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by Matt Adler Sacha Baron Cohen?s ?The Dictator? has invaded theaters, featuring His Excellency, the incomparable Admiral General Aladeen, in his feature film debut. But the beloved Admiral General is far from the only despot to reign over the big screen throughout the years, so as a celebration of this momentous occasion in his glorious [...]
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Tags : Dictator
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – JPMorgan Chase & Co Chief Executive Jamie Dimon has agreed to testify before Congress over the bank’s recent trading losses, which have ignited a political debate over whether large U.S. banks need to be reined in by regulators or new laws.
U.S. Senate Banking Committee Chairman Tim Johnson said in a statement on Thursday that his panel will invite Dimon to appear before Congress.
He did not say on what date the committee wants Dimon to testify but that it would follow a set of hearings with regulators on the trades and efforts to implement Wall Street reforms that will conclude on June 6.
“As always, we will continue to be open and transparent with our regulators and Congress,” JPMorgan spokesman Kristin Lemkau said in a statement. She said Dimon will appear before the panel.
Last week JPMorgan announced that it has suffered at least $2 billion in losses due to trades that went bad.
Johnson said committee staff has been discussing the losses with regulators and the bank since they were disclosed and have determined Dimon should testify.
Critics of Wall Street have pointed to the trades as evidence that reforms called for under the 2010 Dodd-Frank financial oversight law should be strictly enforced once finalized.
Two regional Federal Reserve presidents have said the losses underscore the point that banks like JPMorgan are too big to manage and should be broken up.
These reactions are being dismissed by some analysts and lawmakers as an overreaction since the bank’s stability has not been put at risk.
“Even with this loss, I believe they’re one of the most profitable financial institutions in the country and unless the facts are diametrically different from what we’ve heard, there is no risk from this loss to depositors or to tax payers,” House Financial Services Chairman Spencer Bachus said on Wednesday.
WASHINGTON WRANGLING
The JPMorgan losses have, in particular, put a renewed focus on whether regulators should tighten the so-called Volcker rule that will restrict bank trading activities. A proposed rule was released in October and a final version is expected later this year.
The restrictions will ban banks from proprietary trading, or trades that are made solely for their own profit, and greatly limit their ability to invest in hedge funds.
The crackdown is named after former Federal Reserve Chairman Paul Volcker who championed the idea.
Its supporters say banks that receive federal backstops, such as deposit insurance, should not make risky trades that could endanger deposits and possibly taxpayer money.
Banks have lobbied the issue heavily saying if the restrictions are too tightly drawn they will negatively impact financial markets and make it harder, for instance, for companies in a variety of businesses to raise funds.
Democratic Senators Carl Levin and Jeff Merkley, who authored the Volcker rule language in Dodd-Frank, said the October proposal creates a loophole in the crackdown because it would give banks the latitude to hedge against portfolio risk as opposed to individual positions.
They have been publicly pressuring regulators to tighten the rule since the trading losses were announced.
In a sign of the political importance surrounding the issue, Levin told reporters on Thursday that White House National Economic Council Director Gene Sperling called him this week to discuss the Volcker rule. Levin said he urged Sperling to have the White House speak out on the need to tighten the hedging language.
The rule is being written by the federal banking regulators, the Securities and Exchange Commission and the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, all of which are independent regulators.
Under Dodd-Frank, the Treasury Department is suppose to coordinate the rule writing and Levin has previously said he believes the department pushed for the broader hedging exemption allowed under the October proposal.
On Thursday, he said Sperling had assured him that is not the case and that Treasury has only tried to coordinate discussions.
“I accepted that,” he said.
One regulator has come out publicly in favor of tightening the October proposal.
CFTC Chairman Gary Gensler wants a final rule to bar portfolio hedging, his spokesman Steve Adamske said.
(Additional reporting by David Henry and Alexandra Alper; Editing by Neil Stempleman)
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Tags : JPMorgan
Mitt Romney’s first TV ad of the general election bypasses the usual personal narrative to give us his agenda for Day 1 in office: the Keystone pipeline, tax reform, and replacing ‘Obamacare.’
Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney’s first general election advertisement.
Mitt Romney, man of action.
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That?s the message of his briskly paced first ad of the general election campaign, called ?Day One.? In just 30 seconds, we learn everything the presumed Republican presidential nominee would do on his first day in the Oval Office: Approve the job-creating Keystone Pipeline project, cut and reform taxes, and replace ?Obamacare? with ?common-sense health-care reform.?
Congressional approval? No mention of that, though a campaign ad isn?t a civics lessons. This is about conveying a sense to voters that Mr. Romney will roll up his sleeves and get to work just as soon as he?s said ?so help me God.? The details don?t matter.
Mitt Romney’s five biggest liabilities as GOP nominee
According to the Associated Press, the Romney campaign is spending $1.3 million to air the ad in Iowa, North Carolina, Virginia, and Ohio, all battleground states. The campaign also produced a Spanish-language version.
Team Romney?s decision to focus its debut general-election ad on the candidate?s Day 1 agenda and not on his personal narrative is telling.?Usually candidates begin with a positive message about themselves, and Romney is facing a wide likability gap with the president. With President Obama and Vice President Biden slamming Romney for his years as a venture capitalist at Bain Capital, Romney could have started the process with a bit of personal narrative.
The ?dog on car? story is getting old, and the Washington Post?s deep dive into his high school years ? including a story about him bullying a fellow student ? has provided a window into Romney?s elite upbringing. But there just isn?t much else out there about Romney the person. Now, analysts suggest, what he needs to do is fill in his biography and let voters know what he?s really all about. ?
?The decisions presidents must make are often not just about policy or even political calculations,? writes Susan Milligan of US News & World Report. ?Some of them come straight from the gut (such as, do I send in the Navy SEALs to attempt to take out Osama bin Laden?). Some of them are rooted more in a person’s own value system and character. It’s a big job with a lot of responsibility and power. We can’t help wanting to know who these candidates are, and what makes them tick.?
To be sure, there?s plenty of time for Romney to tell us who he is. The campaign is just starting. But for now, he?s telling us what he wants to do.
Mitt Romney’s five biggest assets as GOP nominee
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David Gray / Reuters
A paramilitary policeman holds up his hand as he stands guard outside the main entrance to the North Korean embassy in central Beijing on Thursday. North Koreans holding three Chinese fishing boats and 29 sailors have demanded payment before they will release them, Chinese media reported on Thursday.
By Ed Flanagan, NBC News
BEIJING ? In what appears to be a rare public spat between longtime neighbors and allies, 29 Chinese sailors have been kidnapped in the Yellow Sea by North Koreans, according to Chinese media reports.
Three Chinese fishing ships were operating in waters between North Korea and China on May 8 when they were boarded, 29 crew members taken hostage and the vessels hijacked, the reports said late Wednesday.?
The vessels reportedly were then taken to North Korean waters where they have remained since. One fisherman was said to have escaped. ?
?
How Sun was able to determine whether the hijackers? ship was a North Korean military vessel, much less whether the kidnappers were working on behalf of the North Korean government or were pirates working independently, remains unclear.??
Immediately after the incident, the hijackers allegedly asked one of the Chinese captains to call Sun to tell him that the hijackers were demanding 1.2 million yuan ($190,000) in ransom for the three ships captured. Sun said he has not been in contact with his crew since that call, but new reports late Thursday suggested that the kidnappers are now seeking around 900,000 yuan ($140,000) for their release.
North Korea?s government has not made any public comment on the case. Likewise, China?s government would not publicly confirm any details about the reported incident.?
China is North Korea?s key international ally, with Beijing having been Pyongyang?s main supplier of food aid and oil despite strict international sanctions over the reclusive country?s nuclear ambitions and rocket launches.?
“China is maintaining close contact with North Korea through the relevant channels and we hope this problem will be appropriately solved as soon as possible,” Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Hong Lei told a daily briefing.?
“We have also stated to North Korea that it should ensure the legitimate rights of Chinese ship personnel.”
The owner of another ship involved, named Zhang Dechang, said that during a talk with his ship?s captain on May 9, he was assured?that no direct threats had been made against the sailors themselves. However, in an article Thursday in the Chinese newspaper Global Times Zhang said he had received a call from the hijackers on Tuesday threatening to ?dispose? of the ships and the fishermen if the ransom was not paid by May 17.
Conditions on the boats are said to be cramped and the fishermen reportedly have not been well looked after. Both Zhang and Sun said their ship captains have told him that they don?t have much to eat and that they?ve had little rest.
Sun said the incident has brought feelings of anger and helplessness. ?Relatives of the sailors ? parents, children, wives ? came to us for their men, weeping,? he said, ?We could do nothing.???
Anger among Chinese?
The incident has raised the ire of China?s netizens, who have wondered why it has taken so long for news of the alleged hijacking to be released and why Beijing has reacted so gently on this matter.?
On China?s Twitter-like service, Weibo, the issue was the top trending topic Thursday. ?Has North Korea forgotten how China aided North Korea in the Korean War?? wrote one user. ?Why are our fishermen always being arrested by foreigners, our waters always occupied by other countries? Don?t bully us, OK???
Others Weibo users were more belligerent. ?If they dare to execute hostages, we should immediately destroy them!? declared another.?
In general, there appears to be a growing public frustration in China over the government?s seeming desire to not react to the incidents aggressively, perhaps best summed up by one Weibo user who wrote: ?I wish the Chinese government could be stronger and stop chanting slogans like ?harmony? and ?peace.???
NBC News? Horace Lu contributed to this report.?
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Tags : Thursday
News | Health
Brain tissue from deceased military veterans exposed to explosions shows signs of the same neurodegenerative brain disorder that strikes football players who have sustained multiple concussions
?| May 16, 2012
CONCUSSIVE FORCE: Soldiers are injured by more than just the initial shock wave of very high air pressure following a blast. An IED’s secondary “blast wind,” a huge volume of displaced air flooding at high pressure back into the vacuum, can also damage the brain and lead to long-term consequences such as CTE.
Image: Courtesy of Craig Lathrop, via iStockphoto.com
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The stress and suffering of combat are known to leave a lasting impact on military veterans, in some cases triggering post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). Researchers have now found an even more serious and debilitating mental condition, known as chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE), in veterans, particularly those injured by the concussive force of bomb blasts.
Whereas PTSD is a mental illness, marked by unwelcome flashbacks and anguish, CTE is a progressive neurodegenerative brain disorder characterized by abnormal protein deposits that eventually kill brain cells and thus cause cognitive declines, including loss of memory and the ability to learn, as well as depression. The number of veterans at risk is large: traumatic brain injury caused by explosive blasts is thought to afflict about 20 percent of the 2.3 million servicemen and women deployed in combat since 2001, according to a team of researchers from Boston University, New York Medical College and the Veterans Affairs Boston Healthcare System.
These researchers say they have demonstrated that exposure to a single blast equivalent to that generated by a typical improvised explosive device (IED) can result in CTE and long-term brain impairments that accompany the disease. The research, published online Wednesday in Science Translational Medicine, also indicates that soldiers are injured by more than just the initial shock wave of very high air pressure following a blast. An IED’s secondary “blast wind,” a huge volume of displaced air flooding at high pressure back into the vacuum, can also damage the brain and lead to long-term consequences such as CTE. The blast wind created by an IED can reach a velocity of more than 530 kilometers per hour. Winds from a category 5 hurricane (the most severe), by comparison, reach about 250 kilometers per hour.
For their study, the researchers analyzed postmortem brain tissue from four military service members who were known to have been injured by a blast or had a concussive injury. The scientists compared that tissue with brain tissue samples from three young amateur American football players and a professional wrestler, all of whom had a history of repetitive concussive injury, and with four samples from comparably aged control subjects with no history of blast exposure, concussive injury or neurological disease. The signs of CTE (which can only be diagnosed postmortem) in the brains of blast-exposed military veterans were indistinguishable from those found in the deceased athletes, according to the researchers, led by Lee Goldstein, an associate professor at Boston University School of Medicine (B.U.S.M.) and Boston University College of Engineering, and Ann McKee, a B.U.S.M. professor and director of the Neuropathology Service for the VA New England Healthcare System.
Growing awareness of CTE has come primarily from its impact on the lives of former professional football players diagnosed with the condition. Several of these former players?including Chicago Bears safety Dave Duerson, Philadelphia Eagles safety Andre Waters and Pittsburgh Steelers offensive lineman Terry Long?ended up taking their own lives. Before shooting himself in the chest in February 2011, the 50-year-old Duerson sent a text message to his family specifying that he wanted his brain to be used for research at B.U.S.M. A few months later McKee and her colleagues at B.U. confirmed that Duerson suffered from CTE, possibly caused by concussions and other repetitive head trauma sustained on the gridiron.
More recently the Brain Injury Research Institute (BIRI), which studies the impact of concussions, asked the family of the late National Football League star linebacker Junior Seau to donate his brain so it, too, could be studied for signs of CTE. BIRI co-founder Bennet Omalu, the forensic pathologist who discovered physical evidence tying concussions to CTE, assisted in the autopsy of Seau’s brain, although the results will not be known for weeks. Seau committed suicide earlier this month by shooting himself in the chest.
When studying a brain for signs of CTE, researchers look for abnormal deposits of the proteins tau and TDP-43. The buildup of tau, in particular, within the brain cells is indicative of CTE. In a February 2012 Scientific American article, McKee noted that the parts of the brain afflicted with abnormal tau correlate with the psychological problems of a person suffering from CTE. The abnormal tau is found in the frontal cortex, which is responsible for impulse control, judgment and the ability to multitask. She also found tau in areas of the brain associated with depression as well as memory formation and retention.
Protecting soldiers and athletes from concussions presents a huge challenge because these injuries are not necessarily the result of repeated blows to the head. A concussion can occur whenever there is a sudden acceleration or deceleration of the head. This means helmets?whether for combat or football?actually provide little protection from concussions.
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Tags : CTE
WASHINGTON (AP) ? A small study raises more concern about the long-term consequences of brain injuries suffered by thousands of soldiers ? suggesting they may be at risk of developing the same degenerative brain disease as some retired football players.
Autopsies of four young veterans found the earliest signs of chronic traumatic encephalopathy, or CTE, in their brain tissue, Boston researchers reported Wednesday.
They compared the brain tissue of some of the youngest athletes ever found with signs of early CTE, in their teens and 20s, and concluded the abnormalities were nearly identical.
“It’s very distinctive,” said Dr. Lee Goldstein of Boston University, who led the study with Dr. Ann McKee of the VA New England Healthcare System. “You don’t see this in normal individuals.”
The research suggests that the cause of the injury, whether a blast or repeated blows, doesn’t matter ? it can trigger the same disease-causing process, said McKee, who has long studied the athlete connection.
Further experiments with mice showed that a single blast, equivalent to a roadside bomb, was enough to start the damage ? offering a model to help scientists better understand these wounds and perhaps how to treat them, the team reported in the journal Science Translational Medicine.
CTE is a progressive disease linked to multiple concussions. It has made headlines in recent years with the deaths of some former professional athletes, and lawsuits filed against the National Football League by others worried about the still unclear toll of a sport that can bring repeated blows to the head. Symptoms include memory problems, behavior changes including aggression, and eventually dementia. For now, only an autopsy confirms a diagnosis.
Traumatic brain injury, or TBI, is a signature injury of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, most of them closed-head injuries caused by being near an explosion. While many recover fine, others have some lasting cognitive or psychiatric symptoms ? and traditional medical exams can’t see the damage, making it incredibly difficult to diagnose what’s wrong. Additionally, scientists have long warned that many of those veterans may be at risk of long-term problems such as Alzheimer’s-like dementia.
Wednesday’s study, while very small, sheds important light on how damaging those TBIs can be even if the person walks away from the blast.
The four young veterans, ages 22 to 45, lived for a year or longer after their military TBIs, but complained of problems with memory, irritability, sleep and other issues before dying of suicide or other causes. Goldstein and McKee found their brains contained broken axons, the nerve fibers that act as the brain’s telephone system.
More surprising: Abnormal tangles of a brain protein named tau are a hallmark of early CTE, and researchers found that tau buildup in the brains of the veterans’ and the young athletes, three of them who played high school or college football and the fourth a professional wrestler. They didn’t see it in the brains of four other young men who hadn’t experienced concussions before death.
Three of the veterans had been exposed to blasts, while one had a different kind of concussion while deployed ? and all had had at least one pre-military concussion, from football, wrecks or fights.
While that begs the question of whether the blast was to blame, Goldstein said the mouse study shows a single explosion could trigger that kind of damage. Wind from a simulated blast whipped the animals’ heads like a bobble-head doll, severely shaking the brain, he explained. They experienced broken axons and blood vessels, inflammation and problems with learning and memory ? and two weeks later, were forming abnormal tau.
When the animals’ heads were immobilized, they escaped that damage, Goldstein said.
He said helmets may be crucial in protecting the skulls of soldiers and athletes, but they cannot protect the brain from that kind of rattling injury and might even worsen it by increasing the load on the neck.
Specialists not connected to Wednesday’s study caution that far more research is needed on the possible link between this brain degeneration and TBIs, especially in veterans.
Still, “they are very important findings,” said TBI researcher Dr. Amy Wagner of the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine.
For abnormalities to begin so soon after injury triggers questions about how resilient different people are, she said: Who’s more likely to recover? How many blows are too many? What other factors could make this slow-moving disease eventually worsen?
A key next step will be for brain banks, which store donated brain tissue for research, to look more closely for CTE so scientists can learn how often it occurs and in whom, said neuroscientist Dr. Sam Gandy of New York’s Mount Sinai School of Medicine. He predicts that people who carry genes linked to Alzheimer’s disease would be more prone to lasting damage from TBI. In an editorial in the same journal on Wednesday, he suggested studying if gene testing of would-be high school athletes or military recruits might one day help persuade the most vulnerable to avoid those occupations.
McKee said her lab so far has found evidence of CTE in more than 65 athletes and veterans, ranging from the early abnormalities to profound degeneration. She now is researching how to diagnose CTE before death, perhaps with brain scans or by measuring tau in spinal fluid.
“This work raises a number of questions for researchers to explore in further studies. In particular, the animal model developed by the researchers will enable a better understanding of the brain pathology involved in blast injuries and ideally lead to new therapies to help service members and veterans with TBIs,” Dr. Joel Kupersmith, research chief at the Department of Veterans Affairs, said in a statement.
Associated Press
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Tags : Study
Stocks discussed on the in-depth session of Jim Cramer’s Mad Money TV Program, Tuesday May 15.
No Buy Zone For Facebook (FB), Zillow (Z), Jive (JIVE), Linkedin (LNKD)
It has been announced that the Facebook IPO will be priced 14% higher than anticipated, to over $38. A huge pop on Friday is a foregone conclusion, since recent social media IPOs jumped an average of 42% the first day. While Cramer urges investors to get in on the FB deal and buy as many shares as possible, he calls Friday a “No Buy Zone” for Facebook. Even if the stock falls dramatically from its initial pop on Friday, there will be a better time to buy it than Friday. Cramer discussed other social media IPOs that have worked as long-term investments: Zillow , Jive and LinkedIn. Investors who were patient and waited for a lower entry point in ensuing weeks and months reaped a 90% gain from Zillow, and could have bought Jive 4.7% lower than it fell initially after its IPO. It is just as important to stay away from Facebook on Friday as it is to buy as many shares as possible before Friday.
Whole Foods (WFM), Chipotle Mexican Grill (CMG), Starbucks (SBUX), Disney (DIS), Home Depot (HD), Costco (COST), JPMorgan (JPM), Yahoo (YHOO), Morgan Stanley (MS)
Before investors buy stocks, they should know what they own. Cramer recommends great companies with popular appeal and easy-to-understand business models, like Whole Foods (WFM), Chipotle (CMG), Starbucks (SBUX), Disney (DIS), Home Depot (HD) and Costco (COST). While the latter two have faced obstacles lately, Cramer thinks these are merely “speed bumps” on the road to growth. JPMorgan (JPM) seemed like a straightforward company, but its hiccups in the past few years, including the latest scandal that cost the company $2 billion, are a sign that not even a great CEO like Jamie Dimon can stay on top of the complexity and inner workings of the bank. While Yahoo (YHOO) doesn’t seem so complicated, it has no cloud, mobile and social networking exposure and is worth buying only as a takeover target. The bullish thesis for buying Yahoo would be too complicated and dependent on some other company buying it, so Cramer would give Yahoo a miss.
Cramer took a call
Morgan Stanley (MS) is an expensive stock; “An international bank is not something I want to own.”
Ingersoll Rand (IR)
Sometimes it pays to “piggyback” off of successful hedge fund managers, but what if the news about an activist investor like Nelson Peltz is already out? Is it worth buying a Peltz holding after he has already bought it? Cramer looked at 7 of Nelson Peltz’s holdings and found that the stocks increased an average of 10% a year after he bought them, with most of the gains occurring in the first 3 months. Ingersoll Rand (IR) jumped 5% recently on news Nelson Peltz purchased a 7.3% stake in the company, but the move might not be over. While IR has a diverse array of businesses, from HVAC to locks and high tech security, it has been an under-managed company. Peltz may have enough influence to pressure management into aggressive restructuring in the company, which will unlock value. Cramer would not buy IR without doing thorough research on the company, but the fact that it is now one of Nelson Peltz’s holdings may be one reason to buy the stock.
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Tags : company, jamie dimon, jive jive
FILE – In this May 15, 2012 file photo, Nebraska Democratic Senate candidate Bob Kerrey speaks in the Benson neighborhood in Omaha, Neb. It’s encouraging news for Democrats: Divisive Republican primaries, a surprise GOP retirement in Maine and an unexpectedly strong Democratic challenger in North Dakota are making the battle for Senate control increasingly difficult to predict. Nearly half of all races appear competitive, an unusually high number. (AP Photo/Nati Harnik, File)
FILE – In this May 15, 2012 file photo, Nebraska Democratic Senate candidate Bob Kerrey speaks in the Benson neighborhood in Omaha, Neb. It’s encouraging news for Democrats: Divisive Republican primaries, a surprise GOP retirement in Maine and an unexpectedly strong Democratic challenger in North Dakota are making the battle for Senate control increasingly difficult to predict. Nearly half of all races appear competitive, an unusually high number. (AP Photo/Nati Harnik, File)
FILE – In this May 16, 2012 file photo, Nebraska state Sen. Deb Fischer speaks in Lincoln, Neb. It’s encouraging news for Democrats: Divisive Republican primaries, a surprise GOP retirement in Maine and an unexpectedly strong Democratic challenger in North Dakota are making the battle for Senate control increasingly difficult to predict. Nearly half of all races appear competitive, an unusually high number. (AP Photo/Nati Harnik, File)
FILE In this May 3, 2012 file photo, North Dakota Democratic Senate candidate Heidi Heitkamp speaks in Minot, N.D. It’s encouraging news for Democrats: Divisive Republican primaries, a surprise GOP retirement in Maine and an unexpectedly strong Democratic challenger in North Dakota are making the battle for Senate control increasingly difficult to predict. Nearly half of all races appear competitive, an unusually high number. (AP Photo/Dale Wetzel, File)
FILE – In this March 31, 2012 file photo, Rep. Rick Berg, R-ND, shakes hands with supporters in Bismarck, N.D. It’s encouraging news for Democrats: Divisive Republican primaries, a surprise GOP retirement in Maine and an unexpectedly strong Democratic challenger in North Dakota are making the battle for Senate control increasingly difficult to predict. Nearly half of all races appear competitive, an unusually high number. (AP Photo/Will Kincaid, File)
FILE – In this Dec. 7,2011 file photo, former Virginia Govs Tim Kaine, left, and George Allen, a former senator, greet each other in Richmond, Va, It’s encouraging news for Democrats: Divisive Republican primaries, a surprise GOP retirement in Maine and an unexpectedly strong Democratic challenger in North Dakota are making the battle for Senate control increasingly difficult to predict. Nearly half of all races appear competitive, an unusually high number. (AP Photo/Steve Helber, File)
WASHINGTON (AP) ? Divisive Republican primaries, an out-of-nowhere GOP retirement in Maine and an unexpectedly competitive race in North Dakota add up to an unpredictable battle for control of the Senate this fall, confounding early forecasts that an era of Democratic rule was inevitably coming to an end.
Adding to the uncertainty, tea party-backed challengers are on the primary ballot against establishment candidates in New Mexico and Texas in the coming weeks, a continuation of an internal Republican struggle that Democrats hope will aid them as it did in 2010.
With the support of two independents, Democrats now hold an effective 53-47 majority in the Senate, control that they and President Barack Obama can ill afford to lose. Republicans have repeatedly pushed their own versions of legislation through the House in the past year, only to have it blocked or altered by the Democratic Senate.
Democrats are defending 23 of the 33 Senate seats on the ballot this fall, including the two held by independents. Republicans must gain four to be assured of a majority when the new Congress convenes in 2013.
Republicans claim Nebraska, North Dakota, Missouri and Montana as the states where they have the best chance to pick up seats, followed by Wisconsin, New Mexico and, possibly, Ohio.
Democrats point to Maine, Massachusetts, Nevada and perhaps Indiana, where veteran Sen. Richard Lugar fell in a primary to a tea party-backed challenger, as opportunities to offset any losses they suffer elsewhere. They also claim hopes for Arizona, which Obama’s campaign hopes to make competitive in his race against Mitt Romney.
“I would say we still have a great opportunity to win a majority,” said Rob Jesmer, the executive director of the Senate Republican campaign organization. He said his party is defending only three seriously contested seats it holds and is mounting strong challenges in 10 or 12. His bottom line: “We feel good about our chances, but it is going to be close.”
Even that is an acknowledgment of a shift that has taken place in the political landscape since the two parties began evaluating their chances for 2012 more than a year ago.
” I just remember when I took this on a year and a half ago, there wasn’t anyone who said this was easy or we were going to get the majority or we even had a chance,” said Sen. Patty Murray, the head of the Democratic counterpart organization. “The map has changed dramatically” since then, she said.
Still unknown is the full impact of outside groups, including the newly formed super PACs that operate under rules that allow them to accept donations of unlimited size.
For example, conservative organizations already have spent millions of dollars on television advertising against Democratic Sen. Sherrod Brown of Ohio in hopes of making him vulnerable to a challenge, $6.5 million by his campaign’s own count.
While outside groups have recently pumped in an estimated $700,000 to support Brown, a spokesman said Wednesday his lead in the race as measured in public polling has been cut roughly in half. The first-term incumbent recently began advertising on his own.
The list of competitive races underscores the impact that retirements, candidate recruitment and primaries have had on the fortunes of the two parties since the 2010 elections.
Democratic Sen. Ben Nelson’s decision to retire in Nebraska opened up an early opportunity for Republicans.
Democrats countered by recruiting Bob Kerrey, a Medal of Honor winner, former governor and former senator who has more recently been a university president in New York ? and boasted they had at least made the race competitive.
But little-known state Sen. Deb Fischer emerged victorious Tuesday night in a three-way Republican primary after winning an endorsement from Sarah Palin and benefiting from a $200,000 ad campaign backed by TD Ameritrade founder and Chicago Cubs co-owner Joe Ricketts.
Privately, Republicans and Democrats both said Wednesday that her win had probably made Kerrey’s comeback more difficult.
North Dakota looked like a sure thing for Republicans when Democratic Sen. Kent Conrad announced plans to retire.
But Democratic challenger Heidi Heitkamp, a former attorney general, is credited with running a strong campaign that even Republicans concede has made her race against Rep. Rick Berg a competitive one ? even though the state is expected to vote heavily for Romney this fall. At a minimum, the GOP and allied groups are likely to be forced to spend money on television advertising that once seemed unnecessary.
In Missouri, a three-way Republican primary is on the horizon, but already Sen. Claire McCaskill is rated among the most endangered incumbents of either party. Unlike other Democrats in tough races, she probably won’t benefit from the White House race, since Obama appears unlikely to spend time or money in the state.
In Montana, Democratic Sen. Jon Tester has been defending his seat against a challenge from Rep. Dennis Rehberg in a race that is expected to remain close through Election Day.
Democrats’ chances got a lift in Maine with Sen. Olympia Snowe’s decision to retire, although they still have virtually no chance of winning the seat outright.
The primaries won’t be held until August, but former Gov. Angus King’s decision to run as an independent has overshadowed all other events. He won’t say which party he would side with if elected to the Senate. Republicans say they doubt it would be them and have encouraged speculation it would be the Democrats, an apparent attempt to sully his chances.
In Massachusetts, Democrats viewed Republican Sen. Scott Brown as an interloper after he won the race to fill out the unexpired term of the late Sen. Edward M. Kennedy. They eagerly recruited Elizabeth Warren to run after Republicans blocked her nomination to a consumer protection post in the Obama administration.
Warren has raised more money than Brown since joining the race, pulling in $15.8 million as of her most recent report to the Federal Election Commission. But she has stumbled recently following the disclosure that she had listed herself as having Native American heritage in law school directories.
In Nevada, Democratic hopes rest on the party’s ability to defeat appointed Sen. Dean Heller. Two years ago, the GOP chances of winning a seat vanished when tea party-packed challenger Sharron Angle emerged from a primary.
This year, Indiana appears the state likeliest to test the Democratic claim that tea party candidates hurt the Republicans ? as happened in Delaware, Colorado and Nevada in 2010.
State Treasurer Richard Mourdock defeated six-term Sen. Lugar in the GOP primary and will face Rep. Joe Donnelly in the fall. Democrats say the race is winnable, and Republicans concede that, as elsewhere, they are likely to have to spend campaign funds to make sure the seat stays in their column.
Associated Press
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Although it’s been true for some time that Google Maps will remember frequent searches as long as you’re signed in to Google, it hasn’t had the option of permanently tagging important places by their familiar names. An update to the web version of Maps now lets you define specific home and work locations that will stay attached to your Google account, no matter how much PC-hopping you do. Along with just speeding up day-to-day direction searches, the locations are particularly handy if you’re staying in a foreign country and don’t yet have the neighborhood committed to heart. The addition should already be live, so you can establish home base at the same time as you’re checking out Chrome 19′s tab syncing.
Google Maps adds always-available home and work locations for the navigation-needy originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 15 May 2012 17:26:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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? Wednesday, May 16th, 2012
Affordable Concrete Cutting Boston1223 2
Will it really be legal?
It can?t be done legally! I?ve heard it literally hundreds of times, yet in my concrete cutting business, one that is crucial in the conversion process, I have seen it done hundreds of times. How you may ask? It?s actually not any more difficult than most major home renovations. And if you ask what are the benefits? That is a simple one: it can increase the value of your home by 50% and sometimes double. It also allows you to legally rent your new apartment(s) out to cut your personal living expenses. Still sound impossible? Well, if you call your local building department and ask if it can be done, you may get laughed at but depending on your city or town?s local by-laws you may be surprised to find out that it isn?t at all uncommon. However, there are several conditions that must be in place before a building inspector would even consider handing you an application for a building permit. You may or may not already meet the criteria for this undertaking, but if you don?t, you may be able to easily make the necessary changes.
These conditions in most cases are/but not limited to:
* Ample parking for each unit ? usually two parking spaces for each unit are necessary depending on the amount of bedrooms. If space permits, parking can easily be increased on your property with some excavating and/or by adding concrete retaining walls.
* Ceiling height ? If the basement or attic is to be converted to an apartment there are limits to how low the ceiling can be. Lowering a concrete basement floor can be accomplished, in most cases, by cutting and removing the existing concrete, digging the dirt out and pouring a new concrete slab.
* Egress ? This is the ability to enter and exit the new unit. There must be a set amount of windows and doors of certain widths and lengths. This is where our expertise comes in to play. We are a professional concrete cutting service. We cut egress windows and doors into concrete foundations and openings for the installation of basement stairs and bulkheads.
* Each unit must have a bathroom and kitchen in order to be considered legal.
We once cut in some egress windows for a woman in Revere, MA who already had an ?illegal? in-law apartment that she easily converted it to a ?legal? apartment. She had been asking $259,000 for her single family home but couldn?t sell it. After seeing her neighbor convert her home into a two family she did the same. She completed the conversion and ended up selling her property for $379,000.
I remember doing a job for a man in the prestigious community of Brookline, MA in Boston. He owned a condominium in a six unit building which each came with a storage unit that was one sixth of the basement of the building. He told the other five-condo owners that he needed additional storage and that he was willing to pay them to purchase their storage units. He ended up buying the other five storage areas for $15,000 each, 1,200 sq feet of prime real estate for a total of $75,000. We ended up cutting and removing the concrete slab and cutting in a doorway in the foundation for him. He lowered the basement floor and converted it into a beautiful condo and sold it for over $1,000,000.
These examples are evidence that anything is possible. By checking with your local building department and doing your homework, you too may be able to convert your single family into a multi-unit property.
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May.19,2012