Originally published on Wed July 11, 2012 11:37 am
Urban life is multifaceted and complex. But, sometimes you need to just go with the flow and this chart may (or may not) show you if you're really an urbanite.
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There apparently isn't a unified Republican message on whether President Obama has introduced a big new tax through the Affordable Care Act.
Eric Fehrnstrom, a top aide to Mitt Romney, said Monday that the Republican presidential candidate's position is that the penalty under the new law — the one for people who can afford to buy health insurance, but don't — is not a tax.
The Supreme Court last week upheld the health care law's individual mandate on the grounds that it is a permissible tax, in a 5-4 opinion authored by Chief Justice John Roberts.
Afghanistan produces about half the power it currently uses and imports the other half from neighboring countries. But that total still doesn't meet the country's demands. This photo shows Kabul at night in January.
The Omid Plastic Making Factory in Kabul manufactures plastic bags. Even though the industrial park where it's located was supposed to guarantee full power, the factory often relies on a generator. "There is no industrial power for us. We are using the same power as normal people," says factory manager Abdul Qadida Sozai.
Afghanistan desperately needs to jump-start its economy if it hopes to stand on its own after NATO's drawdown in 2014. But there's a major constraint for a country trying to build a modern economy: electricity shortages.
Afghanistan ranks among the countries with the lowest electricity production per capita in the world. Despite billions of dollars in projects over the past decade, at best one-third of the population has access to regular power.
An interesting technological case has emerged from the Occupy Wall Street protests of last fall. At issue is whether prosectors can simply subpoena the tweets of Malcom Harris, one of about 700 protesters arrested last year while walking on the Brooklyn Bridge.
Manhattan Criminal Court Judge Matthew A. Sciarrino Jr. had already ruled on this once before saying Harris had no jurisdiction to challenge the subpoena because his tweets belonged to Twitter.
Airbus, the European aviation giant, announced that it was opening its first assembly plant in the United States.
The AP reports this is a significant and symbolic step in its rivalry with the American Boeing.
The AP adds:
"The French-based company said the Alabama plant is expected to cost $600 million to build and will employ 1,000 people when it reaches full production, likely to be four planes a month by 2017.
Members of the Williamsburg Volunteer Fire Department were unable to find fuel at a station in Crawley, W.Va. Elsewhere, people waited in line for hours for the chance to fill up.
Trucking company owner Tod Moss, who lives in the town of Beckley, drove 40 miles to Crawley to bring a few gallons of gas to his employees. "You could get beat up and killed for 5 gallons of gas," he says.
People who show up at the Shell station in Crawley, W.Va., hoping to find ice, water or a working bathroom are out of luck. With no power to work the pumps, there's no hope of buying gas, either.
Still, a steady stream of customers arrived at the station Sunday evening, picking up snack cakes and 12-packs of Bud Light. A couple of women left the food store with little kids in tow holding Gatorade and Cheetos, which seems like a suitable supper when the food in your home freezer has started to go bad.
GlaxoSmithKline's mishandling of information on safety problems with diabetes drug Avandia is just one of the violations cited in a settlement with the government.
If you've grown numb to the federal fraud charges settled by drugmakers one after another, shake it off and take note of today's huge settlement by GlaxoSmithKline.
The U.S. Supreme Court justices (first row, from left) Clarence Thomas, Antonin Scalia, Chief Justice John Roberts, Anthony Kennedy, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, (back row) Sonia Sotomayor, Stephen Breyer, Samuel Alito and Elena Kagan.
It was much rumored as soon as the 5-4 decision that upheld President Obama's signature health care law was announced.
Chief Justice John Roberts had sided with the liberal wing of the court and he had done so after initially voting in favor of striking down the individual mandate, the part of the law the required every American to obtain health care.
The U.S. Supreme Court justices (first row, from left) Clarence Thomas, Antonin Scalia, Chief Justice John Roberts, Anthony Kennedy, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, (back row) Sonia Sotomayor, Stephen Breyer, Samuel Alito and Elena Kagan — pose at the Supreme Court in 2010.
An eventful term of the U.S. Supreme Court ended Thursday with the landmark 5-4 ruling affirming the legality of the Affordable Care Act. Much attention has focused on the pivotal role of Chief Justice John Roberts in the case — and whether some elements of his opinion in the health care ruling will have a conservative influence on future cases.
Why say that now? As Cooper says in the email, he's been asked "the gay question" before about what had been an open secret for years and not publicly addressed it.