Alas, no. Just the opposite. Each part of the FIRE (finance, insurance, real estate) economy is imploding as "modern" finance hits the wall.
Interest rates, for instance, have fallen for three decades...
Society's Child
Alas, no. Just the opposite. Each part of the FIRE (finance, insurance, real estate) economy is imploding as "modern" finance hits the wall.
Interest rates, for instance, have fallen for three decades...
© Sarasota/Manatee Farmworkers Supporters
However, one particularly horrible and non-abstract aspect of these companies' dealings is how they treat migrant workers and the conditions the workers are forced to live in. The Big Ag corporations have thousands of migrant labor camps scattered around the country with thousands of underpaid migrants working at each camp.
When state inspectors visit these camps, they find violations as often as 60 percent of the time. Despite giving citations and ordering the properties to make the necessary changes to comply with the law, the demands are often ignored because inspection agencies have little to no power or means of enforcement.
Among a total of 1.5 million drug arrests in 2015 in the United States, 38.6 percent were for marijuana compared to 19.9 percent for heroin, cocaine and derivatives, and 5.1 percent for synthetic or manufactured drugs.
Broken down for marijuana possession arrests totaled 574,641 while trafficking and sale arrests totaled 64,480. It translates to one pot bust every 49 seconds. While half a million arrests may seem high, it still represents a drop of 2.3 percent from 15 years ago.
Comment: What a complete waste of time, money and resources! The situation is so ludicrous that Denver police are are running out of room to store all the pot they have confiscated in raids, despite the fact that marijuana is legal in Colorado. And of course, the department is asking for more funds to handle the problem!
What makes this so egregious is that there is such a dire need for funds that could be more productively used - particularly when poverty and homelessness in the U.S have been growing at such an alarming rate. In a sane society taking care of the homeless or providing for food pantries would be prioritized.
© Carlo Allegri / Reuters
A derailed New Jersey Transit train is seen under a collapsed roof after it derailed and crashed into the station in Hoboken, New Jersey, U.S. September 29, 2016.
A derailed New Jersey Transit train is seen under a collapsed roof after it derailed and crashed into the station in Hoboken, New Jersey, U.S. September 29, 2016.
New Jersey Transit's 1614 train on the Pascack Valley Line slammed into the Hoboken terminal on Thursday morning during rush hour, knocking over several support columns and causing the roof to cave in. Fabiola Bittar de Kroon, 34, was struck by the debris and died. More than 100 people, both on board the train and inside the station, suffered injuries.
Investigators with the National Transportation Safety Board were unable to get any information from the engine's data recorder, or black box, which was over 20 years old.
"Unfortunately, the event recorder was not functioning during this trip," NTSB Vice Chairman Bella Dinh-Zarr told reporters at a press conference Sunday.
Investigators are trying to retrieve the data recorder from the front car of the train, which is buried under the wreckage of the terminal building.
© John Sommers II / Reuters
Agents from the Immigration and Customs Enforcement Agency (ICE) asked local law enforcement to use plate reading technology to record information on vehicles attending the gun show in Del Mar back in 2010.
Data was then cross checked with information on vehicles which crossed the Mexican border, around 37 miles south of Del Mar, in the hope of finding gun smugglers, according to the Wall Street Journal (WSJ).
ICE confirmed to WSJ that the activity took place and resulted in no investigations or arrests. The annual gun show at Del Mar, which attracts 9,000 people, is the only show where it was planned to take place, according to the emails seen by the WSJ.
Comment: The U.S. government is watching every move citizens make, so this shouldn't come as any big surprise.
Between September 13th and 23rd, Fancy Bear released five batches of samples from the World Anti-Doping Agency database. The information on 107 athletes who tested positive for banned substances, was posted on the internet. However, for some reason, often medical, WADA allowed these athletes to take part in the competitions.
Most "sick" athletes are US or UK citizens - 23% and 22% correspondingly. They are followed by Canada (10%), Germany (8%), Australia (7%), Denmark (6%), Italy (5%) - 23 countries in total.
Comment: Yesterday the hacker group Fancy Bears released even more names of athletes who tested positive for banned substances by WADA but were permitted to participate in the Olympics because of the "therapeutic use" exemption. The athletes given an exemption are primarily from Western countries: Argentina, Australia, Brazil, Canada, Colombia, Germany, France, Great Britain, Japan, New Zealand, Sweden, Venezuela, South Africa and of course the USA. Rio 2016 Gold medal rower Mahe Drysdale of New Zealand is among those listed as testing positive for banned substances. It should be fairly clear at this point that the banning of Russian athletes at the Rio 2016 Olympics is a complete joke and had nothing to do with doping since everyone is doing it. The Russian ban was not about doping, but about the US propaganda effort to demonize Russia in any way possible.
See also:
- Western cheats: Author of WADA report on Russia admits 'therapeutic use exemptions' prone to abuse
- 'Fancy Bears' release more athletes' names in WADA hack
- Bombshell leak reveals Williams tennis sisters and Rio Olympics gymnast heroine have been doping for years, with WADA's approval
- The white-washed WADA report on Russian doping will make you laugh through your tears
- Cultural warfare: US attempt to ban Russia from Olympics for 'cheating' is rank hypocrisy
- SOTT News Snapshot: September 15 edition - Everything you need to know about American doping
- More WADA leaks: British Olympic champion Mo Farah, Spanish tennis star Rafael were given 'exemptions' to take performance-enhancing drugs
Urbanite Colombians cheer for more death and destruction.
Just last week, western media was praising the Colombian peace agreement. Four years of negotiations in Cuba, commentators noted, had finally put an end to a 50-year conflict between the government and the left-wing rebel movement Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC), and involving various right-wing paramilitary groups and narco cartels that had claimed an estimated 200,000 lives, and displaced five million people.
The negotiators had hammered out a 300-page document, and on September 26, Colombian officials and FARC representatives signed an accord in Cartagena, in front of foreign dignitaries including UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon and US Secretary of State John Kerry.
When Colombia's President Juan Manuel Santos and Rodrigo Londono, the leader of the FARC, shook hands, jets flew overhead trailing smoke in the yellow, blue and red of the Colombian flag. The upcoming referendum on the accord, pollsters predicted, would be a resounding "Yes".
Peace process in limbo
And yet on Sunday the pact was rejected - 50.21 percent to 49.78 percent, a difference of 53,894 votes - in a referendum that has thrown the peace process into limbo.
The result while shocking, is not inexplicable. The vote was largely a result of domestic politics.
© Simon Newman / Reuters
The Bureau of Investigative Journalism (TBIJ) tested 97 pork products sold at the supermarkets and found three were contaminated with MRSA CC398 - a potentially deadly bacteria which can cause serious health problems.
The bug is less harmful to humans than the MRSA bug that kills about 300 people in hospitals in England and Wales each year, but is known to be responsible for at least six deaths in Denmark.
In Denmark, the MRSA CC398 is viewed as a public health crisis. Appearing over a decade ago, it now affects about two-thirds of pig farms, with 12,000 people believed to have contracted it.
Current regulations in British import regulations leave an "open door"for MRSA CC398-infected live pigs to arrive from places like Denmark, according to the Guardian.
The bug can be contracted from infected meat and animals, with workers on pig farms able to catch the disease and pass it on to other people. It can cause chronic infections and seriously harm people with compromised immune systems.
Comment: The rise in sales of critically important antibiotics is happening despite the fact it is now known that resistant forms of certain food poisoning illnesses, including campylobacter, and some variations of the superbug MRSA, are directly linked to antibiotic use on farms.
See also: Big Pharma's industrial waste is fueling the rise in superbugs worldwide
© John Lucas / Flikr
The incident began on June 7, 2016, when Campbell was stopped because Mack claimed his wife's new minivan's temporary license plate wasn't visible through the back glass.
Comment: A bit melodramatic? Perhaps, but how would the same events be reported if conducted by someone not in uniform?
'He was a patriot and the CIA turned on him': Poor medical care endangers Jeffrey Sterling in prison
© Rick Wilking / Reuters
Prison officials have been reluctant to provide CIA whistleblower Jeffrey Sterling with the necessary medical care. After a monthlong battle to allow him to see a cardiac specialist, the little treatment he has received is about to end.
It took an uphill battle against the Englewood Correctional Facility in Colorado for Jeffrey Sterling to receive outside medical treatment for a heart issue that he had before he arrived in the prison. But even after receiving it, he may have to keep fighting against the correctional facility that is responsible for keeping him alive.
Sterling is serving a three-and-a-half-year sentence after being found guilty under the Espionage Act in 2015. While incarcerated at the Englewood Correctional Facility in Colorado, he began experiencing heart issues that he described as feeling similar to atrial fibrillation (afib), a condition that left him hospitalized for four days in the past.
Comment: Not only are they treated inhumanely, but farm workers are regularly exposed to massive amounts of pesticides causing more chemical-related injuries and illnesses than in any other workforce nationwide and most don't receive adequate medical care.