another site
The market is fine for some things, people
will say, but other activities are too important to be left to the
market. Or too complicated. Or too fundamental to our democracy.
John Stossel points out that we let people sell blood. And sperm.
And eggs. Why not kidneys? Why not privatize everything?
from Hit & Run http://reason.com/blog/2013/11/06/john-stossel-says-privatize-everything
via IFTTT
And so another conspiracy theory, that Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat was poisoned with Polonium, becomes non-conspiracy fact. From Reuters:
Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat was poisoned to death in 2004 with radioactive polonium, his widow Suha said on Wednesday after receiving the results of Swiss forensic tests on her husband’s corpse.
“We are revealing a real crime, a political assassination,” she told Reuters in Paris.
A team of experts, including from Lausanne University Hospital’s Institute of Radiation Physics, opened Arafat’s grave in the West Bank city of Ramallah last November, and took samples from his body to seek evidence of alleged poisoning. “This has confirmed all our doubts,” said Suha Arafat, who met members of the Swiss forensic team in Geneva on Tuesday. “It is scientifically proved that he didn’t die a natural death and we have scientific proof that this man was killed.”
She did not accuse any country or person, and acknowledged that the historic leader of the Palestine Liberation Organization had many enemies. Arafat signed the 1993 Oslo interim peace accords with Israel and led a subsequent uprising after the failure of talks in 2000 on a comprehensive agreement.
Allegations of foul play surfaced immediately. Arafat had foes among his own people, but many Palestinians pointed the finger at Israel, which had besieged him in his Ramallah headquarters for the final two and a half years of his life.
The Israeli government has denied any role in his death, noting that he was 75 years old and had an unhealthy lifestyle.
An investigation by the Qatar-based Al Jazeera television news channel first reported last year that traces of polonium-210 were found on personal effects of Arafat given to his widow by the French military hospital where he died.
That led French prosecutors to open an investigation for suspected murder in August 2012 at the request of Suha Arafat. Forensic experts from Switzerland, Russia and France all took samples from his corpse for testing after the Palestinian Authority agreed to open his mausoleum.
“SMOKING GUN”
The head of the Russian forensics institute, Vladimir Uiba, was quoted by the Interfax news agency last month as saying no trace of polonium had been found on the body specimens examined in Moscow, but his Federal Medico-Biological Agency later denied he had made any official comment on its findings.
The French pathologists have not reported their conclusions publicly, nor have their findings been shared with Suha Arafat’s legal team. A spokeswoman for the French prosecutor’s office said the investigating magistrats had received no expert reports so far.
One of her lawyers said the Swiss institute’s report, commissioned by Al Jazeera, would be translated from English into French and handed over to the three magistrates in the Paris suburb of Nanterre who are investigating the case.
…
The Al Jazeera investigation was spearheaded by investigative journalist Clayton Swisher, a former U.S. Secret Service bodyguard who became friendly with Arafat and was suspicious of the manner of his death.
Hani al-Hassan, a former aide, said in 2003 that he had witnessed 13 assassination attempts on Arafat’s life, dating back to his years on the run as PLO leader. Arafat claimed to have survived 40 attempts on his life.
Now… whoever may have wanted the leader of the Palestinians dead?
He escaped another attempt on his life when Israeli warplanes came close to killing him during the invasion of Beirut when they hit one of the buildings they suspected he was using as his headquarters but he was not there. In December 2001, Arafat was rushed to safety just before Israeli helicopters bombarded his compound in Ramallah with rockets.
Oh wait…
     |
via Zero Hedge http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/zerohedge/feed/~3/W-crHkZjDnQ/story01.htm Tyler Durden
Today’s AM fix was USD 1,317.00, EUR 975.05 and GBP 817.66 per ounce.
Yesterday’s AM fix was USD 1,311.25, EUR 971.30 and GBP 817.08 per ounce.
Gold fell $3.40 or 0.26% yesterday, closing at $1,310.80/oz. Silver climbed $0.06 or 0.28% closing at $21.68. Platinum dropped $4.74 or 0.3% to $1,445.00/oz, while palladium rose $0.50 or 0.1% to $747/oz.
Gold gained ground today and is up 0.6% as it tries to shake its longest losing streak in six months and the lowest prices seen in almost three weeks. Gold is range bound between $1,250/oz and $1,450/oz. The fundamentals including the current macroeconomic, systemic, geo-political and monetary conditions are favourable and suggest higher gold prices are likely in the coming months.
Gold in US Dollars, 30 Day – (Bloomberg)
However in the short term, gold looks poor technically and a breakout above $1,360/oz and $1,450/oz will be needed to encourage more nervous buyers.
Gold sales from Australia’s Perth Mint, which refines most of the gold bullion from the world’s second largest producer, rose in October as a drop in prices to a three month low led to increased demand and the mint filled a backlog of orders according to Bloomberg.
Sales of coins and minted Perth Mint gold bars climbed 13% to 77,255 ounces last month from 68,488 ounces in September, according to data from the mint.While demand in October more than doubled from 30,430 ounces in August, sales were 31% lower than this year’s record in April.
“There’d be people buying while the price is low,” said Ron Currie, the Perth Mint’s sales and marketing director.
“We’re getting a lot more product out the door because of previous orders that we hadn’t been able to supply because of capacity,” Currie said.
Gold in USD, 5 Year – (Bloomberg)
The U.S. Mint sold 755,500 ounces of American Eagle coins as of November 1st, compared with 753,000 ounces in all of 2012, according to data on the mint’s website. The mint sold 48,500 ounces in October from 13,000 in September and 11,500 in August.. Coin sales last month were still 77% lower than in April, when they surged to a 40 month high of 209,500 ounces. The Perth Mint sold 112,575 ounces of gold in April.
As bar and coins sales increased, demand waned for ETPs. Holdings tumbled 29% this year to 1,875.04 metric tons on November 4th, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. Assets have shrunk every month this year, the worst run on record.
The Perth Mint, which began operations in 1899, is owned by the Western Australian government and refines between 300 tons and 400 tons each year, including mined and scrap gold. Perth Mint gold bars are rapidly becoming some of the most popular one ounce gold formats in the world.
Australia is the world’s biggest gold producer after China.
Click GOLD NEWS For Today’s Breaking Gold And Silver News
Click GOLD and SILVER COMMENTARY For Today’s Leading Gold And Silver Comment And Opinion
Like Our FACEBOOK Page For Breaking News, Interesting Insights, Blogs, Prizes and Special Offers
| |
via Zero Hedge http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/zerohedge/feed/~3/og6FlKafIss/story01.htm GoldCore
Having been “on fire” for most of the year – managing a simply remarkable (Venezuela stock market-like) 472% gain from the start of the year to September highs; it appears the momentum stock of the year is ‘running out of gas’. Now down over 22% from its highs, Elon Musk’s experiment in exuberance has entered a bear market. Indices most levred to the momo mayhem are struggling this morning also with NASDAQ leading the ‘charge’ lower. At 3-month lows, TSLA is now up ‘only’ 335% YTD…
maybe – as @ECantoni noted, replacing ORCL with TSLA in the NASDAQ 100 in July was not such a great idea after all…
| |
via Zero Hedge http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/zerohedge/feed/~3/4UA2nCTzveo/story01.htm Tyler Durden
Having been “on fire” for most of the year – managing a simply remarkable (Venezuela stock market-like) 472% gain from the start of the year to September highs; it appears the momentum stock of the year is ‘running out of gas’. Now down over 22% from its highs, Elon Musk’s experiment in exuberance has entered a bear market. Indices most levred to the momo mayhem are struggling this morning also with NASDAQ leading the ‘charge’ lower. At 3-month lows, TSLA is now up ‘only’ 335% YTD…
maybe – as @ECantoni noted, replacing ORCL with TSLA in the NASDAQ 100 in July was not such a great idea after all…
| |
via Zero Hedge http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/zerohedge/feed/~3/4UA2nCTzveo/story01.htm Tyler Durden
That’s the headline on the
World Meteorological Organization’s
press release for its latest
Greenhouse Gas Bulletin report issued just before the
19th
Conference of the Parties (COP-19) of the U.N. Framework
Convention on Climate Change convenes later this month in Warsaw.
The release notes:
The amount of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere reached a new
record high in 2012, continuing an upward and accelerating trend
which is driving climate change and will shape the future of our
planet for hundreds and thousands of years.The World Meteorological Organization’s annual Greenhouse Gas
Bulletin shows that between 1990 and 2012 there was a 32% increase
in radiative forcing – the warming effect on our climate – because
of carbon dioxide (CO2) and other heat-trapping long-lived gases
such as methane and nitrous oxide.Carbon dioxide, mainly from fossil fuel-related emissions,
accounted for 80% of this increase. The atmospheric increase of CO2
from 2011 to 2012 was higher than its average growth rate over the
past ten years, according to the Greenhouse Gas Bulletin.Since the start of the industrial era in 1750, the global
average concentration of CO2 in the atmosphere has increased by
41%, methane by 160% and nitrous oxide by 20%. What is happening in
the atmosphere is one part of a much wider picture. Only about half
of the CO2 emitted by human activities remains in the atmosphere,
with the rest being absorbed in the biosphere and in the
oceans.
Interestingly, the GHG Bulletin notes that the amount
of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere has increased by 32 percent
since 1990. Yet global average temperatures have been
more or less flat for the last 15 years. Curious.
Heads up: I will be writing daily dispatches from the COP-19
in Warsaw from November 18 to its end on November 22.
from Hit & Run http://reason.com/blog/2013/11/06/greenhouse-gas-concentrations-in-the-atm
via IFTTT
| |
via Zero Hedge http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/zerohedge/feed/~3/D1MWvdofqVQ/story01.htm williambanzai7
HHS Secretary Sebelius faces up to the self-described “debacle” that is Obamacare in fron the The Senate Finance Committee this morning. We should expect much “mid-November”-ing as the new replacement for “plead da fif.”
Live Stream via Bloomberg:
Stream via CSPAN, (click image)
| |
via Zero Hedge http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/zerohedge/feed/~3/j98x_lURNDI/story01.htm Tyler Durden
Anti-biotech luddites tried to scare the
citizens of Washington State into voting for the I-522 initiative
that would have mandated labels on foods containing ingredients
derived from genetically modified crops, even those crops are as
safe or safer than conventional or organic crops. Styled as a
“right to know” initiative, the scientifically dishonest proponents
of labeling actually hope that confused consumers would mistake
them as “warning labels,” and thus avoid purchasing foods made from
cheaper and more environmentally
friendly biotech crops.
All the votes are not yet in – a lot of in Washington State
residents vote by mail, but the trend looks promising. As
Politico
reports:
Washington state’s GMO labeling measure appears to be going down
in defeat, early results show.With slightly less than a million votes counted, the current
tally on Ballot Initiative 522, which would require the labeling of
foods that contain genetically modified organisms, show those
opposed leading by about 536,000 (54.8 percent) to 442,000 (45.2
percent). The figures represent about a quarter of the state’s 3.9
million registered voters, but not all of the votes have been
counted.The delay in the final vote total is due to the fact that
Washington is a mail-in ballot state, and it will count any ballots
postmarked by Nov. 5, even if those ballots arrive at the end of
the week. As a result, the tally on election night often only
reflects about 60 percent of the votes that ultimately will be
received, according to Brian Zylstra, a spokesman for Washington’s
Office of the Secretary of State.If that holds true in this election, with 997,566 ballots
counted on election night, another 665,044 could be in the
mail.
Here’s hoping that good sense will ultimately prevail among
Washington voters and this scientifically ignorant measure fails.
It’s a pity that the food and farming industries have to
waste so much money to counter this egregious anti-biotech
propaganda.
from Hit & Run http://reason.com/blog/2013/11/06/gmo-labeling-disinformation-campaign-may
via IFTTT
Mr. and Mrs. Ed Worrell of Fayetteville, Ga. are pleased to announce the engagement of their daughter, “Betty” Molly Elizabeth Worrell to Joshua Dale Gebhardt, son of Mr. and Mrs. Aron Gebhardt of Douglasville, Ga.
Miss Worrell is the granddaughter of Mr. and Mrs. Frank Vowell of Clinton, Tenn., Mrs. Betty Worrell of Jonesboro, Ga. and the late Dr. George Worrell.
Mr. Gebhardt is the grandson of Mr. and Mrs. Ed Gebhardt of Fayetteville, Ga., Mrs. Dorothea Canning of Tyrone, Ga. and the late Mr. Robert T. Canning.
via The Citizen http://www.thecitizen.com/articles/11-06-2013/worrell-gebhardt-engagement