I guess those guns make Mexico a freer nation as NRA argues:
68,000 guns recovered by Mexican authorities in the past five years have been traced back to the United States, authorities said Friday.
The flood of tens of thousands of weapons underscores complaints from Mexico that the U.S. is responsible for arming the drug cartels plaguing its southern neighbor. Six years of violence between warring cartels have killed more than 47,000 people in Mexico.
A radio personality in Cleveland is facing tremendous backlash after telling a father that he should get one of his male friends to rape his daughter to force her to turn straight.
In response to an email from a father who suspected his daughter was gay after discovering her kissing another girl, DJ Dominic Deiter declared on the air that “You should get one of your friends to screw your daughter straight.”
The people are rising up everywhere:
Riot police fired tear gas and water cannon on Saturday at a crowd of up to 25,000 protesters who had converged on the center of the Malaysian capital Kuala Lumpur to demand changes to an electoral system.Full article
Demonstrators also battled with police at a train station nearby, throwing bottles at officers who responded by firing tear gas rounds.
Thousands who had been confronting police outside the city's historic Merdeka Square were scattered after riot police fired water cannon and then at least 10 rounds of tear gas into the crowd. The police said they had been forced to react after protesters tried to force their way through barriers and enter the square.
The violence could carry political risks for Prime Minister Najib Razak if it is seen as unjustified, possibly forcing him to delay elections that must be called by next March but which could be held as early as June. Najib's approval rating tumbled after July last year when police were accused of a heavy handed response to the last major electoral reform rally by the Bersih (Clean) group.
The American people are beginning to realize that the two-party system dragging us ruin. Either we turn to an alternative with answers or remain with same gang that does not serve the American people. Our democracy and nation is dying. It's time we took action to save our republic:
Talk of a late third party presidential candidate keeps popping up among D.C. political pros who look at reams of polling data and other evidence and see an electorate anxious to cast a pox on both political houses in the form of an independent presidential bid.Full article
The public is “sending a message,” veteran Democratic pollster Peter Hart said Thursday morning at a National Journal/United Technologies policy breakfast, “and they’re sending it as loudly and clearly as possible. And the message is: ‘We hate you.’”
[...]That opens the doors for an independent, Hart and others agreed. “The environment [is] very ripe for independent candidates,” said veteran Democratic strategist Jamal Simmons. “Somebody has to be the ‘eat your vegetables’ candidate, and I don’t see Republicans or Democrats doing that.”
Hart likened the political mood in the country to 1948, 1968, and 1992—all years with strong independent presidential bids. “It is ripe for an independent candidate,” he said. “If there’s an independent candidate in this race, it will make a huge difference.” He argued that an independent would draw from the kind of voters who looked to Ross Perot and to Ron Paul—“it’ll come from the West, it’ll come from the rural areas, etc.”
Hopefully the West is army the rebels by way of Turkey and other means. If they are it's not enough. We know that the Russians are arming the Assad regime. The UN intervention is a complete joke and allows the Syrian government to get an advantage. The removal of Assad, and his minions, should be a major foreign policy of this country. The White House can't be trusted to do the right thing. That's why the World must speak out:
Gunmen in inflatable dinghies have attacked a military unit on Syria's Mediterranean coast, state media say, in the first seaborne assault of a 13-month-old uprising.
The official SANA news agency said several gunmen and soldiers were killed in a firefight that followed the coastal attack near the northern port of Latakia, 35 km south of the Turkish border.
"The fighting ... resulted in the death and wounding of a number of military personnel while the number of those killed from the terrorist group was not known because they attacked the military unit at night," SANA said.
It did not state the nationality of the attackers.
The Syrian government of president Bashar al-Assad has accused Turkey of allowing weapons and funds to flow to insurgents throughout the uprising.
This could turn into a major international dispute. The Chinese are not going to tolerate any interference in "domestic matters." Will the administration cave? Most likely. This White House like the previous don't give a damn about human rights in China:
Full articleA leading Chinese activist who escaped from house arrest last weekend is now under US "protection" and Washington and Beijing are in talks over his status, an overseas rights group said Saturday.
Chen Guangcheng, who has been blind since childhood, fled last Sunday with the help of his supporters from under the noses of dozens of guards, and subsequently recorded a video alleging abuses against him and his family.
China Aid, a group run by the former Tiananmen Square democracy activist Bob Fu, said it had learned from a "source close to the Chen Guangcheng situation" that the activist was now "under US protection".
"High-level talks are currently under way between US and Chinese officials regarding Chen's status," said the statement, which also called on the United States to ensure the safety of the activist and his family.
It is clear that there is an effort to start a war with Iran. And it's apparent there is more debate in Israel than in the U.S. Unfortunately no one is asking whether Obama will carry out such an attack if he is re-elected. Think that is far-fetched? So far this President has shown a willingness to act like another George Bush in many respects. Just as when he was elected in 2008, the President will be under pressure to appease the pro-Israel lobby, who want war. After coming into office Barack Obama broke just about every promise he made to the American people and did the bidding of the big business donors who financed his campaign:
Full article
"My major problem is that I have no faith in the current leadership, which must lead us in an event on the scale of war with Iran or a regional war," he said.
"I don't believe in either the prime minister or the defence minister. I don't believe in a leadership that makes decisions based on messianic feelings. Believe me, I have observed them from up close ... They are not people who I, on a personal level, trust to lead Israel to an event on that scale and carry it off.
"They are misleading the public on the Iran issue. They tell the public that if Israel acts, Iran won't have a nuclear bomb. This is misleading. Actually, many experts say that an Israeli attack would accelerate the Iranian nuclear race."
This administration has nothing but contempt for it's supporters:
"I guess what I’m trying to say without boring you too long at breakfast –- and you all look dull as hell, I might add," he told a crowd of more than 200 fundraisers from the Turkish and Azerbaijani communities in Washington DC. "The dullest audience I have ever spoken to. Just sitting there, staring at me. Pretend you like me!”Full article
The comment was met with laughs, per a White House pool reporter on the scene of the $2,500-per-ticket fundraising breakfast.
Another example of how America is becoming a third-word nation:
A new report from a Seattle non-profit group says that downtown Seattle's hotels are projected to enjoy tidy profits this year - at the expense of hotel workers and local taxpayers.Full article
The report called "Our Pain, Their Gain: The hidden costs of profitability in Seattle's downtown hotels," notes that between 2006 and 2010, the State of Washington spent more than $44 million to cover an average of 4,224 uninsured hotel workers per year.
"There is a hidden subsidy to this industry," says Howard Greenwich, research director of Puget Sound Sage, a regional economic policy advocacy group.
At this point the economy should not be so weak. This suggests serious underlying factors, such as debt, structural unemployment, and low wages. We can expect the economy to dip into a recession or worse in 2013:
Full articleThe U.S. economic recovery lost a bit more steam in the first quarter than most experts expected, as business investments and inventories slowed and government cutbacks continued to be a drag on growth.
The nation’s economic output expanded at a modest 2.2% annual rate in the first three months of the year, down from a 3% increase in the nation’s gross domestic product in last year’s fourth quarter, the Commerce Department said Friday.
Most analysts were expecting a GDP growth rate of 2.6% or a little higher for the first quarter.
Inflation-adjusted consumer spending grew at a solid 2.9% pace in the first quarter, boosted again by robust car sales as well as a pick-up in consumption of services. But business spending came in much weaker; investments for equipment and software rose 1.7% from the prior quarter, compared with an increase of 7.5% in the fourth quarter.
Much of the GDP slowdown was because of a significantly smaller buildup of inventories of products in the first quarter. That was expected as manufacturers and other businesses had increased their stockpiles of goods late last year to levels higher than what demand seemed to support.
Blind legal activist Chen Guangcheng escaped house arrest in eastern China and is now safe at an undisclosed location in Beijing, a U.S.-based rights group said in a statement.
Chen escaped earlier this week from his home in Shandong province where he has been under house arrest since being released from prison in Sept. 2010, Midland, Texas-based ChinaAid reported on its website. The group said there is speculation he is in the U.S. Embassy in Beijing.
“Dear Premier Wen, I’ve escaped after trying so hard,” a man who claimed to be Chen and resembled him said in a video that was posted on YouTube today, in a reference to Premier Wen Jiabao. “I am free now, but I am still very worried because my beloved wife and son are still under the devilish hands.”
Thousands of Mexicans have died because of the thousands of guns exported to Mexico. We can thank the NRA and U.S. government for this fact:
The government said Thursday that 68,000 guns recovered by Mexican authorities in the past five years have been traced back to the United States.Full article
The flood of tens of thousands of weapons underscores complaints from Mexico that the U.S. is responsible for arming the drug cartels plaguing its southern neighbor. Six years of violence between warring cartels have killed more than 47,000 people in Mexico.
The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives released its latest data covering 2007 through 2011. According to ATF, many of the guns seized in Mexico and submitted to ATF for tracing were recovered at the scenes of cartel shootings while others were seized in raids on illegal arms caches. All the recovered weapons were suspected of being used in crimes in Mexico.
Palin is wrong. Obama doesn't care about laborers either:
In a Facebook post titled “If I Wanted America to Fail, I’d Ban Kids From Farm Work,” Palin wrote,Full article
“The Obama Administration is working on regulations that would prevent children from working on our own family farms. This is more overreach of the federal government with many negative consequences. And if you think the government’s new regs will stop at family farms, think again.”
Her post is in response to US Department of Labor’s plan to update the Fair Labor Standards Act to include the farming industry. For the first time, children would be protected on non-family owned farms. Working with pesticides, lumber mills, animals, manure pits, storage bins, and many other jobs that children are often employed to perform would be regulated. But Sarah Palin doesn’t think America needs to protect kids. She thinks child labor laws make America fail. The problem with Palin’s position is that it’s dangerous and threatens the lives of our kids. Industry has taken advantage of child workers before.
According to Eastern Illinois University, before child labor laws, children, some as young as three years old, “endured some of the harshest conditions. Workdays would often be 10 to 14 hours with minimal breaks during the shift. Factories employing children were often very dangerous places leading to injuries and even deaths. Machinery often ran so quickly that little fingers, arms and legs could easily get caught. Beyond the equipment, the environment was a threat to children as well as factories put out fumes and toxins. When inhaled by children these most certainly could result in illness, chronic conditions or disease. Beyond the topic of safety, children working lengthy hours had limited access to education. Many families relied on income earned by each family member and did not allow children to attend school at all. Those fortunate enough to be enrolled often attended only portions of a school day or only a few weeks at a time.”
The boycott ALEC movement has turned its sights on Walmart, finding new allies among the retailer’s longtime opponents.
Civil rights activists including the Rev. Jesse Jackson are demanding that Walmart cut ties with the American Legislative Exchange Council, a conservative nonprofit that’s come under fire for promoting Stand Your Ground laws such as the one at the center of the Trayvon Martin case.
They are working with Making Change at Walmart, a coalition of activists that launched a petition drive Wednesday demanding the nation’s largest retailer drop its financial support of ALEC.
Source:
Throughout American history, almost every generation has had substantially more education than that of its parents.
That is no longer true.
When baby boomers born in 1955 reached age 30, they had about two years more schooling than their parents, according to Harvard University economists Claudia Goldin and Lawrence Katz, who have calculated the average years of schooling for native-born Americans back to 1876.
In contrast, when Americans born in 1980 turned 30 in 2010, they averaged about eight months more schooling than their parents.
A grassroots campaign by Keystone Progress to encourage Pennsylvania legislators to publicly reject membership in the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) is already yielding dividends. Zaid Jilani reports 28 lawmakers nationwide have quit ALEC this month.Five former members of the shadowy right-wing front group behind state laws restricting access to the ballot and “stand your ground” gun laws have already said they have left ALEC. One of those, State Sen. John Pippy (R), is the former ALEC Pennsylvania state chair. Nationally, thirteen companies have announced they have severed ties with the “stealth business lobbyist” organization.
Five Pennsylvania Legislators Leave ALEC
Too bad for home owners. They aren't wealthy enough. Only large corporations get bailed out. Remember they are people too:
Home prices have been bogged down by a series of problems, from restrictive lending policies by banks to the weak housing market. But foreclosures are the biggest drag in many parts of the country. The real estate marketing firm RealtyTrac says number of homes in foreclosure rose during the first three months of this year in more than half of the largest metropolitan areas.Full article
“First-quarter metro foreclosure trends were a mixed bag,” said Brandon Moore, chief executive officer of RealtyTrac. “While the majority of metro areas continued to show foreclosure activity down from a year ago, more than half reported increasing foreclosure activity from the previous quarter – an early sign that long-dormant foreclosures are coming out of hibernation in many local markets.”
Home ownership is down. According to a new Gallup poll, 62% of Americans say they own a home, compared to 68 percent last year. Some 53 percent of Americans believe their house is worth more today than when they bought it, down significantly from 80 percent in 2008 and 92 percent in 2006.
Of course the head of News Corp knew nothing about the criminal activities going on his company, involving his own son:
News Corp. chief Rupert Murdoch said Thursday that he panicked when he closed the News of the World tabloid last year, one of a series of revealing exchanges made at an inquiry into British media ethics.Full article
The 81-year-old media magnate acknowledged that the scandal which erupted at the Sunday tabloid last July was a "serious blot" on his reputation, but claimed his company was drawing a line under the sordid episode.
"I've spent hundreds of millions of dollars" cleaning up News Corp. subsidiary News International, Murdoch told the inquiry. "We are now a new company altogether."
The Wall St. culture has not changed one bit. And once again that greed will bring down the financial markets, thus the economy. But the next time there will be no "recovery" for a long time:
I saw something recently that blew my mind and I need to share with you. A venture capitalist having to defend making a 31,200% return — in two years.Full article
Seriously, read this post from Ben Horowitz , Netscape founder Marc Andreeseen’s investing partner. They were seed investors in Instagram, recently sold for $1 billion to Facebook FB 0.00% .
I’ll let @bhorowitz explain why he’s feels the need to defend hitting a grand-slam (emphasis mine)...
