2013-05-31

Fwd: Wheat



'Japan and South Korea suspended some imports of American wheat, and the European Union urged its 27 nations to increase testing, after the United States government disclosed this week that a strain of genetically engineered wheat that was never approved for sale was found growing in an Oregon field.

 

Although none of the wheat, developed by Monsanto Company, was found in any grain shipments — and the Department of Agriculture said there would be no health risk if any was shipped — governments in Asia and Europe acted quickly to limit their risk.

 

South Korea, which last year purchased roughly half of its total wheat imports of five million tons from the United States, said Friday it would suspend purchases until tests were performed on arriving shipments…

 

Seoul also raised quarantine measures on wheat for livestock feed, while Thailand put ports on alert.

 

The European Union, which has a "zero tolerance" approach to genetically modified crops, said through its consumer protection office Friday that if any shipments tested positive, they would not be sold…

 

The United States is the world's biggest exporter of wheat. While genetically engineered corn and soybeans are routinely grown, they are largely consumed by animals, while wheat is consumed directly by people and has faced more consumer resistance…

 

Japan and Mexico are among the biggest importers of American wheat. The European Union imports more than one million tons each year, mostly to Spain.'

 

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/06/01/business/global/japan-and-south-korea-bar-us-wheat-imports.html?_r=0

 

Fwd: EU



'Eurostat, the European Union's statistics office, said Friday that the unemployment rate rose to 12.2 percent in April from the previous record of 12.1 percent the month before. In 2008, before the worst of the financial crisis, it was around 7.5 percent.

 

…taking the total to 19.38 million. At that pace, unemployment in the currency bloc — which has a population of about 330 million — could breach the 20 million mark by the end of the year.'

 

http://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory/eurozone-unemployment-hits-record-high-19294089#.UaitpFKQHYY

 

 


2013-05-12

Utah bans teenage driver cell phone use.

Breaking News

The Salt Lake Tribune just released a story about how during the last election the IRS targeted the Tea Party and other groups
and deliberately harrassed them. I have pulled some quick quotes here. Clearly there are at least some people in our government that don't want us to understand either the Constitution or the Bill of Rights. See the link at the bottom for the full report.

Lerner instructed agents to change the criteria for flagging groups "immediately," the report says.

At the meeting, she was told that groups with "Tea Party," ''Patriot" or "9/12 Project" in their names were being flagged for additional and often burdensome scrutiny, the report says.

On Jan, 25, 2012, the criteria for flagging suspect groups was changed to, "political action type organizations involved in limiting/expanding Government, educating on the Constitution and Bill of Rights, social economic reform/movement," 

"This timeline reveals at least two extremely unethical actions by the IRS. One, as early as 2010, they targeted groups for political purposes. Two, they willfully and knowingly lied to Congress for years despite being aware that Congress was investigating this practice," Boustany said.