ALJAZEERA: Politics stink — literally — according to scientists who released a study this week showing that people find the smells of others who share their political viewpoints more viscerally attractive than the odors of their ideological opponents. The researchers suspect that preferences of this kind stem from evolutionary adaptations that support bonds between friends […]
LETTER to a senator objecting to training of 5000 Syrian soldiers
Once we arm such a Syrian force we will be forced by political considerations to employ them in Syria, and once they are in Syria we will be unable for political as well as military imperatives to permit them to be decimated or destroyed.
Number of Children Living in Poverty Drops Sharply, Census Bureau Reports
NEW YORK TIMES: … Charles T. Nelson, a Census Bureau official, said the decline in the poverty rate resulted partly from an increase in the number of people working full time year-round. In particular, he said, the numbers show an increase in employment and earnings for parents with dependent children… Poverty thresholds vary with the […]
Shame on the NYT and others for sensational and misleading headlines
The print edition headline is “U. S. General open to ground force as ption in Iraq” with a sub head “Joint Chiefs chairman raises apossibility Obama rejects.”
Gen. Dempsey: Half of Iraqi Army Worthless as US Partners
NEWSMAX: ….Gen. Martin Dempsey, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and a former wartime commander of U.S. training programs in Iraq, said a renewed U.S. training effort might revive the issue of gaining legal immunity from Iraqi prosecution for those U.S. troops who are training the Iraqis. The previous Iraqi government refused to grant […]
Sanctions hit Russian economy as ruble plummets
USA TODAY: Russia’s ruble traded at 38.8 against the dollar on Tuesday, setting a new historic low. The Russian currency has now fallen as much as 19% since the start of the year… “Due to isolation from credit markets, there is a lot of buying on the domestic market,” said Alexander Golovtsov, head researcher at […]
EU and Ukraine ratify trade agreement in historic vote
FINANCIAL TIMES: …The ratification also follows a request from Kiev to postpone the bilateral implementation of free trade until December 2015 from November this year as originally agreed… The 14-month suspension has triggered alarm in the EU, with many officials expressing concerns that Russia had dictated the terms of a deal that was meant to […]
Did casino gaming live up to the promises and hype?
Casino gambling could deliver noticeably bigger tax relief if so much of the money didn’t go to subsidize Pennsylvania’s horse racing industry…
Tainted water in Pennsylvania, Texas from leaky gas wells, not fracking itself, study says
“We found the evidence suggested that fracking was not to blame, that it was actually a well integrity issue,” said Ohio State University geochemist Thomas Darrah, lead author of the study.
‘A National Admissions Office’ for Low-Income Strivers
The pamphlet was from a nonprofit organization called QuestBridge, which has quietly become one of the biggest players in elite-college admissions. Almost 300 undergraduates at Stanford this year, or 4 percent of the student body, came through QuestBridge. The share at Amherst is 11 percent, and it’s 9 percent at Pomona. At Yale, the admissions office has changed its application to make it more like QuestBridge’s…
Fixing Climate Change May Add No Costs, Report Says
NEW YORK TIMES: In decades of public debate about global warming, one assumption has been accepted by virtually all factions: that tackling it would necessarily be costly. But a new report casts doubt on that idea, declaring that the necessary fixes could wind up being effectively free. A global commission will announce its finding on […]
Tally of Uninsured Fell by 3.8 Million in Early 2014
WALL STREET JOURNAL: The survey’s findings indicated that around 3.7 million people surveyed between January and March said that they had obtained private coverage through the online exchanges run by states and the federal government… The Obama administration announced in mid-April that the number of people who had bought coverage through the exchanges had surpassed […]
Obama to announce expanded plan to fight Ebola
USA TODAY: President Obama on Tuesday will announce an expansion of a $763 million U.S. plan to help West Africa nations fight the spread of the Ebola virus, officials said Monday night… About 3,000 U.S. military personnel will be in West Africa to lead the project, officials said. The virus does not threaten the United […]
Only corruption explains Hungarian gov’t purchase of natural gas companies
SEPTEMBER 14, 2014 BY ZOLTÁN KOVÁCS BUDAPEST BEACON: “E.ON refused to allow the government to investigate the business before signing the letter of intent. Even then the value of the company had been appraised at EUR 380 million the year before. The government ended up paying more than twice as much. According to the terms […]