• 35% the corporate tax rate set by the U.S. government
• 18.5% the average “real” tax rate paid by 280 Fortune 500 companies source

• » And some companies don’t even pay: Two notably large companies that don’t pay any taxes … and in fact owe less than nothing somehow? General Electric and Pepco. (On a side note: DC residents looooooove Pepco, because the power goes out all the time around here.) Both companies defend their businesses practices.

• NOthis story isn’t true … the AP fell victim to a hoax source

• » Moral of the story: The AP really annoys the crap out of us sometimes.

• Protest over the Mark 1 reactor The Mark 1 Nuclear Reactor, as we mentioned yesterday, has a long history of safety concerns, so much so that 35 years ago, General Electric scientist Dale G. Bridenbaugh and two of his fellow employees resigned in protest over the design. He worried that the containment system wasn’t prepared to deal with a massive loss of coolant, which seems on the spot.
• The high price of poor oversight Also unveiled by Wikileaks, a U.S. cable indicates that Tokyo opposed a court order relating to nuclear safety. The court ruled that an earthquake of a magnitude over 6.5 could cause radiation exposure. Japan’s rebuttal: “Japan’s Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency believes the reactor is safe and that all safety analyses were appropriately conducted.” source

Boron’s (possibly) stabilizing effect

• 52.6 tons of Boron that South Korea is giving Japan

• » That is, obviously, a lot of Boron. The Japanese are hoping this emergency shipment from the South Korean government will help them stabilize the reactor crises happening at the Fukushima Plant. The element, which is crucial in the process of stopping nuclear reactions, will be mixed into the seawater that’s being used to try to cool the fuel rods. South Korea is really coming through for Japan on this one; their own Boron stockpile has been mostly used up at Fukushima.

• Before you know it my iPhone can’t turn it’s screen off because I’m getting near constant push notifications of retweets.
• Twitter user (and SFB reader) Eric Fadden • Explaining how he became something of a Twitter celebrity yesterday after a key point that he made in the Keith Olbermann saga received 2,500 retweets. The tweet? “Gotta love the new campaign contribution rules. Keith Olbermann donates as a citizen and gets suspended. A corp can give & remain nameless.” Fadden says that around 90 percent of the tweeters agreed him, but the other ten percent were very critical. To that, he says: “Has the polarization gotten that bad where we would mock one of our own as their rights are trampled by their employer…nay, even worse, when that employer enjoys more protection than those it employs?” Good point, Eric. It’s good to point out that the game is a little different for journalists, but Olbermann is biased and should not be held to the standard of a reporter. Meanwhile, General Electric can anonymously influence the electoral process as they choose. source

• 19% freefall when “The Jay Leno Show” was on the air source

• $30
  billion the value of the merger, announced this morning after months of rumors suggesting it
• 51/49
  split the breakdown of the company’s ownership; Comcast is big spoon, GE is little spoon source

• GE and Vivendi agree on terms that’ll allow a Comcast deal to go forward. How much is Vivendi’s 20% stake in NBC Universal? $5.8 billion. At least that’s the number the water company agreed on with General Electric. GE, which owns 80% of the company, is in the midst of building a 50/50 joint venture with media giant wannabe Comcast. The deal clears the way for that to happen. source

• By the end of the week, it’s likely that GE and Comcast will have agreed on a deal to give most of NBC Universal to the cable company. Owning a chunk of the content pie is something that Comcast has been angling for – most famously, they tried making a deal for Disney back in the day. But is it good for consumers? Vote above.source