Education Freestyle

Drug Lab Found in Georgetown University Dorm

Edu Freestyle — Sun, 21 Nov 2010 19:17:33 +0000

Cited: Daily News

Three college freshmen were arrested by campus police on the campus of Georgetown University after discovering they had converted their dorm room into a clandestine drug lab. Please and school officials said the students were using the room to create dimethyltryptamine (DMT) a powerful hallucinogenic that is said to cause visions of alien encounters and trigger horrific, near-death sensations.

Early reports misidentified the room, located on the top floor of Georgetown’s Harbin Hall, as a methamphetamine lab.

Georgetown freshmen John Perrone, 18, and Charles Smith, 18, whose Andover addresses were listed as 66 Bartlet St., and 7 Porter Road, respectively, and University of Richmond freshman John Perrone were arrested early Saturday morning, October 23, and charged with conspiracy to manufacture and possess the hallucinogen dimethyltryptamine (DMT) with the intent to distribute, according to NBC Washington. DMT can be smoked but can also be snorted as a powder or injected as a liquid. Users might also dip marijuana cigarette in liquid DMT, officials said.

Cops busted the dorm room drug den after a Harbin resident called campus police at around 5 a.m. to report a strange odor coming from room 926 on the top floor of the residence.

More than 400 bleary-eyed students were forced to evacuate the building at around 6 a.m. on October 23 while police and safety officials swept the building with drug-sniffing dogs.

Once in the room, cops found a stash of sketchy-looking chemicals and materials, including a glass jar with an unidentified red substance, mason jars containing a clear liquid, a turkey baster and black suitcase reeking of a strong, chemical smell, NBC reported.

Seven people were reportedly tested for exposure to the toxins, which can be harmful if inhaled or exposed to skin. They were later cleared.

University spokeswoman Julie Green Bataille said that toxins from the room had not spread.

“It appears to be confined to that one room,” she told The Washington Post. “It will have to be decontaminated.”

Students were initially allowed back into the dorm at around 9 a.m. but were again forced to leave the building at around 10:45 a.m., according to campus newspaper The Hoya.

The drug bust doesn’t exactly square with the University’s preppy, popped-collar image.

The private Catholic school’s campus sits on 104 acres among the cobblestone streets of one of Washington, D.C.’s most affluent neighborhoods. Students at Georgetown are known for binge drinking and casual drug use, according to the Post, but hard drugs are less common.

“For this campus, this is very out of the norm,” Kayla Bostwick, 18, a Harbin resident, told The Post. “This should not happen.”

Romano, Smith and Perrone are looking at 20 years and fines up to $1 million if convicted, according to The Hoya.

Two Andover High School honor graduates appeared in federal court in Washington, D.C., October 27 on charges they manufactured an illegal drug in a dorm room at Georgetown University.

Whether Smith and Perrone return to classes at their universities remains to be seen because violating Georgetown University’s code of conduct can result in suspension or expulsion, but spokeswoman Julie Green Bataille said that any discipline would be confidential. University of Richmond spokesman Brian Eckert says any student found to have violated a drug law is subject to sanction by the university.

After court on October 27, a lawyer for Perrone, G. Allen Dale, described the teens as “scared to death” and said they were going to return to Massachusetts to “put their lives together.” Dale and an attorney for Smith, David Schertler, did not say what their plans were as far as work or school.

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My Take: I realized it college is a time of sowing one’s “wild oats”, but this is a little too much if you ask me. I hope they have good Redwood City CA criminal attorneys that will do right by them. This is nothing like getting a DUI and needing a DWI lawyer Redwood City. This is much worse!

Maybe universities should have seminars for freshmen for Bucks County criminal attorneys and speak to them about the ramifications, legally speaking, of drugs. Otherwise they will need a drug lawyer Philadelphia when they are arrested for possession or distribution.

It’s too bad that something like PS3 or even Wii games don’t come out with a game that discourages drug use of any kind. They can easily download Wii games of this type if they were available. Students all over the country and the world download Wii sports games all the time, why not one discourages alcohol or drug abuse.

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Tweet, Tweet Mount Everest

Edu Freestyle — Sun, 21 Nov 2010 19:13:36 +0000

Cited: AP

Mount Everest has joined the rest of the world finally! They have installed near Mount Everest base camp 3G cell towers so that explorers can now surf the web, Tweet and post Facebook updates without worrying about losing the signal including.

You now cannot get away from a cell phone call, even at the top of the Mount Everest or the world.

The new high-speed service, announced Friday by Ncell, a subsidiary of Swedish telecom company TeliaSonera, will allow mountaineers setting off to the summit of the world’s tallest mountain to access wireless Internet and make video calls to family, friends and supporters.

“You know, I think it’s kind of good and kind of bad, but to me it’s kind of inevitable,” said renowned climber Ed Viesturs, frequently described as the strongest U.S. high-altitude mountaineer.

The 51-year-old veteran of seven climbs to Everest’s 29,035-foot summit said the new technology is not for him.

“I’m kind of old school,” said Viesturs, who has climbed all 14 of the world’s highest peaks. “But you can imagine the newer generation saying, ‘No, bring it on. The more the better.’”

Every year, thousands of trekkers from all over the world walk to Everest’s base camp at 17,000 feet, and hundreds of mountaineers take on the arduous and dangerous route to the summit.

Until now, they were forced to carry heavy — and expensive — satellite equipment to transmit information and images from base camp. On the climb, mountaineers carry handheld VHF radios to talk with base camp, though an expedition might also carry a satellite phone to contact sponsors and family.

For 25-year-old Leif Whittaker, who summited Everest for the first time in May — calling his mother on the descent, using a satellite phone — the advantage comes down to being able to easily phone home.

“Just being able to communicate with your family and friends would make it a lot easier to spend two months in a tent away from home,” said Whittaker, whose father, Jim Whittaker, was the first American to summit Everest.

But there is a risk that it could be a dangerous distraction, the Port Townsend, Washington, resident said. When attempting the summit, “you need to stay focused in the moment.”

Dave Hahn, who has climbed Everest 12 times, more than any other American, noted that the north side base camp in Tibet has had cell service for several years, but not the south side in Nepal.

The 48-year-old from Taos, N.M., said that when he first climbed Everest in 1991, he had equipment that allowed him to transmit lines of Telex. “That was pretty high-tech in 1991.”

And in 1999, when Hahn was on the expedition that found the body of legendary English mountaineer George Mallory, who died on Everest in 1924: “I remember sitting up all night figuring out how to send the photos out in big enough resolution.”

That will be a thing of the past now. But might Facebook, Twitter and the high-pitched sound of dozens of cell phones ringing cheapen the experience?

“I hear that all the time,” Hahn said. “And what can you say? Things change that way. And those of us who’ve beamed home pictures and stories from the place, well, we’ve accelerated that change.”

Gordon Janow of Alpine Accent International of Seattle agreed. He helped set up the base camp for expeditions that Alpine set up. He also stated “I don’t know if it’s good or bad. It was one of the few places you could go and lose yourself in the world,” even though trekkers in the lower revelations of the Himalayas also use cell phones.

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My Take: People have been able to get phone calls on Mount Everest since they created satellite phones. So I don’t see what all the excitement is about. The cell phone is a cell phone. I know there is the iPhone and the BlackBerry and to many others to even list.

The problem is, if you need iPhone repair, it could cost an arm and leg. Of course, nowadays it is like any other electronic repair. I have heard of one iPod repair company that is fairly reputable and competitive in their prices. I, myself, would rather be putting up a website and climbing Mount Everest anyway.

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Are Randy Quaid and Wife Crazy or Not?

Edu Freestyle — Sun, 21 Nov 2010 18:02:45 +0000

Cited: ABC News

Randy Quaid and his wife are seeking asylum in Canada claiming that they fear for their lives. It seems that the exploits of Oscar nominated actor Randy Quaid and his wife are taking a turn for the bizarre even by Hollywood standards.

The increasingly eccentric duo, who are wanted in California for allegedly skipping out on a hefty hotel bill and for vandalizing a house they once owned, fled north of the border earlier this month, and now claim they are the targets of a mysterious clan they believe murdered actors Heath Ledger and David Carradine. Records show that Ledger died of a drug overdose in 2008 and Carradine was found dead, apparently from accidental asphyxiation, last year.

“Hollywood is murdering its movie stars,” Evi Quaid said in Vancouver last week. She and Randy Quaid had been released on $10,000 bail following their arrest in Vancouver on outstanding warrants from California.

Their lawyer, who has declined interview requests, has said Canadian asylum will save his clients’ lives. They are due to appear before the Canadian Immigration and Refugee Board Thursday, the Vancouver Sun reported.

The two have sent messages back to the U.S., saying they will be killed by a group they called the Star Whackers.

“This is a bizarre tale indeed,” former prosecutor Robin Sax told “Good Morning America” today. “They continue to think they can get away with the crime they committed.”

Sax said that while it would normally be unlikely that the state of California and the governments of Canada and the United States would sink vast resources into extraditing a couple wanted for fairly innocuous charges, the Quaids’ continual flouting of the law and their Hollywood status may be a factor.

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“Their behavior keeps raising the odds … that the court would consider jail,” she said. “I think that we’re going to see this move along fairly quickly because of Canada’s cooperation with the United States.”

Quaid, the older brother of actor Dennis Quaid, was considered a talented actor, well-known for his roles in the “National Lampoon” series as well as “Independence Day” and “Brokeback Mountain.”

In mid-October, a judge issued two $50,000 arrest warrants for the Quaids, who were no-shows at a court hearing related to their arrests last month on suspicion that they illegally squatted at the guest house of a Montecito home they once owned, The Associated Press reported.

Evi and Randy Quaid each face a felony vandalism charge.

Public Downfall for Hollywood Actor Began With $10,000 Hotel Bill

The Quaids’ legal troubles first surfaced in 2009 when they were arrested in Texas for allegedly skipping out on a $10,000 bill from a posh Santa Barbara, Calif., hotel.

The arrest seemed to kick off a downward spiral of missed court dates, mug shots and accusations that they moved back into a house they once owned and then trashed the place.

“It amounts to pretending that something distressing doesn’t exist, otherwise called denial,” said Paul S. Appelbaum, a psychiatrist and professor of psychiatry, medicine and law at Columbia University. “At some level, most people will register that the summons to appear in court is for them, but it’s what the mind does with that information that’s important.”

Appelbaum noted that peer groups can influence how people respond to court dates by saying, “Oh, you don’t have to go.” And, in some cases, he said, all you need for a peer group is one person, who can be your spouse or other intimate.

Another factor that can create a no-show mindset is how much they once got away with. “People who are talented, smart or athletically gifted are often allowed to avoid unpleasant realities,” said Appelbaum, noting it might be something as simple as being excused from chores because you’re in a school play.

A professor of criminal law at Fordham Law school, Jim Cohen , whose expertise is in psychology and criminal law stated that, “Once you feel entitled, it’s very hard to think of yourself as unentitled, even if you’re not in demand or fielding phone calls. People who consider themselves entitled are not happy being told what to do.”

Update:

The legal difficulties for actor Randy Quaid and his wife Evi have become another Hollywood headline refrain since telling ABC’s Good Morning America earlier this month that they were refugees running from “star whackers.”

But court documents show financial problems began for the couple more than 10 years ago.

Quaid and his wife, Evi, failed to appear Tuesday, November 16, for their arraignment in Santa Barbara, Calif., on felony vandalism charges. Both Randy and Evi Quaid were free on $500,000 bonds, and by failing to show up in court they have forfeited the $1 million bail money.

On Tuesday, November 16, the Quaids’ attorney, Robert Sanger, told the judge that authorities in Canada have confiscated the actor’s passport. Randy, who is seeking asylum in Canada, is scheduled to have an immigration admissibility hearing in Vancouver on Nov. 23. His wife is eligible for Canadian citizenship through her Canadian father.

Santa Barbara Deputy District Attorney Anthony Davis said his office was communicating with the Canadian authorities.

“Extradition is always a possibility,” said Davis.

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My Take: I tried to find a reference to “Star Whackers” on the Internet. I searched through hundreds of listings and everywhere that had the term “Star Whackers” were all retaining to the arrest of the Quaids. Either they are an ultra, ultra secret organization or they only exist in the minds of Randy Quaid and his wife.

It would be easier for the couple to find a divorce attorney then it is to find these “Star Whackers” as they call them. Either that or they need to find bankruptcy attorneys. They definitely do not need a Murfreesboro family law attorney because they seem to be on the same page. Either that or they are looking for a career change as crazies or criminals. If they are, they definitely would not do any good in sales careers.

One thing is for sure, Randy needs to look into hair replacement treatments. Maybe if he had hair restoration, he might get more parts in movies.

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Wells Fargo and B of A Admits Foreclosure Mistakes

Edu Freestyle — Sun, 21 Nov 2010 17:52:33 +0000

Cited: Reuters/Daily News

OnOctober 28, Wells Fargo admitted it made mistakes in the paperwork of thousands of foreclosures and promised to fix them. According to the Wall Street Journal, Bank of America Corp found mistakes in foreclosure files as it began a review of 102,000 cases.

Wells Fargo, a San Francisco-based bank, said it plans to refile documents in 55,000 of the cases by mid-November. The company said not all those cases included errors but didn’t say how many thousands did.

Wells Fargo described the mistakes as technical and said it has no plans to halt the foreclosure process, though filing new paperwork will cause some delays.

“We don’t believe that there are instances in which the foreclosures would not have occurred otherwise,” said Teri Schrettenbrunner, a Wells Fargo spokeswoman. The documents are being refiled in the 23 states where a judge’s approval is needed to complete a foreclosure.

Wells Fargo & Co.’s CEO, John Stumpf, has declined to join Bank of America Corp., Ally Financial Inc.’s GMAC Mortgage and other banks in suspending foreclosures because of flawed paperwork that surfaced at several large banks.

On a conference call with investors this month, Stumpf said the bank is “confident that our practices, procedures and documentation” are accurate.

Depositions of two Wells Fargo employees have called the company’s foreclosure practices into question. A Fort Mill, S.C.-based Wells employee said in a deposition taken last March that she signed between 300 and 500 foreclosure documents per day,

In another deposition taken in May, another Wells employee said he verified only the dates on up to 150 foreclosure documents he signed daily and relied on co-workers to ensure that other information was correct.

Bank of America is scheduled to meet October 28 with state officials investigating allegations the bank rushed the foreclosure process without properly reviewing documents.

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A person briefed on the matter confirmed the parties will have a preliminary discussion about issues related to the foreclosure documents. The person did not give details about the meeting or who will participate. The person, who spoke on condition of anonymity, was not authorized to speak publicly.

Bank of America, based in Charlotte, N.C., said in a statement: “We have been cooperating with the attorneys general and continue to have dialogue and share information with these important stakeholders.”

The bank resumed foreclosures this week after halting them temporarily to resubmit documents with a new process designed to correct any mistakes such as misspelled names or incorrect numbers.

Attorneys general in all 50 states and the District of Columbia are jointly investigating whether paperwork and legal procedures were handled properly in hundreds of thousands of cases.

On October 24, it was reported that Bank of America found errors in 10-25 out of the first several hundred foreclosure cases it reviewed, the newspaper said in its electronic edition.

The problems included improper paperwork, lack of signatures and missing files, as well as cases in which information about the property and payment history being unmatched, the newspaper said.

The bank has not found any evidence of wrongful foreclosures, the newspaper said.

The bank found the errors while reviewing less than 1% of 102,000 foreclosure files that need review before going back to the courts in 23 states, the newspaper said.

All 50 U.S. states have started a joint investigation of the mortgage industry, focusing on allegations that, for years, banks have not reviewed documents properly or have submitted false statements to evict delinquent borrowers.

Bloomberg News reported earlier in the day that state attorneys general were scheduled to meet with lenders this week on the foreclosure-document probe and had conference calls with several lenders, also known as loan servicers.

Iowa Attorney General Tom Miller is leading the multistate probe. Geoff Greenwood, a spokesman for Miller, confirmed that a meeting is scheduled for Thursday. He declined to comment on which banks are expected to attend.

Besides state regulators, banking regulators including the Federal Reserve are examining whether mortgage companies cut corners on their own procedures when they moved to foreclose on people’s homes.

Despite the problems, the Obama administration maintains there is no need to halt foreclosures in all 50 states.

On Wednesday, Phyllis Caldwell, chief of the Treasury Department’s homeownership preservation office, told a financial bailout watchdog panel that there was no evidence of risk to the financial system from the documents scandal - or from efforts by mortgage investors to force banks to buy back problem loans.

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My Take: I am amazed! The bank actually admitted they made a mistake and a big one. I wonder how many home buyers got caught up in that mess. I know that there are a lot of Arizona foreclosures right now and they predict more to come. I also wonder how many newly constructed home buyers got caught up in a mess as well. For those I would recommend getting Colorado construction attorneys to fight it.

If we’re successful in purchasing our first home, it will be a foreclosure and I feel sorry for the people that previously owned because they lost home. People shouldn’t have to be worrying about whether they’re going to lose their homes. This time a year they should be worrying about Christmas gifts and prom dresses. Well, it might be a little early for homecoming dresses, but they shouldn’t have to worry about their home.

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The War Next Door

Edu Freestyle — Sun, 21 Nov 2010 17:36:43 +0000

Cited: MSNBC

As the vicious drug cartels fight, not only each other, but the authorities as well over smuggling routes into and out of the US as well as distributing rights and Mexico, Americans find it difficult to understand the level of brutality. That brutality is so close that bullets for Mexican gunfire had struck buildings on the American side of the 2,000-mile-long US border fence. That difficulty in understanding comes because most Americans only see the brutality on the news.

In the nearly four years since Mexican President Felipe Calderon, firmly supported by the U.S. government, launched an unprecedented attack on Mexico’s drug kingpins, nearly 30,000 people have been killed. The victims include thousands of police officers, soldiers, public officials, judges and journalists, as the traffickers fight back with powerful weapons, many of them purchased in the United States. Often Mexican police find themselves outmanned and outgunned by the criminals.

Terrified Mexican officials have fled across the border seeking political asylum and some Mexican villages have become ghost towns after traffickers killed or pushed out the residents to clear the way for their smuggling operations.

The Mexican trafficking organizations have also crossed deeply into the United States, peddling tons of marijuana, methamphetamine, heroin and cocaine to American drug users, who reward the cartels with an estimated 19 to 39 billion dollars a year, according to the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration. Federal authorities say Mexican traffickers are now entrenched in at least 270 American cities, running sophisticated and disciplined networks that not only bring the drugs in, but also ship truckloads of cash back to Mexico.

“Mexico and its government are looking at transnational drug trafficking as a national security threat. We, too, have to look at it seriously in our country,” said David Gaddis, the DEA’s chief for global enforcement operations. “It is our country’s number one organized crime threat.”

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Making al-Qaida ‘look tame’

A distinguishing feature of the Mexican drug war is the unspeakable violence played out daily on the streets and posted in graphic detail by newspapers and media websites. Large-scale gun battles, mass executions, corpses strewn in public, beheadings, torture and grenade attacks have become commonplace. As of this writing, at least a dozen Mexican mayors have been killed in 2010 alone. A gubernatorial candidate was shot dead on a highway. After a Mexican marine was killed during a raid against a drug kingpin, gunmen massacred the young man’s family after his funeral.

“I think they make al-Qaida look tame in terms of what they do. I can’t explain how someone loses their humanity and resorts to these things,” said Anthony Coulson, a recently retired DEA supervisor. Coulson ran the DEA’s Tucson District Office, overseeing 255 miles of border between the U.S. and Mexico. He argued that the violence, and the amounts of illicit drugs flowing from Mexico into the United States, has never been higher and that the traffickers have never been more powerful or in control of more territory than they are no

“It’s getting worse. I’ve never seen it at this level before,” said Coulson.

Of particular concern is Ciudad Juarez, Mexico’s fourth largest city with a population of 1.3 million people sitting right across the border from El Paso, Texas. Two major drug cartels and local gangs have been engaged in a vicious battle there over turf and smuggling routes. Last year alone, 2,800 people were killed there and the death toll this year could be higher. In two separate incidents within one week this October, gunmen stormed private parties in Juarez homes and opened fire.

In the first massacre, nine were killed. In the second, thirteen — ranging in age from 16 to 25 years old — died when gunmen stormed a birthday party and started shooting. The attackers escaped, but authorities suspect the rampage is somehow connected to the ongoing turf war over drugs. Several other mass killings have occurred in drug rehabilitation facilities.

Adding to the terror in Juarez, a remote-controlled car bomb aimed at police was detonated in the downtown area, killing three people and raising concerns over a heightened level of violence. To lure police to the scene, the bombers shot a man, dressed him in a police uniform, laid him on a street corner and then made an emergency call reporting an officer down. When responders arrived, the bomb hidden in a brief case exploded.

A 2 Nation Threat

Political and law enforcement leaders in both countries agree that American drug users fuel the Mexican trafficking cartels by purchasing their illicit products. They insist that demand reduction is an important component for calming the violence. There also are arguments about whether drug legalization would help, although the predominant view is both countries is that such measures are unlikely to be implemented on a national scale.

Another debate is over who is over who is actually winning the fight between the Mexican government and the drug traffickers.

“I don’t think it’s a winnable war,” said Tony Payan, a drug cartel expert who teaches at the University of Texas at El Paso. “The reason I don’t think it’s winnable is that the United States is not addressing the consumption part. It’s not doing its part to reduce the market itself.”

David Gaddis, of the DEA, agrees than demand reduction is crucial, but he also points to recent arrests of major traffickers, large drug seizures and increase cooperation and intelligence sharing between Mexican and U.S. authorities. He argued that the extreme violence is the result of traffickers being threatened and cut off from their normal smuggling activities by the Mexican police and military.

“I see it as very positive, despite the violence that’s ongoing throughout Mexico,” Gaddis said.

“Desperation results in desperate acts, such as the brutality and the massacres that are ongoing. So we would expect to see continued violence for some time. But at some point, it will yield.”

Others fear that Mexico is now in a long-term spiral toward more bloodshed as the brazen traffickers lash out and fight for control. Mexico’s next presidential election in 2012, they say, is critical, because it will determine whether the current level of pressure on the cartels will continue past President Calderon’s administration.

“The same gangs that are in Mexico are the same gangs that distribute drugs in the United States,” Jose Reyes Ferriz said. “It is a joint problem, and (solving) the problem of Mexico prevents the problem from jumping to the United States.” The former mayor of Juarez insists the United States must fully understand that the drug war affects both sides of the border deeply and should do more to help defeat the drug cartels in this drug war.

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My Take: The main problem is that Mexican officials are so corrupt. Mexico needs to get rid of the corruption in their own police forces before they can even take on the cartels. However, that being said, the US does need to step it up a notch. That means I need to get something done on this side of the border so that they can work with others on the other side.

One thing that might help is figuring out how to trace what they call “throw away” or no contract cell phones. Drug dealers use them all the time and it would help if they could trace. I’m not talking about the T Mobile PDA phones because they usually the contract requires your name, address, phone number and just about everything else. I mean those cheap ones you can buy for $20-$30.

I know that the cartels have tried sending drugs through air cargo services and lost their cargo. That’s because there is more security on air cargo handling nowadays because of 9/11. They just need to start increasing the security at the border, which I understand they are actually attempting to do now.

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Other Resources

Transcription the American Way

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Paramount Discovers Secret to Box Office Success

Edu Freestyle — Fri, 19 Nov 2010 01:09:09 +0000

Cited: Time

Making cheap, R-rated sequels and releasing them in October seems to be what the folks at Paramount Pictures think of as the secret elixir for box-office success. Following that October 16 weekend debut for Jackass 3-D, the $20 million movie that made $50.4 million in 3 days, Paramount released “Paranormal Activity 2″ a prequel to the last Fall’s out of nowhere haunted house pseudo-documentary. This one earned $41.5 million in the US and placed first in the overall pre-Halloween weekend. It is always nice for filmmakers to see that in just 3 days their work has grossed 14 times its production cost, with a $3 million budget, making it Avatar-size in comparison.

These two bargain-basement sensations have earned Paramount nearly $130 million in 10 days, with more to come. The take for Jackass 3D fell 57% in its second frame to $21.6 million; but that figure would still have been enough to land the film at the head of the box-office chart in five of the past 10 weekends. With $87.1 million in the till, the Johnny Knoxville maso-comedy is already the top-grossing movie released this fall, ahead of The Town ($84.7 million) and The Social Network ($72.9 million), and should become the first of the season’s films to reach $100 million by next weekend.

Off-Topic Breach: Auto lockout tools have evolved over the years in surprising ways. The Slim Jim was supreme in the past because a good practitioner could open most anything with it. Using a Slim Jim is not always as straight forward as you might think. As with all other auto opening tools or lock picks, you need to be innovative. Most people think to “slim jim a car” involves jamming the tool down into the car door cavity until something ‘pops’. All too often what ‘pops’ is a broken lock linkage. Brutal techniques have no place in locksmithing, whether we’re using car door tools or lockpicking tools.

That weekend’s runner-up, the senior-citizen spy caper Red, finished third, at $15 million, dropping only 31% in its second time around. The movie appeals to older viewers, who are slower than their grandkids in showing up at theaters but can be counted on to patronize their favorite stars — here Bruce Willis, Helen Mirren, Morgan Freeman and John Malkovich as ex-CIA operatives taking on one last mission. Except this surely won’t be the last. By tomorrow, Red will have out-grossed all Willis starring-role projects of the past decade, except for Live Free or Die Hard and Sin City. Can you smell franchise?

The weekend’s other new wide release, the otherworldly drama Hereafter, earned a so-so $12 million in expanding from its six-theater showcase to more than 2,000 screens. Starring Matt Damon as a reluctant psychic who’s mysteriously connected to two other people with afterlife experiences, Hereafter was directed by Clint Eastwood, and continues his middling record in helming films he doesn’t appear in. Over the last eight years Eastwood has taken the leading role in two movies; the Oscar-winning Million Dollar Baby, from 2004, earned $100.5 million in North America, and the 2008 Gran Torino zoomed to $148 million. Moviegoers still want to see Clint Eastwood; they just don’t want to see un film de Clint Eastwood.

Of the six films Clint has directed but not starred in, only Mystic River was a hit ($90.1 million). The Japanese-language Letters from Iwo Jima earned a Best Picture Oscar nomination but grossed a disappointing $13.8 million in North America, while three other Eastwood-directed projects — Flags of Our Fathers, Changeling and Invictus — topped out in the mid-$30 millions. That’s the likely finishing mark for Hereafter, which would be fine for a low-cost indie but not for a film with a $50 million budget. Oddly, Eastwood’s three hits in this stretch were the cheapest to produce: Mystic River at $25 million, Million Dollar Baby at $30 million and Gran Torino at $33 million. The flops cost between $50 million and $90 million, though even these usually made back their investment because they performed well abroad.

At 80, the old cowboy continues to pile up the auteur esteem but not the cash. He ought to think about another starring role — maybe in Paranormal Activity 3, scaring the ghosts away with one angry growl or how about Jackass 4? Clint could introduce those crazy guys to a whole new world of pain.

The pre-Halloween weekends estimates for top grossing pictures and the US theaters that was reported by Box Office Mojo are as follows:

Paranormal Activity 2, $41.5 million, first weekend
Jackass 3D, $21.6 million; $87.1 million, second week
Red, $15 million; $43.5 million, second week
Hereafter, $12 million; $12.3 million, second week
The Social Network, $7.3 million; $72.9 million, fourth week
Secretariat, $6.9 million; $37.4 million, third week
Life as We Know It, $6.15 million; $37.6 million, third week
Legend of the Guardians: The Owls of Ga’Hoole, $3.2 million; $50.2 million, fifth week
The Town, $2.7 million; $84.7 million, sixth week
Easy A, $1.75 million; $54.8 million, sixth week

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My Take: I have not seen any of these movies, at least not yet. I will probably wait until I come on cable to watch them. It just costs too much to go to a movie anymore. It is among many other things that have gone up in price that is meant for enjoyment. Unlike the Greek apparel that students wear in college, the everyday fun things are way too expensive. Of course, custom Greek apparel is still too expensive because it is custom-made.

The things that are necessary, like sending kids to an academy driving school NY are expensive but necessary for the safety of a teenager. For those who are looking for a career change, such as truck driving, they need to go to a truck driving school and again it is expensive but necessary.

And then you have people who are obese and must lose weight to continue living. They need to learn how to lose belly fat and that can run into a lot of money. And believe it or not it is easier to lose stomach fat for men than it is for women because women have and need a higher percentage of body fat than men.

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Other Resources

Keeping a Sketchbook

Since it’s likely that kids art classes might only be available once a week for learning, a child can continue to be creative at home after class and during the week by keeping a sketchbook filled with the ideas the child might come up with when he’s not in class. A sketchbook can not only serve as the springboard for larger artistic ideas but it can also be a great way to track the progress of a child or any student over the course of his lessons. It’s important to remember that a sketchbook can be filled with scratch-outs since it’s just a practice tome.

Opera Star Sings Better after Double Lung Transplant

Edu Freestyle — Fri, 19 Nov 2010 00:55:43 +0000

Cited: ABC News

On October 26, opera singer Charity Tillemann-Dick took the stage to open this year’s TEDMED conference in San Diego for an exquisitely sung aria! This conference is one that examines the novel approaches to medicine and health care as well as marking an anniversary for the singer. It was one year ago the chart you will from a month-long coma that follow a typical double lung transplant.

At age 20, Tillemann-Dick was just starting her singing career in Europe when she was diagnosed with pulmonary hypertension, a condition in which the arteries supplying the lungs have unusually high blood pressure, putting patients at risk for heart failure.

“I saw a specialist and she told me that I had to stop singing, that those high notes were going to kill me,” the soprano said at Tuesday’s conference. “She was emphatic: I was singing my own obituary.”

But Tillemann-Dick did not give up singing and even when her condition worsened and she had to carry around a 4-pound apparatus that delivered medicine to her continually just to be able to function, she managed to perform all over the globe.

“She just wasn’t going to let [her condition] rule her life,” the singer’s mother, Annette Tillemann-Dick says.

After her father died suddenly however, her condition worsened, as did her voice. When the singer had right heart failure due to her worsening symptoms, she finally gave in to her doctor’s advice and agreed to a double-lung transplant.

Singer Gets New Set of Pipes

Given that opera singing focuses heavily on proper breathing technique, Tillemann-Dick was less than floored when the impossible happened: a donor from Texas was available as a match within days of her agreeing to undergo the procedure.

“I had spent my entire life training my lungs. I wasn’t enthusiastic about giving them up,” she says. She asked her surgeon at the Cleveland clinic, Dr. Ken McCurry, to please try to save her voice. Knowing that the breathing tubes put in place after her surgery would no doubt destroy her voice, while still in a post-operative coma, surgeons performed a special procedure to reroute the tubes to preserve a slim chance that Tillemann-Dick might perform again.

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Long Road to Recovery

The surgery had been a trying one, with the singer flat-lining twice and the month-long coma following left doctors wondering why she was not waking up.

By the time she woke from her coma, she had been on a respirator for so long that her diaphragm had atrophied, forcing her to relearn the simple task of breathing — a feat that took two and a half months, she says. It was Christmas Eve last year, just months after her surgery, when she first attempted to sing along with her occupational therapist to a Christmas song.

“It wasn’t much of a voice, but it was something,” she says. Now, just a year later, her vocal couch says that her voice is even better than it was before her surgery.

To this day, Tilleman-Dick says she thinks often of the first doctor’s prescription, that she should never sing again. She credits doctors at Johns Hopkins and the Cleveland Clinic for believing that she could have a higher quality of life than that.

“We need to stop letting disease divorce us from our dreams. We will find that patients don’t just survive, we thrive,” she said, closing her presentation.

A Lung Breathing Outside the Body

Tilleman-Dick’s story highlights the incredible medical feats made possible by organ transplantation, but it was the next presenter at TEDMED, Dr. Shaf Keshavjee, director of the Toronto Lung Program, who is taking transplants to a realm usually left to science fiction.

“Charity would not be alive today if it were not for her lung transplant,” Keshavjee said Tuesday. He “marvels” at what transplant can do for patients today and the technology he and his colleagues are working on with hopes to extend the number of patients who can undergo transplantation by improving the quality of donor organs available.

How does he intend to do that? Using an apparatus he helped create that allows a human lung to breathe and live outside of the human body. Using a freshly-harvested pig lung as a demonstration on stage October 26, Keshavjee showed how a donor lung can live independent of any body long enough for doctors to use sophisticated therapies on it, such as genetic modification, that make it more suitable for donation.

“It’s fascinating,” domestic guru and TEDMED attendee Martha Stewart said as she, as one of a few volunteers from the audience, was allowed to squeeze the breathing lung with a gloved hand.

Normally, to slow the process of dying, donor tissues are flash-cooled, a process that makes it harder for the organ to get up and running once transplanted. With this apparatus, the lung not only doesn’t have to be cooled but it can be treated and improved and hopefully, one day can be made to match the patient’s body so closely that rejection — the ruin of many transplantations — will no longer be an issue.

“We have transplanted 30 patients with lungs we wouldn’t normally use [using this technology]. Now 30 people are alive. It’s something I certainly never thought I would see in my lifetime,” he says.

TEDMED website explains “from personal health to public health, devices to design and Hollywood to the hospital.” This is a annual conference dedicated to increasing innovation in the medical field of study.

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My Take: It is absolutely amazing what they can do with medicine these days. That is like the Sigvaris support stockings became out with years ago. They help people with heart problems by keeping circulation going in their legs. If you did not know, many people with heart problems suffer from swelling legs because they cannot move around as much. It is called edema or water retention and makes circulation in the legs difficult. Compression stockings keep the edema from forming and thereby helping circulation.

Believe it or not, even a liposuction surgeon will recommend the stockings for patients after surgery. Because when you don’t move around very much, you can get swelling of the legs. That is why a plastic surgeon will recommend them. Of course, it does not mean you have to wear them. And yes, it is usually a cardiologist or even a pulmonologist who orders or recommends the use of support stockings.

The funny thing is, people like waitresses, bartenders and even maids for a maid cleaning service where the precursor for support stockings and that is hosiery. Even the football star Joe Montana was known to wear hosiery because of the support that he gave his legs. So the next time you need Maryland house cleaning and maid comes in, do not be surprised if he or she is wearing hosiery!

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Other Resources

Wilderness Shelters

Everyone has seen programs on the television that describe harrowing moments in the wild when a person has become lost far away from civilization and has forgotten to pack a survival kit and is out of range of a cell phone tower. The best way to survive the night in those circumstances if that person is without a tent or other shelter is to create a temporary place to rest within the branches of nearby trees. Although the cold weather might not be kept out by the simple branches, it’s likely that layering a significant number of branches upon one another may be sufficient to keep high winds out.

Deadly Shark Attack in Central California

Edu Freestyle — Fri, 19 Nov 2010 00:51:24 +0000

Cited: ABC News

A shark expert has stated that the shark attack may have been a case of mistaken identity. The shark that killed Lucas Ransom, 19-year-old trained lifeguard, who was boogie boarding off the coast of central California could have been mistaken for a seal or sea lion.

Lucas Ransom was surfing Friday morning between 50 and 100 yards offshore at Surf Beach, which is in Vandenburg Air Force Base, north of Santa Barbara, when the shark reared up out of the waves, pulled him under and bit off his leg, witnesses said.

Because of recent storm weather, the water was murky and the shark could have mistaken Ransom for its normal prey, shark expert Ralph Collier told ABC Los Angeles station KABC-TV.

“That would be like you and I trying to see out of our windshield in our car in a heavy fog, and a young man in a boogie board could have replicated or represented a seal or sea lion to this shark,” he said.

Ransom, who was a junior at University of California-Santa Barbara, majoring in Chemical Engineering, worked at a Murrieta, Calif., and community pool as a lifeguard in 2007 and was honored by the city when he and two other lifeguards saved a young boy’s life.

According to witness accounts, the shark that attacked him Friday gave him no chance to save his own life.

“When the shark hit him, he just said, ‘Help me, dude!’ He knew what was going on,” Matthew Garcia, a friend who was surfing with Ransom, told The Associated Press. “It was really fast. You just saw a red wave and this water is blue, as blue as it could ever be, and it was just red, the whole wave.”

Garcia, who told the The Associated Press he was just two feet away when the shark attacked, said he searched for Ransom’s body but couldn’t find his friend in the murky, bloody surf. Only after he started swimming for shore did he see Ransom’s boogie board pop up, and then he saw his body.

He said he tried to revive Ransom as he brought him to shore.

“Apparently the friend of the victim saw his buddy go underwater for a brief period of time and then was able to bring his friend back to shore,” Vandenburg spokesman Jeremy Eggers said.

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Shark Kills Surfer off California Beach

“He was just floating in the water. I flipped him over on his back and underhooked his arms. I was pressing on his chest and doing rescue breathing in the water,” Garcia said. “He was just kind of lifeless, just dead weight.”

Ransom was pronounced dead after further efforts to revive him on the beach, Eggers said.

“To hear that a sad thing happened to him was just like a heartbreak, you know,” said Brittany Holland, a good friend of Ransom’s. “He was the happiest kid in the world.”

Though officials have not identified the type of shark, witnesses described it as being 14 to 20 feet in length.

Officials at Vandenburg Air Force Base released photos of the victim’s body board, which had a one-foot section torn out by the shark.

There have been frequent shark sightings at the beach, but attacks have been extremely rare.

The last shark attack at Surf Beach was in 2008 when a shark bit a surfer’s board, but the surfer was not injured, according to ABC Santa Barbara affiliate KEYT-TV. The last fatal shark attack happened in 2003 at Avila Beach.

As a result of the attack, officials closed three beaches in the area, Surf, Wall and Minuteman, for 72 hours.

In 2008, the last fatal shark attack occurred at a San Diego beach. There were 28 shark attacks recorded in the United States that were unprovoked in 2009.

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My Take: It only seems logical because humans are eating up all the fish in the sea. 2 of the research and you will discover, for example, that the number of tuna being caught is getting smaller. All you really have to do is look at the cost of seafood and how much it is going up to realize that there is not enough price down. In fact, anybody who goes on the Keys fishing charter in Florida can tell you how difficult it is to catch “big” fish in.

Key West fishing charters when and know where the fish are going to be, but cannot guarantee the size of that sailfish or swordfish you will catch. The reason is simple; we are reducing the amount of fish in the sea because our population is growing. The more our population grows, the more something either increases or decreases depending on what they are.

A work injury lawyer can tell you that there are more work injuries because more unskilled workers are being hired because there are not enough skilled workers. We live in a world of depleting natural resources and increasing population with a need for more natural resources. Even a personal injury attorney knows that with an increasing population there will be more personal injury cases.

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Other Resources

Music or Movie Duplications

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Manufacturers of Wakeboard Racks

Wakeboard racks are available from many different wakeboarding suppliers like Monster Tower and Krypt who create racks designed to fit nearly any surfboard on the market with ease and without modification. Focusing on the ease of installation and maintenance, wakeboard rack manufacturers try to ensure that users of their products will be able to enter the wakeboarding scene with as little prep work as possible by creating standard size machinery and items designed to fit most commonly sized boats and boards. Although custom-made wakeboard racks are certainly available from most manufacturers, that sort of investment is generally not required.

Was BB Gun Last Resort for Angry Mom?

Edu Freestyle — Fri, 19 Nov 2010 00:39:22 +0000

Cited: Daily News

After arming her 12-year-old son with a BB gun and a knife to defend himself against school bullies, a Connecticut mother has been arrested according to police. Sylvia Mojica of Hartford has been charged with risk of injury to a minor, according to authorities.

The 38-year-old allegedly put the pistol and blade in the backpack of the child, who now may be suspended or expelled from Burns Elementary School.

School officials are looking into the claims that he was being bullied. According to the Hartford Courant, security officers at the school had once seen the boy being chased by students.

Hartford school officials say a 12-year-old boy was caught with a BB gun and a folding knife in his backpack was not bullied in school.

Initial reports said the boy’s mother told officials he needed the weapons because he was being bullied. But David Medina, a school system spokesman, says officials were told the boy was carrying the weapons on October 22 because of an altercation in his neighborhood the night before.

Medina said that encounter involved adults and teens who did not attend the same school.

The boy’s mother, 38-year-old Sylvia Mojica (moe-HEE’-kuh) is accused of providing the boy with the weapons. She has been charged with risk of injury to a minor and is due in court October 29. The boy told school officials that he had the items in his backpack.

Administrators say the boy now faces a suspension or even expulsion. They are also investigating the bullying allegations.

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It was not immediately clear if Mojica had a lawyer.

The charges come the same day that the U.S. Department of Education issued new guidelines warning schools that tolerating harassment could put them in violation of federal anti-discrimination laws.

That move follows several high-profile cases of bullying in recent months. Russlynn Ali, assistant secretary for civil rights, said the department was responding to what it senses as a growing problem within schools.

She said the Office for Civil Rights had received 800 complaints alleging harassment over the last fiscal year, and that reports from the field indicate an increase of harassment against certain groups including gays and lesbians, as well as Muslim students after the 9/11 attacks.

According to a USA Today survey released October 26, nearly half of American high school students ages 15-18 (47%) report being bullied or teased at least once during the last year and 50% also say they have bullied, teased or taunted others.

According to the Clemson University Institute on Family and Neighborhood Life, one in six students admit to being bullied 2-3 or more every month.

In January, a 15-year-old Massachusetts girl, Phoebe Prince (left), took her own life after being relentlessly bullied by her classmates, prosecutors said. Six teenagers have been charged. One, a 19-year-old charged with statutory rape, is expected in court Tuesday for a hearing.

A Minnesota school district unanimously passed changes to its anti-bullying and harassment policies to clearly list protected classes (including race, color, creed, religion, national origin, sex, marital status, disability, age, poverty and sexual orientation), three months after 15-year-old Justin Aaberg, of Andover, Minn., hanged himself in his room. His friends told his mother he had been a frequent victim of anti-gay bullying.

Asher Brown of Cypress, Tex., and Seth Walsh of Tehachapi, Calif., both 13, and 15-year Billy Lucas of Greensburg, Ind., who each committed suicide during the past few months, were said to be targets of anti-gay bullying.

In September, 18-year-old Rutgers University student Tyler Clementi committed suicide after his roommate secretly webcast his dorm-room tryst with a man, police said. The roommate and another student have been charged with invasion of privacy and authorities are considering whether to add a hate-crime charge.

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My Take: As a recipient of childhood bullying, I think schools should be more attentive than they are to the matter. I also think that anyone who causes someone to commit suicide because of some type of bullying or harassment should be charged and the family should get a NYC wrongful death lawyer to sue them.

It seems to me that schools have walk through metal detectors to prevent weapons being brought into school, they could at least try to stop the bullying on school premises. In fact, more and more schools are bringing in metal detection equipment just for that purpose. If they can afford to do that, they can afford to teach their teachers what to look for to resolve bullying on school property.

Now that I am an adult, I understand the reason behind bullying. The reason is twofold. One part of it is to have fun and parents should teach their child that is not a good way to have fun. The other part is that the kids are afraid of something and the only way to get over that fear is to berate it. Even a NYC car accidents lawyer can tell the parents that they can be sued for harassment if your child continues.

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Other Resources

No Systemic Financial Threat?

Edu Freestyle — Fri, 19 Nov 2010 00:33:55 +0000

Cited: Reuters

On October 27, a senior treasury official said that the US Treasury does not foresee a systemic financial threat due to the possibility that banks will be forced to buy back mortgage securities of faulty foreclosure documents

But the foreclosure controversy could put downward pressure on home prices by delaying the sale of thousands of distressed properties, Phyllis Caldwell, chief of Treasury’s Homeowner Preservation Office, told a bailout watchdog panel,

The Treasury is closely watching the situation involving mortgage “put-back” risk to major banks, Caldwell told the Congressional Oversight Panel.

“We are very closely monitoring any litigation risk to see if there’s any systemic threat but at this point there is no indication that there is,” she said.

All 50 states have launched a joint investigation into whether mortgage servicers filed faulty affidavits in foreclosure cases, threatening a new wave of problems for lenders and placing a cloud over the long-delayed recovery of the distressed U.S. housing market.

A member of the Congressional Oversight Panel, Damon Silvers, objected to Treasury’s benign view of the threat, citing a demand by eight large investors, including the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, that Bank of America take back some $47 billion in mortgage bonds because of mishandled mortgages backing them.

According to Fed estimates, Bank of America would likely have to book a $23 billion loss on the securities if forced to buy them back, Silvers said.

“Five such requests, if honored, to Bank of America will amount to more than the current market capitalization of Bank of America, which is now $115 billion,” Silvers told Caldwell.

“Now, do you wish to retract your statement that there is no systemic risk in this situation? And the word is risk — not certainty — but risk,” he added. “I would urge you to do so because these things can become embarrassing later.”

Caldwell said there were many factors involved in assessing put-back risks, including the severity of problems with the mortgages, the litigation itself, and the probability that it might be successful.

“It is still early and we are monitoring it daily,” she said.

Bank of America Chief Executive Brian Moynihan last week vowed to fight litigation from investors who want to offload poorly performing mortgage bonds. He characterized investors’ claims as: “I bought a Chevy Vega and I want it to be a Mercedes.”

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BANK REGULATOR WANTS RISKS ASSESSED

The Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, a top U.S. bank regulator, pledged to make sure that banks adequately assess the risks of lawsuits over the foreclosure mess and carry adequate reserves to cover losses.

“We’re working with our banks to assess that put-back risk and basically make sure that is properly dimensioned, that they have the reserves for that, and make sure they are doing a very full, complete analysis of that,” Joseph Evers, the OCC’s deputy comptroller for large bank supervision, told the oversight panel.

Another witness at the hearing, Inside Mortgage Finance publisher and chief executive Guy Cecala, said that in 25 years of covering the industry, he was not aware of any successful litigation involving a violation of foreclosure procedures that required lenders to buy back loans.

Caldwell said it may take several months for mortgage servicers, state courts and law enforcement agencies to clear up questions over foreclosures, delaying the process.

Longer foreclosure timelines will push down prices, particularly for vacant houses, and uncertainty over the status and titles of already foreclosed homes may also discourage buyers.

“This would hurt homeowners and home buyers alike at a time when foreclosed homes make up 25 percent of home sales,” Caldwell said in prepared testimony. “Together, these two factors may exert downward pressure on overall housing prices both in the short and long-run.”

Treasury believes, however, that while the probes may in the near-term reduce the number of foreclosed houses available for sale, most distressed properties affected by the controversy will “eventually come onto the market.”

Caldwell also scolded mortgage servicers that have reported possible filings of faulty foreclosure affidavits, including Bank of America, Ally Financial, and JPMorgan Chase.

“The reported behavior of these mortgage servicers is unacceptable,” she said. “Servicers must comply with all applicable laws and regulations and be held accountable if they do not.”

Separately, U.S. Senator Mark Warner urged the Obama administration to create a non-partisan task force to examine the foreclosure problems and make recommendations to improve the transparency of the process.

The senator did state in a letter to the White House that policy recommendations might come as early is mid-December if a panel was set up quickly by the administration.

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My Take: If the government would start infusing more jobs and the economy people wouldn’t be in a situation of being foreclosed on because they would have the money to pay their mortgage. It, Obama is encouraging companies to outsource work to other countries instead of keeping network break here in the US.

By creating jobs here in the US, it would create a domino effect because people would need to buy workwear, like Carhartt coats, and they would need to find daycare, which in turn would create more jobs. In this example, those jobs would be making the Carhartt flame resistant clothing and creating a need for daycare workers. Finding daycare centers would be fairly easy because there is a child care finder online that people can utilize to search for daycare centers in their areas.

Some people may even need energy supplements to get back up to speed for work. Those same people might even be nutrition conscious parents who want their children to have a sports nutrition supplements for their sporting activities. As you can see, it creates a domino effect. It just seems to me that keeping jobs in America for Americans is a better choice. I also see the difficulty in doing this because it costs more to pay Americans to do the same job that foreign employees do for less pay. This creates a vicious circle! Americans want more pay which means that companies have to charge more for their products or services.

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Other Resources

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