Milk prices have eased in recent months after skyrocketing last year. The national average price of a gallon of whole milk was $3.72 in April, after peaking at $3.87 last September, according to a USDA survey. As milk prices climbed 17% last year, as measured by the USDA survey, farmers responded by increasing production while consumers reduced consumption. That rise in supply and drop in demand resulted in the recent price drop.
Since the recession of 2001, the employee's average cost of an annual health care premium for family coverage has nearly doubled -- to $3,300, up from $1,800 -- while incomes have come nowhere close to keeping up. Factor in other out-of-pocket medical costs, and the portion of the average American household's income that goes toward health care has risen about 12 percent, according to the consulting and accounting firm Deloitte, and is now approaching one-fifth of the average household's spending.
The Iraqi Constitution is laden with contradictions. Equality of genders is stated in the document while at the same time Sharia is stated as the acceptable justice and legal system. Sharia regards one male worth two females. This must be observed throughout the country.
Women protesting this discrimination are beheaded. In Mosul two years ago, eight protesters were beheaded "in a terror campaign."
"'It was really, really horrifying,' said an official. Honor killings and murder are widespread. Thousands [of people] ... have become victims of murder, violence and rape--all backed by laws, tribal customs and religious rules. We urge the international community, the government to condemn this barbaric practice, and help the women of Iraq.'"
A Senate panel has agreed unanimously to block the Defense Department from funding Iraq reconstruction projects worth more than $2 million and to begin to force Baghdad to cover the costs of training and equipping its security forces. The provision, included in a 2009 defense policy bill approved this week by the Senate Armed Services Committee, comes as Democrats draft a similar provision within separate legislation that would cover this year's war spending. The efforts are part of the latest push on Capitol Hill to get Iraq to spend more of its own money and spare U.S. taxpayers. Democrats and many Republicans say it is unfair that Iraq is looking at pulling in as much as $70 billion in oil revenues this year while Americans grapple with soaring fuel prices at the pump.
CLEVELAND - Republican John McCain said President Bush should not be held responsible for the much-criticized "Mission Accomplished" banner five years ago, but he should be blamed for bungling the early months of the war.
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On Thursday, the fifth anniversary of Bush's dramatic landing on an aircraft carrier where the banner hung, McCain said, "I thought it was wrong at the time."
"So all I can tell you was that I was the strongest advocate, or one of the strongest advocates, for changing to adopt the surge," McCain told reporters. "And I think that history will judge me by the fact that I thought it was wrong."
It's really sickening how people like this don't take drunk driving seriously.
In my neck of the woods, a habitual drunkard who has been busted 8 times for drunk driving (with only a slap on the wrist) killed four people recently, including a dad and his two kids. This guy has also been in trouble with the law over 30 times.
It's all terribly disgusting...
www.herald-dispatch.com
They don't need lobbyists in Washington. All they need is a lawyer or two to file lawsuits. Even in the most nuclear-friendly locales in America, good luck getting the permitting on a new nuclear facility. Or a refinery. It's not necessarily the legislation, or the legislators--it's the constant legal hassles the enviros throw up.
I've been in the environmental consulting field for over a decade, and have never had a single project stopped-dead because of any environmental issues (out of 1000's of projects). Nearly everything can be mitigated in some way or another and what can't, usually gets wavered by the DEP, EPA, Army Corps, DSMRA, etc. Stories about spotted owls and bats flying into turbines are extremely rare; these are actually examples of shoddy environmental/biological surveys and poor planning, and not systematic failures in the permitting process.
I think nuclear plants are their own can of worms, because nobody wants them in their own backyards. For most power plants, you can stick them in a rural area, with few local inhabitants, and you wont have much of an issue. I suspect the problem with nuclear plants, is that while people generally don't object to living 20 miles from a coal plant, very few people want to be anywhere near the nuke. My aunt lives in Pottstown, PA within eye sight of the Limerick power plant; as soon as it went up, their property values fell dramatically.
As for oil refineries, I'd really like to see some specific details regarding a few people holding up construction with lawsuits. My firm has done numerous projects for Marathon Oil in Ashland, KY and we never had any issues. The oil industry also has enough money and laywers, I'm not convinced a few people could really hold them up in court. Given that they're making a whole lot of money and there isn't any shortage, I believe the reason there aren't more refineries is simply the lack of incentive.