You'll Be Ashamed to Fill These Vintage-Inspired Fridges With Junk Food [Desired]
patrice patrice tether lana peters lana peters jennifer nettles jennifer nettles
patrice patrice tether lana peters lana peters jennifer nettles jennifer nettles
LONG BEACH, California (AP) ? An immigration agent shot and injured another agent Thursday and was then killed by a third colleague in a federal building, the FBI said.
The shooting occurred at about 5:30 p.m. local time, said FBI Special Agent Steven Martinez.
There were conflicting early reports about the number of people shot, with local authorities saying two were dead and one wounded, while ICE said one was dead and one wounded.
Martinez characterized the incident as a case of workplace violence involving two federal agents. He says one agent fired several rounds at another agent, wounding him. At that point, another agent intervened and additional rounds were fired, resulting in the death of the shooter.
The wounded agent is hospitalized in stable condition, ICE Special Agent in Charge Claude Arnold.
"At times like this words honestly seem inadequate. When something like this happens in our offices, it's incomprehensible, Arnold said.
Names of the agents involved were not released pending notification of next of kin.
In addition to ICE, the nine-story federal building also houses the Internal Revenue Service and the U.S. Probation and Parole Office.
Associated Press2011 bowl projections ndamukong suh ndamukong suh aptera aptera national defense authorization act national defense authorization act
The Street Signs crew take a look at Canadian companies that trade in America, that are on the rise, including, McEwen Mining, Lululemon, and IMAX.
Related Links:
Business & financial news headlines from msnbc.com
Top of page
Source: http://video.msnbc.msn.com/cnbc/46401305/
nfl cruise ship italy patriots broncos game new orleans saints saints willis mcgahee willis mcgahee
LOS ANGELES |
LOS ANGELES
California was one of states hardest hit by the 2007-2009 recession and will continue to lag national economic indicators as the national picture improves, says the report by the Los Angeles County Economic Development Corporation (LAEDC).
Overall, the report forecasts that California will see economic growth of 1.5 percent this year, and will add 200,000 jobs, with the unemployment rate averaging 11.1 percent.
That compares with a national average today of 8.3 percent unemployment, down from 9.1 percent in January 2011.
The Californian economy "will continue to heal but the process is uncomfortably long," the report says. Unemployment will still be at 10.3 percent in 2013, according to the LAEDC, a nonprofit economic development organization.
The leading economic sectors in 2012 will be the booming technology sector centered around companies such as Google and Facebook in Silicon Valley, tourism, international trade and the entertainment industry.
But the crisis-hit housing sector in California, although expected to see some improvement, is still a long way from full recovery, the study says.
Southern California was particularly hard hit by the collapse in the housing market and the financial crash of 2008, with an epidemic of foreclosures. Even today, 44 percent of homeowners in the region owe more on their mortgages than their homes are worth.
"As the calendar turned to 2012, the timeline for recovery in the housing market continued to be measured in years and not in months," the report says.
BUYERS WANTED
A huge backlog of foreclosed homes that have yet to be sold continues to depress house prices, which increases the number of mortgage holders with negative equity. In 2011 home prices in California actually fell compared to 2010.
"To date, rock-bottom mortgage interest rates and good affordability have not been enough to entice buyers back to the market," the report states.
"What happens in 2012 will depend on how fast lenders work through their foreclosure files."
In addition, the report says, "tighter mortgage lending standards and fundamentals such as slow job growth and flagging consumer confidence have dampened demand" in the housing sector.
The LAEDC forecasts a better housing market for California in 2012 but with significant risks remaining, especially if job growth fails to accelerate. Foreclosures and negative equity "remain significant hurdles to recovery," it adds.
The Californian economy is so large that its performance is inextricably linked to the national and global economies, the reports says.
California has fallen from eighth to ninth in the list of the world's largest economies, behind Brazil and Italy, but still ahead of India, Canada, Russia, Spain and Australia, according to the study.
(Reporting By Tim Reid; Editing by Xavier Briand)
major league alicia sacramone occupy chicago occupy chicago ron white ron white alcs
President Obama's performance in head-to-head matchups with his Republican competitors, especially Mitt Romney, have dramatically improved in recent weeks. In a survey conducted by the Pew Research Center for People & the Press, Obama went from being tied with Romney in trial heats last fall to holding an eight-point lead in the fresh batch of data released this week. The turnaround was even faster in the New York Times/CBS News poll, which found Obama trailing Romney by two points in January and up by six this week. The reasons might not be immediately apparent.
Presidential approval has not seen huge gains since the end of last year: Gallup tracking data show Obama's job approval rating very close to where it was in mid-October of 2011 -- and in mid-October of 2010 for that matter -- dipping just under water-level in the mid-40s. There are a few surveys that show something closer to 50, but national approval figures may actually overstate the President's position. Michael Scherer recently illustrated the degree to which Obama's approval ratings in key swing states lagged behind national trends in 2011, while worse unemployment numbers dogged those same core states. So how can we square those facts with what we're seeing in the head-to-head polls? (See Michael Scherer's story on the swing states.)
For one, swing states may decide presidential elections, but their economic health does not. As George Washington political science professor John Sides explains:
First, Thomas Holbrook found that state-level economies -- measured with unemployment or changes in real per capita income -- had no relationship to presidential election outcomes in the states in 1960-84, once measures of the national economy were taken into account. Second, Daniel Eisenberg and Jonathan Ketchum's study of the 1972-2000 elections also finds that the national economy outweighs the effect of state and county economies. (See pictures of Barack Obama's campaign behind the scenes.)
In this context, Obama's brighter general election prospects begin to make sense. Voters might not feel like he's doing a much better job, but they are beginning to feel better about the direction of the country economically, a dynamic which favors the incumbent. Three-quarters of Americans still believe the economy is in bad shape, according to the NYT/CBS poll, but the remaining 23% who say things are good is the highest level since last spring. More importantly, the number of Americans who think the economy is improving -- absolutes are less important in politics than a feeling of positive movement -- has grown even faster: 34% in the same survey, up six percentage points in a month. Gallup data also show the highest economic confidence level in a year, and the crucial outlook number overtook appraisals of current conditions in December, a trendline that holds promise for the current occupants of the White House:
The second piece of this puzzle is Mitt Romney. Romney has long been the strongest general-election player in the GOP field, but the savage primary fight is beginning to take a toll. Romney's unfavorability rating has reached its highest mark -- 49% in the Pew poll -- since his debut on the national stage in 2007. The number of voters who perceived him as "untrustworthy" leaped from 32% a month prior to 45% this week. The number of independents who said he was prepared to be President dropped 10 percentage points to 48%, and their candidate preference swung narrowly to Obama. Where Romney once out-performed the likes of Rick Santorum in these trial heats, the latest polls found only a one-point difference between the two. (See pictures of Barack Obama on Flickr.)
It could all shift again. The GOP race has taken plenty of hairpin turns already and when (or if) Romney secures his track to the nomination, there will be a period of calm in which he can work to restore his standing with independents or drag Obama's numbers back down. Presidential candidates in years past have been scarred by primary scrapes only to appear unblemished for the general election. Economic confidence is still low, the recovery may darken again under the cloud of Europe and the President faces a daunting re-election task either way. But for this snapshot in time, a weakened Romney and a strengthened economy make for the best outlook Obama's had in quite some time.
See TIME's Pictures of the Week.
See the Cartoons of the Week.
View this article on Time.com
Most Popular on Time.com:
rose bowl 2012 nfl playoff picture nfl playoff picture ryan seacrest sat cheating scandal the secret life of bees kyle orton
Beautiful! RT ?@NatGeoTraveler: Photo: Magic of the Trevi Fountain at night on.natgeo.com/yOuLtL #Rome #Italy? Cath Henderson
Source:
Beautiful! RT “@natgeotraveler: Photo: Magic of the Trevi Fountain at night on.natgeo.com/yOuLtL #Rome #Italy”
— Cath (@cath_henderson) February 15, 2012
beebe michelle malkin goodrich death penalty gary busey the x factor execution
House Republicans and Senate Democrats are barreling toward an all-out floor fight over the payroll tax holiday.
House GOP leaders are expected to announce Monday afternoon that they will attempt to pass their own fallback plan to extend the tax holiday until the end of 2012, after consulting with their members Tuesday. The bill could come to the floor as soon as Wednesday, sources say. House Republicans will meet both Tuesday and Wednesday in closed session.
Continue ReadingAnd Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid is making final preparations on a bill he?ll discuss with his leadership team Monday evening and with the full conference during a party lunch Tuesday.
Both sides will try to characterize their plans as compromises, in an attempt to convince voters they?re acting reasonable despite the rancor that?s gripped Congress since December. But whether the floor fight will ultimately lead to a bipartisan deal ? or simply force each side to dig in further ? remains to be seen.
Next week?s congressional recess will be in jeopardy if a deal isn?t within reach.
Neither side says it?s abandoning talks between Ways and Means Chairman Dave Camp (R-Mich.) and Senate Finance Chairman Max Baucus (D-Mont.), but the fresh action on both sides of the chamber point to a wide gulf between the two parties.
The fact that the conference committee ? which House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) pushed for ? could well fail speaks to the paralyzing gridlock that?s consumed Washington for much of the divided 112th Congress.
At the heart of the most recent dispute is how to finance a package expected to cost $160 billion over 10 years, in order to extend for the rest of the year expiring jobless benefits and a two-point reduction of the Social Security payroll tax break ? along with a rate fix for physicians servicing Medicare patients. Current law expires at month?s end.
Baucus and Camp spent the weekend negotiating, but the weekend ended with senior officials from both parties accusing the other of scuttling a compromise.
The discussions started heading south Sunday evening, when Republicans said Democrats walked away from several previously agreed upon positions. Reid (D-Nev.) began pushing hard for an increase in Transportation Security Administration fees, Republicans said. Democrats and chafed at the GOP?s characterizations of the talks, saying Republicans had balked at a potential compromise over taxes.
nl mvp nl mvp verlander verlander justin verlander pepper spraying cop pepper spraying cop
Leena Rao currently works as a writer for TechCrunch. She recently finished graduate school at the Medill School of Journalism at Northwestern University, where she studied business journalism and videography. From 2004 to 2007, she helped lead Congresswoman Carloyn Maloney???s community outreach and relations efforts in New York City. She graduated from Columbia University in 2003, where she was... ? Learn More
Brazilian social gaming giant Vostu is laying off an undisclosed number of employees, we?ve learned. Vostu, which has raised $46 million from Intel Capital, Accel Partners, General Catalyst, and Tiger Technology Global Management; is one largest social gaming companies in Latin America. The gaming company was founded in 2007 by three Harvard classmates: CEO Daniel Kafie, chief scientist Mario Schlosser, and Joshua Kushner. UPDATE: Vostu has confirmed the layoffs.
It?s unclear what?s caused the layoffs but Vostu is fresh off of a settlement with Zynga over copyright issues. As we?ve reported in the past, Zynga hit Vostu with a massive lawsuit in June of 2011, alleging that the company was copying Zynga?s games. In fact, Zynga alleged that Vostu was copying Zynga?s games so closely that they even inadvertently included the bugs.
Vostu then claimed that Zynga has copied other games repeatedly over the years, including Zynga?s hit game Cityville. Zynga then sued shareholder Google over the?dispute, because Orkut, which is popular in Brazil, was hosting the Vostu games that Zynga said were?ripoffs.
In December, both companies issued a statement that they had settled the copyright lawsuits and counterclaims against each other in the legal systems in the United States and Brazil. As part of the settlement, Vostu made a monetary payment to Zynga and made changes to four of its games.
Perhaps the layoffs could be a result of the settlement and the legal costs associated with the matter. But Vostu has reportedly been growing in terms of traffic, and launched four mobile games over the past two months (and the company has said that 25 percent of all internet-connected Brazilians play its games). Next month, the company plans to launch two additional games.
UPDATE: Here?s the statement Vostu issued to us on the news: ?Vostu grew a significant amount in the last 18 months and is constantly focused on improving efficiency for future growth which includes select and strategic hiring. We are consolidating our game design and development at our new headquarters in Buenos Aires.?
Vostu is a social gaming company which was launched in May 2007. Initially a social network for Latin America with a strong presence in Brazil, the company developed and launched its first succesful social game in June 2009 under the title ?Joga Craque?, a soccer-focused RPG for Brazilian players. It then launched a version of the same game on the popular Brazilian social network Orkut in October 2009. More recently, Vostu launched a farming game on Orkut called ?Mini Fazenda?...
Learn morequirky chrissy teigen chia seeds embers metta shannon brown utah jazz
For centuries the art of scrapbooking has been kept alive because we all love mementos and souvenirs of our past. We all like taking photos of our friends and our families because very often we do not get to spend as much time as we would like with them. Creative memories scrapbooking is a wonderful way of keeping these special occasions alive. It is a way of capturing the treasured moments you spend together in a personal photographic journal that you can make as decorative as you like.?
Very often all our photographs stay in boxes or drawers because we never seem to have the time to sort through them. Some of our favourite ones may get framed or put into albums which then just stay on a bookshelf gathering dust. But photos often depict milestones in our lives. These photos are often taken during important occasions such as weddings, christenings and birthday parties.?
Scrapbooking has become one of the nicest hobbies for people to do when they are at home and creative memory scrapbooking means that all those old photos can now be retrieved from the boxes and drawers to be sorted and reminisced over in the nicest of possible ways.?
It is a very therapeutic pass time which keeps memories alive for the whole family to enjoy and appreciate. This whole concept of scrapbooking is an inventive approach to making sure nothing is ever forgotten. Scrapbooks are far nicer than simple photo albums because you can make them into beautifully decorative books which have your own very personal touch to them. These books tell the world exactly who you are and how you express yourself. This is all achieved in the manner in which you create your personal scrapbook.?
puma
Your treasured moments are there for all to see on the pages you have personally made and creative memory scrapbooks suddenly have a life of their own, with memories of times long past suddenly jumping out of the pages at everyone who views them. The great part about it all is that you can add text to each of the pages, so that your story is not only visual but written as well. Each of the pages will lead to the next in a wonderful way if you plan it well.?
To create a memory scrapbook is easy these days. Just by going on the Internet you will be able to find all the tools and materials you would ever need to start off doing this lovely and creative hobby. Just by looking around your own home, you will find simple mementos and decorations which you can use to embellish your scrapbook. This is how they use to create scrapbooks in times long past.?
We are lucky to have so much at our disposal, but it is always nicer to mix what you find yourself with things you find either in a craft store or on the Internet. You can create a very personal scrapbook by doing just this instead of just using prepared ready to use items. But if you are stuck for decorations or need extra embellishments to add that little bit extra to your scrapbook, you will find a treasure trove of goodies by going on the Internet.?
There are websites which specialise in scrapbooking and they offer some great ideas as well as supplying materials and kits which help get you started. Once you have created one scrapbook, you are well on your way to creating another because it is such a fun thing to do. Your children will love to be a part of the project and it will encourage them to use their imaginations and give you ideas on how to go about decorating your book.?
puma ferrari shoes
Source: http://pumashoes1.bligoo.com/creative-memory-scrapbooking-is-a-wonderful-new-art-form
the express zappos hacked jane fonda morgan freeman jon huntsman bit coin huntsman
FILE - In this Sept. 22, 2012 file photo, the Groupon logo is displayed inside the online coupon company's offices, in Chicago. Groupon Inc., reports quarterly financial earnings Wednesday, Feb. 8, 2012, after the market close. (AP Photo/Charles Rex Arbogast, File)
FILE - In this Sept. 22, 2012 file photo, the Groupon logo is displayed inside the online coupon company's offices, in Chicago. Groupon Inc., reports quarterly financial earnings Wednesday, Feb. 8, 2012, after the market close. (AP Photo/Charles Rex Arbogast, File)
NEW YORK (AP) ? Groupon had a lot to prove with its first earnings report as a public company. The nearly 14 percent slide in its stock Thursday suggests investors were not impressed.
The online deals site on Wednesday reported sharply higher fourth-quarter revenue that surpassed Wall Street's expectations. But some analysts worry about the trajectory suggested by its revenue forecast of $510 million to $550 million for the current quarter.
The guidance means Groupon Inc. expects revenue to grow by about 5 percent in the first three months of this year, compared with the last three months of 2011. By that same measure, revenue grew by a double-digit percentage in each quarter of 2011. That suggests growth is slowing down, said Collins Stewart analyst Mayuresh Masurekar.
Groupon's growth from signing up more subscribers and adding to its list of merchants is slowing, Masurekar said in a note to investors.
Chicago-based Groupon is expanding abroad, sending subscribers coupons personalized to their tastes and offering new types of deals, but growth from those initiatives may not be enough to counteract its slowing daily-deals business, Masurekar said.
Groupon makes money by sending its 33 million subscribers discounted deals on restaurant meals, manicures, gifts and a broad range of other offerings and taking a cut from what merchants take home.
The company posted an adjusted fourth-quarter loss of 2 cents per share, in large part because of unusually high international taxes. Analysts were expecting a profit of 3 cents per share
Its revenue grew 18 percent from the third quarter to the fourth, to $506.5 million. It was helped by strong holiday demand and special deals the company offered as part of its Grouponicus promotion, dubbed as Groupon's "wintertime celebration." Revenue increased 10 percent from the second quarter to the third and 33 percent from the first quarter to the second.
Still, Masurekar, along with other analysts, said Groupon's latest results were solid. Analysts don't suggest selling the stock, just waiting to see whether the company can show it can keep growing fast.
Morgan Stanley's Scott Devitt kept his rating on the stock as "Equal-weight," which means the analyst thinks the stock will trade in line with other industry stocks he covers.
Groupon, he said kept its competitive position, grew revenue while reducing marketing costs and showed no signs of "customer deal fatigue." Morgan Stanley was the main underwriter of Groupon's IPO.
Concerns about the sustainability of its easy-to-copy business model have dogged Groupon since before its November PO. Though its early growth was meteoric, rivals quickly popped up. And it drew scrutiny from the Securities and Exchange Commission for the way it accounted for revenue in an early filing. The company restated its numbers to count as revenue only what it takes home, not the full amount that people pay for its deals.
Groupon has also been spending heavily on marketing to gain new subscribers and on hiring new workers at a frantic pace. It had about 10,000 employees as of last fall.
After pricing its IPO at $20, Groupon's stock has fluctuated between $14.85 and $31.14. On Thursday the stock fell $3.41 to close at $21.17.
Associated Pressnaomi wolf social security increase menagerie columbus dispatch social security social security adderall