Not suspicious at all

Michael Cormier, a respected forensic technician for the Los Angeles County Coroner, who likely worked on the autopsy of Andrew Breitbart, died under suspicious circumstances at his North Hollywood home April 20, the same day Breitbart’s cause of death was finally made public.

“There are mysterious circumstances surrounding his death,” said Elizabeth Espinosa, a news reporter for KTLA-TV. “We’re told detectives are looking into the possibility that he was poisoned by arsenic.”
--http://www.economicpolicyjournal.com/2012/04/hot-breitbarts-coroner-possibly.html

DOD Projected Outlays

FY2012  738
FY2013  676
FY2014  665
FY2015  672
FY2016  680

Source: http://comptroller.defense.gov/defbudget/fy2012/FY12_Green_Book.pdf, pg. 14

The Zambian space program

In 1964, at the very height of the Space Race, Zambian grade-school science teacher Edward Makuka Nkoloso announced he was creating a national space programme.
He claimed he would beat both the Soviets and the United States by launching a rocket that would send twelve astronauts and ten cats to Mars.

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2135354/Meet-afronauts-Hilarious-pictures-poke-fun-Zambian-space-programme-quite-got-ground.html#ixzz1tBai0FBM

Another Columbine-style attack stopped

"A high school student has been charged after he was found with a journal where he outlined a 'Columbine-style' attack on his school.
Sean Ivaldi, 18, was being held by police after jottings he made in his journal, including a points system for his kills, was discovered by a teacher.
The system he had scribbled down awarded 20 points for killing a student, 30 points for teachers, and 60 points for a police officer during the rampage he had allegedly planned at his school in Stoughton, Massachusetts.
Although the teenage boy did not possess any weapons, police believed he posed enough danger to arrest him for making terror threats.
He is currently being held without bail.
Police in Stoughton said the journal was written last summer when Ivaldi was 17.
As well as the kill list, there appeared to be details of how the massacre at Stoughton High School would be carried out and drawings of the premises.
The plan to carry out the massacre was found by a teacher who took the journal to the school's principal Matt Colantonio.
Ivaldi was removed from the school on April 13 but was not charged with any offence. He was later held by police who said there was enough evidence to warrant charges."

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2135108/Sean-Ivaldi-High-school-student-arrested-plotting-Columbine-style-attack-Stoughton-Massachusetts.html#ixzz1tAZaeU8G

New Social Security and Medicare Trustees Reports

I haven't read the new Social Security and Medicare reports, but apparently they aren't good news.  SS will be completely broke by 2033, 3 years earlier than previously projected.  It's hard to know exactly when the system will break, but the trend is not positive.

Medicare projected expenditures (pg 209):
2013 598
2014 631
2015 663
2016 704
2017 752
2018 806
2019 865
2020 933
2021 1005

Social Security projected expenditures (pg. 51, intermediate):
2013 832
2014 881
2015 933
2016 988
2017 1048
2018 1115
2019 1187
2020 1266
2021 1350

Medicaid projected expenditures (pg. 31):
2013 282
2014 341
2015 376
2016 408
2017 437
2018 465
2019 498
2020 531

The US and Europe are not the center of the world

I just wanted to make the point that most of these lists are very US and Euro-centric. Westerners should be more humble and realize the world is changing.  There aren't really that many US or EU cities listed in the top 100 world cities.

US: New York, Miami, Los Angeles, Washington DC, Chicago, Houston, Honolulu, Atlanta, Boston, San Francisco, Dallas/Ft. Worth, Philadelphia, Las Vegas, Seattle. 

EU: London, Paris, Berlin, Rome, Frankfurt, Madrid, Vienna, Bonn/Cologne/Dusseldorf/Dortmund/Essen, Brussels, Milan, Stockholm, Amsterdam/Rotterdam, Oslo, Warsaw, Barcelona, Copenhagen, Munich, Hamburg, and Athens.

That's it.  Only 14 US cities, and 19 EU cities (5 of which don't use the Euro, and 5 of which are in Germany).  There are only 9 non-German, Euro-using cities on the list, and that includes Athens.  Subtract out the PIIGS, and there are only 4 - Paris, Brussels, Amsterdam, and Vienna.

The West isn't finished.  But it isn't going to dominate the planet in the future.

Tier 5 Cities, version 14

101. Helsinki, Finland (76)
102. Lisbon (77)
103. Detroit/Windsor (78)
104. Phoenix (80)
105. Dublin (81)
106. Minneapolis/St. Paul (82)
107. Tel Aviv (83)
108. Birmingham, UK (84)
109. Prague (85)
110. Nagoya, Japan (86)
111. Budapest (87)
112. San Diego/Tijuana (88)
113. Kuwait City (89)
114. Bucharest, Romania (90)
115. Denver (91)
116. Belo Horizonte, Brazil (93)
117. Hyderabad, India (94)
118. Glasgow, Scotland, UK (95)
119. Cape Town, South Africa (96)
120. Tampa/St. Petersburg, FL (97)
121.  Bangalore, India (98)
122.  Manchester, UK (99)
123. Chennai, India (100)
124. Dhaka, Bangladesh (87)
125. Benidorm, Spain (203)

I don't think anyone cares about cities after 100, but these were ranked 76-100 previously.  The next cities would be based on the previous Tier 5 cities.

Tier 4 cities, version 14

This is based on leftovers from the previous top 75, plus skyline ratings.  Benidorm, Spain and Penang Island are skipped.

76. Johannesburg (52)
77. Warsaw (54)
78. Tehran (55)
79. Barcelona (58)
80. Copenhagen (59)
81. Munich (62)
82. Cairo (63)
83. Karachi (65)
84. Kolkata (66)
85. Hamburg (68)
86. Athens (70)
87. Lima, Peru (72)
88. Bogota, Colombia (73)
89. Lagos (74)
90. Fortaleza, Brazil (175)
91. Brisbane, Australia (131)
92. Incheon, South Korea (113)
93. Salvador, Brazil (165)
94. Qingdao, China (152)
95. Chengdu, China (134)
96. Yokohama, Japan (144)
97. Sharjah, UAE (219)
98. Shenyang, China (221)
99. Hangzhou, China (156)
100. Kaohsiung, Taiwan (148)

Tier 3 Cities, version 14

This is a mix of leftovers from the previous top 50 and skyline ratings.

51. New Delhi (24)
52. Bonn/Cologne/Dusseldorf/Dortmund/Essen (26)
53. Zurich (29)
54. Boston (30)
55. San Francisco (31)
56. Auckland (36)
57. Dallas/Ft. Worth (38)
58. Brussels/Ghent/Antwerp (39)
59. Milan (40)
60. Stockholm (42)
61. Amsterdam/Rotterdam (43)
62. Philadelphia (44)
63. Oslo (45)
64. Taipei (46)
65. Montreal (48)
66. Riyadh (50)
67. Abu Dhabi (69)
66. St. Petersburg, Russia (121)
67. Las Vegas (142)
68. Nanjing, China (206)
69. Santiago, Chile (79)
70. Dalian, China (125)
71. Kyiv (Kiev) (137)
72. Xiamen, China (208)
73. Doha (65)
74. Calgary (114)
75. Seattle (64)

Tier 2 Cities, version 14

This is based on skyline ratings.

26. Chicago (27)
27. Seoul (33)
28. Bangkok (56)
29. Guangzhou (Canton) (53)
30. Toronto (32)
31. Chongqing (75)
32. Kuala Lumpur (61)
33. Rio de Janeiro (49)
34. Macao (123)
35. Osaka (34)
36. Jakarta (47)
37. Buenos Aires (37)
38. Istanbul (35)
39. Recife, Brazil (163)
40. Panama City (126)
41. Melbourne (57)
42. Wuhan, China (176)
43. Houston (41)
44. Honolulu (112)
45. Busan, South Korea (92)
46. Gold Coast City (177)
47. Curitiba, Brazil (178)
48. Atlanta (51)
49. Caracas (71)
50. Manila (60)

Tier 1 Cities, version 14

Where the rich and powerful are, or would like to be.

1. London (1)
2. New York (2)
3. Hong Kong/Shenzhen (3)
4. Paris (4)
5. Tokyo (19)
6. Shanghai (8)
7. Beijing/Tianjin (9)
8. Singapore (5)
9. Miami (6)
10. Geneva (7)
11. Berlin (10)
12. Moscow (11)
13. Los Angeles (28)
14. Rome (12)
15. Dubai (13)
16. Monaco (14)
17. Frankfurt (15)
18. Madrid (16)
19. Vancouver (17)
20. Sao Paulo (18)
21. Mexico City (20)
22. Washington DC/Baltimore (21)
23. Mumbai (22)
24. Vienna (23)
25. Sydney (25)

Dhaka

This is one of the world's largest cities, but it is made up largely of slums.

April 20, 2012

Nothing happened today, thank God, but these were the main headlines:

1.  In Norway, mass murderer Anders Behring Breivik, gives chilling testimony of how he killed 69 innocent children.  (Why did this have to come out on today of all days?)
2.  George Zimmerman, who killed Trayvon Martin, granted $150,000 bond.
3. The Secret Service, instead of focusing on security arrangements in Colombia, parties with a group of at least 20 prostitutes.  The story comes to light after one cheapskate decides to stiff the escort, Dania Suarez, who becomes instantly famous as a result of the scandal. At least 11 Secret Service agents are being investigated.
4.  Meanwhile, the Bumbler-in-Chief on Friday, April 13, on his way to Colombia, gives a speech at Hooker's Point in Tampa.  Once he arrived in Colombia, he gives a speech in which he refers to the Falkland Islands as the Maldives instead of the Malvinas, and then claims he was neutral on the dispute.  Our distinguished Madame Secretary of State carries on the Clinton tradition by boozing it up in public.

Police stop Columbine-style shooting plot in Spokane

"Police arrested the 16-year-old at his home on Tuesday [April 17, 2012] for Threats to Bomb or Injure Property. On Wednesday, in a Spokane County juvenile court room, Superior Court Judge Ellen Clark ruled there was not enough evidence to keep him in jail. However, as conditions of his release, the teen must be under 24/7 supervision by his mother or step-father. Clark also said the teen could not have firearms, drugs or alcohol, or have any contact with anyone at North Central High School.
Court documents allege that on March 22, 2012, a woman called Spokane Police to say that her teen overheard two people discussing "doing a Columbine style shooting" at North Central High School. The documents state the teen was talked about having a map of the school, how he planned to blow up propane tanks and then 'begin shooting at the school.' The date of the planned attack was April 20, 2013, according to court documents.
It wasn't until several weeks later that police found another warning of an impending attack. On April 10, 2012, Spokane police received a call from employees at WinCo Foods, at 9257 N. Nevada, who noticed graffiti inside the men's bathroom with a threatening message.
Someone wrote on the wall "I'm serius. NC school shooting 4/20/15 be ready."
April 20 is the anniversary of the Columbine High School massacre."
--http://www.khq.com/story/17548457/teen-accused-of-columbine-style-shooting-released-on-house-arrest-expelled-from-school

Tier 3 Cities, version 13

51.  Atlanta (45)
52.  Johannesburg (48)
53.  Guangzhou (Canton) (49)
54. Warsaw (51)
55. Tehran (52)
56. Bangkok (53)
57. Melbourne (54)
58. Barcelona (56)
59. Copenhagen (57)
60. Manila (58)
61. Kuala Lumpur (59)
62. Munich (60)
63. Cairo (61)
64. Seattle (62)
65. Karachi (63)
66. Kolkata (64)
67. Doha (65)
68. Hamburg (66)
69. Abu Dhabi (68)
70. Athens (69)
71. Caracas, Venezuela (70)
72. Lima, Peru (71)
73. Bogota, Colombia (72)
74. Lagos (73)
75. Chongqing (75)

Tier 2 Cities, version 13

26. Bonn/Cologne/Dusseldorf/Dortmund/Essen (8)
27. Chicago (9)
28. Los Angeles (10)
29. Zurich (14)
30. Boston (15)
31. San Francisco (16)
32. Toronto (17)
33. Seoul (18)
34. Osaka (20)
35. Istanbul (25)
36. Auckland (27)
37. Buenos Aires (28)
38. Dallas/Ft. Worth (30)
39. Brussels/Ghent/Antwerp (31)
40.  Milan (32)
41. Houston (33)
42. Stockholm (34)
43. Amsterdam/Rotterdam (36)
44. Philadelphia (37)
45. Oslo (38)
46. Taipei (39)
47. Jakarta (41)
48. Montreal (42)
49. Rio de Janeiro (44)
50. Riyadh (46)

Top 25 Cities, version 13

This is copied from the previous post, which is based on a survey of what cities very wealthy people think are important:

1. London (1)
2. New York (2)
3. Hong Kong/Shenzhen (4)
4. Paris (7)
5. Singapore (22)
6. Miami (26)
7. Geneva (55)
8. Shanghai (6)
9. Beijing/Tianjin (11)
10. Berlin (29)
11. Moscow (19)
12. Rome (67)
13. Dubai (47)
14. Monaco (118)
15. Frankfurt (23)
16. Madrid (35)
17. Vancouver (40)
18. Sao Paulo (13)
19. Tokyo (3)
20. Mexico City (24)
21. Washington DC/Baltimore (5)
22. Mumbai (21)
23. Vienna (43)
24. New Delhi (50)
25. Sydney (12)

Most Important Global Cities

This is very interesting.  I'm going to have to rethink my list again:

1. London
2. New York
3. Hong Kong
4. Paris
5. Singapore
6. Miami
7. Geneva
8. Shanghai
9. Beijing
10. Berlin
11. Moscow
12. Rome
13. Dubai
14. Monaco
15. Frankfurt
16. Madrid
17. Vancouver
18. Sao Paulo
19. Tokyo
20. Mexico City

Source: http://www.thewealthreport.net/The-Wealth-Report-2012.pdf 

Cities that will be important in the future:
Washington DC
Mumbai
Vienna
New Delhi
Sydney

Another bizarre April event

"A Massachusetts Institute of Technology researcher facing federal charges of traveling to Colorado to have sex with a mother and her two children has apparently killed himself in prison, officials said on Monday.
Yaron Segal, 30, an Israeli citizen, died Friday, said John Sell, executive assistant with the Federal Correctional Institution Englewood.
Guards found Segal alone, hanging from a homemade noose in his cell at the detention center, where defendants are held while awaiting trial, Sell said. The federal jail is a separate facility next to a minimum-security prison where former Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich began serving his 14-year corruption sentence last month."

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2131384/Yaron-Segal-MIT-researcher-flew-Colorado-sex-tryst-mother-daughters-kills-prison.html#ixzz1sQbLECi9

I guess this sort of thing happens every day, and I am just extra-sensitive to it this time of year.  I just want to point out that Friday was the 13th, and that the location was less than 5 miles from Columbine High School in Englewood, Colorado.

The $15 trillion gold scam

I can't vouch for this. He might be on to something, or he might be high on opium.  Something about 750,000 tons of gold missing.  That's a lot of gold, considering that the annual global production of gold is only 2400 tons.

Tier 5 Cities, version 12

These cities are almost good enough, but just don't belong in the top 100, in my opinion.

101. Edinburgh (102)
102. Wellington, New Zealand (133)
103. Manama, Bahrain (141)
104. Brasilia, Brazil (115)
105. Luxembourg (139)
106. Monterrey, Mexico (107)
107. Charlotte, NC (112)
108. Ho Chi Min City, Vietnam (88)
109. St Louis, MO (108)
110. Portland, OR (116)
111. Jersey (135)
112. Honolulu, HI (128)
113. Pittsburgh, PA (126)
114. Calgary (130)
115. Jeddah, Saudi Arabia (142)
116. Brisbane, Australia (131)
117. Stuttgart, Germany (143)
118. Monaco (111)
119. Talinn, Estonia (155)
120. Port Louis, Mauritius (157)
121. St. Petersburg, Russia (127)
122. Reykjavik, Finland (161)
123. Macao (149)
124. Yokohama (144)
125. Isle of Man (137)
126. Panama City (121)
127. Hamilton, Bermuda (190)
128. Dalian, China (125)
129. Chengdu, China (134)
130. Incheon, South Korea (113)
131. Cleveland, OH (114)
132. Kansas City, MO (118)
133. Indianapolis, IN (120)
134. Orlando, FL (122)
135. Cincinnati, OH (124)
136. Almaty, Kazakhstan (79)
137. Kyiv/Kiev, Ukraine (81)
138. Bratislava, Slovakia (91)
139. Montevideo, Uruguay (228)
140. Muscat, Oman (150)
141. Perth, Australia (201)
142. Las Vegas, NV (145)
143. Luanda, Angola (93)
144. Algiers, Algeria (76)
145. Casablanca, Morocco (90)
146. Tripoli, Libya (96)
147. Khartoum, Sudan (97)
148. Zagreb, Croatia (99)
149. Fukuoka, Japan (117)
150. Nairobi, Kenya (172)

Tier 4 Cities, version 12

These are provincial cities, dominant in their region, but not quite world-class:

76. Helsinki, Finland (58)
77. Lisbon (61)
78. Detroit/Windsor (74)
79. Santiago, Chile (67)
80. Phoenix (80)
81. Dublin (66)
82. Minneapolis/St. Paul (83)
83. Tel Aviv (64)
84. Birmingham, UK (100)
85. Prague (72)
86. Nagoya, Japan  (109)
87. Budapest (84)
88. San Diego/Tijuana (86)
89. Kuwait City (82)
90. Bucharest, Romania (73)
91. Denver (89)
92. Busan, South Korea (95)
93. Belo Horizonte, Brazil (106)
94. Hyderabad, India (167)
95. Glasgow, Scotland, UK (104)
96. Cape Town, South Africa (105)
97. Tampa/St. Petersburg, FL (110)
98.  Bangalore, India (123)
99.  Manchester, UK (180)
100. Chennai, India (140)

Tier 3 Cities, version 12

These are all world-class cities that didn't quite make the top 50 for whatever reason, in my opinion.

51. Warsaw (37)
52. Tehran (43)
53. Bangkok (49)
54. Melbourne (56)
55. Geneva (59)
56. Barcelona (65)
57. Copenhagen (51)
58. Manila (70)
59. Kuala Lumpur (60)
60. Munich (71)
61. Cairo (63)
62. Seattle (77)
63. Karachi (75)
64. Kolkata (103)
65. Doha (85)
66. Hamburg (98)
67. Rome (92)
68. Abu Dhabi (101)
69. Athens (52)
70. Caracas, Venezuela (55)
71. Lima, Peru (78)
72. Bogota, Colombia (57)
73. Lagos (69)
74. Dhaka, Bangladesh (87)
75. Chongqing (129)

Lazika, new planned city in Georgia

That's Georgia as in Tbilisi, not Georgia as in Atlanta.  Very cool video.

Tier 2 Cities, version 12

These are the cities ranked 26-50.  These are all world-class cities, but a step below the mega cities in the first tier.  There is probably more debate as to which cities belong in this tier than in the first 25.

26. Miami (38).  The capital of South America
27. Auckland (25)
28. Buenos Aires (46).  Ranked in the top 25 on some surveys. A huge city, but I would rank Mexico City, Istanbul, and Mumbai higher.
29. Berlin (24). Ranked in the top 25 on some surveys.
30. Dallas/Ft. Worth (26)
31. Brussels/Ghent/Antwerp (39).  Some polls rank it as high as #5, but I just don't see it.
32. Milan (15)
33. Houston (29)
34. Stockholm (22)
35. Madrid (24)
36. Amsterdam/Rotterdam (31)
37. Philadelphia (35)
38. Oslo (33)
39. Taipei (42)
40. Vancouver (41). Ranked in the top 25 on some surveys.
41. Jakarta (36)
42. Montreal (44). Ranked in the top 25 on some surveys.
43. Vienna (45). Ranked in the top 25 on some surveys.
44. Rio de Janeiro (53)
45. Atlanta (47)
46. Riyadh (40)
47. Dubai  (54)
48. Johannesburg (48)
49. Guangzhou (Canton) (50)
50. Delhi/New Delhi (62)

Honorable Mention:
Barcelona
Tehran
Rome
Munich
Hamburg
Bangkok
Cairo
Melbourne
Warsaw
Geneva
Copenhagen
Dublin
Tel Aviv
Kuala Lumpur
Seattle
Birmingham
Shenzhen
Abu Dhabi
Prague
Doha
Nagoya
Lisbon
Santiago
Karachi
Kolkata
Manila

The Yen is about to pop

"Japanese companies are struggling with profitability. It only gets worse from here. When a major company goes bankrupt, this may change the prevailing psychology. A weak yen consensus will emerge then." As for the bubble pop, it will be a sudden pop, not the 30 year deflationary whimper Mrs. Watanabe has gotten so used to: "Yen devaluation is likely to unfold quickly. A financial bubble doesn't burst slowly. When it occurs, it just pops. The odds are that yen devaluation will occur over days. Only a large and sudden devaluation can keep the JGB yield low.

Japan has only one way out – a massive devaluation. If the stable national debt is 120 percent of GDP, the yen needs to be devalued by 40 percent because devaluation is ultimately equal to the nominal GDP increase."
--http://www.zerohedge.com/news/chinese-business-media-cautions-jgb-bubble-ready-burst-anticipates-40-yen-devaluation 

Top 25 Cities, version 12

1. London (9)
2. New York (1)
3. Tokyo (4)
4. Hong Kong/Shenzhen (19)
5. Washington/Baltimore (2)
6. Shanghai (3)
7. Paris (7)
8. Bonn/Cologne/Dusseldorf/Dortmund/Essen (6).  Ranked high because it has the prestige of being the largest metropolitan area in the largest economy in the Eurozone.
9. Chicago (5)
10. Los Angeles (8)
11. Beijing/Tianjin (14)
12. Sydney (10)
13. Sao Paulo (12)
14. Zurich (13)
15. Boston (11)
16. San Francisco (20)
17. Toronto (16)
18. Seoul (28)
19. Moscow (21)
20. Osaka (17)
21. Mumbai (18)
22. Singapore (30)
23. Frankfurt (23)
24. Mexico City (27)
25. Istanbul (34)

Titanic Fever

One hundred years ago tomorrow, the Titanic sank, carrying with her 1,514 people. This tragedy is by far the most remembered of any of the April events.

"There are replica ships in Tennessee and Missouri, graveyard tours in New York and Nova Scotia, traveling exhibits from Las Vegas to Atlanta, and two brand new museums in Belfast, Northern Ireland, and Southampton, England. Titanic exhibits are also on display at the Luxor Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas, the Natural History Museum in San Diego, The Henry Ford Museum in Dearborn, Mich., on International Drive in Orlando, at Union Station in Kansas City, and opening soon at Atlantic Station in Atlanta."
--http://local.msn.com/article2.aspx?cp-documentid=33135660

Can the President raise the debt ceiling on his own?

"If the U.S. defaults on its obligations in early August, it will be because the President chose not to exercise his power to raise the debt ceiling on his own.The President has it within his power to order the Treasury Department to issue new bonds to fund current obligations, even if those issuances exceed the debt ceiling.

“When Abraham Lincoln suspended habeas corpus during the Civil War, he said that it was necessary to violate one law, lest all the laws but one fall into ruin,” legal academics Eric Posner and Adrian Vermeule have argued in a New York Times Op-Ed. “So too here: the president may need to violate the debt ceiling to prevent a catastrophe—whether a default on the debt or an enormous reduction in federal spending, which would throw the country back into recession.”

Their argument doesn’t rest on any contentious reading of the 14th Amendment. Rather it rests on the primacy of the presidency in our contemporary constitutional order. 

--http://www.cnbc.com//id/43881701

My comments:  The constitution says that only the Congress has power to levy taxes or borrow money.  Art. I, Sect. 8.  But legal academics in love with Obama want him to be a dictator, constitution be damned.

Shenfu New Town, China

Gorgeous pictures at http://rhetroactive.com/project/shenfu-new-town/

How Las Vegas almost had a full-scale model of the Starship Enterprise

http://www.thegoddardgroup.com/blog/

"This project was one of my greatest disappointments because we had come so CLOSE.  We were in the room.  Financing was there.  Land was there. Everyone involved wanted it to happen.  And one person entered the room and killed it."  The killjoy's name was Stanley Jaffe, CEO of Paramount.

High fiber foods

1. Barley
2. Almonds
3. Apple (skin on)
4. Broccoli
5. Peas
6. Raspberries
7. Oatmeal
8. Artichoke
9. Pear (skin on)
10. Lentils
11. Whole wheat bread
12. Edamame / soybeans
13. Brown rice
14. Whole wheat pasta
15. Avocado
16. Garbanzo beans/chickpeas
17. Kidney beans
18. Black beans
19. White beans
20. Corn

Source: http://www.health.com/health/gallery/0,,20553010_21,00.html

Satiety Index

Satiety is the degree to which food satisfies hunger.  A higher number means the food is more satisfying.

Potatoes, boiled - 323
Ling fish - 225
Oatmeal - 209
Oranges - 202
Apples - 197
Brown pasta - 188
Beef - 176
Baked beans - 168
Grapes - 162
Popcorn - 154
Whole-grain bread - 154
All-Bran - 151
Eggs - 150
Cheese - 146
White rice - 138
Lentils - 133
Honeysmacks - 132
Brown rice - 132
Crackers - 127
Cookies - 120
White pasta - 119
Cornflakes - 118
Jelly beans - 118
Bananas - 118
Special K - 116
French fries - 116
White bread - 100
Doughnuts - 68
Cake - 65
Croissant - 47

Source: http://www.mendosa.com/satiety.htm

Dietitians jealous of Miley Cyrus' diet

Miley Cyrus lost weight on a gluten-free (no wheat products) diet, and nutrition "experts" are criticizing her.

"After proclaiming on Twitter that the reason behind her skinny new frame is a gluten and lactose-free eating plan, Miley Cyrus has come under criticism for her endorsement of the heavily restrictive diet.

The 19-year-old pop star tweeted to her 5.4million followers yesterday: 'Everyone should try no gluten for a week! The change in your skin, physical and mental health is amazing. You won’t go back!'

But dietitians and nutritionists have warned that a gluten-free diet, which omits grains such as wheat, rye, barley and triticale is said to be detrimental to a person’s health if they are not genuinely allergic to gluten."

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-2127918/Gluten-free-diet-wont-help-lose-weight-Experts-backlash-Miley-Cyrus-tweet.html#ixzz1rgIxHbP6

The truth is that dietitians don't actually want people to lose weight, because they would be out of a job. 

The French Fry Diet

I'm thinking about going on a French Fry diet for a month.  The only rule will be no ketchup or other sauce with sugar.  Potatoes have protein, carbs and fiber, but no fat (which is easily remedied), so they are a complete meal.  They also contain resistant starch, which is similar to fiber.

Anyways, I will think about this a little and if I choose to do it, I will start a new blog to list my progress.

See also:  http://frenchfrydiary.blogspot.com/

Update:  I started this at frenchfrydiet.blogspot.com

The Warrior Diet

In the warrior diet, you fast for 20 hours a day and eat during 4 hours. It advocates skipping breakfast and promotes eating only in the evening.

It actually promotes "overeating".  "Briefly, when people practice overeating after undereating, their body changes to a more thermogenic and highly metabolized state. The brain receives a signal that it should elevate metabolism in order to burn the extra energy coming from food."

This is similar to the Eat One Meal (E1M) diet I previously blogged about.

Top 10 Diet Foods that will make you fat

1.  Juice.  Orange juice, apple juice, grapefruit juice.  Just eat the fruit instead.
2.  Diet sodas.  They raise your insulin level. "When you taste the sweet in diet soda, your body perceives it as sugar and causes the pancreas to release insulin just as it would if you were consuming actual sugar."
3. Sports drinks and enhanced water.  Just drink water.
4. Skim milk.  It has reduced fat, but not reduced carbs.  It still has all the lactose.  Just drink water.
5.  Breakfast cereals.  They have lots of sugar and corn syrup and empty calories.  Just eat oatmeal.
6. Fat-free salad dressing.  It has lots of sugar and corn syrup.  Stick to olive oil and vinegar.
7.  Yogurt and Frozen yogurt. Lots of sugar.  (Unless it is plain and unsweetened).
8.  Fat-free or low-fat cookies and candy.  Fat-free anything.  Ditto.  Just say no to cookies and eat a cucumber instead.
9.  Protein bars.  Ditto. Just eat some dark chocolate instead.
10.  Cottage cheese.  Contains corn starch.

Honorable mention:
Smoothies.  Lots of fat and sugar.
Granola. Ditto.
Trail mix.  Ditto.
Turkey burgers.  These are no healthier than hamburgers.
Vegetable chips.  There are no healthier than potato chips.

The McDonald's Diet

Morgan Spurlock claims that he ate at McDonalds every day for a month, ate an average of 5000 calories per day and gained 24.5 lbs and got very sick.  He doesn't say where the calories came from but apparently, most of it came from soda.

McDonalds can actually be very healthy if you avoid the sodas and shakes.  Even french fries can be healthy if you stick to the small size (230 calories).

A Virginia man lost 80 pounds over six months and ate every meal at McDonalds. "Not Big Macs, french fries and chocolate shakes. Mostly salads, wraps and apple dippers without the caramel sauce. Chris Coleson tipped the scales at 278 pounds in December. The 5-foot-8 Coleson now weighs 199 pounds and his waist size has dropped from 50 to 36."

Emily Strunk-Helm is a marathon runner who eats only at McDonalds, including cheeseburgers, chicken nuggets and french fries. "I think the hardest part of this challenge will be making it to McDonalds enough times during the day to satisfy my hunger."

Joe D’Amico is another marathon runner who eats only at McDonalds. "He usually starts the day with a plate of hot cakes, an Egg McMuffin and an orange juice. He eats a grilled chicken sandwich for lunch, washed down with a large Coke, then enjoys a hamburger and fries for dinner, with cookies for desert. His only deviation from the McDonald’s menu is a daily multivitamin, tap water, and an energy gel he takes while on the road."

Here is the complete diet plan.  Try it if you dare.

Day 1
Fruit and Yogurt Parfait
English Muffin
2 Pats Whipped Margarine
2 Packets of Strawberry Jam
Grilled Chicken Sandwich
Medium French Fry
Large Diet Coke
1 Chocolate Chip Cookie
Bacon Ranch Salad with Grilled Chicken
1 Packet Ranch Dressing
Strawberry Sundae

Sources of calories in the average diet

These are the top sources of calories in the average American diet:

1.  Grain-based desserts (cake, cookies, pie, donuts, cinnamon rolls, Twinkies, etc).
2.  Bread
3. Chicken
4. Soda & Sports Drinks
5. Alcohol (beer, wine, etc)
6. Pizza
7.  Tortillas/Burritos/Tacos
8.  Pasta (including macaroni)
9.  Beef (steak, meatloaf)
10.  Dairy Desserts (ice cream)
11. Burgers
12. Cheese
13. Potato Chips
14. Sausage, Hot Dogs, Bacon & Ribs
15. Nuts & Seeds
16. French fries / fried potatoes
17. Breakfast cereals
18. Candy
19. Eggs
20.  Rice
21. Milk
22. Quickbreads (corn bread, biscuits, muffins)
23. Fish
24. Fruit drinks (including both orange juice and fruit-flavored drinks)
25. Salad Dressing

Source: http://www.health.gov/dietaryguidelines/dga2010/dietaryguidelines2010.pdf

I think you could use this info to design your own diet. If you avoid wheat and sugar, that knocks most of the items off the list.

The Baked Beans Diet

Neil King lost 140 pounds in 9 months eating 6 cans of baked beans per day.

"And his high fiber diet has been gas-free since he stopped having toast with his beans, it is reported. The diet helped King go from 420 pounds to 280 pounds.Baked beans contain little fat and are full of fiber, although it is best to go for a low-salt variety."

The Tuna and Apple Diet

Christian Bale, to play an emaciated guy in the movie "The Machinist", lost 63 pounds (from 173 to 110) in 4 months in 2004, eating only 1 can of tuna (with no mayo or oil) and 1 apple per day.  Not something anyone would want to follow, but if someone really wants to lose weight, it would be something to consider.

He then gained 100 pounds in 6 months (from 130 to 230) to play the part of Batman in "Batman Begins".

The Cucumber and Egg Diet

The Cucumber & Egg Diet is another great fad diet.  One entire cucumber has only 45 calories.  An egg has only 70 calories.  If one ate only cucumbers & eggs it would be almost impossible to even maintain one's weight.  To consume 1500 calories on this diet, one would have to eat a dozen eggs and 15 cucumbers.  Not possible.

The Lemonade Diet

Beyonce Knowles lost 20 pounds in 2 weeks on the Lemonade Diet for the movie "Dreamgirls".

The Beer Diet

A man abstained from solid food and drank nothing but beer and water for 46 days. He lost 25 pounds.

===============
MH: Why was dopplebock your beer of choice for the undertaking?
JW: One 12-ounce serving contains 288 calories, and it’s completely unfiltered—just like the kind the German monks consumed in the 1600s. As a result, it retains plenty yeast and B-complex vitamins, making it a hearty, nutritious brew—especially compared to, say, a Budweiser, which has been filtered and pasteurized and weighs in at just 100 calories. (More from MensHealth.com: The Healthiest Beers for Men)
MH: What was your drinking schedule like?
JW: Four beers on weekdays, and five a day on Saturdays and Sundays. I didn’t have to go anywhere on the weekends, so I was less concerned about the alcohol. I drove my kids to school, arrived at the office at 8 a.m., poured myself a beer, had another one at noon for lunch, poured a beer around 3 p.m., and then another beer at 7 when I got home.

Read more at Men's Health: http://blogs.menshealth.com/health-headlines/the-beer-diet/2011/04/30#ixzz1rWaQKb6h

The Cookie Diet

Eat 6 special cookies a day, plus a sensible dinner.  Here is one recipe, but it contains sugar.  This is actually similar to the oatmeal diet, since the main ingredient is rolled oats.

The Burrito Diet

Matt Lisk lost 80 pounds in 8 months eating nothing but burritos. 

"His wife found high-fiber, high-protein tortillas one day, and Lisk began using them as a weight-loss tool. "Basically, the diet consists of taking healthy food and wrapping it up in these tortillas. The burritos were just the container that helped with portion control, and the goal was for each to contain fiber, protein and fruits or veggies." Lisk ate three burritos a day, along with three snacks -- usually cottage cheese, yogurt, an apple, or some almonds."

The Oatmeal Diet

"By following a strict 30-day regimen of eating three meals of oatmeal a day and a low-fat snack in between, you will be well on your way to losing as much as 2 to 5 lbs. per week on the oatmeal diet.

Eat nothing but oatmeal for the first seven days of the diet. Eat only a 1/2 cup of oatmeal per meal. Eat whole oatmeal, not processed or instant oatmeal during this initial phase. Do not eat processed oatmeal snacks or granola bars for the first seven days of the diet. If you need to drink milk with your oatmeal, use less than a 1/2 cup, and make sure the milk is fat free or skim. Keep your calorie consumption between 900 and 1,200 calories per day. Record what you eat with a pen and notepad."

Read more: How to Do the Oatmeal Diet | eHow.com

The Subway Diet

Jared Fogle developed a diet that amounted to approximately 1,000 calories per day. As a college student, he usually ate before his first class, which was scheduled for noon or 1 p.m. Fogle said in interviews that he ate little or no breakfast. He sometimes breakfasted on a bowl of cereal with skim milk or a piece of fruit. Otherwise, a Subway sandwich was his first meal of the day. He sometimes snacked on a piece of fruit and took a daily multivitamin. His daily diet, according to his book, Jared, the Subway Guy: Winning Through Losing: 13 Lessons for Turning Your Life Around, consisted of:

• Breakfast of coffee.
• Lunch of a Subway 6-inch turkey sub, a diet soda, and small bag of baked potato chips or pretzels.
• Dinner of a Subway foot-long Veggie Delite sandwich, a diet soda, and small bag of baked potato chips or pretzels.

Fogle ordered sandwiches filled with lettuce, green peppers, banana peppers, jalapeno peppers, and pickles. Fogle omitted cheese and condiments that contained fat like mayonnaise and oil. Instead, he used condiments like spicy mustard or vinegar.--http://www.diet.com/g/subway-diet

The Potato Diet

A man eats 20 potatoes per day for 60 days.  He loses 21 pounds and lowers his cholesterol.

" This always sounds so shocking to most people when I write or say it out loud, but I had to add french fries and potato chips to my diet to make it more healthy. Because there is no fat in a potato, I had to add some so my body would have access to the essential fatty acids that every body needs to function."

The Pizza and Soda diet

A man ate nothing but pizza and soda for 30 days, lost 24 pounds and lowered his blood pressure and bad cholesterol.  See TourDePizza.com.

London trades twice as many dollars as New York does

The average daily turnover in the City this year was $1.85 trillion (£1.2 trillion) - or 37pc of global turnover, according to a three-year report into currency dealing by the Bank of International Settlements.

Around $4 trillion changed hands around the world every day in April, up from $3.3 trillion in April 2007.

New York, the second most important currency centre, does about half the amount of trading taking place in London.

The dollar continued to be the most traded currency in the UK market, involved in 85pc of all trades, while the euro and the Japanese yen gained relative to April 2007.

Among the 10 most actively traded currencies, the Australian and Canadian dollars both increased market share, while the proportion of turnover involving sterling fell from 22pc to 18pc. The Swiss franc also lost ground.
--http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/currency/7975193/Financial-crisis-boosts-Londons-dominance-in-global-currency-trading.html

My comments:  London seems almost like an American city.  To the extent that the dollar is dominant, a large portion of this is due to London.

Is it racist for a black woman to sing about chicken?

Somebody needs to get a life

The Egg Diet

Jimmy Moore went on a diet where he ate up to 24 eggs a day, with a little butter and cheese, and nothing else.  He lost 14 pounds in one week.
--http://livinlavidalowcarb.com/blog/my-severe-hyperinsulinemia-has-dictated-i-go-on-a-high-fat-low-carb-eggfest/7447

The Twinkie Diet

[Dr. Mark] Haub is a Human Nutrition professor at Kansas State, and as such, ate wisely: whole grains, plenty of fiber, fruits and veggies, occasional treat meals (burgers, pizza), and so forth. And yet, he seemed stuck on the high side of 200 pounds. He was eating healthily, but, he observes, “I wasn’t healthy. I was eating too much.”

It occurred to him to wonder if perhaps the key to weight loss had nothing to do with nutritional quality, but merely the quantity that one consumed. He decided to try a little experiment with himself as guinea pig. For one month, he determined, he would consume very little other than junk food, but with a strict control on calorie intake. At 211 pounds, he would ordinarily pack away about 2,600 calories per day; he gave himself an absolute limit of 1,800.

But those 1,800 calories were mostly composed of a diet that would make a nutritionist’s head explode. Instead of actual meals, every three hours he would scarf down a few Hostess Twinkies or Doritos or powdered donuts or Kellogg’s Corn Pops or Oreos. He avoided meat, whole grains and fruit. His central focus was on portion control, not nutrition. In all, 2/3 of his daily intake consisted of junk food, augmented by a multivitamin pill, a protein shake, and vegetables such as celery or baby carrots.

At the end of the month, he found that his weight was down a few pounds, and he felt reasonably okay, so he stuck with the regimen. Finally, after ten weeks of this, he took inventory of his vital statistics. In a little more than two months, he had lost a total of 27 pounds, down to 174, had lowered his body fat from 33.4 to 24.9 percent, and reduced his BMI from 28.8 (overweight) to 24.9 (normal). Even more unexpectedly, his LDL (bad) cholesterol was down by 20 percent and his HDL (good) cholesterol was up by the same, 20 percent.
--http://www.carbwire.com/2010/12/07/the-twinkie-diet-guy-dr-mark-haub-regrets-his-experiment-went-public

Central Park jogger attack shocks New York City

April 19, 1989

On this day in 1989, a 28-year-old female investment banker is severely beaten and sexually assaulted while jogging in New York City’s Central Park. Five teenagers from Harlem were convicted of the crime, which shocked New Yorkers for its randomness and viciousness and became emblematic of the perceived lawlessness of the city at the time. The case was also racially divisive, as the teens were black and Hispanic and the victim was white.

The “Central Park jogger,” as she became known in the media, was discovered by passerby in a muddy ravine, her skull smashed and near death, hours after she went for a jog in the park around 9 p.m. After being rescued, she spent nearly two weeks in a coma, but surprised doctors by eventually recovering from most of her injuries. However, she remembered nothing about the near-fatal attack or the events leading up to it.

Police quickly charged five male teens with the crime; four made videotaped confessions, while implicating a fifth suspect. The teens were part of a larger group of youths who had been roaming Central Park on the night of April 19, robbing and beating people. The public became familiar with a new term, “wilding,” to describe the gang’s random, violent rampage. 

The teens charged in the Central Park jogger attack soon claimed their confessions had been coerced by the police; however, the five were convicted in two separate trials in 1990, and received prison sentences ranging from five to 15 years. Then, in 2002, a convicted murderer and serial rapist, already behind bars, came forward to confess he had attacked the Central Park jogger when he was 17 and had acted alone. DNA evidence later confirmed his rape claim. In December 2002, the convictions of the five men originally charged in the case were overturned. The men later filed multi-million dollar lawsuits against New York City, which have not been settled.

In 2003, the Central Park jogger, Trisha Meili, publicly revealed her identity by publishing a book about her ordeal. In the years after the attack, she became a motivational speaker and advocate for victims of sexual assault and brain injury.
--http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/central-park-jogger-attack-shocks-new-york-city

Bizarre story about ethical breaches by Phoenix DA

http://www.abajournal.com/magazine/article/the_prosecutor_on_trial_ex-maricopa_co._atty_faces_disbarment_for_political

At age 38 and with virtually no prosecutorial experience, [Andrew] Thomas, a Harvard Law School grad, took office in 2005 after a tough-on-crime campaign, then was re-elected as a populist hero whose battles against illegal immigration helped spark a number of states to enact immigration laws out of frustration with what they see as the feds being feckless on the job. Thomas was instrumental in the movement launched from his state, and the issue is now before the U.S. Supreme Court in Arizona v. United States.
Early in his tenure, the prosecutor started feuding with other elected officials, judges and county managers. He used the bully pulpit of news conferences and opened criminal investigations against those who criticized or questioned his handling of immigration enforcement and other issues.

The detailed, 33-charge bar complaint accuses Thomas and Lisa Aubuchon, his former go-to assistant for prosecuting politically charged matters, of, among other things, filing criminal and civil cases without probable cause or evidentiary basis; bringing them to embarrass, burden or delay; dishonesty and fraud; incompetence; conflicts of interest; and engaging in criminal conduct (by causing an unknowing sheriff’s detective to swear to a false affidavit for charging a judge with crimes after others had balked.) It seeks their disbarment.

Sarkozy gives up cheese

"Nicolas Sarkozy has committed gastronomic sacrilege and risked his reputation with the French public by giving up cheese, it has been claimed.
The French president's chef made the potentially embarrassing revelation that brie has been banned from the dinner table at the Elysee Palace.
Mr Sarkozy's culinary credibility had previously taken a blow when it emerged that he drinks no wine - a key source of French national pride.

The president's wholesome diet is said to have been inspired by his wife Carla, a former model who is 13 years his junior.As part of her strict health programme for her husband, she has him following a strenuous exercise regime and a frugal diet of fish, vegetables, salads and sorbets.
Cottage cheese is still allowed, it is understood.
However, with elections only three-weeks away, Mr Sarkozy has shown himself willing to break the ban if he believes it can earn him votes."

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2126026/Sarko-causes-stink-French-president-risks-culinary-credibility-admitting-given-cheese.html#ixzz1rHQcU0P9

My comments:  He deserves to lose the election.  You can't be a Frenchman if you don't like cheese and wine.  Cheese is good for you.  And he lets his wife tell him what to eat?  Sarko is a wimp. If I were French, I would vote for Marine Le Pen.

March 2012 Monthly Budget Review

Just released.  There was a $777 billion deficit for the first 6 months of the fiscal year. 

Medicare and Medicaid spending are way below what I was earlier projecting, which is great news, but tax revenue is also running behind projections.

The April curse continues

If this stuff didn't happen in April I would ignore it.

April 6, 2012 - Earl Albert Moore sentenced to life in prison for placing an explosive device in Southwest Plaza on April 20, 2011, the anniversary of the Columbine shootings.
April 12, 2012 - Charles Manson, now 77, faces his 12th parole hearing.  It will probably be his last.
April 13, 2012 - It's a Friday.  Nothing really unusual about that, unless something else happens that day.

===================================

Here is an article about Moore:
"Had this incident taken place on any other day, and in any other location, it might have received modest local news coverage and been promptly forgotten. But because it happened on the Columbine anniversary within spitting distance of the school, the act quickly became an international story even as it freaked out locals fearful that a lethal copycat was on the loose.
So...was Moore's act intended as a Columbine homage. Not according to what he told investigators. He insisted that he didn't have any clue about the anniversary."
--http://blogs.westword.com/latestword/2012/04/earl_moore_life_southwest_plaza_bombing_columbine_anniversary.php

Interest payments will exceed defense spending by 2019

http://www.weeklystandard.com/blogs/obamas-budget-interest-payments-will-exceed-defense-budget-2019_635445.html

Eating more cheese can help fat people lose weight

During the 12-week trial, experts, in Perth put 40 volunteers on a calorie-reduced diet, but some were asked to eat more cheese, yoghurt and low fat milk.

Those who increased their daily servings of dairy products from three to five lost the most weight, the Curtin University of Technology study found.

They also had lower blood pressure, the least stomach fat and "significantly improved" their chances of improving their health and avoid heart disease and diabetes.

Cheese and other dairy products are high in protein, which can help us feel full quickly as it speeds up the body's metabolism.

"Many people commonly believe that when trying to lose weight, dairy products are key foods that they have to cut out of their diet as they are high in fat," said lead researcher, Dr Wendy Chan She Ping Delfos.
"This study has shown that when trying to lose weight people can actually benefit by increasing the amount of dairy they consume, as long as during the weight loss period total energy intake is less than their requirements.
"It will help you reduce your blood pressure and it also causes greater total abdominal fat loss, so you'd lose weight more around the belly.
--http://www.telegraph.co.uk/health/healthnews/6413146/Eating-more-cheese-can-help-fat-people-lose-weight-study-claims.html

MIT predicts Global Economic Collapse by 2030

Researchers at the world-renowned Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) say that, at this rate, the planet is likely to be plagued by a “global economic collapse” in fewer than two decades if humans continue to gobble up natural resources at the same rate they are today.
The report was led by MIT’s Jay W. Forrester’s Institute and used a computing model to examine the correlation between global developments and their affect on the Earth. Variables involving the amount of available resources, different level of agricultural productivity, birth control and environmental protection were taken into account to examine what the future holds for the human race and, according to the researchers, it isn’t very good.
“Only drastic measures for environmental protection proved to be suitable to change this systems behavior, and only under these circumstances, scenarios could be calculated in which both world population and wealth could remain at a constant level. However, so far the necessary political measures were not taken,” explains The Club of Rome, a global think-tank based out of Italy who commissioned MIT to conduct the research.
The study suggests that as earthlings continue to consume vast amounts of resources that cannot be replaced, a “precipitous population decline” will also be triggered unless adjustment are made to the way mankind manages its intake and stays at its current pace of plaguing the Earth’s ecosystems through mass industrialization. Perhaps most surprising, however, is that the researcher’s results, to some, is nothing new at all.
As it happens, the MIT report largely mirrors the results of a similar study conducted back in 1972 called “The Limits to Growth.”
--http://rt.com/usa/news/global-collapse-mit-predict-376/

Worst Cities in the World

#10.  Colombo, Sri Lanka
#9. Dakar, Senegal
#8. Tehran, Iran
#7. Douala, Cameroon
#6. Karachi, Pakistan
#5. Algiers, Algeria
#4. Lagos, Nigeria
#3. Port Moresby, Papua New Guinea
#2. Dhaka, Bangladesh
#1. Harare, Zimbabwe

Honorable Mention - Dangerous Cities:
Kabul, Afghanistan
Baghdad, Iraq
Juarez, Mexico
Caracas, Venezuela
Acapulco, Mexico
Medellin, Colombia
Cali, Colombia
Bogota, Colombia
San Salvador, El Salvador
Guatemala City, Guatemala
Detroit, US
San Juan, Puerto Rico

Honorable Mention - Dirty Cities:
New Delhi, India
Maputo, Mozambique
Luanda, Angola
Brazzaville, Congo
Almaty, Kazakhstan
Addis Ababa, Ethiopia
Mexico City, Mexico
Baku, Azerbaijan
Port-au-prince, Haiti

Honorable Mention - Expensive Cities:
N'Djamena, Chad
Moscow, Russia
Tokyo, Japan
Libreville, Gabon
Sao Paulo, Brazil
Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
Ougadougou, Burkina Faso

Oppressive Cities:
Pyongyang, North Korea

Flashback: Carlos Ghigliotti

This is on my list of the strange events that occur around April 19.  Ghigliotti was an investigator of the Waco massacre but was found dead in his house on April 28, 2000.

Waco Siege Investigator Found Dead In His Home

By Cindy Loose
Washington Post Staff Writer
Saturday, April 29, 2000; Page B03

Carlos Ghigliotti, who had been retained by a U.S. House committee to help investigate the 1993 siege of the Branch Davidian compound in Waco, Tex., was found dead in Laurel under unexplained circumstances yesterday.

"We're investigating it as a homicide," said Laurel police spokesman Jim Collins. Ghigliotti, 42, was found about 1:30 p.m. in the 600 block of Washington Boulevard. His body was badly decomposed, said police. There were no signs of a break-in or a struggle at the home, where Ghigliotti ran his business, Infrared Technologies Corp., police said. An expert in thermal imaging and videotape, Ghigliotti told the House Government Reform Committee in October that his analysis of tapes at Waco indicated that an FBI agent fired shots at the compound on April 19, the final day of the siege--a view disputed by the FBI.

Michael Caddell, lead lawyer in a $100 million wrongful death lawsuit stemming from the Waco siege, said last night that he recently had discussed the findings with Ghigliotti and intended to retain him--not only because his work was impressive but also because Caddell's first expert had suffered a stoke recently. Caddell said that two weeks ago he wrote to Waco Special Counsel John C. Danforth, urging that he interview Ghigliotti immediately. Caddell said he'd heard of Ghigliotti's death yesterday from Rep. Dan Burton (R-Ind.), chair of the committee that retained Ghigliotti. Police called Burton, Caddell said, because his business card was found in Ghigliotti's pocket.

A building manager, concerned that no one had seen Ghigliotti for some weeks, contacted police, who found the body. Michael McNulty, who made a documentary film about Waco that was instrumental in reopening the investigation, said he had been looking forward to seeing Ghigliotti's conclusions. He added, "My impression is that the work he did was significant and important."

Ghigliotti's body was transported to the chief medical examiner's office in Baltimore for an autopsy.
--http://www.apfn.org/apfn/waco_investigator.htm

Southwest Mall Bomb Scare Press Conference

The bomb scare occurred on April 20, 2011 and the press conference was the next day.  Earl Albert Moore later pled guilty to the incident. 

G4T loses it

Bernanke warns of unsustainable debt

By definition, the unsustainable trajectories of deficits and debt that the CBO outlines cannot actually happen, because creditors would never be willing to lend to a government with debt, relative to national income, that is rising without limit. One way or the other, fiscal adjustments sufficient to stabilize the federal budget must occur at some point. The question is whether these adjustments will take place through a careful and deliberative process that weighs priorities and gives people adequate time to adjust to changes in government programs or tax policies, or whether the needed fiscal adjustments will come as a rapid and painful response to a looming or actual fiscal crisis. 

Sustained high rates of government borrowing would both drain funds away from private investment and increase our debt to foreigners, with adverse long-run effects on U.S. output, incomes, and standards of living. Moreover, diminishing investor confidence that deficits will be brought under control would ultimately lead to sharply rising interest rates on government debt and, potentially, to broader financial turmoil. In a vicious circle, high and rising interest rates would cause debt-service payments on the federal debt to grow even faster, resulting in further increases in the debt-to-GDP ratio and making fiscal adjustment all the more difficult. 
--http://www.cnbc.com/id/41491193/

Exactly.  Adjustments must occur. If they don't, then at some point there will be a vicious circle of rising interest rates.

Top 20 Fad Diets

I don't know if I will try any of these but they are something to consider.

1.  Lemonade Diet.  Drink lemonade 6 times a day, and no solid food for a week.
2.  Beverly Hills Diet. Eat fruit for breakfast, carbs for lunch, and protein for dinner.
3.  The 3 Hour Diet.  Eat every 3 hours. For each meal, eat protein the size of a deck of cards, carbs the size of a Rubik's cube, and enough fat to fill a water bottle lid.
4.  The Cabbage Soup Diet. Eat only 2 bowls of cabbage soup a day, with additional vegetables, for one week.
5.  The Fast Food Diet.  Eat healthy for two meals a day, and fast food for one meal (skipping the french fries and soda), and walk a mile per day.
6. The Nutrisystem Diet.  Buy a 28-day supply of food from their website for $300, and only eat their food.
7.  The Rachel Ray Diet.  Prepare meals using Rachel Ray's recipes.  Don't eat anything else except for vegetables.
8.  The Shangri La Diet.  Eat only bland foods, and one teaspoon of sugar water for a morning snack, and one teaspoon of olive oil for an afternoon snack.
9. The Sugar Busters Diet.  Eliminate all sugar from your diet including bread, beer, soda, rice, potatoes, carrots and bananas.
10.  The Morning Banana Diet.  Eat 1 or 2 bananas for breakfast with a glass of water, and then anything else you want for the rest of the day, except dessert, but don't eat after 8:00pm.
11. The Raw Food Diet.  Eat only raw fruits and vegetables.  Don't eat anything cooked.  You can have avocados, nuts, and bananas.
12.  The Negative Calorie Diet.  Eat only foods that supposedly have negative calories, such as celery, cucumbers, lettuce and green beans.
13. The Grape Diet.  Like it sounds, eat only grapes and drink only water.
14.  The Mono Diet.  Eat only 1 food at each meal, like 1 potato, or one piece of fish.  Similar to the Beverly Hills Diet.
15.  The Ice Cream Diet.  Eat only salads, fruits, and vegetable soup, along with a small bowl of ice cream each night.
16.  The Grapefruit Diet.  Eat only one-half a grapefruit for breakfast lunch and dinner, along with a small salad.
17.  The Caveman Diet.  Eat only vegetables (except potatoes), eggs, fruit, nuts, berries, and fish or chicken.
18.  The Three Day Diet.  Strictly follow a menu for three days.  Similar to the Ice Cream Diet.
19.  The Metabolism Diet.  This is a restricted calorie, low carb diet that you follow for 7 days.
20.  The Special K Diet.  Eat only Special K with skim milk and fruit for breakfast and lunch and then eat a sensible dinner.

Source:  http://www.dietdigest.net/best-fad-diets; http://www.free-fad-diets.com/top-ten-fad-diets.html

Cheese - the perfect food?

This is just a crazy idea that I have that might work.  Could one lose weight just eating about 6 ounces of cheese per day?

A one-ounce serving of full-fat string cheese has 5 grams of fat (45 calories), and 7 grams of protein (28 calories).  (The total says 80 calories, so there is another 7 calories there somewhere, but which can be ignored.)
The Weight Watchers smoked string cheese has 2.5 grams of fat (22 calories), and 6 grams of protein (24 calories) and no carbs.

There are lots of diets out there that promote cottage cheese, but I don't see what is so great about cottage cheese as compared to regular cheese.  Cottage cheese does have carbs, but in low amounts. Cottage cheese is less calorically dense than regular cheese, but the idea is to satisfy hunger not to fill your belly.

The fat helps satisfy hunger, and promotes fat-burning.  The cheese provides some vitamins (A, B12), calcium, zinc and phosphorous. It is really a complete meal, except it doesn't have vitamin C or enough fiber, which a little fruit will provide. The only concern is the high amount of saturated fat, but there is really no connection between dietary saturated fat and the stuff that clogs your arteries.  Besides, I am not promoting eating only cheese forever, I am talking about for a short-term diet.  Anyways, I just wanted to throw this idea out there.

GAO's Long-Term Outlook

"Despite limits on discretionary spending that would bring discretionary spending to levels not seen in recent history, our simulations show total federal spending continuing to exceed revenues and feeding an unsustainable growth in debt."
--http://gao.gov/assets/590/589835.pdf

Sugar is poison

The English Defence League celebrates St. George's Day

There are so many bizarre aspects to events that occur around April 20. This is another one. St. George (who is celebrated on April 23) is the patron saint of England, and thus the English Defence League (EDL), which is considered racist or at least far right.  Thus St. George and his flag may be considered racist.

St. George was a martyr who was killed for his belief in Jesus Christ. The EDL takes a strong stand against Islam.

They sold their souls for rock and roll

The Columbine Massacre was influenced by Marilyn Manson

This is not the droid you are looking for

Hussain Al-Hussaini was seen with Timothy McVeigh before April 19, 1995. He had a distinguishing tattoo of an anchor with a snake wrapped around it, which was common among members of the Iraqi army.

He was arrested in Quincy, Massachusetts on March 10, 2011 for fighting with another homeless man, but the FBI is NOT interested in talking to him.  “The investigation was closed and the FBI has no further interest in that individual”. Why? "The Clinton-Reno Justice Department laid down the official line that the Oklahoma bombing was a purely domestic terrorist act".  Ok then.  Move along folks.

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Inauspicious April Dates

April 19 and 20 seem to be the unluckiest dates ever.  Waco, Oklahoma City, and Columbine will sear it forever in our hearts and minds. Add to that the assassination of Lincoln and the Titanic sinking and there is no other date on the calendar that even comes close.  Here is my list of tragedies and important events that occurred on those dates or surrounding dates. (Not all of these dates are notable and this needs editing).

April 23, 303 AD -  Death of St. George.  St. George is the patron saint of England, and St. George's Day is celebrated as a major holiday there.
April 17, 1421 - Dikes at Dort Holland breaks, 100,000 drown
April 17, 1457 - Vlad the Impaler (aka Dracula) executes boyers at an Easter feast in Wallachia
April 17, 1521 - Martin Luther refuses to recant his teachings at the Diet of Worms
April 23, 1616 - Death of William Shakespeare. He may have also been born on April 23 in 1564
April 20, 1653 - Oliver Cromwell dissolves the Rump Parliament
April 21 (o.s. May 2 n.s.), 1729 - Catherine the Great of Russia born
April 19, 1770 - Capt. James Cook discovers Australia
April 19, 1775 - American Revolution begins in Lexington, Massachusetts with the "shot heard round the world"
April 19, 1782 - The Dutch Republic became the first foreign nation to recognize U.S. independence when it accepted John Adams as ambassador.  April 19 is still celebrated as Dutch-American Friendship Day
April 20, 1792 - France declares war on Austria, beginning the French Revolutionary Wars, which continue until 1802
April 19, 1810 - Venezuela becomes independent of Spain
April 21, 1836 - The Battle of San Jacinto won by the Texas army led by Gen. Sam Houston. It was the deciding battle in the Texas Revolution.
April 19, 1839 - Belgium independence is recognized by the Treaty of London
April 18, 1857 - Clarence Darrow, a lawyer who defended John Scopes in 1925 for teaching evolution, is born
April 12, 1861 - Civil War begins as Confederates fire on Ft. Sumter
April 19, 1861 - riot in Baltimore between Confederate sympathizers and the Massachusetts militia
April 20, 1861 - Robert E. Lee resigns from the US Army in order to command the forces of Virginia
April 14, 1865 - Abraham Lincoln shot by John Wilkes Boothe and dies on April 15
April 22 (April 10 o.s.), 1870 - Birthday of Vladimir Lenin
April 20, 1876 - The April Uprising occurs in Bulgaria, which resulted in the establishment of Bulgaria as an autonomous nation
April 22 (April 10 o.s.), 1899 - Birthday of Vladimir Nabokov, author of the novel Lolita
April 18, 1881 - Billy the Kid escapes from jail in Mesilla County, NM
April 19, 1882 - death of Charles Darwin
April 30, 1888 - 230 killed by hail the size of oranges in Moradabad, India
April 22, 1889 - Oklahoma land rush begins
April 20, 1889 - Birth of Adolf Hitler
April 19, 1904 - The Great Fire of Toronto
April 18, 1906 - earthquake destroys much of San Francisco
April 14, 1907 - Haitian dictator Francois "Papa Doc" Duvalier born in Port-au-Prince
April 23, 1907 - death of Alferd Packer the cannibal
April 21, 1910 - Mark Twain dies
April (unknown year). Fictional sinking of the ocean liner Titan which struck an iceberg in the novel “The Wreck of the Titan, or Futility” published in 1898, which was very similar to the real-life sinking of the Titanic in 1912
April 15, 1912 - Titanic strikes an iceberg and sinks
April 20, 1912 - Bram Stoker, author of Dracula, dies
April 20, 1914 - Ludlow massacre, in which 20 people were killed by the Colorado National Guard
April 24, 1915 - Armenian Genocide begins with the total number of deaths between 1 and 1.5 million
April 25, 1915 - 100,000 soldiers die in a failed attack on Gallipoli, Turkey during WWI. It is remembered as ANZAC day.
April 21, 1918 - Manfred von Richthofen aka the "Red Baron" was killed in action
April 20, 1920 -  Tornadoes kill 219 in Alabama and Mississippi 
April 25, 1920 - San Remo conference incorporates Balfour Declaration and makes Palestine a British Mandate 
April 21, 1926 - Birth of Elizabeth Windsor II, Queen of England
April 19, 1936 - Arab revolt begins in Jaffa, Palestine against Jewish immigrants
April 21, 1936 - Birth of James Dobson, American psychologist
April 20, 1937 - George Takei, who plays Mr. Sulu in Star Trek, born
April 1940 In Katyn forest in Russia, 22,000 Polish officials were executed by the Soviet secret police
April 19, 1940 - "Lake Shore Ltd" derails speed killing 34 near Little Falls NY
April 23, 1940 - Rhythm nightclub fire in Natchez, Mississippi kills 209 African-Americans
April 18, 1942 - Doolittle Raid on Japan
April 19, 1943 - beginning of Warsaw Ghetto Uprising. " Nazi Storm Troopers began to pour fire into each end of the storm drain, using flame-throwers"
April 16, 1945 - More than 6,000 die when the German refugee ship Goya is sunk by a Soviet submarine torpedo
April 29, 1945 - Adolf Hitler marries Eva Braun
April 30, 1945 - Adolf Hitler commits suicide
April 17, 1946 - Syria becomes independent of France
April 20, 1946 - The League of Nations dissolves, giving its remaining property and power to the United Nations
April 16, 1947 - Texas City Disaster: An explosion on board a freighter in port causes the city of Texas City, Texas, to catch fire, killing almost 600.
April 23, 1947 - Phil Schneider born.  He lectured on alien abductions, underground bases, the OKC bombing, etc, and died in mysterious circumstances in January 1996
April 18, 1949 - Republic of Ireland comes into force
April 16, 1951 - British submarine Affray sank in English Channel, killing 75
April 19, 1960 - Revolution in South Korea
April 19, 1961 - Bay of Pigs invasion of Cuba fails
April 12, 1961 - Yuri Gagarin becomes first human to travel into space and orbit the Earth
April 4, 1968 - Martin Luther King, Jr. assassinated
April 20, 1968 - Enoch Powell of the UK, gives an incindiary racist "Rivers of Blood" speech, criticizing immigration and anti-discrimination policies
April 20, 1968 -  South Africa Boeing 707 crashes at Windhoek, 122 killed
April 23, 1968 -  birth of Oklahoma city bomber Timothy McVeigh
April 17, 1969 - Sirhan Sirhan was convicted of the murder of Robert Kennedy.
April 23, 1969 - Sirhan Sirhan  was sentenced to death by gas chamber, later commuted to life in prison.
April 17, 1970 - The ill-fated Apollo 13 spacecraft returns to Earth
April 21, 1970 - Principality of Hutt River declares its independence from Australia
April 22, 1970 - environmental activists celebrate Earth Day
April 19, 1971 - Veterans begin a protest against the Vietnam war in Washington DC.
April 19, 1971 - Charles Manson was sentenced to death. This was later changed to life in prison.
April 21, 1971 - Haitian dictator Francois "Papa Doc" Duvalier dies
April 22, 1971 - John Kerry testifies for 2 hours against the Vietnam War before the Senate.
April 20, 1972 - Apollo 16 lands on the moon
April 21, 1975 - Battle of Xuan Loc. In the last major battle of the Vietnam war, the South Vietnamese army is defeated, allowing the North to advance on Saigon.
April 23, 1977 -  Miltitary workers kill 300-500 students in Addis Ababa
April 20, 1978 - Korean Airlines Flight 902 shot down by Soviet aircraft
April 18, 1980 - Zimbabwe comes into being. It was formerly known as Rhodesia
April 20, 1980 - hundreds of Berber activists arrested in Algeria, in a critical point during the Berber Spring
April 23, 1980 - Soviet sub catches fire off Japan, 9 die
March 30, 1981 - attempted assassination of Ronald Reagan by John Hinckley, Jr.
April 19, 1981 - Hayden Christensen, actor who plays Anakin Skywalker in Star Wars, is born
April 18, 1983 - U.S. embassy in Lebanon bombed by Islamic terrorists, killing over 60 people
April 20, 1984 - during the Good Friday Massacre, the Montreal Canadiens and Quebec Nordiques get into a brawl that lasted for a full hour
April 19, 1985 - ATF siege of Aryan compound in Arkansas, ending peacefully
April 5, 1986 - Libyan agents bomb a Berlin disco, killing 4 and injuring 230
April 15, 1986 - US military bombs Libya in response to the Berlin bombing
April 26, 1986 - Chernobyl disaster, worst nuclear disaster in history
April 21, 1987 - terrorist attack by Tamil Tigers in Colombo, Sri Lanka, killing 106
April 23, 1987 - 28 construction workers killed in an apt collapse in Bridgeport, Ct
April 9, 1989 - Soviet troops fire on protestors in Tbilisi, Georgia, killing 20, leading to Georgia's independence. It is celebrated today as a public holiday.
April 15, 1989 - Hillsborough, UK disaster, killing 96 people in a stampede at a football match. It is the deadliest stadium-related disaster in British history.
April 15, 1989 - Hu Yaobang, Chinese reformer, dies of a heart attack, and 100,000 gather to mourn, leading to the Tiananmen Square protests
April 19, 1989 - gun turret on the USS Iowa explodes, killing 47 sailors, in an act of sabotage
April 5, 1991 - Sen. John Tower was killed in an suspicious airplane crash near Brunswick, Georgia
April 10, 1992 - IRA bombs the Baltic Exchange building in London, killing 3 and causing £800 million in damages
April 22, 1992 - Guadalajara, Mexico explosion in sewer system kills over 200
April 29, 1992 - Rodney King riots in Los Angeles, killing 53 people and causing over $1 billion in damages
April 19, 1993 - Waco tragedy - 76 people, including cult leader David Koresh, died in a fire after a siege by the ATF
April 19, 1993 - George Mickelson, governor of S. Dakota, dies in a plane crash near Dubuque, Iowa along with 7 others. This was the same date as the end of the Branch Davidian siege.
April 19, 1993 - Fire in psychiatric institute in South Korea, kills 40
April 24, 1993 - Bishopsgate bombing in London, killing 1 and causing over £1 billion in damages, near the Baltic Exchange bombing the previous year
April 6, 1994 - Rwandan Genocide begins, killing at least 500,000
April 20, 1994 - Serbian army bombs hospital in Goradze Bosnia, 47 killed
April 22, 1994. Former Pres. Richard Nixon dies at the age of 81
April 19, 1995 - Oklahoma City bombing by Timothy McVeigh killing 168 people
April 19, 1995 - white supremacist Richard Snell executed in Arkansas
April 3, 1996  - US Sec. of Commerce Ron Brown is killed in a suspicious plane crash
April 18, 1996 - In Qana, Lebanon, Israeli forces shell a UN compound, killing at least 106 civilians
April 27, 1996 - Former CIA director William Colby dies in a suspicious boating accident
April 18, 1997 - Red River Flood begins with a dike breached in Grand Forks, ND
April 24, 1997 -  trial of Timothy McVeigh begins in Denver
April 19, 1999 - The German Bundestag returns to Berlin
April 20, 1999 - Columbine High School massacre, killing 15 including the assailants
April 18, 2000 - Zimbabwe President Robert Mugabe vilifies white farmers as enemies
April 19, 2000 - Air Philippines flight 541 crashes into a hill near Davao, killing 131
April 22, 2000 - six-year old Elian Gonzales seized by Federal agents and sent to Cuba
April 23, 2000 - Gulf Air flight 72 crashes near Bahrain, killing 143
April 28, 2000 - Carlos Ghigliotti, who was investigating the Waco incident, died of an apparent heart attack at his home in Washington DC
April 18, 2002 - a plane crashes into a tower in Milan, Italy killing 3 and injuring 60
April 22, 2004 - Train fire and explosion in Ryongchon, North Korea kills at least 160 and levels several buildings
April 22, 2004 - Pat Tillman, NFL star, was killed or possibly assassinated in a "friendly fire" incident in Afghanistan
April 6, 2005 - White Supremacist Matthew Hale sentenced to 40 years in prison for trying to kill a federal judge
April 19, 2005 - Cardinal Ratzinger, former Nazi, elected pope and becomes Pope Benedict XVI
April 16, 2007 - Virginia Tech massacre, killing 33 including the assailant Seung-Hui Cho
April 20, 2007 - Johnson Space Center shooting in which the gunman killed one person before committing suicide
April 23, 2007 - death of former Russian President Boris Yeltsin
April 20, 2008 - more than 10,000 people gather at CU-Boulder to smoke marijuana and celebrate "420", a counterculture holiday
April 29, 2008 - Roland Carnaby, possible CIA agent, was killed by Houston police after a high speed chase
April 12, 2009 - The Zimbabwean Dollar is abandoned, as its value had disappeared because of massive hyperinflation
April 19, 2009 – Easter (varies from year to year)
April 21, 2009 - Holocaust Remembrance Day (varies from year to year)
April 10, 2010 - The Polish president and 95 other people died in an airplane crash in Russia en-route to commemorate the 70th anniversary of the Katyn massacre
April 14, 2010- Neo-Nazi Bill White sentenced to 30 months in prison
April 14, 2010 - Eruption of a volcano in Iceland which severely disrupted airline traffic in Europe for a week.
April 18, 2010 - US Pres. Obama was forced to cancel a trip to Poland to attend the funeral of the Polish president due to the volcanic plume covering Europe
April 19, 2010 - In Canada over 400 hundred of straw bales caught on fire and blazed out of control.
April 20, 2010 - Deepwater Horizon oil rig explodes in the Gulf of Mexico, killing 11 workers and causing a massive spill covering at least 2500 square miles
April 11, 2011 – The accident at the Fukushima Nuclear Power Station is officially raised to Level 7, which is the same level as the Chernobyl disaster.
April 15, 2011 – Income tax due
April 15, 2011 – Atlas Shrugged, the movie based on the book by Ayn Rand, opens
April 18, 2011 - A landslide in Indonesia's East Java province kills 100 people
April 19, 2011 - Fidel Castro resigns as dictator of Cuba
April 20, 2011 - A pipe bomb is found at Southwest Plaza Mall, only 1 mile from Columbine
April 20, 2011 - Neo-Nazi Bill White has his conviction for promoting violence on his website overturned as a violation of his First Amendment rights
April 21, 2011 - Students at Stony Creek Elementary School, about 2 miles from Columbine, were evacuated due to reports of a suspicious man in the building.  The strange man was there because he had to use the restroom.

Update:  I just clicked on the article about The Covenant, The Sword, and the Arm of the Lord, which states:  "The date of the siege [April 19, 1985], coincidentally, was the 210th anniversary of "the shot heard round the world" from the Revolutionary War. Eight years later in 1993, this was the date that the FBI chose to end the standoff in Waco, after specifically having studied the outcome of the CSA standoff. Two years after that, in 1995, this was the date chosen by Timothy McVeigh, in protest against the Waco incident among others, to bomb the Federal building in Oklahoma City."

The Columbine High School Massacre page states:  "One theory states that the original date chosen was April 19, because it was a date on which Robyn Anderson, one of the people who purchased the guns and a close friend of Klebold, would not be present. Due to delays in manufacturing the propane bombs and in acquiring ammunition, the date was moved to April 20. The date of the shooting coincided with Adolf Hitler's birthday, leading to some speculation that the two were Neo-Nazis. It was also one day after the anniversary of the Oklahoma City Bombing and the immolation of the Branch Davidians in Waco, further strengthening another theory that the original intended date was set for April 19; both shooters mentioned in videos that they had hoped to outdo these events."