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updated: 2021-10-19
 

"Contention window sizes are always 1 less than a power of 2 (e.g, 31, 63, 127, 255).   Each time the retry counter increases, the contention window moves to the next greatest power of 2." --- Matthew S. Gast 2002 April _802.11 Wireless Networks_ pg 33

 
 

2011 Jun

U	M	T	W	R	F	S
			1	2	3	4
5	6	7	8	9	10	11
12	13	14	15	16	17	18
19	20	21	22	23	24	25
26	27	28	29	30

 

"If we knew what we were doing, it would not be called research, would it?" --- Albert Einstein (quoted in David LaBounty & Jim Blau 2002 _Job Surfing: The Sciences -- Research & Medicine_ pg 4)

 
 
 

captain William Scott's flag for the Republic of Texas.

2011-06-01

2011-06-01
Jay Hancock _Baltimore MD Sun_
Conference Board: On-Line Help-Wanted ads increased 148,800 in May, but were any of them for real jobs? (with graph)
Sacramento CA Bee
Bloomberg

2011-06-01
Paul Krill _InfoWorld_/_PC Advisor_/_IDG_
interview with Obummer's CTO Aneesh Chopra

2011-06-01 07:46PDT (10:46EDT) (14:46GMT) (17:46Jerusalem)
Roger Harris _Knoxville TN News Sentinel_
modest improvement forecast for TN economy
"Tennessee's jobless rate will fall from 9.7% in 2010 to 9.4% this year.   A further drop to 8.7% is expected for 2012."
contact Roger Harris

2011-06-01 07:46PDT (10:46EDT) (14:46GMT) (17:46Jerusalem)
_Treasure Coast FL Palm_/_Scripps_
Treasure Coast contestant survived first 2 rounds in North American and Pacific spelling bee
David Skolnick: Vindicator contestant eliminated in semi-finals
Cumberland PA Sentinel: Carlisle PA student places 3rd in spelling bee, Sukanya Roy of South Abington twp PA took first
"Her competitors: 274 best-of-the-best national and international spellers ages 8 through 15, many of whom competed at the national level in past years.   The cut-off age for all entrants is 15.   She has participated in bees since she was 8 years old.   In fourth grade, she won both the English and Spanish school bees and placed fourth at the Scripps Treasure Coast Regional Spelling Bee when she was in fifth grade."
follow the results

2011-06-01 08:33PDT (11:33EDT) (15:33GMT) (18:33Jerusalem)
_Knoxville TN News Sentinel_/_AP_
Federal government to lose $14G in auto-maker bail-out funds, though firms have announced they've paid back

2011-06-01 08:50PDT (11:50EDT) (15:50GMT) (18:50Jerusalem)
Chris Isidore _CNN_
Another hidden unemployment problem as more of the work-force goes onto the disabled list
"There are 8.3M workers receiving disability payments, an increase of 1.2M, or 17% from when the recession began, according to the [Socialist Insecurity Abomination]."

2011-06-01 10:38PDT (13:38EDT) (17:38GMT) (20:38Jerusalem)
Lucas L. Johnson ii & Sheila Burke _Knoxville TN News Sentinel_/_AP_
TN passed bill to curtail theft of music, movies

2011-06-01 12:19PDT (15:19EDT) (19:19GMT) (22:19Jerusalem)
Patrick Thibodeau _ComputerWorld_/_IDG_
New rules may bring "false H-1B demand" as process could lead to significant savings for executives
IT World
"the government proposal would also create a new way to game the H-1B visa system...   Under the proposed rule, employers would initially register electronically by completing a relatively simple form in a process that should take about 30 minutes.   The electronic registrations would be used by officials to create a first cut of full registrants.   A waiting list would be created if the number of H-1B registrations exceeds the cap limit."

2011-06-01 16:35PDT (19:35EDT) (23:35GMT) (2011-06-02 02:35Jerusalem)
Adrian Kingsley-Hughes _Ziff Davis_/_CBS_
Cheap GPUs are rendering strong pass-words useless

2011-06-01
Robert Guttersohn _Youngstown OH Vindicator_
to Fred Seitz "The character is what matters" as he prepares to attend RIT

2011-06-01
Aaron Goldstein _American Spectator_
Sarah Palin has the leftist media dancing on a string

2011-06-01
_NY Sun_
The Van NotHaus/Liberty Dollars question

2011-06-01
Robert Moore _Cenantua_
Web log postings may be cutting-edge, but still leave a lot to be desired

2011-06-01 (5771 Ayyr 28)
Brian Bennett & Michael A. Memoli _Jewish World Review_
Iraqis indicted on terrorism charges had been admitted to USA as refugees
"Alwan was admitted into the U.S. even though his finger-print was found in 2005 on an unexploded road-side bomb that was set to blow up a U.S. convoy in Iraq.   The print was loaded into a Department of Defense data-base, but a search of that data-base was not then a part of the application process for refugee status in the U.S.A."

2011-06-01 (5771 Ayyr 28)
R' Dov Fischer _Jewish World Review_
Why -- and whose -- Jerusalem?: On the 44th anniversary of the liberation and reunification of the Holy City, answering the questions few are so bold to ask
"Ever since I learned to pray, I learned about Jerusalem.   In time, as a little boy, I learned to pray 3 times every day in my 'Sh'moneh Esrai' [sometimes Shemoneh Esrei -- literally the 17 blessings] prayer (the central prayer in every formal Jewish service) for the return to and the rebuilding of united Jerusalem.   It is the same prayer that my paternal grand-father recited in the late 1800s in Southern Poland and that my maternal grand-father recited then in Russia.   The same prayer that their grand-parents recited before them, and theirs before them.   It did not matter to them that it seemed hopeless in those centuries, long before anyone even had fabricated the apocryphal notion of a 'Palestinian People', that Jews ever might return to the land of Israel, which Rome had re-named 'Palestine'."

2011-06-01 (5771 Ayyr 28)
Walter E. Williams _Jewish World Review_
Do we deserve our fate?
Patriot Post
GOP USA
"The combined unfunded liability of [Socialist Insecurity] and Medicare has reached nearly $107T in today's dollars.   That is about seven times the size of the U.S. economy and 10 times the size of the national debt.   Those entitlement programs, along with others, account for nearly 60% of federal spending...   The language Congress uses to describe their spending is corrupt beyond redemption...   The only way Congress can give one American a dollar is to first take it from another American.   Therefore, an entitlement is a congressionally given right for one American to live at the expense of another.   In other words, Congress forcibly uses one American to serve the purposes of another American.   As such, it differs in degree, but not kind, from that uglier part of our history where black people were forcibly used to serve the purposes of their slave masters...   Controlling for inflation, federal tax revenue today is 23 times [as much as] it was in 1960, but congressional spending is 42 times [as much]."

2011-06-01 (5771 Ayyr 28)
Thomas Sowell _Jewish World Review_
Politically seductive notions part2
"The only thing surprising about Barack Obama's latest blow against Israel is that there are people who are surprised.   As for a Palestinian homeland, that was never a big issue when the Arabs controlled that land, up to 1967.   Obama's declaration that Israel must give up the land it acquired, after neighboring countries threatened its survival in 1967, is completely consistent with both his ideology of many years and his previous actions as President of the United States.   Whether as a radical student, a community organizer or a far left politician, Barack Obama's ideology has been based on a vision of the Haves versus the Have Nots.   However complex the ramifications of this ideology, and however clever the means by which Obama has camouflaged it, that is what it has amounted to...   Israel is one of the Haves.   Its neighbors remain among the Have Nots, despite their oil.   No wonder that Barack Obama has bent over backward, in addition to bowing low forward, to support the side that his ideology favors.   Whether at home or abroad, Obama's ideology is an ideology of envy, resentment and payback...   After one of his meetings with Netanyahu, Barack Obama simply told the prime minister that he was going upstairs to have dinner.   You wouldn't say that to an ordinary neighbor visiting in your home, without inviting him to join you.   Obama knew that.   Netanyahu knew that.   It was a calculated insult...   Obama's visit to the Queen of England was likewise conducted without the respect normally shown to a monarch...   All of this is consistent with Obama's general approach to foreign policy -- selling out our allies to curry favor with our adversaries."
Proposed Bills 2011
 
 

2011-06-02

2011-06-02 05:30PDT (08:30EDT) (12:30GMT) (15:30Jerusalem)
Scott Gibbons & Tony Sznoluch _DoL ETA_
un-employment insurance weekly claims report
DoL home page
DoL OPA press releases
historical data
DoL regulations
"The advance number of actual initial claims under state programs, unadjusted, totaled 377,421 in the week ending May 28, an increase of 1,701 from the previous week.   There were 418,873 initial claims in the comparable week in 2010.   The advance unadjusted insured unemployment rate was 2.8% during the week ending May 21, unchanged from the prior week.   The advance unadjusted number for persons claiming UI benefits in state programs totaled 3,477,006, a decrease of 63,881 from the preceding week.   A year earlier, the rate was 3.4% and the volume was 4,380,562.   The total number of people claiming benefits in all programs for the week ending May 14 was 7,682,830, a decrease of 56,742 from the previous week.   Extended benefits were available in AL, AK, AZ, CA, CO, CT, DE, DC, FL, GA, ID, IL, IN, KS, KY, ME, MA, MI, MN, MO, NV, NJ, NM, NY, OH, OR, PA, RI, SC, TX, VA, WA, and WV, during the week ending May 14.   States reported 3,415,223 persons claiming EUC (Emergency Unemployment Compensation) benefits for the week ending May 14, an increase of 3,363 from the prior week.   There were 4,998,428 claimants in the comparable week in 2010.   EUC weekly claims include first, second, third, and fourth tier activity.   [Note that the population used for calculating the "insured unemployment rate" changes
to 132,623,886 beginning 2007-10-06;
to 133,010,953 beginning 2008-01-05;
to 133,382,559 beginning 2008-04-05;
to 133,690,617 beginning 2008-07-05;
to 133,902,387 beginning 2008-10-04;
to 133,886,830 beginning 2009-01-03;
to 133,683,433 beginning 2009-04-04;
to 133,078,480 beginning 2009-07-04;
to 133,823,421 beginning 2009-10-03;
to 131,823,421 beginning 2009-10-17;
to 130,128,328 beginning 2010-01-02;
to 128,298,468 beginning 2010-04-03;
to 126,763,245 beginning 2010-07-03;
to 125,845,577 beginning 2010-09-25;
to 125,560,066 beginning 2011-01-15;
to 125,572,661 beginning 2011-04-02.]
EUC (Excel)
EB
graphs
more graphs

2011-06-02
Matthew Vadum _American Spectator_
Leftist billionaire bankers Herb & Marion Sandler paid ACORN about $11M to hurt competitor Wells Fargo

2011-06-02
_Philadelphia PA Inquirer_
CGC: 37,135 planned lay-offs announced in May
Greg Robb: MarketWatch/Utah Daily Herald
Elizabeth Lazarowitz: NY Daily News
EuroMoney Institutional Investor
Jonathan Cheng & Justin LaHart: Wall Street Journal
Hartford CT Courant
Daniel Indiviglio: Atlantic (with graphs)
Investor's Business Daily
Medill school of journalism NW U (with graph)
Adam Samson: Fox
204,374 lay-offs announced to date in 2001
governments announced 14,755 in cuts
graphs

2011-06-02
Quin Hillyer _American Spectator_
How Obummer and his allies blew the economy even worse than the Shrub
Center for Individual Freedom

2011-06-02
Jay D. Homnick _American Spectator_
Morton Klein a worthy advocate for Israel
"In the 1906 Baedeker's travel guide to Syria and Palestine it cites population figures for Jerusalem at 40K Jews, 13K Christians and 7K Moslems..."

2011-06-02
R. Emmett Tyrrell ii _American Spectator_
Don Shipley strives to sort genuine heroes from the imposters

2011-06-02
Doug Bandow _American Spectator_
At great expense in lives and money the USA brought democracy to Iraq... but liberty is still lacking

2011-06-02
Paul Chesser _American Spectator_
Twisted Scripture and Pseudo-Science
"For a group that plans to express views representative of mainstream Christian theology on man's relationship and treatment of the Earth, to purposely hide it from thousands of evangelical leaders -- who might have informed opinions about it, and many who undoubtedly will disagree -- wasn't a very honest way to go about it.   So why was Flourish so surreptitious?   Maybe because they hoped no critical eye-balls would catch the unbiblical premises upon which they've built 'Caretakers of Creation', and thus wreck their evangelical 'call to action'."

2011-06-02
Christopher Orlet _American Spectator_
Jail-House Crock
"the recent 5.5% drop in violent crime nationally...   according to a 2009 Department of Justice report, more than half (52.4%) of criminals in state prisons were imprisoned for violent crimes...   'From 2000 to 2008, the state prison population increased by 159,200 prisoners, and violent offenders accounted for 60% of this increase.   The number of drug offenders in state prisons declined by 12,400 over this period.'"

2011-06-02
Jesse Benton _Lew Rockwell_
Latest Job Numbers

2011-06-02
Frosty Wooldridge _News with Views_
My Daddy Is a US Marine
index

2011-06-02
Henry McCulloch _V Dare_
Preferential admissions at Harvard: Harvard apparently hates America, so should America shun Harvard?
"Americans need to figure out how to recapture our once-great universities, which are now effectively enemy encampments in the middle of our society."

2011-06-02
Patrick J. Buchanan _V Dare_
Obummer in a Dream World

2011-06-02 (5771 Ayyr 2999)
Sharon Begley _Jewish World Review_
Saving Sight, Testing Faith
"If cells harvested from patients themselves can treat disease, perhaps there's no need to use ones obtained from human embryos -- with all the questions that raises...   Lanza's dream of turning human embryonic stem cells into therapies for the sick and the suffering is taking a huge step closer to reality.   As early as this month, the first patient will undergo a revolutionary procedure aimed at restoring sight.   A bioethics board at UCLA recently approved a clinical trial of cells Lanza has produced from human embryonic stem cells -- obtained from donated in vitro fertilization embryos -- to treat blindness."

2011-06-02 (5771 Ayyr 2999)
Gloria Goodale _Jewish World Review_
What's at stake in Google's plan to digitize all of the world's books
"For Judge Chin and the Justice Department regulators, however, Google's bid to scan, post, and profit from millions of out-of-print books with unclear copyright claims -- so called 'unclaimed' or 'orphan' books -- runs the risk of running roughshod over an industry that is only now beginning to find its feet.   As Chin put it in March: The deal 'would give Google a de facto monopoly over unclaimed works' as well as 'a significant advantage over competitors, rewarding it for engaging in wholesale copying of copyrighted works without permission'."

2011-06-02 (5771 Ayyr 2999)
Michael Steininger _Jewish World Review_
Arab refugee influx cause Europe to re-think its open borders
 
Proposed Bills 2011
 
 

2011-06-03

2011-06-03
Kevin G. Hall _Miami FL Herald_/_McClatchy_
US hiring slowed dramatically in May
Shanthi Bharatwaj: The Street
Christopher S. Rugaber: Knoxville TN News Sentinel/AP
Greg Robb: MarketWatch
graphs

2011-06-03 10:26PDT (13:26EDT) (17:26GMT) (20:26Jerusalem)
Christina Cheddar Berk _CNBC_
More Americans Think Economy Will Never Recover
"some 61%, say they don't expect to return to their respective pre-recession life-styles...   a full 10% said they expect they will never return to pre-recession spending...   Goldman Sachs economist Jan Hatzius said the number of consumers who believe they have a chance to bring home more money one year from now is at its lowest level in 25 years, based on his analysis of the University of Michigan and Thomson Reuters consumer sentiment poll."

2011-06-03
William L. Anderson
Who is to blame for the coming down-turn?: Another recession within the economic depression
"When Barack Obama took office, Paul Krugman urged him to emulate Franklin Roosevelt, and it looks as though Obama might just achieve what FDR did: have a depression within a depression."

2011-06-03
_Washington's web log_
Unemployment during the Great Depression has been over-stated and current unemployment under-stated (We've now gt depression-level unemployment)

2011-06-03
Robert Moore _Cenantua_
general Thomas Jackson (StoneWall) prayer oak tree near Mt. Meridian in northern Augusta county VA is no more
Why it was called Jackson's prayer oak
Luray's witness tree

2011-06-03 (5771 Sivan 01)
Caroline B. Glick _Jewish World Review_
The real Egyptian revolution
"Neither the military nor the protesters are calling the shots anymore in Egypt, if they ever were.   That is the job of the Muslim Brotherhood...   Beyond blood-lust, the supposedly liberal, young sweethearts of the Western media are demanding a cancellation of the results of the referendum held in March on the sequencing of elections and constitutional reform.   Voting in that referendum was widely assessed as the freest vote in Egyptian history.   77% of the public voted to hold parliamentary and presidential elections in September and to appoint members of a constitutional assembly from among the elected members of the next parliament to prepare Egypt's new constitution.   The protesters rightly assert that the early elections will pave the way for the Muslim Brotherhood's take-over of Egypt since the Brotherhood is the only well-organized political force in Egypt.   But then, the [leftists] said they wanted popular rule."
Investigative Project: CAIR-Hamas-Muslim Brotherhood links
Discover the Networks: Muslim Brotherhood (MB)

2011-06-03 (5771 Sivan 01)
Ken Dilanian _Jewish World Review_
Yemen's chaos is giving a boost to al-Qaida
 
Proposed Bills 2011

2011-06-03

DJIA	12,151.26
S&P 500(SPX)	1,300.16
NASDAQ(COMP)	2,732.78
Nikkei	9,492.21
10-year US T-Bond(UST10Y)	2.99
crude oil(CLN11)	$100.22/barrel
natgas(NGN11)	$4.71/MBTU
reformulatedgasoline(RBN11)	$2.99/gal
heatingoil(HON11)	$3.06/gal
gold(GCQ11)	$1,542.40/ounce
silver(SIN11)	$36.19/ounce
platinum(PLN11)	$1,823.70/ounce
palladium(PAU11)	$785.40/ounce
copper(HGN11)	$0.2579375/ounce
soybeans	$14.1450/bushel
maize	$7.54/bushel
wheat	$7.7375/bushel
dollarindex(DXY)	73.775
yenperdollar(USDYEN)	80.27
dollarspereuro(EURUSD)	1.4626
dollarsperpound(GBPUSD)	$1.6424
swissfrancsperdollar	0.8364
indianrupeesperdollar	44.83
mexicanpesosperdollar(MXN)	11.6679
MorganStanleyHighTechIndex	660.71

I usually get this info from MarketWatch.
 
 
Proposed Bills 2011

2011-06-03
R' Dovid Rosenfeld _Torah.org_
Maimonides on Life: Laws of Understanding: Body and Soul chapter3 law5(b)
"כא וְעַמֵּךְ כֻּלָּם צַדִּיקִים, לְעוֹלָם יִירְשׁוּ אָרֶץ; נֵצֶר מטעו (מַטָּעַי) מַעֲשֵׂה יָדַי, לְהִתְפָּאֵר. And your nation, all of them are righteous, they will eternally inherit the land; the branch of My planting, the work of My hands, wherein I glory. --- Isaiah/Ishayahu 60:21
'So too the pious of the nations of the world have a share in the World to Come.'
commandments, etc. beginning Deuteronomy/Debrim 5:6
וַאֲדַבְּרָה אֵלֶיךָ אֵת כָּל-הַמִּצְוָה וְהַחֻקִּים וְהַמִּשְׁפָּטִים, אֲשֶׁר תְּלַמְּדֵם; וְעָשׂוּ בָאָרֶץ, אֲשֶׁר אָנֹכִי נֹתֵן לָהֶם לְרִשְׁתָּהּ all the commandment, and the statutes, and the ordinances (Deuteronomy/Debrim 5:27)
קְשַׁרְתָּם לְאוֹת, עַל-יָדֶךָ; וְהָיוּ לְטֹטָפֹת, בֵּין עֵינֶיךָ And thou shalt bind them for a sign (auth/avth) upon thy hand, and they shall be for frontlets (totafoth) between thine eyes (ainik). (Deuteronomy/Debrim 6:8)"

2011-06-03
R' Yaakov Feldman _Torah.org_
The Path of the Just chapter21 part4
"The point to remember, as Ramchal reminds us, is that 'it isn't so much the effort (we make) that produces results, it's that the effort is necessary' because of Adam and Eve's blunder.   The truth of the matter is that 'by making the effort (we) meet that requirement, and we thus produce a receptacle for the blessings of heaven to dwell upon'.   For in truth 'once you work just a little, all you need do after that is to trust in G-d' Ramchal then assures us, 'and you'll never be concerned about worldly matters'.   Indeed, 'your mind will be set free' from your distractions, 'and your heart will be prepared for true piety and perfect service to G-d'."

2011-06-03
R' Dovid Rosenfeld _Torah.org_
_Pirkei Avos_/_Pirqi Abot_ The 48 Ways: 33(b): Does Israel Know Better? part2 chapter6 mishna6
"We cannot be the arbiters of G-d's existence and wisdom in this world.   If He does exist (and we were certainly witness to that at Mount Sinai), His existence is not dependent upon our ability to understand Him or appreciate His mitzvos (commandments).   Yes, to the extent we understand, G-d's mitzvos, if observed properly, are meaningful and uplifting to an extreme.   Yet our acceptance of them simply cannot hinge upon our own limited comprehension.   To state it bluntly, it would be arrogant beyond words to make acceptance of the commands of the Creator dependent upon their understandability to the very creatures He created...   Just as there is a mitzvah to say something which will be heard, so too there is a mitzvah not to say something which will not be heard...   as it is written: 'Do not rebuke a scoffer lest he hate you; rebuke a wise man and he will love you' (Proverbs/Mishlei 9:8) (Yevamos 65b)...   'Rebuke' means *showing* others they can improve, not imposing our 'better-held' positions upon them.   Enacting legal regulations -- and certainly wielding the threat of violence and intimidation -- are hardly fulfillments of this mitzvah and usually do little more than increase tension and resentment."

2011-06-03
R' Label Lam _Torah.org_
Torah's Security Bais [Beith]!: The House of Jacob and Sons of Israel

2011-06-03
R' Naftali Reich _Torah.org_
Guaranteed Investments

2011-06-03
R' Berel Wein _Torah.org_
The Torah's Safeguards
"Let no one allow one's self to be found in compromising circumstances and to think that somehow one is immune from its consequences...   The public revelation of another's sin should serve as a reminder to all of the consequences of that sin...   One should never say that this can never happen to me.   When it comes to the areas of human appetites and desires there are no automatic safeguards.   Rather, only care, vigilance and avoidance of risk and compromising situations are the unique tools of prevention readily available...   An abundance of over-confidence in one's ability to withstand temptations of all sorts will always lead to unforeseen problems and sad consequences."

2011-06-03
R' Yochanan Zweig (adapted by R' Mordechai Shifman) _Torah.org_
Out of Control "The leaders of the 12 tribes brought identical offerings for the dedication of the altar.   Nevertheless, the Torah records each leader's offering individually, expending 72 [6*12, 8*9=2^3*3^2] verses in the process.   The Talmud and the various Midrashim go to great lengths, expounding upon the different names of the leaders, to show how each leader's motivation reflected his own unique abilities... The expression used to define this abstinence is 'yazir' -- 'to separate'.   On other occasions the Torah uses more common terminology to express the concept of separating...   a person who acknowledges a deficiency in himself and works to overcome it, will be crowned by his peers as a role model.   Not only will he not be viewed with disdain by his peers, but on the contrary, he will be elevated in their eyes."

2011-06-03
R' Pinchas Winston _Torah.org_
Channeling Divine Light to the Entire World
"In fact, after the Purim miracle and the return of many Jews to Eretz Yisroel, thousands of years ago, so many had forgotten so much in 70 short years.   As a result, after Ezra finished sorting out just who was Jewish and who wasn't, they had to go about re-educating the Jewish people in the way of Torah.   It was a mess, and we probably never really sorted it all out, and probably wont until Moshiach comes and finishes the job.   Just take a look around.   The assimilation rate is over 80%.   80%!!   The intermarriage rate is well over 50%, and so many conversions take place daily that are halachically invalid...   just as the kohanim act as conduits for the Divine light to reach the Jewish people, likewise do the Jewish people act as conduits for the Divine light to reach the rest of the world.
אֲנִי יְהוָה קְרָאתִיךָ בְצֶדֶק, וְאַחְזֵק בְּיָדֶךָ; וְאֶצָּרְךָ, וְאֶתֶּנְךָ לִבְרִית עָם--לְאוֹר גּוֹיִם 6 I the LORD have called thee in righteousness, and have taken hold of thy hand, and kept thee, and set thee for a covenant of the people, for a light of the nations; --- Isaiah/Ishayahu 42:6"

2011-06-03
R' Yissocher Frand _Torah.org_
"Your Money Or Your Wife?" and Other Such Life Decisions
"Whether we are 30, 40, 60, or 70, this is not the time for matzevahs [tombstones].   A matzevah is for after we die.   When we are still alive, we should use the time to grow and improve ourselves spiritually."
 
Proposed Bills 2011
 
 

2011-06-04

2011-06-04
_MarketWatch_
U.S. government economic policy is debasing the dollar, says Axel Merk, manager of the Merk Hard Currency Fund (video)

2011-06-04
Robert Moore _Cenantua_
From 1861-06-04, the Cleveland OH Herald opines... VA playing the fool(?)
 
Proposed Bills 2011
 
 

2011-06-05

2011-06-05
Austin Hill _Town Hall_
Message from California: US citizens need not apply

2011-06-05
_Town Hall_/_AP_
Ron Paul warned us of excessive federal debt and deficits

2011-06-05 04:04PDT (07:04EDT) (11:04GMT) (14:04Jerusalem)
Mark Davis _Atlanta GA Journal-Constitution_
local farm labor brings in the harvest
"She'd pocket about $100 for her 12-hour work day [$8.33/hour]...   'There are no jobs around.', he said.   'So people, they've got to do this.'   Work is hard to find, agreed Jan Williams.   She hustled to fold the corrugated boxes for cantaloupes.   She's 56 and lives in Pelham."

2011-06-05
Star Parker _San Francisco CA Examiner_
Can a country "conceived in liberty" tolerate almost half its economy consumed by government, its citizens increasingly ham-strung by dictates of bureaucrats?

2011-06-05
Thomas E. Brewton _View from 1776_
Hell is separation from God

2011-06-05
Shannon Firth _Finding Dulcinea_
attractive and "personable" students get more help and higher grades from teachers
 
Proposed Bills 2011
 
 

2011-06-06

1944-06-06: D-Day

2011-06-06 03:38PDT (06:38EDT) (10:38GMT) (13:38Jerusalem)
Bruce A. Bittles _Bradenton FL Times_
Conference Board's Employment Trends Index (ETI) fell for the first time in 7 months
Jeff Dickey-Chasins: On-Line Recruiting News
Mervin Hughes: Star Global Tribune
Sacramento CA Bee

2011-06-06 05:26PDT (08:26EDT) (12:26GMT) (15:26Jerusalem)
Armstrong Williams _The Hill_
Immigration

2011-06-06
Frosty Wooldridge _News with Views_
Worm turning on relentless excessive immigration into the USA
index

2011-06-06 08:02PDT (11:02EDT) (15:02GMT) (18:02Jerusalem)
Jeremy Beck _Numbers USA_
e-Verify error rate is 0.3%; e-Verify use is a "safe harbor" for employers; SB1070 only allows status check after traffic violation stop or arrest
"this 0.3% don't lose their job.   Rather, they continue on their job while checking with federal authorities to find out why they are not being confirmed and getting their records straight.   The fact that 0.3% of the queries produce an 'error' doesn't mean that anybody who has the legal right to a job doesn't get to keep the job."

2011-06-06 08:19PDT (11:19EDT) (15:19GMT) (18:19Jerusalem)
Jonathan Mattise _Treasure Coast FL Palm_
Sophomore FCAT scores in: Martin county FL
St. Lucie county FL
Indian River county FL

20011-06-06 08:41PDT (11:41EDT) (15:41GMT) (18:41Jerusalem)
Roger Harris _Knoxville TN News Sentinel_
start-up business plan competition finals Tuesday
"Finalists are 490 BioTech, a life sciences company; GoGrabLunch.com, a business contact management web-site; MYU Daily, a news, commentary and entertainment web-site; PajamaGardener.com, an on-line garden suppplies web-site; and SytLogic, a business services software company."
contact Roger Harris

2011-06-06 10:55PDT (13:55EDT) (17:55GMT) (20:55Jerusalem)
Rachel King _Ziff Davis_/_CBS_
WWDC: new iOS features
OS X Lion has 250 new features
 
Proposed Bills 2011
 
 

2011-06-07

2011-06-07
Karl Henkel _Youngstown OH Vindicator_
Siemens aktien gesselschaft CEO Eric Spiegel says Ohio region should steer toward "green growth"
"And after 24 years as a consultant for Booz & Co., Spiegel in 2010 January shifted to his current position as president and CEO of Washington, DC-based Siemens, a U.S. division of Siemens AG, a German conglomerate that provides technological products and services for the health-care, energy and industrial sectors and had more than $125G in sales last year.   Spiegel on Monday returned home (he's a 1976 graduate of Poland Seminary High School) where he served as the key-note speaker at the 2011 Youngstown State University Sustainable Energy Forum at Kilcawley Center...   The event drew more than 150 guests who heard Spiegel's analysis of America's infrastructure and energy sources and what the tech belt, consisting of Cleveland, Youngstown and Pittsburgh, needs to do to regain and ensure future economic stability.   Spiegel, who also met with Youngstown Mayor Jay Williams and today heads to the White House as part of German Chancellor Angela Merkel's visit, said the bulk of the region's growth should come from three areas: clean coal, wind power, and maybe most importantly, the Marcellus Shale."

2011-06-07 06:49PDT (09:49EDT) (13:49GMT) (16:49Jerusalem)
Mike Brownfield _Heritage Foundation_
Obummer's jobless America

2011-06-07 06:58PDT (09:58EDT) (13:58GMT) (16:58Jerusalem)
Sarah Robinson _Examiner_
Goolsbee resigned from president's council of economic advisors
Fox
Peter Nicholas: Los Angeles CA Times
"Recently, vice president Joe Biden's economic advisor, Jared Bernstein, left following the departure of former National Economic chairman Larry Summers at the beginning of the year.   OMB director Peter Orszage also left last year and is now a top player at Citigroup." 2011-06-07 07:19PDT (10:19EDT) (14:19GMT) (17:19Jerusalem)
Jonathan S. Tobin _Commentary_
59% disapprove Obummer's handling of economic policy
Steven Shepard: Fox
Steven Ertelt: Life News
MIchael Falcone & Amy Walter: abc
"47% of Americans approve of Obama, while 49% disapprove.   A majority of independents, 53%, disapproves of his job performance...   by a margin of 2 to 1, Americans believe the country is on the wrong track.   Most disapprove of the way President Obama is handling his job.   The economy is clearly Obama's big problem with 59% specifically disapproving of his handling of the economy and nearly as many (57%) who don't think the long-promised economic recovery has yet begun...   Ed Morrissey of Hot Air says the polling sample makes it so Obama's numbers are likely worse than the Post poll shows.   'The D/R/I in the April poll sample was a ridiculous 32/22/41.   This sample has a slightly better split, although still skewed at 31/25/39, which still undersamples Republicans.', he explained.   'In a sample more reflective of reality, Obama's job approval would be lower than the 47% shown here, and he'd be in deeper trouble against Republican challengers than this shows.'"

2011-06-07
Tim Steller _Arizona Daily Star_
NYTimes found suspicious contracting by Guelen schools
"they repeatedly favored Turkish contractors even when others bid far lower...   ultimately, the schools are using [tax-victim] dollars to benefit the Gulen movement -- by giving business to Gulen followers, or through financial arrangements with local foundations that promote Gulen teachings and Turkish culture...   The New York Times published an interesting investigation today, complete with a flow chart of relationships among schools, institutes and contractors.   A small portion of that chart is shown here."

20011-06-07 11:36PDT (14:36EDT) (18:36GMT) (21:36Jerusalem)
Kimberly Dvorak _San Diego CA Examiner_
68 year old NM rancher Lary Link murdered by illegal alien

2011-06-07
_News Max_/_AP_
Egypt re-legalized Muslim Brotherhood under new name "Freedom and Justice Party"
Investigative Project: CAIR-Hamas-Muslim Brotherhood links
Discover the Networks: Muslim Brotherhood (MB)

2011-06-07
Jeff Young _Chronicle of Higher Education_
Yale complains that Shaanxi Normal U Press in Red China is plagiarizing Yale's free on-line course materials

2011-06-07
Hal G.P. Colebatch _American Spectator_
Ayn Rand and Karl Marx

2011-06-07
Jason B. Jones _Chronicle of Higher Education_
iWork (Pages, Numbers, and Keynote) on all iOS devices

2011-06-07
Jackie Dewe Mathews _Global Post_
High proportion of Albino people in Tanzania

2011-06-07
Mary Helen Miller _Christian Science Monitor_
Is the USA losing its technological edge? No!
"Political rhetoric aside, there's no lack of workers to fill technical jobs.   And the pipe-line of US math and science students to fill future positions has not deteriorated in terms of international competitiveness in the past 15 years.   'Every time we look at these shortage claims, we can't find them.', says Hal Salzman, a public policy expert at Rutgers University in New Brunswick, NJ.   Nobody argues that the USA couldn't do better in improving science and math education and technological competitiveness.   But if the justification for pumping up STEM education is an economic one, alarmist warnings could take money away from equally deserving programs.   'They're asking the government to direct a huge number of resources to increase the supply for something that's not in great demand.', says Mr. Salzman.   'Does that come at the expense of dealing with real problems?'...   a 2010 revision of a 2005 National Academies Press publication warns that the US 'has increasingly placed shackles on [innovative] prowess such that, if not relieved, the nation's ability to provide financially and personally rewarding jobs for its own citizens can be expected to decline at an accelerating pace'...   But policy-makers may want to take a closer look at the numbers before they take more action.   Although the US has dropped slightly in its share of the world's technical publications and cited work, 'on the whole the evidence did not support that we had a shortage of STEM workers in the economy', says James Hosek, a researcher at the RAND Corp. in Santa Monica, CA, and coauthor with RAND's Titus Galama of a 2008 study on the issue.   In fact, data show that the USA accounts for 40% of the entire world's research and development spending, and it increased that spending more than any other region between 1993 and 2003.   Between 1983 and 2007, the percentage of the workforce in science and engineering occupations grew from 2.6% to 4.3%.   The number of graduates in the STEM fields exceeds the number of people who end up working in those fields."

2011-06-07
Michael Cutler _Providence RI Journal_
hundreds of U.S. cities have been infiltrated by Mexican gangs
"The report estimated that the United States has more than 900K 'criminally active gang members representing approximately 20K street gangs in more than 2,500 cities'...   In February 2011, federal officials said they had identified a Mexico-based fraudulent-document trafficking operation that had cells in 19 cities, including one in Pawtucket.   Cell managers were charged with various counts that included murder, racketeering, money-laundering and kidnapping.   Prosecutors said kidnapping and beating was used to drive competitors out of the region."

2011-06-07
William L. Anderson
Now the Keynesians want more war in the mistaken belief that it will boost the economy

2011-06-07 (5771 Sivan 05)
Thomas Sowell _Jewish World Review_
Different Decisions: Government vs. Private
"Under the headline 'Foreclosed Homes Sell at Big Discounts', USA Today reported that banks were selling the homes they foreclosed on, at discounts of 38% in TN to 41% in IL and OH.   Banks in general try to get rid of the homes they acquire by foreclosure, by selling them quickly for whatever they can get.   Why? Because banks are forced by economic realities to realize that they are not real estate companies.   No matter how much expertise bank officials may have in financial transactions, that is very different from knowing the best ways to maintain and market empty houses.   Meanwhile, there was a story on the Fox News Channel about schools that are using their time to indoctrinate kindergartners and fourth graders with politically correct attitudes about sex.   Anyone familiar with the low standards and mushy notions in the schools and departments of education that turn out our public school teachers might think that these teachers would have all they can do to make American children competent in reading, writing and math...   In other words, teachers and schools that are failing to provide the basics of education are branching out into all sorts of other areas, where they have even less competence.   Why are teachers so bold when banks are so cautious?   The banks pay a price for being wrong.   Teachers don't."

2011-06-07 (5771 Sivan 05)
David Mamet _Free Republic_
why I am no longer a brain-dead illiberal leftist
2008-03-11: Village Voice
 
Proposed Bills 2011
 
 

2011-06-08

1789-06-08: Bill of Rights proposed to congress by James Madison
Library of Congress
US Constitution.net
Constitution.org
James Madison quotes on proposed bill of rights
Jimbo Wales's WikiPedia

2011-06-07 17:21PDT (2011-06-07 20:21EDT) (2011-06-08 00:21GMT) (2011-06-08 03:21Jerusalem)
Greg Risling _Atlanta GA Journal-Constitution_/_AP_
over 50 Varrio Azusa 13 gangsters arrested for targeting blacks in Azusa, CA

2011-06-08
Norm Matloff _H-1B/ L-1/ Off-Shoring News-Letter_
abolition of H-1B
even I have never called for abolition of the H-1B program.   I do believe that 95% of the employers, definitely including the big main-stream U.S. firms, abuse the program, using it for cheap labor.   But if it were used for the original purpose it had back in the old H-1 days, to bring in the world's best and the brightest, that's fine with me.   As I've always said, the key is to remove the loop-holes -- including allowing employers to hire young H-1Bs instead of over-35 Americans.   Without the loop-holes, it would revert to the tiny program it was when it first began...
 
The same programmers and engineers who are finding their employment opportunities reduced by the presence of H-1Bs will find that those new foreign grads clutching their newly-minted automatic green cards will have exactly the same effect.
 
The reason -- once again -- is that H-1B is fundamentally about AGE.   Yet, the employers do tend to pay young H-1Bs less than comparable young Americans, but the employers' main interest in H-1B is to avoid hiring the older (age 35!) American workers.   A program granting automatic green cards to new foreign grads of U.S. universities would be definition give the cards to the young...
 
As I explained here recently and in much more detail a few years ago, these science fairs don't mean much.
 
What is going on -- and anyone who lives in the Chinese/Indian immigrant communities has known this for years -- is that a number of H-1Bs absolutely love competition, especially for their kids, especially as a stepping‚Äìstone to MIT or the Ivy League.   The kids who win these things work amazingly hard, but in most cases they are NOT doing original science; they're working on problems given to them by university researchers, with the kids mainly doing the legwork.   Good for the kids, but one should NOT conclude that the kids are brilliant scientists.
 
Success in these contests is typically due to a combination of (a) a connection to a good university researcher who knows how to choose a problem a teenager can work on, (b) extreme, single-minded dedication, and (c) the ability to explain things well to judges.   Nothing wrong with (a), (b) and (c), but again my point is that it is almost a "formula", and indeed there is now a book on it, _Success with Science: the Winners' Guide to High School Research_, written by several former winners now in college, complete with chapters with titles like "Impressing Your Mentor". Read some specific examples of prizewinning kids (not from the book), to see what I mean...
 
It's not an H-1B issue.
 
I believe that these fairs, at least in the form they've evolved to, are actually destructive.   They just send to wrong messages to kids.   They have become the "Little League-ization" of science.   They do not improve our nation's prowess in science (the typical goals of these kids, by the way, is careers as physicians, not scientists), but in my opinion do exactly the opposite.   True heroes of science don't need or want books that explain "how to impress your mentor".
 
I'll be writing a much more detailed post on this subject when I get a chance.
 
Norm
---30---

2011-06-08
David Louie _KGO abc San Francisco CA_
Small business owners compete for cheap, pliant H-1B guest-workers against big bodyshops
"You can find holders of H-1B visas in many types of businesses.   Vittal Shetty is one of them, he is the corporate chef for the Amber Indian Restaurant Group.   They're also common at high tech companies across Silicon Valley...   a would-be, foreign-born entrepreneur has to have a boss to be a visa sponsor.   Those who run staffing services to arrange for H-1B visas say the process has become slow and bureaucratic...   Tanya Taneja from Akraya Staffing Solutions... Mike Honda... Winslow Sargeant, Ph.D., of the U.S. Small Business Administration..."

2011-06-08 05:00PDT (08:00EDT) (12:00GMT) (15:00Jerusalem)
Joseph Cress _Cumberland PA Sentinel_
Registration open for creative "Anything Floats" entries
"The event involves teams building home-made and human-powered watercraft out of virtually anything that would float other than a canoe or kayak.   All participants are required to supply their own life vests...   Last year, a Chevrolet pick-up truck took on a giant dinosaur in a close finish.   Past entries have included a Santa in a mock sleigh pulled by 8 inflatable reindeer and a floating living room complete with a couch and TV set.   There have been vessels made of cardboard, wood, barrels, inner tubes, plastic jugs and pipe.   People have used oars, paddle wheels and foot power to race around a lower buoy and return to the start line."

2011-06-08 06:50:03PDT (09:50:03EDT) (13:50:03GMT) (16:50:03Jerusalem)
Matthew Wilson _Cupertino CA Courier_/_San Jose CA Mercury "News"_
Steve Jobs begs Cupertino government for permission to expand, build new facility for 12K employees
John Letzing: MarketWatch

2011-06-08 08:16PDT (11:16EDT) (15:16GMT) (18:16Jerusalem)
Colleen Wixon _Treasure Coast FL Palm_
Algebra 1 final exam grades: Indian River county FL
Eric Pfahler: St. Lucie county FL
Christin Erazo: Martin county FL

2011-06-08 09:56PDT (12:56EDT) (16:56GMT) (19:56Jerusalem)
Stephan Chapman _Zif Davis_/_CBS_
dice to host live chat / VR career fair
"On Wednesday, 2011 June 15th, Dice -- a technical job search site -- is holding a live, virtual career fair for job-seekers on the East Coast... from 10:00-15:00EDT."

2011-06-08 11:38PDT (14:38EDT) (18:38GMT) (21:38Jerusalem)
Dave Gibson _Examiner_
Illegal aliens taking the jobs that Americans will do (video)

2011-06-08 13:47PDT (16:47EDT) (20:47GMT) (23:47Jerusalem)
Steve Gelsi _MarketWatch_
Exxon found combined estimated reserves of 700M barrels of oil equivalent in Gulf of Mexico

2011-06-08
Peter Ferrara _American Spectator_
The economic crash of 2013

20011-06-08
George Gilder _American Spectator_
The Economics of Settlement

2011-06-08
Elaine Quigano _CBS_
A long struggle for the long-term unemployed
"The average length of unemployment in the U.S. is growing.   The precipitous job loss of the current recession hasn't been followed by a rebound like in previous crises -- and many people have been out of work for two to three years, as CBS News correspondent Elaine Quijano reports.   Thirty-seven-year-old TA puts on a suit and tie when he heads to the office -- the one in his home where he searches for jobs each day...   The chemist was laid off two years ago from a pharmaceutical company.   'It was devastating.', TA said.   'Even though I am very young, I tend to be very loyal.   So when I came out in 2009 it was devastating because that was like family.   That was my first job coming out of university.'   Abraham is one of more than 6M Americans the government calls the long-term unemployed -- people who've been without work for 27 weeks or longer."

2011-06-08
Rana Foroohar _Time_
What economic recovery?
"Double dip is not a term that a government keen to extricate itself from the economic-crisis-management business likes to hear.   A couple of weeks ago, the Obama Administration was poised to switch to growth mode.   Then the ugly data started pouring in like the overflowing Mississippi.   First-quarter GDP numbers showed a measly 1.8% increase, well short of the expectations of above 3%, and second-quarter estimates are not much better.   Then came a report on housing-price declines that have not been seen since the Great Depression, followed by reports of consumer spending at six-month lows and weak manufacturing surveys.   The worst was unemployment figures to make you cry: a mere 54K jobs were created in May, less than half of what was expected and less than a third of what is needed to lower a 9.1% unemployment rate.   You can hardly blame Council of Economic Advisers head Austan Goolsbee for picking this moment to retreat to his tenured university post in Chicago."

2011-06-08 (5771 Sivan 06)
Celia Rivenbark _Jewish World Review_
College degree in 3 days; yah, sure
"Three years' life experience (which must mean a 3-year-old is eligible) earns the right to have a bachelor's degree; 4 years, a master's; 6 years, a doctorate and, hold on to your mortarboard, Buford, 10 years life experience entitles you to a FULL PROFESSORSHIP. Well, that and $210."

2011-06-08 (5771 Sivan 06)
Lori Borgman _Jewish World Review_
Get Talent? So do we

2011-06-08 (5771 Sivan 06)
Tony Blankley _Jewish World Review_
The key to political victory is resisting division between social and economic conservatives

2011-06-08 (5771 Sivan 06)
Jack Kelly _Jewish World Review_
Palin apparently knows her history better than the talking heads
"As the former Alaska governor emerged with her family from a visit to the Old North Church in Boston, reporters asked her if she knew who Paul Revere was.   'He who warned the British that they weren't going to be taking away our arms.', Ms. Palin responded. [Leftist] snarking was interrupted when historians said Sarah Palin was right."

2011-06-08 (5771 Sivan 06)
Paul Johnson _Jewish World Review_
The Moral Logic of Intervention
"Poor Mr. Obama!... Has he not studied any history or absorbed any of its painful lessons?   There are 2 fundamental truths that any American taking over the White House and beginning his watch in the Oval Office has to accept--one moral, the other physical.   The moral point can be briefly stated.   No country -- not even the U.S.A. -- is obliged to try to make the world perfect.   It will always be imperfect, with most of its ills beyond remedy or mitigation (witness the appalling earth-quake/ tsunami disaster in Japan).   But if a great nation such as the U.S.A. believes in freedom, practices democracy, accepts a Judeo-Christian sense of morality as an ideal, honors human rights, and deplores and denounces all the evils of the totalitarian state -- imprisonment without trial, torture, suppression of all freedoms and the slaughter of opponents, their womenfolk and children with artillery, tanks and bombers -- then that nation cannot allow a dictator, before the eyes of the world, to violate all the principles of justice and humanity if said nation has the means to prevent it.   Which brings us to the second point.   President Obama, in the recesses of his curious worldview, may not like the fact, but America is a great power and is likely to remain the only superpower for some time...   These forces are provided at huge expense by the American [tax-victim] and are staffed by thousands of dedicated young American men and women whose express purpose is to protect civilization from barbarism.   That, as they see it and have been taught to see it, is precisely what America stands for; it is the principal moral justification for their nation's immense power and riches."

2011-06-08 (5771 Sivan 06)
Jonah Goldberg _Jewish World Review_
It's Obummer's economy, stupid
"The unemployment rate then [2009-07-14] was [a seasonally adjusted] 9.5%.   It's now 9.1%, well above the 8% cap that the administration advisors projected under the stimulus bill.   But that's not the amazing part.   According to a White House report written by economic advisors Jared Bernstein and Christina Romer in 2009 January in support of the bill, if we had passed no stimulus package at all, the unemployment rate would have topped out at around 8.8% in the last quarter of 2010.   If only.   Instead, we got Obama's vital 'investments'.   Since his speech in Warren, we've spent another $2.8T in borrowed money...   Meanwhile, we've accrued a total of $3.7T in debt on Obama's watch, while losing 2.8M jobs."

2011-06-08 (5771 Sivan 06)
Walter E. Williams _Jewish World Review_
Irksome Things
 
Proposed Bills 2011
 
 

2011-06-09

1722-06-09: British revenue schooner HMS Gaspee, was run aground, and set fire the next morning
Gaspee.org
Gaspee Days celebration
Library of Congress
History Channel
Jimbo Wales's WikiPedia

2011-06-08 20:22PDT (2011-06-08 23:22EDT) (2011-06-09 02:22GMT) (2011-06-09 06:22Jerusalem)
Lauren McLane _Cumberland PA Sentinel_
Spring rain delays planting schedule

2011-06-08 22:01PDT (2011-06-09 00:01EDT) (2011-06-09 04:01GMT) (08:01Jerusalem)
Robert Powell _MarketWatch_
Most of us won't be able to retire until our 80s

2011-06-08 21:51PDT (2011-06-09 00:51EDT) (2011-06-09 04:51GMT) (2011-06-09 07:51Jerusalem)
Chris Oliver _MarketWatch_
Citigroup customer data hacked

2011-06-09 05:30PDT (08:30EDT) (12:30GMT) (15:30Jerusalem)
Scott Gibbons & Tony Sznoluch _DoL ETA_
un-employment insurance weekly claims report
DoL home page
DoL OPA press releases
historical data
DoL regulations
"The advance number of actual initial claims under state programs, unadjusted, totaled 364,507 in the week ending June 4, a decrease of 16,990 from the previous week.   There were 398,864 initial claims in the comparable week in 2010.   The advance unadjusted insured unemployment rate was 2.7% during the week ending May 28, a decrease of 0.1 percentage point from the prior week.   The advance unadjusted number for persons claiming UI benefits in state programs totaled 3,407,607, a decrease of 102,900 from the preceding week.   A year earlier, the rate was 3.3% and the volume was 4,202,202.   The total number of people claiming benefits in all programs for the week ending May 21 was 7,601,344, a decrease of 89,233 from the previous week.   Extended benefits were available in AL, AK, AZ, CA, CO, CT, DE, DC, FL, GA, ID, IL, IN, KS, KY, ME, MA, MI, MN, MO, NV, NJ, NM, NY, NC, OH, OR, PA, RI, SC, TN, TX, WA, and WV, during the week ending May 21 [a couple additions and deletions this week].   States reported 3,372,090 persons claiming EUC (Emergency Unemployment Compensation) benefits for the week ending May 21, a decrease of 45,515 from the prior week.   There were 4,987,711 claimants in the comparable week in 2010.   EUC weekly claims include first, second, third, and fourth tier activity.   [Note that the population used for calculating the "insured unemployment rate" changes
to 132,623,886 beginning 2007-10-06;
to 133,010,953 beginning 2008-01-05;
to 133,382,559 beginning 2008-04-05;
to 133,690,617 beginning 2008-07-05;
to 133,902,387 beginning 2008-10-04;
to 133,886,830 beginning 2009-01-03;
to 133,683,433 beginning 2009-04-04;
to 133,078,480 beginning 2009-07-04;
to 133,823,421 beginning 2009-10-03;
to 131,823,421 beginning 2009-10-17;
to 130,128,328 beginning 2010-01-02;
to 128,298,468 beginning 2010-04-03;
to 126,763,245 beginning 2010-07-03;
to 125,845,577 beginning 2010-09-25;
to 125,560,066 beginning 2011-01-15;
to 125,572,661 beginning 2011-04-02.]
EUC (Excel)
EB
graphs
more graphs

2011-06-09
Rachel Alexander _Town Hall_
Opposition to illegal immigration remains main-stream

2011-06-09 09:13PDT (12:13EDT) (16:13GMT) (19:13Jerusalem)
Roger Harris _Knoxville TN News Sentinel_
domestic bodyshop Saratoga Technologies has acquired domestic bodyshop AlterCorp Technology
more
contact Roger Harris

2011-06-09
Quin Hillyer _American Spectator_
Running on empty due to Obummer

2011-06-09 13:09PDT (16:09EDT) (20:09GMT) (23:09Jerusalem)
Matt Andrejczak _MarketWatch_
Farm Bureau Federation: Food prices continue to climb in the grocery stores

2011-06-09 13:25:07PDT (16:25:07EDT) (20:25:07GMT) (23:25:07Jerusalem)
_CA Employment Development Dept._/_San Jose CA Mercury "News"_
Sili Valley unemployment rate at 10.1%: 90,300 UEASW

2011-06-09
John Lillpop _Canada Free Press_
America will soon take on the issue of anchor babies

2011-06-09
Steven A. Camarota _Center for Immigration Studies_
education levels of immigrants, non-immigrants and illegal aliens
"Back in 2001, CIS published a report showing that 32% of recent immigrants (age 25 to 64) had not completed high school compared to 28% who had a college degree.   And it has also been known that immigrant education levels differ significantly by metropolitan area...   In 1970, 48% of recent immigrants (ages 25 to 64) compared to 42% of natives had not completed high school -- a 6 percentage-point gap.   In 2010 the figure for recent immigrants (ages 25 to 64) was 30%, compared to 7% for natives -- a 23 percentage-point gap...   recent immigrants in 1970 were nearly 50% more likely than natives to have at least a college degree.   In 2010, the share of recent immigrants and natives with a college degree is about the same -- around 32%...   for young college graduates (21 to 29) the broader measure of unemployment (referred to as the U-6 rate) was 12.2% in the first quarter of 2011."

2011-06-09
Eric Ruark _Dan Stein Report_
Brookings study found that 70% of foreign workers are not "highly-skilled"
 
Proposed Bills 2011
 
 

2011-06-10

2011-06-10
Norm Matloff _H-1B/ L-1/ Off-Shoring News-Letter_
CSM: U.S.A. is on top after all
 
We hear constantly in the press that not enough American college students study science.   That must have a hollow ring to the young woman I heard about yesterday.
 
She's basically got an assembly line job in a factory.   Granted, it's a science-oriented factory, a biotech firm in the Bay Area, but the fact remains that her job is to run a machine that produces goods in an assembly line manner.   She has the swing shift, 15:00 to 01:00, 4 days a week.   It is a factory job, no doubt about it.
 
I had assumed that this person was just a high school grad, or maybe had a community college degree.   But no -- she has a Bachelor's degree in biochemistry from my university, UC Davis, just a year ago.   She is rather bitter about the outcome to all that [education] in the area the newspapers keep saying has a labor shortage: science.   Especially biotech.
 
To be sure, I don't know what this person's grades were like at UCD, etc., and our new graduates in computer science are getting engineering jobs.   But the NACE data on starting salaries for new CS and engineering grads are still pretty flat.   And a much-publicized Dice report claiming we don't nearly have enough tech grads changes its tune by the time it gets to page 6 (pdf):
 
In a hiring market that looks to have growing demand, you might expect a surge in salaries to accompany those plentiful job openings.   And you would be wrong, at least so far, according to the 2010-2011 Annual Dice Salary Survey of nearly 20K technology and engineering professionals.   The average raise in pay for tech workers [all of them, not just new grads -- NM] last year?   Less than 1%, as tech workers' average salary jumped from $78,845 in 2009 to $79,384 in 2010.
 
And, of course, I continue to see that those over 35 are still tending to be shunned.
 
So, we're producing enough tech grads after all.   And, the enclosed article says, we're doing fine by the other measures too.   The following quote says it all:
 
"Every time we look at these shortage claims, we can't find them.", says Hal Salzman, a public policy expert at Rutgers University in New Brunswick, NJ.
 
Some of you will remember Salzman's earlier report with Lindsay Lowell on this same topic.
 
Sadly, the Stuart Andersons of the world have much better access to the press than do the Hal Salzmans.
 
Norm
Mary Helen Miller: Christian Science Monitor: US losing its technological edge? No!

2011-06-10
Norm Matloff _H-1B/ L-1/ Off-Shoring News-Letter_
report on educational shift in immigrant population
 
A number of people called my attention today to the [linked] article -- not the article as a whole, but the last 2 paragraphs:
 
Some employers may say they prefer immigrants to native-born workers.   When Samir Kumar needs to hire employees for his Northern Virginia-based IT business, he often looks over-seas.   Not only do workers from India and Ukraine have the required training, but their expectations are lower, he said.
 
"They actually don't demand a very high amount of salary, and the expectations are kind of grounded and they don't jump around so much" between companies, said the 39-year-old Ashburn resident, an immigrant from India.   U.S.-born technology and business analysts are hard to find and hard to retain, he said, while immigrants with the same skills and education "are much easier to manage".
 
So, here is an explicit reference to the use of H-1Bs as cheap labor, rare for the Washington DC Post.   The terms "don't jump around so much" and "hard to retain" are allusions to the fact that H-1Bs who don't have much mobility, in fact essentially none if they're being sponsored for a green card, which again leads to wage exploitation.   (BTW, the "instant green card" proposals made recently for new foreign grads of U.S. universities aren't instant at all; they actually would impose their own immobility, at least in the versions I've seen.)
 
The above quote also goes to a point I've made before as well, that employers like H-1Bs not only as cheap labor but also as docile labor.
 
Concerning the remainder of the article, it touches on a point brought up by other researchers recently, that many high-skilled immigrants end up in low-skilled jobs.   Again, anyone who is immersed in immigrant communities has known this for years.   In some cases, this is due to credentialing issues, but often it is the one I cite so much for the natives/earlier immigrants -- age.
 
One passage caught my eye:
 
Workers from Mexico and Central America tend to be lower skilled, while India, China and the Philippines send many more highly skilled workers than lower-skilled one, said Audrey Singer, a senior fellow at Brookings who co-wrote the study.
 
There is no data in the study (pdf) on this and I wonder whether Dr. Singer is simply making a guess based on stereotype (engineers from India and China, nurses from the Philippines).   The country among these whose immigration patterns I know well, China, sends a very large number of family immigrants, only a small percentage of which have a college education.
 
Indeed, if you look at the immigration web page of the Organization of Chinese Americans [OCA], the most influential East Asian-American lobbying group you'll see it looks a lot like the Latino activist web pages:
 
OCA believes that now is the time to push for comprehensive immigration reform of our currently broken system.   Issues that adversely affect APAs in particular include the family immigration laws, work-place raids, deportation and detention, and the treatment of unauthorized immigrants.   In order to address these inhumane practices, OCA supports efforts to decrease the extensive back-log of family-based immigration; stop work-place raids, which become scare tactics to terrorize local communities; establish safer and more humane [lax] deportation and detention procedures; and create [yet another] path to legalize [otherwise] law-abiding, [illegal aliens].
 
It would be interesting to know whether Singer's statement was a guess or based on recent data.
 
Norm
Tara Bahrampour: Washington DC Post: Report documents dramatic shift in immigrant workforce's skill level

2011-06-10
Matthew McLaughlin _Cumberland PA Sentinel_
White-nose fungus continues to reduce bat population
"'A common female bat... can eat about 4,500 insects per night.', Pennsylvania Game Commission biologist Greg Turner said.   'They're above ground foraging for about 200, 220 days out of the year, so they have the potential to eat 900K insects per bat, and then, if we're going to lose millions of bats, that number of insects that are not going to be eaten is astronomical.'...   It was first discovered in New York in 2007, but photos later proved it was present in the state as early as 2006, according to wildlife biologist Carl Herzog with the New York Department of Environmental Conservation.   There are currently three theories for its transfer to the U.S.: an infected bat made the trip across the Atlantic on a cargo ship, a caver carried the disease to the U.S. on equipment or clothing or it was brought by a tourist to Howe Caverns, a tourist attraction in upstate New York, according to Herzog.   'The photos that we have of an infected bat from 2006 are from a distant portion of that cave.', the New York biologist said.   'Something like 150K people a year run through there.'...   Pennsylvania is home to 6 species of hibernating bats and 3 species of bats that do not hibernate.   5 of those 6 hibernating species are known to be affected, according to Turner.   At many sites being monitored by the state game commission, the little brown bat, northern long-eared bat, Indiana bat and tri-colored bat have experienced mortality rates of more than 90% because of WNS, and the big brown bat has experienced mortality rates of 40%, according to Turner."

2011-06-10 04:29PDT (07:29EDT) (11:29GMT) (14:29Jerusalem)
Kelli Wynn _Springfield OH News-Sun_/_Dayton OH Daily News_
2 charged in widespread human trafficking scheme

2011-06-10 04:34PDT (07:34EDT) (11:34GMT) (14:34Jerusalem)
Jennifer Epstein _Politico_
Alabama enacted law to discourage illegal immigration, HB56
Quin Hillyer: American Spectator
John Lillpop: Canada Free Press
Frum Forum
Birmingham News
Numbers USA

2011-06-10
Barry Bagnato _CBS_
Why quitting smoking makes you fat
"Yann Maneur, an associate research scientist at Yale... 'We found that nicotine, when it enters the brain, activates specific nicotine receptors that are located on specific neurons known to decrease feeding and increase energy expenditure when activated.'"

2011-06-10
_Hispanic Ohio_
Despite high unemployment, US government continues admitting millions of legal immigrants and temporary foreign workers

2011-06-10
Roger Hedgecock _Human Events_
voter rolls of this country are stuffed with illegal aliens, felons and dead people
"Another box on the registration form requests a permanent mail-in ballot be sent to the 'voter'.   The mailing address is different from the 'voter's' residence address, meaning that the the illegal alien 'voter' never receives a ballot and never votes.   The mail-in ballots are sent to another location and someone else votes and mails back the ballot for the new 'voter'.   Random checks of these mailing addresses show the same addresses over and over.   This is election fraud on an organized level.   It's going on now in every state."

2011-06-10 08:47PDT (11:47EDT) (15:47GMT) (18:47Jerusalem)
Erich Schwartzel _Knoxville TN News Sentinel_/_Scripps Howard_
Exxon investing $1.7G in development of natural gas extraction in PA

2011-06-10 09:30PDT (12:30EDT) (16:30GMT) (19:30Jerusalem)
Stephen Chapman _Ziff Davis_/_CBS_
If a stranger aske you, in-person, the same questions FB, Grouply, LinkedIn do, what would you say?

2011-06-10
_C-SPAN_
interview with Roy Beck of Numbers USA on court decisions and US immigration policy, with responses to callers and e-mail messages (video)

2011-06-10
Evan Sayet _Front Page Magazine_
Warmist hysteria and promotion of one-world socialism

2011-06-10
Christopher Rugaber _Daily Journal of Commerce_/_AP_
Average US home equity fell to 38%, down from 61% a decade ago
Investment Watch
Derek Kravitz: MSFT NBC/AP

2011-06-10
William L. Anderson
Rule by inflation

2011-06-10 (5771 Sivan 08)
Caroline B. Glick _Jewish World Review_
Yale, Jews, and Double Standards
"Last week Yale University announced its decision to close down its institute for the study of anti-Semitism..."
David Glenn: Chronicle of Higher Education: closure sparks discord

2011-06-10 (5771 Sivan 08)
Michael Barone _Jewish World Review_
Free market, not government policy, drives energy boom

2011-06-10 (5771 Sivan 08)
Victor Davis Hanson _Jewish World Review_
Europe is warning us
"All this European turmoil raises a paradox. If dispirited Europeans are conceding that something is terribly wrong with their half-century-long experiment with socialism, unassimilated immigrants, cultural apologies, defense cuts and post-nationalism, why in the world is the Obama administration intent on adopting what Europeans are rejecting?"

2011-06-10 (5771 Sivan 08)
Diana West _Jewish World Review_
Islamic threat as bright as the sun
"On one level, I approach a new study on violence and Islam in the Middle East Quarterly in much the same way.   That is, I've lived through 2001/09/11 and the 17,298 Islamic terror attacks since (as tabulated by the web-site The Religion of Peace).   I've seen pictures of Muslims rampaging around the world over a cartoon.   I also understand Islam's animating role in the terror and subversion designed to extend Islamic law (Shariah) to a point where an Islamic government, or caliphate, rules the world.   But there is something transfixing about the new study, 'Shari'a and Violence in American Mosques'.   The authors have amassed a solid bank of peer-reviewed data attesting to the presence and promotion of literature advocating violence in the majority of 100 randomly selected American mosques.   And yes: that's majority of "American" mosques.   Not Saudi mosques.   Not Pakistani.   Not Iranian.   Not Turkish.   Not even British mosques.   American mosques.   There goes that post-2001/09/11 myth -- the one that tells us that American Islam is a happily assimilating creed, wholly different from the aggressive Islam transforming Europe.   The new data collected by Israeli scholar Mordechai Kedar and attorney David Yerushalmi of the Center for Security Policy (and one of my 18 co-authors on the book _Shariah: The Threat to America_) indicate that most American mosques are sanctioning, if not also promoting, the study of material of similar peril...   More than 80% of the mosques in the study feature Islamic literature that advocates violence."

2011-06-10 (5771 Sivan 08)
John Stossel _Jewish World Review_
The cancer of regulation
Hawaii Reporter
Reason
Fox

2011-06-10 (5771 Sivan 08)
Linda Chavez _Jewish World Review_
Killing the housing market

2011-06-10 (5771 Sivan 08)
Michelle Malkin _Jewish World Review_
The government job-training juggernaut
"In the real world, private businesses spend up to 12 times more on job-training programs and trainee salaries than state and federal governments combined, according to workforce analysts.   The American Society for Training and Development reports that U.S. private entities spent an estimated $125.9G on employee learning and development in 2009 alone... Earlier this year, a General Accounting Office report found that no one in the bowels of the Beltway really knows how effective the feds' $18G a year spent on 47 separate job-training programs run by nine different agencies really is. That's because half of those programs haven't undergone a performance review since 2004, and only five have ever conducted research on whether job seekers in the program do better than those who weren't enrolled."
 
Proposed Bills 2011

2011-06-10

DJIA	11,951.91
S&P 500(SPX)	1,270.98
NASDAQ(COMP)	2,643.73
Nikkei	9,514.44
10-year US T-Bond(UST10Y)	2.96
crude oil(CL1N)	$99.29/barrel
natgas(NG11N)	$4.76/MBTU
reformulatedgasoline(RB1N)	$3.02/gal
heatingoil(HO1N)	$3.11/gal
gold(GC1Q)	$1,529.20/ounce
silver(SI1N)	$36.33/ounce
platinum(PL1N)	$1,828.10/ounce
palladium(PAU11)	$812.80/ounce
copper(HGN11)	$0.2525/ounce
soybeans	$13.8725/bushel
maize	$7.87/bushel
wheat	$7.5925/bushel
dollarindex(DXY)	74.768
yenperdollar(USDYEN)	80.35
dollarspereuro(EURUSD)	1.4354
dollarsperpound(GBPUSD)	$1.6226
swissfrancsperdollar	0.8429
indianrupeesperdollar	44.725
mexicanpesosperdollar(MXN)	11.8831
MorganStanleyHighTechIndex	638.85

I usually get this info from MarketWatch.
 
 
Proposed Bills 2011
 
 

2011-06-11

2011-06-11
_Hindustan Times_
Infosys's N.R. Narayana Murthy unhappy over US investigation of their abuse of B-1 visas

2011-06-11
Erica L. Green _Baltimore MD Sun_
Baltimore school system faces challenges in keeping cheap pliant Filipino teachers despite a growing pool of U.S. teaching applicants

2011-06-11
Thomas E. Brewton & Robert Curry _View from 1776_
America's exceptional history
"John Witherspoon, James Madison's teacher and mentor, is a perfect example of the impact of the Scottish Enlightenment on the Founding.   Before coming to America from Scotland, Witherspoon had been a student of Adam Smith and of Thomas Reid, giants of the Scottish Enlightenment.   As the president of Princeton, he trained a large cohort of Americans of the Founders' generation, and was himself a member of the Continental Congress, and a signer of both the Declaration and the Constitution, one of only six who signed both documents.   He was also a Presbyterian minister.   Witherspoon certainly earned the right to be counted as a member in good standing of both the Scottish and the American Enlightenments, and like his colleagues in Scotland and in America, he was not a foe of religion but instead a champion of religion and of religious liberty. "

2011-06-11
Thomas E. Brewton _View from 1776_
Religious warmism is strangling the USA
 
Proposed Bills 2011
 
 

2011-06-12

2011-06-12
Tom Lutey _Billings MT Gazette_
Rain, floods overwhelm farms, irrigation systems

2011-06-12
Kevin Carey _Chronicle of Higher Education_
Students and parents deserve to know what grads are paid
"PayScale then ranks the 1,050 colleges in its survey from top to bottom and posts the results online.   It cites the California Institute of Technology as yielding a 30-year net return of $1,713,000 for its graduates.   Institutions like the University of Wisconsin-Stout rank in the middle, returning $281,700.   Shaw, at only $15,480, is featured as having the 'Lowest College ROI'...   At the moment, only two hard numbers are commonly used to judge college outcomes: graduation rates and student-loan default rates.   That's because everyone agrees that diplomas and loan defaults are important, and because diplomas and loan defaults are easy to count...   For example, a 2006 resident graduate of Northern Arizona University who stayed and worked in the state earned a median of $35,010 in 2007.   That's actually a little higher than typical earnings for graduates of the flagship University of Arizona, who earned $34,885.   But when the state looked at 1991 graduates of the 2 universities, University of Arizona students in 2007 earned over $5K per year more.   Perhaps NAU has been improving.   Or perhaps flagships' degrees pay off better in the long run.   These are the kinds of important questions that earnings data provoke...   The Illinois Community College Board calculates that its students earn 31% more with a degree, adding up to $541,115 over the course of their lives."

2011-06-12
Jennifer Gonzalez _Chronicle of Higher Education_
Florida jucos offering bachelor's degrees in education, nursing and other health care, and information technology

2011-06-12
Robert Moore _Cenantua_
Tangents... and looking for "intersections" part1
"My WW1 interests center on the fact that, at this time, 93 years ago, the 5th Marines were in the middle of some intense dealings in Belleau Wood.   In that particular affair, we have a Virginian (and a Shenandoah Valley boy, to boot) of note‚Ķ Major Lloyd William Williams.   Williams was from Berryville (yes, the same place that is currently in the Wendy's food chain commercials), a VT grad (Class of '07... that's '19-ought-7', not '2-double-ought-7'), and a career Marine.   He's particularly remembered for his reply to a French officer who advised him to move his men, once they arrived at their first position, on 1918 June 1... 'Retreat, hell! We just got here.'"

2011-06-12
Walter E. Williams _Biloxi MS Sun Herald_
Like Reagan, Palin is a passionate patriot

2011-06-12
Robert Moore _Cenantua_
The "meanest" planter... and my first harvest of the year
 
Proposed Bills 2011
 
 

2011-06-13

2011-06-13
Joe Guzzardi _Oregonian_
As executives lay off workers, who stays and who goes?
"Yet Barack Obama is paralyzed when it comes to taking a stand against one of the most destructive federal policies regarding employment: non-immigrant worker visas that cost Americans jobs.   An interesting case in point is developing at Cisco Systems where Chief Executive John Chambers announced his goal of slashing costs by $1G.   Analysts estimate that 3K workers will be fired, many directly related to Cisco's dumping of the Flip camera business line.   But which workers will go: American citizens or H-1B visa holders of which Cisco is a heavy user?   During the period 2001-2010, Cisco sponsored 5,220 H-1B visa workers.   An estimated 1K work at the company today.   For Cisco, the rub is that according to the terms of an H-1B visa, the company must pay the costs associated with sending home a dismissed foreign-born employee.   The question is whether Cisco will give preferential consideration to H-1B visa holders over Americans simply to avoid the substantial cost of returning foreign-born workers to their native countries.   If Cisco lays off 3K Americans and no H-1B visa employees, it sets itself up for a discrimination law suit especially if those Americans are over 40...   In the meantime, the companies benefit from the cheap labor those employees provide.   During sustained periods of job loss and high unemployment, immigration should be severely restricted.   Instead, the United States grants work permits to over 1M immigrants each year."

2011-06-13
David Frum
Incredible shrinking production workers' income

2011-06-13
_Lexology_
TARP recipients no longer treated as though classified as "H-1B dependent", so the charade of considering US applicants has ended for them

2011-06-13 10:19PDT (13:19EDT) (17:19GMT) (20:19Jerusalem)
Roger Harris _Knoxville TN News Sentinel_
BAE Systems to dump 132, may close Jefferson City TN body armor plant
"A little more than a year ago, BAE laid off about 200 workers in Jefferson City and closed its Grainger County plant, resulting in a loss of 173 full- and part-time jobs.   BAE is a global defense and aerospace company based in the United Kingdom with about 100K employees worldwide and revenues of about $34.6G."
contact Roger Harris

2011-06-13 10:52PDT (13:52EDT) (17:52GMT) (20:52Jerusalem)
_Knoxville TN News Sentinel_/_Scripps_/_AP_
$405M coal gasification plant planned in Morristown

2011-06-13
Dan Rather _Gamut News_/_HD_
Dan Rather presents poignant profiles of jobless Americans displaced by cheaper foreign labor
HD net/Dan Rather reports
PR News Wire/UBM
Digital Journal
"Critics claim the federal guest worker visa programs are riddled by corporate myths and abusive practices and that there is no shortage of the best and brightest talent right here‚ especially now with more than 20M Americans jobless or under-employed.   The H-1B visa is one of several guest worker visa programs that enable U.S. companies to hire high-skilled workers from over-seas on a temporary basis, presumably to offset a shortage of qualified Americans.   Over the past [21] years, visas such as the H-1B have become particularly widespread in the IT industry, but they have also become very controversial."
part 1 (video)
part 2 (video)
part 3 (video)
part 4 (video)
hd

2011-06-13
Frosty Wooldridge _News with Views_
Many people prefer comfortable lies to unpleasant truths
"In 1965, Senator Teddy Kennedy said his new Immigration Reform act would not change the ethnic demographic content in America of 90% White, 6% Black and 4% Hispanic.   Within 35 to 40 years, America will be a majority Mexican-Hispanic population.   Because of Kennedy's bill, we added 100M people to the United States in 40 years.   We will add another 300M people because of that bill within another 60 to 70 years...   Just below me in New Mexico, housing developers 'okayed' a new housing tract for something like 100K new homes in Albuquerque.   They clearly don't possess water supplies.   In Denver, a new Sterling Ranch tract will become home to 40K new residents and we clearly don't have the water, but we do have grid-lock and toxic air with every breath."

2011-06-13
Daniel Oliver _American Spectator_
Conscripts in a Ponzi Scheme: Socialist Insecurity

2011-06-13
Erin White _NWU_/_Eurekalert_/_AAAS_
Researches reverse-engineer Cahokia copper-working techniques
"This prehistoric approach to metalworking was part of a metallurgical analysis of copper artifacts left behind by the Mississippians of the Cahokia Mounds, who lived in southeastern Illinois from 700CE until 1400CE.   The study was published in the Journal of Archaeological Science in May.   The researchers were able to identify how the coppersmiths of Cahokia likely set up their work-shop and the methods and tools used to work copper nuggets into sacred jewelry, head-dresses, breast-plates and other regalia...   Two materials science and engineering students conducted much of the research.   Matt Chastain, a Northwestern undergraduate at the time of the study, worked alongside Alix Deymier-Black, a graduate student in the materials science and engineering department.   Chastain, first author of the paper, undertook the metallurgical analysis of the samples, supplied from ongoing excavations at Mound 34 in Cahokia.   Chastain followed up his analysis by volunteering at the excavation site."

2011-06-13
William L. Anderson
governments cannot eliminate opportunity costs

2011-06-13
Walter E. Williams _Washington DC Examiner_
No one has the right to life off of another's sweat
 
Proposed Bills 2011
 
 

2011-06-14: Flag Day

2011-06-13 22:30PDT (2011-06-14 01:30EDT) (2011-06-14 05:30GMT) (08:30Jerusalem)
Dave Gibson _Examiner_
Lax federal government not reimbursing states for full costs of jailing illegal alien criminals

2011-06-14
_MMD_/_ALIPAC_
NC and TX may join states taking measures to discourage illegal immigration

2011-06-14
Mark Krikorian _National Review_
Questions, answers allow Rep candidates to dodge clear positions on immigration

2011-06-14 03:09PDT (06:09EDT) (10:09GMT) (13:09 Jerusalem)
Dhanya Ann Thoppil _Wall Street Journal_
Tata announced plans to hire more than 1,200 Americans this fiscal year through 2012 March, but refuses to say how many of their employees in the USA are US citizens
"Ajoyendra Mukherjee, vice president and global head of human resources"
Tata median salaries by city

2011-06-14 08:06PDT (11:06EDT) (15:06GMT) (18:06Jerusalem)
Larry Dignan _Ziff Davis_/_CBS_
Apple and Nokia reach patent agreement
Los Angeles CA Times
All Things Digital/Dow Jones
Wall Street Journal
Ars Technica
Motley Fool

2011-06-14 09:26PDT (12:26EDT) (16:26GMT) (19:26Jerusalem)
Greg Robb _MarketWatch_
Retail sales fell 0.2% in May

2011-06-14 11:49PDT (14:49EDT) (18:49GMT) (21:49Jerusalem)
Marco Rubio _Orlando FL Sentinel_
New American Century
St. Petersburg FL Times
Human Events
"There is still no nation or institution on this planet that is willing or able to do what America has done...   Yes, the price we're going to pay to keep America's light shining is high.   But the price we will pay if America's light stops shining is even higher.   And yes, there are new nations emerging with prosperity and influence.   And that is what we always wanted.   America never wanted to be the only shining city on the hill.   We wanted our example to inspire the people of the earth to build one of their own.   You see, these nations, these new emerging nations, these new shining cities, we hope they will join us, but they can never replace us.   Because their light is but a reflection of our own.   The light of an American century that now spreads throughout the earth."

2011-06-14 12:31PDT (15:31EDT) (19:31GMT) (22:31Jerusalem)
Jay Bookman _Atlanta GA Journal Constitution_
Georgia's farmers whining "crisis" as curbs on illegal aliens begin to be effective

2011-06-14
Norm Matloff _H-1B/ L-1/ Off-Shoring News-Letter_
industry credibility
 
A reader sent me the [link], which she said ran on the CBS Evening News tonight.
 
Dow Chemical CEO Andrew Liveris said in the piece,
 
The starting salary of a chemical engineer is $85K.   And I can't get chemical engineers.
 
Yet NACE, the most relied-upon source for starting salaries, found that the average offer this Spring was $66,866.
 
Some of you will recall that a couple of years ago Bill Gates told Washington Post columnist David Broder that MSFT pays its H-1Bs starting salaries of $100K.   As I show in an upcoming article, only 11% of MSFT H-1Bs make that much (and only 6% of its software engineers).
 
MSFT's credibility track record is especially poor.   See for example MSFT claim belied and more.
 
You will see more and more of planted articles such as the one below.   Representative Lofgren has now released her H-1B/green card reform bill, so the industry lobbyists will be working hard to get their message out.
 
The Lofgren bill is definitely a big step backward.   It's filled with provisions that sound like positive reform, but which will mislead those who wish to see worker-oriented reform of H-1B/green card policy.   I'll be posting an analysis either later this evening or tomorrow.
 
Norm
CBS
 
P.S. Well, another reader pointed to a speech Liveris gave on C-SPAN on Feb. 23, and there he says that the starting salary is $120K!   (Go to the video, and move the slider to about 1:01.10.   The transcript, by the way, is jumbled, so you need to actually watch the video.)
 
Norm
---30---

2011-06-14
Thomas E. Brewton _View from 1776_
Expressed government intentions often don't match results

2011-06-14
Thomas E. Brewton _View from 1776_
In defense of free and honest markets

211-06-14
Daniel Greenfield _Front Page Magazine_
professor who "sharia'ed" Bill Clinton
"Obama has announced the appointment of Azizah al-Hibri to the United States Commission on International Religious Freedom.   Al-Hibri (full name, Azizah Yahia Muhammad Toufiq al-Hibri) is a Muslim professor and the granddaughter of a Sheikh, who claims that the Koran inspired Thomas Jefferson and the Founders and that the Saudi criminal justice system is more moral than the American one because it accepts blood money from murderers."

2011-06-14
Ralph R. Reiland _American Spectator_
Under-counting the unemployed
"The U.S. labor force, the total of those who are working or actively looking for work, has shrunk by 246K people over the past 4 years.   Correspondingly, the labor participation rate, the percentage of the working age population that is working or seeking work, is now 64%, a 25-year low.   At 54K new jobs per month, it would take 22 years to get the unemployed 13.9M people [still actively seeking work] back to work.   Even with the economy growing at the higher rate of 130,500 new jobs per month, it would still take nine years to get the 13.9M currently jobless workers back on the job.   And that doesn't take into account the additional job growth that's required to create work for the approximately 150K people who newly enter the U.S. labor force each month.   But it's even worse than that.   On top of the 13.9M unemployed, the Labor Department reported last week that the 'number of persons employed part time for economic reasons (sometimes referred to as involuntary part-time workers)' was 8.5M in May...   Also uncounted as jobless in the official unemployment statistics are those who were out of work and couldn't find a job and went back to school full-time.   Hanging around graduate school until you're 30 or 40 isn't a job.   [And the under-employed, not making full use of their talents, knowledge, credentials and experience because the jobs they prepared to do aren't available.]"

2011-06-14
W. James Antle iii _American Spectator_
Rumble Foreign Policy

2011-06-14
_GAO_
ACORN: Federal funding and monitoriing (GAO-11-484)
"17 of the 31 agencies identified more than $48M -- $44.6M in federal grants and at least $3.8M in subawards (grants and contracts awarded by federal grantees) -- to ACORN or potentially related organizations, primarily for housing-related purposes, during fiscal years 2005 through 2009. Agencies were not required to collect data on sub-awards; consequently, agencies were limited in their ability to identify all funding they provided to ACORN or potentially related organizations through sub-awards."

2011-06-14
William L. Anderson
genuine goods vs. "collective goods"

2011-06-14
William McBride _Tax Foundation_
The Budget Debate in Pictures: A Look at CBO Projections and the Role that Bush-Era Tax and Spending Policies Play in the Deficit

2011-06-14
Thomas E. Brewton _View from 1776_
Obummer's economic equality sledge-hammer

2011-06-14
Thomas E. Brewton & Jeff Lukens _View from 1776_
Defense cuts and national security: the strategic debate we need to have
"The U.S. federal debt is our nation's greatest strategic weakness."
 
Proposed Bills 2011
 
 

2011-06-15

2011-06-15
Norm Matloff _H-1B/ L-1/ Off-Shoring News-Letter_
Lofgren bill a big step backward
 
You can find (an outline) of the text of the bill at Scribd.
 
As usual, "the devil is in the details", but even from the vague descriptions in the outline, it's clear where the bill is going.   And the details are probably even worse.
 
I've been writing for a while now that the thinking in DC (and, unfortunately, among some H-1B reform activists) is that the main-stream American firms (to be referred here as the "Intels") are the Good Guys while the Indian bodyshop firms (the "Infosyses") are the Bad Guys.   IOW, the Infosyses abuse the H-1B system while the Intels are using it responsibly, so the argument goes.
 
Senator Schumer put this thinking into action last year in a bill that the Indian firms felt targeted them, in a punitive manner.   I sided with the Indian firms: Schumer scape-goating and Schumer scape-goating part 2.
 
Among other things, I wrote that I'd previously "shown the irresponsible behavior in foreign labor programs of MSFT, Cisco, the [Bank of India], etc.". It's not a Good Guy/Bad Guy dichotomy at all; basically, H-1B and employer-sponsored green cards are abused across the board.
 
Some readers here will recall the notorious Cisco case, for instance, in which an American network engineer responded to a Cisco job ad.   The person the ad directed applicants to turned out to be a clerk in an immigration law firm (Fragomen, the nation's largest), not Cisco HR.   The point was apparently to screen OUT the American applicants, as Cisco was sponsoring a foreign worker for a green card.   There was then a DoL investigation, which of course found that Fragomen had done nothing illegal.   (This wasn't corruption in DoL, but rather just a reflection once again of the huge loop-holes in the law and regulations.)
 
My point, again, is that the Intels are just as culpable as the Infosyses.
 
I've been predicting that more and more legislation, though, would have this Good Guy/Bad Guy theme, and Lofgren's bill in particular has this trait.   It actually creates a formal Good Guy category, named "Established U.S. Recruiter".   The bill would put such firms on a fast track, subject to fewer rules.   It's clear from the definition (Sec. 301) that this category is the Intels category, with the implication that the Infosyses are the ones who need rules.
 
So, here is the first sense in which the Lofgren bill would be a major step backward: The loop-holes in the system are already bad enough as it is, but with Lofgren there would in effect be even more loopholes for the Intels to use.   And the Infosyses would essentially be able to do business as usual.
 
Sec. 301 concerns Labor Certification, the process under which employers who sponsor foreign workers for green cards must show that no Americans were qualified for the job.   Under the current policy, the term used is "minimally qualified", which Lofgren would change to the more stringent "equally qualified". (see discussion of requirements)
 
While this might at first seem reasonable to non-techies, the problem is that even under the current policy employers define "minimally qualified" to carry so many conditions that the foreign worker in question is the only one who meets the requirements.   If the employer does this in too transparent a manner, the DoL will object, but it can be done subtlely.   With Lofgren, employers and their immigration lawyers would find it even easier to do this.   Thus, another step backward.
 
As many of you know, the H-1B visa, unless green cards, does not have any requirement to give U.S. citizens and permanent residents hiring priority.   Lofgren's bill claims to add such a requirement, but inspection of the provision reveals that it would wind up applying largely to the Infosyses, very similar to what those employers go through today as H-1B-dependent employers.   So, not a step backward, but pretty much the status quo in terms of actual impact.
 
The Orwellian-named Title IV, Protecting American Workers, may be the most misleading part of the bill, particularly Sec.401, Strengthening the Prevailing Wage System to Protect American Workers.   The current 4-level prevailing wage system would become a 3-level system under the bill.   (Note by the way that the prevailing wage requirement is the same for both H-1B and green cards.)
 
Again, this is aimed at the Infosyses.   Granted, they do currently make more use of Level I than the Intels do, but that is because the Intels tend to hire more people with Master's degrees.   But the Intels under-pay Master's people just like the Infosyses under-pay Bachelor's degree holders.   So, reducing the number of prevailing wage levels to 3 does not in itself prevent abuse.
 
But even more interesting is the way Lofgren defines her new 3 levels.   Her bill states that the current Level I is defined to be the mean of the bottom 1/3 of wages; she wants the new Level I to make that the mean of the bottom 2/3.
 
Actually, existing policy does NOT define the levels by position in the statistical distribution of wages.   Instead, the definitions are in terms of degree of responsibility that the job entails.
 
In any event, I went to the OES government site used for these things (zip file), and did a quick calculation for software engineers.   It turned out that the cumulative distribution almost perfectly fit a straight line, so I interpolated for the 2/3 point, and then found the mean of the bottom 2/3.   We can only take this as a rough first estimate, but the number I came up with after all this was $55,935.
 
Let's put this number in perspective, in 3 different ways:
 
* The mean starting salary for new computer science graduates is currently $63,017 (according to the NACE press release).   So, Lofgren would be happy to give an H-1B visa or green card to a foreign worker making less than the average for new grads; and remember, the foreign worker typically has a couple of years of experience in addition to the degree.
 
* In 2009, the mean wage in the computer area EVEN FOR H-1BS was $74K.   See [USCIS's] "Annual Report on Characteristics of Specialty Occupation Workers (H-1B) for Fiscal Year 2009".   So Lofgren would be happy to give an H-1B visa or green card to a foreign worker whose wage is low even by foreign-worker standards.
 
* The Durbin/Grassley bill, which I've endorsed, would require the employer to pay the foreign worker the overall median for the occupation, in this case $87,790 (same OES data), far higher than Lofgren's Level I.
 
Any way you slice it, the Lofgren definition of prevailing wage would be quite generous to employers, including the Infosyses.   True, Lofgren's bill might force a couple of mom-and-pop H-1B bodyshops to stop paying $35K for a programmer, but those cases are rare.   The net effect is that Infosys, TCS [Tata], Wipro and so on would still conduct business as usual were Lofgren's bill enacted.
 
The bill would grant automatic green cards to foreign students who earn advanced degrees in STEM at "certain U.S. universities".   That might sound like MIT, but it turns out to mean first any research university, which is already extremely broad, and then adds others as well.   Interestingly, it refers to any graduate of such university as "the best and the brightest".   So any Master's student from a bottom-tier school counts as "best/brightest", as long as the school does research.   And of course once the industry lobbyists got through with it, the door would be wide open.
 
I know the autogreen card notion appeals to many anti-H-1B activists, on the grounds that with green cards these workers can't be exploited.   But they still would be YOUNG, and as I've often stated, H-1B is more than anything about AGE.   The employers want autogreen as a way to swell the youth labor market, because younger workers are cheaper, both in wages and benefits.   I've never understood why many of the activists cannot grasp this obvious fact.   If you are age 35 and think that autogreen is going to result in more jobs being available to you, I'm sorry, but you are sadly mistaken.
 
Of course, the idea of giving an automatic green card for anything invites rampant abuse, creating its own demand.   Among other things it would make U.S. grad programs even more disprortionately consist of foreign students than today.   I've written that the current situation is itself due to the influx of foreign students holding down grad-degree salaries and also graduate student stipends, both of which have driven away American students from graduate study.   To add this new incentive would be unconscionable.
 
There are some other provisions, including one or two that I actually do like, but they are lost in a vast array of smoke and mirrors of faux "reforms" that would not only not solve the problems, but actually make things worse.   Lofgren's creation is the worst major bill I've seen on this topic.
 
Norm
Tata median salaries by city
Wipro median salaries by city
Infosys median salaries by city

2011-06-15
John T. Bennett _American Thinker_
The "achievement gap" fraud

2011-06-15
Charlie Gillis & Kate Lunau _Maclean's_
A world of 10G

2011-06-15
R. Emmett Tyrrell ii _NY Sun_
Michele Bachmann stole the show in first GOP debate of 2012 presidential election campaign

2011-06-15
_Global Post_
Pakistan government has arrested the good guys, refused to investigate the bad
"Pakistani intelligence officials have reportedly arrested 5 people accused of providing the CIA with information that helped lead to the raid on Osama bin Laden's compound.   Among them is an army major who allegedly copied the license plates of cars visiting the bin Laden compound in Abbottobad.   The fate of the 5 arrested is unclear.   Analysts say it's a sign of deteriorating USA-Pakistani ties.   'Instead of hunting down the support network that allowed Bin Laden to live comfortably for years, the Pakistani authorities are arresting those who assisted in the raid that killed the world's most wanted man.', the New York Times states."

2011-06-15 03:00PDT (06:00EDT) (10:00GMT) (13:00Jerusalem)
Patrick Thibodeau _ComputerWorld_/_IDG_
Leftists seek major worsening of H-1B and green card programs
Katie Hoffmann: Bloomberg

2011-06-15 04:10PDT (07:10EDT) (11:10GMT) (14:10Jerusalem)
_Tech Republic_/_Ziff Davis_/_CBS_
How Legos are made

2011-06-15 04:24PDT (07:24EDT) (11:24GMT) (14:24Jerusalem)
_WESH Orlando FL_
Lockheed-Martin announced 1200 lay-offs

2011-06-15
Randall Burns _V Dare_
Leftist Perspective: Washington state cuts education funding for American children, ignores immigration dimension

2011-06-15
Paul Bedard _US News & World Report_
Most illegal aliens come from Mexico
"A new congressional report sure to stir up the heated immigration debate finds that about 1 in 4 foreigners in America are here illegally and that 62% of them come from Mexico through America's most porous border.   Using brand new data, the Congressional Budget Office also reports that 25% of 'non-citizens', or those here illegally or with temporary passes, live in poverty.   Overall, the CBO found that there are about 39M foreign-born people living in the United States, making up more than 12% of the population, which is the largest since 1920, the height of the European migration to the United States.   Of those, about 10.8M are here illegally and the subject of much of the discussion in the immigration debate...   The states with the highest numbers of illegals: California (2.6M), Texas (1.7M), Florida (700K), and New York (600K).   Some 61% are aged 35-44...   An estimated 62% of [illegal aliens] were from Mexico.   From 2000 to 2009, more than 10M people were granted legal permanent resident (LPR [green cards]) status in the United States...   In 2009, 29% of the foreign-born population between the ages of 25 and 64 had not completed high school, compared with 8% of the native-born population.   Some groups of foreign-born people, however, had more education than their native-born counterparts.   About 55% of people from Asia had at least a bachelor's degree, as did 47% of people from Europe and Canada; just 32% of the native-born population had earned at least a bachelor's degree."

2011-06-15
_NY Times_
Do employers need a nudge to hire and retain older workers?

2011-06-15
Douglas French _Ludwig von Mises Institute_
The economics of law school

20011-06-15
Douglas French _Ludwig von Mises Institute_
Tough times on Main Street

2011-06-15
Robert Moore _Cenantua_
Is the First World War small in importance in the U.S.A.?
 
Proposed Bills 2011
 
 

2011-06-16

2011-06-16
Norm Matloff _H-1B/ L-1/ Off-Shoring News-Letter_
NYT Room for Debate
 
The New York Times' Room for Debate on-line column asked me to comment again on the computer science job market.   You can see the debate.   Scroll down to Computer Science's 'Sputnik Moment'?.
 
Not surprisingly, the NYT also chose Vivek Wadhwa as one of the other debaters.   In fact, some of what he says was similar to my comments (also not surprisingly).
 
Also not surprisingly still, they chose professor Ed Lazowska, who had been quoted in the original article to which this debate is a response.   Over the years, he has been the foremost academic speaking in favor of H-1B, often making public statements claiming a tech labor shortage.   Plug "Ed Lazowska H-1B" and "Ed Lazowska shortage" into Google to get a sampling.
 
I think you'll find all the debaters' remarks interesting.   Of course, there is also a provision for you to post your own reader comments.
 
Norm
Jonathan Zittrain
"What's notable about most of these and other game-changing inventions is that their creators mostly weren't computer science majors.   They were self-taught or learned their craft through apprenticeship to other coders."

2011-06-16
Ruth Mantell _MarketWatch_
more well-paid "middle class" jobs in danger
"The on-going movement of jobs to countries where labor is cheaper, plus the development of new technologies, may mean fewer opportunities for some well-paid positions in the U.S.A. over the next decade, said Larry Katz, an economist at Harvard University...   Workers making about $40K to $80K a year constitute the bulk of labor costs for many companies, and these workers may be on the chopping block, said Jeffrey Joerres, chief executive of ManPOWERGroup, a Milwaukee-based [bodyshop]...   Kevin Hallock, director of the Institute for Compensation Studies at Cornell University, cited radiologists as an example of a well-paid worker that could be hit by technology and cheap global labor...   'A lot of medical diagnostic work will be done over-seas.   You can have the initial diagnostic done elsewhere, and have a domestic supervising physician.', said David Autor, an economist at Massachusetts Institute of Technology...   Computer programming is also becoming a commodity, Katz said.   'What used to be good programming jobs, or routine legal work, these are things that are easily broken into parts, and done in other places.', Katz said...   Here are the 10 fastest growing occupations from 2008 to 2018, and their median wages, according to the Labor Department:   Biomedical engineers, median wages of $77,400; Network systems and data communications analysts, $71,100; Home health aides, $20,460; Personal and home care aides, $19,180; Financial examiners, $70,930; Medical scientists, except epidemiologists, $72,590; Physician assistants, $81,230; Skin care specialists, $28,730; Biochemists and biophysicists, $82,840; Athletic trainers, $39,640."

2011-06-16 04:50PDT (07:50EDT) (11:50GMT) (14:50Jerusalem)
Toni Bowers _Tech Republic_/_Ziff Davis_/_CBS_
Name discrimination

2011-06-16 05:30PDT (08:30EDT) (12:30GMT) (15:30Jerusalem)
Scott Gibbons & Tony Sznoluch _DoL ETA_
un-employment insurance weekly claims report
DoL home page
DoL OPA press releases
historical data
DoL regulations
"The advance number of actual initial claims under state programs, unadjusted, totaled 394,910 in the week ending June 11, an increase of 28,094 from the previous week.   There were 448,305 initial claims in the comparable week in 2010.   The advance unadjusted insured unemployment rate was 2.8% during the week ending June 4, an increase of 0.1 percentage point from the prior week.   The advance unadjusted number for persons claiming UI benefits in state programs totaled 3,465,277, an increase of 38,932 from the preceding week.   A year earlier, the rate was 3.4% and the volume was 4,319,021.   The total number of people claiming benefits in all programs for the week ending May 28 was 7,401,228, a decrease of 209,116 from the previous week.   Extended benefits were available in AL, AK, AZ, CA, CO, CT, DE, DC, FL, GA, ID, IL, IN, KS, KY, ME, MA, MI, MN, MO, NV, NJ, NM, NY, NC, OH, OR, PA, RI, SC, TN, TX, WA, and WV, during the week ending May 28 [a couple additions and deletions this week].   States reported 3,293,507 persons claiming EUC (Emergency Unemployment Compensation) benefits for the week ending May 28, a decrease of 87,583 from the prior week.   There were 4,798,099 claimants in the comparable week in 2010.   EUC weekly claims include first, second, third, and fourth tier activity.   [Note that the population used for calculating the "insured unemployment rate" changes
to 132,623,886 beginning 2007-10-06;
to 133,010,953 beginning 2008-01-05;
to 133,382,559 beginning 2008-04-05;
to 133,690,617 beginning 2008-07-05;
to 133,902,387 beginning 2008-10-04;
to 133,886,830 beginning 2009-01-03;
to 133,683,433 beginning 2009-04-04;
to 133,078,480 beginning 2009-07-04;
to 133,823,421 beginning 2009-10-03;
to 131,823,421 beginning 2009-10-17;
to 130,128,328 beginning 2010-01-02;
to 128,298,468 beginning 2010-04-03;
to 126,763,245 beginning 2010-07-03;
to 125,845,577 beginning 2010-09-25;
to 125,560,066 beginning 2011-01-15;
to 125,572,661 beginning 2011-04-02.]
EUC (Excel)
EB
graphs
more graphs

2011-06-16 07:54PDT (10:54EDT) (14:54GMT) (17:54Jerusalem)
Todd Fluhr _Tech Republic_/_Ziff Davis_/_CBS_
Your IT future depends on having a parachute ready for the next wave of lay-offs: Awareness, preparedness, and escape.

2011-06-16
Michael Tighe & Arijit Ghosh _BusinessWeek_
As bodyshopping and off-shoring continue to escalate, Tata hired 70K last year, plans to hire 60K this year; no word on how many are US citizens
"India's $88.1G IT services and out-sourcing industries were built by hiring cheap talent, mostly local, to write computer programs and maintain software for foreign companies looking to lower their own costs...   Tata Consultancy had 198,614 workers on 2011 March 31, compared with about 41K six years earlier, according to annual reports...   Infosys...has 3K workers in China and plans to double that within 18 months, Chief Operating Officer Shibulal said in a May 1 interview."

2011-06-16 13:56PDT (16:56EDT) (20:56GMT) (23:56 Jerusalem)
John Seney 513-248-7683 _Cincinnati Enquirer_/_Gannett_
Tata tech camp attempts to sucker youngsters
"This year, the 3-day camp June 13 to June 15 attracted 65 students from 15 school districts in the Cincinnati area...   Amar Naga, director of operations at Tata's Miami [twp Clermont county facility]...   There now are 450 employees, with plans to add 250 more by the end of 2011, Naga said [but refuses to say how many or what proportion of of their bodies shopped are US citizens]."
Tata median salaries by city

2011-06-16
Miriam Jordan _Wall Street Journal_
ICE is auditing more firms' employee records
"It brought to 2,338 the number of companies audited by ICE in the fiscal year that began Oct. 1 and topped the prior year's record of 2,196.   The audits, affecting such businesses as garment makers, produce growers and fast-food chains, result in the firing of every [illegal alien] found on a company's pay-roll."

2011-06-16 11:15PDT (14:15EDT) (18:15GMT) (21:15Jerusalem)
R.E. Nester _Baltimore Sun_
Baltimore Schools CEO Andrés Alonso is abusing the H-1B visa program to keep Filipino teachers on the job
"On May 25, about 700 teachers attended a city school job fair seeking positions.   However, now school officials claim there are more applicants than positions.   So why do we need foreign teachers filling Baltimore's coveted assignments?...   to use this visa system to undermine American workers is repugnant."

2011-06-16
R. Emmett Tyrrell ii _American Spectator_
The charismatic, pulchritudinous Bachmann and Palin are making the leftists hysterical

2011-06-16
Doug Bandow _American Spectator_
Finally, a principled farm state legislator: Tim Huelskamp
"That means slashing, not freezing, domestic discretionary spending.   We should start with the most abusive outlays, like corporate welfare and specialized federal doles like agricultural subsidies.   For decades the government has paid farmers to produce and not produce, to add cows for milk and to kill cows for less milk, and more.   We can't afford such foolishness any more."

2011-06-16
Edwin S. Rubenstein _V Dare_
Americans with PhDs have it tough enough without importing guest-workers and immigrants

2011-06-16
William L. Anderson
Kristof advocates military domination of USA

2011-06-16
Stefano R. Mugnaini _Ludwig von Mises Institute_
How I learned the truth about the police state

2011-06-16
Robert P. Murphy _Ludwig von Mises Institute_
Keynesians and the economic crisis: 8 week course

2011-06-16
Frank Shostak _Ludwig von Mises Institute_
Unemployment and economic recovery
 
Proposed Bills 2011
 
 

2011-06-17

1775-06-17: Battle of Bunker Hill and Breed's Hill
Jimbo Wales's WikiPedia
visit Boston
Boston city links: map

2011-06-17
Denise Dick _Youngstown OH Vindicator_
16 of 70 students in school with 15:1 student:teacher ratio could fail 1st grade
"Of Taft's 72 first-graders, 13 may not be promoted to second grade.   At William Holmes McGuffey Elementary, 11 of 109 first-graders face the same possibility.   At Kirkmere, it's 6 out of 46 first-graders; at Martin Luther King, 6 out of 104.   At Paul C. Bunn, only 1 of the 60 first-graders at the school is in danger of not moving on to second grade, and at Williamson, the number is 7 out of 61."

2011-06-17 07:30PDT (10:30EDT) (14:30GMT) (17:30Jerusalem)
Ruth Mantell _MarketWatch_
UMich consumer sentiment index fell from 74.3 in May to 71.8 in early June
Federal Reserve Board St. Louis

2011-06-17 07:41PDT (10:41EDT) (14:41GMT) (17:41Jerusalem)
Steve Goldsten _MarketWatch_
Conference Board: May leading economic indicators up 0.8%

2011-06-17
Andrew J. Coulson _American Spectators_
A less perfect union: Monopolistic schools and unions (with graph)
"The public school employee unions have been the single biggest political contributors at the federal level over the past 20 years.   The $56M they've spent is roughly equal to the combined contributions of Chevron, Exxon Mobil, the NRA, and Lockheed Martin.   But it is at the state level that their lobbying efforts are focused, because that is the level at which the nation's public school monopolies are legally enshrined.   So long as they protect that monopoly on roughly $600G in tax dollars, they will face no meaningful competition, and so long as they are without competition, they will be able to secure wages, benefits, and staffing levels far above what a competitive market would bear...   At the moment, dues are returning around 2,000% annually (public school teachers enjoy a $17K annual compensation premium over their private sector counterparts, and dues run only about $800)."

2011-06-17
Doug Bandow _American Spectator_
Unconstitutional Authority
"First he ignored the Constitution's clear division of powers. Article 1, Sec. 8 (11) of the Constitution states that 'Congress shall have the power...to declare war.'"

2011-06-17
Iain Murray _American Spectator_
Obummer over-drawn at the ideas ATM
"From 1985 to 2002, U.S. banks some 300K ATMs around the country, but also added 42K bank teller jobs."

2011-06-17
George H. Wittman _American Spectator_
Is enlightened-Islam stalling in Turkey?

2011-06-17 10:01PDT (13:01EDT) (17:01GMT) (20:01Jerusalem)
_Knoxville TN News Sentinel_/_AP_
GM to invest $65M in engine plants in TN and NY

2011-06-17
_Judicial Watch_
funding for National Council of la Racists sky-rockets after Obummer hires their VP

2011-06-17 11:56PDT (14:56EDT) (18:56GMT) (21:56Jerusalem)
_KGO_/_AP_
US senate approved repeal of tax credits for producing ethanol

2011-06-17 12:58PDT (15:58EDT) (19:58GMT) (22:58Jerusalem)
Dan Rather _Huffington Post_
Looking for jobs in all the wrong places
"5 of the companies with executives on the Council -- General Electric, Citigroup, Intel, Procter & Gamble and DuPont -- generate the bulk of their revenues over-seas...     Cree -- which received a $39M tax credit in stimulus funds -- has more than half of its 5K-person work-force in [Red China]...   recent research shows the number of STEM students graduating each year from U.S. universities far exceeds the number of new jobs...   industry data indicates there are upwards of 200K tech workers unemployed across the country today [while professional organizations suggest that number is well over 500K]...   According to U.S. Department of Labor, a guest worker visa known as H-1B for 'specialty occupations' especially tech workers -- may be issued 'even when a qualified U.S. worker wants the job'.   In fact, the bulletin notes, 'A U.S. worker can be displaced from the job in favor of the foreign worker.'"
part 1 (video)
part 2 (video)
part 3 (video)
part 4 (video)
hd

2011-06-17
Jason Overdorf _Global Post_
India's execs are whining "skills shortage"
"Though millions of Indians remain unemployed or under-employed, the country's lagging brick-and-mortar industries had imported tens of thousands of Chinese workers -- on business visas, no less -- to build and operate power plants, steel mills and telecommunications towers...   only about 5% of India's 400M strong labor force has received any formal training, compared with 70% in Germany and 95% in Korea.   Importing skilled workers from China -- on or off the books -- is only the most dramatic manifestation of the problem...   India's service-related businesses account for more than half of GDP, while manufacturing contributes only 15%.   And though China's [GDP] is only 4 times [the size of] India's, its manufacturing sector is 50 times [as big].   Meanwhile, China has some 500K vocational training centers, compared with India's 10K obsolete Industrial Training Institutes...   More than 90% of India's work force is still employed in the so-called 'unorganized sector', where neither safety standards nor minimum wage laws can be enforced.   Where there is no money for boots and hardhats, there is surely none for technology or training...   That's why TeamLease is working in Gujarat to set up the country's first vocational university.   Similarly, Global Talent Track, which has partnered with multi-national computer networking firm Cisco Systems Inc. and some 900 colleges across 15 states, recently tied up with the University of Kashmir to train degree students with the job skills that employers are looking for.   'In this country, traditionally, skills and education have always followed two different paths.', said Global Talent Track chief executive Uma Ganesh...   the drop-out rate for students on complete scholarships is as high as 70% to 80%.   It falls to 10% to 20% among students paying all or part of the fee themselves...   To make India an industrial powerhouse, the mindset of the entire country will have to change."

2011-06-17
_Salisbury Post_
North Rowan guest-teachers' visa are running out

2011-06-17
Becca Gregg _Cumberland PA Sentinel_
Juneteenth event comes to Carlisle PA's Memorial Park
"on 1865 June 19, general Gordon Granger rode into Galveston, Texas, and said, 'You're free now. I got your back.'"

2011-06-17
William L. Anderson
Krugman endorsed insanity (and I almost missed it)
 
Proposed Bills 2011

2011-06-17

DJIA	12,004.36
S&P 500(SPX)	1,271.50
NASDAQ(COMP)	2,616.48
Nikkei	9,351.40
10-year US T-Bond(UST10Y)	2.93
crude oil(CL1N)	$93.01/barrel
natgas(NG11N)	$4.33/MBTU
reformulatedgasoline(RB1N)	$2.95/gal
heatingoil(HO1N)	$2.98/gal
gold(GC1Q)	$1,539.80/ounce
silver(SI1N)	$35.75/ounce
platinum(PL1N)	$1,752.10/ounce
palladium(PAU11)	$745.40/ounce
copper(HGN11)	$0.25625/ounce
soybeans	$13.33/bushel
maize	$7.0025/bushel
wheat	$6.7225/bushel
dollarindex(DXY)	74.98
yenperdollar(USDYEN)	80.08
dollarspereuro(EURUSD)	1.4307
dollarsperpound(GBPUSD)	$1.6193
swissfrancsperdollar	0.8463
indianrupeesperdollar	44.795
mexicanpesosperdollar(MXN)	11.9075
MorganStanleyHighTechIndex	622.16

I usually get this info from MarketWatch.
 
 
Proposed Bills 2011

2011-06-17 (5771 Sivan 15)
R' Dovid Rosenfeld _Torah.org_
Pirkei Avos/Pirqi Abot: The Human Challenge part 2 chapter6 mishna6 ways34-36(b)
"Thus says the L-rd, 'Let not the wise man praise himself for his wisdom, nor the strong man for his strength, nor the rich man for his wealth.   But rather for this shall he praise himself: comprehend and know Me... for this is what I want,' says the L-rd." --- Jeremiah/Irmiyahu 9:22-3
"My pride lies in the ecstatic knowledge that I have connected with my G-d, the ultimate and infinite source of existence, and that I have *annulled* myself before His infinity.   I feel great, but it is not *my* greatness; it is G-d's greatness which I have become a part of.   And standing in G-d's presence is both humbling and crushing."
"One who seeks honor is 'heavy' or full of himself.   Rather than connecting himself to G-d, he weighs himself down -- increasing the distance between himself and G-d -- attempting to fill an empty soul..."

2011-06-17 (5771 Sivan 15)
R' Yitzchok Rubin _Torah.org_
Tehillim/Psalms: Rhythm of the Heart chapter3
"In the place where baalei teshuva [masters of repentance] stand, even completely righteous tzaddikim cannot stand." --- Berachos 34b
"There is no greater strength than accepting one's past misdeeds and turning away from them onto the path of righteousness.   Despair, on the other hand, only leads to failure."

2011-06-17 (5771 Sivan 15)
R' Dovid Rosenfeld _Torah.org_
Maimonides on Life: Laws of Understanding: God's Agenda chapter3 law5(c)
"G-d did not create x billion 'goyim' just so He could ignore them or damn them to Hell because they had the poor fortune of not being one of 'us'.   G-d still wants a relationship with all His children.   Each and every one of us can reach out to Him today, and ultimately, with the Messiah's arrival, the world over 'will be filled with the knowledge of G-d' (Isaiah 11:9)."

2011-06-17 (5771 Sivan 15)
R' Label Lam _Torah.org_
Why We Are
"you live in front of HASHEM, as King David says, I place HASHEM before me always.   The Baal Shem Tov said that where a persons thoughts are, there is where they are entirely."

2011-06-17 (5771 Sivan 15)
R' Naftali Reich _Torah.org_
Heart Palpitations

2011-06-17 (5771 Sivan 15)
R' Berel Wein _Torah.org_
Jewish Sovereignty in the Land of Israel

2011-06-17 (5771 Sivan 15)
R' Yochanan Zweig (adapted by R' Mordechai Shifman) _Torah.org_
Internal Injury

2011-06-17 (5771 Sivan 15)
Shlomo Katz _Torah.org_
The Spies and Yerushalayim vol25 #37
"Pirkei Avot [Pirqi Abot] [Rabbi Tarfon] used to say: You are not required to complete the task, yet you are not free to neglect it.   If you have studied much Torah, you will be given great reward, and your Employer can be relied upon to pay you the wage for your labor, but be aware that the reward of the righteous will be given in the World to Come. (Ch.2)"

2011-06-17 (5771 Sivan 15)
R' Pinchas Winston _Torah.org_
Cherish Her Dust
"Just as the momentary eating from the Aitz HaDaas Tov vRah -- the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil -- cost mankind Paradise until this day, likewise has the momentary rejection of Eretz Yisroel back at our beginning cost us 3,322 years of exile, and counting...   It was Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon who pushed to give Gush Katif to the Arabs as part of his unilateral peace initiative.   The area promptly became a terrorist haven for Hamas, while Sharon suffered a stroke that immediately left his life in limbo, and his reputation in tatters.   He has thus far been denied the chance to become a hero, or to receive a hero's burial."

2011-06-17 (5771 Sivan 15)
R' Yissocher Frand _Torah.org_
Sheva Brochos Material
"Bribes will blind those who have sight and pervert the words of the righteous." --- Shmos/Shemot 23:8
 
Proposed Bills 2011
 
 

2011-06-18

2011-06-18
_Reuters_
Ron Paul won GOP straw-poll in New Orleans
Target Feedom: Ron Paul won GOP straw-poll in New Orleans
 
Proposed Bills 2011
 
 

2011-06-19

2011-06-19
Jordan Cohen _Youngstown OH Vindicator_
Soap Box Derby winners head to July 23 championships in Akron
"Most impressed by the cars, competition and turn-out was 93-year-old John Fraser, the winner of the first Soap Box Derby race in Youngstown in 1934 when he was 17 -- the first year of the national competition.   Fraser said he is the last surviving competitor from the 1934 national derby championships in Dayton.   'It's absolutely great.', said Fraser, now a resident of Copeland Oaks Village in Sebring, whose appearance Saturday drew loud applause from spectators on the sun-drenched course.   'There was no plastic when I raced, just actual soap-boxes and orange crates that we used to make our cars.', he said.   'We raced on Gypsy Lane [in Youngstown] and I think we went around 45 miles per hour.'   Andy Bowell Jr., local derby chapter president, said girls out-numbered the boys in Saturday's competition 23-17."

2011-06-19
Simon Constable _MarketWatch_
Shiller: Risk of yet another recession within the on-going Bush-Clinton-Bush-Obama economic depression is "Substantial" (video)

2011-06-19
Ben Pimentel _MarketWatch_
Philippines whine of "talent shortage" (video)

2011-06-19
Michael Angley _Big Government_
Reducing illegal immigration: A risk-benefit analysis

2011-06-19
Steve Sailer _V Dare_
NYTimes's Jonathan Mahler on Arizona: Immigration policy is fantasy baseball for leftists
"Ironically, maintaining the border is of such low priority to the U.S. government that the right side of the photo reveals a big gap in the fence that anybody could wade through. But the NYT isn't terribly alert to irony when it comes to the sacred topic of illegal aliens...   Mahler begins by lamenting that organized baseball has no history that he can denounce of banning players based on Hispanic ethnicity... 'many of the game's historians point to two Cubans, Rafael Almeida and Armando Marsans, who made their debut with the Cincinnati Reds a century ago.'"

2011-06-19
Patrick Cleburne _V Dare_
J-1 visas take summer jobs from USA teens
Nancy Lofholm: Denver CO Post (with graphs)

2011-06-19
Naomi Schaefer Riley _Chronicle of Higher Education_
The Economic Up-Side to Ending Tenure
"As the George Mason University economist Tyler Cowen explains, 'In a lot of academia, once you're over 50 it's hard to get another job, even if you've done well.'   He compares it to being a computer programmer, where age seems to be a disadvantage no matter how talented you are.   Taking an academic job without the promise of tenure is what Cowen calls 'a massive risk'.   So there would have to be a lot of money on the front end to make up for it [or keep the professionals in the dark until the axe falls]."

2011-06-19
Robert Moore _Cenantua_
Discovering the remains of soldiers from the 55th Massachusetts
 
Proposed Bills 2011
 
 

2011-06-20

2011-06-19 21:07PDT (2011-06-20 00:07EDT) (2011-06-20 04:07GMT) (31:07Jerusalem)
Mark Williams _Youngstown OH Vindicator_
Ohio jobs outlook expected to remain tepid
Columbus OH Dispatch

2011-06-20
Frosty Wooldridge _News with Views_
"Free" trade is destroying American workers
"But when a Congress critter cheats or lies or misrepresents, it affects millions of Americans as to jobs, lives, communities and our country.   Unfortunately, Congress cheats on American citizens everyday they are in session.   They lie, carry on bogus wars and cheat every [tax-victim] 24/7.   The 2 wars in Iraq and Afghanistan constitute a 10 year nightmare of death, destruction, financial rat hole, arrogance and sheer stupidity.   The War on Drugs is a 40 year farce.   Foreign aid is absurd.   TSA pats down gray-haired old ladies to make sure they don't create a problem on a flight while Congress leaves the borders wide open 24/7 for any terrorists to inject himself and his intentions into America.   Congress allows 10M illegal aliens to maintain full time jobs by not enforcing employment laws while it watches 14M Americans out of work.   We're up to our eyeballs in debt, but neither party will make rational, logical and realistic decisions to employ our citizens.   We suffer $700G annually in trade debt, but Congress won't create manufacturing jobs for Americans, but it keeps [Red China's] factories humming.   'No man's life, liberty or property is safe while the legislature is in session.', purportedly said by Mark Twain.   All 535 critters cheat the American worker with 'Free Trade' because it's killing our standard of living and quality of life.   They flood us with 200K legal immigrants every 30 days while 15M of us stand in unemployment lines and food stamp lines."

2011-06-20
Heather MacDonald _National Review_
assault on "Secure Communities"
"For years, open-borders advocates have howled that Secure Communities was flagging for possible deportation 'mere' petty criminals -- drunk drivers, unlicensed drivers, non-gun-using assailants, shoplifters, thieves, garden-variety drug dealers and drug users -- instead of 'serious' violent offenders.   'Only' 30% of illegal aliens deported under the program were 'serious' violent felons such as murderers and rapists, reports the Los Angeles Times, with typical offended righteousness.   To which one can only respond: So what? Even if Secure Communities flagged for possible deportation only illegal aliens with no criminal records at all, it is impossible to see any injustice or illegality in the operation of the law..."

2011-06-20 01:48PDT (04:48EDT) (08:48GMT) (11:48Jerusalem)
Jeremy Redmon _Atlanta GA Journal-Constitution_
Federal judge to review Georgia's immigration control law

2011-06-20
_Stop the ACLU_
in the Leftist mind, One Man One Vote is somehow anti-democratic

2011-06-20
Donna Healy _Billings MT Gazette_
students head for national auto, diesel skills competition in KC
"The national competition, called SkillsUSA, helps hone work-force skills.   Competitors in automotive and diesel categories move from work station to work station where they must use a scan tool to diagnose problems or grapple with the cause of a snapped driveline...   During the state competition, high school students spent less than 10 minutes at each work station.   At nationals, they may have 15 to 30 minutes to complete tougher tasks."

2011-06-20 03:22PDT (06:22EDT) (10:22GMT) (13:22Jerusalem)
Dave Gibson _Examiner_
H-1B reform proposal: Stop issuing the until unemployment drops below 5%

2011-06-20 06:43PDT (09:43EDT) (13:43GMT) (16:43Jerusalem)
Martin Crutsinger _Knoxville TN News Sentinel_/_AP_
European government debt crisis casts shadow on proceedings of Fed meeting on the US economy

2011-06-20 10:10PDT (13:10EDT) (17:10GMT) (20:10Jerusalem)
Josh Fischman _Chronicle of Higher Education_ only 5 universities make the ComputerWorld list of 100 best places to work in IT
ComputerWorld/IDG
average scores given by employees to their employers

2011-06-20 10:55PDT (13:55EDT) (17:55GMT) (20:55Jerusalem)
_WNYC_
Corruption in NYC pay-roll system project, CityTime
Chris Kanaracus: PC World/IDG
Juan Gonzaelz: NY Daily News
Celeste Katz & Greg B. Smith: NY Daily News: CityTime scam worse than we thought
Michael Howard Saul: Wall Street Journal
Reuters
Crain's NY Business
Graha Rayman: Village Voice
David W. Chen & William K. Rashbaum: NYTimes
Bruce Golding: NY Post
CBS NY
Jonathan Dienst & Shimon Prokupecz: NBC NY
Samantha Gross: BusinessWeek/AP
Samantha Gross: Beaumont Enterprise/AP
Washington DC Post/AP
Washington Technology
Hugh R. Morley: North Jersey
CourtHouse News
The cost of the project has ballooned to more than $700M from about $68M.   Nearly all the city paid for the automated pay-roll project was directly or indirectly tainted, authorities now estimate.   The indictment, released by Manhattan US prosecutor Preet Bharara, names 11, including TechnoDyne LLC, based in Wayne, NJ and the company's 2 owners, Padma and Reddy Allen, who have apparently fled back to India.   Prosecutors have seized more than $38M in some 120 bank accounts for the scores of shell companies the crooks used across 3 continents.   Some of the defendants conspired to hire consultants who were not needed for the project for the city.   Office of Pay-roll Administration agent Mark Mazer contracted to SAIC for over $600M, where Gerard Denault and Carl bell sub-contracted to Technodyne for over $450M, where Padma Allen and Reddy Allen sub-sub-contracted to D.A. Solutions (Dimitry Aronshtein) and Prime View (Victor Natanzon) for $75M.   Technodyne allegedly kicked back about $15M to people at SAIC where Bell and Denault received $5 per hour worked on the project, while the sub-sub-contractors kicked back $25M to Mazer. TechnoDyne grew so rapidly that NJBiz dubbed it the No. 2 minority-owned firm in that state.   Ernst & Young honored Padma Allen as entrepreneur of the year last year.   Mazer approved time sheets for consultants who were on leave, who had been fired, and who were working less time than was reported.

2011-06-20
_CityTown Info_
More employees unhappy at work but reluctant to quit, though a third are considering it
Joe Light: Wall Street Journal
MarketWatch
Ben Rooney: CNN
Sarah E. Needleman: Wall Street Journal
Devin Banerjee: Bloomberg
Katie Johnston Chase: Boston Globe
Jonathan Chevreau: Financial Post: half of Canadian workers are ready to leave their jobs

2011-06-20
David Rasmussen
Poll: 64% say border control is top immigration priority

20011-06-20
Penny Starr _Cybercast News Service_
AZ sheriff Paul Babeu asks why there are more US troops at the Korean border than along US borders

2011-06-20
Mortimer B. Zuckerman _US News & World Report_
Why the US job markets are worse than they look at first glance
"The real job losses are...closer to 10.5M...   Total payrolls today amount to 131M, but this figure is lower than it was at the beginning of the year 2000, even though our population has grown by nearly 30M...   the number of people unemployed for 6 months or longer grew 361K to 6.2M, increasing their share of the unemployed to 45.1%...   Labor's share of national income has fallen to the lowest level in modern history, down to 57.5% in the first quarter as compared to 59.8% when the so-called recovery began.   This reflects not only the 7M fewer workers but the fact that wages for part-time workers now average $19K -- less than half the median income...   10 years ago, 5M people were collecting federal disability payments; now 8M are on the rolls, at a cost to [tax-victims] of approximately $120G a year.   The states today owe the federal insurance fund an astonishing $90G to cover unemployment benefits...   In 2009 February there were 4.7M separations—that is, jobs lost—but by 2011 March this had fallen to 3.8M."

2011-06-20
William L. Anderson
Creating caricatures is "listening"? Only in Wonderland!

2011-06-20
William L. Anderson
Perverse Princeton University Economics: Blinder claimed there is no such thing as opportunity cost

2011-06-20 (5771 Sivan 18)
Owais Tohid _Jewish World Review_
Pakistani teen tells of being recruited and trained as a suicide bomber

2011-06-20 (5771 Sivan 18)
Elaine Woo _Jewish World Review_
Al Schwimmer arranged for Israelis to have fighter planes before re-establishment in 1948, was punished for violating US "Neutrality Act", became leader of Israel's aerospace industry b: 1917 in NY, NY d: Friday 2011-06-17 (5771 Sivan 15) in Tel Aviv

2011-06-20 (5771 Sivan 18)
Joshua Mitnick _Jewish World Review_
How Israel and Egypt can preserve a cool peace
 
Proposed Bills 2011
 
 

2011-06-21

1788-06-21: US constitution ratified

2011-06-21 01:00PDT (04:00EDT) (08:00GMT) (11:00Jerusalem)
Nina Mandell _NY Daily News_
NC man robbed a store for a dollar, hoping he'd get better health care in prison than he can afford to buy

2011-06-21
Mark Krikorian _Center for Immigration Studies_
HR2164 is this year's most important jobs bill (e-Verify)

2011-06-21 11:00PDT (14:00EDT) (18:00GMT) (21:00Jerusalem)
_Joint Economic Committee_
Spend Less, Owe Less, Grow the Economy
JEC site

2011-06-21 14:05PDT (17:05EDT) (21:05GMT) (2011-06-22 00:05Jerusalem)
Dave Gibson _Examiner_
Obummer issues executive order blocking deportation of illegal alien students, pregnant or nursing illegal aliens
ICE memo (pdf)

2011-06-21
Hugh G. Willett _Knoxville TN News Sentinel_
New Comcast brand Xfinity intended to combine supply of several differentiated services under one label
"Xfinity, which already is appearing in some Knoxville-area homes and businesses and is being introduced throughout the area, includes an enhanced fiber-optic network for TV, phone and Internet that offers down-loads at 50Mb/s and moving to more than 100Mb/s in the future.   A typical high-definition movie that would load in 16 minutes at 50Mb/s can be down-loaded in less than half that time at 100Mb/s."

2011-06-21
Cindy Uken _Billings MT Gazette_
Home births increasing
"Less than 1% of U.S. births occur at home.   But the proportion of home births is markedly increasing, according to researchers at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.   The spike in home births occurred between 2004 and 2008, rising from 23,150 in 2004 to 28,357 home births in 2008.   Between 1990 and 2004, the number of home births had been trending downward.   27 states had significant increases during those 4 years.   Montana, Vermont and Oregon recorded the highest percentage -- about one in 50 births were at home in those states, according to the CDCP.   In 2008, Montana had the highest number of home births, 275, or 2.18%, according to the CDCP research...   She charges $3,500 for a home birth, which includes all pre- and post-natal visits as well as labor and delivery.   Some insurance plans cover home births.   A normal delivery at a Billings hospital costs between $4,446 and $6,946 and does not include pre- or post-natal visits.   Most insurance plans cover hospital births...   The number of babies born prematurely fell by 16%.   By 2008 only 6% of all home births involved preterm births, according to the CDCP...   Only about 1 in 357 black women give birth at home, and only 1 in 500 Hispanic women did, according to the CDCP.   For all races combined, about 1 in 143 births were at home in 2008, up from 1 in 179 in 2004."

2011-06-21
Malia Politzer & Surabhi Agarwal _LiveMint_
Misuse of US visas may be wide-spread
"Palmer alleged that Infosys was [abusing B-1 visas] to circumvent increased restrictions [and oversight of] work visas, especially the H-1B category.   In May, the company was served a federal grand jury sub poena requesting that it submit all documents and correspondence..."

2011-06-21
Isaac Sweeney _Chronicle of Higher Education_
Want to get on the tenure-track? Don't keep quiet
"I believe that pointing out inadequacies can lead to changes for the better."

2011-06-21
Thomas E. Brewton _View from 1776_
Leftist indoctrinators still trying to control how students think
Patrick J. Buchanan: Town Hall: The Dumbing-Down of America
"'History text-books', added McCullough, 'are badly written'.   Many texts have been made 'so politically correct as to be comic.   Very minor characters that are currently fashionable are given considerable space, whereas people of major consequence' -- such as inventor Thomas Edison -- 'are given very little space or none at all'."

2011-06-21 (5771 Sivan 19)
Caroline B. Glick _Jewish World Review_
Obummer foreign policy shift?
"US defense spending comprises less than 5% of the federal budget."

2011-06-21 (5771 Sivan 19)
David S. Cloud & Christi Parsons _Jewish World Review_
10K US soldiers being recalled from Afghanistan... but not right now

2011-06-21 (5771 Sivan 19)
Ben Arnoldy & Tom A. Peter _Jewish World Review_
Why NATO and the Taliban are stepping up the fight just as diplomatic talks begin

2011-06-21 (5771 Sivan 19)
Frank J. Gaffney ii _Jewish World Review_
Determined disinterest in our own destruction
"we confront the Islamic doctrine known as Shariah and the Muslim Brotherhood, which serves as the principal engine for extending its reach.   It seems, however, that we have no counter-intelligence effort comparable to that of the Cold War or remotely commensurate with today's threat.   Indeed, based on the evidence of successful penetration and influence operations being run by the Muslim Brotherhood these days, one would be tempted to conclude that counter-intelligence has effectively ceased to be part of our tool kit in keeping America safe and free."
Investigative Project: CAIR-Hamas-Muslim Brotherhood links
Discover the Networks: Muslim Brotherhood (MB)

2011-06-21 (5771 Sivan 19)
Thomas Sowell _Jewish World Review_
Missing Money
"Their anger should be directed instead against those politicians who were irresponsible enough to set up these costly programs without putting aside enough money to pay for the promises that were made -- promises that now cannot be kept, regardless of which political party controls the government.   Someone needs to say to those who want [Socialist Insecurity] and Medicare to continue on unchanged: 'Don't you understand? The money is not there any more.'   Many retired people remember the money that was taken out of their pay-checks for years and feel that they are now entitled to receive [Socialist Insecurity] benefits as a right.   But the way [Socialist Insecurity] was set up was so financially shaky that anyone who set up a similar retirement scheme in the private sector could be sent to federal prison for fraud.   But you can't send a whole Congress to prison, however much they may deserve it.   This is not some newly discovered problem. Innumerable economists and others pointed out decades ago that [Socialist Insecurity] was unsustainable in the long run, including yours truly on 'Meet the Press' in 1981."
 
Proposed Bills 2011
 
 

2011-06-22

2011-06-21 21:10PDT (2011-06-22 00:10EDT) (2011-06-22 04:10GMT) (31:10Jerusalem)
Daniel Wagner _BusinessWeek_
Bankers say, after infusions of hundreds of billions from US tax-victims and lavish bonuses for their executives, that their recovery is ahead of the general economy

2011-06-22 05:04PDT (08:04EDT) (12:04GMT) (15:04Jerusalem)
Toni Bowers _Tech Republic_/_Ziff Davis_/_CBS_
Weirdest job requirements

2011-06-22 08:33PDT (11:33EDT) (15:33GMT) (18:33Jerusalem)
Patrick Thibodeau _ComputerWorld_/_IDG_
Reasonable visa restrictions could put a major cramp in Indian cross-border bodyshopping/off-shoring business model

2011-06-22 09:30PDT (12:30EDT) (16:30GMT) (19:30Jerusalem)
Andrew Nusca _Ziff Davis_/_CBS_
Apple awarded patent for lame touch-screen gesture-based GUI action on mobile devices

2011-06-22
John Hawkins _Town Hall_
Give leftists these 10 things they say they want
"1) There are far too many people in our prisons who have been failed by our society.   That certainly isn't their fault.   That's why we need to release a few million prisoners into halfway houses in [leftist] neighborhoods.
 
2) America needs to lead the way in alternative energy; so it should be illegal for [leftists] to power their homes with anything other than windmills and solar energy.   On the upside, since this will mean a lot of time in the dark, these [leftists] will gain the added bonus of being able to get back to nature.
 
3) Bodyguards for [leftist] politicians, celebrities, and athletes shouldn't be able to use guns.   After all, people don't kill people; guns kill people -- so by removing the guns from those bodyguards, those people will be safer than ever!
 
4) We do need to make sure that everyone gets a 'working wage'.   So, let's raise the minimum wage to $100 an hour.   We can start by raising the salaries of chauffeurs, gardeners, nannies, cooks, and maids in Hollywood and expand from there until we all make at least $100 an hour and will thus, be rich! But wait....if we were all rich, then we'd all be exploitive and evil....ah, that's something to figure out in the next column.
 
5) We do need to bring illegal aliens 'out of the shadows', which is why any illegal aliens captured in America who aren't immediately deported should be shipped to Berkeley or San Francisco, where they can live in peace, use the schools, and collect government benefits until their trials...well, if they show up for their trials...
 
6) Union labor is important, which is why [leftist] businesses should be legally obligated to ONLY use unionized labor.   Granted, that might mean long delays, their competitors dramatically under-cutting them on costs, or even going out of business, but wouldn't that be worth it for those people if they got to put more money in the pockets of union members?
 
7) Fairness is very important.   That's why we need to apply the Fairness Doctrine to newspaper editorial pages, MSNBC, Current TV, [DailyKos, Netroots Nation, OpEdNews, NPR, CPB], and the Huffington Post..."

2011-06-22 07:15PDT (10:15EDT) (14:15GMT) (17:15Jerusalem)
_Joint Economic Committee_
Does the US government need a "manufacturing strategy"?
JEC site

2011-06-22
Thomas E. Brewton & Robert Curry _View from 1776_
John Locke's influence on the founding of the USA
"A philosopher may be a perfect master of Descartes and Leibniz, may pursue his own metaphysical inquiries to any length, may enter into the innermost recesses of the human mind, and make the noblest discoveries for the benefit of his species; nay, he may defend the principles of liberty and the rights of mankind with great abilities and success; and, after all, when called upon to produce a plan of legislation, he may astonish the world with a signal absurdity." --- John Adams
"James Madison, too, was not overawed by Locke's constitutional authority.   Locke first made his mark with the publication of Letters on Toleration in 1689.   By 1776 the young James Madison, though a very junior member of the committee that wrote the constitution for Virginia, was ready to argue against the Lockean notion of religious toleration.   He won the committee over to a view that was based on a critique of Locke's thinking, a critique developed by the thinkers of the Scottish Enlightenment."

2011-06-22
Don Surchych _Sonoran News_
The federal government has deliberately allowed continued invasion by illegal aliens
"The hostile reaction to state senate president Russell Pearce by illegal aliens is both predictable and understandable.   He wants illegals out of the state and they want the luxuries of the United States without earning it.   The federal government has deliberately allowed continued invasion by illegal aliens and the annual estimated net cost, exclusive of taxes they pay, is $113G.   Arizona spends $2.5G annually, thanks to their illegal residency here.   Without them we would have a balanced budget."

2011-06-22
William L. Anderson
NYTimes thinks WM is evil

2011-06-22
Keith Herron
time management for recovering sys admins

2011-06-22 (5771 Sivan 20)
Mary Helen Miller _Jewish World Review_
USA is not losing its technological edge
"the US has plenty of technical workers and American students have not slipped in science, math over the past 15 years, studies show...   Amid some $40G in budget cuts in April, Congress decided to preserve a favorite -- education programs for science, technology, engineering, and math. 'STEM' programs...   the pipe-line of US math and science students to fill future positions has not deteriorated in terms of international competitiveness in the past 15 years.   'Every time we look at these shortage claims, we can't find them.', says Hal Salzman, a public policy expert at Rutgers University in New Brunswick, NJ...   Claus von Zastrow, chief operating officer of Change the Equation, a STEM education advocacy group...of more than 100 CEOs that formed last year to focus effective philanthropy and change standardized testing of STEM subjects at the state level...   Although the USA has dropped slightly in its share of the world's technical publications and cited work, 'on the whole the evidence did not support that we had a shortage of STEM workers in the economy', says James Hosek, a researcher at the RAND Corp. in Santa Monica, CA, and coauthor with RAND's Titus Galama of a 2008 study on the issue.   In fact, data show that the US accounts for 40% of the entire world's research and development spending, and it increased that spending more than any other region between 1993 and 2003.   Between 1983 and 2007, the percentage of the work-force in science and engineering occupations grew from 2.6% to 4.3%.   The number of graduates in the STEM fields exceeds the number of people who end up working in those fields.   Those are healthy signs for the US, since there does seem to be a correlation between the size of a country's scientific work-force and its economic growth, according to a 2000 study by 3 Stanford University and University of California, Irvine, professors."

2011-06-22 (5771 Sivan 20)
Borzou Daragahi _Jewish World Review_
Iran's Ahmadinejad again facing humiliation at home

2011-06-22 (5771 Sivan 20)
Walter E. Williams _Jewish World Review_
America's New Racists
"Black silence in the face of black racism has to be one of the biggest betrayals of the civil rights struggle that included black and white Americans."
 
Proposed Bills 2011
 
 

2011-06-23

2011-06-23 (5771 Sivan 21)
Linda Tucci _Search CIO_
Weak economy is re-defining domestic IT bodyshopping. But does it pay?
"The economic viability of domestic [bodyshopping] is likely to resonate increasingly with CIOs because of issues that go beyond costs, experts say.   One reason is U.S. politicians' concern about high unemployment, said Ron Hira, associate professor of public policy at the Rochester Institute of Technology in New York.   'That [concern] can affect CIOs in a couple of ways.   If it is a federal or state contract that they are subbing out to somebody, there will be a preference probably for domestic out-sourcing or less risk for back-lash.', Hira said.   'There also will be better tax incentives and other types of grants to make that domestic out-sourcing more favorable for the business-case point of view.'...   Indian wages are rising 10% to 15% annually in the face of increasing demand in India for IT services, and attrition levels are high...   'They are not able to replace people; nor do they want to' [Thomas Young, formerly finance director at AT&T Labs and now partner and managing director at the bodyshopping advisory firm TPI Inc.] said, because of the high over-head associated with full-time employees, such as pension benefits."

2011-06-23 (5771 Sivan 21)
Matt Smith _San Francisco CA Weekly_
How to tell whether your boss plans to replace you with an H-1B guest-worker

2011-06-23 (5771 Sivan 21)
John W. Schoen _MSFTNBC_
"Skilled" positions going unfilled for lack of "qualified" applicants
"Despite an unemployment rate of 9.1% in May, nearly 3M job openings went unfilled -- up from roughly 2.1M went the recession ended in 2009 June. To be sure, there aren't nearly enough jobs for the roughly 15M Americans..."

2011-06-23 (5771 Sivan 21)
Jared Bernstein _Christian Science Monitor_
immigration and US job markets
Jared Bernstein

2011-06-23 (5771 Sivan 21)
_Sky News_
Obummer: 33K troops to be withdrawn from Afghanistan by election day 2012 (with map)

2011-06-23 05:30PDT (08:30EDT) (12:30GMT) (15:30Jerusalem)
Scott Gibbons & Tony Sznoluch _DoL ETA_
un-employment insurance weekly claims report
DoL home page
DoL OPA press releases
historical data
DoL regulations
"The advance number of actual initial claims under state programs, unadjusted, totaled 394,925 in the week ending June 18, a decrease of 5,683 from the previous week.   There were 427,080 initial claims in the comparable week in 2010.   The advance unadjusted insured unemployment rate was 2.8% during the week ending June 11, unchanged from the prior week.   The advance unadjusted number for persons claiming UI benefits in state programs totaled 3,475,301, a decrease of 12,192 from the preceding week.   A year earlier, the rate was 3.4% and the volume was 4,306,402.   The total number of people claiming benefits in all programs for the week ending June 4 was 7,538,448, an increase of 137,220 from the previous week.   Extended benefits were available in AL, AK, AZ, CA, CO, CT, DE, DC, FL, GA, ID, IL, IN, KS, KY, ME, MA, MI, MN, MO, NV, NJ, NM, NY, NC, OH, OR, PA, RI, SC, TN, TX, WA, and WV, during the week ending June 4.   States reported 3,299,235 persons claiming EUC (Emergency Unemployment Compensation) benefits for the week ending June 4, an increase of 5,728 from the prior week.   There were 4,727,008 claimants in the comparable week in 2010.   EUC weekly claims include first, second, third, and fourth tier activity.   [Note that the population used for calculating the "insured unemployment rate" changes
to 132,623,886 beginning 2007-10-06;
to 133,010,953 beginning 2008-01-05;
to 133,382,559 beginning 2008-04-05;
to 133,690,617 beginning 2008-07-05;
to 133,902,387 beginning 2008-10-04;
to 133,886,830 beginning 2009-01-03;
to 133,683,433 beginning 2009-04-04;
to 133,078,480 beginning 2009-07-04;
to 133,823,421 beginning 2009-10-03;
to 131,823,421 beginning 2009-10-17;
to 130,128,328 beginning 2010-01-02;
to 128,298,468 beginning 2010-04-03;
to 126,763,245 beginning 2010-07-03;
to 125,845,577 beginning 2010-09-25;
to 125,560,066 beginning 2011-01-15;
to 125,572,661 beginning 2011-04-02.]
EUC (Excel)
EB
graphs
more graphs

2011-06-23 (5771 Sivan 21)
Steven A. Camarota _Center for Immigration Studies_
Un-employment and Under-employment in 2011Q1

2011-06-23 11:46:05PDT (14:46:05EDT) (18:46:05GMT) (21:46:05Jerusalem)
_San Jose CA Mercury News_
Sili Valley economic indicators

2011-06-23 (5771 Sivan 21)
Donna Healy _Billings MT Gazette_
Paths to US citizenship remain wide open as new citizens enjoy their day in court

2011-06-23 (5771 Sivan 21)
Victor Davis Hanson _Town Hall_
Department of Food Subsidies
Northern OH Morning Journal
St. Augustine FL
Patriot Post
Richmond VA Times-Dispatch
Real Clear Politics
Jewish World Review
"Net farm income is expected in 2011 to reach its highest levels in more than 3 decades, as a rapidly growing and food-short world increasingly looks to the United States to provide it everything from soybeans and wheat to beef and fruit.   Somebody should explain that good news to the Department of Agriculture: This year it will give a record $20G in various crop 'supports' to the nation's wealthiest farmers -- with the richest 10% receiving over 70% of all the redistributive payouts.   If farmers on their own are making handsome profits, why, with a $1.6T annual federal deficit, is the Department of Agriculture borrowing unprecedented amounts to subsidize them? At least $5G will be in direct cash pay-outs.   Yet no one in the USDA can explain why cotton and soybeans are subsidized, but not lettuce or carrots.   In fact, 70% of all subsidies go to corn, wheat, cotton, rice and soybean farmers.   Most other farmers receive no federal cash.   Yet somehow peach, melon and almond growers seem to be doing fine without government checks in the mail.   Then there is the more than $5G in ethanol subsidies...   In a brilliantly conceived devil's bargain, the Department of Agriculture gives welfare to the wealthy OT1H, while on the other sending more than $70G to the lower income brackets in food stamps...   2011 could be another sort of record year for the Agriculture Department, as it may achieve an all-time high in subsidizing 47M Americans on food stamps -- nearly one-sixth of the country.   If 30 years ago the public had sympathy for the strapped family who pulled out clumsy paper coupons to buy essentials like rice and bread at the checkout line, today it is often turned off by the now common spectacle in our superstores of plastic government credit cards being used for food purchases -- freeing up the shopper's cash for another basket of snacks, alcohol and other non-essential goods."

2011-06-23 (5771 Sivan 21)
Steven Emerson _Jewish World Review_
CAIR lost 501(c)(3) tax-exempt status after failing for 3 years to file required annual form 990 reports detailing their revenues and expenses
Clarion Project: Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR)
Investigative Project: CAIR-Hamas-Muslim Brotherhood links
Discover the Networks: Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR)
anti-CAIR
Discover the Networks: Muslim Brotherhood (MB)

2011-06-23 (5771 Sivan 21)
Malia Politzer & Surabhi Agarwarl _LiveMint_
B-1 business visitor visa holders in demand on job portals, but they're not work visas
 
Proposed Bills 2011
 
 

2011-06-24

2011-06-23 18:04PDT (2011-06-23 21:04EDT) (2011-06-24 01:04GMT) (04:04Jerusalem)
Dave Gibson _Examiner_
ICE agents warn Americans "to brace themselves for what's coming" as result of Obummer's declared "back-door amnesty" policies
Marcos Restrepo: Florida Independent
ICE union/UBM/PR News Wire

2011-06-24 03:55PDT (06:55EDT) (10:55GMT) (13:55Jerusalem)
Larry M. Elkin _Wall Street Pit_
Why a Nobel prize is not enough
"President Obama nominated Diamond to serve as one of the seven governors of the Fed in 2010 April.   Diamond was renominated in September, and again in January.   On each occasion, his nomination was blocked in committee, and he never received a full Senate vote...   Of course, winning a Nobel Prize is no easy feat, but the honor does not automatically qualify anyone for high public office.   Diamond, and perhaps a few other laureates, might assume that the Founding Fathers would have given confirmation power to the Nobel Committee if it had existed in 1789, but I doubt it.   In any case, such power is vested in the Senate...   In reality, however, the senators did not focus on whether Diamond has contributed compelling work to the field, but on whether his theories, as they might be translated into policy, would benefit the country.   This is a very different matter from assessing his academic accomplishments.   Far from demonstrating a lack of understanding of monetary policy, the senators who opposed Diamond's nomination did so largely on policy grounds.   Diamond, who specializes in labor dynamics, is a vocal advocate of high levels of stimulus spending and quantitative easing to help lower the unemployment rate.   He supports these policies despite the fact that others believe that they could produce runaway inflation and leave the country unable to service its debts.   senator Mike Johanns, R-NB, who initially supported Diamond but later reversed his vote, explained, 'I can no longer support a nominee so vocally in favor of more spending, more stimulus, and more quantitative easing.'...   Though they rejected him for his reasoning, Senate Republicans would have been fully justified in dismissing him for his arrogance as well...   Such opportunities include the right to believe that his high honor certifies him as smarter or wiser than those who disagree with his priorities.   I will take this opportunity to wish him many years of congeniality in academia, where he can remind his less-congenial peers whenever he likes that he is a Nobel laureate."

2011-06-24 04:43PDT (07:43EDT) (11:43GMT) (14:43Jerusalem)
Eric Pfahler _Treasure Coast FL Palm_
Small business owners, economic "leaders" discuss region's out-look
"Look at what you pay at the grocery store.   All of a sudden a one-pound package is now 12 ounces, but you're still paying the same.   And we see it in our business.   The price of tires, the price of oil has crept up probably 20%-25% in the last 12 months, and that's a lot.   That's a lot for the average family.   Tires are not a purchase any more -- they're an investment.   You pay $1,000 to $1,200 for a set of tires on an average automobile, and you'd better hope they last for 3 years because like I said, they're an investment...   Andy Beindorf:...I think, (we) are in the top 5 in unemployment rate in the country.   We're in probably the top 3 in mortgage delinquencies in the country.   We're in the top 3 in foreclosures in the country, and it takes 600 days for a bank to actually perfect a foreclosure in the sense of where we stand...   Ed Massey: At a time when there is a recession, people are laid off...   So our enrollment has gone up drastically, double-digits for about the last 3 years in the growth at the college.   The problem with that is the state money and the support of course is going down.   So our big problem internally is managing an increased enrollment and keeping the doors open and classes open and keeping the diversity of classes that people are requesting available at a time when the federal money is going down and the state money is going down...   The people who are out of work, they need to come back, they need to get training...   If we can't keep the doors open and keep the access, then they cannot get the training.   Therefore, they cannot search for new jobs.   I'd say our biggest challenge is access...   Bonnie Turk: The (restaurant) in Fort Pierce that we just remodeled, (Fort Pierce Utilities Authority) wanted a $5K deposit.   That's a lot of money to come up for me because on top of everything else, it cost us over $1,500 to put a shed 6 inches in the variance."

2011-06-24 05:03PDT (08:03EDT) (12:03GMT) (15:03Jerusalem)
Jim Kouri _Examiner_
Is Obummer aiding illegal aliens in hopes of enabling them to vote for leftists?

2011-06-24 05:39PDT (08:39EDT) (12:39GMT) (15:39Jerusalem)
Eric Pfahler _Treasure Coast FL Palm_
People are doing whatever it takes to get a job
"Some Treasure Coast residents are doing whatever it takes to find a job.   That could mean sending out hundreds of resumes or applying for jobs that require far different skills or much lower pay than the position an individual previously held.   When applying to multiple locations, many job seekers apply to at least some small businesses simply because they make up the majority of businesses in the area.   According to the Agency for Workforce Innovation, about 26% of employees in the region, which includes the Treasure Coast and Okeechobee county, work for businesses with 19 or fewer employees, Workforce Solutions spokeswoman Odaly Victorio said...   Allison O'Connor: Oh yes, our resumes, we were shocked.   We were getting former accountants, (certified nursing assistant), teachers, people that had lost their jobs and it was sad to hear.   Some of these people had a nice life prior, but it was, 'I'll do anything.   I'll wash your dishes.'   It was heart-breaking to hear..."

2011-06-24 07:11PDT (10:11EDT) (14:11GMT) (17:11Jerusalem)
Greg Robb _MarketWatch_
US durable-gods orders rose 1.9% in May

2011-06-24 09:04PDT (12:04EDT) (16:04GMT) (19:04Jerusalem)
Roger Harris _Knoxville TN News Sentinel_
U of TN student Gregg Rader won national economics title
contact Roger Harris

2011-06-24 14:47:53PDT (17:47:53EDT) (21:47:53GMT) (2011-06-25 00:47:53Jerusalem)
Seth Borenstein _San Jose CA Mercury News_/_AP_
Experimentation with varying AC frequencies may disrupt clocks and motors

2011-06-24 15:29PDT (18:29EDT) (22:29GMT) (2011-06-25 01:29Jerusalem)
Dave Gibson _Examiner_
ICE refusing to exercise due diligence
"Between Wednesday evening and Thursday morning, police in Beaver Meadows, PA, picked up 4 illegal aliens on traffic violations.   Immigration and Customs Enforcement refused to issue detainers on any of the suspects, so all were released...   On May 9, state and local officials in Pennsylvania held a press conference to announce their displeasure with Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), after the agency failed to issue a detainer on an illegal alien arrested the previous week by Beaver Meadows Police Chief Mike Morresi.   The suspect, Oswaldo Tlamis-Perez, 30, was pulled over by Chief Morresi on Route 93 for speeding.   When asked for his identification, the driver presented a Mexican voter registration card and ACCESS welfare benefit cards from two different states."

2011-06-24
William L. Anderson
If there is anything that Krugman hates, it is the presence of markets that are beyond government micro-management

2011-06-24
Alexander Wolfe _Design News_/_UBM_
Do Tough Employer Words Presage Better Engineering Employment?
"You and I both know that, truth be told, most engineers are more up to speed than the managers who lament their lack of hiring options.   Which is why I wasn't initially surprised to read the comments in the Financial Times Sunday from Siemens Corp. (US) CEO Eric Spiegel, who says the company is having a hard time finding staff, despite the US unemployment rate of more than 9%.   However, upon further investigation, and a back-and-forth with someone at the company, it turns out that Siemens is actually approaching this with an attitude that should improve perceptions about engineers, as well as their employment prospects...   US engineers are skilled and productive, buddy.   Our failing isn't a lack of technical acumen, nor the ability to readjust from analog to digital, COBOL to PHP, or integrated circuits to SoCs.   Our problems stem from letting scientifically illiterate others define us as geeks -- that's their fault -- and failing to emulate the powerful lobbying efforts of doctors and lawyers while we bicker over nits in irrelevant engineering societies -- that's our fault.   I was similarly fired up when I went to my Siemens contact to ask for more specifics on what Spiegel was referring to when he said that the workers he needs are hard to find."

2011-06-24
Joe Guzzardi _Summit AZ Daily News_
Arizona fires and the conspiracy of silence

2011-06-24
Stephen Brighton & Neil Tickner _U of MD_/_Eurekalert_/_AAAS_
Baltimore's Irish immigrants
"An archaeological team from the University of Maryland is unearthing a unique picture of the Baltimore-area's early Irish immigrants -- of city children taught to read and write at home before widespread public education and child labor laws, as well as insular rural residents who resisted assimilation for 100 years...   Now, Brighton's team has begun work excavating another Baltimore-area site -- a small settlement in Texas, MD that resisted adopting a more main-stream American life-style up to the Eisenhower years.   This is the third year Brighton's team has worked there...   Brighton and University of Maryland undergraduates participating in his archaeological field school spent the past 3 weeks digging behind the Irish Shrine in Baltimore -- 3 homes along Lemmon Street in Baltimore dating to the 1850s.   They stand across the street from the B&O Railroad Museum, once head-quarters of the line.   Most of the Lemmon Street immigrants performed semi- or unskilled labor for the B&O [co-founded by Scots-Irish senator John Pendleton Kennedy]...   'We're looking back at a period in American history well before child labor laws.', Brighton says.   'To have a large collection of toys from 2 working-class sites illustrates that many children, at least for a time, were allowed to be children.'"

2011-06-24
_Top 500_
vendors of fastest computers
fastest computers LinPack bench-Mark

2011-06-24 (5771 Sivan 22)
R' Berel Wein _Jewish World Review_
A biblical warning about populist "leaders"

2011-06-24 (5771 Sivan 22)
Caroline B. Glick _Jewish World Review_
Leftist American Jewish suckers
"As has become his habit, Obama opened his remarks by talking about his commitment to Israel's security. And as has become his habit, Obama went on to say that it is his job to force Israelis to bow to his demands because he knows what is best for Israel."
 
Proposed Bills 2011

2011-06-24

DJIA	11,934.58
S&P 500(SPX)	1,268.45
NASDAQ(COMP)	2,652.89
Nikkei	9,678.71
10-year US T-Bond(UST10Y)	2.68
crude oil(CL1Q)	$91.16/barrel
natgas(NG11N)	$4.23/MBTU
reformulatedgasoline(RB1N)	$2.78/gal
heatingoil(HO1N)	$2.75/gal
gold(GC1Q)	$1,500.90/ounce
silver(SI1N)	$34.64/ounce
platinum(PL1N)	$1,677.60/ounce
palladium(PA1U)	$731.50/ounce
copper(HGN11)	$0.25625/ounce
soybeans	$13.13/bushel
maize	$6.46/bushel
wheat	$6.735/bushel
dollarindex(DXY)	75.695
yenperdollar(USDYEN)	80.55
dollarspereuro(EURUSD)	$1.4165
dollarsperpound(GBPUSD)	$1.5974
swissfrancsperdollar	0.8335
indianrupeesperdollar	44.95
mexicanpesosperdollar(MXN)	11.9085
MorganStanleyHighTechIndex	626.93

I usually get this info from MarketWatch.
 
 
Proposed Bills 2011
 
 

2011-06-25

2011-06-25
Hugh Holub _Tucson AZ Citizen_
Drug smuggling mule trains and illegal aliens in the "secure" border-lands

2011-06-25
Mike McConnell _FAIR US_/_WGN_
interview of Dan Stein about low-skill H-1B visas (mp3)

2011-06-25
_YouTube_
2 Infosys execs join the whistle-blowing regarding visa abuses (video)
 
Proposed Bills 2011
 
 

2011-06-26

2011-06-25 20:10PDT (2011-06-25 23:10EDT) (2011-06-26 03:10GMT) (2011-06-26 06:10Jerusalem)
Jack Kelly _Bucks county PA Courier Times_
Obummer's view of the US constitution and laws: Ignore them 2011-06-25 21:05PDT (2011-06-26 00:05EDT) (2011-06-26 04:05GMT) (2011-06-26 07:05Jerusalem)
Jack Reeves _Daytona Beach FL News-Journal_
Often so-called cliches align with common sense

2011-06-26
_YouTube_
Who Broke America's Job Machine? (video)

2011-06-26
Cindy Uken _Billings MT Gazette_
Medical facilities stock up against pharmaceutical "shortages"
"medical facilities...hustle for costly alternative medications and to stock-pile drugs to ensure that patients remain safe and receive quality care...   Drug shortages cost U.S. hospitals at least $200M annually, in part because providers pay an average of 11% more for shortage products, according to a report from Premier Healthcare Alliance, a performance improvement alliance of more than 2,500 U.S. hospitals.   As the 6-year-old shortage grows more dire, it means increased prescription drug co-pays for patients and bigger financial burdens to insurance companies as hospitals, pharmacies and physicians scramble for coveted and costly substitutes.   For physicians, it means shelling out thousands of dollars up front to keep drugs on hand.   And for hospitals, it means eating costs they are prohibited from passing along to patients...   In 2010, more than 240 drugs were either in short supply or not available, according to a report from Premier Healthcare Alliance.   And, more than 400 generic drugs were back-ordered for more than five days.   Compounding the problem is that at least 89 new shortages were recorded through the end of March...   The biggest impact to Frontier Cancer Center has been financial, Dr. Patrick Cobb said.   The center, like others across the nation, has found it nearly impossible to secure a supply of a generic drug used primarily to treat colon cancer.   It sells for $75 per cycle.   The pricier name brand, seldom in short supply, sells for $2,250 per cycle, Cobb said...   Suppliers require payment before they will ship, so Cobb said he now shells out $10K for 5 cycles of the drug compared with $300 for the generic brand."

2011-06-26
Peter H. Milliken _Youngstown OH Vindicator_
9 year old federal court-house crumbling: under-going $1.3M in repairs

2011-06-26 07:06:50PDT (10:06:50EDT) (14:06:50GMT) (17:06:50Jerusalem)
Pete Carey _San Jose CA Mercury News_
a few young, foreign, niche tech workers with "flexible ethics" are in high demand in Sili Valley

2011-06-26
Robert Moore _Cenantua_
Tangents, and looking for intersections part2: John W. Saylor & the Jessie Scouts
 
Proposed Bills 2011
 
 

2011-06-27

2011-06-27 00:21PDT (03:21EDT) (07:21GMT) (10:21Jerusalem)
Brian Stelter _NYTimes_/_San Jose CA Mercury News_
In the age of the Internet, there's no privacy
"Now, it seems, it is the place where anonymity dies...   The collective [idiocy] of the Internet's 2G users, and the digital finger-prints that so many users leave on web-sites, combine to make it more and more likely that every embarrassing video, every intimate photo, and every indelicate e-mail is attributed to its source, whether that source wants it to be or not...   This erosion of anonymity is a product of pervasive social media services, cheap cell-phone cameras, free photo and video Web hosts, and perhaps most importantly of all a change in people's views about what ought to be public and what ought to be private.   Experts say that [evil, privacy violating] web-sites like FB, which require real identities and encourage the 'sharing' of photographs and videos, have hastened this change."

2011-06-27 08:00PDT (11:00EDT) (15:00GMT) (18:00Jerusalem)
Derek Thompson _Atlantic_
What's the Best Investment: Stocks, Bonds, Homes... or College?

2011-06-27 11:26PDT (14:26EDT) (18:26GMT) (21:26Jerusalem)
Jon Letzing _MarketWatch_
privacy hating Google gives personal private info user info to governments 94% of the time
"Google's compliance with 94% of the roughly 4,600 government requests for user data in the U.S.A. compared to 72% compliance with 1,162 requests made in the U.K., for example, 76% compliance with 1,804 requests in Brazil, and 90% compliance with 72 requests made in Japan."

2011-06-27
Josh Keller _Chronicle of Higher Education_
Universities moving from custom apps for each brand of mobile device to mobile-friendly web pages

2011-06-27
Courtney Comstock _Business Insider_
Goldman Sachs is firing employees in the USA so it can hire 1K in Singapore
"Goldman's planned lay-offs and off-shore hiring are exactly the opposite of what Washington wants of course.   Unemployment is already too high.   And off-shore hiring that's a result of something the government is requiring will result in head-lines that look bad for both Goldman and Washington.   So this news of the adverse effects that capital requirements will have on employment at Goldman Sachs should help the bankers' as they argue against the requirements in coming months.   That's why this looks like a political move to discourage Washington from adding capital requirements above the 7% that Basel III regulations will enforce."

2011-06-27
Jack Farchy _Financial Times of London_
Dollar seen losing "global reserve" status

211-06-27
Alex Newman _New American_
Jailed border agent Jesus Diaz denied bond; family speaks out

2011-06-27
Brian M. Kemp _Washington State U_/_Eurekalert_/_AAAS_
Under-grad researcher Sarah "Misa" Runnels shows direct DNA sequencing as accurate as cloned
"In 2000, researchers writing in the journal Science recommended a set of standards that emphasized cloning bits of ancient DNA to detect errors and contamination from modern DNA...   Runnells, who had learned to clone while majoring in bio-technology as a WSU under-graduate.   The 2 used both methods to analyze 3,500-year-old northern fur seal bones...   'After 5 samples with both cloning and direct sequencing, we got the same answer from both methods.', [she reported]...   Their findings even held up with one particularly degraded sample.   Cloning gave conflicting DNA sequences in the sample, while direct sequencing showed gaps in the code.   'In no case did the results of one method conflict with another.', says Kemp...   Direct sequencing can cost a fraction of cloning and be done in less time, says Kemp."

2011-06-27
William L. Anderson
Is Greece's over-spending creating prosperity? Hardly

2011-06-27 (5771 Sivan 25)
Stephen L. Carter _Jewish World Review_
Lost in Afghanistan?
"A Yale University law professor argues that Obama would rather not talk about military victory. And that choice is as telling as it is troubling."

2011-06-27 (5771 Sivan 25)
Hannah Allam _Jewish World Review_
In Egypt, a stealthy campaign is under way for radical Islamic wins in parliamentary elections later this year
"Islamist leaders say the work is simply charity, a formalization of their long-standing service projects.   But moderate and liberal political rivals consider the Salfis' charity to be part of a stealthy campaign for big Islamist wins in parliamentary elections later this year, and the Islamists themselves acknowledge inspiration from the electoral successes of other regional Islamist factions with charity wings: Hezbollah in Lebanon, Hamas in Gaza and the Justice and Development Party in Turkey, for example...   Egyptian liberals, moderates and Coptic Christians are likewise terrified that Islamist parties would use elected office to reverse the revolution's efforts to improve human rights, the status of women, and provide freedom of religion and expression."
 
Proposed Bills 2011
 
 

2011-06-28

2011-06-28
_Lexology_
State Dept. responded to Grassley inquiry regarding abuse of B-1 visa as substitute for H-1B
"The DoS has responded to concerns raised by senator Charles E. Grassley (R-IA) about the misuse of the 'B-1 in lieu of H-1B' provision by foreign employers to send low-skilled and low-wage workers to the United States on a B-1 visa in order to avoid the H-1B visa cap and prevailing wage restrictions.   The provision, set forth in the Foreign Affairs Manual [but not in law], allows foreign workers, who should be entering on an H-1B visa, to obtain a B-1 visa if they are employed by a foreign company who is paying them to work at a U.S. client of that foreign company...   DoS responded that they are working with DHS to decide whether to amend or eliminate the policy, and noted that any change decided upon will not be implemented for some time."

2011-06-28
Denise Dick _Youngstown OH Vindicator_
Chaney HS hiring STEM and arts consultants
"The STEM consultant is Pam Lubich of Niles whose resume shows she has worked as the STEM supervisor at the Trumbull County Educational Service Center since 1996.   Her summer salary will not exceed $13K...   The district is still in the process of selecting a principal for Chaney.   The position was initially posted in March with an $81,088 annual salary.   'The STEM and VPA coordinator will work with the teachers to infuse STEM/VPA activities into the curriculum, assure that the program has the appropriate technology and dance/music experiences and conduct professional development for teachers.', Karen Ingraham, district communication director, said in an e-mail...   'finding a principal with in-depth experience in both STEM and VPA would be nearly impossible', Ingraham's e-mail said.   As part of a districtwide restructuring plan, Chaney will change this Fall to a STEM and Visual/Performing Arts school for students in grades 6 through 12.   About 330 students are expected to attend the school during its inaugural year and had to complete auditions or applications to be selected."

2011-06-28
Tom Lutey _Billings MT Gazette_
Leftist ranchers complain of unfair trade practices in the meat industry
"Livestock producers who supported Obama in 2008 said recently the president needs to pull the trigger soon on regulations intended to give ranchers more bargaining power when dealing with meat-packers.   The reforms empowering the Grains Inspection, Packers and Stockyards Administration to do more for ranchers were drafted one year ago and are now losing congressional support...   At issue is the way the nation's largest meat-packers buy cattle.   Ranchers say too often meat-packers are making private sale arrangements, both between themselves and with individual cattle operations.   And when sales are private, other ranchers [they claim] can never quite be sure they're getting as good a deal.   It would be fairer to ranchers, said Bill Bullard, of the Ranchers-Cattlemen Action Legal Fund, United Stockgrowers of America, if the private sales arrangements were made public.   He suspects ranchers selling cattle publicly in auction houses would begin asking considerably more for their cattle if the meat-packer deals made in private were exposed.   As it is, the number of sales done publicly is declining, which is bad for competition, Bullard said.   'In our cattle industry in 2005, about 52% of all cattle were sold in a cash market.   In 2010 that fell nationally to just 37%.', Bullard said.   'The packers can pick up residual need supplies without having to competitively bid for cattle in a cash market.'   The new rules would make it easier for a rancher who believes he's been harmed by such practices to call for government intervention.   Currently, before the government will intervene in a market fairness issue, ranchers must prove a meat-packer's business practices caused competitive injury to the entire market-place.   The rules proposed last year would lower the bar, requiring the rancher prove only his own operation was treated unfairly.   RCALF-USA, based in Billings, supports the change.   However, an equally large number of ranchers have sided with the meat-packing industry in attempting to keep the proposed rule changes off the books.   The National Cattlemen's Beef Association earlier this month persuaded the House of Representatives to cut off all funding for the regulations from the 2012 budget funding agriculture, rural development and the Food and Drug Administration [FDA]...   Any rancher involved in a private sale has done so of his own volition and has probably spent years developing livestock to a buyer's specific wants, Donald said."

2011-06-28
_abc_/_AP_
Conference Board: consumer confidence down in June
Knoxville TN News Sentinel/Scripps
"Consumers' assessment of the job market was also less favorable.   Those stating jobs are 'hard to get' increased to 43.8% from 43.5%, while those stating jobs are 'plentiful' decreased to 5.2% from 5.7%."

2011-06-28
Mary Jander, Michael Singer, Kim Davis & Nicole Ferraro _Internet Evolution_
Business/professional ethics on the web
"Invading user privacy.   Stuffing terms of service agreements with hidden catches.   Poor monitoring of on-line forums.   Seeding social networks with good news about your company.   Bad-mouthing the competition in the guise of users on social sites.   Black hat SEO...   Known as RFC 1087, the IAB's policies listed unethical Internet behavior as 'any activity which purposely... seeks to gain unauthorized access to the resources of the Internet... disrupts the intended use of the Internet... wastes resources... destroys the integrity of computer-based information, and/or... compromises the privacy of users'."
Nicole Ferraro: Evaluating enterprise ethics

2011-06-28 09:11PDT (12:11EDT) (16:11GMT) (19:11Jerusalem)
Paul Ivice _Treasure Coast FL Palm_
Aegis holding cattle-call for 500 positions in their call center in Port St. Lucie across from Digial Domain

2011-06-28
"bfjdilbert" _TechsUnite_
US citizen families harmed by broken immigration system stone-walled by Obummer and congress-critters

2011-06-28
James Bowman _American Spectator_
In Our Bitter World

2011-06-28
Jeffrey Lord _American Spectator_
A Question of Ethics
"And what do the attackers have in common?   That's right.   A tie to funding from George Soros.   And a false claim of 'non-partisanship'.   Which is to say, a lie...   From media projects and interest groups to think tanks, George Soros is on the dime with lots of dimes, as documented by Dan Gainor here and 'Liberty Chick' (don't you love the blogosphere?) over at Andrew Breitbart's Big Journalism site."

2011-06-28
William L. Anderson
Federal government loan guarantees helped get us into trouble

2011-06-28 (5771 Sivan 26)
Ben Arnoldy _Jewish World Review_
Taliban using young girls in suicide bombings

2011-06-28 (5771 Sivan 26)
Michael Doyle _Jewish World Review_
Supremes ruled against CA on holocaust-era art

2011-06-28 (5771 Sivan 26)
Lawrence W. Reed _Jewish World Review_
The deficit people should think about most: Personal character
"Your character is not defined by what you say you believe.   It's defined by the choices you make.   History painfully records that when a people allow their personal character to dissipate, they become putty in the hands of tyrants and demagogues.   Such tyranny often takes the form of actual rulers, but it can also involve the serfdom of our nobler nature to a lord of lustful impulse.   Decadence can destroy democracy as surely as dictatorship.   Among the traits that define strong character are honesty, humility, responsibility, self-discipline, courage, self-reliance, and long-term thinking.   A free society is not possible without these traits in widespread practice.   When a person spurns his conscience and fails to do what he knows is right, he subtracts from his character.   When he evades his responsibilities, foists his problems and burdens on others, or fails to exert self-discipline; when he allows or encourages wrongdoing on any scale; when he attempts to reform the world without reforming himself first; when he obligates the yet-unborn to pay his current bills for him; when he expects politicians to solve problems that are properly his own business alone; he subtracts from his character -- and drags the rest of us down, too.   Mountainous debts, unconscionable deficits, irresponsible bailouts, and reckless spending: These are all economic problems because they sprang first from character problems.   Reform starts with recognition.   Not the easy kind that points out flaws in others, but the hard kind that reflects on, then roots out, errors in ourselves."

2011-06-28 (5771 Sivan 26)
Thomas Sowell _Jewish World Review_
July 4th Is Independence Day
"Not only did 1776 July 4 mark American independence from England, it marked a radically different kind of government from the governments that prevailed around the world at the time -- and the kinds of governments that had prevailed for thousands of years before.   The American Revolution was not simply a rebellion against the King of England, it was a rebellion against being ruled by kings in general.   That is why the opening salvo of the American Revolution [at Lexington, MA] was called 'the shot heard round the world'.   Autocratic rulers and their subjects heard that shot -- and things that had not been questioned for millennia were now open to challenge.   As the generations went by, more and more autocratic governments around the world proved unable to meet that challenge.   Some clever people today ask whether the United States has really been 'exceptional'.   You couldn't be more exceptional in the 18th century than to create your fundamental document -- the Constitution of the United States -- by opening with the momentous words, 'We the people...'   Those 3 words were a slap in the face to those who thought themselves entitled to rule, and who regarded the people as if they were simply human livestock, destined to be herded and shepherded by their betters.   Indeed, to this very day, elites who think that way -- and that includes many among the intelligentsia, as well as political messiahs -- find the Constitution of the United States a real pain because it stands in the way of their imposing their will and their presumptions on the rest of us.   More than a hundred years ago, so-called 'Progressives' began a campaign to undermine the Constitution's strict limitations on government, which stood in the way of self-anointed political crusaders imposing their grand schemes on all the rest of us.   That effort to discredit the Constitution continues to this day, and the arguments haven't really changed much in a hundred years...   A constitution exists to create a framework for government -- and the Constitution of the United States tries to keep the government inside that framework...   Does the Constitution matter? If it doesn't, then your Freedom doesn't matter."
 
Proposed Bills 2011
 
 

2011-06-29

2011-06-29 13:11PDT (16:11EDT) (20:11GMT) (23:11Jerusalem)
Hannah G. Vickers _Medill_/_MarketWatch_
senate commerce committee debating consumer privacy and data security

2011-06-29
Paul Chesser _American Spectator_
Elite science's selective outrage
"Today the board of directors of American Association for the Advancement of Science [AAAS] announced they'd had enough of scrutiny of the pioneers of global warming propagandism, particularly when it comes to the work of Climategater Michael Mann and the hockey stick chart he made up (flat-lining the Medieval Warming Period) when he was at the University of Virginia, and also the outside wealth-making of NASA star-gazer Dr. James Hansen.   In particular they took my organization, American Tradition Institute, to task for asking for records of the aforementioned scientists, and the formerly main-stream media unsurprisingly rushed to amplify the AAASes' message.   The delicate flower from the New York Times who called our Christopher Horner was particularly off-put by his likening the situation to Hollywood's defense of Roman Polanski.   Specifically, the board of AAASes said they objected to personal attacks on climate [anti-scientists]..."

2011-06-29 17:14PDT (2011-06-29 20:14EDT) (2011-06-30 00:14GMT) (2011-06-30 03:14Jerusalem)
Darlene Hill _Fox_
Rahm Emanuel, Clinton, Geithner demonstrate their isolation from reality at job summit
"Rahm Emanuel told the crowd that there are more than 120K jobs right here in the Chicago area alone, but try throwing that number around at an unemployment office.   'Oh no.   No.   No.   There's no jobs like that.   I mean, I wouldn't be coming to the unemployment office right now if that were the case.', job seeker Jeanette Kennedy said.   Jasmine Cook said she's tired of the job search and dealing with the state's unemployment agency...   If the 120K [alleged] job openings were filled, the state's unemployment rate would still be 4%."

2011-06-29
Thomas E. Brewton & Robert Curry _View from 1776_
The Scottish Enlightenment and America's Founding: The View from Windsor Castle
"John Knox, the Martin Luther of the Scottish Reformation, founded the Presbyterian Church in 1560-1561.   Long before the Founders began to make their argument for popular sovereignty, he preached popular sovereignty as a matter of doctrine.   Political authority, Knox and the Presbyterians believed, ultimately belonged to the people.   According to Knox, the people had the right to choose those who would manage their political affairs, and it was the people's right to remove them at will.   Knox famously treated the sequence of monarchs with whom he had to deal during his life-time with undisguised impatience and contempt, and the Kirk was often at odds with the monarchy...   We know that Madison was steeped in the Scottish tradition.   His education was so strongly Scottish in its character that he even spoke French with a Scottish accent, and Princeton, his alma mater, had been founded by the Presbyterians to provide for the education of their American clergy.   Because of Madison's involvement with what Garry Wills calls the 'Princeton/Presbyterian network', we know that Madison was very familiar with the workings of the Presbyterian ministry."

2011-06-29
Julie Kirchner _FAIR US_
Senate committee bars US citizens from hearing room, while escorting streams of illegal aliens in for discussion of NIGHTMARE act

2011-06-29
Thomas E. Brewton _View from 1776_
Why prices may rise even faster when business revives
2011-06-23: Robert Higgs: The Continuing Puzzle of the Hyper-Inflation that Has Not Yet Shown Itself in Prices
2011-06-26: Robert Higgs: Money versus Monetary Base: A Basic Yet Critical Distinction

2011-06-29
Joe Guzzardi _Jersey Journal_
Birth tourism fraud exposed in Chines main-stream media
"A pregnant woman's journey from a remote village in China to an American birthing center is geographically long and arduous.   But skilled middlemen well-schooled in the loopholes of U.S. immigration policy can make her travels much easier.   The woman's mission, to deliver an American-born child with all the privileges associated with citizenship status, is a priceless commodity that makes whatever risks she may take worthwhile...   According to the Shanghai couple, a former marketing director and a former television producer, they have helped between 500 and 600 mothers give birth to American babies since 2005."

2011-06-29
James DeVitt _NYU_/_Eurekalert_/_AAAS_
Homo erectus
"Homo erectus is widely considered a direct human ancestor—it resembles modern humans in many respects, except for its smaller brain and differently shaped skull—and was the first of our ancestors to migrate out of Africa, approximately 1.8M years ago.   Homo erectus went extinct in Africa and much of Asia by about 500K years ago, but appeared to have survived in Indonesia until about 35K to 50K years ago at the site of Ngandong on the Solo River.   These late members of Homo erectus would have shared the environment with early members of our own species, Homo sapiens, who arrived in Indonesia by about 40K years ago...   However, findings by the SoRT Project show that Homo erectus' time in the region ended before modern humans arrived [in Indoneisa].   The analyses suggest that Homo erectus was gone by at least 143K years ago -- and likely by more than 550K years ago.   This means the demise of Homo erectus occurred long before the arrival of Homo sapiens...   The team applied two different dating techniques to the sites.   Like earlier work, they used the techniques -- U-series and Electron Spin Resonance, or ESR -- that are applied to fossilized teeth.   They also used a technique called argon-argon dating that is applied to volcanic minerals in the sediments.   All 3 methods use radioactive decay in different ways to assess age and all yielded robust and methodologically valid results, but the ages were inconsistent with one another.   The argon-argon results yielded highly precise ages of about 550K years old on pumices -- very light, porous volcanic products found at Ngandong and Jigar...   By contrast, the oldest of the U-series and ESR ages, which were conducted at Australian National University by Rainer Grün, are just 143K years...   The National Science Foundation [NSF] sponsored field and laboratory work by the Solo River Terrace Project."

2011-06-29
"FrauTech"
engineering employment over time

2011-06-29
Robert Moore _Cenantua_
How blindly do we honor those who died in the Civil War?: "French Bill" Loge

2011-06-29 (5771 Sivan 27)
Jonathan Tobin _Jewish World Review_
Law-Suit Threat Slows Launch of Terrorist-Aid Flotilla

2011-06-29 (5771 Sivan 27)
Anna Mulrine _Jewish World Review_
At Obummer's pentagon, "be all that you can be" is becoming "dress for success" as appearances begin to edge out substance
"In the aftermath of the 2001/09/11 attacks, Pentagon-based soldiers began wearing their camouflage uniforms.   It was one way of signaling that though not all forces were deployed to the conflicts overseas, the entire US military was at war.   It was then-Army chief of staff general Peter Schoomaker's intent after he took the job in 2003 to 'get people to realize that we are in combat', says the US Army's top non-commissioned officer, sergeant-major Raymond Chandler -- and that the war 'wasn't going to get done with anytime soon'.   The current Army chief of staff, general Martin Dempsey, decided that starting in July Army troops at the Pentagon will wear their BDUs -- or battle dress uniforms -- considered business attire for troops...   This marks a key movement away from 'this muddy boots culture that has pervaded everything' in the US military, says retired colonel Charles Allen, professor of cultural science at the US Army War College in Carlisle, PA."

2011-06-29 (5771 Sivan 27)
Ambrosia Viramontes-Brody _USC_
in memoriam: John Hospers, Ph.D. 1918-2011
b: 1918-06-09 in Pella, Iowa d: 211-06-12 in Los Angeles, CA
Ludwig von Mises Institute
Daniel Sayani: New American: champion of liberty
EveriPedia
Jane O'Grady: Manchester Guardian

2011-06-29 (5771 Sivan 27)
Walter E. Williams _Jewish World Review_
Ignorance, Stupidity or Manipulation
GOP USA
Richmond VA Times-Dispatch
"Let's look at the origin of the three-fifths clause.   Northern delegates to the 1787 Constitutional Convention and those opposed to slavery wished to count only free people of each state for the purpose of representation in the House of Representatives and the Electoral College.   Southerners wanted to count slaves just as any other person.   By counting slaves, who didn't have a right to vote, slave states would have had greater representation in the House and the Electoral College.   If slaveholding states could not have counted slaves, the Constitution would not have been ratified and there would not be a union.   The compromise was for slaves to be counted as three-fifths of a person in deciding representation in the House and Electoral College.   The compromise reduced the power of slave states relative to the South's original proposal but increased it over the North's original proposal...   Here's my hypothesis about people who use slavery to trash the Founders: They have contempt for our constitutional guarantees of liberty.   Slavery is merely a convenient moral posturing tool as they try to reduce respect for our Constitution."

2011-06-29 (5771 Sivan 27)
Thomas Sowell _Jewish World Review_
Is a constitutional democratic republic viable?
"Iran continues advancing toward creating a nuclear bomb, and nobody is doing anything that is likely to stop them.   Nuclear weapons in the hands of the world's leading sponsor of international terrorism might seem to be something that would sober up even the most giddy members of the chattering class...   A society that cannot or will not focus on matters of life and death is a society whose survival as a free nation is at least questionable.   Hard as it may be to conceive how the kind of world that one has been used to, and taken for granted, can come to an end, it can happen in the life-time of today's generation.   Those who founded the United States of America were keenly aware that they were making a radical departure in the kinds of governments under which human beings had lived over the centuries -- and that its success was by no means guaranteed.   Monarchies in Europe had lasted for centuries and the Chinese dynasties for thousands of years.   But a democratic republic was something else.   While the convention that was writing the Constitution of the United States was still in session, a lady asked Benjamin Franklin what the delegation was creating.   'A republic, madam', he said, "if you can keep it.'"
 
Proposed Bills 2011
 
 

2011-06-30

2011-06-30 (5771 Sivan 28)
Cindy Uken _Billings MT Gazette_
Billings Clinic called "pioneer" for its approach to reducing MRSA rates
"MRSA, the commonly known name for methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus, is a bacterium that is resistant to antibiotics in the penicillin family, the ones usually prescribed to treat bacterial infections.   If untreated or treated improperly, it can kill human tissue and damage internal organs.   About 19K Americans die annually from MRSA infections, according to the CDCP.   Reducing infection rates plays a significant role in controlling the rising cost of health care.   The average extra cost to a hospital for treating a patient who becomes infected with MRSA is $27K, adding $10G a year to the country's health care bill, according to Plexus."

2011-06-30 (5771 Sivan 28)
Steve Pardo _Detroit News_
Michigander catches illegal alien Czech invader trying to swim the St. Clair river

2011-06-30 05:30PDT (08:30EDT) (12:30GMT) (15:30Jerusalem)
Scott Gibbons & Tony Sznoluch _DoL ETA_
un-employment insurance weekly claims report
DoL home page
DoL OPA press releases
historical data
DoL regulations
"The advance number of actual initial claims under state programs, unadjusted, totaled 403,284 in the week ending June 25, an increase of 8,998 from the previous week.   There were 444,712 initial claims in the comparable week in 2010.   The advance unadjusted insured unemployment rate was 2.8% during the week ending June 18, unchanged from the prior week.   The advance unadjusted number for persons claiming UI benefits in state programs totaled 3,491,213, a decrease of 320 from the preceding week.   A year earlier, the rate was 3.4% and the volume was 4,328,074.   The total number of people claiming benefits in all programs for the week ending June 11 was 7,511,613, a decrease of 30,701 from the previous week.   Extended benefits were available in AL, AK, AZ, CA, CO, CT, DE, DC, FL, GA, ID, IL, IN, KS, KY, ME, MA, MI, MN, MO, NV, NJ, NM, NY, NC, OH, OR, PA, RI, SC, TN, TX, WA, and WV, during the week ending June 11.   States reported 3,300,706 persons claiming EUC (Emergency Unemployment Compensation) benefits for the week ending June 11, an increase of 1,471 from the prior week.   There were 4,516,594 claimants in the comparable week in 2010.   EUC weekly claims include first, second, third, and fourth tier activity.   [Note that the population used for calculating the "insured unemployment rate" changes
to 132,623,886 beginning 2007-10-06;
to 133,010,953 beginning 2008-01-05;
to 133,382,559 beginning 2008-04-05;
to 133,690,617 beginning 2008-07-05;
to 133,902,387 beginning 2008-10-04;
to 133,886,830 beginning 2009-01-03;
to 133,683,433 beginning 2009-04-04;
to 133,078,480 beginning 2009-07-04;
to 133,823,421 beginning 2009-10-03;
to 131,823,421 beginning 2009-10-17;
to 130,128,328 beginning 2010-01-02;
to 128,298,468 beginning 2010-04-03;
to 126,763,245 beginning 2010-07-03;
to 125,845,577 beginning 2010-09-25;
to 125,560,066 beginning 2011-01-15;
to 125,572,661 beginning 2011-04-02.]
EUC (Excel)
EB
graphs
more graphs

2011-06-30 (5771 Sivan 28)
Joanna Clay _Laguna Beach CA CoastLine Pilot_
4 illegal aliens arrested for counterfeiting
Salvador Hernandez: Orange county CA Register

2011-06-30 (5771 Sivan 28)
Ron Miller _Southern Maryland_
Resistance to referendum petition drive reveals ugly side of MD politics

2011-06-30 (5771 Sivan 28)
Tim Steller _Arizona Daily Star_
Wariness of Turkish charter schools is growing
"Recent news from three states, including Arizona, shows some officials are growing wary of the nationwide network of Turkish-run charter schools associated with Fethullah Gulen [Guelen]."

2011-06-30 (5771 Sivan 28)
David Skolnick _Youngstown OH Vindicator_
173 seek jobs with fire department
"It's a dangerous job with a starting annual salary of $24K and only 2 current openings, but there are plenty of people interested."

2011-06-30 (5771 Sivan 28)
Karl Henkel _Youngstown OH Vindicator_
Tech Belt center unveiled
"There were 68 open-hearth furnaces used in steel mills [in 1976], but today there remains just one in the city, at Ira Rennert's The Renco Group...   The center won't immediately create new jobs, but officials said in the long run it will develop opportunities to attract and maintain the young, intellectual minds of energy and manufacturing...   The building, which cost about $250K and has passed engineering and environmental testing, is at 125 Market St. Years ago, it was an S.S. Kresge five-and-dime store.   When the center moves in, it will continue to fill buildings on Market Street.   The Raymond John Wean Foundation announced in April that it will restore the 17K-square-foot location at 147 Market St., and last year the block added an Eastern Gateway Community College satellite location."

2011-06-30 (5771 Sivan 28)
Matthew Vadun _American Spectator_
Obummer gives new grant to ACORN, apparently in violation of the law
"Judicial Watch discovered that the Obama administration is flouting the will of Congress by giving federal taxpayer money to ACORN.   Obama's Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) gave a $79,819 grant to the largest branch of the ACORN tree, ACORN Housing Corp. (AHC).   AHC filed papers last year legally changing its name to Affordable Housing Centers of America (AHCOA).   It's the same old organization with a brand new ACORN-free name."

2011-06-30 (5771 Sivan 28)
W. James Antle iii _American Spectator_
Is a balanced budget amendment a worthwhile price for debt limit extension?

2011-06-30 (5771 Sivan 28)
Ross Kaminsky _American Spectator_
Obummer's medical mystery shoppers

2011-06-30 (5771 Sivan 28)
Tom Lutey _Billings MT Gazette_
Report that seeded acres are up triggers price slide and skepticism
"The report by National Agriculture Statistics Service said that Montana farmers had planted 5.78M acres of wheat, an increase of 340K acres from the previous year.   Farmers, many of whom had less than five weather-friendly field days to plant in May, balked at the report even as U.S. grain market prices nosedived on the assumption an unexpected wheat supply would flood the market.   The wheat report was coupled with an unexpectedly large corn crop that pulled all grain prices down.   Farmers have told the Farm Service Agency at least 174,011 wheat acres have gone unplanted this year.   The total for all crops unplanted is 223,528.   At one point, wheat futures hit an 11-month low as market controls kicked in and stopped the price slide at the allowed maximum of 60 cents a bushel on the Chicago Board of Trade.   In neighboring North Dakota, the NASS report suggested wheat plantings could be down 1 percent from earlier expectations, but local estimates suggested wheat seeding was off as much as 14%.   'In North Dakota, the Farm Service Agency is meeting because there's 5M acres unseeded in North Dakota.   At least a million of that has to be wheat.', said Leonard Schock, of Vida."

2011-06-30 (5771 Sivan 28)
Tristan McConnell _Global Post_
Sudan troops accused of mass killings in the south

2011-06-30 (5771 Sivan 28)
_Freedom Fighter Radio_
LAPD has links to Muslim Brotherhood?
Investigative Project: CAIR-Hamas-Muslim Brotherhood links
Discover the Networks: Muslim Brotherhood (MB)

2011-06-30 (5771 Sivan 28)
_Conference Board_
New committee to study corporate political spending

2011-06-30 (5771 Sivan 28)
"FrauTech"
mechanical engineering employment and pay

2011-06-30 (5771 Sivan 28)
Aram Roston _Jewish World Review_
hand-outs for Middle East dictators

2011-06-30 (5771 Sivan 28)
Howard LaFranchi _Jewish World Review_
White House reveals significantly different counter-terrorism strategy

2011-06-30 (5771 Sivan 28)
P.A. Madison _Federalist_
how states & nations regulated their commercial intercourse
 
Proposed Bills 2011
 
 

2011 June
top 500 fastest super computers LinPack bench-mark

Proposed Bills 2011

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World + USA Over-Population Clocks
Jimbo Wales's WikiPedia on World Over-Population
 

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