Posting a tad early today so I can get some yard work done. see you all tomorrow, have a good day!
The following heartbreaking story, comes from the Ozarker at Conflicted Doomer. Like she said in her email this morning, this could be where we are headed here, (and in some sections of the US we're almost there already) if we don't get our shit together.
The following heartbreaking story, comes from the Ozarker at Conflicted Doomer. Like she said in her email this morning, this could be where we are headed here, (and in some sections of the US we're almost there already) if we don't get our shit together.
(CNN) -- Felipa Fabon waits outside a local fried chicken restaurant in Manila. Crouching near to feral cats and rubbish bins, she isn't there to meet friends for dinner but to search through the diner's trash bags.
"I'm sorting the garbage, looking for 'pagpag'," she says.
In Tagalog "pagpag" means the dust you shake off your clothing or carpet, but in Fabon's poverty- stricken world, it means chicken pulled from the trash.
Pagpag is the product of a hidden food system for the urban poor that exists on the leftovers of the city's middle class.
And, if you're coming to this site via the LATOC link, I think you'll find all your old friends and many new ones at the forums linked at the bottom of the blog.
Peak Oil and Energy News
CNNMoney: Delta to buy oil refinery
CNBC: OPEC Output Hits Highest Since 2008: Reuters Survey - OPEC output in April has hit its highest since 2008 as extra crude from Iraq, Saudi Arabia and Libya more than compensates for the lowest Iranian supply in two decades ahead of an EU embargo, a Reuters survey found on Monday.
Philly.com: Texas pipeline firm to buy Sunoco Inc. for $5.3B
CuriousCapitalist: Natural Gas Prices Up 5% on Production Report
MJPerry: Cheap Natural Gas Heralds an Energy Revolution That Will Displace Nuclear, Coal, Wind and Solar
OilPrice: The Art Of Recycling: Converting Plastic To Oil - The days of dumping trash into overcrowded landfills may be over. Just as you would not dump gold, diamonds, or hundred dollar bills into garbage bins, you soon will hesitate to throw out your plastic water bottle, as the once typical trash is taking on a whole new value. New developments in technology seem to have done the unfathomable—and scientists have now found a means to turn plastic pollution into oil.
Reuters: UPDATE 1-BP plans to add 3 Gulf of Mexico rigs in 2012-exec - BP Plc has five drilling rigs running in the Gulf of Mexico two years after its Macondo oil spill and plans to add three more by the end of 2012, the company's head of development said on Monday.
Reuters: UPDATE 1-Shell, Iogen scrap plans for Canada biofuel plant - April 30 (Reuters) - Royal Dutch Shell Plc and Iogen Corp have scrapped plans for a commercial-scale biofuel plant in Manitoba, spelling the loss of 150 jobs and raising questions about widespread and near-term use of fuel made from agricultural waste in Canada. TheOilDrum: Past and Future at Total's Elgin/Franklin Project - Four weeks after the Elgin G4 well sprung a leak above the production platform in the North Sea, Total has spudded the first of two relief wells as backup in case the attempt to kill the well from above doesn't work. It will take 6 months to drill the wells, however, and an estimated 200,000 cubic meters of gas per day was initially being released, and reportedly enough so far has leaked to heat all of Aberdeen for a decade (a suspect claim, perhaps). In this post, I will provide some additional background on the history of this project and what Total E&P UK's plans were prior to the leak and subsequent shutdown of all production.
Zerohedge: Time To Start Looking At The Pump Prices Again
CNNMoney: T. Boone Pickens: Natural gas has bottomed
DesignObserver: Visualizing The Ends Of Oil - By now most of us understand that oil is powering the rapid transformation of our planet, enabling us to extract resources, intensify agriculture, manufacture goods, and transport people and objects at unprecedented rates and in unprecedented quantities. But what remains more difficult to grasp is the impact — the scale — of this transformation; and I would argue that this difficulty in comprehending profound change is to some crucial degree related to the difficulty of visualizing it.
TechReview: Physicists Crack Fusion Mystery - A new theory might help researchers double the power of fusion reactors.
EnergyBulletin: Will quantum fusion save the day?
TheOilDrum: The Oil Curse: How Petroleum Wealth Shapes the Development of Nations
Global Conflict
WSJ: Dissident Case Clouds US's Beijing Visit
Telegraph: Nine from one family killed in bombardment in Syria
Hosted: Friend: Police note blind activist's escape legal
CBS: 1 year after Osama bin Laden killed, still no answers from Pakistan
CBS: New insights on American al Qaeda
Reuters: White powder envelopes close NYC bank branches
NYT: Barak Says All Israeli Options Remain Open on Iran
SeattleTimes: AP EXCLUSIVE: US keeps mum on some Afghan attacks
The military is under-reporting the number of times that Afghan soldiers and police open fire on American and other foreign troops.NYT: In Syria, Blame Cast by 2 Sides in Attacks
The U.S.-led coalition routinely reports each time an American or other foreign soldier is killed by an Afghan in uniform. But The Associated Press has learned it does not report insider attacks in which the Afghan wounds - or misses - his U.S. or allied target. It also doesn't report the wounding of troops who were attacked alongside those who were killed.
Such attacks reveal a level of mistrust and ill will between the U.S.-led coalition and its Afghan counterparts in an increasingly unpopular war. The U.S. and its military partners are working more closely with Afghan troops in preparation for handing off security responsibility to them by the end of 2014.
SeattleTimes: Pakistanis dead; got 'blood money' in CIA killing
The widow and mother-in-law of a Pakistani man killed by a CIA contractor last year were murdered Monday, allegedly by the widow's father who may have feared she would remarry and take the "blood money" she received with her, police said.NYT: Dispute Over Island of Abu Musa Unites Iran
OWS/Protests
MSNBC: 'Overwhelming military-type response': Report criticizes Oakland police handling of Occupy protests
Oakland police used "an overwhelming military-type response" to disperse Occupy Oakland demonstrators and fired at a former Marine and Iraq war veteran who was critically injured in the clashes in October, according to a report issued on Monday.CBSNews: Occupy: What to expect in May Day "general strike"
CNN: San Francisco Bay ferry service suspended in anticipation of protest
CNNMoney: Occupy calls for 'a day without the 99%'
Reuters: Occupy supporters in New York, Wisconsin sue over free speech
Reuters: Report criticizes Oakland police handling of Occupy protests
TheGuardian: May Day Occupy protests - live coverage
BBC: Europe focus of global May Day labour protests
NakedCapitalism: Occupy Wall Street Sues New York City, JP Morgan #OWS
CBSNews: Cleveland Bomb Plot: 5 arrested in alleged plot to blow up Ohio bridge
CBS/AP) WASHINGTON - The Justice Department says five men have been arrested in a plot to bomb a bridge outside Cleveland, Ohio.Rabble.ca: Quebec students ignite the popular imagination - Vibrant nightly protests over the past week in downtown Montréal, in solidarity with the Quebec student strike, are sparking global attention. As the Quebec-wide strike continues - it has now been going for over 11 weeks - a new energy is apparent in the city.
A department official says the five men are self-described anarchists and are not tied to international terrorism.
The department also says the five men were taken into custody as part of an undercover operation by law enforcement authorities.
Hacker News
Zerohedge: Bad News For Rupert Murdoch As Panel Finds Him Unfit To Lead
WSJ: UK Report Condemns News Corp.
Domestic Financial News
Bloomberg: Tea Party Congressmen Accept Cash From Bailed-Out Bankers
MSNMoney: Dow hits 4-year high on manufacturing strength
CNNMoney: Homeownership falls to lowest rate in 15 years
NEW YORK (CNNMoney) -- Homeownership in the U.S. fell to its lowest rate in 15 years during the first quarter as more delinquent borrowers lost their homes to foreclosure, forcing many to rent.WSJ: Less White Equals More Green
The percentage of Americans who own their homes dropped a full percentage point over the past 12 months to 65.4% during the first three months of 2012, according to the latest Census Bureau data. That's the lowest rate since 1997 and down from the peak of 69.2% reached in 2004.
States and cities across the northern half of the country saved millions of dollars from a winter that was unusually warm and lacking in snow, providing a rare fiscal bonus and leaving them with surpluses of road salt and other supplies for this year's season.SFGate: U.S. must halt incentives for corporate tax dodges
WashingtonPost: Fewer Americans form households after recession, hampering economic recovery
DetroitNews: GM to chop 100 R&D positions
General Motors Co. will cut about 100 positions at its global research and development headquarters in Warren and will close a research and development facility in Bangalore, India, as part of a global restructuring, a source familiar with the plans said Monday.USAToday: Chrysler boosts Jeep output, speeds 1,100 new jobs
TheEuropean: "Politics Is at the Root of the Problem"
Austerity policies are driving us towards a double-dip recession, warns US economist Joseph Stiglitz. He sat down with Martin Eiermann to discuss new economic thinking and the influence of money in politics.TheAtlantic: The Inflation Threat Is a Bogeyman - British celebrity historian and Harvard professor Niall Ferguson thinks inflation is "really" much higher than its official number. So does celebrity politician and self-styled Austrian economist Ron Paul. And then there's John Williams of Shadow Stats. He too warns of double-digit inflation -- but curiously takes payments for his newsletter in dollars. Even more curiously, he hasn't increased its price in years. There's just one problem with the inflation monster. It's not real.
EconoSpeak: Paul Ryan – Imposing Austerity in order to Avoid It? - Paul Ryan’s interview with Jonathan Weisman included a passage that shows how utterly clueless he is noting that the Republican fiscal policy objective is to: preempt austerity – we want to prevent that bitter kind of European austerity mode which is what we will have if we have a debt crisis. In other words, cut government spending now to avoid fiscal restraint later?
Zerohedge: The Demented "Old Normal" Speaks: Greenspan Forgets His Lines From Year Ago, Now Hearts QE
SunSentinel: Bad Neighbor Banks: How big lenders spread real estate blight across South Florida - Thousands of vacant homes across South Florida have deteriorated into eyesores that violate local health and safety laws, depress property values and spread blight. The owners of these homes: some of the world's biggest banks.
CharlesHughSmith: Does Believing in the "Recovery" Make It Real?
Global Financial News
Zerohedge: The Market Calls BS on Spain's Efforts to Cover Its Toxic Banking Debt
NYT: French Are Too Comfortable to Consider Reform
ETFDaily: S&P Downgrades The Outlook On India; What’s The Impact For India ETFs?
GlobeAndMail: The high cost of Iceland’s remarkable recovery
In this small Icelandic village, sailors are making double their pre-crisis pay, haddock sales to places like Boston and Brussels are booming and unemployment is almost zero – signs of this island’s surprisingly rapid rise from the ashes of banking ruin.IBTimes: China’s Manufacturing Activity Continues To Grow
VancouverSun: Global unemployment an 'alarming' situation: ILO-196 million people were unemployed worldwide at the end of last year, forecast to rise to 202 million in 2012
GENEVA — Fiscal austerity and tough labour reforms have failed to create jobs, leading to an “alarming” situation in the global employment market that shows no sign of recovering, the International Labour Organization says.FT: No alternative to austerity - Spanish unemployment is nearing 25 per cent. The suicide rate is climbing in Greece. Britain is in a double-dip recession. Amid all this pain, the cry is growing louder. Austerity policies in Europe are dangerous. Someone has to stop this madness.Step forward, François Hollande, the likely winner of the French presidential election. He is campaigning as the man who will stand up to the austerity ayatollahs in Germany. His campaign is resonating – not just in Europe, but even in the US, where the grandees of the economics profession, from Larry Summers to Paul Krugman, are lining up to call for an end to Europe’s austerity policies.
In advanced countries, especially in Europe, employment is not expected to return to pre-crisis levels of 2008 until the end of 2016 — two years later than it previously predicted — in line with a slowdown in production.
Forbes: Lack of Trust Hurting Greek Economy
Commodities/Metals
CommodityOnline: Japan zinc exports fall 35% in March
Mineweb: Gold slips from two week high
ETFDaily: Expect Gold Prices To Test The $1900 Level; Mining Stocks To See A 30-45% Gain
ETFDaily: Finally, WSJ Reports Of Suspicious Activity In Gold Market
Environmental
USGS
M 5.4, Sulawesi, Indonesia
ScienceDaily: Venus to appear in once-in-a-lifetime event
WildlifeNews: Lynx captured in Washington State.
BBC: April is the wettest in 100 years - It has been the wettest April in the UK for over 100 years, with some areas seeing three times their usual average, figures from the Met Office show.
Some 121.8mm of rain has fallen, beating the previous record of 120.3mm which was set in 2000.
Photo: Al Jazeera
"We're continuing to pull up oil in our nets. People who live here
know better than to swim in or eat what comes out of our waters."
CNNMoney: Reporting of fracking and drilling violations weak
Warming in equatorial Pacific may actually offer protection, research finds
CNNMoney: Reporting of fracking and drilling violations weak
WILLIAMSPORT, Pa. (CNNMoney) -- For Pennsylvanians with natural gas wells on their land, chances are they won't know if a safety violation occurs on their property.MSNBC: Weird ocean current may create coral refuges
That's because the state agency charged with regulating the wells -- the Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) -- does not have to notify landowners if a violation is discovered. Even if landowners inquire about safety violations, DEP records are often too technical for the average person and incomplete.
Warming in equatorial Pacific may actually offer protection, research finds
MSNBC: Tree cricket's song is in tune with the temperature
Big question facing scientists is, 'Why?' And how do the females then find their mates?
MotherJones: Big Changes in Ocean Salinity Intensifying Water Cycle - A paper in Science today finds rapidly changing ocean salinities as a result of a warming atmosphere have intensified the global water cycle (evaporation and precipitation) by an incredible 4 percent between 1950 and 2000. That's twice the rate predicted by models.
DesdemonaDespair: Video: Record rains flood Peru and ColombiaBig question facing scientists is, 'Why?' And how do the females then find their mates?
MotherJones: Big Changes in Ocean Salinity Intensifying Water Cycle - A paper in Science today finds rapidly changing ocean salinities as a result of a warming atmosphere have intensified the global water cycle (evaporation and precipitation) by an incredible 4 percent between 1950 and 2000. That's twice the rate predicted by models.
America in Decline
The following story from RJ at The Global Glass Onion, is to me, a textbook example of Fascism.
NakedCapitalism: Charlotte to Suspend Constitutional Free Speech and Assembly Protections to Help Bank of America, Duke Shareholder Meetings - It has become pretty routine for local police to engage in thuggery and run roughshod over Constitutional protections in the name of maintaining order, which increasingly means not annoying big companies. With habeas corpus suspended, our own Attorney General maintaining the Administration has the right to kill suspected terrorists (ie, pretty much anyone) without a trial, and electronic surveillance ever on the rise, it might seem hard to get worked up about small minded suspensions of the right to make a political point in public of the sort planned in Charlotte, NC. As recounted in the Charlotte Business Journal, the City Council passed strict (meaning of questionable legality) security rules for the Democratic convention this summer. Natch, some of the big local companies seem to have gotten to the city manager, who designated the annual meetings of Bank of America and Duke Energy (May 9) the sort of “extraordinary event” that merits intrusive searches:
TheAtlantic: The 10 States and 10 Jobs With the Most Low-Wage Workers - Why a white fast-food employee in Mississippi who never started college is the statistical epitome of American poverty
Zerohedge: The Decline And Fall Of Suburbia
ABCNews: NYC Security Surge, Worry of Body Bombs on Osama bin Laden Anniversary
WashingtonPost: Officer shoots, critically wounds teen student suspected in Houston-area school break-in - PASADENA, Texas — Authorities say a 14-year-old student at a Houston-area school is in critical condition after a police officer investigating a classroom break-in shot him.
IBTimes: South Carolina Teacher Arrested For 'This Is What The Nazis Do To Jews' Comment
A South Carolina teacher was accused of dragging a seventh-grade student by his shirt collar under a table, telling him that "this is what the Nazis do to Jews," police said Monday.ArsTechnica: Feature: "Free babysitting": how would-be pedophiles use Craigslist—and how they get caught
On Wednesday, the 12-year-old boy from Bluffton Middle School, South Carolina, told the police that his social studies teacher, Patricia Mulholland, grabbed him by his collar while he was returning to his desk after sharpening pencil and dragged him 10 feet under a table and said, "Come here, Jew."
The student said that he did not know what to do and was "shocked and appalled." In the evening, he informed his parents about the alleged incident, and the parents decided to press charges against the teacher.
Reuters: When Is School Drug Testing Legal? - Introduced in the late 1980's as part of the war on drugs, school drug testing has become commonplace in public schools across the country. Still, some think school drug testing polices go too far and violate a student's Fourth Amendment right to be free from unreasonable searches and seizures.
Food and Water
CSMonitor: 10 weirdest global fast foods
CBS: Calif. chefs seek repeal of looming foie gras ban
RedditScience: Guess What Drugs and Illegal Substances Are Showing Up in Chicken?
DesdemonaDespair: New genetically modified crops could make superweeds even stronger
Science and Technology
MSNBC: Quantum entanglement can reach into the past - Area of physics in which two particles remain intimately connected just got spookier
Entanglement is a weird state where two particles remain intimately connected, even when separated over vast distances, like two die that must always show the same numbers when rolled. For the first time, scientists have entangled particles after they've been measured and may no longer even exist.MSNBC: Giant alien planet may have split into 2 Earth-size worlds
If that sounds baffling, even the researchers agree it's a bit "radical," in a paper reporting the experiment published online April 22 in the journal Nature Physics.
A unique look at role planets in our galaxy may play in their stars' evolution
TechReview: Ancient Egyptians Recorded Algol's Variable Magnitude 3000 Years Before Western Astronomers
BigThink: You Are Not Your Brain -The "brain-as-calculating machine" analogy assumes that human thought, personality, memory, and emotion are located somewhere in the gray matter protected by the skull. In other words, you -- at least, the waking you who gets out of bed in the morning -- are your brain. But you're not, says Noë. Just as love does not live inside the heart, consciousness is not contained in a finite space -- it's something that arises, something that occurs: a verb rather than a noun. And since the publication of Francis Crick's influential The Astonishing Hypothesis: The Scientific Search for the Soul, scientists have been looking for it in all the wrong places. Watch our video interview:
Forbes: Here's Why Google and Facebook Might Completely Disappear in the Next 5 Years
We think of Google and Facebook as Web gorillas. They’ll be around forever. Yet, with the rate that the tech world is moving these days, there are good reasons to think both might be gone completely in 5 – 8 years. Not bankrupt gone, but MySpace gone. And there’s some academic theory to back up that view, along with casual observations from recent history.
Medical and Health
CNN: As childhood obesity improves, will kids in poverty be left behind?
(Health.com) -- The statistics are grim: Roughly one in six U.S. children are obese, and, at last count, nearly one in three are overweight, putting them at increased risk of health problems ranging from diabetes to being bullied at school.BetterMedicine: Why the Doctor Treats Snoring Seriously
Vitals: More babies born with exposure to addictive drugs
ScienceDaily: Children with juvenile arthritis have higher rates of bacterial infection
Doomsteading, Gardening, Urban Farming
WaldenEffect: Why did our package of bees abscond?
BBC: Founding farmer Watch - Aquaponics pioneer brings tilapia to New York
PreppingToSurvive: The Outdoor Pharmacy: Basil - On my list of “must have” spices, basil ranks in the top five.
CityFarmer: MLS-listed house selling with ‘Urban Farmer’ pitch
Other News
BigThink: Defaulting to Conservatism - The brain is a complex and demanding machine. Given the amount of resources required to run the average brain, it’s no surprise that it takes a few shortcuts when it can. After all, it’s the ultimate multi-tasker—and needs to distribute its energy in a smart and efficient fashion. And now, a recent study published online in the Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin suggests that one of those energy-saving shortcuts may have us defaulting to more conservative ideology when we don’t have the resources to think through a situation.
DailyMail: Suicide riddle of weapons expert who worked with David Kelly: Scientist tells wife he is going for a walk, then takes his life in a field... just like his friend
A weapons expert who worked with Dr David Kelly at the Government’s secret chemical warfare laboratory has been found dead in an apparent suicide.ChicagoTribune: George Zimmerman: Defense enters Twitter, Facebook conversation
In circumstances strongly reminiscent of Dr Kelly’s own mysterious death nine years ago, the body of Dr Richard Holmes was discovered in a field four miles from the Porton Down defence establishment in Wiltshire. It is not yet known how he died.
Mr Holmes, 48, had gone missing two days earlier after telling his wife he was going out for a walk – just as Dr Kelly did before he was found dead at an Oxfordshire beauty spot in July 2003.
CNN: Homeland Security launches investigation into prostitution scandal
WashingtonPost: Scores dead in ferry sinking in India; hope for survivors dwindles
CNN: Octuplets mom Suleman says she's open to porn offer, but no touching
Reddit: For anyone who stopped giving a fuck, what were the results?
BostonHerald: Bodies of 2 elderly women found near Saugus school
CNNBlog: Eyewitness to the Trayvon Martin shooting speaks out
Slate: Why Do So Many Zippers Say YKK?
Politics
CNN: Ex-aide's wife: Edwards said donations for mistress's expenses were legal
MSNBC: Romney aide: Save the auto industry? Mitt did that
SFGate: It's here! The “bumper sticker” message for Obama 2012: “Forward” (VIDEO)
LVRJ: Petition for redress still ignored after all these years - Forget Social Security; it's marijuana that's the real third rail in American politics.
While politicians are becoming increasingly willing to talk about the reform (or, more realistically, the dismantling) of Social Security, finding one willing to talk about marijuana legalization is much more difficult.
Forums
TinfoilPalace: Globalism and Government Control (Radio Program Summary)
TinfoilPalace: Alien Interview: Planet Earth's Use (GLP)
TheOilAge: Japanese Harley washes ashore in BC
TheOilAge: New Popular Mechanics 9/11 "explanation" debunked
HubbertsArms: Earth Faces a Century of Disasters
HubbertsArms: Tuaregs set Sahara aflame, proclaim new country
SilentCountry: Georgia town of Toomsboro up for sale; population: 700
SilentCountry: Stop the tar sands pipeline to China
DestinyCalls: Do it yourself Tesla projects
DestinyCalls: What tarot card are you fun quiz
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