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US: 1 in 15 Americans Now Rank as Poorest Poor

Jim Axelrod
CBSNews.com
Thu, 03 Nov 2011 05:12 UTC
Image
© APMiguel Lopez hauls a load of plastic bottles and aluminum cans for recycling in Los Angeles, Sept. 14, 2011. Lopez earned $68 for the load.
The ranks of America's poorest poor have climbed to a record high -- 1 in 15 people -- spread widely across metropolitan areas as the housing bust pushed many inner-city poor into suburbs and other outlying places and shriveled jobs and income.

New census data paint a stark portrait of the nation's haves and have-nots at a time when unemployment remains persistently high. It comes a week before the government releases first-ever economic data that will show more Hispanics, elderly and working-age poor have fallen into poverty.

CBS News correspondent Jim Axelrod reports the Midwest is the region with the fastest growing poverty rate, up 79 percent. And Youngstown, Ohio, has the highest concentration of poverty, having been hit hard by the loss of steel jobs.

In all, the numbers underscore the breadth and scope by which the downturn has reached further into mainstream America. "There now really is no unaffected group, except maybe the very top income earners," said Robert Moffitt, a professor of economics at Johns Hopkins University. "Recessions are supposed to be temporary, and when it's over, everything returns to where it was before. But the worry now is that the downturn -- which will end eventually -- will have long-lasting effects on families who lose jobs, become worse off and can't recover."
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Handcuffs

US: Uniform Code of Military Justice Charges Expected in Espionage Case

Joe Gould
Army Times
Tue, 01 Nov 2011 17:29 UTC
William Millay
© FacebookSpc. William Millay is assigned to the rear detachment of the 164th Military Police Company, 793rd Military Police Battalion, 2nd Engineer Brigade, which deployed to Afghanistan earlier this year.
An Alaska soldier arrested on suspicion of espionage will face military charges, but he is not expected to be charged in federal criminal court, according to an Army spokesman.

Spc. William Colton Millay, a 22-year-old military policeman from Owensboro, Ky., is expected to be charged under the Uniform Code of Military Justice within the week, according to Lt. Col. Bill Coppernoll, a spokesman for U.S. Army Alaska.

"We are preparing to prefer charges against Spc. Millay," Coppernoll told Army Times.

Millay is assigned to the rear detachment of the 164th Military Police Company, 793rd Military Police Battalion, 2nd Engineer Brigade. The unit, known as the Arctic Enforcers, deployed to Afghanistan in the spring, leaving at Millay at Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson.

Coppernoll said Millay was arrested at Elmendorf-Richardson on Oct. 29 as the result of an ongoing FBI and Army Counterintelligence investigation, but declined to explain the circumstances that led to Millay's arrest.
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Che Guevara

Best of the Web: 30,000 people shut down 5th largest US port as Oakland, California goes on general strike

Adam Gabbatt
The Guardian
Thu, 03 Nov 2011 13:32 UTC
Police in Oakland use teargas on three separate occasions as tensions flare after protesters occupied building during protest


Police used teargas and non-lethal weapons to control Occupy Oakland protesters overnight after a general strike had effectively shut down the city's port and downtown areas.

There were three separate instances of police using teargas, all near to the Occupy camp, as tensions erupted when protesters occupied a disused building.

Earlier a thousands-strong march had closed down Oakland's port after a day of striking had seen streets closed in downtown and some banks damaged.

Police first used teargas on Broadway at 12.30am, following a day which had actually seen a light police presence.

Officers arrived on the street - the scene of the police clearout of Occupy Oakland on Tuesday 25 October which left Scott Olsen seriously injured - after protesters occupied a disused building on 16th Street.

Comment: Black Bloc Provocateurs Vandalize Property During Occupy Oakland's General Strike

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Vader

Greek referendum and EU: A damnable contempt for democracy

Dominic Sandbrook
Mail Online
Thu, 03 Nov 2011 19:45 UTC
Greece
Gloom: To those who cherish the legacy of the ancient Greeks, the plight of their modern-day inheritors is a tragedy
The derision over the Greeks' desire for a referendum betrays the EU's loathing of ordinary people

Some 2,500 years ago, the ancient Greeks coined a new word: 'democracy'. In the city of Athens, whose citizens were allowed to decide their future for themselves, a new political system was taking shape, based on the freedom of the individual.

Athens was the wonder of the age, a shining beacon of literature and philosophy. It could hardly have been more different from its 21st-century successor, sunk in economic gloom and scarred by months of riots and demonstrations.

To anyone who cherishes the legacy of the ancient Greeks, the plight of their modern-day inheritors is nothing less than a tragedy. And yet amid the appalling economic headlines, the flame of freedom still burns in the land that gave democracy to the world.

To most European leaders, the Greek Prime Minister George Papandreou's decision to submit the latest bailout to a national referendum is simply incomprehensible.

Brussels insiders have been queuing up to denounce his irresponsibility, insisting the future of the euro is simply too important to be decided by the ordinary men and women of Greece.

Yet despite all the consternation in the markets, it is easy to see why Mr Papandreou felt that he had no choice but to go to the people.
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Pistol

Pirates Seize Oil Tanker, Kidnap Crew Near Nigeria

Jon Gambrell
The Associated Press
Thu, 03 Nov 2011 11:18 UTC
Image
© UnknownMap of Nigeria
Lagos - Pirates seized an oil tanker off the coast of Nigeria's southern delta, kidnapping the crew in a bid to steal ship's cargo in the latest hijacking targeting the region, private security officials said Thursday.

Gunmen boarded the MT Halifax as it sat in waters off the coast of Port Harcourt, the main city in the oil-rich Niger Delta, the officials said.

The pirates took over control of the ship and sailed off into the waters of the Gulf of Guinea, and are holding onto the crew as they offload the crude oil in the ship's hold, the officials said.

The officials spoke on condition of anonymity to The Associated Press as they were not authorized to discuss the seizure with journalists.

It remains unclear how many crew members were taken or if any have been injured. The Halifax, registered in Malta, is managed by Ancora Investment Trust Inc. of Greece. An employee who answered a telephone call to the company's office in Athens declined to comment Thursday, saying someone would be able to discuss the hijacking Friday.

A profile of the ship on Ancora's company website identified the nationalities of those onboard as Filipino and Indian, with an Italian ship master.

Commodore Kabir Aliyu, a spokesman for Nigeria's navy, declined to immediately comment.
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Megaphone

California, US: Oakland Occupy Protest Degenerates Into Riot


The Associated Press
Thu, 03 Nov 2011 10:39 UTC
Oakland - Occupy Wall Street protesters had just a few hours to celebrate what they saw as their biggest victory so far: the peaceful shutdown of the nation's fifth-busiest port. Then the rioting began.


A day of demonstrations in Oakland that began as a significant step toward expanding the political and economic influence of the Occupy Wall Street movement, ended with police in riot gear arresting dozens of protesters who had marched through downtown to break into a vacant building, shattering windows, spraying graffiti and setting fires along the way.

"We go from having a peaceful movement to now just chaos," said protester Monique Agnew, 40.

Comment: It sounds like another round of bastardizing the protestors. People are angry and if you can undermine the movement from the inside, by having police infiltrate the movement, you can stir up further anger by being the first to cross the line (throw an object, strike out at police). While this may not be the case, since people need little coaxing after Scott Olsen was injured, it's certainly a possibility. The media will always take the side of Industry, Corporatism and socially engineered society. They create perception management and help us to conclude their view is the only correct one.

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Family

Who's Afraid of Seven Billion People?

Matt Ridley
The Wall Street Journal
Sat, 29 Oct 2011 00:00 UTC
Image
© John S. Dykes
This Halloween, the United Nations declared over the summer, a baby will be born somewhere on Earth who will tip the world's population over seven billion for the first time. Truly do international bureaucrats have the power of prophecy!

The precision is bunk, of course, or rather a public-relations gimmick. According to demographers, nobody knows the exact population of the world to within 100 million. (Incidentally, the record-setting baby will not be the seven billionth human being to have existed, as some press reports have implied - more like the 108 billionth.)

Nonetheless, the occasion will provide an excuse for yet another round of Malthusian gnashing of teeth about overpopulation. But we shouldn't let it obscure the real story of the past 50 years, which is not how much faster than expected, but how much slower, population has been growing.

In the 1960s, some experts feared an exponentially accelerating population explosion, and in 1969, the State Department envisaged 7.5 billion people by the year 2000. In 1994, the United Nations' medium estimate expected the seven-billion milestone to arrive around 2009. Compared with most population forecasts made in the past half century, the world keeps undershooting.
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Pumpkin

Five signs that all is not well in America this Halloween

Tim Stanley
The Telegraph, UK
Mon, 31 Oct 2011 00:00 UTC
Image
© unknownAmericans hate politics too much to fork out for Sarah Palin masks
There's little festive spirit in America this Halloween. Fox News offers an indictment of the general misery of recession-era USA with this dark story: "A girl was found hanging by a noose inside a haunted house attraction Thursday night. Customers may have even walked past her thinking she was a scary prop." Luckily, the girl survived, but this was just one of the many signs from the gods that all is not well in the beloved USA. Here are five more:
  1. Liberals hijack the festival to make a politically correct point.
    A student organisation in Ohio is running a poster campaign against "racist" Halloween costumes. The posters feature students of different ethnicities holding up photos of someone dressed as a stereotype (geisha girl, Arab terrorist etc), each beneath the tagline "We're a culture, not a costume." It was a cheap shot in the culture war, earning itself a volley of wonderful online pastiches. The best by far is of an offended Dracula holding up a photo of a guy in a vampire costume, again beneath the words "We're a culture, not a costume". Hey, his great grandfather didn't schlep all the way here from Romania to be a running gag at frat parties.
  2. Halloween becomes a sting operation to entrap paedophiles.
    The police are on alert in Fox Valley, Wisconsin for any signs of trouble from the burgeoning population of registered sex offenders. The cops will be conducting door-to-door inspections to make sure that they aren't talking to kids, handing out candy or "turning on the porch light". Ninety-one offenders are standing up for the spirit of the season and defying the order. A local defence attorney reasoned, "The fact of the matter is that well over 90 per cent of child sex offences occur when there is a prior relationship between the child and the offender ... The biggest danger you have is not from strangers, but from family". That cheering thought was the top story of the news-starved local paper, The Appleton Post-Crescent.
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Dollar

US: NBC Confirms One Cain Accuser Received Cash Settlement

Chuck Todd, Lisa Myers, and Domenico Montanaro
MSNBC
Mon, 31 Oct 2011 00:00 UTC
Herman Cain
© unknownHerman Cain
NBC News has confirmed that one woman received a settlement from the National Restaurant Association after complaining about inappropriate sexual conduct by Herman Cain.

NBC News is not disclosing the name of the woman nor characterizing who she is.

Cain denied the allegations, saying on FOX this morning he was "falsely accused." "I have never sexually harassed anyone, anyone," he said, "and absolutely, these are false accusations."

Despite being the chief executive officer of the National Restaurant Association, he said he was unaware of any settlement with the accusers, though he didn't deny it.

"If the restaurant association did a settlement, I wasn't even aware of it," he claimed, "and I hope it wasn't for much. If there was a settlement, it was handled by some of the other officers at the restaurant association."
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Che Guevara

US, California: Thousands of Occupy Protesters Disrupt Busy Port

Terence Chea, Lisa Leff and Terry Collins
Sacramento Bee
Wed, 02 Nov 2011 23:38 UTC
Image
© N/A
Several thousand Occupy Wall Street demonstrators gathering in Oakland forced a halt to operations at the nation's fifth busiest port Wednesday evening, escalating a movement whose tactics had largely been limited to marches, rallies and tent encampments since it began in September.

Police estimated that a crowd of about 3,000 had gathered at the Port of Oakland by about 5 p.m. PDT. Some had marched from the city's downtown, while others had been bused to the port.

Port spokesman Isaac Kos-Read said maritime operations had effectively been shut down, and interim Oakland police chief Howard Jordan warned that protesters who went inside the port's gates would be committing a federal offense.
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