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04 Feb 2011 17:34

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Biz: Bernie Madoff trustee: The NY Mets knowingly took ill-gotten cash

  • $300
    million     the estimated amount in profits the New York Mets allegedly earned from Bernie Madoff’s ponzi scheme
  • $90
    million     the estimated amount that the team reportedly took from Bernie Madoff-related bank accounts source
  • » And now they’re being pressured to give it up: Irving Picard, the trustee in charge of the insanely massive Bernie Madoff account, claims in a lawsuit that the Mets organization, represented by Sterling Equities, turned a blind eye to Madoff’s scheme and had plenty of opportunities to see red flags pop up. “The Sterling partners were simply in too deep – having substantially supported their businesses with Madoff money – to do anything but ignore the gathering clouds,” says the complaint first made public on Friday. Officials for the team call the claims “an outrageous strong-arm effort” at getting money out of them, and deny any wrongdoing.
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink

04 Feb 2011 17:04

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World: Experts: Volatile Egypt unlikely to fall into Iran-style regime

  • No representative system can take root in Egypt without the Brotherhood’s participation. But, after spending the last half century battling Islamist political forces, the military leadership will have trouble overcoming its deep disdain for the Brotherhood.
  • Center for Strategic & International Studies’ Middle East program deputy director Haim Malka • Discussing the deep divide between the military and the Muslim Brotherhood which may make Democracy in the region difficult – but at the same time, make it hard for an Iran-style regime to take hold in Egypt. With the military holding so much power over the country, many scholars see such a result as unlikely, due to their lack of power in the region and the dissenters being less radical than those in Iran. source
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink

04 Feb 2011 14:19

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Biz, U.S.: Unemployment rate: How did it fall with such low job creation?

  • 36,000new jobs in January (really freaking low)
  • 9.8% November’s really high unemployment rate
  • 9.4% December’s falling unemployment rate
  • 9.0% January’s rate; how did it dip so far? source
  • » Explaining exactly what happened: We’ve seen three perfectly valid arguments for why this disparity between slow job growth and deep unemployment decline took place. The first is pointed out by a Gallup chart that shows that non-seasonally-adjusted unemployment is actually at 9.8 percent – suggesting seasonal adjustment is skewing the numbers. The second suggested reason is much more sinister-sounding: Unemployment benefits for so-called 99ers are starting to run out, and they aren’t looking for jobs, meaning that they are no longer covered as part of the total amount. Finally, the weather sucked in January, with snow covering most of the country, so that could be a possible explanation too. So, which one is the case, anyway?
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink

04 Feb 2011 13:33

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U.S.: Gabrielle Giffords’ husband Mark Kelly going back to astronaut job

  • January Astronaut Mark Kelly had to stop his preparations for a space flight after finding out his wife, Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, was shot in the head by a really crazy kid.
  • Monday With Giffords in full recovery mode in Houston, Kelly will return to his preparations for leading the space shuttle Columbia into orbit in a couple months.
  • April Kelly will leave for space, his fourth trip. His goal is that his crew “can execute this mission safely — and that it’s successful.” This is a good sign, right? source
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink

04 Feb 2011 13:05

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World: Interesting: Some Mubarak-tied officials joining with protesters

  • I am participating in the protests and I have issued statements that support the revolutionists as far as they go.
  • Al Azhar spokesman Mohamed Rafah Tahtawy • Explaining that he’s taking part in the Egypt protests, rather than continuing at their state-sponsored job. Al-Azhar, a Sunni Muslim educational institution, is the largest state-tied religious institution, so it’s a notable switching of sides. But he’s not the only one: Amr Moussa, the Arab League‘s secretary-general and a former Mubarak staffer, was also in the crowd. Signs of fracturing support for Hosni Mubarak are notable since today’s protest is intended to push him out of office. source
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink

04 Feb 2011 12:35

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U.S.: Census: Post-Katrina New Orleans shrinks by a third

  • 484,674 New Orleans’ population as of the 2000 census
  • 343,829 the city’s population in 2010, five years after Hurricane Katrina source
  • » As a whole, the country grew: In contrast with the decline of New Orleans’ population, the population at large grew by 9.7 percent, to 308.7 million. The data, overall, is expected to show that minorities caused much of the growth.
Posted by Ernie Smith • 0 Comments • Permalink

04 Feb 2011 01:08

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U.S.: Texas company: Give us money and trees, and we’ll give you fuel

  • $1 billion to make gasoline out of wood chips source
Posted by Seth Millstein • 0 Comments • Permalink
 

04 Feb 2011 01:04

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Politics: Judges spar over constitutionality of health care reform

  • tuesday A federal judge in Florida found the Affordable Care Act’s individual mandate provision unconstitutional and struck down the whole law, saying the provision invalidated everything. Republicans rejoiced.
  • thursday A federal judge in Mississippi, tackling a similar lawsuit, contended that there wasn’t sufficient standing for him to take the case, and threw it out. Democrats rejoiced. source
Posted by Seth Millstein • 0 Comments • Permalink

04 Feb 2011 01:00

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World: Otter-skin hat implies change in North Korean leadership

  • It’s an unwritten rule that nobody else can wear such a hat, so if Kim Jong-Un is also wearing one, it means he has now reached almost the same status as his father.
  • A “senior South Korean government official” • On the significance of headwear in totalitarian dictatorships. Bear with us here: apparently, Kim Jong-Un was spotted wearing an otter-skin hat similar to one worn by his father, Kim Jong-il, and since nobody but the Dear Leader is allowed to wear that hat, this implies that the elder Kim will soon be passing the throne on to his son. Whatever you say, unnamed South Korean official.  source
Posted by Seth Millstein • 0 Comments • Permalink

04 Feb 2011 00:57

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Politics: Conservatives launch anti-President Romney campaign

  • You know how sometimes a movement will arise to try and draft a reluctant candidate to run for President? Well, this is the opposite: a movement to dissuade an eager candidate from running. The problem with Romney, according to the good folks at DontDoItMitt.com, is that he’s just not conservative enough. The site says that he “pushed through [his] own version of nationalized health care in Massachusetts” (an odd charge, seeing as “nationalized” refers explicitly to something that’s not state-level), and begs him “not to take down the entire Republican party.” Maybe if they’re successful, Romney will bow out gracefully and decline a run. We’re thinking probably not. source
Posted by Seth Millstein • 0 Comments • Permalink
 
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