The American Gulag, the largest prison system in human history is now facing transformation into the largest geriatric ward in the world. As this report makes clear we pay dearly for the stupidity of our social policies — you pay dearly that is, since it is all being done with tax monies. Most of these people are in jail for Marijuana. We spend more on warehousing aging prisoners than we do for elementary and sec! ondary schools. How stupid is that? Click through to see the accompanying chart.
Food prices are expected to see their biggest annual increase in the past three years thanks mostly to devastating drought conditions all over the world. Dry conditions mean poor crop production; poor crop production means fewer livestock; and fewer livestock means higher prices for meats and dairy at the grocery store. That plus a pinch on products like cocoa, sugar, wheat, rice and especially coffee have the Bureau of Labor Statistics predicting a big bump in food costs.
Higher meat and dairy prices are mostly the culprits in the United States, thanks in part to ongoing drought conditions in the Midwest and Great Plains that have forced ranchers to cull their herds rather than pay exorbitant prices to feed the animals. Inflation of corn and soybean products could be managed if farmers receive favorable conditions for their crops this summer, in turn driving down prices of animal feed as well as products for human consumption. Still, consumers could pay as much as $1 more per gallon for milk at the store to compensate for low supplies mixed with high demand.
Flight 370: Zio-Al Queda-NeoCon Sequel to 9-11 Aborted, a Practice Run or on Horizon (Literally)?
This article states the piloting of flight 270 involved flying it at very low levels to evade radar:
“As the search for the missing flight MH370 enters its 10th day with few clues as to its whereabouts, the New Straits Times said today the Boeing 777-200ER dropped 5,000 feet (1,500m) to evade commercial radar detection. In an exclusive story, the government-backed paper said investigators analysing MH370’s flight data revealed that the 200-tonne, fully laden twinjet descended 1,500m or even lower to evade commercial (secondary) radar coverage after it turned back from its flight path en route to Beijing. The Malaysia Airlines Boeing 777-200ER (9M-MRO) disappeared on March 8 with 239 people on board. Malaysian authorities said on Saturday the plane was deliberately diverted and its on-board transmission devices switched off to avoid detection. Its last contact was at 8:11am north of the Strait of Malacca. Investigators poring over MH370’s flight data had said the plane had flown low and used “terrain masking” as it flew over the e Bay of Bengal and headed north towards land, the NST reported.”
“Terrain masking” is an interesting term, implying a military aspect:
This is where our money goes. We don't have money to feed kids, educate them, or run public libraries. But another 100 million for a new weapon… sure, no problem.
Anyone who reads the works of the late Chalmers Johnson will have an excellent understanding of the role that the U.S. national-security state, especially the vast military empire and military-industrial complex, plays in America’s foreign-policy woes. I particularly recommend his four books: Blowback, The Sorrows of Empire, Nemesis, and Dismantling the Empire. For those who would prefer to begin with online articles, here is a link to an article I wrote in 2011 that contains a list of some of the online articles written by Johnson.
Among the most insightful articles written by Johnson are two that are pertinent today, given the controversy that has erupted over the CIA’s spying on Congress. The titles of those two articles are: “Abolish the CIA” and “Improve the CIA? Better to Abolish It.”
NEW YORK (AP) — Even while the cause remains unknown, a deadly blast that leveled two buildings served by a 127-year-old gas main has provided a jarring reminder of just how old and vulnerable much of the infrastructure is in New York and many other cities nationwide.
I am all for slipshod work, particularly when delivered by government contractors. Hey, the emphasis is on scope changes and engineering change orders, not on delivering what the wild and crazy statement of work requires.
I was delighted to read the Hacker News thread at http://bit.ly/MW4epC about broken links and missing data sets on Data.gov at www.data.gov. The thread contains a number of interesting comments. These may be evidence that substandard attention to detail suggests digital eczema. Just Bing it.
In the early days of www.firstgov.gov, some effort was expended to minimize the number of dead links on US government servers. In the present incarnation as www.usa.gov, there are some interesting changes.
