Thoughts & Musings
Cops Want Your TXTs
Cops to Congress: We need logs of Americans' text messages State and local law enforcement groups want wireless providers to store detailed information about your SMS messages for at least two years -- in case they're needed for future criminal investigations. via...
Pensioners Take Note, Municipal Bond Storm Coming
[B]ut California too is now starting to hand it to bondholders. Cities in California are now testing the limits of bankruptcy law, and not paying the debt nor the payments for retirees to the state system. Thus this article describes how the state retirement system...
And you thought taxpayer propaganda was dead???
Chicago’s New Billboard Deal All But Signed
Kudos to Alderman Bob Fioretti: A Chicago City Council committee signed off Monday on Mayor Rahm Emanuel's latest privatization deal—even though, after nearly five hours of testimony, aldermen still didn't quite know how it added up for taxpayers, what its shortfalls...
New Faces Of Meth
Eight years ago, the Multnomah County Sheriff's Office launched a campaign called "the Faces of Meth" to address Oregon's methamphetamine problem. The images showed the jarring effects of meth on addicts' faces through before-and-after pictures from their arrest...
Plastic Bulb Promises Better Quality Light
The new light source is called field-induced polymer electroluminescent Fipel technology. It is made from three layers of white-emitting polymer that contain a small volume of nanomaterials that glow when electric current is passed through them. The inventor of the...
$55 Million Paid to Kids to Do Nothing
Records provided to CNN show that $54.5 million was spent on the NRI program, mostly through the governor's discretionary fund, which doesn't require legislative approval. The only data on the program's accomplishments come directly from the Illinois Violence...
Who Would Rather Not Work?
This first came up (recently at least) with the Hostess workers: Interviews with more than a dozen workers showed there was little sign of regret from employees who voted for the strike. They said they would rather lose their jobs than put up with lower wages and...
Pregnant Hurricane Sandy Victim and 2-year-old Daughter Homeless
A pregnant Hurricane Sandy victim was booted from her hotel room yesterday and forced to hunt for a place to stay because FEMA dropped the ball on her reservation. Keri Christian, 27, was living at Brooklyn’s Nu Hotel with her daughter, Serafina, 2, after the storm...
$45k/yr is the “New Rich”
Implemented in 1969 to make sure upper-income Americans pay their share of taxes, the AMT has increasingly snared more middle-income Americans over the years because it was never indexed for inflation. During the 2011 tax year for example, the higher tax hit single...
2/3 of Millionaires Avoid 50% Tax Rate
Two-thirds of millionaires left Britain to avoid 50p tax rate Almost two-thirds of the country’s million-pound earners disappeared from Britain after the introduction of the 50p top rate of tax, figures have disclosed. via Telegraph. Shhhhh... This is a secret. No...
A General Lack of Regard for Einstein’s Brain
There's a story about Einstein's brain over at the Washington Post. It's your basic nature vs. nurture about how this guy got to have this unique piece of gray matter between his ears. It appears quite a few Wash. Post readers don't think much of Ol' Albert or his...
China To Build World’s Tallest Building In 90 Days
It all started simple enough. A 15-Story Hotel in just 6 days. Six days. That's how long it took to build this level 9 Earthquake-resistant, sound-proofed, thermal-insulated 15-story hotel in Changsha, complete with everything, from the cabling to three-pane windows....
Racists Blacks Fret About Sole White Lady
Black leaders are growing increasingly worried that a white candidate might seize the seat of former Democratic Rep. Jesse Jackson in the upcoming Illinois special election. With a host of black candidates announcing their intention to seek the seat, the concern is...
Everyone Wants a Drone – Zero Concern For Your Privacy
Are unmanned aircraft, known to have difficulty avoiding collisions, safe to use in America's crowded airspace? And would their widespread use for surveillance result in unconstitutional invasions of privacy? via SFGate. Yes, and no seem like pretty straightforward...
Black Friday Gun Sales Hit New Record High
Black Friday gun sales hit an all time record high last week with demand for new firearms so overwhelming that it caused outages at the FBI background check center on two separate occasions. Fueled by fears that the Obama administration will go after gun rights during...
Illinois’ Pension Time-Bomb Too Big Too Fix
So says the Commercial Club of Chicago. In a memo to its members, the Civic Committee of the Commercial Club of Chicago said last week’s elections didn’t bring in an influx of lawmakers willing to deal with the pension crisis but instead leaves taxpayers with “more...
Ineptocracy
Union Workers Turn Against Organized Labor
As organized labor loses leverage in a race-to-the-bottom global market, some workers are becoming so disillusioned by what their unions can, or rather can't, do for them that they want out. The disaffected include dozens of machinists at Caterpillar Inc.'s plant in...
Senate bill rewrite lets feds read your e-mail without warrants | Politics and Law – CNET News
A Senate proposal touted as protecting Americans' e-mail privacy has been quietly rewritten, giving government agencies more surveillance power than they possess under current law. CNET has learned that Patrick Leahy, the influential Democratic chairman of the Senate...