, cocoa and soya oil, which have leapt 39 per cent, 23 per cent and 14 per cent respectively since last year, according to Mintec figures. Commodity experts from Russia have also announced that the country’s wheat exports could plummet by almost 50 per cent because of a drought, raising fears of a Russian export ban which would have a significant impact on UK food inflation. John Devonald, a food market expert said: “All the conditions are set for a perfect storm in food prices. The implications of a much broader range of effects could see extreme results and possibly present economies with a double-dip recession.” [...]"  Related: USDA Reports Food Shortages: Wall Street 'Caught Off Guard' by Severity

Judge allows teen to refuse chemotherapy [08/04/10] "An Ohio judge refused Tuesday to order a teenager estranged from her Muslim parents to undergo chemotherapy for uterine cancer.  [...]"   

 Commentary: Myths and Reality About People Who Carry Concealed Weapons [08/04/10] "There are lots of people in our world that are overly concerned about law-abiding people carrying guns for self-defense. Their concerns are real but they’re driven by simple ignorance. [...]" 

Investigations: For-Profit Colleges Encouraged Fraud And Used Deceptive Marketing, Watchdog Says [08/04/10] "We’ve been following allegations of enrollment abuses and bogus marketing schemes at for-profit schools for some time now, and a report released by the Government Accountability Office this week further highlights some of the questionable recruiting tactics of several for-profit colleges across the country. Undercover investigators posing as prospective students found that four of 15 for-profit colleges “were encouraged by college personnel to falsify their financial aid forms to qualify for federal aid.” From the report: [...]"  

Lawsuit settled over Ill. deputy’s use of stun gun [08/04/10] "A federal lawsuit that accused a southern Illinois sheriff's deputy of zapping three children with a stun gun at an emergency youth shelter and threatening to sodomize one of them has been settled for $750,000, according to court documents. David Bowers and a fellow Jefferson County deputy who the lawsuit alleged watched Bowers' misconduct at the center near Mount Vernon acknowledged no wrongdoing as part of the deal. One-third of the settlement's payout — covered by the sheriff's department's insurer — will go toward attorneys' fees. Bowers and fellow deputy Lonnie Lawler still work for the department, where their boss — Sheriff Roger Mulch — has defended their actions, insisting the law enforcers followed protocol and did "nothing out of the ordinary." Mulch also has noted that separate investigations by his department and Illinois State Police determined the deputies did nothing wrong. No criminal charges were filed. Mulch declined to comment on the matter Tuesday, citing the advice from his attorney. Bowers and Lawler do not have listed home telephone numbers and could not be reached by The Associated Press. [...]"  

Justice gives AZ sheriff deadline in civil rights probe [08/04/10] "The Justice Department says an Arizona sheriff known for his efforts against illegal immigrants has refused to cooperate with a civil rights investigation and the department is threatening to sue. Since March 2009, the U.S. Justice Department has been investigating Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio's office in Phoenix for alleged discrimination and for unconstitutional searches and seizures. Arpaio says the inquiry is focused on his immigration efforts. In a letter, assistant attorney general Thomas Perez gives the sheriff's office until Aug. 17 to turn over documents first requested last year in what the department calls an inquiry into claims of discrimination based on national origin. [...]"   

Consumer Spending and Incomes in U.S. Stagnate [08/04/10] "Consumer spending and personal incomes in the U.S. unexpectedly stagnated in June, showing a lack of jobs is hurting the biggest part of the economy. [...]"   Note:  If they STILL think it's 'unexpected', they're dumb as a stone. 

States slash pre-K programs as budgets bleed [08/04/10] "States are cutting hundreds of millions from their prekindergarten budgets, undermining years of working to help young children — particularly poor kids — get ready for school. States are slashing nearly $350 million from their pre-K programs by next year and more cuts are likely on the horizon once federal stimulus money dries up, according to the National Institute for Early Education Research at Rutgers University. The reductions mean fewer slots for children, teacher layoffs and even fewer services for needy families who can't afford high-quality private preschool programs. One state — Arizona — has proposed eliminating its 5,500-child program entirely. Illinois cut $32 million from last fiscal year's pre-k budget and plans to slash another $48 million this year. "The overall impact is less access to a quality education in the early years at a time when parents have reduced capability to purchase that on their own," said Steve Barnett, co-director of the Rutgers institute. "Families are getting hit from both sides." Wealthier parents can afford to send their kids to private preschools, but children from poorer families will likely languish in lower-quality childcare that doesn't prepare them for kindergarten, experts said. [...]"   

FBI Continues Attack on Civil Rights, Demands Increased Powers [08/03/10] "Last week, The Washington Post concluded a two-year investigation of our government’s domestic spying activities, revealing a lack of accountability pervading its far-flung and vast operations. Last week, FBI Director Robert S. Mueller testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee, confirming that the FBI is violating the constitutional rights of Americans en masse – as it has done before. [...] the FBI currently conducts monitoring and surveillance operations based on neither evidence nor suspicion [...] "  

Trends:  Popularity of Farming Soars in Massachusetts [08/03/10] "After decades of decline, farming is resurging across the state. New farmers are graduates fresh out of college, immigrants with farming backgrounds, or former professionals starting second careers. Many begin as part-timers while hanging on to day jobs to supplement their incomes. Those looking to make a new living from tilling the soil begin at training programs run by the state, universities, or nonprofit organizations — and the skills they learn have as much to do with running a business as with harvesting a crop. In Massachusetts, where farmland is scarce, most lease their acreage from the state, private owners, nonprofits, or farmers with more space than they can cultivate. [...]"  

 Commentary: "The Myth of an 'Overcrowded Planet' and Why the Elites Want Us to Think That" [08/03/10] "... Did you know that everyone on the planet could live in an area the size of Texas? Yep that’s right and it’s not a difficult arithmetical problem to solve. You simply divide the landmass by the amount of people on the planet. Now I’m sure some will state quite rightly that not all the land in Texas for example is habitable but we should remember we’re only talking about Texas here. There is ample habitable land in other states or countries which could adequately cope with every person on Earth with enough space to not only have a sizable home but also enough space to grow their own healthy food. This fact also destroys the myth that too many people will lead to a world food shortage. The only reason there will be a food shortage is if it’s artificially created. This process of artificial food scarcity is actually ongoing as more and more farmers are put out of business through government regulation or are being paid not to grow food. The United Nations itself has said in their own documents that Africa could feed the world so why are Africans starving? [...]"   

 Concepts and Practices: "Ignorance of the Law Is No Excuse" [08/03/10] "Ignorance of the law is no excuse. That's the standard line motorists hear when they say they weren't aware of the speed limit, or gun owners hear when they say didn't know about the gun laws in the jurisdiction they happened to get arrested in. Yet that ignorance is pretty understandable in an America where just about everything is being criminalized. At the federal level alone there are now more than 4,500 separate crimes, and that's not counting the massive regulatory code, violations of which also can sometimes be punished with criminal charges. As citizens, we're expected to know and obey all of these laws, in addition to state and local statutes and the relevant court opinions that interpret the breadth and depth of all of those laws. But what happens when law enforcement officials don't know the law? What happens when they illegally detain, arrest, and charge you even though you've done nothing wrong? Unlike you, their ignorance doesn't result in arrest or jail. And unless the violation is pretty egregious, they're unlikely to be punished for it. Consider the case of Brian Kelly. [...] And Kelly isn't the only person this has happened to. Last month, Allegheny County, Pennsylvania settled a lawsuit with Elijah Matheny, who was arrested and charged in 2009 for recording the police with a cell phone camera. Part of the settlement requires the Allegheny County DA's office to instruct local police that citizens in Pennsylvania have the right to record on-duty police officers.  That's a start. But it's one county, in one state. There have also been recent wiretapping arrests of citizens recording police in Maryland, New Hampshire, and Oregon, despite the fact that all three states have privacy provisions in their wiretapping laws, and that no court in the country has ruled that on-duty cops have an expectation of privacy in public spaces or while performing their official duties. The justification for those arrests is that the citizens of those states should know that antiquated laws covering the tapping of phone lines also make it illegal to record a police officer with a cell phone. But just as in Pennsylvania, it is law enforcement officials themselves who are wrong on the law. And even in the rare case where a wrongful arrest leads to a cash settlement, it's generally paid for by taxpayers, not the law enforcement officials who broke the law in the first place. And the problem goes beyond wiretapping laws. [...] "   

Trends:  Baltimore Puts House Up for Sale Over $3.91 in Unpaid Taxes [08/03/10] "Westport rowhouse goes to tax sale over citations for the state of the yard and $3.91 in property taxes [...] By law, the citations against Nickels for trash in his property's backyard and other maintenance issues couldn't have forced him into a tax sale. Neither could the $3.91 tax bill, left over when he mistakenly paid the wrong amount in 2008. But together, they did.  ...  "What the city's done is privatized the tax collection, and given the tax-sale purchasers these ridiculously high incentives to take advantage of people who make small mistakes," said Freeman, with the law firm of Brown, Goldstein & Levy. Nickels, who lives in Abingdon and runs his own roofing company, appears to have gotten caught in a farce of compounding errors."  Note:  More from the delusional mental construct called the 'american dream', based on a dynamic in the late 1940's and 1950's ... the underpinnings of which were altered over time.

  UK: National Citizenship Service for 16-year-olds launched today [08/03/10] "The “National Citizen Service” will bring together 16-year-olds from different backgrounds and around the country to become community volunteers and join in outdoor pursuits. David Cameron has said that he hopes participation in the non-military, voluntary form of national service will become a “rite of passage” for all teenagers. It is being announced by Francis Maude, the Cabinet Office Minister, as part of the Government’s drive to create a “Big Society” of volunteers. While critics have cast doubt over whether teenagers would be prepared to give up their summer holidays to participate in the programme, the scheme is close to the Prime Minister’s heart. He was a member of the cadet force while at Eton College, and has also spoken of how much he enjoyed volunteering to help shop for local elderly people while at school. He wants the Service to become one of the “proudest legacies” of his Government. As well as giving 16-year-olds a sense of “purpose, optimism and belonging,” Mr Cameron has said that he hopes that the scheme will promote a sense of greater community cohesion. Teenagers would be put into mixed groups to ensure that they got to know youngsters from different social groups, ethnicities and parts of the country from their own. When he announced the Citizen Service during the general election, Mr Cameron said: “I want to see a programme which engages young people and gives them a sense of purpose, optimism and belonging. “Something like national service, but not military, not compulsory but universal.  “And in the same spirit, mixing up people from different backgrounds. A residential programme, so young people have time to live together, work together, play together.” A military form of national service was compulsory in the United Kingdom between 1947 and 1960, and remains in place in a number of countries around the world, including Russia, Israel and China. [...]"    

Trends: Armed Police Raid Private Organic Food Co-Op (Security Camera Footage) [08/03/10] [0:55]  Related:  Raiding and Regulating the New Enemy in the War on Drugs: Rawesome 'Foodies' "As if the prohibition of non-corporate drugs wasn't already enough of a tragedy of liberty, the Feds are now increasingly arming themselves to raid peaceful organic farms, food Co-Ops, and even Amish dairies over raw milk. [...]"    

New ID theft targets kids’ SS numbers [08/02/10] "The latest form of identity theft doesn't depend on stealing your Social Security number. Now thieves are targeting your kid's number long before the little one even has a bank account. Hundreds of online businesses are using computers to find dormant Social Security numbers — usually  those assigned to children who don't use them — then selling those numbers under another name to help people establish phony credit and run up huge debts they will never pay off. Authorities say the scheme could pose a new threat to the nation's credit system. Because the numbers exist in a legal gray area, federal investigators have not figured out a way to prosecute the people involved. "If people are obtaining enough credit by fraud, we're back to another financial collapse," said Linda Marshall, an assistant U.S. attorney in Kansas City. "We tend to talk about it as the next wave." The sellers get around the law by not referring to Social Security numbers. Instead, just as someone might pay for an escort service instead of a prostitute, they refer to CPNs — for credit profile, credit protection or credit privacy numbers. [...] Julia Jensen, an FBI agent in Kansas City, discovered the scheme while investigating a mortgage-fraud case. She has given presentations to lenders across the Kansas City area to show them how easy it is to create a false credit score using these numbers. "The back door is wide open," she said. "We're trying to get lenders to understand the risks." It's not clear how widespread the fraud is, mostly because the scheme is difficult to detect and practiced by fly-by-night businesses. But the deception is emerging as millions of Americans watch their credit scores sink to new lows. Figures from April show that 25.5 percent of consumers — nearly 43.4 million people — now have a credit score of 599 or below, marking them as poor risks for lenders. They will have trouble getting credit cards, auto loans or mortgages under the tighter lending standards banks now use. The scheme works like this: ..."  [...]   

Trends: Welcome to El Centro, CA: Unemployment 28% [08/02/10] "El Centro, California, and nearby Yuma, Arizona, have the country's highest and second-highest official unemployment rate, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. In the U.S., 128 metropolitan areas have official jobless rates of more than 10%, but El Centro leads the way with 27.6%. [...]"   

New York police to continue stop-and-frisk onslaught despite new law [08/02/10] "The New York City police will continue subjecting hundreds of thousands of working class and minority youth to stop-and-frisks, despite a new state law limiting the NYPD’s power to store information on these encounters in electronic data bases. [...]"  

Iraq establishes special court to prosecute journalists [08/02/10] "Iraq is seeking to extend the powers of the state over the media, with the announcement earlier this month of the creation of a special court to try journalists. [...]"  

Expert: Supreme Court decisions allow ‘cops to work around Miranda’ [08/02/10] "You have the right to remain silent, but only if you tell the police that you're remaining silent. You have a right to a lawyer — before, during and after questioning, even though the police don't have to tell you exactly when the lawyer can be with you. If you can't afford a lawyer, one will be provided to you. Do you understand these rights as they have been read to you, which, by the way, are only good for the next two weeks? The Supreme Court made major revisions to the now familiar Miranda warnings this year. The rulings will change the ways police, lawyers and criminal suspects interact amid what experts call an attempt to pull back some of the rights that Americans have become used to over recent decades. The high court has made clear it's not going to eliminate the requirement that police officers give suspects a Miranda warning, so it is tinkering around the edges, said Jeffrey L. Fisher, co-chair of the amicus committee of the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers. [...]"  

Arizona Sheriff: 'Our Own Government Has Become Our Enemy' [08/02/10] "Pinal County (Ariz.) Sheriff Paul Babeu, whose deputies patrol a county along the U.S.-Mexico border, is hopping mad at the federal government. Babeu told CNSNews.com that rather than help law enforcement in Arizona stop the hundreds of thousands of people who come into the United States illegally, the federal government is targeting the state and its law enforcement personnel. “What’s very troubling is the fact that at a time when we in law enforcement and our state need help from the federal government, instead of sending help they put up billboard-size signs warning our citizens to stay out of the desert in my county because of dangerous drug and human smuggling and weapons and bandits and all these other things and then, behind that, they drag us into court with the ACLU,” Babeu said. [...]"  Related:  Babeu is new face of Arizona sheriffs  | “Our own government has become our enemy and is taking us to court at a time when we need help,” Babeu said. Babeu's website links to a July 28 Fox 10 interview, in which he said something similar after a judge blocked key provisions of the controversial law: "Our own government, our own federal government is our enemy here."

American Manufacturing Can No Longer Compete [08/01/10] "Today there are fewer manufacturing employees than in 1955, and over the past 20 years 3.7 million manufacturing jobs have been lost. These figures are a grim reminder that America can no longer manufacture competitively.  How did this happen? Two causes stand out: low international wage rates in countries like China and Mexico that America will not and cannot compete with, and America’s abandonment of capital and knowledge intensive industries. [...]"  

UK: Food inflation 'could go beyond 10pc before next year' [08/01/10] "The price of milk, cheese, chicken, beef and pork and associated products are all expected to rise because the industry has been hit by soaring animal feed prices, a shortage of silage and poor harvests. Food inflation is closely linked to overall inflation and some in the industry have warned it could push the economy towards a "double-dip" recession. BOCM Pauls, Britain's biggest animal feed supplier, has reported a 20 per cent increase in the price of raw material feed on last year The cost of wheat used as animal feed has also jumped by 30 per cent. The company warned that the price at which it sells feed to dairy, poultry, beef and pig farmers would have to increase by the same amount over the next three months, trade magazine The Grocer said. It is possible that such a margin could be passed on to consumers, however, it is unlikely to be passed on in full. Instead, prices are likely to go up while producers' and retailers' profit margins are also squeezed. [...]"    

Study: 'Western diet' linked to ADHD [08/01/10] "Australian researchers linked the "Western-style" diet -- processed, fried and refined foods -- and attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder. Researchers at Perth's Telethon Institute for Child Health Research say a diet high in the Western pattern of foods high in fat, refined sugar and sodium -- is associated with more than double the risk of having an ADHD diagnosis compared with a diet low in the Western pattern. Oddy and colleagues examined the dietary patterns of 1,800 adolescents of whom 115 had been diagnosed with ADHD by age 14. [...]" 

Homes keep falling into foreclosure as programs fail to help [07/30/10] "More than three years into the housing crisis that helped trigger a worldwide recession, the torrid pace of home foreclosures continues to tear at the core of the "American dream". New figures Thursday from Realty-Trac showed that foreclosure activity declined over the first six months of the year in nine of the 10 large metropolitan areas with the highest foreclosure rates. However, most of the 206 metropolitan areas with 200,000-plus residents didn't fare as well. In fact, three out of four posted year-to-year increases in their foreclosure rates. Seventeen of the 20 hardest-hit areas were in Florida and California In the first half of 2010, more than 1.6 million U.S. properties were hit with foreclosure filings, which include bank repossessions, default notices and auction sale notices. That's up 8 percent from the first six months of 2009 and puts the U.S. on pace to top 3 million filings this year. That includes more than a million bank repossessions, and while sub-prime borrowers and bad loans led the surge in foreclosures in 2008 and 2009, this year's wave comes from homeowners who've lost their jobs. [...]"  Note: This whole 'American dream' notion is circa 1952 ... no where in the universe do societal policies work forever ... the model of the 'American dream', and later, 'going to college to get a good job' would eventually be out of context with reality, yet encouraged by the greedy banks and social control systems. 

Busier people may be happier than the idle [07/30/10] "People with a sense of purpose who accomplish a lot, or even those who fill their days with pointless activity, are happier than the idle, U.S. researchers say. [...]"   

Iran: "US taints Marlboros with pig blood, nuke material, sends them to Iran" [07/30/10] "An Iranian official says cigarettes smuggled into Iran have been tainted with pig blood and nuclear material as part of a Western conspiracy. The semiofficial Mehr news agency quotes Mohammad Reza Madani from the Society for Fighting Smoking as saying contraband Marlboros have been contaminated with pig hemoglobin and unspecified nuclear material. [...]"   

The “new normal”: More than one in five Americans at risk of destitution [07/29/10] "More than one in five Americans in 2009 suffered a household income loss of 25 percent or more over the previous year, according to a new report sponsored by the Rockefeller Foundation and entitled “Economic Security at Risk.” The report documents a steady increase in economic insecurity since the 1960s, and concludes that annual income losses of 25 percent or greater increased by 49.9 percent between 1985 and 2009....The report does not include 2010, when long-term joblessness has become endemic. The ESI for this year will doubtless be considerably higher than for 2009. The study notes that a staggering 60 percent of Americans experienced at least one income loss of 25 percent or more over the 1966-2006 period, and that losses of this size have become more common across most income sectors since the mid-1980s. [...]"    

Collapse of Dysfunctional States Is Another Step To The Federal Bubble Detonation [07/29/10] "An important thing to remember during this financial crisis is that it’s not just the federal government that has mismanaged the public’s money by taking on too much debt and entitlement promises like social security and medicare which it simply cannot service. Like the central planners in Washington D.C., many of our states are also in trouble, namely because of social service programs like state health care and state pension funds. Over the last several years many state pension funds have experienced massive declines and because we’re nowhere near the finish line, we can expect even more destruction as stock invested pensions get decimated in coming months and years. This means that the states will be incapable of making payments not only to pensioners, but they’ll be forced to either make massive cuts in essential services like emergency response and government administration, or borrow money from the federal government - probably both. Here’s how the states fared in a recent study: [...]"  Note:  Interesting graphic

Parts of Arizona immigration law blocked by judge [07/29/10] "A federal judge Wednesday blocked the most controversial parts of Arizona's new immigration law, barring police from checking the immigrant status of suspected criminals. The ruling by US District Court Judge Susan Bolton came just hours before the new law had been due to go into effect, handing temporary victory to civil rights groups and the US government which have challenged the legislation in the court. Bolton is currently hearing seven suits lodged against the law, signed by Republican Arizona governor Jan Brewer. In her ruling, Bolton said the US administration "is likely to succeed" in arguing that some sections of the Arizona legislation were already covered by federal law. White House lawyers have argued that immigration policy is exclusively the government's responsibility and that state laws cannot trump federal rules or the US Constitution. Bolton issued a preliminary injunction suspending the section of the Arizona law requiring police officers to check the immigrant status of any person they have stopped for a violation. She also blocked a provision making it a crime to fail to apply for or carry proper papers, and a third section making it a crime for illegal immigrants to apply for or perform any work. The rest of the law will go into effect across the state in the early hours of Thursday. [...]"  

UK:  'Asbos' could be axed - government [07/29/10] "The Asbo - the "anti-social behaviour order" - was brought in to deal with persistent minor offenders whose actions might not otherwise have been punished. It imposes restrictions, such as banning people from a local area or preventing them from swearing in public. If an Asbo is breached, offenders can face jail. Mrs May said she wanted a review of the powers because police should be able to use their "common sense" to deal with anti-social behaviour. Punishments should be "rehabilitative and restorative", rather than "criminalising", she argued. [...]" Related:   Britain's most unusual Asbos [07/29/10] "Peter Trigger's Asbo stopped him from wearing skirts or showing bare legs on school days between 0830 and 1000 and 1445 and 1600. The authorities acted after parents complained he was waiting near a primary school dressed in clothes similar to school uniform. He then breached this in December last year by bending over in front of his neighbours repeatedly. But a bid to ban an 18-year-old from wearing low-slung trousers was dropped earlier this year. Ellis Drummond, 18, from Rushden, Northants was instead barred from using threatening behaviour and demanding money. [...]"   

Gen Y: No jobs, lots of loans, grim future [07/28/10] "They are perhaps the best-educated generation ever, but they can’t find jobs. Many face staggering college loans and have moved back in with their parents. Even worse, their difficulty in getting careers launched could set them back financially for years.  [...]"  

UK: The N.H.S. Collapses, Foretelling The Bleak Future of America’s Socialized Health Care [07/28/10] "To write that there are problems with the American health care system (symptom management system) is to commit an understatement of gigantic proportions. As a result of frustrations with both incompetence within the system, and the system's strong tendency to bankrupt its own customers, there have been groups of U.S. citizens who have been demanding a nationalized health care system for several years. It says something about the current dismal state that so many U.S. citizens tend to believe that their government would almost certainly do a better job. In many cases, socialized medicine proponents have heralded the British system as an ideal for the U.S. to follow. They have boasted that everyone in the U.K. has access to medical care, regardless of income. An economic disaster has struck the United Kingdom, similar to the one in the U.S.. One quarter of working-age Britons are unemployed, and those having part time jobs has risen 40 percent. One of Britain's first governmental institutions to experience the effects of the country's economic tailspin has been its glorified national system of medicine. The Telegraph has just reported that the British Government is now making health decisions for people, without their consent, in order to halt what it considers to be unnecessary health care expenses. The British Government is suddenly deciding which medical treatments are necessary, and cutting its losses. The British people shall continue paying the same exorbitant amounts in taxes, but for a lower standard of care now, and sometimes to have that care entirely refused against their wishes and wellbeing. The senior citizens are expendable, after all. Right? This is the future of America, when it switches to a similar system. [...]"   

Exposé: Will Public Unions Force California Into Receivership? [8:35]  [07/27/10] "Orange County, CA Supervisor John Moorlach is the only elected official on the Board of Supervisors who has a financial background. As a former CPA he has been very vocal about the influence of the public safety unions that use their political powers to elect politicians with their hefty membership dues to gain retroactive pension benefits that are about to force the County into a second bankruptcy.  [...]"  Note:  Interesting and revealing video clip ... Anger at Overpaid Government Officials in Bell , California   Video clip    

Ultra-Orthodox Jews are holding Israel to ransom  By Julian Kossoff [07/27/10] "My grandfather was an Orthodox Jew by faith. By profession he was a baker who rose at 4 am every morning, apart from the Sabbath, to go to work.  Born in a Fiddler on the Roof-style village ruled by the Tsar, he was more than familiar with the deeply religious world of the ultra-Orthodox Jews – a disparate group of sects, dynasties, schools of thought and beliefs now collectively known as the Haredi. Many were eternal students spending their days studying Torah and praying in the yeshiva, and grandpa had only contempt for their aversion to honest toil. Indeed, there’s a family anecdote about him en route to a Zionist rally shortly after World War Two when he was buttonholed by one of the men in black, wheedling for a donation. An angry exchange ensued, there was a flash of my patriarch’s Russian temper, and with side-curls flying the unfortunate fellow was sent sprawling on the London pavement. “Parasite!” declared Mr Kossoff Snr. A far more refined man than my workaholic, immigrant forefathers, the esteemed Bank of Israel Governor Stanley Fischer has come to the same conclusion. Last week he issued a warning aimed at the Haredi. “We can’t have an ever-increasing proportion of the population continuing to not go to work. By the time you are up to 10 percent of the population of whom 70 percent of the male part of the population doesn’t work, you are getting to a macroeconomic issue,” he said.  No figures are available for the UK or other Diaspora communities, though they no doubt make full use of the modern welfare system to top up their income. But it is in Israel where the exponential growth of the Haredi – birth rates three times the Israeli average – raises the prospect of huge swathes of economically inactive adults undermining the state itself. Arrangements have to be made to force them into work, said Fischer – and fight, your average Israeli would add.  [...] Beyond their closed world there is nothing else of interest – no art, no science, no culture, no history, no innovation, no progress. Six billion other human beings are lumped together as "the goyim", while secular Jews are heretics and sell-outs whose remaining use is via their wallets to profer a donation born out of Judaic nostalgia. The Haredi believe this world is a phase for the next life in heaven and the only way to get into heaven is by knowing Torah, etc. Better still, the Haredi’s devotion and piety will hasten the arrival of the Messiah – heaven on earth – and thus they like to believe they’re “working” for a mankind that they currently want nothing to do with.  [...]"  Note: Israeli society has become a basket case, with innumerable levels of conflict ... and a government with genocidal existential angst. A recipe for ... well ... a whole bunch of photons, all at once ... take everyone with them ....  

Automated Debt-Collection Lawsuits Engulf Courts [07/27/10] "As millions of Americans have fallen behind on paying their bills, debt collection law firms have been clogging courtrooms with lawsuits seeking repayment. Few have been as prolific as Cohen & Slamowitz, a Woodbury, N.Y., firm that has specialized in debt collection for nearly two decades. The firm has been filing roughly 80,000 lawsuits a year. With just 14 lawyers on staff, that works out to more than 5,700 cases per lawyer. How is that possible? The answer to that question is at the heart of a growing debate over the increasing use of the nation’s legal system to collect on bad debts. Like many other firms, Cohen & Slamowitz relies on computer software to help prepare its cases. Collection law firms are able to handle such large volumes of cases because computer software automates much of their work. Typically, a debt buyer sends a law firm an electronic database that contains various data about consumers, including name, home address, the outstanding balance, the date of default and whether interest is still accruing on the account. Once the data is obtained by a law firm, software like Collection-Master from a company called Commercial Legal Software can “take a file and run it through the entire legal system automatically,” including sending out collection letters, summonses and lawsuits, said Nicholas D. Arcaro, vice president for sales and marketing at the company. [...]" 

  UK:  Johnson slams 'unnecessary' police reforms [07/27/10] "The government's planned shake-up of policing in England and Wales is an "unnecessary, unwanted and expensive diversion", shadow home secretary Alan Johnson has said. [...]"   

Trends:  People Begin Living Without Electricity and Water in California [07/27/10] [0:00]  "I couldn't find statistics for local utility shut offs in my area, but I knew we would start to see more and more of this. Houses everywhere are going vacant. People don't say goodbye, they don't leave a number, they just disappear. With their disappearance we add another vacant house to the street. But families living in housing without utilities is a new sight for me to behold. I spoke recently with a rep from So Cal Edison who, full time contacts residence who have had their electricity turned off due to non payment. She has a negotiator sent in and they work on a reduced payment. It's amazing to me, that now, it is becoming acceptable in California to camp out in your home. People are losing their homes, losing their cars and losing their dignity. How are we going to afford kids clothes and school supplies for the coming year? How can we expect families to pay for all these additional costs when the economy is in the shape it in. I ask myself this everyday. [...]"   

Freedom of photography: Police, security often clamp down despite public right [07/27/10] "A lot of these guys have guns and are enforcing laws they obviously don't understand, and they are not to be reasoned with," he said. After detaining Urick for a few minutes and conferring with a colleague on a radio, the officer let him go. [...]"    

 Trends: Cities Give Land Away In Attempt to Gain Taxpayers [07/27/10] "Give away land to make money? It hardly sounds like a prudent scheme. But in a bit of déjà vu, that is exactly what this small Nebraska city aims to do. The calculus is simple, if counterintuitive: hand out city land now to ensure property tax revenues in the future. [...]"   

Collecting rainwater now illegal in many states as Big Government claims ownership over our water [07/27/10] "Many of the freedoms we enjoy here in the U.S. are quickly eroding as the nation transforms from the land of the free into the land of the enslaved, but what I’m about to share with you takes the assault on our freedoms to a whole new level. You may not be aware of this, but many Western states, including Utah, Washington and Colorado, have long outlawed individuals from collecting rainwater on their own properties because, according to officials, that rain belongs to someone else. As bizarre as it sounds, laws restricting property owners from “diverting” water that falls on their own homes and land have been on the books for quite some time in many Western states. Only recently, as droughts and renewed interest in water conservation methods have become more common, have individuals and business owners started butting heads with law enforcement over the practice of collecting rainwater for personal use. Check out this YouTube video of a news report out of Salt Lake City, Utah, about the issue. It’s illegal in Utah to divert rainwater without a valid water right, and Mark Miller of Mark Miller Toyota, found this out the hard way. [...]"  

Trends:  Mass. State workers feverishly taking sick time...as politcos push for reform in private sector [07/27/10] "he nauseating number of state employees banging in ill is compelling one Bay State politician to call for a probe just as the Legislature is set to take up a controversial first-in-the-nation sick-time policy for the private sector. State Rep. Kay Khan said the clock is ticking on her bill mandating seven paid sick days for everyone - and state workers calling in sick in high numbers is an ill-timed irony. “It sounds like something that needs to be investigated, certainly if we’re pushing to get this done in the private sector,” said Khan (D-Newton), after being told of the sick-time tally by the Herald yesterday. “We need more fairness across the board,” she said, adding her bill is in the House Ways and Means Committee and could be up for a vote this week before the legislative session ends Saturday. A Herald investigation of state worker sick-day use shows executive branch employees averaged 8.1 days a year in 2009 - and are on pace to equal that this year. But many call in sick more than that [...]"     

UK: ‘Minority Report’ technology used by police to predict crimes [07/26/10] "Two police forces have begun trialling the sophisticated programme, which has echoes of the Tom Cruise film Minority Report, where psychics are used to stop criminals before they commit a crime. The system, known as Crush (Criminal Reduction Utilising Statistical History) evaluates crime records, intelligence briefings, offender profiles and even weather reports, to identify potential flashpoints where a crime is most likely to occur. The “predictive analytics” technology has been credited as a key factor behind a 31 per cent fall in crime and 15 per cent drop in violent crime in Memphis, Tennessee, according to The Observer. John Williams, of the Memphis Crime Analysis Unit, said: “This is more of a proactive tool than reacting after crimes have occurred. This pretty much puts officers in the area at the time that the crimes are being committed.” The software has been developed by IBM, which has invested $11 billion in analytics over the past four years. Mark Cleverley, the company’s head of government strategy, said: “What the technology does is what police officers have always done, sometimes purely on instinct – looking for patterns to work out what is likely to happen next. “What is different is the scale on which the systems operates and the speed at which the analysis takes place.”  [...]"   Related:  Artificially Intelligent CCTV could prevent crimes before they happen  "... ISIS, short for Integrated Sensor Information System, is being developed by a team at Queen’s University Belfast at its Centre for Secure Information Technologies. It is designed to work with the extensive network of CCTV cameras already installed on buses and trains as well as in stations, airports and on the street. It centres on specially developed “computer vision technology” that analyses images picked up by CCTV and is able to profile individuals to see if they pose a risk and then to check for patterns of behaviour that may be suspicious or anti-social. The computer constantly assesses the situation and if it becomes a major risk alerts a control room who can send out a verbal warning or alert officers nearby to stampout crimes before they occur. Criteria that ISIS will look for are likely to include clothing such as hooded tops, sudden movements, odd behaviour such as moving seats and verbal aggression.  [...] “We have four million cameras across the country at present but their impact on anti-social behaviour is actually fairly negligible,” said Dr Paul Miller, who is part of the 50-strong team. “We aim to develop a system which helps to make crime-free buses, trains, stations and airports a reality. We think it will be a strong deterrent.” "  Note: Critically examining the logic, reasoning of these people, and matching it against what is really the case, and the outcome, is an interesting exercise.  One crime solved for every 1,000 CCTV cameras, senior officer claims  

Pakistan's woes compounded by severe water crisis [07/26/10] "Water availability per person in Pakistan has fallen from about 5,000 cubic meters (175,000 cubic feet) in 1947, when the country was founded, to around 1,000 cubic meters (35,000 cubic feet) today. Most of the drop is the result of a population that has more than quadrupled since independence, but many scientists predict global warming could have a significant impact by shrinking the glaciers that feed Pakistan's rivers. Experts also point to inefficient irrigation methods in Pakistan as a key factor. [...]"  Note: Instead of using part of the billions sent to Pakistan to construct water desalination plants, in order to promote crop growth and supply adequate water to the population, the money gets pocketed by greedy brigands and buffoons. It's all a matter of choice combined with foresight. Of course, they're conceptually hobbled, and largely dumb as a box of rocks, and steeped in base sequential predispositions for power, control, greed, etc., so what should logically happen, doesn't. Other countries have constructed, or plan to construct these plants, so the option is clearly out there.

 Trends: Homeless increase on Hawaii's beaches, creating politicized debate on shipping them out [07/26/10] "Williams is among the growing number of homeless on Oahu taking advantage of inviting beaches and support services in the islands, where they never have to worry about freezing. A census taken earlier this year showed there were more than 4,000 homeless on the island. Officials fear homeless encampments on the beach could damage tourism, and they are weighing several proposals that they say would help the homeless, while moving them from public view. [...]" Related:  Homeless in Hawaii Offered Plane Tickets and Tents to Disappear  "Every morning, Tony Williams wakes to the sound of waves crashing on Hawaii's famed Waikiki beaches and has a spectacular view of the Pacific. But he's not paying a cent for his priceless vista. Williams is among the growing number of homeless on Oahu taking advantage of inviting beaches and support services in the islands, where they never have to worry about freezing. [...]"   

Daily Kos: Take Legal Action to 'End Organized, Institutionalized Religion' [07/26/10] "... Please, do not confuse -- accidentally or on purpose -- my position that we need to end ORGANIZED, INSTITUTIONALIZED religion with my already stated belief that everyone has the right to believe in the big polka-dotted betentacled glamgrum from Aldebaran if you want. Belief is a personal choice and I am regarding it as such. However, institutions with a vested interest in ignorance whose last check on reality was during Nero's time (if then), have to be fought tooth and nail. Was the "reality check" of Nero's time being slaughtered in the Coliseum for an audience? The lions certainly fought those first Christians "tooth and nail."  [...]"  Note: This article was amusing ...  

Too Many Laws, Too Many Prisoners [07/26/10] "Never in the civilised world have so many been locked up for so little [...] Three pickup trucks pulled up outside George Norris’s home in Spring, Texas. Six armed police in flak jackets jumped out. Thinking they must have come to the wrong place, Mr Norris opened his front door, and was startled to be shoved against a wall and frisked for weapons. He was forced into a chair for four hours while officers ransacked his house. They pulled out drawers, rifled through papers, dumped things on the floor and eventually loaded 37 boxes of Mr Norris’s possessions onto their pickups. They refused to tell him what he had done wrong. “It wasn’t fun, I can tell you that,” he recalls."  [...] "

 Trends:  VA Does the Unthinkable, Relaxing Official Federal Position on Medical Marijuana [07/26/10] "The Veterans Administration (VA) is relaxing the rules for veterans who use medical marijuana in states where it is legal. Experts and activists are calling the decision an historic event; it will certainly change the position of many vets currently receiving care, who until now have been restricted under VA rules, to dangerous morphine based drugs for treatment; pills that are both highly addictive, and deadly. The news means veterans will no longer face losing benefits and access to their other prescription pain medication through the VA, if they are caught smoking cannabis. The VA doctors aren’t going to start prescribing medical pot, but if veterans seek that type of medical treatment through another source, they will now be able to discuss it openly with the VA without fear of retribution. According to an article by Dan Frosch in the New York Times: “A department directive, expected to take effect next week, resolves the conflict in veterans facilities between federal law, which outlaws marijuana, and the 14 states that allow medicinal use of the drug, effectively deferring to the states.” [1] One person who has had a major hand in the development of the new ruling, is Michael Krawitz, executive director of Veterans for Medical Marijuana Access, (VMMA). Along with others like Martin Chilcutt, also of VMMA, Krawitz has worked closely with federal officials in reaching the new conclusion. [...]"  

Dam fails in eastern Iowa, causing massive flooding [07/25/10] "A dam on an eastern Iowa lake suffered a “catastrophic” failure Saturday, sending a massive amount of water into nearby communities and forcing residents to flee, officials said. The Lake Delhi dam, about 45 miles north of Cedar Rapids, failed as a result of “massive rain — a very unusually high amount this season,” according to Jim Flansburg, communications director for Gov. Chet Culver. Culver told CNN that nearly 10 inches of rain had recently fallen in a 12-hour period in the area and was “too much water for the dam to hold.” The roads on either side of the dam — which were part of the cement dam’s containment measures — apparently gave out as a result of the rainfall, Flansburg told CNN. The National Weather Service reported a 30-foot-wide gap in the berm alongside the dam. [...]" Video clip  [1:01] 

UK:  The 'plastic chicken' that's only 51% meat [07/25/10] "Shoppers are being fobbed off with low-quality chicken pumped full of chemicals, water and even pig skin. About 40 per cent of the imported chicken sold by catering suppliers undergoes heavy processing. The meat that results is so rubbery and tasteless it is known in the trade as 'plastic chicken'. Huge quantities are involved - about 60,000 tons a year - in what amounts to a massive food fraud. Most of the meat comes from processors in Holland and Belgium, who bring in cheap chickens from Thailand and pump the meat with a chemical mix. The treatment is now so sophisticated that what seems like a fresh, plump chicken breast might be only 51 per cent meat. Much of the plastic chicken goes to curry houses, Chinese restaurants and takeaways, often disguised with highly- spiced sauces and colourings. There are concerns that some is sold to small butchers, while supermarket foods could also include suspect supplies. [...]"  

Battle With Mental Illness:  Right-Wing Charismatic Evangelical Movement Is Burrowing Into The Power Structures Of Major American Cities [07/24/10] "They claim to be able to raise the dead and cause miracles, such as the multiplication of Thanksgiving turkey dinners. They burn "witchcraft items" and "idols." They hold mass exorcisms to cast out alleged evil spirits they say cause lust, pornography, addiction, homosexuality, bisexuality, and perversion. They claim to be able to heal HIV, AIDS, Hepatitis C, Glaucoma, and cancer, and to break "generational curses" and "witchcraft curses." Who are they? Here are a few overviews... They compare opponents of their movement to rats that will be exterminated and one of their leaders has predicted that the regime they're working to create will initially "seem like totalitarianism". They're closely tied to the notorious, so-called "kill the gays bill" before Uganda's Parliament. They're behind Sarah Palin and one of their "prophets" has become the de-facto prayer leader for the Republican Party. While America has fixated on the Tea Party movement, a radical, right-wing charismatic evangelical movement is burrowing into the power structures of major American cities, such as Newark, NJ, and even entire states, such as Alaska and Hawaii. [...]"  Related:  No Dominion: The Lonely, Dangerous Fight Against Christian Supremacists Inside the Armed Forces "In his fight against British imperialism, Mahatma Gandhi described the life cycle of successful civil disobedience: "First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win." Mikey Weinstein, the 55-year-old founder of the Albuquerque, New Mexico-based Military Religious Freedom Foundation (MRFF), likes to quote it, knowing full well he's crossed the line into a bloody-knuckle brawl. Over the past year, Weinstein and his organization have recorded a tremendous string of victories in the fight against Christian supremacists inside the armed forces. [...]"   

Commentary: Homelessness, conundrum for the new decade [07/24/10] Part 1 "This is the tale of two cities. It’s a look at the cities of Boulder and Colorado Springs regarding their municipal approach to a growing problem on the Colorado front range — A problem that’s affecting not only the state, but the entire country as well.  As we all know, Boulder prides itself on being the forward thinking, liberally enlightened and progressive center of academia here in Colorado. While Colorado Springs is seen as more of a conservative military town steeped in fundamentalist Christian values and right wing political views. Yet in spite of these dissimilarities, within the last 12 months both cities have passed very similar ordinances banning camping and sleeping on public property within their city limits. Now in rosier economic times, this would not be an issue. But here in mid 2010, the economy is heading toward what may well be a full-blown economic depression by the end of 2011, and many folks are facing foreclosure and property seizures. New jobs are virtually nonexistent and many existing jobs are being phased out as a result of economic constraints in both the private and the public job markets. As a result, many Americans are now on the verge of homelessness. [...]"  Note: We'll keep an eye out for Part 2. Of course, the Comments after an article like this are always very interesting.

Trends: 20% of Americans hit by major economic loss [07/24/10] Video clip included. "A new study released Wednesday estimates that 20% of Americans suffered a significant economic loss last year - the highest level in the past 25 years. The new Economic Security Index looks at the interaction of three key variables that have a direct bearing on a person's economic security: income loss, medical expenses and debt.  The ESI defines people as economically insecure when their situation meets two criteria. First, within a year's time they have lost 25% or more of their available gross income. Available gross income is the money they have left over after paying for medical costs and debt. Second, they don't have enough in an emergency fund or other liquid reserves to make up the difference.    Hacker noted that it can typically take between six to eight years to restore one's available income to its previous level. Meanwhile, a survey cited by Hacker found that 48% of Americans said last year they only had enough resources to carry them for two months before experiencing any economic hardship.  According to the index, which is based primarily on Census Bureau data, 12.2% of Americans were economically insecure in 1985. By 2009, Hacker and his team estimate that 20.4% of Americans could be classified that way. The actual number of people affected increased by more than half, from 28 million in 1985 to roughly 46 million by 2007, the last year for which hard numbers were available.[...]"    

Social crisis in California deepens for millions [07/24/10] "The seven-week delay by the US Senate in passing an extension of unemployment benefits has considerably deepened the social crisis in California, the most populous state. [...]"  

Friends and Neighbors: The recession's unseen victims [07/24/10] Video clip  "Dateline" anchor Ann Curry travels to Ohio to find out how the Great Recession has affected some of the poorest people in America in this preview report of "America Now: Friends & Neighbors," which airs Sunday, July 25 (7:00 PM/ET) on NBC. (Nightly News) [...]"    

Australia: 90% of Web Surveillance Document Censored to Stop ‘Premature Unnecessary Debate’ [07/24/10] "The federal government has censored approximately 90 per cent of a secret document outlining its controversial plans to snoop on Australians’ web surfing, obtained under freedom of information (FoI) laws, out of fear the document could cause “premature unnecessary debate”. The document was handed out to the industry during a secret briefing it held with ISPs in March. But from the censored document released, it is impossible to know how far the government is planning to take the policy. The government is hiding the plans from the public and it appears to want to move quickly on industry consultation, asking for participants to respond within only one month after it had held the briefings. [...]"   

US jobless claims, housing data point to worsening economy [07/23/10] "...This is a projection for, at best, years of extremely high unemployment, with all of the attendant social consequences. But what shook the stock market on Wednesday was Bernanke’s remark that the economic outlook was “unusually uncertain.” This sent the Dow tumbling, leading to a 109-point drop at the close of trading. [...]"   

UK:  National Citizenship Service for 16-year-olds launched [07/23/10] "The “National Citizen Service” will bring together 16-year-olds from different backgrounds and around the country to become community volunteers and join in outdoor pursuits. David Cameron has said that he hopes participation in the non-military, voluntary form of national service will become a “rite of passage” for all teenagers. It is being announced by Francis Maude, the Cabinet Office Minister, as part of the Government’s drive to create a “Big Society” of volunteers. While critics have cast doubt over whether teenagers would be prepared to give up their summer holidays to participate in the programme, the scheme is close to the Prime Minister’s heart. [...]"  Note:  If there are/will be no jobs, other than government jobs, WHO are these children going to "lead, manage and communicate” with? They will become pawns of the government, as did the Hitler Youth in the 1940's .. to interface, observe and direct the public. Another layer between the public and the cowards and failures that are TPTB.

 Trends: More Car Buyers Paying With Cash Rather Than Borrowing [07/23/10] "It appears the recent economic downturn and spate of fuel price rises has not only changed the types of cars we buy, but also the way we pay for them. The latest study by independent vehicle pricing and information authority Kelley Blue Book has revealed that new car buyers are almost twice as likely to pay for their new purchase with cash as they were just three years ago. [...]"   

"The Public School Nightmare: Why fix a system designed to destroy individual thought?" by John Taylor Gatto [07/22/10] "... Now think about Sweden, a beautiful, healthy, prosperous and up-to-date country with a spectacular reputation for quality in everything it produces. It makes sense to think their schools must have something to do with that. Then what do you make of the fact that you can't go to school in Sweden until you are 7 years old? The reason the unsentimental Swedes have wiped out what would be first and seconds grades here is that they don't want to pay the large social bill that quickly comes due when boys and girls are ripped away from their best teachers at home too early. It just isn't worth the price, say the Swedes, to provide jobs for teachers and therapists if the result is sick, incomplete kids who can't be put back together again very easily. The entire Swedish school sequence isn't 12 years, either – it's nine. Less schooling, not more. The direct savings of such a step in the US would be $75–100 billion, a lot of un-foreclosed home mortgages, a lot of time freed up with which to seek an education. [...]"   

Prominent Hedge Fund Manager’s Idaho Ranch: “It would be a place you could hole up in” [07/22/10] "John Malone isn’t the only well-to-do tycoon with a bug out location. The New York Observer, in The New Doom, discusses various reasons for why those in the upper echelons of earnings are worried about a serious economic and/or political catastrophe: “Life is such a fucking disaster,” a prominent New York hedge fund manager said recently. “We all live in some kind of world we create for ourselves. And I think that what happened is that built into that world were very enlarged expectations about what life was going to be. There’s been this sensation of excessive expectation that, frankly, became unsustainable.” He had just returned from his ranch in the wilderness of central Idaho. “I just like it because it’s massively low human density. It would be a place you could hole up in. But, gosh, I hope that doesn’t happen.” Humans have this poignant desire to feel that we’re in control,” the hedge fund manager said. “I know there will be abrupt change.” The hedge fund manager said he doesn’t even trust gold. “It’s worthless if the social fabric tears,” he said. “We’re going to have to do something different, before we get down to where it’s really bad.” [...]"  

French police use live ammunition against riots over police killings [07/22/10] "Police have mounted large-scale occupations and fired live ammunition against rioters protesting the police killings of two men, in the towns of Grenoble and Saint-Aignan. [...]"     

First-time jobless claims escalate [07/22/10] "First-time claims for U.S. unemployment insurance benefits escalated sharply last week. [...]"   Related: "US initial jobless benefit claims rise" "New claims for US unemployment benefits rose "more than expected" last week, after two weeks of sharp declines linked largely to seasonal layoffs, government data showed Thursday. [...]"  Note:  Always 'more or less than expected' ... for decades ... why don't they just admit that they don't have a clue , because they cannot predict a linear quality in what is essentially a non-linear reality with too many variables. This is what the sequentials  say to excuse their ineptitude and conceptual hobbling. 

"It's Not Illegal to Be Epileptic" [07/22/10] "Mt. Lebanon police arrested and falsely charged a woman with aggravated assault for her actions during a grand mal epileptic seizure, handcuffed her, exacerbating the seizure, and falsely charged her with drug possession, also as a result of her epilepsy, the woman claims in Federal Court. [...]"   

Competing currency being accepted across Mid-Michigan [07/22/10] "New types of money are popping up across Mid-Michigan and supporters say, it’s not counterfeit, but rather a competing currency.  Right now, you can buy a meal or visit a chiropractor without using actual U.S. legal tender.  They sound like real money and look like real money. But you can’t take them to the bank because they’re not made at a government mint. They’re made at private mints.  “I sell three or four every single day and then I get one or two back a week,” said Dave Gillie, owner of Gillies Coney Island Restaurant in Genesee Township.  Gillie also accepts silver, gold, copper and other precious metals to pay for food.  He says, if he wanted to, he could accept marbles.  “Do people have to accept dollars or money? No, they don’t,” Gillie said. “They can accept anything they want or they can refuse to accept anything.” He’s absolutely right.  The U.S. Treasury Department says the Coinage Act of 1965 says “private businesses are free to develop their own policies on whether or not to accept cash, unless there is a state law which says otherwise.” [...]"   

Arizonia cop: "New law makes me feel like a Nazi" [07/22/10] "The appearance in a video about Arizona's SB 1070 immigration law by a Phoenix policeman may result in a reprimand or discipline, authorities say. [...]"  

 Commentary: Ben Stein: The Unemployed Are "People With ‘Unpleasant Personalities…Who Do Not Know How To Do A Day’s Work" [07/22/10] "Writing at the American Spectator yesterday, former Nixon speechwriter and TV personality Ben Stein downplayed the suffering unemployed Americans are experiencing by writing that the people who are unemployed right now are “generally people with poor work habits and poor personalities.” He claims the unemployed are Americans with “unpleasant personalities…who do not know how to do a day’s work“: [...] Of course, saying that the 15 million Americans who are unemployed right now are “generally” people with “poor work habits” is as offensive as it is wrong. The current recession is a global phenomenon caused by the collective bad behavior of the world’s largest financial institutions. Before the recession, the unemployment rate hovered around six percent; it is ludicrious to say that millions of Americans suddenly got lazier and less able to work within the span of a few months. Unfortunately, Stein is a widely respected voice on the American right who regularly appears on cable news to offer his thoughts on politics and policy. Using the Critical Mention media search engine, ThinkProgress finds that the name “Ben Stein” was mentioned 64 times in major television media networks within the past thirty days alone."  Will the jobs ever return?  Note: No. 

WA: Olympia Food Co-op removes Israeli goods from shelves; first US store to institute boycott [07/21/10] "The Olympia Food Co-op Board of Directors has decided to boycott Israeli goods at their two locations in Olympia, Washington. At a July 15th meeting packed with Co-op members, the Board reached this consensus. The Co-op becomes the first US grocery store to publicly join the international grassroots movement for boycott, divestment, and sanctions (BDS) on Israel for its human rights abuses. Co-op board member Rob Richards explained, “My hope is that by being the first in the US to adopt the boycott we act as a catalyst for other co-ops to join in. Each additional organizational entity that joins may have a very small effect on the big picture, but drop by drop fills the tub.” Noah Sochet, a Co-op member and Olympia BDS organizer adds, “As a US citizen and as a Jew, I’m proud to say that my Co-op no longer underwrites the suffering in Palestine.” [...]"  Note:  I personally GO to this Co-op every couple of weeks. A couple of years ago, I went in, and it was on "Women's Day" or something .... I asked the clerk, 'why don't they have a Men's Day?" (Father's day and Mothers day are about breeding). She went back and spoke to the manager, who came out, and called me a "Nazi" because I asked the question. Go figure. I guess it's because the place is run by sequentials and tree huggers .... May they become photons, soon, useless losers.

Graphic: median duration of unemployment is higher today than any time in the last 50 years [07/21/10]

Trends: America’s New Debtor Prison [07/21/10] "People who are imprisoned for their debts are technically locked up for contempt of court after failing to appear for a hearing pertaining to their debt. It’s a legal loophole that debt-collection companies are increasingly using. Here’s how it works: First, the collections company files a lawsuit against the debtor, which requires them to appear in court. If the debtor doesn’t show up, the creditor wins a default judgment against them. This allows them to ask the court to schedule another hearing at which the judge can go through the debtor’s assets and determine if actions such as wage garnishments or bank account seizures can take place. If the debtor doesn’t show up to that hearing, the hammer of justice can come down hard and fast. From there, the judge can order the debtor in contempt of court and issue a warrant for their arrest. If this seems unnecessarily punitive, the price to get out of jail is even more so, say consumer advocates: Generally, the judge sets the cost of bail at the amount of the disputed debt, an amount which is then turned over to the creditor. “This is the private use of government resources to collect debt,” Pete Barry, partner at law firm Barry & Slade LLC, told Walletpop. [...]"  

Unemployment rate falls in 39 states in June [07/21/10] "The unemployment rate fell in most states in June, mainly because more people gave up searching for work and were no longer counted. Fewer states saw job increases, the latest evidence that the economic recovery is slowing. The jobless rate declined in 39 states and Washington, D.C. last month, the Labor Department said Tuesday. That's a slight improvement from May, when 37 states saw their rates decline. But only 21 states saw net job gains in June, the government said. That compared to 41 the previous month and is the fewest this year. The decline in job creation reflects the layoff of thousands of temporary census workers. Those jobs inflated total payrolls in May and then reduced them in June. Still, the report also indicated that businesses aren't hiring many new workers. Nationwide, private employers added a net gain of only 83,000 jobs last month. The national unemployment rate dropped to 9.5 percent in June from 9.7 percent the previous month, as about 650,000 people stopped looking for work. [...]"  

NY: Cavalcade of Corruption Continues in NYC [07/21/10] "The director of a New York City nonprofit health service embezzled almost $60,000 through bogus HIV outreach events, by raising her own salary and paying herself unauthorized "consulting" fees, and took out more than $2 million in fraudulent mortgage loans, federal prosecutors say in New York. [...]"  

Commentary: "It's the end of the world as we know it" [07/21/10] "That is how the largest theft in the history of the world was carried out. 300M people worked and saved their whole lives to set aside $2.5Tn into a retirement system that, if it were paying a fair compounding rate of 5% interest over 40 years of labor (assuming an even $62Bn a year was contributed), would be worth $8.4Tn today - enough money to give 100M workers $84,000 each in cash! The looting of FICA hid the massive deficits of the last 30 years in the Unified Budget. Presidents and Congresses were able to reduce taxes on the wealthiest Americans without complaint from the deficit hawks, because they benefited. The money went directly from the pockets of average Americans into the pockets of the rich. [...]"  

U.S. jobless benefits debate ends [07/20/10] "The Senate ended a long partisan stalemate Tuesday, voting to end debate and clearing the way to give millions of out-of-work Americans a benefits extension. [...]"   

Report out on 'negatives' of hijab ban [07/20/10] "The Iranian Foreign Ministry has issued a report detailing how the ban on hijab in western societies violates the rights of Muslim minorities there. [...]"  Note:  The western societies are not religious states in the sense that muslim countries are. They feature other kinds of tyrannies. As soon as one person hides a bomb or a weapon under a hijib, and that has happened, logically, all bets are off in a non-Muslim society, so why waste time complaining, ignoring the social context of the dynamic, solely to claim an act of prejudice. Dumb as a box of rocks. In an absolute sense, although the hijib is a cultural custom, it also constitutes suppression of individuality, which is a trait of societies which are stratified, with the top portion parasitically thriving only as a result of the suppression of other social layers while they're co-opting their experiences. This whole density, and existence within it, sucks. 

CA: A City Out-Sources Everything. Sky Doesn’t Fall [07/20/10] "... While many communities are fearfully contemplating extensive cuts, Maywood says it is the first city in the nation in the current downturn to take an ax to everyone. .... Senior citizens were afraid they would be assaulted as they walked down the street. Parents worried the parks would be shut and their children would have nowhere to safely play. Landlords said their tenants had begun suggesting that without city-run services they would no longer feel obliged to pay rent. The apocalypse never arrived. In fact, it seems this city was so bad at being a city that outsourcing — so far, at least — is being viewed as an act of municipal genius.  [...] Freed from its employees, Maywood has nowhere to go but up, they say. “Remember the Soviet Union?” said Hector Alvarado, who heads a civic advocacy group. “They had a lot of bureaucracy, and they lost. Maywood was like that. Now people know if they don’t work, they will be laid off. Much better this way.” "   

Trends: Growing Number of Prosecutions for Videotaping the Police [07/20/10] "That Anthony Graber broke the law in early March is indisputable. He raced his Honda motorcycle down Interstate 95 in Maryland at 80 mph, popping a wheelie, roaring past cars and swerving across traffic lanes. But it wasn't his daredevil stunt that has the 25-year-old staff sergeant for the Maryland Air National Guard facing the possibility of 16 years in prison. For that, he was issued a speeding ticket. It was the video that Graber posted on YouTube one week later -- taken with his helmet camera -- of a plainclothes state trooper cutting him off and drawing a gun during the traffic stop near Baltimore. [...]"   

MA: Sex-abuse case against rabbi raises larger issues [07/20/10] "The case, with echoes of clergy sexual abuse incidents in the Catholic Church, is a reflection, scholars say, of similar abuse cases that have taken place in the orthodox Jewish community, where rabbis are held in high regard and the social penalties for criticizing clergy can be high. A number of prominent orthdox rabbis have faced charges, including Baruch Lanner, the subject of a 2000 expose in The Jewish Week, and Yehuda Kolko, who was featured in a 2006 New York magazine article. “There is a growing acknowledgment that we have a problem, which has taken a long time,’’ said Yosef Blau, an Orthodox rabbi who is the spiritual adviser at the theological seminary at New York’s Yeshiva University. “Denial has been very powerful in the community.’’ [...]"   

 Commentary: Anatomy of a Police State Setup and Cover-up [07/20/10] "After watching the video below, most, if not all, American citizens will be outraged at how the Sheriff’s department deputies, in order to save their own skins from criminal and civil penalties, moved to take away the freedoms of a single American who should be protected by Constitutional laws specifically designed for this scenario. The following portions of conversations are highlighted, as the discussion between officers clearly shows an effort to trump up charges, set up Mr. Hart and save their own butts: [...]"  

Retirement Nightmare: Half of Americans Have Less Than $2000 Saved [07/20/10] "One out of three working Americans does not have retirement savings beyond Social Security, and about 35% of those over 65 rely almost totally on Social Security alone," Dallas Salisbury, president of the Alliance for Investor Education and the Employee Benefit Research Institute (EBRI), explained to AlterNet. "Of the remaining two-thirds of working Americans that have some retirement savings, 27 percent report less than $1,000, 16 percent between $1,000 and $9,999, 11 percent between $10,000 and $24,999, 12 percent between $25,000-$49,999, and 36 percent $50,000 or more." Perhaps the most shocking number is that half of Americans have $2,000 or less saved for retirement. [...]" 

Dept of Agriculture Official: "Gov’t Employees Don’t Get Laid Off" [07/20/10] [1:03]  Note: Must be nice to have a guaranteed job that pays more than the civilian counterpart would make  .... and to make decisions that would terminate the useful social life of those who don't work for some form of government.

Minority Report : Beyond the movie and practiced in your school district? [07/19/10] "Minority Report was an alarming movie that depicted that a person could be found guilty and sentenced for a crime they “were” going to commit and not a crime they actually committed. This possibility sent shivers up our spines as we watched the plot unfold. Those same shivers returned when I read about a new program designed to identify children who are at risk of becoming violent offenders later in life. My blood ran cold when the article suggested that “It is not enough to measure risk for violence, professionals must also provide effective treatment to at risk youth.” Furthermore it claims this program is an invaluable tool that examines every factor that may be affecting the youth’s development, and puts a plan in place for the youth to mature into a positively pro-social functioning member of society. One of the most alarming statements in the report reads; “Educators, social workers, mental health professionals, juvenile services professionals, or concerned parents, can provide at-risk children and teenagers with the nurturing, support, and treatment that will give them a ' second chance at life.” [...]"  Note:  Ed: "Simultaneous person writes about his shock and horror when contemplating the sequential notion of testing children for "societal maladaptive behavior" for the purpose of putting them "intervention programs" so that they won't turn into "future criminals." VERY GOOD article which shows just what a total DISCONNECT the simultaneous and sequential paths truly have.   Once you understood how sequentials are extremely disconnected to anything having to do with innocent childhood, their tendencies are a little easier to understand. Although they certainly are on the wrong fucking planet to bring their sequential traits to US - the normal people who were CHILDREN IN CHILDREN'S BODIES." 

 Concepts and Practices: 23% Say U.S. Government Has the Consent of the Governed [07/19/10] "The notion that governments derive their only just authority from the consent of the governed is a foundational principle of the American experiment.  However, a new Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey finds that just 23% of voters nationwide believe the federal government today has the consent of the governed. Sixty-two percent (62%) say it does not, and 15% are not sure. These figures have barely budged since February.  There is no gender gap on this question. Younger voters are more likely than their elders to believe the government today has the necessary consent. Among voters under 30, 28% say the government has that consent. Just 15% of senior citizens share that view. From an ideological perspective, most liberal voters (58%) think the federal government has the consent of the governed. Most moderates (57%) and most conservatives (84%) disagree. Democrats are closely divided on the question. Republicans and unaffiliated voters strongly reject the notion that the government has the consent of the governed.  [...] In his new book, In Search of Self-Governance, Scott Rasmussen observes that the American people are “united in the belief that our political system is broken, that politicians are corrupt and that neither major political party has the answers.” He adds that “the gap between Americans who want to govern themselves and the politicians who want to rule over them may be as big today as the gap between the colonies and England during the 18th century.”  [...]  Voters are evenly divided over the notion that a group of people randomly selected from the phone book could do a better job than the current Congress. One reason for skepticism about the Political Class is that 70% believe Big Government and Big Business are on the same team working together against the rest of us."   

Australia: Sydney Film Festival 2010— Corruption, war in the Middle East, poverty in the US and other issues [07/19/10] "... Moloch Tropical is a visually arresting work and has a tragic Shakespearean quality to it, along with touches of absurdist humour. Zinedine Soualem gives a strong performance as the increasingly brutal and unhinged president. Heated discussions between the president, media minders and senior government officials are particularly effective. While there are obvious references to the Haitian government of former Catholic priest Jean-Bertrand Aristide, Moloch Tropical’s portrait of a disintegrating government and the associated Machiavellian intrigue could, with only minor modifications, apply to any number of contemporary governments. There is not yet any indication that this effective and intelligent satire will be released in Australian cinemas. It certainly deserves to be. [...]  Winter’s Bone, directed by Debra Granik (Snake Feed [1997] and Down to the Bone [2004]), is set in southern Missouri’s poverty-stricken Ozark mountains. Adapted from the novel of the same name by Daniel Woodrell, it centres on the efforts of 17-year-old Ree Dolly (Jennifer Lawrence) to track down her father, who has used the family home as a bail bond and disappeared." The family has no money and Ree has to care for her two young siblings and her disabled disturbed mother. Unless she can find her father or pay the bond to the authorities, the house will be confiscated and the family evicted.  Dolly’s father illegally produces methamphetamines and is heavily connected with local underworld figures. Determined to find him and prevent the family’s impending eviction, she must challenge long-standing clan ties and the dark and desperate world of backwoods illegal drug manufacturing. Granik’s direction is tight and captures the region’s natural beauty and its soul-destroying poverty. A brief scene when Ree visits an army recruiting office to discuss joining the military is particularly effective and points to the desperate economic circumstances that force thousands of unemployed and poor young people from rural America to sign up. While the story has a rather conventional ending, Winter’s Bone is an accurate and unsettling portrait of rural poverty in the US, a subject that the giant American entertainment corporations refuse to touch.[...] "  

 Australia: Biased Lenders  [07/19/10] "... Here in Australia, there are two preferred methods for squeezing the household wallet in the name of the public good. The first is the Mineral Resource Rent Tax. It exists today like a soufflé just taken out of the oven: all puffy and full of promise, but ready to fall flat. It's hard to say if this is still keeping a lid on the upside in Aussie commodity shares.  The other big tax con game is the assertion that carbon needs a price. We have yet to see a compelling argument about why this is so. The only argument we have seen is that carbon dioxide emissions from man-made activities are causing the Earth's temperatures to rise. Thus, carbon needs a price so businesses can be discouraged from carbon dioxide emissions and households can foot the bill to halt the oceans from rising and save the Planet (from us, presumably).  [...]"  

CA: Cities Rent Police, Janitors to Save Cash [07/19/10] "...After years of whittling staff and cutting back on services, towns and cities are now outsourcing some of the most basic functions of local government, from policing to trash collection. Services that cities can no longer afford to provide are being contracted to private vendors, counties or even neighboring towns. [...]"  

High-tech strip search packs massive radiation punch [07/19/10] "Government claims about the safety of the intrusive, invasive full-body X-ray scanners now being used in airports are based on a deadly lie. And now, scientists are warning that the radiation dose delivered by these things is much higher than anyone has admitted — up to 20 times higher than previously thought. Dr. David Brenner of Columbia University’s Center for Radiological Research says it’s because the X-rays don’t distribute evenly. Instead, they concentrate on the skin, which is extremely sensitive to radiation — and that opens up the possibility of chromosome damage and even cancer [...]   

NY: After "Training", Still Scrambling for Employment: No jobs [07/19/10] "In what was beginning to feel like a previous life, Israel Valle had earned $18 an hour as an executive assistant to a designer at a prominent fashion label. Now, he was jobless and struggling to find work. He decided to invest in upgrading his skills. It was February 2009, and the city work force center in Downtown Brooklyn was jammed with hundreds of people hungry for paychecks. His caseworker urged him to take advantage of classes financed by the federal government, which had increased money for job training. Upgrade your skills, she counseled. Then she could arrange job interviews. For six weeks, Mr. Valle, 49, absorbed instruction in spreadsheets and word processing. He tinkered with his résumé. But the interviews his caseworker eventually arranged were for low-wage jobs, and they were mobbed by desperate applicants. More than a year later, Mr. Valle remains among the record 6.8 million Americans who have been officially jobless for six months or longer. He recently applied for welfare benefits. “Training was fruitless,” he said. “I’m not seeing the benefits. Training for what? No one’s hiring.”  [...]"  Note:  Yes, it's all a scam, because it's out of context with actual dynamics that exist. Stupid people, proposing 'solutions' like this. The training company makes money. That's it. Only conceptually-hobbled sequential incarnations come up with social clusterfucks like this.

 Commentary: NY state can fund deficit by selling university, roads [07/18/10] "States have the same difficult choices anybody has when they run into financial difficulties: make more money (by raising taxes), stop spending as much money (stop paying teachers, firefighters, policeman, etc.), or start selling assets.  [...]"   

 UK: Cash crisis in NHS leaves patients lying on operating tables [07/18/10] "A cash crisis in the NHS has left patients lying on the operating table before doctors realised vital equipment had not been ordered, according to a leaked report. Note:  You'd think they'd check beforehand. Nope. Small island.

Illinois cancels most writing tests [07/18/10] "For the second time in less than a decade, Illinois is eliminating the state writing exam for elementary and junior high students, provoking concerns that writing instruction will taper off and fewer students will master the critical skill. Education officials blamed the state's budget crisis, saying canceling the writing test this year will save $3.5 million at a time when cuts are being forced in a variety of education programs. [...]"  Note: Slaves and the dregs of a civilization don't need to write. As Illinois goes, so would the country...

 Trends: Insurers push smaller cost, narrow choice [07/18/10] "The biggest U.S. insurers are pushing plans with reduced premiums but a narrow selection of doctors and hospitals, industry officials say. [...]"  

The Jobless Effect: Is the Real Unemployment Rate 16.5%, 22%, or ? [07/18/10] "... The June poll turned up 27.8% of households with at least one member who's unemployed and looking for a job, while the latest poll conducted in the second week of July showed 28.6% in that situation. That translates to an unemployment rate of over 22%, says Mayur, who has started questioning the accuracy of the Labor Department's jobless numbers. [...]"  

UK: BT to raise call charges by 10% [07/18/10] "Telecoms giant BT says it will increase call charges by 10% and its monthly line rental by 50p from the beginning of October. [...]"  

Food bank 'mistakenly' gives out dog food [07/18/10] "A food bank in Clearwater, Fla., distributed a can labeled as a "superfood" that turned out to be a can of dog food, the recipient said. Viscido was given the can labeled, "Senior Holistic Superfood" by a volunteer who noticed he wanted products for better health , the newspaper reported Friday. [...]" Note: This is what happens when conceptually-hobbled people get together.  

 Trends:  Afghan, Iraq wars teaching US gang members military combat [07/18/10] "Gang members in the US military are returning home from the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan armed with knowledge of military tactics, a fact that could threaten the lives of law enforcement officers in the US and worsen the gang problem, according to a new report from the Chicago Sun-Times.  Jeffrey Stoleson, a Wisconsin corrections officer who has completed multiple tours in Iraq, also told the Sun-Times that civilian contractors are a part of the growing drug-gang problem within the US's overseas wars. Stoleson says he was "involved in destroying a large quantity of drugs confiscated from US contractors in Iraq." An unnamed Chicago police officer who served in Afghanistan said Bagram Air Base is "covered with Chicago gang graffiti," the Sun-Times reported. That same officer said that, since returning to Chicago, he has arrested gang members who had the Army's combat manual at home. Last November, following a number of reports of gang activity among US troops, the Department of Defense banned troops from belonging to gangs. But both Stoleson and the unnamed Chicago officer told the Sun-Times that the problem appears to be growing worse all the same.  Another police officer told the Sun-Times that it has become common practice for his force to be briefed about gang suspects' military training. [...] US GANGS GOING WORLDWIDE  A 2007 FBI report found that "members of nearly every major street gang have been identified on both domestic and international military installations," and warned that "the military enlistment of gang members could ultimately lead to the worldwide expansion of US-based gangs." The report said that some gang members enlist simply to escape the gang lifestyle, or to avoid a lethal gang conflict. But "some gang members may also enlist to receive weapons, combat, and convoy support training; to obtain access to weapons and explosives; or as an alternative to incarceration." The report went on to say: "Military-trained gang members also present an emerging threat to law enforcement officers patrolling the streets of US cities. Both current and former gang-affiliated soldiers transfer their acquired military training and knowledge back to the community and employ them against law enforcement officers, who are typically not trained to engage gangsters with military expertise."   

UK: Revealed: Brutal guide to punishing jailed youths [07/18/10] "Shocking details of techniques used to inflict pain deliberately on children in privately run jails have been revealed for the first time in a government document obtained by the Observer. Some of the restraint and self-defence measures approved by the Ministry of Justice include ramming knuckles into ribs and raking shoes down the shins. Other extraordinary passages in the previously secret manual, Physical Control in Care, authorise staff to: [...]  Published by the HM Prison Service in 2005 and classified as a restricted government document, the manual guides staff on what restraint and self-defence techniques are authorised for use on children as young as 12 in secure training centres. The centres are purpose-built facilities for young offenders up to the age of 17 and run by private firms under government contracts. Instructions to staff warn that the techniques risk giving children a "fracture to the skull" and "temporary or permanent blindness caused by rupture to eyeball or detached retina". The guidance, designed to cope with unruly children, also acknowledges that the measures could cause asphyxia. One passage, explaining how to administer a head-hold on children, adds that "if breathing is compromised the situation ceases to be a restraint and becomes a medical emergency". Carolyne Willow, national co-ordinator of the Children's Rights Alliance for England (CRAE), which led the campaign for disclosure following the deaths of two teenage boys in secure training centres, said: "The manual is deeply disturbing and stands as state authorisation of institutionalised child abuse. What made former ministers believe that children as young as 12 could get so out of control so often that staff should be taught how to ram their knuckles into their rib cages? Would we allow paediatricians, teachers or children's home staff to be trained in how to deliberately hurt and humiliate children?" [...]    

Aid to over 40 countries under threat [07/18/10] "Russia and China expected to face cuts alongside South American and eastern European nations  [...]"  Foreign aid diverted to "stabilize Afghanistan".

Next Try To Help Unemployed Set For Tuesday [07/18/10] "Senate Democrats plan to try again Tuesday to break a GOP filibuster of a jobs-and-tax bill that also would extend unemployment benefits for millions of jobless Americans. [...]"   

 UK: Crime at lowest level since 1981 [07/18/10] "The number of crimes committed in England and Wales has fallen to its lowest level since records began in 1981, official figures show. [...]"  

Cash-strapped Calif. eyes inmate release [07/18/10] Video clip [2:17]  Note: Other states are watching this. Related: Prisoner Release to Spark Rise in Crime?  Yes. Layoff of Police in Oakland Short-Sighted

"Women Are the New Men: The postindustrial economy belongs to females" [07/18/10] "You've had a nice long run, guys, but it's a women's world now. Hanna Rosin rounds up the evidence in an Atlantic piece headlined "The End of Men" (women for the first time hold most of the country's jobs; three-quarters of the 8 million jobs lost in this recession belonged to men; more women go to college, etc.). It's true that a wage gap still exists and that women still do most child care, but "given the power of the forces pushing at the economy, this setup feels like the last gasp of a dying age rather than the permanent establishment," she writes. [...]"  Note: Uh-huh. More Orion body-mindset genderized bullshit trying to convince the conceptually-challenged .... You can tell it's LATE in the game.

 Trends: "Right-To-Die Billboard Raises Concerns" [07/17/10] LINK FIXED "The huge black billboard is hard to miss, looming over a stretch of Route 22 like a harbinger of death, or at least the right to die: "My Life, My Death, My Choice, FinalExitNetwork.org" [...]"  Note: See how quickly they drag belief systems, religion and external deference into the mix. 

Trends: Empty pockets: Sweden weighs benefits of ditching cash [07/17/10]  "In many countries, debit and credit cards are steadily taking the place of cash in everyday transactions. In Sweden, the process has been given new momentum by a campaign to cut crime. Marie Jarvas, a bank worker in central Stockholm, has experienced two robberies. "The first one was early in the morning and two men broke through the glass door with an axe "What they wanted was the box with the cash for the ATMs," she recalls. "I was really scared and I ran into a back room and hid behind a cupboard. I was sure they were going to come and shoot me. I was really scared for my life."  Ms Jarvas's union is now leading Sweden's drive to do away with cash, out of concern for the safety of the 30,000 bank workers among its members. "If we can reduce the amount of cash in the banks and in society in general, robberies will also be reduced," says Ms Jarvas, who no longer works in the bank's front office. "If in the long term we abandon cash completely, there will be no robberies, because there's no point in robbing a bank if there's no cash there to steal." The campaign has some high-profile supporters, including former Abba band member Bjorn Ulvaeus. "There are no direct practical reasons, as far as I can see, to have coins and banknotes," he wrote in a recent blog post.  The Swedish central bank takes no position in this debate. But in a speech earlier this year, the bank's deputy governor Lars Nyberg highlighted the higher cost to society of cash transactions, compared with those made with credit or debit cards. .[...] "The technology exists for a cashless society to work," says Andrew Scott, Professor of Economics at the London Business School. Cash survives, he says, despite the nuisance of bulging pockets and looking for ATMs that work, partly because it preserves privacy. "Its key advantage, in an electronic age, is that it is anonymous and tells you nothing about where it's been," he says. Par Strom, of the New Welfare Foundation in Stockholm, says Sweden's move towards a cashless society is worrying for precisely this reason. "If it's impossible to pay cash when you buy stuff, it's also impossible not to leave electronic footprints behind you, and the electronic footprints from what you buy put together can tell the entire story about your life. This can be very sensitive information," he says. "Most people don't want this total surveillance society." Bernt Nilsson says it will be several years, at least, before Sweden can finally rid itself of cash."  Note: Really stupid sequentials, hard at work ... trying to make it 'one world' with no individualism or variation in experiences. Soon, they'll all be gone. 

US jobless benefit cutoff to hit three million [07/17/10] "More than three million unemployed workers will have lost jobless benefits by the end of this month. Some 2.5 million have already been cut off since the federal program for extending unemployment compensation beyond 26 weeks expired June 1. An analysis published Thursday in USA Today estimated the number of those to be cut off by the end of July at 3 million. A separate study by the National Employment Law Project put the figure at 3.2 million. Even if the long-delayed legislation is finally taken up July 20, the new date announced Wednesday by Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, it would only authorize an extension of jobless benefits through the month of November. Once the congressional election is safely past, there is little doubt that both Democrats and Republicans will agree to terminate the extended benefits program altogether. The Obama administration is responding to this monumental social catastrophe with complete indifference. When extended benefits first expired in June, Obama devoted one Saturday radio/Internet speech to the topic. White House lobbying efforts for the past month have been focused on Senate passage of the financial reform bill, which does nothing to punish those responsible for the economic crisis or prevent another disaster in the future. The sums involved in the banking bill dwarf the $34 billion cost of restoring extended jobless benefits. A single concession to Senator Scott Brown, a Massachusetts Republican who demanded that a new tax on hedge funds be dropped, was worth $19 billion. The failure to extend jobless benefits in the midst of a deep recession is unprecedented since the program first assumed its modern form after World War II. In every recession since then, an extension of unemployment benefits has received bipartisan congressional approval as an emergency measure—i.e., without any offsetting budget cuts or tax increases to pay for it—whenever the unemployment rate was higher than 7.2 percent. The current US rate, which grossly underestimates the actual jobless toll, is 9.5 percent. [...]" 

Ireland: Hundreds demand end to area riots [07/17/10] "Hundreds of people attend a protest in the Ardoyne area of north Belfast to call for an end to the recent rioting. [...]"   

U.S. Authorities Shut Down WordPress Host With 73,000 Blogs [07/17/10] "After the U.S. Government took action against several sites connected to movie streaming recently, nerves are jangling over the possibility that this is just the beginning of a wider crackdown. Now it appears that a free blogging platform has been taken down by its hosting provider on orders from the U.S. authorities on [...]"  Related:  Feds Ignore Due Process, First Amendment, Shut Down Thousands of Blogs [07/17/10] "Once again, the Obama administration has violated the Bill of Rights. Earlier this month, the feds took down a free WordPress blogging platform and disabled more than 73,000 blogs. The action was completely ignored by the corporate media. The site, Blogetery.com, was told by its hosting service that the government had issued orders [...] [...]"     

SPLC Sues to Protect Children in New Orleans School After First-Grader Handcuffed [07/17/10] "Children at an elementary school in New Orleans are subjected to unlawful seizures and arrests – including handcuffing and shackling – for minor violations of school rules, according to a class action lawsuit filed today by the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) and the Juvenile Justice Project of Louisiana (JJPL). The suit was filed on behalf of a first-grade student who was brutally handcuffed and shackled to a chair by an armed security officer after he argued with another youth over a seat in the lunchroom at Sarah T. Reed Elementary School. The school is part of the Louisiana Recovery School District. [...]"   

PA: Teacher Faked Cancer; Pocketed Donations [07/17/10] Video clip [1:07]  " [...]"  Note: Yeah, this stuff happens every once and a while out there. Losers.

Lawsuit aimed at ammunition restrictions [07/17/10] "Seven months before California’s new law regulating the sale of ammunition fully takes effect, a local ammunition business has taken the state to court with a constitutional challenge. State Ammunition Inc. in Ventura has filed a federal suit alleging the law violates the Commerce Clause by prohibiting ammunition sellers from making sales that aren’t face-to-face transactions. [...]"  

ACLU wants mayor to stop praying with employees before meetings [07/17/10] "The ACLU has asked Harrisburg, Penn. Mayor Linda Thompson to end her habit of opening some staff meetings with a prayer. No way, she says. ... Roper, of the ACLU, would not comment on whether the organization will take follow-up steps against the mayor or the city if the practice continues. (PennLive.com) [...]"  

Video: U-Haul Price Gouging Floridians [07/17/10] [5:17]  "U-Haul is gouging Floridians - double plus for trucks and trailers,taking advantage of pending exodus from Florida - Call U-Haul and tell them what scum bags they are governor butch otter,opportunists,dianne stachel nasty witch hippy from the sixties, [...]"   

California judge denies Schwarzenegger's minimum wage order [07/17/10] "Sacramento County Superior Court Judge Patrick Marlette today denied Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's request to immediately compel State Controller John Chiang to pay state employees minimum wage. The denial means there will be a hearing on the issues on July 26, with a full hearing sometime in August, but Marlette's ruling is a boost for about 200,000 state workers, who were facing paychecks for $7.25 an hour for the July pay period. Chiang has said he would issue full pay unless the legal process went against him before July 22, the cutoff to send payroll to the check printer.  [...]"  

Ten States Where Unemployment Is Falling [07/17/10] "The numbers don't lie: unemployment is still high in the U.S, but there are places where things are looking up. [...]"   

Governor purges database of innocents stopped and frisked by NYPD [07/17/10] "Gov. David Paterson signed legislation Friday that eliminates a database of thousands of people stopped and frisked by New York City police without facing charges, calling the practice "not a policy for a democracy." Paterson signed the law over vehement objections of New York City's mayor and police commissioner, who said the city was losing a key crime-fighting tool. But the governor said the policy that targets criminals won't be affected by eliminating a database of people who were stopped, then released. "This law does not in any way tamper with our stop-and-frisk policies," Paterson said. "What it does is it disallows the use of personal data of innocent people who have not done anything wrong. ... That is not a policy for a democracy." Critics have said information from such stops, mainly of blacks and Latinos who are innocent, can lead to future police suspicion and surveillance. Police say the database helped to solve crimes, including anti-gay and anti-Hispanic bias attacks. "Albany has robbed us of a great crime-fighting tool, one that saved lives," Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly said in a statement. "Without it, there will be, inevitably, killers and other criminals who won't be captured as quickly, or perhaps ever." Paterson said he had met with Kelly and spoken to Mayor Michael Bloomberg, but had not been persuaded that the database protects the city from crime. "Civil justice, and I think common sense, would suggest that those who are questioned and not even accused of crimes be protected from any further stigma or suspicion," Paterson said. He signed the bill at a press conference with the bill's sponsors and supporters including the city's public advocate, Bill de Blasio. [...]"  Related: New York Governor Breaks With Status Quo On "Stop and Frisk" "New York Gov. David Paterson signed a bill Friday barring New York City police from storing information on people stopped for questioning and released. Under the law, names and addresses would have to be stripped from a database on those subjected to the city's stop and frisk policy, The New York Times reported. Both Mayor Michael Bloomberg and Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly urged Paterson to veto the measure. (BUT)  "My conscience will not let me veto the bill," Paterson said. He said the bill upholds the principle that those wrongly accused should not suffer adverse consequences. State Sen. Eric Adams, a Democrat who spent 22 years as a New York police officer, joined Paterson for the signing. [...]"   Note:  Notice that this story is UNTITLED at UPI, in an effort to make sure no one notices this.  

84 companies added to ‘leaving California’ list [07/17/10] "A list of companies moving out of or expanding outside California has grown by 84 since the start of the year, says Joe Vranich, Irvine consultant who specializes in relocating companies. [...]"  

Woman shoots home invaders, kills 1 [07/17/10] "A woman shot two intruders breaking into her Tulsa, Okla., home killing one and critically wounding another. [...]"   

22 Statistics That Prove The Middle Class Is Being Systematically Wiped Out Of Existence In America [07/16/10] "The 22 statistics detailed here prove beyond a shadow of a doubt that the middle class is being systematically wiped out of existence in America. The rich are getting richer and the poor are getting poorer at a staggering rate. Once upon a time, the United States had the largest and most prosperous middle class in the history of the world, but now that is changing at a blinding pace. [...]" Chart Form   

UK:  EU to subject Britons to chilling new 'Big Brother' surveillance and investigation powers [07/16/10] "British citizens face being subjected to chilling new EU 'Big Brother' surveillance and investigation powers. Bureaucrats want foreign officials to be able to travel to the UK and immediately assume the powers of our own police. They would be able to order undercover-spying missions, demand DNA and even pursue people for 'crimes' which are not recognised in UK law - such as criminal defamation. Other EU countries could demand the personal details of entire plane-loads of holidaymakers, and force hard-pressed British police to trail suspects on their behalf. [...]"  Related: Paper trail points to Blair: Former PM 'sanctioned the abuse of UK citizens' "Tony Blair was accused of ordering Jack Straw to 'violate the law' as the row over Britain colluding in torture took a new twist. Previously secret documents exposed their alleged roles in sanctioning British citizens being sent to Guantanamo Bay, where they were abused. For the first time, the former Prime Minister's office is implicated in a series of explosive classified files which Labour ministers battled to suppress but which have been released on the orders of the High Court. They cast a new light on Britain's dirty secret and lay bare the extent to which the Labour government allegedly turned a blind eye to the abduction and torturing of its own citizens. [...]" Nailed, Miliband and six lies on torture  "All five candidates for the Labour Party leadership have been scuttling to distance themselves from the record of Gordon Brown in power. But the odds-on favourite to win the leadership contest, former Foreign Secretary David Miliband, is finding it very hard indeed to disentangle himself from the most sordid and shameful aspect of New Labour rule - British involvement in the torture of numerous terror suspects overseas. [...]"  

'Consumer' Prices Drop, Sentiment Turns Sour [07/16/10] "'Consumer' prices fell for a third straight month in June while consumer sentiment tumbled to an 11-month low in July, underscoring the soft nature of the economic recovery. [...]"  Note:  I detest the label 'consumer' ... 

 Commentary: Genocidal Food Crisis Threatens over 7 Million People in Niger and Sahel [07/16/10] "African governments and NGOs are timidly calling world attention to the vast genocide hitting the entire drought-stricken Sahel region in West Africa, encompassing Chad, Cameroon, Mali, and the world's poorest country, Niger, as its epicenter. [...]"  Note:  More nations plundered via the IMF. See Food Resources link at the top of this panel for related stories.

Raids are increasing on farms and private food-supply clubs [07/16/10] "... What's behind all these raids? They seem to stem from increasing concern at both the state and federal level about the spread of private food groups that have sprung up around the country in recent years -- food clubs and buying groups to provide specialized local products that are generally unavailable in groceries, like grass-fed meats, pastured eggs, fermented foods, and, in some cases, raw dairy products. Because they are private and limited to consumers who sign up for membership, these groups generally avoid obtaining retail and public health licenses required of retailers that sell to the general public. [...]"  

Report: Parts of Louisiana Militarized; Road Blocks, ID Requirements [07/16/10] "In May we reported that reports were surfacing of multi-state National Guard mobilizations. We opined that this might be due to the Gulf disaster and that FEMA may be taking pre-emptive steps for imminent evacuations. In June, Fox News confirmed that 17,500 NG soldiers were being deployed to the Gulf in “minimal roles.” Based on troop movements and the severity of the oil disaster, those without their head buried in the sand were able to deduce that the National Guard would be in Gulf areas for policing actions, and if necessary, mass evacuations. A report from the Dallas Examiner suggests that the National Guard is now moving to secure parts of the oil-leak affected areas: [...]"    

Argentina legalizes gay marriage [07/15/10] "Argentina on Thursday became the first country in Latin America to legalize same-sex marriage, following a landmark Senate vote carried live on national television. The law, backed by the center-left government of President Cristina Kirchner, was adopted in a 33-27 vote after 15 hours of debate. In this majority Roman Catholic country, some had reservations, but the law passed. "It is a historic day," said ruling party leader Miguel Pichetto. Opposition Radical senator Gerardo Morales said Argentine society has changed, stressing that the bill was aimed at guaranteeing the rights of minorities. Hundreds of people outside Congress cheered when the bill passed. Some chanted "Equality, Equality." Some tearful couples embraced. [...]"   

Banks Repossess U.S. Homes at Record Pace [07/15/10] "Banks repossessed a record number of U.S. homes in the second quarter, but slowed new foreclosure notices to manage distressed properties on the market, real estate data company RealtyTrac said on Thursday. The root problems of job losses and wage cuts persist, making a sustained U.S. housing recovery elusive. [...]"   

 Commentary: U.S. Hospital System Disintegrates While Obama Hails Medical "Reform" [07/14/10] "The current disintegration of the U.S. hospital system exposes the killer intent behind Pres. Obama's health care measures, as he brags about "reform." The physical means don't exist to take care of people. The delivery system for health care in the U.S. is being downsized and closed at a crisis rate—hospitals, clinics, equipment, staff, and public health capacity. [...]"  Related: Diseases and Disease Vectors Spread in the USA Amidst Economic Collapse  "Diseases and disease vectors are spreading in the U.S., under conditions of the lack of standard public health measures, and economic collapse. Exemplifying this, are the outbreaks of whooping cough (pertussis), encephalitis, and new cases of dengue. In recent years, the rate of infectious diseases started slowing rising again in the United States—after nine decades of decline. [...]"   

More Police and Fire Department Layoffs Push Cities Over the Brink [07/14/10] "The city making the top of today's list for cities heading into self-destruction, is Trenton, N.J. [...]" 

 Commentary: American Psyche Fails To Understand Current Crisis [07/14/10] "We are living in a time of incredible corruption. That we all know. We have a generation of top down elitists who despite their ignorance are strongly arrogant in their feeling of their ability to control and manipulate the mass public. Perhaps with good reason. While many liberals in the Northeast are still confused to some degree that the Democrats and Brand Obama could give them that warm and cuddly feeling of "change" that will make everything good again, the southern anti-establishment movement is content to dig its heels in like a bull waiting to charge a red flag, only their supposed enemy goes by a name Fox News, Wall Street and the Military-Industrial Complex are only all too willing to hang in in front of them like a toreador. Socialism. With this the anti-establishment right continues the old Reagan era (and earlier) mythology of the "left," the "communists," "liberal cockroaches" or "socialists", as the ones behind all the trouble of today. Obama is the leader of this socialist revolution they contend. This is a complete, and disastrous falsehood which gives me ZERO hope for the future of this country.  [...]"  

 Commentary: Collapse in Living Standards in America: More Poverty By Any Measure [07/14/10] "More than 15 million Americans are unemployed, homelessness has increased by 50 percent in some cities, and 38 million people are receiving food stamps, more than at any time in the program’s almost 50-year history.  Evidence of rising economic hardship is ample. There’s one commonly used standard for measuring it: the U.S. Census Bureau’s poverty rate. It guides much of federal and state spending aimed at helping those unable to make a decent living. But a number of states have become convinced that the federal figures actually understate poverty, and have begun using different criteria in operating state-based social programs. At the same time, conservative economists are warning that a change in the formula to a threshold that counts more people as poor could lead to an unacceptable increase in the cost of federal and state social service programs. [...]"    

UK:  Taxes Squandered On Nagging People Out Of Driving Cars [07/14/10] "Millions of pounds of taxpayers’ money has been spent on sending council snoopers into people’s homes to hector motorists into giving up their cars. Under the Scottish Government’s latest initiative to drive cars off the road, tens of thousands have been lectured on their own doorsteps about public transport and climate change. Four local authorities, Dundee, Dumfries and Galloway, East Renfrewshire, and Falkirk, have lavished £10million on a string of “insulting” green projects, which included sending officials on door-to-door visits. [...]"  Note:  Small island. Small gene pool. Left to their own devices by the simultaneous who withdrew from the game. Priceless.

French Assembly Votes to Ban Burka [07/14/10] "The French Assembly has voted nearly unanimously to ban the burka in public, and the Senate is expected to do the same in a matter of weeks. France will likely become the second European nation after Belgium to crack down on the Islamic garb. Similar bills are also pending in Spain and Italy. The bill, which passed the Assembly 335 to 1, would fine women who wear face-covering veils $200, or require them to attend citizenship classes, or both. Husbands who insist the veils be worn in public would face up to a year in prison and a $38,000 fine. France is home to some 5 million Muslims, Europe's largest population. Almost 9 out of 10 French support a ban, according to a recent poll, compared with 6 out of 10 in Britain [...]"   Related: French MPs vote to ban full veil "A controversial ban on wearing the Islamic full veil in public is overwhelmingly passed in France's lower house. [...]"  Note: They want everyone to 'be the same' ... more sequential predispositions imposed on individual unique cultural expression. More co-opting of the experience of others ....

Commentary: The Disintegration of the Welfare State Neil Reynolds [07/14/10] "Democracies produced Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy, fulfilling the expectation of Socrates and Machiavelli that democracies end in tyranny. Now democracies are fulfilling the complementary expectation of Nobel laureate economist Milton Friedman that democracies end in bankruptcy. Put a democracy in charge of the Sahara, Mr. Friedman once said, and sand itself will become scarce. Democracies are indeed profligate trustees – or have been for the past 30 or 40 years. Mr. Friedman’s primary fret, though, was the tendency of democracy to centralize political and economic power in the same hands. Most critiques of democracy reflect this elemental distrust. “Democracy is two wolves and a lamb,” Benjamin Franklin reputedly said, “voting on what to have for lunch.” Democratic self-deprecation isn’t quite as funny as it once was. Mobs have already taken to the venerable, iconic streets of European states, notably among them Greece, birthplace of Athenian democracy. It’s apparently easier to give wealth away than it is to take it back. Democracy assembled the welfare state peaceably enough. Can democracy dismantle it as peaceably? No, it can’t. The mobs are not finished. In a disturbing analysis titled Democracy, Debt and Disorder, prophetically published early in 2008, two Italian economists assert that Italian governments have accumulated so much debt that it’s essentially impossible to avert the disintegration of the country’s social contract.  [...]"   

 UK: "Prison 'not linked' to crime drop" [07/14/10] "Justice Secretary Ken Clarke tells judges he does not believe there is a link between rising imprisonment and falling crime. [...]"  Note:  Why not?  After all, punitive law has been created for a thousand years, using this very premise. Now that society is locked down, they're having second thoughts? I don't think so. Related: UK: Warning over police jobs freeze  "A jobs freeze by some Scots police forces will result in a fall in officer numbers and a rise in crime, it is claimed. [...]"  Note:  In the UK, they should really make up their minds on which strategy for the expenditure of resources they're going to foist on the public. 

Oakland, CA lays off 80 police officers [07/14/10] "Oakland, Calif., officials said late Tuesday 80 police officers would be laid off following the collapse of contract talks with the police union. [...]"  

Senate Likely To Pass Unemployment Benefits Extension Next Week [07/14/10] "White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs predicted on Tuesday that the Senate will pass an extension of unemployment benefits sometime next week after nearly a month of delays over the size and scope of the package. "I think this president will press and my belief is the Senate will take up [the package]," said Gibbs, "and we will pass next week an extension of unemployment insurance. Should the Senate, as Gibbs hinted, finally act on unemployment insurance, it will mark an end to a depressing and telling fight that has taken place over the course of several weeks. Republicans, along with the occasional conservative Democrat (see: Sen. Ben Nelson) have objected to several variations of the package being considered, raising concerns about both the cost of the package and the philosophical message it sends to those who are out of work. As a result, 2.1 million people who have been out of work for longer than six months have missed checks and the economy -- according to even Republican-leaning economists -- has been hampered in its recovery. " [...]"  Note:  Of course, they let existing support expire first. As for the "philosophical message" angle, they are completely out of touch with the real world 'out there', and have no right to pontificate.

No English Defense Works In N.J. DUI Case [07/14/10] "New Jersey drunken drivers who don’t understand a police officer’s English commands are immune from prosecution thanks to a state Supreme Court ruling, which this week overturned three separate court decisions to side with a Spanish-speaking drug dealer. The case involves a suspected illegal immigrant (German Marquez) arrested for driving drunk in 2007 after rear-ending a car in Plainfield. Marquez appeared intoxicated and the police officer on the scene smelled alcohol on his breath. For decades New Jersey law has required all drivers operating a vehicle on public roads to consent to a breath test. Those who refuse automatically get prosecuted for not complying.  [...]"    

Tracking gold and silver coin purchases starting Jan 1, 2012 [07/14/10] "U.S. federal law will require coin and bullion dealers to report to the Internal Revenue Service all gold and silver coin purchases and sales greater than $600. The report is written by David L. Ganz and is headlined "$600 Sale? Get Ready for Tax Form." Apparently this little jewel was an add-on to the national health care legislation. But there’s a new bill being introduced by Rep. Dan Lungren (H.R. 5141), which has gathered over 80 members of Congress as co-sponsors to repeal this section. [...]"  Note: Notice that again, 2012 is not only astrologically toxic, but it's when the dark polarity would completely smother civilization ... were the local game allowed to continue.   

Boom Times for Millionaires [07/14/10] "... It is estimated that 4.7 million millionaires live in the U.S., representing 4% of the nation’s population. The U.S. has more millionaires than any other country in the world, followed by Japan, China, the United Kingdom and Germany. The report also noted that women control 27% of the world’s wealth. [...]"  

Drug-related ER visits involve suicide [07/14/10] "Almost 10 percent of drug-related U.S. emergency room visits involved teen suicide attempts -- 72 percent by female teens, U.S. health officials say. [...]"     

Six More Charged in New Orleans Danziger Bridge Shootings [07/14/10] "U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder today announced the indictment of six current or former New Orleans Police Department officers in connection to the Danziger Bridge shootings, which occurred during the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina in 2005. [...]  

US media swearing ban thrown out [07/14/10] "A US appeals court throws out a government policy banning the broadcasting of profanity, ruling the law is unconstitutional. [...]"  

When Census Ends: 700,000 New Jobless Americans [07/14/10] "It was a finely honed machine, this United States Census team, and it had a good run. But in the coming days and weeks, many of its members will experience the pain of unemployment — once again. Christine Egan, a 31-year-old massage therapist, says her census job offered shelter from the economic storm last year. “The economy was terrible; there was nothing,” she says. “I’ve already gone through ‘horrific,’ so I’m immunized.” She smiles, optimism almost extending to her eyes. “It must be better now, right?” When the Census Bureau hired upward of 700,000 Americans over the last two years — most in the last six months — it landed more experienced workers with more sophisticated skills than any time in recent memory. This was the unintended upside of the nastiest recession of the last 70 years. Now, its decennial work largely done, the Census Bureau is shedding hundreds of thousands of workers — about 225,000 in just the last few weeks, enough to account for a jot or two in the unemployment rate, say federal economists. Most of those remaining will be gone by August; a few will last into September. [...]"  

Fight Over Same-Gender Marriage Heading Inexorably Toward Supreme Court [07/14/10] "As a federal judge in Boston declared unconstitutional the federal Defense of Marriage Act on the grounds that it violates the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment -- and another federal judge in San Francisco prepares to rule on the constitutionality of California's voter-approved Proposition 8, there can be no doubt now that the issue of whether gay and lesbian couples have a constitutional right to marry will inevitably be decided by the Supreme Court. . . [...]"  

Widespread male infertility sweeping the globe [07/14/10] "Realistically, there is probably more than just one cause. Environmental toxins, synthetic food and water additives, and estrogenic substances in food are all likely culprits.  [...]"   

Empty Store Shelves Coming to America [07/13/10] [6:14]  Note:  The makers of the video think hyperinflation won't hit until '2015'. Nevertheless, the video points out what happens to people when disaster strikes, in terms of the quest for food, water and goods to survive.

2 Ga. officers out after stun gun video surfaces [07/13/10] "One officer was fired and another quit after a rural Georgia woman who called police to complain of a prowler was zapped repeatedly with a stun gun.  Ryan Smith of the Lumpkin Police Department has resigned and Tim Murphy, of Richland Police Department, was fired for using pepper spray on the woman, Janice Wells. Wells, 57, says she feared a prowler was outside her Richland house. A minute-long dashboard video from Smith's patrol car shows the officer pulling up to assist another officer. What happens is largely hidden by an open police cruiser door, but Wells can be heard screaming "Don't do that! Don't do that!" as a stun gun is heard repeatedly zapping. Authorities say the April 26 struggle began when Wells wouldn't tell police the name of an acquaintance who had been at her house. Lumpkin Police Chief Steven Ogle says the video is shocking. Well has hired an attorney." The following YouTube video was made available by The Associated Press: Video clip  [2:01]  

Arizona Freeway speed cameras to be turned off this week [07/13/10] "While the cameras have done a good job at snapping speeders, drivers have been ignoring the tickets. According to the Department of Public Safety, the cameras led to more than 700,000 tickets in the first year of operation. Many of those people, however, never paid the fines. Some say that's because the tickets were mailed, making them easy to ignore. Any driver who ignored a photo-enforcement ticket was supposed to have been served. One problem was that process servers were inundated and simply couldn't get to everybody. If a person was not served, his or her ticket became invalid after three months. [...]"    

"The Creativity Crisis" [07/13/10] "Kyung Hee Kim at the College of William & Mary discovered this in May, after analyzing almost 300,000 Torrance scores of children and adults. Kim found creativity scores had been steadily rising, just like IQ scores, until 1990. Since then, creativity scores have consistently inched downward. “It’s very clear, and the decrease is very significant,” Kim says. It is the scores of younger children in America—from kindergarten through sixth grade—for whom the decline is “most serious.” [...]"  Note:  More conceptually-hobbled sequential children in schools, as time goes on, is part of what this represents.

Louisiana Parent Accuses School of 'Brutal' Policies (New Orleans) [07/13/10] "An elementary school's "brutal and unconstitutional policy" of "intrusive arrests and seizures" of little kids left a first-grader terrified of school, afraid that "grown-ups with guns may hurt him again," the black child's parents say in a federal class action. The parents say their first-grade son, and other kids, "are unlawfully seized, arrested, handcuffed, shackled, and chained to furniture for very minor violations of school rules." [...]"   

UK: Police forces under pressure over Europe evidence demands [07/13/10] "Police forces risk being swamped by demands from foreign countries for DNA and other evidence under plans for a new Europe-wide investigation warrant. The Government has until the end of the month to decide whether to opt out of the scheme - which would give authorities in any country in the whole of the EU the power to order our police to produce evidence, or even interrogate or launch surveillance of suspects without their knowledge. Civil liberties groups have warned that, for example, police investigating a fight at a nightclub in Spain could demand that British police take the DNA of anyone from this country who had traveled there at the time.  Under the terms of the order, any prosecutor or police officer in all 27 members of the EU could be given the power to issue demands for evidence, regardless of the cost involved. Judges in this country would be powerless to block the requests, even if they related to offences that are considered trivial in this country. Overstretched police resources could then be expended on demands to launch lengthy surveillance operations, take DNA samples or secure documents such as bank statements or phone records. [...]"  

Governors Of Struggling States Ask Washington For Help [07/13/10] "Governors hamstrung by the sluggish economic rebound in their states and bound to balance their own budgets are pressing anew for Washington to step up with more help, some say even if it means adding to the nation's red ink.  [...]"  Related: Axelrod: 'No Great Appetite' For More Aid To States  "White House senior adviser David Axelrod told ABC News's Jake Tapper this weekend that getting additional stimulus dollars for states is likely not politically feasible, despite the urgings of Obama's economic team. (Scroll down for video). [...]"  

More Americans' credit scores sink to new lows  [07/13/10] "The credit scores of millions more Americans are sinking to new lows. Figures provided by FICO Inc. show that 25.5 percent of consumers _ nearly 43.4 million people _ now have a credit score of 599 or below, marking them as poor risks for lenders. It's unlikely they will be able to get credit cards, auto loans or mortgages under the tighter lending standards banks now use. Because consumers relied so heavily on debt to fuel their spending in recent years, their restricted access to credit is one reason for the slow economic recovery. [...]"    

 UK: 30 police officers hurt in Belfast riots [07/13/10] "Officials blamed dissidents for violence during riots in Belfast, Northern Ireland, in which as many as 30 police officers were injured. [...]"  

New Rohatyn Privatization Plan to Dismember New Jersey, A "Path for Change" ... to Fascism [07/12/10] "A report on how to privatize government functions in New Jersey, in order to save money, was submitted today to Gov. Chris Christie (R), by a task force he commissioned earlier in the year. [...]"  

State and Local Government Layoffs Accelerate an Already Rapid Collapse [07/12/10] "State and local government officials across the country are laying off government employees left and right in a futile effort to balance their ever collapsing budgets. State and local governments laid off 95,000 employees in the first six months of 2010, and Mark Zandi, chief economist of Moody's Economy.com, estimates that 400,000 more layoffs will come in the next year. [...]"   Related: White Plains Fire Sparks Debate About Firefighter Layoffs  "A July 7 fire that wiped half a city block in White Plains, New York, has fueled debate in the city over the layoffs of firefighters that occurred just two weeks before the fire. "The key thing in fighting a fire is manpower and response time," said Joseph Carrier, president of the White Plains fire union. [...]"   

Class Claims Blue Shield Overcharges [07/12/10] "Blue Shield charged California policyholders as much as three times the premiums allowed by state law, a class action claims in Superior Court. The named plaintiff claims she was overcharged by $1,400 a year for 3 years, and estimates the class contains more than 6,000 people. [...]"   

UK: Rules on stop and search changed [07/11/10] "The home secretary announces stricter tests for stop and search powers after they were ruled unlawful by a European court. New restrictions are being placed on a controversial police power used to stop and search people, Home Secretary Theresa May has announced. Police will now not be allowed to use the power unless they "reasonably suspect" a person of being a terrorist. Last month, the European Court of Human Rights ruled the power to search people without suspicion under Section 44 of the Terrorism Act 2000 was illegal.  Human rights campaigners Liberty said the original power had "criminalised and alienated more people than it ever protected". The ruling followed a case brought by two people who had been stopped by police near an arms fair in London in 2003. In a Commons statement, Home Secretary Theresa May said: "The first duty of government is to protect the public but that duty must never be used as a reason to ride roughshod over our civil liberties." She said the European Court's judgement had found the use of Section 44 amounted to "the violation of the right to a private life". The court found the powers were "drawn too broadly at the time of their initial authorisation and when they are used" and lacked sufficient safeguards to protect civil liberties.  Mrs May said: "The government cannot appeal this judgment, although we would not have done so had we been able. "We have always been clear in our concerns about these powers and they will be included as part of our review of counter-terrorism legislation." She said after taking legal advice and consulting with police forces, the use of Section 44 powers will now be restricted to searching vehicles. Both the High Court and the Court of Appeal rejected their claim that such tactics were illegal, ruling that stop-and-search was legitimate given the threat of terrorism in London. However, the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) disagreed, and declared it an unlawful violation of an individual's right to privacy and family life.[...]" 

State prisoner numbers reach 40-year low [07/11/10] The number of inmates in state prisons in the United States has declined for the first time in almost 40 years, statistics show. State prisons throughout the country held 1,404,053 people Jan. 1 -- 4,777 fewer than a year before following years of annual increases, the Pew Center on the States in Washington said. The Christian Science Monitor reported Friday cash-strapped states have sought alternatives to cut prison population and thus costs, including diverting low-level offenders to other sentencing and early release of inmates who complete programs aimed at reducing recidivism. [...]"    

 Concepts and Practices: Civil Rights and Armed Self-Defense [07/10/10] "On December 11, 2002, the U.S. Supreme Court heard oral arguments in the case of Virginia v. Black. At issue was the constitutionality of a Virginia statute that prohibited the act of cross burning, a ban the Court later struck down as a violation of the First Amendment. As is often the case, Justice Clarence Thomas was preparing to cast a lone dissenting vote.  “It’s my understanding that we had almost 100 years of lynching and activity in the South by the Knights of Camellia and the Ku Klux Klan, and this was a reign of terror and the cross was a symbol of that reign of terror,” Thomas told Deputy Solicitor General Michael Dreeben during oral arguments. In his dissent a few months later, Thomas dug even further into American history, citing sources ranging from a scholarly encyclopedia of the Ku Klux Klan to contemporaneous reports of cross burnings, lynchings, and other acts of racist terrorism to make the case that cross burning was an act of thuggish intimidation that deserved no protection under the First Amendment. It wasn’t the first time Clarence Thomas weighed in on America’s long and bloody history of racism—and it wouldn’t be the last.  [...]"  

Orionization: The End of Men [07/10/10] "Earlier this year, women became the majority of the workforce for the first time in U.S. history. Most managers are now women too. And for every two men who get a college degree this year, three women will do the same. For years, women’s progress has been cast as a struggle for equality. But what if equality isn’t the end point? What if modern, postindustrial society is simply better suited to women? A report on the unprecedented role reversal now under way— and its vast cultural consequences [...]"    Related:   Sarah Palin 2012: ‘Unstoppable’?

Nullification and Civil Disobedience [07/10/10] "Nullification has long been thought of as a dead issue, but it has made a bit of comeback of late. The issue is whether states can nullify, or not enforce, federal laws they find to be unconstitutional. The constitutionality and morality of nullification seem like an important debate, but nullification is seen as ‘secession light’ and has become so tied up with the United States’ long history of racial oppression that the mere mention of nullification is likely to elicit charges of racism or sedition. [...]"   

Change To Wipe 25% Off UK Private Pensions [07/10/10] "Millions of people with private sector retirement schemes are likely to see their pensions reduced by as much as 25 per cent after the Government announced plans to change the way they are calculated.  [...]"  Note: Government pensions should take an equivalent cut. 

Riots in California after police officer who shot unarmed black man in the back is cleared of murder [07/10/10] "Violent protests erupted in the city of Oakland in California today after a Los Angeles jury convicted a white former transit officer of involuntary manslaughter in the fatal shooting of an unarmed black man. Police in riot gear watched over a crowd of protesters as emotions ran high with 500 people marching in the street and 83 people arrested. Prosecutors had wanted Johannes Mehserle, 22, to be convicted of murdering Oscar Grant. Justice Department officials have announced they will look into whether the case warrants federal prosecution. [...]"  Note:  53 arrests as protesters furious at verdict storm the streets...

S.F. considers banning sale of pets except fish because buyers 'may not take care of them' [07/09/10] "Sell a guinea pig, go to jail.  That’s the law under consideration by San Francisco’s Commission of Animal Control and Welfare. If the commission approves the ordinance at its meeting tonight, San Francisco could soon have what is believed to be the country’s first ban on the sale of all pets except fish. That includes dogs, cats, hamsters, mice, rats, chinchillas, guinea pigs, birds, snakes, lizards and nearly every other critter, or, as the commission calls them, companion animals. “People buy small animals all the time as an impulse buy, don’t know what they’re getting into, and the animals end up at the shelter and often are euthanized,” said commission Chairwoman Sally Stephens. “That’s what we’d like to stop.” [...]"  Note: So we hear from sequential Sally Stevens, trying to co-opt people's experiences and control lives. Sally, take yourself in to be euthanized and do us a favor! 

Washington Court Strikes Down 90-Day Notice Rule [07/09/10] "Washington state's requirement that doctors and dentists receive 90 days' notice before being sued for malpractice is unconstitutional, the Washington Supreme Court ruled. [...]"   

Warren Buffett's Favorite Economic Indicator: Rail [07/09/10] "In this CNBC interview, Warren Buffett was asked to identify the single most important economic statistic he would choose if he was stranded on a desert island for a month and could only get one set of economic numbers. Buffett reported that his favorite “desert island indicator” would be freight car loadings. The likely reason that Buffett is so fond of rail traffic as his “desert island indicator” is that it measures the amount of raw materials, inputs, and supplies moving around the country every week, and this should accurately predict the future direction of the overall economy. After all, the inputs transported by rail eventually get processed into inventory, final output, and goods for sale. In that case, Buffett must be pretty pleased with yesterday's American Railroad Association’s (AAR’s) weekly report, which shows that rail traffic in the United States is booming.  [...]"  Note:  Rail Time Indicators, a monthly report from the Association of American Railroads, combines rail traffic data with more than 15 key economic indicators (such as consumer confidence, housing starts, and industrial production) in a non-technical snapshot of the U.S. economy. US Economic Health: Railroad Traffic Report | Rail Time Indicators Report 

Sheriff Richard Mack – Fed’s Can’t Tell States What to do – Alex Jones Tv [07/09/10] "Alex also talks with Sheriff Richard Mack, a former sheriff in Graham County, Arizona, who sued the Clinton administration during the mid-90s over the Brady Bill. He currently educates sheriffs nation-wide about their powers to protect their constituents from abuse by the federal government.  [...]"    4 Video clips

Civil Unrest Hits Puerto Rico, Cops Respond With Violence [07/09/10] "A police riot over budget cuts broke out in Puerto Rico’s capital Wednesday, with cops wielding batons and firing pepper spray on demonstrators. The demonstrators, many of them students from the local university, attempted to enter the statehouse in San Juan to protest budget cuts and other laws under Gov. Luis Fortuno. [...]"    Note:  After 615 posts on this article at Huffington Post .. they still spell 'unrest' as 'unwrest' in article title, as of 10am PST. I left them an appropriate comment. Losers. Video clip  [4:04]

Italian Journalists Strike Against Gagging Law [07/09/10] "here will be no news in Italy today; or, at least, hardly any. That is not a prediction, but fact: none of the main newspapers are appearing because their reporters and editors are on a 24-hour strike. Today they are due to be joined by radio, TV and some internet journalists. [...]"  Note:  TV, radio, and newspaper journalists in Italy are on a 24-hour strike, shutting down news around the country Friday in response to a so-called “gagging law” that intends to protect politicians, like playboy prime minister Silvio Berlusconi, by greatly prohibiting the capacity for investigators to record phone conversations. 

UK: Cycle row parents: 'children's development harmed by culture of fear' [07/09/10] "Oliver and Gillian Schönrock, the parents criticised for allowing their children to cycle to school, have warned that a culture of fear risks damaging youngsters' social development. The couple, who were told they could be reported to social services over their decision, said children’s quality of life in Britain is suffering because they are not allowed to take risks. They claim state advice has left parents too frightened to let their children out alone and called for a change in attitudes to childhood freedoms. The Schönrocks sparked a national debate on parenting after it emerged that they were in a dispute with Alleyn’s Junior School in Dulwich, south London, over their decision to let their children ride to class unsupervised. They claimed they let their five-year-old son and eight-year-old daughter make the one-mile trip from their home on their own to teach them self-confidence and responsibility. But the couple were warned they could be reported to social services after the school said it was concerned about the safety of the children.  [...]"    

Concepts and Practices:  An American Honor Killing  [07/09/10] "Around the sprawling, sunbaked campus of Dysart High School in El Mirage, Arizona, not many people knew about the double life of a pretty, dark-haired girl named Noor Almaleki.  At school, she was known as a fun-loving student who made friends easily. She played tennis in a T-shirt emblazoned with the school mascot — a baby demon in a diaper. She liked to watch Heroes and eat at Chipotle. Sometimes she talked in a goofy Keanu Reeves voice. She wore dark jeans, jeweled sandals, and flowy tops from Forever 21. She texted constantly and called her friends "dude." In other words, she was an American girl much like any other.  But at home, Noor inhabited a darker world. She lived a life of subservience, often left to care for her six younger siblings. Noor's father, 49-year-old Faleh Almaleki, was strict and domineering, deeming it inappropriate for her to socialize with guys, wear jeans, or post snapshots of herself on MySpace. Her responsibility was to follow orders, or to risk a beating. From her father's perspective, the only time Noor's life would ever change would be when she married a man he selected for her — back in his homeland of Iraq. Noor, however, had a different vision for herself. Having lived in the U.S. for 16 years, she held dreams of becoming a teacher, of marrying a man she loved, and, most importantly, of making her own choices. On a cloudless, breezy afternoon in late October 2009, her father set out to end those dreams. [...]"   

Federal Judge Finds Gay Marriage Ban Unconstitutional [07/09/10] "Congress undertook this classification for the one purpose that lies entirely outside of legislative bounds, to disadvantage a group of which it disapproves. And such a classification the Constitution clearly will not permit,” [U.S. District Judge] Tauro wrote.  [...] Andrea Lafferty, executive director of the Traditional Values Coalition, called Tauro’s ruling “judicial activism” and said Tauro was a “rogue judge.” Gay marriage advocates will keep pushing their agenda in the courts, she said, but noted voters often reject gay marriage at the ballot box, including in a recent California vote. “We can’t allow the lowest common denominator states, like Massachusetts, to set standards for the country,” Lafferty said. [...]"  Related:  Federal Judge Finds "Defense of Marriage Act" Unconstitutional "A federal judge on Thursday found the national Defense of Marriage Act unconstitutional. The 1996 law bars the federal government from recognizing same-sex marriage. But U.S. District Judge Joseph Tauro ruled that it violates the equal protection clause of the Constitution, denying benefits to one class of married people - homosexual unions - but not others. [...]"  

Trends:  Broadcast viewer ship hits record low  [07/09/10] "Americans avoided television in historic levels over the past week.  CBS, NBC, ABC and Fox together had the smallest number of prime-time viewers last week in two decades of record-keeping, the Nielsen Co. said. Given the dominance of the big broadcasters before then, you'd probably have to go back to the early days of television to find such a collective shrug. The first week of July tends to be among the slowest weeks of the year in television, anyway, with families more engaged in barbecues and fireworks. The problem was magnified this year because July Fourth came on Sunday, largely knocking out one of a typical week's biggest viewing nights. [...]"  Note:  Fewer and fewer Americans are imbibing at the propaganda fountain called broadcast television and its “news” shows, as set up by the corporate state after its WWII. Last week, it was the fewest ever recorded. "Programming" is just what people don't need. 

Concepts and Practices:  Compared to running out of money, fear of death is no biggie [07/09/10] "For older Americans surveyed by Allianz Life Insurance Co., death is not such a big deal. Not, that is, when it compares to the spectre of a dwindling bank account. In a poll of people between the ages of 44 and 75, 61% said that running out money was their biggest fear. The remaining 39% thought death was scarier.  With a couple of banking crises under our belts, we've become almost entirely focused on the monetary aspect of advanced age. The context is important. The poll of 3,257 people, released last month, found that a whopping 92% of respondents agreed that "the United Sta