Your Tax Dollars At Play

…Basically, this CDC report can be summed up this way:
Gay men in the South are seeing a spike in HIV, and it’s all the fault of those rednecks!

Apparently, the CDC believes if you people in the South would stop acting like having indiscriminate same-sex partners was risky and dangerous, then having indiscriminate same-sex partners would stop being risky and dangerous.

This is about as “scientific” as believing that schizophrenia is caused by witches.…

Based on thousands of pages of documents, many obtained through the Freedom of Information Act, the lawsuit alleges that EPA intentionally exposed at least dozens of unhealthy human study subjects to concentrated and elevated levels of air pollutants that EPA has determined are lethal, highly toxic and/or carcinogenic, including fine particulate matter (PM2.5) and diesel exhaust.

Many of the study subjects were health-impaired – that is, suffering from asthma or metabolic syndrome. Many were elderly, possibly as old as 75 years. “The purpose of the experiments,” noted Milloy, “was often simply to see what would happen when health-impaired people inhaled highly toxic substances.”

The experiments, which have been conducted with the assistance of the University of North Carolina School of Medicine, are ongoing.

Okay, this is kind of interesting. This story in the Washington Free Beacon talks about the political decision to not sell our gubmint held shares in GM; to do so would mean the amount of loss is made public:

http://tinyurl.com/6wt5dnq

So then I did a little research. We the peeeeple hold 500 million shares of GM. Per a Feb.14, 2012 CNN article, if they were sold at the then current price of $25.40 per share, we would show a loss of $12.7 billion. That is on top of the $7 billion we are already in the hole on the deal. Source:

http://tinyurl.com/7jckre3

So what is the current share price? $23.57

So gee, at 500 million shares that's another $750 million loss. The stock will have to reach $51 per share for us to break even.

Sigh.

A senior government official resigned Monday after a report concluded her agency improperly paid for an 'over-the-top' training session near Las Vegas that allegedly featured a mind reader, a clown, a comedian, bicycle giveaways and lavish after-hour receptions in resort suites for federal workers.

The White House accepted General Services Administration chief Martha Johnson's resignation after she dismissed two deputies and suspended other career federal employees over the $820,000 conference.

The 300-person event at the M Resort Spa and Casino in Henderson, Nevada, included $3,200 for a mind reader, $6,300 on commemorative coin sets, and $75,000 on a training exercise to build a bicycle in 2010.

In fiscal 2011, the cost of the promises grew from $30.9 trillion to $33.8 trillion. To put that in context, consider that the total value of companies traded on U.S. stock markets is $13.1 trillion, based on the Wilshire 5000 index, and the value of the equity in U.S. taxpayers’ homes, according to Freddie Mac, is $6.2 trillion. Said another way, there is not enough wealth in America to meet those promises. If the government followed corporate accounting rules, that $2.9 trillion increase would be added to the $1.3 trillion cash deficit for fiscal 2011 that has been widely reported. And a $4.2 trillion deficit is something that Americans need to know about....

Twelve state and local water agencies in Southern California are suing the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service over its arbitrary decision last July to double the size of the habitat for a small algae-eating fish known as the Santa Ana Sucker. Wielding the all-purpose Endangered Species Act, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service's no-explanation decision plants a Godzilla-sized footprint over local efforts to conserve the fish and its environment. But worse, it will cut water supplies for up to 3 million citizens in Southern California's Inland Empire region, raising water prices and straining water supplies elsewhere all in the name of "conservation." It's nothing but a power grab that will leave a new round of economic and environmental wreckage.