CJE Saturday News Briefs
YIN & Yang News;
WS – Seemingly opposite or contrary forces are interconnected and interdependent in the natural world; and, they give rise to each other as they inter-relate to one other.
The Yin: Senate leaders to make last-ditch “fiscal cliff” effort - President Barack Obama and U.S. congressional leaders agreed on Friday to make a final effort to prevent the United States from going over the “fiscal cliff,” setting off intense bargaining over Americans’ tax rates as a New Year’s Eve deadline looms.
The Yang: US banks’ profits are best in six years
— US banks are enjoying their best profits in six years and are lending a bit more freely. The gradual improvement suggests the industry will sustain its healing from the worst financial crisis in decades and help strengthen the economy.
The industry earned $37.6 billion from July through September, a 6.6 percent increase from a year earlier. More…
Partial Deal With Union Averts a Strike at 14 Ports
WS – You’all knew about this right? (Snicker, snicker)
Dockworkers dropped their threat of an imminent strike against ports from Boston to Houston after their union and shipping companies reached a deal on the main point of their dispute, a federal mediator announced on Friday.
The mediator said the two sides had agreed to extend the existing contract by 30 days, to Jan. 28, to give them time to try to reach an agreement on the remaining issues, including what the companies say are antiquated work rules. Late Friday, the two sides issued a new announcement, saying they had agreed to extend the contract an additional week, to Feb. 6, creating a new potential strike deadline.
The partial agreement means that the union, the International Longshoremen’s Association, will not carry out its threat to have 14,500 dockworkers go on strike this Sunday at 14 ports along the East and Gulf Coasts.
In a statement on Friday, George H. Cohen, director of the Federal Mediation and Conciliation Service, said the two sides had reached an agreement in principle on a particularly contentious issue, known as container royalty payments. More…
Today is “National Lose the F$cking Attitude Day”
Governor signs new law for abortion clinics in Michigan
WS - Governor Rick Snyder; Why do you hate your mother?
(Reuters) – Michigan’s Republican governor on Friday signed into law new rules for abortion providers that supporters say will protect the health of pregnant women but critics say will shutter clinics and restrict access.
The law signed by Governor Rick Snyder increases state oversight of abortion clinics and establishes a screening protocol to make sure women are not being forced to get an abortion.
The measure requires health facilities or clinics that perform more than 120 abortions a year to become licensed freestanding surgical outpatient facilities. More…
Fukushima Debris to Keep Hitting the Pacific Coast This Winter
WS - Authorities have the Authority to keep on Authorizing other Authorities to hire more Authorities to Authorize reports that only Authorized Authorities have been Authorized to talk to the Media about. Authorities say.
Authorities expect more debris from the March 2011 Japanese Tsunami to wash up on the Pacific Coast this winter. Seasonal changes in ocean currents and North Pacific winds will push the 1.5 million tons of debris still out there towards our shores.
Just last week, authorities in Washington State were nervously tracking the massive dock in the image above. It had been spotted floating in the Pacific Ocean before authorities found itcrashed into the beach of Olympic National Park on December 18th. The confirmed tsunami wreckage spent nearly two years at sea.
The tsunami that devastated Japan has left its mark on North American soil in the form of tokens large and small washed ashore on its beaches: A soccer ball inscribed in Japanese characters, a Harley Davidson motorcycle, and earlier this year, yet another massive dock. This one was 66-feet long and landed in Oregon in June: More…
Death! Sex! The Comic Book Sales Bump
WS – Textbook example of how Corporate Media place advertising within a article and present the article as news. The “Book Sales Bump” comes from the article. Not the other way around. Note the missing independent sources for this “News” story. Axel Alonso, editor in chief at Marvel Comics, may be a bit unreliable for accurate numbers.
In comic book publishing, the decision to kill off a long-running and beloved character may seem, at first glance, like a terribly unwise business move. But when Marvel Comics released its latest issue of Amazing Spider-Man—#700, which ends with Peter Parker, the webbed crusader’s alter ego, getting murdered—the issue began flying off the shelves.
“The sales are phenomenal,” says Axel Alonso, the editor in chief at Marvel Comics, “Amazing Spider-Man #700 has sold nearly 250,000 copies in print alone; final digital orders aren’t in yet. This is the best-selling comic book at this price-point of the last decade, at least.” More…
Researchers probe the science behind how music moves us
Music can make us tap our toes or help mend a broken heart. For centuries, people have instinctively taken advantage of its expressive and motivational powers, through dance, military marches, and modern-day workout mixes. But music is also laden with cultural meaning, history, and tradition. The fundamental link between movement and music has remained poorly understood, from a scientific point of view.
A team of Dartmouth College scientists embarked on an effort to strip music and movement down, to see if they could uncover a “shared structure” that would transcend cultural meaning and learned associations. They had a little bit of scientific work to build off of, suggesting the possible universal basis of the connection: baby researchers had found that even very young infants prefer music in a meter to which they had already been bounced. The way a runner slows down and stops, a group of researchers found, shares certain characteristics of the ends of musical pieces. And music is often written at speeds that aren’t far off from human beings’ most fundamental metronomes: heartbeats and walking speed. More…
‘Barbie’ demonstrating the G.H.W. Bush blow up doll. Pre-order yours now…
Bush sings while in hospital
WS – That’s it George, sing along with the voices and follow the light. Always follow the light George. Stop hanging on Georgie. Just let go…
– Former U.S. President George H.W. Bush, hospitalized for a fever, was feeling good enough Friday to croon a bit with his doctors and nurses, a spokesman said.
While Bush remained in intensive care at Methodist Hospital in Houston, family spokesman Jim McGrath said in a statement the 88-year-old former president was on the mend, Politico and The Washington Post reported.
“The president is alert and, as always, in good spirits — and his exchanges with doctors and nurses now include singing,” McGrath said. More…
Cancer-linked chemical found in mattresses
WS – Mattress manufacturers are sure to blame this on “Baby Pee”.
(UPI) — Lab tests have shown three popular brands of baby mattresses contain toxic flame retardants linked to increased cancer risk, the Chicago Tribune reported.
In tests conducted for the newspaper a chemical removed from children’s pajamas because of cancer concerns in the late 1970s was found in 11 baby mattresses sold recently under the Babies R Us, Foundations and Angeles brands, the Tribune said.
“These are bad chemicals, and we’ve known they’ve been bad for a long time,” Linda Birnbaum, director of the federal government’s National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences, told the newspaper. “If these chemicals are in your child’s mattress, they are going to be constantly exposed.” More…
