Business Activity in U.S. Grows at Slowest Pace Since 2009 - Bloomberg through the San Francisco Chronicle - Timothy R. Homan - April 30, 2012 - Business activity in the U.S. expanded in April at the slowest pace since November 2009, a sign that manufacturing may be cooling as business investment eases. The Institute for Supply Management-Chicago Inc. said today its barometer decreased to 56.2 during the month, lower than the most pessimistic forecast in a Bloomberg News survey, from 62.2 in March. Readings greater than 50 signal growth. Economists projected the gauge would fall to 60, according to the median of 55 estimates in the survey. A slowdown in demand may prompt companies in the U.S. to slow the rate of inventory accumulation, while exports to Europe and Asia may cool. Auto purchases may prevent a prolonged deterioration in the industry that spurred the recovery.
Disinformation On Every Front - Paul Craig Roberts.org - Paul Craig Roberts| May 4, 2012 - Some readers have come to the erroneous conclusion that the Matrix consists of Republican Party disinformation as if there is no disinformation from the left. Others think that propaganda is the business of Obama and the Democrats. In fact, propaganda from the right, the left and the middle are all part of the disinformation fed to americans. If I may give some examples: The other day Chuck Colson, one of the Nixon officials imprisoned for Watergate crimes, died. This gave NPR the opportunity to relive the Nixon horror. What precisely was the Nixon horror? Essentially, there was no such thing. Watergate was about President Nixon lying about when he learned about the Watergate burglary. When Nixon learned about the burglary, he did not act on it prior to his reelection, because he reasoned, rightly, that the Washington Post would blame him for the burglary, although he had nothing to do with it, in the hopes of preventing his reelection.
By going along with a cover-up, Nixon enabled the Washington Post to make an issue of the precise date on which Nixon learned of the burglary. White House tapes indicated that Nixon had learned of the burglary before he said he learned of it. So Nixon had permitted a cover-up and had to go, but what was the real reason? What was the Watergate burglary? We don’t really know. A group of men including former CIA operatives were hired by the Committee to Re-elect the President to break into a Democratic campaign office in the Watergate complex. We don’t know the purpose of the burglary. Some claim it was to wire-tap the telephones in the belief that the Democratic Party was getting re-election money from communists in Cuba or elsewhere. Others claim that the burglars were looking for a list of call girls, that compromised a White House official, as his fiancee was allegedly one of the call girls. Looking back from our time during which Bush and Obama have deep-sixed the US Constitution, violated numerous US and international laws, and behaved as if they were caesars unconstrained by any law or any morality, Nixon’s “crimes” appear so trivial as to be unremarkable. Yet, Nixon was driven from office and is regarded as a criminal. What was Watergate really about?
Unemployment rate at 8.1%, only 115K jobs added, participation rate shrinks again to new low - Hot Air - Ed Morrissey - May 4, 2012 - The April jobs report fell short of analysts expectations, as only 115,000 jobs were added. Consensus expectations had been in the 165K-170K range, which still would have been below the rate jobs were added in February, January, and December. While the jobless rate dropped slightly, the number of jobs added came in short of March’s disappointing level: So how did the jobless rate drop? The same way it’s been dropping all along — people exiting the workforce: The civilian labor force participation rate declined in April to 63.6 percent, while the employment-population ratio, at 58.4 percent, changed little. That’s a new 30-year low in the participation rate. Here’s the chart from the BLS for the last 30 years:
People Not In Labor Force Soar By 522,000, Labor Force Participation Rate Lowest Since 1981 - Zero Hedge - Tyler Durden - May 4, 2012 - it is just getting sad now. In April the number of people not in the labor force rose by a whopping 522,000 from 87,897,000 to 88,419,000. This is the highest on record. The flip side, and the reason why the unemployment dropped to 8.1% is that the labor force participation rate just dipped to a new 30 year low of 64.3%.
95 Percent Of The Jobs Lost During The Recession Were Middle Class Jobs - The Economic Collapse Blog - Who is the biggest loser in the ongoing decline of the U.S. economy? Is it the wealthy? No, the stock market has been soaring lately and their incomes are actually going up. Is it the poor? Well, the poor are definitely hurting very badly, but when you don't have much to begin with you don't have much to lose. Unfortunately, it is the middle class that has lost the most during this economic downturn. According to Bloomberg, 95 percent of the jobs lost during the recession were middle class jobs. That is an absolutely astounding figure. Yes, some executives lost their jobs during the last recession as did some minimum-wage workers. But overwhelmingly the jobs that were lost were middle income jobs. Sadly, the limited number of jobs that have been added since the end of the last recession have mostly been low income jobs. A higher percentage of Americans are working low income jobs than ever before, and the cost of living continues to rise at a very brisk pace. This is causing an erosion of the middle class unlike anything we have ever seen in American history. When I was growing up I was taught that the fact that we had the largest middle class in the history of the world was evidence that our economic system was working incredibly well. So what does the fact that the middle class is shrinking at a very rapid pace at this point say about how well our economy is working?
Why? - 21 Unanswered Questions That They Don't Want You To Look Into - The End of the American Dream. com - Do you ever get the feeling that the mainstream media is feeding you a very watered-down and twisted version of the news? Do you ever get the feeling that the federal government does not believe that the American people can actually be trusted with the truth? It is exasperating to realize that the news that the public is being fed every single day is very heavily filtered and very heavily censored. In a world where "spin" is everything, simply telling the truth is a revolutionary act. Fortunately, the Internet has helped fuel the rise of the alternative media, and millions of Americans that are starting to wake up are turning to the alternative media for answers to their unanswered questions. Increasingly, people are becoming willing to question the orthodoxy that is being shoved down their throats by the major news networks, and that is a very good thing. The world is becoming an incredibly unstable place, and it is more imperative than ever that we all learn to think for ourselves. We live during a time of great deception, and the lies are going to get even bigger and even more bold in the years to come. If we don't know why we believe what we believe, then we are in danger of falling for just about anything. It is those that seek the truth that end up finding it. If you just accept the version of reality that the system wants to feed you, then you are probably going to become what the system wants you to become. But if you are not afraid to question everything, then you will have a chance to become everything that you were always meant to be. So what are some things that we should be questioning right now?
The following are 21 unanswered questions that they don't want you to look into....
The 10 things they really don’t tell you at graduation - The Washington Post - Alexandra Petri - May 3, 2012 - A piece at the Wall Street Journal has been making waves recently by billing itself as “What They Don’t Tell You At Graduation.” The one trouble with this piece is that all the observations seemed vaguely familiar — from graduation speeches. Here’s what they really don’t tell you.
1) Next year, you will probably be unemployed, or live in your parents’ basement, or be unemployed and live in your parents’ basement....
2) You will keep in touch with friends, but not the ones you thought....
3) When you hit a certain point in your 20s, everyone around you starts to get married, for no apparent reason and without any warning...
4) In life, no one rewards you for performing mundane tasks....
5) Regardless of anything the rampant college hookup culture has taught you, you are suddenly expected to Start Going On Dates....
6) Something strange happens to music as you age....
7) Being young isn’t everything, but it’s a good thing....
8) As Cynthia Heimel says, “There is a microscopically thin line between being brilliantly creative and acting like the most gigantic idiot on earth. So what the hell, leap.”
9) You have no idea how personal finance works.....
10) Some days will be better than others. Some days will be worse than others.....
11) No one in book club has ever read the book.
A message from Rick Smyre the Director of "Communities of the Future."
Hi Friends....
Would encourage you to take a look at this five minute dialogue on CBS about the lose of faith in institutions and how the panel explains what is happening and why. My wife, Brownie, was the one who suggested I take a look at this because of our COTF work in many of the areas discussed in the interview.
I am having this type of conversation four days a weeks with varied organizations and people throughout the U.S. and other countries. In my opinion, the fact that so many people are now beginning to have these concerns and realizing the old institutional structures and the traditional forms of leadership (as well as the corruption of leadership only focused on self-interest) are facing challenges for which they are not prepared, are key reasons we are seeing such an explosion of interest in our COTF ideas and methods.
By the way, there will be an article about our COTF work nationally in the July/August issue of The Futurist Magazine published by the World Future Society. I sincerely appreciate the interest in and support for our work shown by Cindy Wagner, the editor of The Futurist, and Ken Hunter, Chairman of the Board of WFS.
Hope the link below connecting to the CBS interview is of interest. All my best. Rick
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