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April 30, 2008
Penis theft panic hits city..
By Joe Bavier
KINSHASA (Reuters) - Police in Congo have arrested 13 suspected sorcerers accused of using black magic to steal or shrink men's penises after a wave of panic and attempted lynchings triggered by the alleged witchcraft.
Reports of so-called penis snatching are not uncommon in West Africa, where belief in traditional religions and witchcraft remains widespread, and where ritual killings to obtain blood or body parts still occur.
Rumors of penis theft began circulating last week in Kinshasa, Democratic Republic of Congo's sprawling capital of some 8 million inhabitants. They quickly dominated radio call-in shows, with listeners advised to beware of fellow passengers in communal taxis wearing gold rings.
Purported victims, 14 of whom were also detained by police, claimed that sorcerers simply touched them to make their genitals shrink or disappear, in what some residents said was an attempt to extort cash with the promise of a cure.
"You just have to be accused of that, and people come after you. We've had a number of attempted lynchings. ... You see them covered in marks after being beaten," Kinshasa's police chief, Jean-Dieudonne Oleko, told Reuters on Tuesday.
Police arrested the accused sorcerers and their victims in an effort to avoid the sort of bloodshed seen in Ghana a decade ago, when 12 suspected penis snatchers were beaten to death by angry mobs. The 27 men have since been released.
"I'm tempted to say it's one huge joke," Oleko said.
"But when you try to tell the victims that their penises are still there, they tell you that it's become tiny or that they've become impotent. To that I tell them, 'How do you know if you haven't gone home and tried it'," he said.
Some Kinshasa residents accuse a separatist sect from nearby Bas-Congo province of being behind the witchcraft in revenge for a recent government crackdown on its members.
"It's real. Just yesterday here, there was a man who was a victim. We saw. What was left was tiny," said 29-year-old Alain Kalala, who sells phone credits near a Kinshasa police station.
(Editing by Nick Tattersall and Mary Gabriel)
Posted by Jim at 04:13 PM | Comments (0)
Time Warner to spin off cable business
US media conglomerate Time Warner said Wednesday it wants to sell its struggling cable business as part of a restructuring that includes spinning off part of its AOL Internet business.
"We've decided that a complete structural separation of Time Warner Cable, under the right circumstances, is in the best interests of both companies' shareholders," said Time Warner chief executive Jeff Bewkes.
Bewkes said the company expects to finalize "soon" an agreement with Time Warner Cable. Time Warner owns about 84 percent of Time Warner Cable, the second-largest cable TV operator in the country after Comcast Corp.
Time Warner had indicated in February it was considering the sale of its interest in Time Warner Cable, which according to first-quarter earnings reported Wednesday, remains the main driver of growth at Time Warner.
Time Warner said operating profit fell 23 percent to 1.9 billion dollars, while that of Time Warner Cable rose 10 percent to 636 million dollars.
Bewkes has led a radical reorganization of Time Warner since taking the CEO post on January 1.
The group has merged its two movie studios -- Warner Bros. Entertainment and New Line Cinema -- and is planning to divest Internet service provider and portal AOL.
Bewkes said Wednesday that the AOL spinoff should be finalized by the end of June.
But the market remains skeptical about the reorganization of the sprawling media empire that also owns Turner Broadcasting, parent of CNN and HBO, and Time magazine. Time Warner shares have barely budged since Bewkes' arrival and remain more than 25 percent lower than a year ago.
Shares slipped 0.79 percent to 15.15 dollars Wednesday in late New York trade.
Time Warner reported a 36 percent drop in first-quarter net profit to 771 million dollars, citing problems with its AOL unit. Earnings per share were 21 cents, slightly below analysts' consensus expectation of 23 cents.
Copyright AFP 2008, AFP stories and photos shall not be published, broadcast, rewritten for broadcast or publication or redistributed directly or indirectly in any medium
My take on this is that the infrastructure that Time Warner has built is now falling apart and needs to be rebuilt and they don't want to pay for it so what they'll do is open up markets like Milwaukee to multiple cable companies and those companies will use the crumbling network, sucking as much as possible out of the consumer until the whole thing falls apart a bit at a time and then the municipalities that allowed TWC to be a monopoly in places like Milwaukee will have to find a way to pay for the re cabling of America because you see, nothing lasts forever.
Posted by Jim at 03:36 PM | Comments (0)
April 29, 2008
You gotta get Jenny!
Under Fact or Fiction, Kirstie Alley went on a diet last year, like it was one of those Hollywood diets where you look great in the commercials but in real life you are not so great... She's a rather ordinary looking woman, a bit on the heavy side. I guess she fell off the wagon and crushed Jenny Craig...
Posted by Jim at 06:24 AM | Comments (0)
April 25, 2008
Beaches closed after fatal shark attack in North County
By Karen Kucher and Debbi Farr Baker
UNION-TRIBUNE BREAKING NEWS TEAM
and Terry Rodgers
UNION-TRIBUNE STAFF WRITER
11:53 a.m. April 25, 2008
SOLANA BEACH – Several North County beaches were closed Friday morning after a man was killed in a shark attack north of Fletcher Cove, officials said.
Dave Martin, 66, was attacked as he was swimming about 150 yards offshore shortly after 7 a.m., officials said.
A helicopter initially was sent to take Martin to a hospital, but he was pronounced dead at a lifeguard station.
Witnesses told lifeguards that a “big gray shark” attacked Martin, biting both his legs, said Solana Beach Marine Safety Capt. Craig Miller.
Martin was swimming with a group of about 10 others, heading north from Fletcher Cove, near Tide Park, when the attack occurred. The group regularly swims in the area. All the swimmers were wearing wet suits.
Miller said two of the swimmers were about 20 yards ahead of the victim when he was attacked. They heard him screaming, went to his aid and brought him to shore, he said.
Encinitas Lifeguard Lt. Paul Chapman, who went to Fletcher Cove after the attack, said the victim's legs had suffered deep jagged lacerations, from the upper thighs to the lower shin, with a bite radius of about 22 inches.
“Wherever that thing is right now,” Chapman said, “it's pretty good-sized.”
Shark attacks are extremely rare in Southern California.
“I can't remember a shark ever being in this area before,” Miller said.
Officials closed beaches in Solana Beach, Del Mar and Encinitas after the attack.
Lifeguards in two vehicles were patrolling Solana Beach's 1.7 miles of coastline and a sheriff's helicopter flew overhead Friday morning, telling people to stay out of the water.
Beach closure signs also were posted.
“This is a tragic situation for Solana Beach and the surrounding areas and the county of San Diego,” said Solana Beach Mayor Joe Kellejian.
Kellejian urged the public to listen to safety officers and to stay out of the water.
“It just doesn't happen. A shark attack is unheard of,” said Solana Beach Deputy Fire Chief Dismas Abelman.
In Encinitas, the city just north of Solana Beach, extra lifeguards were called in and they cleared the water as a precaution, warning surfers face-to-face not to go out.
“We're keeping the water clear and informing people that they shouldn't be in the water,” Chapman said. “A couple people have chosen to go in the water and surf at Swami's and one at Beacons, against our advice.”
Chapman said that seals and sea lions have been beaching themselves in the area – he said a crew from Sea World was on its way to rescue one as he spoke. Such beachings are a possible sign of a large predator in the coastal waters.
“Those are signs that say this isn't the place to go,” Chapman said. “We have one person fatally wounded and we have sea life exiting the water. It's better to say out of the water and give it time.”
He also said a juvenile great white shark washed up on a nearby beach a few weeks before.
Officials are trying to determine how long beaches should be closed. Solana Beach may close its beaches as long as 72 hours, Miller said. If swimmers ignore the ban, he said, sheriff's deputies would be called to enforce the order.
The swimmers who were with the victim were taken to a community center to be debriefed, Abelman said.
A Coast Guard helicopter was sent to the area. The crew helped clear the area and spotters were trying to “spot the culprit,” said Coast Guard Petty Officer Clinton Dotson.
So far, no San Diego beaches have been closed, San Diego lifeguard Lt. Nick Lerma said. “It happened a significant distance from us, so we're sort of status quo,” Lerma said.
The state lifeguards who patrol Carlsbad's shoreline also did not feel the need to close that city's beaches, but did post warning signs and were broadcasting advisories from loudspeakers at lifeguard posts, said Lifeguard Travis Fryant.
“It's not a mandatory closure,” Fryant said. “We're letting the public know the facts and letting them make their own decisions about it.”
Lifeguards in Oceanside were also broadcasting warnings over their stations' loudspeakers, said city Lifeguard Emile Lagendijk.
The ocean temperatures off the coast are in the upper 50s, fairly typical for this time of year, according to Jim Purpura, meteorologist in charge of the National Weather Service office in Rancho Bernardo.
The last time a shark was confirmed to have killed someone in San Diego County waters was in 1994.
The victim, 25-year-old Michelle Von Emster, went for a nighttime swim by herself in Ocean Beach April 14.
Her body, with her leg severed at midthigh, was found the following day two miles to the south, near the surfing area known as Garbage Reef.
Investigators determined she drowned after being bitten by a great white shark.
Homicide detectives were called in after friends of the victim raised questions of foul play.
Friends said the woman – whose body was found unclothed – would not swim alone or without a swim suit. They also wondered why Von Emster's purse was found on the bluffs above the beach, and why her clothing was never found.
Reports of a great white shark at the same spot raised alarms in 2003, two years after great white shark sightings caused a scare at the venerable surf spot at San Onofre State Beach. No one was harmed either time.
Posted by James at 01:44 PM | Comments (0)
Humans lived in tiny, separate bands for 100,000 years
Human beings for 100,000 years lived in tiny, separate groups, facing harsh conditions that brought them to the brink of extinction, before they reunited and populated the world, genetic researchers have said.
"Who would have thought that as recently as 70,000 years ago, extremes of climate had reduced our population to such small numbers that we were on the very edge of extinction," said paleontologist Meave Leakey, of Stony Brook University, New York.
The genetic study examined for the first time the evolution of our species from its origins with "mitochondrial Eve," a female hominid who lived some 200,000 years ago, to the point of near extinction 70,000 years ago, when the human population dwindled to as little as 2,000.
After this dismal period, the human race expanded quickly all over the African continent and emigrated beyond its shores until it populated all the corners of the Earth.
The expansion marked the end of the Stone Age in Africa and the beginning of a cultural advancement that has led several archeologists to consider it the start of modern man, with the advent of language and complex and abstract thought.
The migrations out of Africa are estimated to have begun some 60,000 years ago. But little was known about the human trajectory between Eve and that period.
Published in the American Journal of Human Genetics, the study analyzed the maternally-transmitted mitochondrial DNA of human populations in southern and eastern Africa who appear to have diverged from other groups 90,000 to 150,000 years ago.
The researchers said paleoclimatological data suggests that Eastern Africa went through a severe series of droughts between 135,000 and 90,000 years ago that may have contributed to population splits.
Tiny bands of early humans developed in isolation from each other for as much as half of our entire history as a species, explained the study's chief authors Doron Behar, a genographic associate researcher based at Rambam Medical Center, Haifa, Israel, and Saharon Rosset, of IBM T.J. Watson Research Center, New York and Tel Aviv University.
"It was only around 40,000 years ago that they became part of a single pan-African population, reunited after as much as 100,000 years apart," said Behar.
"This new study ... illustrates the extraordinary power of genetics to reveal insights into some of the key events in our species' history," said Spencer Wells, of the National Geographic Society.
"Tiny bands of early humans, forced apart by harsh environmental conditions, coming back from the brink to reunite and populate the world. Truly an epic drama, written in our DNA," he added.
From a band of about 2,000 individuals, human beings have grown to a current population of about 6.6 billion.
Begun in 2005, the research was funded by National Geographic Society, IBM, the Waitt Family Foundation and the Seaver Family Foundation.
Copyright AFP 2008,
Posted by James at 01:41 PM | Comments (0)
Is it time to give up the search for an Aids vaccine?
After 25 years and billions of pounds, leading scientists are now forced to ask this question
By Steve Connor and Chris Green
Thursday, 24 April 2008
Most scientists involved in Aids research believe that a vaccine against HIV is further away than ever and some have admitted that effective immunisation against the virus may never be possible, according to an unprecedented poll conducted by The Independent.
A mood of deep pessimism has spread among the international community of Aids scientists after the failure of a trial of a promising vaccine at the end of last year. It just was the latest in a series of setbacks in the 25-year struggle to develop an HIV vaccine.
The Independent's survey of more than 35 leading Aids scientists in Britain and the United States found that just two were now more optimistic about the prospects for an HIV vaccine than they were a year ago; only four said they were more optimistic now than they were five years ago.
Nearly two thirds believed that an HIV vaccine will not be developed within the next 10 years and some of them said that it may take at least 20 more years of research before a vaccine can be used to protect people either from infection or the onset of Aids.
A substantial minority of the scientists admitted that an HIV vaccine may never be developed, and even those who believe that one could appear within the next 10 years added caveats saying that such a vaccine would be unlikely to work as a truly effective prophylactic against infection by the virus.
One of the major conclusions to emerge from the failed clinical trial of the most promising prototype vaccine, manufactured by the drug company Merck, was that an important animal model used for more than a decade, testing HIV vaccines on monkeys before they are used on humans, does not in fact work.
This has meant that prototype HIV vaccines which appear to work well when tested on monkeys infected with an artificial virus do not work when tested on human volunteers at risk of HIV – a finding that will be exploited by anti-vivisectionist campaigners opposed to vaccine experiments on primates.
Anthony Fauci, the director of the US National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), near Washington, told The Independent that the animal model – which uses genetically engineered simian and human immunodeficiency viruses in a combination, known as SHIV – failed to predict what will happen when a prototype vaccine is moved from laboratory monkeys to people. "We've learnt a few important things [from the clinical trial]. We've learnt that one of the animal models, the SHIV model, really doesn't predict very well at all," he said.
"At least we now know that you can get a situation where it looks like you are protecting against SHIV and you're not protecting at all in the human model – that's important," he said.
The NIAID spends about $500m (£250m) on HIV vaccine research each year and despite calls from some Aids pressure groups for funds to be diverted to other forms of Aids prevention, Dr Fauci said this was not the time to stop vaccine research. "I don't think you should say that this is the point where we're going to give up on developing a vaccine. I think you continue given that there are so many unanswered questions to answer," he said. "There is an impression given by some that if you do vaccine research you are neglecting other areas of prevention. That's not the case. We should and we are doing them simultaneously."
More than 80 per cent of the scientists who took part in our survey agreed that it was now important to change the direction of HIV vaccine research, given the failure of the Merck clinical trial, which was cancelled when it emerged that the vaccine may have actually increased the chances of people developing Aids.
Robert Gallo, a prominent Aids researcher in the US who is credited with co-discovering the virus in the early 1980s, likened the vaccine's failure to the Challenger disaster, which forced Nasa to ground the space shuttle fleet for years.
At the end of last month, Dr Fauci convened a high-level summit of leading HIV specialists at a hotel in Bethesda, Maryland, to discuss the future direction of research. A group of 14 prominent Aids specialists had already written to Dr Fauci suggesting that his institute had "lost its way" in terms of an HIV vaccine.
He said that one outcome of the meeting was a refocusing of the vaccine effort away from expensive clinical trials towards more fundamental research to understand the basic biology of the virus and its effects on the human immune system.
"We'll be turning the knob more towards answering some fundamental questions rather than going into big clinical trials," Dr Fauci said. "I'm certainly disappointed that we're not further ahead in the development of a vaccine but I don't say that this year I'm more discouraged than I was last year. I always knew from the beginning that it would be a very difficult task given what we know about this very elusive virus."
About 33 million people in the world are infected with HIV and some 26 million have died of Aids since the pandemic began.
The majority of scientists who responded to The Independent's survey said that a vaccine would be the most effective way of preventing the spread of the virus given the failure of many education programmes.
Winnie Sseruma, 46: 'For me, the key has been not to give up'
Ms Sseruma says she believes abandoning research for a vaccine would mean a loss of hope for millions of people. "When I was diagnosed, nearly 20 years ago, it was when the first drugs had come on the market. A lot of people had said before then that there was no hope and that all efforts should be put into prevention. But look where we are now. We cannot lose hope; we need to invest in a vaccine."
She says this latest failure needs to be seen as the first hurdle, not a signal to give up. "Yes, the scientists have not been very successful in their quest for a vaccine, but you can learn a lot from failures. Now they have realised they cannot use the normal routes used to develope simpler vaccines."
Ms Sseruma lives in London, but was born in Uganda and says that the current climate of pessimism for the vaccine is not dissimilar to the initial doubts over the likelihood of treating HIV in Africa.
"I remember when treatment started being available in the West and people were saying it would be impossible to send it to Africa. But look what's happened. We should always do whatever is humanly possible to fight Aids. It's been a long journey, but for me, the key has been not to give up, and the scientists need to have the same attitude."
'Philippe B', 42: 'People are getting resistant to drugs'
"Philippe", who wishes to remain anonymous, discovered he was HIV positive 11 years ago. The 42-year-old believes the search for the vaccination should no longer be a priority, but that it should not stop altogether.
"Unfortunately what's happening now is that people are getting more resistant to drug treatment, and more money needs to be put into finding more drugs for treatment," he said.
For people like Philippe, the fear of building an immunity to drugs and running out of options is a real one. He believes that as long as scientists are still pessimistic about the chances of successfully finding a vaccine, money needs to be invested in continuing to fund research into treatment.
"I've already become resistant to five combination treatments over the last ten years, and if I was on the last one available I'd be very afraid. HIV is not a death sentence in the way it once was, but we do need to fund further research into the drugs that treat it."
Nevertheless, Philippe thinks it is not yet time to abandon all research into a vaccine. "In my lifetime I don't think we'll have a vaccine, but there's no reason we should believe it isn't possible," he said. "But we should now be spending more on other ways of dealing with the disease."
Posted by Jim at 11:12 AM | Comments (0)
Teen charged with not disclosing HIV
18-year-old woman says they had unsafe sex
By CROCKER STEPHENSON
cstephenson@journalsentinel.com
Posted: April 22, 2008
An 18-year-old man accused of having unprotected sex with another teen without telling her that he is infected with HIV was charged Tuesday with second-degree recklessly endangering safety, a felony punishable by up to 10 years in prison.
According to a complaint, Rick Allen Brown had unprotected intercourse with an 18-year-old woman three times. Brown was living in South Milwaukee with his aunt at the time.
Brown's aunt told the girl she believed Brown was HIV positive, and the girl went to South Milwaukee police.
The girl told police she would not have had sex with Brown if she knew about his medical condition.
In an April 14 phone conversation, a South Milwaukee police officer asked Brown if he was HIV positive.
"Yes, I am," Brown replied, according to the complaint.
Brown said he had known for about 18 months. He denied, however, having sexual intercourse with the young woman.
According to court records filed this month in support of subpoena seeking Brown's medical records, a 16-year-old told police at South Milwaukee High School that she had sexual contact, but not intercourse, with Brown and that he did not tell her about his condition. The same court records indicate that the woman in Tuesday's complaint is 18.
The 16-year-old was not mentioned in Tuesday's complaint.
The human immunodeficiency virus is a life-threatening sexually transmitted disease that can lead to the development of AIDS.
Brown made his initial appearance Tuesday before Court Commissioner Rosa M. Barillas. He is a tall, thin man who appeared all the more lanky dressed in baggy orange jail clothing.
Barillas set a cash bail of $1,000. As conditions of his bail, Barillas ordered Brown to have no contact with the 18-year-old girl and to advise anyone he has sex with of his medical condition.
According to computerized state court records, Brown pleaded no contest in 2006 in Racine County to a misdemeanor charge of carrying a concealed weapon. Less than a month later, he pleaded no contest to a misdemeanor charges of theft and receiving stolen property.
He was ordered to serve two years of probation. A condition of the probation was that Brown enroll in school.
School officials for the South Milwaukee district didn't respond to requests for interviews Tuesday.
The parent of a sophomore at South Milwaukee High School said he can see why administrators there aren't eager to comment, given that the sexual acts Brown has been accused of did not happen on school grounds.
"Something happened, and it's terrible, but it's not the school's problem," the parent said Tuesday. "The school can't be the police for these individuals. Everybody looks for someone to blame, but the schools can't be responsible for that."
Dani McClain of the Journal Sentinel staff contributed to this report.
Posted by Jim at 11:10 AM | Comments (0)
April 24, 2008
SKorea trains cloned drug-sniffing dogs
By HYUNG-JIN KIM
Associated Press Writer
AP Photo/Lee Jin-man
SKorea trains cloned drug-sniffing dogs
INCHEON, South Korea (AP) -- The country that created the world's first cloned canine plans to put duplicated dogs on patrol to sniff out drugs and explosives.
The Korean Customs Service unveiled Thursday seven cloned Labrador retrievers being trained near Incheon International Airport, west of Seoul. The dogs were born five to six months ago after being separately cloned from a skilled drug-sniffing canine in active service.
Due to the difficulties in finding dogs who are up to snuff for the critical jobs, officials said using clones could help reduce costs.
The cloning work was conducted by a team of Seoul National University scientists who in 2005 successfully created the world's first known dog clone, an Afghan hound named Snuppy.
The team is led by Professor Lee Byeong-chun, who was a key aide to disgraced scientist Hwang Woo-suk. Hwang's purported breakthroughs in stem cell research were revealed as false, but independent tests proved the team's dog cloning was genuine.
The seven new cloned male dogs are all healthy, though one was sent to a university laboratory a few days ago for a minor foot injury it received during training, according to training center head Lim Jae-ryoung. For now, the dogs all share the same name: "Toppy" - a combination of the words "tomorrow" and "puppy."
"They have a superior nature. They are active and excel in accepting the training," said Kim Nak-seung, a trainer at the Customs Service-affiliated dog training center.
In February, all seven dogs passed a behavior test aimed at finding whether they are genetically qualified to work as sniffing dogs. Only 10 percent to 15 percent of naturally born dogs typically pass the test.
If the cloned dogs succeed in other tests for physical strength, concentration and sniffing ability, they will be put to work by July next year at airports and harbors across South Korea, according to the training center.
The agency says the cloned dogs could also save money.
"We came up with the idea of dog cloning after thinking about how we can possess a superior breed at a cheaper cost," said agency head Hur Yong-suk.
Normally, only about three out every 10 naturally born dogs it trains - at a cost of about $40,140 each - ends up qualifying for the job.
Lee of Seoul National University said it cost approximately $100,000 to $150,000 to clone each of the seven golden Labrador retrievers.
He said the seven are the world's first cloned drug-sniffing dogs.
The university team did not ask for payment from the customs authorities because it created the clones for academic purposes with government funds, Lee said.
He said his team has so far cloned 20 dogs and five wolves.
On Thursday the dogs frolicked with trainer Kim, running together and chasing a red rubber ball he threw across a playground - a part of training aimed at bolstering their stamina.
"If I look at them very carefully, there are now some small differences in their facial features," said Kim, who has been training the dogs since they were born. "But it's still hard to tell."
Posted by Jim at 12:55 PM | Comments (0)
Secret Service Catch Mexican Official Nabbing White House BlackBerries
Whether he was up to no good or simply desperate to play BrickBreaker, a Mexican press attaché was caught on camera by Secret Service pocketing several White House BlackBerries during a recent meeting in New Orleans, FOX News has learned.
Sources with knowledge of the incident said the official, Rafael Quintero Curiel, served as the lead press advance person for the Mexican Delegation and was responsible for handling logistics and guiding the Mexican media around at the conference. He took six or seven of the handheld devices from a table outside a special room in the hotel where the Mexican delegation was meeting with President Bush earlier this week.
Everyone entering the room was required to leave his or her cell phone, BlackBerry and other such devices on the table, a common practice when high-level meetings are held. American officials discovered their missing belongings when they were leaving the session.
It didn't take long before Secret Service officials reviewed videotape taken by a surveillance camera and found footage showing Quintero Curiel absconding with the BlackBerries.
Sources said Quintero Curiel made it all the way to the airport before Secret Service officers caught up with him. He initially denied taking the devices, but after agents showed him the DVD, Quintero Curiel said it was purely accidental, gave them back, claimed diplomatic immunity and left New Orleans with the Mexican delegation.
It is unclear what disciplinary measures, if any, await him in Mexico. White House spokeswoman Dana Perino refused to discuss the incident, telling FOX News, "We are aware of the situation, but as it's under investigation by law enforcement officials, we will decline to comment."
FOX News' James Rosen and Mike Emanuel contributed to this report.
Posted by Jim at 12:52 PM | Comments (0)
April 23, 2008
Poor Bitter Voters?
This is from the front page of huffpost the day after Hillary Clinton won the 2008 Pennsylvania Primary by a 10% margin. This ties in with Obama's comment about rural Pennsylvanians being bitter and poor.
HuffPost hates Hillary! They really, really hate her! they accuse her of the most nasty campaign in history without any consideration for the very fact that she really, really wants to win!
Posted by Jim at 10:21 AM | Comments (0)
Does God Hate Tony Snow?
He's not dead yet but is it a blessing or just another sign of how much God hates Tony Snow? And, does God hate CNN too?
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/04/22/tony-snow-cnn-anchor-a-lo_n_98015.html
Posted by Jim at 05:35 AM | Comments (0)
A Hard Plastic Is Raising Hard Questions
By TARA PARKER-POPE
Published: April 22, 2008
Are toxic plastics lurking in your kitchen?
It’s a question many families are asking after reports last week that a chemical used to make baby bottles, water bottles and food containers is facing increasing scrutiny by health officials in Canada and the United States.
The substance is bisphenol-a, or BPA, widely used in the making of the hard, clear and nearly unbreakable plastic called polycarbonate. Studies and tests show that trace amounts of BPA are leaching from polycarbonate containers into foods and liquids.
While most of the focus is on products for children, including clear plastic bottles and canned infant formula, the chemical is also used in food-storage containers, some clear plastic pitchers used for filtered water, refillable water bottles and the lining of soft-drink and food cans.
While there is debate about how much of a health worry BPA really is, retailers including Wal-Mart have said they are withdrawing baby products made with it. Nalgene, the maker of a popular sports bottle, and the baby-products maker Playtex have announced they will stop using it.
Here are answers to some common questions about BPA.
What is the evidence that BPA is harmful?
It all comes from animal studies. Rat pups exposed to BPA, through injection or food, showed changes in mammary and prostate tissue, suggesting a potential cancer risk. In some tests of female mice, exposure appeared to accelerate puberty.
A draft report from the National Toxicology Program, part of the Department of Health and Human Services, notes that there is no direct evidence that human exposure to BPA harms reproduction or infant development. “I don’t think there’s anything in this brief that should lead to alarm,” said Dr. Michael D. Shelby, director of the Center for the Evaluation of Risks to Human Reproduction, who oversaw the report. “It means we’ve got a limited amount of evidence from some studies that were done in laboratory animals.”
The main concern is the possible risk to infants and pregnant women, although Canada has begun a study to monitor BPA exposure among about 5,000 people to assess any danger to adults.
How much BPA are we exposed to?
BPA migrates into food from polycarbonate plastic bottles or the epoxy resin coatings that line canned food. The typical adult ingests an estimated 1 microgram of BPA for every kilogram (2.2 pounds) of body weight. Babies who use polycarbonate bottles and formula from cans get more, an estimated 10 micrograms per kilogram of body weight. A microgram represents a trace amount. Consider this: a single M&M is about a gram. If you cut it into 100,000 slices, one slice would equal about 10 micrograms.
The 2003-4 National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention found detectable levels of BPA in 93 percent of urine samples collected from more than 2,500 adults and children over 6.
How do I know if the plastic containers in my home contain BPA?
Any product made of hard, clear plastic is probably made from polycarbonate unless the manufacturer specifically states that it’s BPA-free. One way to check is to look for the triangle stamp on or near the bottom: polycarbonate plastics should have the numeral 7 in the triangle, sometimes with the letters PC.
Unfortunately, 7 is a catchall “other” category for a variety of plastics. In my own kitchen, I found just one product with a 7 — plastic fruit cups my daughter takes to school. But the plastic is soft and pliable, so it is probably not made with BPA.
I also found refillable water bottles without a stamp. Because they are hard, shatterproof and clear, it’s reasonable to assume they are made from polycarbonate.
What about canned food and drinks?
While much of the focus is on plastic bottles, most human exposure occurs through the lining of canned foods. Canned beverages appear to contain less of the chemical than canned foods like soup, pasta, fruits and vegetables, which are often processed at high temperatures. Virtually every canned product, even those labeled organic, has a liner with BPA. One brand, Eden Organic Baked Beans, says it uses a BPA-free can.
How do I lower my exposure?
Switch to frozen or fresh vegetables. Use glass, porcelain and stainless-steel containers, particularly for hot foods and liquids. If you don’t want to use a glass baby bottle, several companies, including the popular brand Born Free, now sell BPA-free baby bottles and sippy cups. For formula-fed babies, you can switch to powdered formula rather than liquid.
Although many plastic products claim to be microwave safe, some scientists warn against putting any plastic in the microwave. “There is such a wide variety now, from disposable containers to actual Tupperware,” says Dr. Anila Jacob, a senior scientist for the Environmental Working Group, a Washington-based advocacy group. “I don’t know of anyone who has done definitive testing of all these different types of plastic containers to see what is leaching into food.”
Posted by Jim at 05:25 AM | Comments (0)
April 22, 2008
Some Statistics
Military member fatalities actively serving in the armed forces from 1993 through 2006:
1993 .......... 1,213
1994 .......... 1,075
1995 .......... 2,465
1996 .......... 2,318 13,417 deaths
1997 .......... 817
1998 ......... 2,252
1999 .......... 1,984
-------------------------------------------------
2000 .......... 1,983
2001 .......... 890
2002 .......... 1,007 9,016 deaths
2003 .......... 1,410
2004 .......... 1,887
2005 ......... 919
2006.......... 920
------------------------------------------------------------
European descent (White) ............ 69.12%
Hispanic ............................. 12.5%
Black................................. 12.3%
Asian ................................. 3.7%
Native American ....................... 1.0%
Fatalities by Race over the past three years:
European descent (white) ............ 74.31%
Hispanic ............................ 10.74%
Black ................................ 9.67%
Asian ................................ 1.81%
Native American...................... 1.09%
http://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/natsec/RL32492.pdf
Posted by Jim at 04:53 PM | Comments (0)
April 15, 2008
Saudi King to leave some oil finds for future...
By Agencies on Sunday, April 13 , 2008
Saudi Arabia's King Abdullah said he had ordered some new oil discoveries left untapped to preserve oil wealth in the world's top exporter for future generations, the official Saudi Press Agency (SPA) reported.
"I keep no secret from you that when there were some new finds, I told them, 'no, leave it in the ground, with grace from god, our children need it'," King Abdullah said in remarks made late on Saturday.
US President George W Bush in January urged the Saudi King to help tame soaring prices by encouraging Opec to pump more oil. On separate trips to Saudi Arabia this year, the US Energy Secretary also asked for more oil, while the Vice-President discussed high prices with the king.
The kingdom has spent billions on building over 2 million bpd of spare crude capacity and is the only country in the world able to bring online large volumes of crude supply quickly to deal with unexpected supply shortages.
Opec held production steady at meetings in February and March despite calls for more oil from the US and other consumers. Opec officials blame the high price on factors beyond the group's control such as the weak dollar, investment flows into commodities and speculation. Saudi Oil Minister Ali Al Naimi said last week that global oil markets were well supplied and there was no need to put more oil on the market, despite prices hitting a record of over $112 a barrel last week.
Saudi Arabia has trimmed its output to around 9 million bpd to reflect lower customer demand, a Saudi oil source said on Friday. The kingdom had in previous months pumped around 9.2 million bpd. Crude demand traditionally dips at this time of year after the end of winter as refiners carry out maintenance and prepare to meet summer demand.
Saudi production capacity stands at around 11.3 million bpd, and is scheduled to rise to 12. 5 million bpd next year. (Reuters)
The combination of relatively high oil prices and exports led to a revenues windfall for Saudi Arabia during 2004 and early 2005. For 2004 as a whole, Saudi Arabia earned about $116 billion in net oil export revenues, up 35 percent from 2003 revenue levels. Saudi net oil export revenues are forecast to increase in 2005 and 2006, to $150 billion and $154 billion, respectively, mainly due to higher oil prices. Increased oil prices and consequent revenues since the price collapse of 1998 have significantly improved Saudi Arabia's economic situation, with real GDP growth of 5.2 percent in 2004, and forecasts of 5.7% and 4.8% growth for 2005 and 2006, respectively.
For fiscal year 2004, Saudi Arabia originally had been expecting a budget deficit. However, this was based on an extremely conservative price assumption of $19 per barrel for Saudi oil and an assumed production of 7.7 Mbbl/d (12,200 m³/d). Both of these estimates turned out to be far below actual levels. As a result, as of mid-December 2004, the Saudi Finance Ministry was expecting a huge budget surplus of $26.1 billion, on budget revenues of $104.8 billion (nearly double the country's original estimate) and expenditures of $78.6 billion (28 percent above the approved budget levels). This surplus is being used for several purposes, including: paying down the Kingdom's public debt (to $164 billion from $176 billion at the start of 2004); extra spending on education and development projects; increased security expenditures (possibly an additional $2.5 billion dollars in 2004; see below) due to threats from terrorists; and higher payments to Saudi citizens through subsidies (for housing, education, health care, etc.). For 2005, Saudi Arabia is assuming a balanced budget, with revenues and expenditures of $74.6 billion each.
In spite of the recent surge in its oil income, Saudi Arabia continues to face serious long-term economic challenges, including high rates of unemployment (12 percent of Saudi nationals),[9] one of the world's fastest population growth rates, and the consequent need for increased government spending. All of these place pressures on Saudi oil revenues. The Kingdom also is facing serious security threats, including a number of terrorist attacks (on foreign workers, primarily) in 2003 and 2004. In response, the Saudis reportedly have ramped up spending in the security area (reportedly by 50 percent in 2004, from $5.5 billion in 2003). Saudi Arabia's per capita oil export revenues remain far below high levels reached during the 1970s and early 1980s. In 2007, Saudi Arabia's citizens earned around $20,700 per person, versus $22,589 in 1980, but it is catching up. This 80 percent decline in real per capita oil export revenues since 1980 is in large part because Saudi Arabia's young population has nearly tripled since 1980, while oil export revenues in real terms have fallen by over 40 percent (despite recent increases). Meanwhile, Saudi Arabia has faced nearly two decades of heavy budget and trade deficits, the expensive 1990-1991 war with Iraq, and total public debt of around $175 billion. On the other hand, Saudi Arabia does have extensive foreign assets (around $110 billion) which provide a substantial fiscal "cushion."
Posted by Jim at 12:52 PM | Comments (0)
April 13, 2008
Space Shuttle In Germany
Posted by Jim at 10:01 PM | Comments (0)
Jamaica 2008 Videos
Posted by Jim at 09:26 PM | Comments (0)
IRS eases pressure on Big U.S. companies, study says
From: The International Herald Tribune
By Lynnley Browning
Published: April 13, 2008
NEW YORK: Most Americans dread tax season. But corporate America seems to have less to fear from the Internal Revenue Service than it used to, according to a new study.
The IRS's scrutiny of the biggest U.S. companies is running at a 20-year low, according to the study, conducted by Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse, or TRAC, a research group affiliated with Syracuse University.
The study, made public Sunday, points to "a historic collapse in audits." It found that major corporations - defined as those with assets of at least $250 million - have about a one in four chance of being audited, down from about three in four in 1990.
Individuals have about a 10 percent chance of being audited, more than double the odds in 2000, according to the IRS.
The study's findings stand in sharp contrast to the tough talk coming out of the IRS in recent years. The report suggests that the agency is shifting its focus away from big corporations to small companies, private partnerships and other private entities, a move that tax lawyers said was consistent with trends they were seeing.
But IRS officials, who reviewed the report prior to its release, said Friday that TRAC misinterpreted a basic shift in corporate America in recent years. Companies of all sizes, as well as wealthy individuals, have embraced certain partnerships and other opaque entities in an effort to minimize taxes, the officials said.
Sometimes those arrangements cross the line into tax abuse. Because large companies increasingly use such partnerships, the IRS has stepped up scrutiny of these entities.
"These aren't mom-and-pop grocery stores we're auditing," said Barry Shott, a deputy IRS commissioner.
The IRS has not reduced its scrutiny of large corporations, he said. Instead, it is focusing on the private partnerships some of these companies use to avoid paying taxes.
Shott said the IRS supplied data to TRAC but that the group, which gathers information from government agencies under the Freedom of Information Act, misinterpreted it. TRAC, which has gone to court to force the IRS to turn over more detailed data on audits, stood by its findings.
While the report singled out the IRS's increased focus on partnerships, it also said that the agency was increasingly targeting smaller corporations, or those with no more than $50 million in assets. Such companies require less time and money to investigate, something that is important to the IRS, which has long complained that it is underfinanced. Such investigations, however, typically bring in fewer unpaid tax dollars than audits of large corporations.
"I'm still trying to find my jaw on the ground from the finding that audit rates for the big boys are plummeting," said Dean Zerbe, the national managing director of Alliant Group, a tax planning company. While corporations account for a small percentage of all taxes paid to the U.S. government, their share of the total has been rising in recent years.
Last year, corporations of all sizes accounted for nearly 23 percent of all federal income taxes paid, or around $395 billion, according to previously-released data from TRAC. That is up significantly from 2001, when corporations accounted for 13.7 percent of all taxes paid, an all-time low. Individuals paid the rest.
The IRS is bringing in more money from corporations of all sizes through its audits. Last year it brought in over $59 billion in unpaid tax revenues, according to statistics from the agency. That is nearly double the level of 1998 and is consistent with a steady climb since then.
Posted by Jim at 09:09 PM | Comments (0)
Global Warming?
From the New York Times -- Yesterday
"Photographic evidence. Far left, a photograph of a cemetery in Lowell, Mass., taken on May 30, 1868. Near left, a photograph of the same location on May 30, 2005, taken by Richard Primack, a biology professor at Boston University. The year 1868 was not the coldest for New England, but the tree branches were still bare at the end of May. In 2005, the leaves were out and the flowers in bloom. Dr. Primack and Abe Miller-Rushing of the Rocky Mountain Biological Laboratory in Colorado compared observations that Henry David Thoreau made in the mid-19th century with their own recent observations and found that blueberry bushes in Concord, Mass., are now blooming more than a week earlier than in Thoreau's day."
Well, if you want evidence of global warming, this is pretty good evidence, don't you think?
Posted by Jim at 07:06 AM | Comments (0)
April 12, 2008
The Oscars
Years ago I had fish. It was an evolution of exploration, testing my ability to love God's creatures. In the end I discovered that loving a fish will only take you so far. Can you see them? Look closely. One is albino and the other is dark brown and below and to the right of him/her. I never knew what sex they were. When I bought them at the pet store they were tiny babies. As time passes they grew into monster fish and they also grew increasingly hungry, hungry for blood! This picture was probably the only one and it was taken when the tank was at it's peak of beauty and cleanliness. As my babies grew, they became increasingly agitated. My tank wasn't big enough for them. When I started feeding them live food, small gold fish, they became increasingly agressive and the tank became a slaughterhouse. I had to remove everything but the gravel and still they churned about. I can't remember how long I had them but I simply wasn't up to the task of keeping the tank clean. It got dirty, they got the ick and then their environment got really toxic. Subsequent tank cleaning did not remove the infection because it was being regenerated by the live minnows from the pet store. It was a viscous circle of self-perpetuating ickyness. Sometimes they would throw themselves about in the tank and I'd be washing the dishes and hear this "thunk" sound and see that the tank was like someone had stirred it all up with a big spoon, gravel going every which way. Those fish were so unhappy. I didn't understand it then, but I do now. Well, eventually they both contracted a terrible brain worm parasite that Oscars sometimes get. I thought that it couldn't get worse, but it did.
The fish were getting sick a lot and I was beside myself. I couldn't keep the tank clean enough and I still didn't understand that my tank was way too small and that my beloved fish were suffering. I decided to remove one of them from the equation. I took out the brown Oscar, wrapped him in a plastic bag and set him by the door to die, peacefully...
It was still alive the next day! I took it outside and put it in my garden and covered it with a thin layer of dirt. The albino Oscar lived on in frustration and failing health for only a few more weeks. Towards the end she/he was swimming around in the tank upside down, making a general mess, she'd lay on the bottom on her side and then float to the top. I couldn't stand it anymore. I took the albino out of the tank and put it into into the garbage. Then I took out the garbage and that was the end of the Oscars. Or at least that's what I thought...
Advance six months... I'm out in my old yard with doggie "Copper". I'm throwing him a frisbee. Copper is a Brittany Spaniel and loves to play catch and return. He's usually pretty good about bringing back what ever I throw but this time he brought back something else. I took it out of his mouth. It was covered with dog slobber. I wiped it off and then realized it had an eye and it was looking at me! I screamed and dropped it now totally recognizing the dried scaly exterior of my old pet Oscar, or at least one side of him. His flesh stripped away long ago. They never truly leave us, our pets...
Posted by Jim at 06:57 AM | Comments (0)
April 08, 2008
Happy Birthday Doris Day!
Remember Doris? She was a popular singer, made movies and television shows from 1948 to 1972. Her career lasted 24 years. She retired from the entertainment business abruptly and once you've read her story you'll understand why. Lately people have been saying bad things about Doris, like she's a bag lady or something but Doris Day is 85 years old this month! She's alive and well and taking care of her many, many dogs at her hilltop estate near Carmel California. Doris doesn't talk about her career as an entertainer. She doesn't make personal appearances, she doesn't do guest shots. Recently she won a Grammy but she didn't show up to receive it. Although Doris had a very successful career, she didn't enjoy a perfect or entirely happy life, but then who does? It seems all she really wanted was a good husband and some children. Doris may have wanted a normal life but she had talent and ambition and in Hollywood that gets you rich and famous. Happiness not necessarily included.
This month's Vanity Fair magazine has a very interesting article about the often described as "reclusive" Doris Day. There's a lot more information than perhaps one might wish to read. It seems that Doris feels that her screen image and her true image are in conflict and she wants people to know exactly who the real Doris Day is, or at least who she was back when she was the top box office draw in the country. I love all of her movies, I even liked her television show, corny and hokey as it was. I'm happy to hear that she's still with us and that she isn't a bag lady.
From my perspective it seems that Doris has been very fortunate to have the support of her many devoted fans. She not only still has fans but her movies have guaranteed her a steady stream of new ones. To understand why, all one needs to do is watch a few of her films. Doris sparkles in front of the camera. She sings, she dances and she can act! She's 100% genuine and the audience 100% believes her. She's beautiful, charming, innocent and sexy but never, ever threatening. Doris Day is still very appealing. The picture is a publicity still from one of her sexy comedies with Rock Hudson. Don't they look great?
Posted by Jim at 03:21 PM | Comments (1)
10 Unbelieveable Conspiracies
The Official British Inquest into the death of Princess Diana is officially over. The ruling is that Princess Diana died because the man driving the car she was a passenger in was drunk and was driving too fast because he was trying to get away from the paparazzi. The driver and the paparazzi share the blame. Even with this ruling, many people appear to believe that the Princess was murdered, assassinated, for a variety of purposes. Is that so hard to believe? Then check out the rest of the story.
Posted by Daniel Finkelstein on April 7, 2008 @ http://timesonline.typepad.com/comment/2008/04/the-absurd-prin.html
Ten conspiracy theories more ridiculous than the Diana "plot"
The absurd Princess Diana conspiracy theories have now had their day in court and been dismissed. So here are a number of other preposterous conspiracy theories.
Can you work out what it is that connects these ridiculous allegations?
1. Harold Wilson's political secretary, Marcia Falkender, made his life such a misery that the Prime Minister's doctor, Joe Stone, hatched a plot to murder her. He told other Wilson aides repeatedly that his plan was foolproof and would not be detected. He dropped it only when they refused to co-operate.
2. In 1959, when Francois Mitterrand was already a famous politician, he narrowly escaped an assassination attempt outside the Luxembourg Gardens in Paris. His car was riddled with bullets but he leapt to safety. When the gunman and the organiser of the attempt were arrested they were able to prove that the whole thing was a fake organised by Mitterrand to win favourable headlines and implicate General de Gaulle. Charges against the "assassins" were dropped. Mitterrand was later elected President of France.
3. John F. Kennedy shared a mistress with a notorious Mafia boss and used her as a courier to bring him Mob money from her other boyfriend. Frank Sinatra disbursed the cash which was used to bribe election officials to fix the outcome of the West Virginia primary.
4. A future member of the Cabinet, Peter Hain, was charged with bank robbery after a man snatched money from Barclays in Putney. He was acquitted and now believes, with good reason, that Boss, the South African secret police, arranged for a Hain double to carry out the crime in order to discredit him.
5. The leader of the Liberal Party, Jeremy Thorpe, was charged with conspiracy to murder after the shooting of a dog belonging to a man who claimed to have been his homosexual lover. This man was also threatened with a chisel hidden in a bunch of flowers. The allegation was that money for the "plot" came from a donation made, entirely innocently, by a future owner of Wolverhampton Wanderers.
6. Jacques Chirac claims that there was nothing suspicious about his financial accounts while he was Mayor of Paris. He and his wife really did consume, personally, more than £100 worth of fruit every day, quite separately from money spent on official entertainment.
7. After World War Two communist cell was established connecting a number of officials with senior roles in the US government and stealing top secret documents. These documents were then photographed and passed on to Soviet agents. Eventually one of the communists defected, shopping the others and revealing that he had secreted incriminating evidence in his pumpkin patch.
8. Presidential candidate Edmund Muskie was forced out of the 1972 race for the White House by a series of documents that later turned out to have been forged. One, produced on Muskie's letterhead falsely alleged that U.S. Senator Henry "Scoop" Jackson, a fellow Democrat, had had an illegitimate child with a 17-year-old. Another letter alleged that Muskie had made disparaging comments about French Canadians. These letters were in fact the work of paid agents of the campaign to re-elect President Richard Nixon.
9. The first British Labour government lost the 1924 election after only a few months in office. In the final days of the campaign, a letter appeared in the Daily Mail that appeared to have originated from Grigori Zinoviev, president of the presidium of the Executive Committee of the Communist International (Comintern) and been sent to the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Great Britain.
The letter advocated intensified Communist agitation in Britain, not least in the armed forces. It suggested that a deal between the Soviets and Britain, as proposed by Labour Prime Minister Ramsey MacDonald, would help such agitation. The letter damaged Labour profoundly, but was, in fact, a fake. It had been concocted by mebers of the SIS (MI6) based in Riga, Latvia deliberately to undermine Labour.
10. In November 1974, the papers ran obituaries of a Labour MP and former minister after he disappeared on a Miami beach, leaving behind a pile of clothes. In fact he wasn't dead at all. Realising he was about to be arrested for fraud, he had made his way to Australia to start a new life with his mistress. Quite by accident he was discovered by police who thought they had finally found Lord Lucan. He returned to the UK and resumed life as a Labour MP. The party did not expel him. Eventually he went to jail.
What do these all have in common?
They're all true.
Posted by Jim at 11:46 AM | Comments (1)
April 06, 2008
His Cold Dead Hands
Charlton Heston croaked yesterday, he was really old. I won't waste my time posting a picture of his tired, old, rifle toting ass. It's not that I didn't like him, I liked many of his movies, especially the first "Planet of the Apes" film. I think that's just about it, he didn't have a lot of talent. He started out as a "pretty boy" and got better as he got older. My big problem with Heston is on gun control. The gun manufacturers just keep cranking out hundreds of thousands of guns. Most end up in a dusty box in a closet so they don't hurt anyone but as far as I'm concerned, hunting with a high powered rifle is not sport. The only way to really hunt is with a bow and arrow. I have no problem with sharp shooters and gun enthusiasts, I just don't think owning a gun makes me any safer and I don't think it will stop the government that he supported so strongly from usurping my civil rights. Simply put, the government has better guns. On the other hand, I think too many rural gun shops are selling guns that end up in the hands of criminals. I personally know an ATF agent and he told me that's where most of the guns found in the inner city come from... Gun shops in rural areas mostly sell to locals but that doesn't bring in enough money so these creeps load up their cars with guns and head for Milwaukee and Chicago to sell guns to street thugs and criminals. Sometimes they get their stupid asses killed... Live by the gun die by the gun.
Posted by Jim at 09:05 AM | Comments (0)
April 02, 2008
Oil Chiefs Tell Congress High Prices Not Our Fault
This is the funniest thing I've read in ages! Here we have Congress asking the Oil companies why oil is so expensive and why they have those billion dollar tax breaks and then the oil company shills shrug their shoulders and smile. How sweet, they must all have a very special relationship with each other.
The reason why the price of oil is so high is because of several factors, the biggest factor is demand. The demand for oil is so high that the oil exporting nations of the world, like Saudi Arabia and Venezuela can demand the highest price the consumers will tolerate. The oil companies are themselves oil consumers and oil producers. The drill for oil and turn that oil into gasoline. For many decades the supply of oil seemed to be inexhaustible and the demand, while growing, did not begin to impact the supply.
Times have changed. Now demand has reached the level where it matches and exceeds the available supply and now prices are going through the roof.
The actual supply of oil depends on how much the oil producers can pump out of the ground and they have sharply curtailed the expansion of the infrastructure to limit the available supply. The reason they did this was to drive up prices. They need to drive up prices so that they can make more profit. They need to make more profit because they're greedy.
They have been able to do this because they bribed everyone in Congress with cash and trips to posh resorts. Yes, I know it sounds simple but it really is very simple.
Greed is a mental illness.
What's in the future? Higher prices until the consumer breaks. I think the oil companies have been pushing the envelope for the last several years and they have seen that the consumer appears to be unbreakable so I think that they will attempt to push and push and push until something breaks. They really don't care about the consequences to the consumer and the economy because they're mentally ill (greedy).
That's the whole plan. What will they do with the money? Build a mega yacht.
Build a mega mansion on a private island.
Have a mega mansion everywhere.
Have a trophy wife (beautiful expensive whore).
Have a few beautiful expensive whores (trophy wives).
Have radical and expensive treaments to cure erectile dysfunction.
Does that cover everything?
Posted by Jim at 07:04 AM | Comments (0)