ObamaSpeak on Zimmerman Verdict (video)

Obama Speaks on the Zimmerman Verdict: "In surprise remarks at the White House, President Obama said, “Trayvon Martin could have been me 35 years ago.”"

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The Power-Hungry Elite

The Power-Hungry Elite Aren't Who You Think They Are | Think Tank | Big Think: . . . "Money is the McMansion in Sarasota that starts falling apart in 10 years. Power is the old stone building that stands for centuries. I cannot respect someone who does not see the difference.". . . .

Suppose you have a guy who’s made 35 million bucks with a chain of used car lots. Occupy Wall Street was not against that guy and his 35 million bucks. They were talking about an elite that runs the country that seems to have a lot of power over other people’s lives and are not sufficiently accountable. That doesn’t include just rich people, it’s a particular kind of person.

In other words, as Murray sees it, the elite are not necessarily the wealthy but the people who run the country. These people live in almost a different world from the rest of us. Murray defines this narrow elite as the 100,000 or so people who have an outsized influence on the nation’s culture, economics and politics. They’re the CEOs of the most important industries, such as Hollywood and Wall Street. They are bureaucrats in Washington.. . ." read more at link above

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How Laura Poitras learned of Edward Snowden

How Laura Poitras learned of Edward Snowden--translated from Portuguese - Google Translate: Renowned for movies on abuses of American power, the documentarian Laura Poitras, who filmed the whistleblower, tells how she was approached by Snowden and came to video him in Hong Kong . . . . Leia mais sobre esse assunto em http://oglobo.globo.com/mundo/filmando-edward-snowden-9028252#ixzz2ZEQ5sFwR

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Low-Tech Mosquito Deterrent

Simulated wind, provided by an electric fan, is good at both discouraging insect flight and dissipating the mosquito-attracting emanations that humans emit--

A Low-Tech Mosquito Deterrent - NYTimes.com: " a small electric fan, perhaps 12 inches high, that swept back and forth, sending a gentle breeze across the grassy area where people were sitting." --read more at link above

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Sergey Brin Explains Google Glasses

Sergey Brin Explains Google Glasses - NYTimes.com: "Why did Google create Google Glass, its glasses with a heads-up display? To hear Sergey Brin, Google co-founder, explain it, it was to prevent social isolation. He got on stage . . . at the $7,500-a-seat TED conference in Long Beach, Calif., and looked down, pretending to use his smartphone. “That is why we created this form factor,” he said. He said rubbing the screens of buttonless and knobless phones was strange. “I feel like it’s kind of emasculating,” he said. “You are just rubbing this featureless piece of glass. There isn’t anything to feel.” “You want something that frees your eyes,” he said. Also, he said, “We wanted to free up your ears.” The sound goes straight to your cranium."

OK.

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Tumblr CEO David Karp keeps it simple

Weekend Confidential: Tumblr CEO David Karp - WSJ.com: "Excursions to the French Riviera aside, Mr. Karp says that his personal life hasn't changed much since the acquisition, and he plans to keep it that way. He'll continue to live in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, with his girlfriend of the past four years, a nursing-school student. He has no plans to move closer to the mother ship in Silicon Valley. "I don't know how you could live in Palo Alto," he says. "It's just boring." Mr. Karp won't be taking any wild vacations, and says that he prefers spending weekends at home or at the movies with his parents. His only new toy is a Honda motorcycle that he enjoys fixing and rebuilding. He does plan to take on philanthropy at some point. "There are some ramifications," he says earnestly. "I have to think of something responsible to do."" read more at link above

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Pew: For Every 10 Americans, Only 3 Trust The Government

Pew: For Every 10 Americans, Only 3 Trust The Government « CBS DC: "The Pew Research Center in Washington, D.C. has found that fewer Americans than ever trust the decisions made by the government. Data collected from a survey taken in January of this year indicates that all demographics and partisan groups experienced an increasing lack of faith in government leadership, according to a release posted on the Pew Research website late last week. “However, there are disparities,” the official summary noted. “[M]ore than twice as many Hispanics as whites (44 percent vs. 20 percent) trust the federal government, and more blacks (38 percent) than whites trust the government.”. . . Trust during President George W. Bush’s time in office was not much higher – and fell far more significantly during his eight years as Commander-in-Chief. . . . According to Pew, almost 60 percent of people in the United States had confidence in the federal government before President Bill Clinton left office. When Bush left, national trust was down to about 25 percent of the nation’s people." (read more at link above)

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Profanity In The Workplace

#@#$! Is There Any Place For Profanity In The Workplace? - Forbes: "It is worth noting here that studies show swearing can actually be a source of pain relief. When mixed with a bit of humor, a bad word now and then can actually jolt our brains into more expansive, tolerant and creative thinking spaces that make us better problem solvers. (On the other hand, one of my favorite religious leaders and speakers, Spencer W. Kimball, noted in one of his writings, “Profanity is the attempt of a feeble mind to express itself.” I tend to agree. Do we not possess the intellect to find a more original way to communicate? Really?) Swearing clearly didn’t help Carol Bartz of Yahoo who famously reigned with a highly profane hand. Also bear in mind that according to a recent CareerBuilder  survey 64% of Americans think less of employees who swear, and 57% say they are less likely to promote someone who curses."

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Ron Paul: "Police manhunt for Boston Marathon bombing suspect scarier than attack"

Ron Paul: Police manhunt for Boston Marathon bombing suspect scarier than attack - Washington Times: "Former Rep. Ron Paul said the law enforcement that swarmed around Boston in the days following the marathon bombings was scarier than the actual terrorist attack. “The Boston bombing provided the opportunity for the government to turn what should have been a police investigation into a military-style occupation of an American city,” he said on the Lew Rockwell website, Politico reported. “This unprecedented move should frighten us as much or more than the attack itself.”. . . ."

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Obama has a sweet retirement package but will you?

Public pensions are the last pensions standing--for how much longer?

Obama has a sweet retirement package. Will you? - The Term Sheet: Fortune's deals blogTerm Sheet: " . . . I can't get past Obama wanting to limit savers to only about half the value of what he stands to get from his post-presidential package. Based on numbers from Vanguard Annuity Access, I value his package at more than $6.6 million.. . . . That's right, $6.6 million. And that doesn't include the IRAs in which Obama has been socking away the $50,000-a-year maximum, or the $18,000 (plus cost of living) a year he will get at age 62 for his service in the Illinois senate, or any other benefits he or his wife may realize from past or future jobs."

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Poll says 29% of US Registered Voters Believe Armed Revolution Might Be Necessary?

The degradation of civil liberties after 9/11 gets pushback?--

Poll: 29% of Registered Voters Believe Armed Revolution Might Be Necessary in Next Few Years | CNS News: "Twenty-nine percent of registered voters think that an armed revolution might be necessary in the next few years in order to protect liberties, according to a Public Mind poll by Fairleigh Dickinson University." (read more at link above)

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"Preserving Culture" and the "Language Police"

Mish's Global Economic Trend Analysis: Emails From French and Canadian Readers on "Preserving Culture" and the "Language Police": " . . .  it's not just France that suffers from such stupidity, it is all of Europe. Every year France blocks changes in agricultural subsidies that exist solely to prop up inefficient French farms. As a result everyone in Europe pays higher prices for produce and other farm goods. Tariffs raise costs and restrain trade. Problems do not stop with agriculture and restaurants. Inane work rules also designed to "preserve the French way of life" have put France and Germany are on a collision course over numerous issues including heated exchanges regarding productivity and trade with China."

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Feds Pick the Recession Losers, Impoverish Us For Doing So

RealClearMarkets - The Feds Pick the Recession's Losers, Impoverish Us For Doing So: " . . . . Ex post facto laws are expressly prohibited by the U.S Constitution (Article 1, Section 9), meaning no applying new laws to actions that have already occurred. Yet the federal government is clearly changing the rules as it goes. By reallocating losses from the recession, rewarding people who behaved recklessly and punishing people who were nothing more than innocent bystanders, the federal government is creating a situation in which contracts and other market transactions cannot be trusted to be enforced as enacted. When people and businesses cannot rely on the enforcement of contracts, fewer contracts will be entered into and much effort and expense will be wasted on additional lawyers and measures designed to protect each party's interests. All of this means a nation that will be poorer in the long run. The federal government has neglected this considerable cost to its actions. Over time those losses will be far greater than the amount of wealth lost in the recession. (read more at link above - Jeffrey Dorfman is a professor of economics at the University of Georgia, and the author of the e-book, Ending the Era of the Free Lunch. ")

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