Shaky economic prospects threaten both parties

This is why both Presidential campaigns spend most of their time attacking each other. They have no answers to the economic quagmire we find ourselves in:

In the short term, the recovery looks shaky. In the long term, the economy looks shaky — so shaky that it may be many years before a president of either party or any ideology can count on winning a second term.

Polls show that President Obama’s lead over Mitt Romney is narrowing, but should Obama lose in November the decisive factor won’t be Romney (who is as inept a presidential candidate as this country has produced in decades). The real culprit will be the economy.

Mad cow case confirmed in California

Mad cow case confirmed in California

Occupy Evicted From Its 'Headquarters'

Source:

A group of Occupy Wall Street protesters were evicted Monday from a Lower Manhattan space that had served as an informal headquarters and a crash pad for the movement's stalwart supporters.

A late-day request to stay the eviction was denied by a judge, leaving the group without a central location to plan several coming events, including what they hoped would be a galvanizing May Day march that is being coordinated with labor unions.

Protesters moved into the space in late October, a few weeks before New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg ordered police to clear out the group's Zuccotti Park encampment. The loft space at 40 Exchange Place is located a few blocks away from the park that served as the heart of the anti-corporate movement until the Nov. 15 raid.

Ghost of Occupy Wall Street to haunt GE meeting

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An offshoot of the Occupy Wall Street movement, which rose to prominence last year with its anticorporate stance, plans to bring its populist message to General Electric Co's shareholder meeting in Detroit on Wednesday.

Members of the "99 Percent" movement plan to picket the largest U.S. conglomerate's meeting to protest its low tax rate. The loosely organized coalition, whose name is a contrast to the top 1 percent of wealthy Americans, expects to have more than 2,000 protesters in attendance, according to organizers.

"It's the 99 percent and we want to serve notice to the 1 percent that it's time to start paying your fair share in taxes and being a little more responsible," said Christian Gary, an organizer with Good Jobs Now in Detroit.

Home prices remain near post-crisis low; new-home sales fall 7%

Because home owners don't count. Unless they happen to work on Wall St.

Home prices remain near post-crisis low; new-home sales fall 7%

1 in 2 new Graduates are Jobless or Underemployed

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The college class of 2012 is in for a rude welcome to the world of work.

A weak labor market already has left half of young college graduates either jobless or underemployed in positions that don't fully use their skills and knowledge.

Young adults with bachelor's degrees are increasingly scraping by in lower-wage jobs — waiter or waitress, bartender, retail clerk or receptionist, for example — and that's confounding their hopes a degree would pay off despite higher tuition and mounting student loans.

Metta World Peace deserves lengthy suspension

Source:

Within a five-second span, Metta World Peace threw everything away.

His vicious elbow didn't just damage Oklahoma City forward James Harden. It damaged World Peace's reputation. His ensuing ejection didn't just hang the Lakers out to dry as they somehow managed to escape with a 114-106 double-overtime victory Sunday over the Oklahoma City Thunder. It left them wondering if they can win without him, since World Peace probably will draw a lengthy suspension. And his apology afterward that it was an "unintentional elbow" isn't just laughable because the Lakers' public relations staff refused to allow him to take follow-up questions. It's head-scratching because the replays show World Peace's blow was hardly an accident.

There's no reason World Peace would cock his arm and then rear back with such force unless he was planning to hit somebody. And because of the severity of that incident, World Peace deserves a suspension that lasts as long as Harden remains sidelined as he tries to recover from a concussion.

"Pro-Romney super PAC declines to give details behind $400,000 donation"

Source:

The super PAC promoting Mitt Romney’s presidential candidacy would not reveal precisely Monday who wrote a $400,000 check to the group in March. Restore Our Future said, however, who did not write the check: Scott DeSano, the man whose business address is listed on a report to the Federal Election Commission.

Restore Our Future on Friday reported to the FEC $8.7 million in March contributions, including a $400,000 gift from “Seaspray Partners LLC” at a Palm Beach, Fla. address. The company at that address belongs to DeSano, a former stock trader at Fidelity Investments.

DeSano told USA Today that he and his company have not contributed any money to Restore Our Future, and a spokeswoman for the super PAC told the Globe that a clerical error was responsible for the incorrect attribution.

US economy faces likely slowdown, big year-end decisions

US economy faces likely slowdown, big year-end decisions

NJ Father Records Teachers Bullying His Autistic Child

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A New Jersey father says he was so desperate to save his autistic son from he calls the bullying of teachers that he sent him to school with a hidden tape recorder.

You'll never believe the shocking things the teachers were caught saying.

FOX 29's Sara Madonna has the recordings from a disappointed, outraged father.

Stuart Chaifetz says his 10-year-old who has autism has always been a very gentle, loving boy. So when he started getting reports from school that his son was hitting teachers, he knew something was wrong after putting a recorder in his pocket for a day.

Anti-union Right’s alternate reality on NLRB election rule

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A vigorous opponent of unions, the Workplace Fairness Institute, according to the New York Times, was founded by “several long-term Republican operatives” and is funded by undisclosed corporate donors. However, Mr. Wszolek’s arguments should be considered on their merits, so let’s take a closer look at his so-called “facts."

Fact No 1: Is “regulatory uncertainty” destroying jobs? On this point, Wszolek might read the Economic Policy Institute’s study, “Regulatory Uncertainty: A Phony Explanation for our jobs problem.” EPI director Larry Mishel concludes, “An examination of current economic trends, and especially what employers are doing in terms of hiring and investment, debunks this story about regulatory uncertainty as the cause of our dismal
job growth.” With regard to the NLRB rules, GOP lawsuits and legislation are responsible for creating the current uncertainty.

Va. couple accidentally shot at gun safety class

Guns are dangerous even for trained people:

A Roanoke, Va., man and his wife were recovering after he accidentally shot himself and her during a firearms safety class.

RNC Spokeswoman: Republican Economic Platform Will Be The Bush Program, ‘Just Updated’

RNC Spokeswoman: Republican Economic Platform Will Be The Bush Program, ‘Just Updated’

Old, Rich White Men Are Buying This Election

Source: Frank Rich, New York Magazine:

This isn’t quite what was supposed to happen. When the Supreme Court handed down its five-to-four Citizens United decision in 2010, pre-vetting Mitt Romney’s credo that “corporations are people,” apocalyptic Democrats, including Obama, predicted that the election would become a wholly owned subsidiary of the likes of Chevron and General Electric. But publicly traded, risk-averse corporations still care more about profits than partisanship. They tend to cover their bets by giving to both parties. And they are fearful of alienating customers and investors. Witness, most recently, the advertisers who fled Rush Limbaugh, or the far bigger brands (­McDonald’s and Wendy’s, Coke and Pepsi) that severed ties with the conservative lobbying mill responsible for pushing state “stand your ground” laws like the one used to justify the shooting of Trayvon Martin in Florida. While corporations and unions remain serious players in the campaign of 2012, their dollars don’t match those of the sugar daddies, who can and do give as much as they want to the newfangled super-PACs.

Sugar daddies—whom I’ll define here as private donors or their privately held companies writing checks totaling $1 million or more (sometimes much more) in this election cycle—are largely a Republican phenomenon, most of them one degree of separation from Karl Rove and his unofficial partners in erecting a moneyed shadow GOP, David and Charles Koch. At last look, there were 25 known sugar daddies on the right (or more, if you want to count separately the spouses and children who pitch in). You’ve likely heard of Sheldon Adelson, the Vegas tycoon who is Benjamin Netanyahu’s unofficial ambassador to the GOP. But you may be less familiar with Irving Moskowitz, the bingo entrepreneur who funnels his profits into East Jerusalem settlements. Or Robert Mercer, the hedge-fund master of “flash trading” who poured a clandestine $1 million into ads attacking the “ground-zero mosque” and nearly another $3 million into a scale-model railroad in his Long Island mansion. Or Steven Lund, the co-founder of Nu Skin, which became “direct selling” sponsor of the Romney-run 2002 Winter Olympics after having spent much of the nineties settling complaints over false advertising and other unscrupulous practices with the Federal Trade Commission and six different states’ attorneys general.

Research Shows the US is a Low Wage Country

This should be a wake-up call to the supporters of this President. If Obama were a Republican this stat would be used against him. But it seems that the left has been drinking the cool aid and refuse to see reality for what it is. President Obama serves the interest of big business. He's proven that over and over again. Don't be fooled any longer.


Source: CBS

Study: ID thieves robbing the grave

Link

Nearly 2.5 million dead people are victims of identity theft every year, according to a study being made public Monday.

U.S. Economy Demands New Policy to Rescue Jobs and Growth

Sources: Forbes.com

Obviously China has been a place of radical institutional change to effectively transform its economy in a mere 30 years, from a poverty-stricken political backwater to a global economic powerhouse. Certainly China has been a country that used the blunt edges of government – heavy investment, government protections and cheap labor – to attract companies from overseas and to grow its own sectors, yet it has worked, quite effectively.

In the United States, it has been anathema to call for a deeper interplay between government and corporate America. While China sets an industrial goal and provides the appropriate policies and assistance to reach it, the U.S. government invests little energy in industrial policy and frequently must be cajoled into investing in new science and technology research.

Almost all major sectors in the United States that have become powerful industries have had some level of support from the government. This is not unfair treatment to be challenged in the World Trade Organization. It is smart capitalism to be emulated. The reality is that building industries – particularly fledgling industries with uncertain markets – requires early investment, an investment risk that the government alone is capable of bearing.

As a nation, the United States needs to think deeply about how best to develop new industries to rebuild its economy. Information technology, biotechnology and renewable energy are critical areas of opportunity. While China is struggling to catch up with the West on information technology and biotechnology, it has made great leaps in the area of renewable energy. China is rapidly moving ahead of the United States and Europe on the development of renewable energy products, despite the fact the technologies are often created here in the United States. Why? The Chinese government aggressively supports renewable energy compared to the U.S. government. China invested some tens of billions in renewable energy.

China’s investment in new industries explains many of the recent defections of U.S. companies to China. Unlike the United States, China perceives the benefit, and, more importantly, the necessity of public-private partnerships to grow and sustain industries today.

ALEC Hit With IRS Compliant Filed By Common Cause

Source:

Open government advocates accused a conservative legislative group Monday of falsely claiming tax-exempt status while doing widespread lobbying.

Advocacy group Common Cause said Monday it had filed an IRS complaint accusing ALEC of masquerading as a public charity. ALEC is formed as a nonprofit that brings together lawmakers and private sector organizations to develop legislation and policy.

ALEC says its work is not lobbying.

Common Cause disagrees. "It tells the IRS in its tax returns that it does no lobbying, yet it exists to pass profit-driven legislation in statehouses all over the country that benefits its corporate members," said Bob Edgar, president of Common Cause, in a statement. "ALEC is not entitled to abuse its charitable tax status to lobby for private corporate interests, and stick the bill to the American taxpayer."

Transcript: 'State of the Union' with Candy Crowley (4-22-12)

Interview with David Axelrod; Interview with Elijah Cummings; Interview with Marco Rubio

CROWLEY: So if you take this, is it fair to say, listen, the president is the guy in charge?

AXELROD: People will judge him based on his record. I think in your own poll he had a big edge in strong and decisive on all those leadership qualities. Part of it is we've been through some big things. We ended a war. We dealt with an oil leak of epic proportions. We've brought bin Laden to justice -- we've been involved in a lot of things that required very strong management, very strong leadership, very strong coordination and oversight. And I think people will judge him on the totality, not these transient stories.

CROWLEY: If this were happening in a Republican administration, would you be one of the first guys out there going hey, this guy is in charge.

AXELROD: Maybe, although I must say that the stories that stick are the ones that are really emblematic and reflective of an administration. These are not.

Look, in any organization I would venture to say that every once in a while someone does something wrong at CNN. And -- not you, of course, but -- and then the question is how do you deal with it. Do you deal with it firmly. Do you learn from it. Do you put in systems to prevent those things from happening in the future. And the answer in this case is yes. That's what we've done.

We've been more aggressive on demanding efficiencies, on attacking waste than I think any other administration has.

CROWLEY: It's also come to light that since last July, Leon Panetta, the defense secretary, who has a very tough job, and we all understand that, has -- it's cost the government $860,000 to fly him back and forth every other weekend, or however often he goes, to his home in California. Does that disturb you at all?

AXELROD: Well, look, Leon's family is out there. I understand that. He's serving the country. He's also the Defense Secretary and that puts some certain security risks around him that almost no one but the president endures. So, you know, I think...

CROWLEY: Tight government times you can see how people might look at this, certainly you're rivals, look at this and say, wow, this is a lot of money, most people when they get a job they move to where the job is -- and their families.

AXELROD: Understood but Leon is doing an important job for the country, really a service to the country at the age of 73 after a long career. He followed Bob Gates at the request of the president. I don't think people are going begrudge him going home and seeing his family.

CROWLEY: OK. Let me -- I want to give you a flash from the past with a couple of sound bites from the president in the campaign.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

OBAMA: Well, what we need is a comprehensive immigration approach.

I want to solve the problem, not use it as a political football.

We've got to fix a broken immigration system.

That's a priority that I will pursue from my very first day.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CROWLEY: OK, the president at other times during that campaign, which I covered fairly closely, said I'm going to get immigration reform in the first year. Now we're almost four years in and he has said, OK, I'm going to get it in the first year of my second term. Why should the Hispanic community or the country at large believe it's going to happen next year?

AXELROD: Well, because the president has tried to get it. He has initiated those actions and here is what happened, Candy. I was --

(CROSSTALK)

'Fareed Zakaria GPS' Transcript (4-22-12)

Full transcript. Excerpt Below:

ZAKARIA: All right. The Billionaires Index, you look at the number of billionaires in a country, but you look at also the total net worth as a percentage of GDP, and what do you do -- what do you find and what are you trying to get at?

SHARMA: You want new wealth to be created, and you don't want too much wealth to be concentrated in a few hands, because that sort of leads to the perception that reforms or opening up the economy is only benefiting a few people, and it leads to a backlash, in fact, against economic reforms.

And if you look at the economic success stories of Korea, Taiwan, one thing that you find, which is very noticeable about them, is that the number of billionaires they have as a share of the total sort of economy is sort of fairly reasonable.

But if you -- but the problem I find in places such as Russia is exactly the opposite, which is the number of billionaires you have, the highest number of billionaires in the world, even though their economy is nowhere near the size of a U.S. or even China, and the more disturbing point about Russia I find is that if you look at the number of millionaires, Russia doesn't even feature in the top 15 in the world. So when it comes to billionaires, top two. When it comes to millionaires, not even the top 15 in the world.

ZAKARIA: So the title of your book is "Breakout Nations." So there is good news here, because you're saying that the old emerging markets, the leader is Brazil, Russia, China, India are perhaps going to slow down. So what are the new ones and why are they thriving?

SHARMA: Well, I think that the most important point here is about expectations. That you have got to have reasonable expectations about countries. And the second thing is to do with per capita income.

Now, if a country like Korea, which I identify as still a break- out nation -- Korea is a remarkable economic success story along with Taiwan. It's the only economy in the world to have grown at 5 percent or more for five decades in a row.

ZAKARIA: Five decades.

SHARMA: Five decades in a row. Only two did in the world grew at more than 5 percent on average each decade. The other country where I think that expectations can be surpassed versus what the consensus is are Indonesia, Turkey, Philippines. I think even Thailand has a chance of doing so. Then a bunch of frontier markets such as Nigeria, Sri Lanka. I think all these countries have a chance of surpassing expectations.

ZAKARIA: And you're bullish on Poland as I remember in the book.

SHARMA: Yes. Eastern Europe. I think that Europe today gets a lot of flack for the fact that you talk about Europe today, and you only think about debt crises and boom-bust cycles, and yet you've got countries such as Poland with very good macroeconomic finances, and a pretty stable growth rate, solid institutions, and some very good companies.

And I think Czech is also in a similar league, even though its economy tends to be a bit more cyclical, because of its exports exposure.

So I think there are a whole bunch of countries out there which can be break-out nations, which can be the countries that emerge as the new economic stars.