In the News

Here's a few different articles for the past weekend that I wanted to share.

1. Engineered E coli Superbug.

Now, I'll be the first to admit that this is, obviously, a 'conspiracy theory', of sorts. However, I believe the article had some compelling arguments, and made some interesting points, so I still think it's worth checking out. I found another related article in my local newspaper this morning that says that German sprouts from an organic farm have been linked to the E-coli virus... First off all, I find it hard to believe that that many people across Europe are consuming organic sprouts from Germany. Secondly, it does seem to support the Higalian Dialect theory (problem, reaction, solution) as suggested in the article in the context of the current war on local, organic foods.

2. Unemployment at Great Depression Levels.

If anyone you know might still happen to believe the official unemployment levels are at 9.1% (recently up .1%, and not, as predicted, "recovering"), then I think you should point them in the direction of this article from the Washington Blog. It's got some fascinating information and graphs in it that really put things today in context to the last great depression.

3. Teen Unemployment at 25%.

This, of course, should come as no surprise at anyone. When companies like McDonnalds have a hiring fair for 60,000 jobs and over 1,000,000 people apply, how many of those jobs do you think went to a completely inexperienced teenager? Probably not many. This, of course, has obvious social ramifications. What I find most interesting, however, how this rate compares to rates in other countries, particularly countries in the mideast like Egypt and Tunisia, that have youth unemployment rates of around 50%, to Eurpean countries like Spain, that's youth unemployment rates are around 40%. Obviously, the youth of these countries have started massive rebellions... again, for obvious reasons. Unfortunately, America's youth, I fear, are far too complacent, obese, and distracted to give a damn. For now, they can continue to live off of their parents, but sooner or later, that well will run dry.

4. Fukushima reactor now more radioactive than ever

Not surprisingly, news about Fukushima is still getting harder and harder to find, even though there are near cataclysmic discoveries coming out about it on a regular basis. I'm not going to say much about this, aside from the fact that I think it would be a good idea to keep reminding people that this is still going on, lest they forget about it entirely. Not that there's much that we can do about this one, though. Here's hoping that the radiation gives us all superpowers like we see in the comics.

5. Consumer confidence lower now that at any point during the great "recession"

Home prices continue to plummet to catastrophic (but ultimately, realistic) levels. Unemployment continues to tick up, not down. The stockmarket, being pulled by the banks, is plummeting down again, and the Fed is talking about QE3 (big surprise). As I read the 'mainstream' papers and watch their news, I'm baffled by how many economists are just NOW saying that things are looking bad, and that we can expect them to get worse. If you've picked up a newspaper or watched the nightly news, you're probably as familiar of these accounts as I am. However, despite everything that's going on, these fucktards are still "confident" that we'll see a recovery soon. Newsflash, people... They weren't right about the housing bubble. They weren't right about the 'great recession'. The only thing they have right now is that things are getting worse. I've been telling people that we wouldn't recover from the crash of 2008 since 2008, and low and behold, 3 years later, we haven't. And if nothing else, things are only going to get worse when the world markets finally realize the full effect of the Japan disaster from March. Japan will release its newest quarterly report in July, which will be the first one to account for the earthquake and tsunami that devastated the country and their economy. Though I have nothing hard to support this, in my personal opinion, these numbers have the potential to send the global market into an even greater tailspin once these figures get published and we get a first 'economic' look at how bad things really are over there.

6. 29 statistics about extreme income inequality.

Personally, I like to have some of these statistics handy, just encase I find myself in a situation where I'm in a conversation and I have a claim I'd like to back up. Nothing new here, really, but still some pretty interesting little facts to boggle your mind... Including the tax rates of some of the biggest corporations in America:

*Honeywell*
Profits: $4.9 billion
Taxes: -$34 million
*Fed Ex*
Profits: $3 billion
Taxes: -$23 million
*Wells Fargo*
Profits: $49.37 billion
Taxes: -$681 million
*Boeing*
Profits: $9.7 billion
Taxes: -$178 million
*Verizon*
Profits: $32.5 billion
Taxes: -$951 million
*Dupont*
Profits: $2.1 billion
Taxes -$72 million
*American Electric Power*
Profits: $5.89 billion
Taxes -$545 million
*General Electric*
Profits: $7.7 billion
Taxes: -$4.7 billion