Federal Reserve

Prediction of spectacular demise for bitcoin as a Ponzi scheme.

Politics

Congress's approval rating drops to 6 percent.

War on Drugs

The war on drugs has made Mexican Drug Cartels so rich, they're taking over other segments of the Mexican economy including shipping iron ore to China.

Freedom of Speech

Britain targets Guardian employees for prosecution for publishing Snowden's leaked NSA document.

Police State

British social services forcibly remove baby from mother's womb because of the mental health police.

"Essex social services obtained a High Court order against the woman that allowed her to be forcibly sedated and her child to be taken from her womb.

The council said it was acting in the best interests of the woman, an Italian who was in Britain on a work trip, because she had suffered a mental breakdown.

The baby girl, now 15 months old, is still in the care of social services, who are refusing to give her back to the mother, even though she claims to have made a full recovery.

The case has developed into an international legal row, with lawyers for the woman describing it as “unprecedented”."

I don't know how any mother would ever get over that.

"I worry about the way these decisions about a person’s mental capacity are being taken without any apparent concern as to the effect on the individual being affected."

At least somebody's rational and compassionate.

Amish family flees the country after court orders doctors to forcibly give the girl chemo for her leukemia.

Police arrest man for tossing $1,000 bills to Black Friday shoppers. Where did he get them? $100 bills are the biggest the treasury currently prints.

Global Warming and Energy

The global warming movement in Europe is dying.

Foreign Policy

Arabs protest Israel's plans to forcibly resettle Bedouins.

The Iranian deal is good for Americans.

War

US offers to destroy Syria's chemical weapons in its possession.

FBI claims Americans are joining jihadists in Syria. This might be a ploy drag the US into the war. Whether it is or isn't, these wars are making Americans and everybody else less safe.

Health Care

I'm skeptical that the healthcare.gov website is working well.

War on Drugs

If America's most marijuana legalization benefactor was a billionaire from Cleveland, how come Ohio is still in the prohibition dark ages?

Health Care

I dispute the premise of this article. Everybody knows they're going to lose their employer-provided health care. If they don't, they're fools. Nobody can have their head buried that deep in the sand and survive.

Obama to claim his minions met the Nov. 30 deadline even though they didn't. What else would you expect. When his lies get exposed again, everybody will cover it up again and most will forget again. Bill Clinton wishes he could get away with what Obama gets away with.

Tax and Spend

While many might think that tax havens the Caymans and Costa Rica agreeing to share account info with the IRS is a good thing, it's not. This is going to accelerate the transfer of wealth out of the US. This is another of the final stages to total collapse in the US.

Feds quietly start bailing out Detroit a piece at a time.

There is no free lunch, and these charts show how much we owe.

Politics

After seeing 100 headlines about Mitt Romney's son helping people from a car crash, I have no doubt that Josh plans to run for office.

Obama calls tea partiers tea baggers in letter to grade school teacher. Do you think the press will excoriate and blackball him like Mel Gibson? Or maybe there will be a double standard.

The sad, sad reality of politics and the media:

"When, after the massacres at Newtown and the Washington Navy Yard, Republicans refused to outlaw the AR-15 rifle or require background checks for gun purchasers, we were told the party had committed suicide by defying 90 percent of the nation.
When Republicans rejected amnesty and a path to citizenship for illegal aliens, we were told the GOP had just forfeited its future.
When House Republicans refused to fund Obamacare, the government was shut down and the Tea Party was blamed, word went forth:
The GOP has destroyed its brand. Republicans face a wipeout in 2014. It will take a generation to remove this mark of Cain.
Eight weeks later, Obama’s approval is below 40 percent. Most Americans find him untrustworthy. And the GOP is favored to hold the seats it has in the House while making gains in the Senate."

Republicans, despite themselves, were right on all these policies, then Obamacare exposed itself to millions of Americans. Oops.

War

NATO admits drone strike killed child in Afghanistan.

Karzai has US generals hopping over killing civilians.

Top Pakistani CIA agent flees after being outed as murderer. I bet he never stands trial in Pakistan for murder.

As freaking stupid as government is, I am skeptical that for a long time nuclear launch codes were all 0s.

Misc

Comet ISON survives its explosion near the sun. After declaring ISON dead, experts are surprised. It must have been a double-layer exploding, not the comet itself.

After 47 or so years of service, suddenly a zero day exploit that is being exploited appears in Windows XP. I sure there's no coincidence with Microsoft pushing to kill this OS.

After 70+ years, flying cars are still on the drawing board. What a loss.

Home erectus skull discovered in Georgia suggests many skeletons previously thought to be different species may be one.

"The odd dimensions of the fossil prompted the team to look at normal skull variation, both in modern humans and chimps, to see how they compared. They found that while the Dmanisi skulls looked different to one another, the variations were no greater than those seen among modern people and among chimps."

Gosh, who would have ever thought to examine that?

"The scientists went on to compare the Dmanisi remains with those of supposedly different species of human ancestor that lived in Africa at the time. They concluded that the variation among them was no greater than that seen at Dmanisi. Rather than being separate species, the human ancestors found in Africa from the same period may simply be normal variants of H erectus."

This sounds like the Keystone cops portraying scientists.

""Some palaeontologists see minor differences in fossils and give them labels, and that has resulted in the family tree accumulating a lot of branches," said White. "The Dmanisi fossils give us a new yardstick, and when you apply that yardstick to the African fossils, a lot of that extra wood in the tree is dead wood. It's arm-waving.""

It's selfish self-promotion. This is another ridiculous case of assumptions promoted and accepted by scientists for personal gain.

Here's a bunch of crap about the Socratic method:
"In ancient Greece (469 - 399 BC), Socrates was widely lauded for his wisdom.

One day the great philosopher came upon an acquaintance, who ran up to him  excitedly and said,
"Socrates, do you know what I just heard about one of your students?"

"Wait a moment," Socrates replied. "Before you tell me,
I'd like you to pass a little test. It's called the Test of Three."

"Test of Three?"

"That's correct," Socrates continued. "Before you talk to me about my student let's take a moment to test what you're going to say. The first test is Truth. Have you made absolutely sure that what you are about to tell me is true?"

"No," the man replied, "actually I just heard about it."

"All right," said Socrates. "So you don't really know if it's true or not. Now let's try the second test, the test of Goodness. Is what you are about to tell me about my student something good?"

"No, on the contrary..."

"So," Socrates continued, "you want to tell me something bad about him even  though you're not certain it's true?"

The man shrugged, a little embarrassed.

Socrates continued, "You may still pass though because there is a third test - the filter of Usefulness.
Is what you want to tell me about my student  going to be useful to me?"

"No, not really..."

"Well," concluded Socrates, "if what you want to tell me is neither true nor  good nor even useful, why tell it to me at all?"

The man was defeated and  ashamed and said no more.

This is the reason Socrates was a great philosopher and held in such high  esteem."
I have a different ending...
The next day his student turned him in to the rulers who forced Socrates to eat poison and die. The problem is with the first question and its answer:

"Have you made absolutely sure that what you are about to tell me is true?"

"No," the man replied, "actually I just heard about it.""

Yet it could still be true, but self-indulgent Socrates never heard the claim. Bye-bye Socrates.

How government perverts out thinking from the beginning. While most cannot imagine economics without politics, we must.

How to reconfigure your router with open source software to extend connectivity. More.

New computer game lampoons others by requiring players to stand in line, inactive. That's hilarious.

Freedom of Speech

French court orders search engines and ISPs to block pirate sites.

Local

1,200 lose power.

Police arrest 76 year old man for offering money for consensual sex. Both people were just trying to improve their lives, and police made them worse instead. Some Thanksgiving for them.

Black Friday report. More.

How is it with Dayton's declining tax revenue that police and fire are getting more tax revenue? The article is hidden behind a pay wall, so we'll never know.

Local economy to remain stagnant while the rest of the country enjoys economic growth. Imagine that. Unfortunately, both predictions are wrong. The US economy will collapse, and the local economy will collapse even faster.

Foreign Policy

It cracks me up how the warmongers keep claiming they are the reason Iran negotiated. They're trying to keep themselves and their warmongering relevant.

Canada allowed NSA to spy on G20 summit. So what? Who cares what different sets of rulers do to each other? I bet every country spied on the G20 summit to the best of its ability.

Police State

Society is stamping out safe outlets for aggression, especially in the war on boys and men, which has consequences.

DHS denies woman entry to US based on her supposedly private medical records. Welcome to the health care police state.

Government surplus stores sell items TSA agents stole from passengers. You can't make this stuff up.

"Humorously, both the TSA and the agencies that are selling the stolen items refuse to admit that they are even confiscating them in the first place. According to the Statesman, a worker at a Texas surplus shop said, concerning how the items were obtained, "We say willfully surrendered." Using this same logic, of course, a man who holds up a woman and steals her purse did not actually steal -- the woman merely "willfully surrendered" her purse upon having a gun pointed in her face."

You can't make this stuff up.

Global Warming and Energy

The Royal Society demanded secrecy for their global warming meeting to cover up their ignorance of the subject.

Lack of cloud physics biases models too high.

It's so cold, the US set nearly 1,000 cold temperature records.

I'm unimpressed with this supposed radioactive wave from Fukushima hitting the US, then again, I live in Ohio.

Economy

Government schools promote herd mentality.

"I like being around crowds of people all doing the same thing," said Dalton Mason, 22, of Stockbridge, Ga."

That's ridiculous.

Black Friday violence. Stabbing. Schools also cripple the development of conflict resolution skills. Cops shoot shoplifting suspect who dragged cop. More.

Blaming capitalism.

Non-employees of Walmart try to disrupt Walmart shopping.

Even bitcoins, ya think?, are in a massive bubble.

PNC CEO pretends the new housing bubble is not collapsing.

Police State

Police getting warrants to dump all call data from cell towers.

On the NSA tracking porn habits of so-called radicals:

"Interestingly, one of the targets is described as a "US person," which means he’s either an American citizen or else he has a green card. What happened to those supposedly strict "guidelines" which allegedly forbid surveillance of US persons?
Is it really necessary to recall the past misadventures of our domestic spooks, who spied on dissidents like Martin Luther King, Dan Ellsberg, and others – tapped their phones, and gathered enough information on their "vulnerabilities" to threaten them with blackmail?
The idea that this Cointelpro-like NSA operation is only targeted at "terrorists" is laughable. Does anyone seriously think our own politicians could possibly resist the temptation to eavesdrop on their political rivals in an effort to gather information about their "vulnerabilities"?"

Don't forget their neighbors, their wives, mistresses, celebrities, etc.

Freedom of Speech

UK government plans to block extremist websites which means any site it doesn't like.

Local

Veterans to get their own court? In what world does turning veterans into a special class make sense?

City withdraws lease for food truck rallies. The Oregon District restaurant owners must have been mad about the loss of business.

"Lisa Grigsby, a Synergy board member, said the organization is looking for a new home and that new location will likely be in the suburbs.
“We really wanted to do it in the city of Dayton, but they strung us along and strung us along,” she said. “(There’s been) no answer, no explanation. “You are just not getting a lease.”
City spokesman Tom Biedenharn said Wednesday that opposition from competing businesses was one factor, but not the only one. The city does not have another user already lined up for the site."

Not enough kickbacks?

"Built as a nonprofit aimed at offering certified commercial kitchen support services and programs, Synergy has held five parking lot food truck rallies since first leasing the former site of Sa-Bai Asian Cuisine & Sushi Bar in July. Grisby said they have drawn a total of 12,000 people."

I knew this Synergy was going to be a non-profit, but I don't see anything about who pays for it.

Misc

Problems with peer review.

"The peer review process is susceptible to conflicts of interest and is easily turned into a form of censorship. It can ensure that published results align with a particular consensus theory. Science is not a democratic process. It is in no sense dependent upon consensus, nor is truth the outcome of a vote. Indeed, consensus is the very antithesis of real science. When a peer review panel begins to promote a particular theory, science is no longer the criterion. Political correctness displaces the physics and the chemistry."

Like everybody else, scientists try to please the people who pay them. If those people have an agenda, they scientists tend to promote it. Because politicians always have a political agenda, the virtual monopoly of scientific funding by government has thoroughly corrupted science.

Comet ISON disintegrates right as it intersects a CME.

Global Warming and Energy

EPA preparing deluge of new regulations.

Media

MSNBC and CNN lost nearly half their viewers in a year.

Misc

Whistle-blowers of scientific fraud face consequences.

Children in cars are more distracting than phones, so maybe government will ban children next.

Tax and Spend

British cut welfare for immigrants. They should cut it for everybody.

Government pays $1 million for positive propaganda about Obamacare. This is legalized corruption.

War

Politicians in Pakistan out top CIA official and demand he be tried for murder for drone strikes.

Israel's siege of Gaza creates inhumane conditions.

Regulation

Vancouver bans doorknobs, and this fool thinks it's a good thing.

Economy

Nasdaq tops 4,000 for the first time since 2000 when the dot.com bubble popped.

Police State

NSA intended to embarrass radicals with porn browsing habits. This sounds like a blueprint for blackmail.

The government's latest plan to track everybody is to convince people to wear trackers with radiation detectors in them ostensibly to detect nuclear threats. I wonder how many people would fall for this.

Local

It's extra cold this Thanksgiving.

I didn't see any announcement of the location of these checkpoints before they went up. The Harrison Twp. checkpoint caught one OVI driver.

"HARRISON TWP., Montgomery County —

An OVI checkpoint on North Main Street yielded more than 35 citations and two arrests as local authorities hone in on keeping area roads clear of impaired drivers this Thanksgiving.
The Montgomery County Sheriff's Office, Ohio Highway Patrol, and the Montgomery County Combined Agency OVI Task Force conducted the checkpoint in the 7000 block of North Main between 7 p.m. and 10:30 p.m.
Seventeen drivers were cited for driving under suspension or no driver's license, the sheriff's office said. An OVI arrest was made in addition to a misdemeanor warrant arrest. Authorities issued three citations for child restraint violations, three seatbelt violation citations, four speed citations and ten citations for other offenses.
The sheriff's office, local police departments and highway patrol plan on having additional deputies, troopers and officers patrolling the streets throughout Thanksgiving."

Think of the cost and hassle to people for no benefit.

Dayton city commissioners vote themselves a raise.

The state destroys another business by denying Hank's Hideout a liquor license.

Federal Reserve

It's ironic that Peter Schiff calls on animal spirits (herd mentality) to explain the stock market. Maybe it isn't animal spirits but rational thought, recognizing that the nominal market is skyrocketing faster than nominal inflation. it's one thing to recognize a bubble. It's another to be able to ride it to its heights then get out at the peak before it bursts.

"But while the Fed was gaining much attention by saying nothing, the Chinese made a blockbuster statement that was summarily ignored. Last week, a deputy governor of the People’s Bank of China said that buying foreign exchange reserves was now no longer in China’s national interest. The implication that China may no longer be accumulating U.S. government debt would amount to the “mother of all tapers” and could create a clear and present danger to the American economy. But the story barely rated a mention in the American media."

But the Chinese have said this before. Words aren't important. Actions are.

Tax and Spend

The Pentagon can't balance its books. Sounds like ubiquitous corruption to me.

""In its investigation, Reuters has found that the Pentagon is largely incapable of keeping track of its vast stores of weapons, ammunition and other supplies; thus it continues to spend money on new supplies it doesn’t need and on storing others long out of date. It has amassed a backlog of more than half a trillion dollars in unaudited contracts with outside vendors; how much of that money paid for actual goods and services delivered isn’t known. And it repeatedly falls prey to fraud and theft that can go undiscovered for years, often eventually detected by external law enforcement agencies.""

That sounds like something we should all worship.

Right to Keep and Bear Arms

There's something fishy about this highly publicized Zimmerman arrest, as if he was set up so prosecutors could talk about his guns.

"George Zimmerman had five guns and more than 100 rounds of ammunition with him when deputies arrested him earlier this month on domestic violence charges, according to court documents released Tuesday."

I bet Eric Holder is just loving this, almost as if he orchestrated it.

Misc

Why do I care how many women, men, dogs, squirrels, trees or mushrooms write code or anything else?

Police State

In the theater of the more absurd department, NYPD bought 32 tall SUVs to look down on people texting. Insert your own joke here. It would be funny if it wasn't stealing from people and destroying their lives.

It's great to know that intelligence officials fear more Snowden revelations. It's about time those monsters under everybody's bed feared somebody else.

Education

Corporal punishment by anybody other than a parent is always abuse.

Economy

Housing bubble bursting in Norway.

War

CIA recruited al Qaeda captives in Guantanamo as double agents. I bet we find out this wasn't that successful.

I bet we'll find this chaos in the Central African Republic is a consequence of US and western aggression in Somalia, Libya, Mali and elsewhere in Africa.

Foreign Policy

Former hostages held in Iranian embassy denounce Iranian nuclear deal.

"The weekend agreement between Iran and six world powers — the U.S., Britain, France, Russia, China and Germany — is to temporarily halt parts of Tehran's disputed nuclear program and allow for more intrusive international monitoring of Iran's facilities.
In exchange, Iran gains some modest relief from stiff economic sanctions and a pledge from Obama that no new penalties will be levied during the six months."

I think it's more like Obama is the one who can't be trusted.

"To be sure, the former hostages have varying views. Victor Tomseth, 72, a retired diplomat from Vienna, Virginia, sees the pact as a positive first step."

That's a big man.

"John Limbert, 70, of Arlington, who was a political officer held hostage during the crisis and later became deputy assistant secretary of state for Iran in 2009 and 2010, also supports the deal.
He said he does not view it in terms of whether Iran can be trusted, but whether the regime recognizes that a deal is in their own interest."

That's a smart man.

Already we have a report that Obama is not committed to peace with Iran.

Warmongers running ads on YouTube against the deal. They're also telling propaganda stories. They might also be breathing air and eating food.

US bombers overfly China's restricted zone over islands in defiance of China's declarations.

Local

State auditors find $19 million in accounting errors in Miami Twp. books, and we're supposed to believe these were just accidents. This place is as corrupt as can be.

News from the bursting housing bubble.

"Eighty-four percent of homes sold were purchased with cash, rising from 36.1 percent a year ago;"

This is interesting.

Local employment drops to lowest level since 2011.

Dayton's centrally planned parking scheme works exactly as expected, there's a surplus, but nobody wants to park in the surplus areas.


RTA shuttle causes another wreck.

Dayton Children's hospital moving 100 tech jobs to Tech Town. Why does Dayton Children's hospital have 100 tech jobs? Why don't they focus on preventing disease and healing children? If they fired all 100 of those people, they would do a better job.

Global Warming and Energy

Environmental costs of corn for ethanol.

2013 saw record production of cereal grains. Too bad they're toxic.

Health Care

Two dental magazines pull mercury study under pressure from mercury company.

FDA blocks at home genetic testing kit in order to protect is corporate agents from that competition and insure the government can build its DNA database.

Nine out of ten (9 out of 10) cases of stomach acid problems are because of too little, not too much, stomach acid.

"Antacids and acid blockers perpetuate the problems of indigestion. They neutralize or block stomach acid, preventing the stomach from digesting food. A vicious cycle is then set up since more acid is needed to digest the food; so, more acid is then produced in the stomach, then more antacid is needed, then the stomach produces more acid, etc.
Over 90% of indigestion is caused by lack of digestive enzymes and stomach acid, not by too much stomach acid. Many of the symptoms of indigestion will disappear when digestive enzymes are supplemented – especially those with betaine HCL, a mild form of hydrochloric acid (similar to what your stomach naturally produces.)
For the 10% of indigestion that does not get better with digestive enzymes, it helps to repair the stomach lining by taking supplements like aloe vera, slippery elm, and deglycerrhized licorice. It may also be helpful to take something to eliminate bacteria or parasites that are compromising the stomach lining"

"Digestive troubles such as gas and bloating"

Indigestion. In-digestion. The poisons are killing people.

Europeans suddenly got a lot more unhealthy, like their American counterparts, after 2003. Apparently nobody knows why. I suggest the import of the Standard American Diet. Obesity is no longer just an American problem.

I predicted the new cholesterol guidelines were a pretense to convince people government acquiesced to the knowledge about the cholesterol myth while actually increasing statin prescription, and I was right. They're doubling down on a fraud and laughing all the way to the mortuary and bank. 

I've long known that booze is good for you. Why is the suddenly news?

Health Care

Mainstream doctor who followed the mainstream advice on diet and exercise developed diabetes and had to admit the mainstream was wrong. Diabetes is a metabolic disease caused by over-eating carbs.

"...the turn-around by this mainstream, respected doctor, his personal journey and his poignant apology to all the patients he inadvertently harmed by swallowing all the mainstream malarkey about diabetes and obesity is something that you’ll really want to see."

I doubt the patients he made sick will be moved.

Doctor blasts the new cholesterol guidelines, calling mainstream doctors statin pushers.

Global Warming and Energy

Every year the alarmists predict an above average hurricane season in the Atlantic. Every year since Katrina in 2005, they've been wrong. The US is enjoying the longest drought of major hurricanes in a century.

"Slow Atlantic hurricane season coming to a close.
No major hurricanes formed in the Atlantic basin – first time since 1994"

Good for us.

Tax and Spend

The ugly truth at the heart of Obamacare.

"The highly publicized glitches and failures associated with the  launch of the Affordable Health Care Act have obscured the central role of the IRS in carrying out the law’s mandate.  Stripped down to its essentials, Obamacare is not an “insurance” plan at all.  It is rather a naked redistributionist scheme to coerce the young and the healthy into paying for the healthcare bills of the elderly and the sickly.  This means that some agency had to be enlisted to penalize the young and healthy who refused to willingly participate in their own fleecing. What agency is better equipped to do this than the IRS?"

Obamacare has nothing to do with health care. It's about robbing people and ordering them around at the point of the government's gun.

War

Obama favorite lying surrogate, Susan Rice from the Benghazi cover-up fame, threatens Karzai if he doesn't sign the agreement continuing the war in Afghanistan.

"President Obama’s national security adviser, Susan E. Rice, imposed an ultimatum on President Hamid Karzai of Afghanistan on Monday, telling him to stop his delay in signing a security agreement or potentially face the complete and final pullout of American troops by the end of 2014, according to American and Afghan officials. "

Talk about upside-down world. Don't sign.

Foreign Policy

South Korea and Singapore help NSA tap undersea cables.

The vitriol targeted at the Iranian nuclear deal is amazing, but there's nothing wrong with this deal. Supposedly the US wants Iran to stop enriching uranium. They agreed to stop for six months in addition to some other things.

"In return for a modest lifting of sanctions, Tehran has agreed to halt work on the heavy water reactor it is building at Arak, to halt production of 20-percent uranium, to dilute half of its existing stockpile, and to allow more inspections."

The main complaint against this deal is it doesn't starve enough Iranian kids to death during the six months.

"Iran’s rivals, Turkey and Egypt, are calling it a good deal. Saudi Arabia says it “could be a first step toward a comprehensive solution for Iran’s nuclear program.” "

Even Saudi Arabia, which just lambasted the US for not attacking Syria and which is probably Iran's most fearful rival, has hope.

"Israeli President Shimon Peres calls the deal satisfactory. Former Military Intelligence Chief Amos Yadlin has remarked of the hysteria in some Israeli circles, “From the reactions this morning, I might have thought Iran had gotten permission to build a bomb.”"

Nice perspective.

"Consider the worst-case scenario we hear from our politicians and pundits – that Iran is cleverly scheming to get the U.S. and U.N. sanctions lifted, and, then, she will make a “mad dash” for the bomb.
But how exactly would Tehran go about this?
If Iran suddenly moved all its low-enriched uranium, to be further enriched in a crash effort to 90 percent, i.e., bomb grade, this would take months to accomplish.
Yet, we would be altered within hours that the uranium was being moved."

The propaganda is crazy. I don't think Israel will attack because there are too many sane people in Israel to counter the propaganda. The threat is a smokescreen.

"So, let us assume another scenario, that the Iranians are not crazed fanatics but rational actors looking out for what is best for their country.
If Iran has no atom bomb program, as the Ayatollah attests, President Hassan Rouhani says he is willing to demonstrate, and 16 U.S. intelligence agencies concluded six years ago and again two years ago, consider the future that might open to Iran – if the Iranians are simply willing and able to prove this to the world’s satisfaction.
First, a steady lifting of sanctions. Second, an end to Iran’s isolation and a return to the global economy. Third, a wave of Western investment for Iran’s oil and gas industry, producing prosperity and easing political pressure on the regime.
Fourth, eventual emergence of Iran, the most populous nation in the Gulf with 85 million citizens, as the dominant power in the Gulf, just as China, after dispensing with the world Communist revolution, became dominant in Asia"

This is what Netanyahu really fears: having to deal with Iran as a rational, equal power. Why would Iran's rulers choose a path of sure destruction versus a path to stealing ever greater wealth?

Misc

Benefits of social cooperation discovered in primitive societies. It's not just about the beer.

War on Drugs

Man arrested on drug charges under Ohio law for having a secret compartment in his trunk, but no drugs.

Local

Montgomery County Sheriff refuse to announce location of OVI checkpoint on Wednesday until a few hours before they set it up. That blatantly violates the public notice requirement. Clark County will also wait to announce the location of a checkpoint.

Officials target whooping cough outbreak. We heard that before, and it keeps getting worse. I predict the more government gets involved, the worse it will get. I like this line:

"The disease, also known as whooping cough, could spread this week with children on break from school and families gathering for Thanksgiving, Clark County Combined Health Commissioner Charles Patterson said."

As if having children separated with their families is the problem, and crowding them together in government schools is the solution. Fortunately, this isn't really what Patterson said. He said,

"“With all of the schools being out at least four days and some of them five or six days, it’s going to have an impact. We hope it’s going to be a positive impact. (But) many times one of the issues around the holidays is people who are sick don’t want to stay home … unfortunately, if those people do go to those events, they could easily spread the pertussis bacterium to all the people in their family,” Patterson said."

The DDN just wanted to make it look like government schools were more healthy for children than homes.

Like all government programs, Obamacare is goldmine for scammers.

Health Care

NBC attacks vitamins and supplements as a service to Big Pharma.

Tax and Spend

More on Detroit's resurgence.

The tremendous explosion of government debt purchased by the Fed.

Government benefits are first stolen from taxpayers.

"For every government benefit paid out, there is an equal and opposite cost paid by taxpayers. If taxpayers pay in $100 as a cost, government employees extract $10 for themselves and pay out the other $90 as benefits, for example."

Exactly.

War

Obama's proxy war in Syria may have turned it into another Afghanistan.

The US is never leaving Afghanistan.

"While many Americans have been led to believe the war in Afghanistan will soon be over, a draft of a key U.S.-Afghan security deal obtained by NBC News shows the United States is prepared to maintain military outposts in Afghanistan for many years to come, and pay to support hundreds of thousands of Afghan security forces.
The wide-ranging document, still unsigned by the United States and Afghanistan, has the potential to commit thousands of American troops to Afghanistan and spend billions of U.S. taxpayer dollars.
The document outlines what appears to be the start of a new, open-ended military commitment in Afghanistan in the name of training and continuing to fight al-Qaeda. The war in Afghanistan doesn’t seem to be ending, but renewed under new, scaled-down U.S.-Afghan terms."

Obama cannot be trusted.

Hopefully Karzai can save us from this agreement.

War on Drugs

Hypocritical Republican congressman busted for cocaine possession.

Police lab chemist guilty of faking tests to gain convictions. This is the norm, not the exception.

Police State

The only reason for an investigation of the Sandy Hook shooting to be secret is corruption.

"Dan Klau, a Hartford attorney who specializes in constitutional law, said the decision to release a summary report before the full evidence file is a reversal of standard practice and one of the most unusual elements of an investigation marked by secrecy."

What are the covering up? What are they making up?

Overreactions to prank virtually shut down LAX.

Misc

Gamma ray burst explodes theories.

Foreign Policy

In conjunction with pressing flight rules over disputed islands controlled by Japan, China publishes nuclear attack plan against US. They're going all out to keep the US from blocking them from taking over those islands. And I expect they'll get them.  Japan rejects. US vows to defend Japan.

Can Obama's peace deals in the Middle East be trusted?

"Should we trust Obama to be honest in his peace talks with Iran and Syria? His lightning shift from warmonger to peacemaker surprised everyone, including his closest regional allies – Israel, Saudi Arabia, and Turkey – not to mention the entire U.S. congress, many of whom seem intent on sabotaging the Iran peace talks by imposing more war-provoking sanctions.
Let’s not forget that Obama was minutes away from blasting Syria into the Stone Age, but as he stared into the abyss of war he blinked at the last moment. Obama hid the consequent humiliation behind a hastily agreed upon chemical weapons deal proposed by Russia, which served to buy him time to think about the regional war he damn near started."

"It’s crucial to remember that Obama could have pursued a peaceful path for well over a year, when Russia and Syria first proposed peace talks. Obama ignored the proposals and John Kerry publicly ridiculed them, so confident they were that the U.S.-backed rebels would topple Assad. This strategy pushed Syrian civilization into barbarism, and peace talks were again proposed last spring – but Obama’s rebels boycotted the talks, since Obama had a plan to help the rebels topple the regime via a Libyan-style US military bombing campaign.
So Syrian blood was allowed to keep flowing. For at least two years Obama oversaw and coordinated – via the CIA – the Syrian “arms trafficking pipeline” – as The New York Times called it – which has helped drive the death count to over 100,000 and made millions more refugees."

Nothing Obama says can be trusted. The one thing that's new is the US military is pushing for negotiations, not more war.

Israel still threatens Iran.

Economy

Ohio unemployment highest in 20 months.

Sports

Because the NCAA is a coercive organization, an Alabama coach was fired for giving a loan to a needy player.

Health Care

Children all around the world are less fit than their parents.

Now companies are radiating seeds to cause mutations. Who would buy them?

A world without working antibiotics would be scary, but why do government's doctors have to educate the public? We've known this was coming for decades while doctors controlled the antibiotics. Yet here we are. Government's doctors created this problem.

California rejects Obama's supposed fix to Obamacare.

Local

Dayton's rulers are forcing taxpayers to pay for socialist railroad repairs.

Apparently Dayton is the nation's emptiest core. They blame it on the expense of the buildings, not the socialism. Some downtown revival.

Government is failing to halt the whooping cough problem.

Local rulers making money off OVI oppression.

Demolition of DDN building to resume, taking down the whole facade this time.

Health Care

Scientists claim blue light is more effective than caffeine.

Media

Because Leno doesn't tow the liberal line, he's killing Letterman in the ratings.

Police State

NSA paper describes goal of obtaining even more power to spy on Americans.

NSA has infected over 50,000 networks with malware.

FBI unit works with NSA on domestic spying.

Federal Reserve

The Fed is making plans to seize control over entire segments of the economy to prevent bank runs.

Global Warming and Energy

Price of electricity hits record high.

"Americans now pay 42 percent more for electricity than they did a decade ago."

This is inflation.

Foreign Policy

G5+1 reach deal with Iran.

"The deal, intended as a first step toward a more comprehensive nuclear pact to be completed in six months, freezes or reverses progress at all of Iran’s major nuclear facilities, according to Western officials familiar with the details. It halts the installation of new centrifuges used to enrich uranium and caps the amount and type of enriched uranium that Iran is allowed to produce.
Iran also agreed to halt work on key components of a heavy-water reactor that could someday provide Iran with a source of plutonium. In addition, Iran accepted a dramatic increase in oversight, including daily monitoring by international nuclear inspectors, the officials said."

This is great news.

Bill Krystol is not happy.

China escalates conflict with Japan over disputed islands by declaring an air defense zone over the islands. They know the US, Japan's supposed defender, can't afford to go to war over those islands.

Misc

NASA re-designates asteroid as comet.

Regulation

Apple wins $280 million judgment against Samsung in patent case. That's money that makes consumers poorer and has no other benefit than enriching the patent owners.

Foreign Policy

UK government allowed NSA to spy on Britons.

The Israel lobby is international.

War

15,000 foreign troops to stay in Afghanistan for another decade past 2014. Karzai supports but won't sign deal.

Three women complete Marine training test, meeting same requirements as men.

More evidence that the war on terror is just another excuse to steal our money.

"As with the rest of our homeland security state, when it comes to border security, reality checks aren’t often in the cards. The money just pours into a world of remarkable secrecy and unaccountability. Last week, however, the Government Accountability Office released a report about a Transportation Security Administration decision to spend $200 million a year on a “behavioral screening program” involving 3,000 “behavior detection officers” at 176 airports. The GAO concluded that, $1 billion later, it worked “probably no better than chance.” Put another way, 3,000 specially trained TSA agents could rely on their expensive profiling techniques to pick twitchy passengers out of screening lines as likely terrorists, or they could look at you and flip a coin.
The lesson here: nothing, not even a program without meaningful content that costs an arm and a leg, will stop our national security officials from constantly up-armoring this country and so making it more secure from one of the least pressing dangers Americans face: terrorism."

It's all about the money.

Health Care

Why do we need technology to track who gave HIV to whom? This could be done with a pencil and paper. Just type the info into a file or database.

Praise for natural wine.

CAFOs bad.

Tax and Spend

Ohio government illegally withheld $30 million in tax refunds. That doesn't surprise me at all. Nobody will be punished.

The release of the Fed minutes from meeting when member considered tapering but chose not to caused bond rates to jump.

Politics

Democrats vote to end filibusters on nominees.

"Senate Democrats eased the way for swift approval of President Barack Obama's current and future nominees on Thursday, voting unilaterally to overturn decades of Senate precedent and undermine Republicans' ability to block final votes.
The 52-48 vote to undercut venerable filibuster rules on presidential appointees capped more than a decade of struggle in which presidents of both parties complained about delays in confirming appointees, particularly to the federal courts."

"Supreme Court nominations would be exempted from the change and subject to a traditional filibuster, the term used to describe the 60-vote requirement to limit debate."

This is a new level of jerkishness meant allow Obama to put radicals in government positions. This is part of the end game of the federal government, making it as oppressive as possible to steal as much wealth as possible before it collapses. Let's hope the Republicans shut down the Senate over this.

Local

I find it hard to believe tearing down the facade of the old DDN building was a mistake.

"Sorrell said the city Landmarks Commission had required that developer Student Suites Inc. retain the original 1908 facade at Fourth and Ludlow, as well as facade facing Fourth Street that was added in 1922.
But engineering drawings provided by Rauch Wednesday indicate the entire 1922 addition was to be demolished, with only the 1908 building standing after a total of four structures were torn down.The four buildings are all shaded out and drawing notes say only the 1908 building is to remain standing."

It could be a screw-up, but it could also be somebody getting what they wanted.

More on this no-so-screw-up.

Bureaucrat watched porn on his government computer.

Dayton city government owns a railroad that services three businesses.

"City Invests in Rail Line Supporting Jobs

 

Renovations and improvements are underway on a City-owned rail line serving businesses in Dayton's Northwest Industrial Park.  

The rail line currently serves three businesses in Dayton and Trotwood employing 270 workers: NVR, Inc., Malt Products and Syncreon. Malt Products recently announced an expansion that will add 30 jobs and new product lines in Dayton.

Improvements on the rail line include rebuilding the crossing at Little Richmond Road, new crossing signals, and other repairs and enhancements. Repairs on the bridge over Wolf Creek are expected in 2014.

The 4-mile line runs parallel to Wolf Creek, from Rosedale Drive to Olive Road. It was acquired by the City of Dayton in 1993 after CSX announced plans to shut it down.

The $750,000 project is funded by three state grants totaling approximately $400,000, with additional funding by the City of Dayton."

All socialist projects are being justified in the name of jobs.

Another fake bomb threat at a school.

Economy

23 percent of Ohio homeowners remain underwater, and housing prices dropped 5 percent year over year in October. The new housing bubble is popping locally too.

The huge supply of stolen identities has forced a price cut.

Dow closes above 16,000 for first time.

Global Warming and Energy

NOAA predicts Ohio's winter weather will have average temperatures and average snowfall.

"The entire Midwest is listed in the "equal chance" category in both precipitation and temperature, meaning there is not a strong or reliable enough climate signal to say either will be above or below normal."

That seems to contradict predictions by both almanacs and climate scientists who predicted a cold, stormy winter. I'll go with the almanacs. I already bought new winter boots.

British PM Cameron wants to ditch all the green crap. Me too. Too bad our government isn't that smart.

Claim that global warming was making frogs extinct refuted.

About half of the American Meteorological Society member believe AGW. So much for consensus.

Contrary to all the alarmism we've been subjected to, arctic temperatures have been flat to declining for over 60 years.

War on Drugs

AG DeWine to ban new synthetic drug without legislation. This is ridiculous. The rule of law is a joke.

New York City raises age to buy tobacco to 21.

Misc

The Big Bang never happened and the speed of light, Part 1. Part 2.

Foreign Policy

Iran blames Israel for bomb attacks in Lebanon.

Health Care

Obama plans to lawlessly waive an insurance plan tax for unions.

Politics

The census department manipulated jobs data to boost Obama before 2012 election.

War

US and Afghan agree that US will continue war in Afghanistan beyond 2014.

Misc

LG smart TV's send viewing information back to the company.

Freedom of Speech

Warner Brothers admits to filing phony take down orders.

Police State

Feds and local police set up road block in Fort Worth, force drivers to stop, then ask them to take a breathalyser, swab them for DNA and take a blood sample.

"The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, which is spending $7.9 million on the survey over three years, said participation was "100 percent voluntary" and anonymous.

But Cope said it didn't feel voluntary to her -- despite signs saying it was.

"I gestured to the guy in front that I just wanted to go straight, but he wouldn't let me and forced me into a parking spot," she said."
"An agency spokeswoman sent an email confirming the government is conducting the surveys in 30 cities across the country in an effort to reduce impaired-driving accidents."

That claim is ridiculous. This is about testing how much the people will submit to and training them to submit.

Boston police unhappy to have their cruisers monitored by GPS.

"But some officers said they worry that under such a system they will have to explain their every move and possibly compromise their ability to court street sources.
“No one likes it. Who wants to be followed all over the place?” said one officer who spoke anonymously because department rules forbid police from speaking to the media without authorization."

How ironic.

NSA blames collection errors on technology like Obamacare website. Give me a break.

Regulation

IBM and Microsoft derail software patent reform.

Global Warming and Energy

BP accused of hiring internet trolls to bully critics.

Local

Greene County offers whooping cough vaccinations.

Heroin overdose deaths spike. More. More.

Politicians use tax money to buy equipment for making meth.

Kettering gets $40 million from an unamed person's estate tax. Thank goodness this abominable tax has been repealed.

After being rejected a half dozen times, Beavercreek school tax passes by 30 votes. I hope it fails in the recount.

Demolition of old DDN building stopped because of violation. Tore down wrong part of building.

Dayton has 7,000 abandoned properties.

I guess somebody sent a memo making sleepy drivers the issue of the week.

Local

The local government's primary propaganda organ reports the local government accidentally destroyed much of the local government's propaganda organ's old building. You can't make this stuff up. I don't thing "irony" is in their dictionary. This is fantastically typical.

Some magazine, whose name the DDN fails to disclose, being prosecuted for fraud.

The heroin epidemic can't be won by jackboots alone. They need every American to pledge allegiance to turn in their neighbors. That way, the jackboots can turn America into a wasteland, and we can all be proud of that. Salute.

Beavercreek has been trying to pass school levies for years, and they always get rebuffed. This time they called so incredibly bogus election two weeks after the main election, then the only way they could pass the tax was through hiding votes in trunks - wink, wind, nod, nod - in traditional Chicago fashion.

Sports

It's funny how, from the NFL's investigation of Miami's Ignotigo to the referee's failure to call the penalty against Carolina in favor of the Patriots, nobody sees the pattern of Napoleon Goodell messing up football. Central planning is killing the NFL.

Health Care

Companies fighting GM labeling accused of money laundering.

Toothpaste with chocolate extracts work better than those with fluoride.

Tax and Spend

CBO stops publishing data to hide the real debt number which is over $200 trillion.

Federal Reserve

JPMorgan Chase to pay $13 billion over mortgage practices.

USA Today asks: Bitcoin: What is it? What should government do? Government shouldn't do anything and nobody should think of asking that question.

Health Care

Family saves boy riddled with cancer after doctors give up on him.

Global Warming and Energy

Japan abandons CO2 targets, but I don't know why people are shocked.

Economy

The new housing bubble is cooling in the same states that popped first last time.

In another economic fallacy, the head of the EU scolds Germany for being too efficient at production and for exporting too much.

War

The consequences of US wars:

"In other words, American soldiers in World I fought and died for nothing."
"In fact, it’s actually worse than that. In the absence of U.S. intervention in World War I, the likelihood is that the warring powers would have entered into a negotiated peace, given the long lasting, deadly stalemate on the battlefield."

Thereby preventing WWII.

"So, what did U.S. soldiers (and British and French soldiers) die for in World War II? They died so that the Soviet Union, rather than Nazi Germany, could control Eastern Europe (and East Germany)."
"I probably should also mention that China, the country that FDR was trying to save from Japanese tyranny, also ended up under the iron fist of the communists."

Some victories. Then there were the rest.

Police State

Supreme Court refuses to hear NSA case. That NSA blackmail works wonders.

Google pays $17 million over tracking Safari users.

Cops kill eight times more Americans than terrorists kill.

"Since 9/11, and the subsequent militarization of the police by the Department of Homeland Security, about 5,000 Americans have been killed by US police officers. The civilian death rate is nearly equal to the number of US soldiers killed in Iraq. In fact, you are 8 times more likely to be killed by a police officer than by a terrorist."

I've said for decades that being engaged by police is the most dangerous thing that happens to the vast majority of Americans.

Right to Keep and Bear Arms

Ohio issues record number of concealed carry permits after setting a record last year.

California has created a special police force to seize guns.

"The State of California’s Armed Prohibited Persons System (APPS) has created an einsatzgruppe dedicated exclusively to gun confiscation. Using gun registration lists, the APPS stormtroopers, “arriving in SUVs and dressed in black tactical uniforms … regularly sweep through California cities” to seize firearms from people the state has designated “prohibited persons,” reports the Fresno Bee. A criminal conviction is not necessary for enrollment on the civilian disarmament register; all that is necessary is an official finding by the state’s Welfare bureaucracy that the gun owner is “a danger to himself or others.”"

Welfare.

Regulation

Government tests truckers for sleep apnea and restricts their hours. More.

War on Drugs

Now Ohio has a heroin epidemic, and yet we'll continue the policy that has failed for 100 years. AG DeWine to create heroin task force.

Remembering when government poisoned people during Prohibition.

Local

Walmart workers strike for higher wages.

State funds funneled to Dayton aerospace businesses.

Regulation

Minimum wage laws outlaw jobs.

Global Warming and Energy

Analysis of advance of human civilization versus climate change.

Active volcano buried under Antarctic ice.

Police State

Police in virtually crime-free Boise, Idaho obtain a tank with a grant.

TSA installing glass prisons for passengers exiting planes.

Economy

Over 1 million Playstation 4s were sold in the first 24 hours.

Detroit's private bus company.

Foreign Policy

France assures Israel it will continue to undermine negotiations with Iran.

Local

Police electrocute fleeing teen after break in.

Huber Heights aquatic center lost even more money in its second year.

Wright State had abandoned building for six years, but the state gave it $900,000 of taxpayer's money to clean it up. Wright State is rolling in dough too.

Storms knock out power to thousands.

Education

Benefits of play and study outdoors in a natural environment.

Health Care

New cholesterol guidelines are an improvement, but still lacking.

There is no fix for Obamacare. It was fatally flawed from the beginning by design.

You know Obamacare is in jeopardy when Nancy Pelosi says Democrats proudly support it.

Tax and Spend

Federal default is inevitable.

Lord Geithner gets giant payday from private equity firm.

Regulation

Los Angeles county's condom requirement for porn actors pushed the porn industry out of LA, hurting the city's economy.

Foreign Policy

German news report slams US for illegal operations in Germany.

"The breach in U.S.-German relations seemed likely to widen Friday after a joint German newspaper and television investigation titled “Secret War” reported that American intelligence and military use this nation for “tapping, code cracking, recruiting informants, observing suspects, kidnapping and abducting foreign enemies.”
What’s more, the reports added: “The Germans have known all that for years.”"

People don't like aggression.

War

Pentagon claims to have destroyed all its chemical weapons.

Fantastic claims about Iraq and Afghanistan wars.

"Forbes reports that one million US soldiers have been injured in the Iraq and Afghanistan wars.http://www.forbes.com/sites/rebeccaruiz/2013/11/04/report-a-million-veterans-injured-in-iraq-afghanistan-wars/
RT reports that the cost of keeping each US soldier in Afghanistan has risen from $1.3 million per soldier to $2.1 million per soldier. http://rt.com/usa/us-afghanistan-pentagon-troops-budget-721/
Matthew J. Nasuti reports in the Kabul Press that it cost US taxpayers $50 million to kill one Taliban soldier. That means it cost $1 billion to kill 20 Taliban fighters. http://kabulpress.org/my/spip.php?article32304 This is a war that can be won only at the cost of the total bankruptcy of the United States.
Joseph Stiglitz and Linda Bilmes have estimated that the current out-of-pocket and already incurred future costs of the Afghan and Iraq wars is at least $6 trillion."

Wow.

Police State

Propaganda piece claims big corporations don't want to help NSA spy. This is baloney. They just don't want their customers to know about it. They didn't resist NSA when those programs were still secret.

How Google laid the groundwork for NSA intercepts.

Article blames Snowden, not the NSA, for drop in Cisco sales.

Seattle police can access city's DHS surveillance cameras in real time in their vehicles.

"While advanced security is to be expected at Seattle’s port, the mesh network nodes’ data gathering of residents in the downtown area has little to do with maritime security. Given Seattle’s “accidental” port surveillance camera placement earlier this year, which saw several of the city’s 30 port security cameras incorrectly faced in towards the city, few residents trust the government’s alleged claims about personal privacy, especially in light of their refusal to comply with a city ordinance requiring them to have divulged information on the network months ago.
Chief McDonagh also said the cameras do not have facial recognition capabilities, although Seattle’s secret participation in the TrapWire program, which used sophisticated facial recognition software ran through city CCTV cameras, leaves the question as to whether the mesh system’s camera access will be run through similar software programs at the whim of unknown federal agencies."

Accidental. That's funny.

University of Cincinnati developing mind reading robots. Lovely.

Global Warming and Energy

Arizona residents have to pay for the privilege of producing solar energy and putting it on the power grid.

EPA considering reducing the amount of ethanol required in gasoline. That's great. And surprising. Ethanol production harms the environment, just like people predicted.

Misc

Anonymous hacks US agencies.

"Included in the list of compromised agencies are the U.S. Army, Department of Energy, Department of Health and Human Services, and potentially many more agencies."

The government claims to want to secure the internet. Give me a break.

Local

Police charged the two men for bringing an airsoft gun to a school.

"Allen Sanders and Donald Hanke are both charged with illegal conveyance of a weapon into a school zone and inducing panic, which are first-degree misdemeanors."

They didn't induce a panic. Whoever put the school in lockdown induced the panic. And I don't think you can call an airsoft gun a weapon. This is ridiculous.

Cops work drunk.

Health Care

Dangerous vaccines.

Doctors warn that doctors are creating superbugs. Since most of these bugs are bred in ancient hospitals that would have been made obsolete in a free market, this is another consequence of government control of health care.

Medicare Advantage cuts force insurance company to drop thousands of doctors. This was planned by Obama too.

Lead contractor on healthcare.gov website has a history of botching government projects. Their execs undoubtedly donate bunches of money to politicians.

The deep, economic problems with Obamacare.