What seems to happen is that immigrants, as they settle into their new American lives, adopt the unhealthy habits of those already here—smoking, drinking, eating fast food, and not exercising.   read more

Many other cases remain unsolved, including the December 10, 1964, death of Frank Morris in Ferriday, Louisiana. Morris, who was black, died when a group of men set his shop on fire. The Concordia Sentinel revealed that a suspect in the case was still alive—someone who had been implicated in the murder by his own family. But the FBI never charged the man, saying they were unable to compile the credible evidence necessary to charge him. The suspect, Arthur Leonard Spencer, died last week.   read more

The company that actually owns the petcoke that is befouling the Detroit waterfront is Koch Carbon, a subsidiary of Koch Industries (annual revenues: $115 billion), the company Charles and David Koch inherited from their father. Koch Carbon sells petcoke to countries like China, India, Mexico and others that burn it to generate electricity and hasten global warming. It is useful to recall that the Koch brothers have spent literally millions of dollars bankrolling the denial of climate change.   read more

Making peer-to-peer communication software “wiretap ready,” however, would seriously jeopardize Internet security for everyone, because any modifications would be targeted by hackers and Internet fraudsters, who could use the technology for a variety of nefarious purposes, including against the government itself.   read more

The three activists managed to cut through not one, not two, not three, but four fences and reach the uranium enrichment facility on foot before one of the plant’s security guards. The government pays $1.2 billion for security at Oak Ridge every year. Rice, Boertje-Obed and Walli were not armed. They carried Bibles, peace banners, flowers and spray paint, which was used to put up peace messages.   read more

Wells Fargo placed Delassus into default after the bank incorrectly charged him for back property taxes, which it turned out was really owed by his neighbor, not Delassus. Even after Delassus pointed out the mistake, which Wells Fargo acknowledged, the bank refused to correct the situation or help him bring his account current, resulting in the condo being seized and sold off.   read more

Instead of using dealerships, Tesla markets and sells its automobiles through the Internet or by phone. This new business model of selling vehicles has upset owners of car dealerships who see Tesla as a threat to the traditional way of making deals. That is why the North Carolina Automobile Dealers Association sponsored a law that would make it illegal for any carmaker to bypass dealerships and sell directly to customers.   read more

Documents sealed from the public include affidavits for search, arrest and charging warrants, as well as incident and investigation reports produced by law enforcement. Representative John Rubin, a Republican and a former federal administrative law judge, told the Kansas City Star that the records should be open “unless law enforcement can provide a justifiable reason to keep records closed or sealed to protect an ongoing investigation for prosecution.”   read more

In 2009, 30.5% of female characters aged 21-39 appeared at least partially nude. This percentage rose to 41.5% in 2010 and dropped back down to 39.6% in 2012. By contrast, the percentage of female characters aged 13-20 who appeared at least partially nude was 28.2% in 2009 and 33.0% in 2010, but jumped to 55.8% in 2012.   read more

Noor pleaded guilty before a military commission to conspiracy and providing material support to terrorism. Under the terms of his plea, he had to serve an additional 34 months on top of the nine years he’s already been imprisoned as a wartime detainee. Noor traveled to Afghanistan in 1994, where he received paramilitary training at an al-Qaeda camp. Noor claimed he was not a member of al-Qaeda, and was never linked to any specific terrorist attack.   read more

CMS officials said they are not responsible for monitoring prescription practices, claiming that duty must be handled by private health insurance plans. However, the inspector general for the Department of Health and Human Services has repeatedly criticized CMS for not policing Part D.   read more

Korman also ridiculed government arguments that allowing full OTC access while the case moves forward in the courts would cause “uncertainty” and “confusion” for women, writing that “this silly argument ignores the fact it is the government’s appeal from the order that sustained the judgment of the commissioner of the FDA that is the cause of any uncertainty. He characterized the contention that women will be confused “largely an insult to the intelligence of women.”   read more

The coal mine methane issue marks at least the fourth category of greenhouse gas emitter the EPA has decided not to regulate, following its rejection of a separate petition last June to reduce emissions from aircraft, ships and off-highway trucks.   read more

From 1996 to 2011, there were 939 accidents at these plants—an average of more than one a week. The accidents, not all of which involved anhydrous ammonia releases, resulted in 19 deaths, 1,651 injuries, and almost $350 million in property damage.   read more

If the city council passes the proposal, New York would become the largest city in the U.S. to allow non-citizens to vote. Non-citizen voting in local elections currently exists in six smaller municipalities in Maryland, as well as in at least nine other countries, In the United States, non-citizen voting was actually common in almost forty states until anti-immigrant sentiment put an end to the practice in the 1920s.   read more

When the 9.0 Fukushima earthquake rocked Japan in 2011, crippling nuclear facilities and generating a deadly tsunami, an early warning system conceived at the California Institute of Technology (Caltech) 10 years ago and installed in 2007 helped prevent even more destruction. The 60 seconds of advanced warning allowed time to stop 11 bullet trains, disable 16,000 elevators, flash warning signs to motorists and give students a chance to duck under desks.   read more