China 'Developing Military Spacecraft'

China is making progress in building an "upper-atmosphere" jet fighter, an official said last week, adding to a flurry of speculation about China's growing air power. 

Hong Kong's Ming Pao daily on Tuesday said Shaanxi TV last Saturday quoted acting provincial governor Zhao Zhengyong as saying China has "succeeded in the test flight of a prototype aircraft that can fly through the atmospheric layer." Zhao was visiting a state-run aircraft corporation at Xi'an high-tech industrial development zone. The channel showed images of a prototype space fighter being assembled whose outward appearance was almost identical to a U.S. pilotless upper-atmosphere military spaceship, the X-37B, the daily said. hostgator coupon 2011

Jim Rogers: Oil will go over $150 a barrel.....

reknown investor Jim Rogers , warns that the Oil Prices may go as high as $200 because the world is running out of oil , the interview is by the BBC 'the world is running out of reserves of oil' 20 January 2011


“Well, the surprise is going to be how high the price of oil stays and how high it goes, because Justin [Rowlatt] we have had no major elephant [field] oil discoveries in over 40 years, The International Energy Agency is going around the world pleading with people to listen. Known reserves of oil are declining. It is not good news. Unless somebody discovers a lot of oil very quickly, prices are going to go much higher over the next decade.”


“Justin, the price of oil is going to make new highs,” Rogers said. “It will go over $150 a barrel. It will probably go over $200 a barrel.”

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Debt crosses $14 trillion mark

NEW YORK (CNNMoney) -- The amount of U.S. debt subject to the country's legal maximum has topped $14 trillion for the first time.

On Wednesday, the amount of debt subject to the cap hit $14.001 trillion at the close of trade, according to the daily Treasury statement released on Thursday.

That means the country is less than $300 billion away from the $14.294 trillion debt ceiling, which is a cap on how much the federal government can legally borrow.

The debt ceiling has become a focal point of the debate over spending and debt. Even though congressional leaders say the cap will be raised, Republicans are vowing to use the issue as leverage to force spending cuts.

The Treasury Department estimates that borrowing could reach the cap sometime between March 31 and May 16, according to a letter Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner sent to Congress earlier this month.

Debt ceiling: Geithner won't let U.S. default

While Treasury has certain measures it can take to postpone a breach from occurring, Geithner said they would only last "several weeks."

He urged lawmakers to act soon to raise the ceiling, warning that failure to do so would be disastrous for the economy and for Americans.

Although the debt ceiling has never been reached -- so it's impossible to say definitively what would happen if it were -- budget and debt experts warn that no good can come of it.

Debt ceiling: What you need to know

If U.S. borrowing hits the ceiling and lawmakers fail to raise it, Treasury would be prohibited from borrowing more money. Barring immediate and draconian policy changes, the country would be unable to pay its bondholders or fund programs and benefits in full. That's because there wouldn't be enough tax revenue coming in to cover all of the country's bills.

Experts say the cascade effect would be crippling not only to the U.S. economy but very likely to economies and markets worldwide.

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How JP Morgan gets rich...food stamps !!!!

JP Morgan is the largest processor of food stamp benefits in the United States.  JP Morgan has contracted to provide food stamp debit cards in 26 U.S. states and the District of Columbia.  JP Morgan is paid for each case that it handles, so that means that the more Americans that go on food stamps, the more profits JP Morgan makes.  Yes, you read that correctly.  When the number of Americans on food stamps goes up, JP Morgan makes more money.  In the video posted below, JP Morgan executive Christopher Paton admits that this is “a very important business to JP Morgan” and that it is doing very well.  Considering the fact that the number of Americans on food stamps has exploded from 26 million in 2007 to 43 million today, one can only imagine how much JP Morgan’s profits in this area have soared.  But doesn’t this give JP Morgan an incentive to keep the number of Americans enrolled in the food stamp program as high as possible?

There are just some things that are a little too “creepy” to be “outsourced” to private corporations.  The JP Morgan executive in the interview below does his best to put a positive spin on all this, but it just seems really unsavory for a big Wall Street bank to be making so much money off of the suffering of tens of millions of Americans….

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Britain could be heading for coldest winter in 300 years

Britain is heading for the coldest winter in 300 years if the freezing weather continues, forecasters have warned.

The Met Office is already predicting a colder than average January with temperatures falling again from New Year's Day Photo: EPA

8:00AM GMT 30 Dec 2010

58 Comments

The average temperature of the season so far has been -0.8C (32F), colder than any year since 1683/84 when the mercury plunged to -1.17C (29.9C).

Traditionally a cold December leads into a chillier than usual January and February, meaning this winter could be one of the coldest on record.

Even though it has been warmer in the last few days, the Met Office is already predicting a colder than average January with temperatures falling again from New Year’s Day.

Dave Britton, of the Met Office, said the winter could be colder than normal.

However he pointed out that the forecast for January is uncertain at the moment and there are no predictions for February yet.

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“We could be heading for a colder than average winter,” he said. “But there is a long way to go. We have a couple of months.”

The Central England Temperature Record, that goes back to 1659, recorded -0.8C as the average temperature up to December 29. This makes it equal coldest with 1890.

The coldest winter on record is 1683/84 at -1.17C (29F) just 67 years after the death of Shakespeare when Charles II was still on the throne. Frost fairs were held on the River Thames and the ground froze to a depth of 4ft in places.

If this winter breaks the record it would be the coldest in more than 1,000 years as temperatures are not believed to have gone below the current record since the beginning of the ‘Medieval Warm Period’ in 950.

Even if it remains around the -0.8C mark it will be cooler than the second coldest on record, the big freeze in 1962/63 when temperatures fell to -0.33C (31.4F) and Britain struggled through 71 days of consecutive snow and drifts up to 20ft high.

Ian Michaelwhite, of Netweather, said Britain was in the grip of a ‘mini-iceage’.

“We expect January to be colder than average - there’s no way we’re moving out of this mini ice

age anytime soon,” he said.

The next couple of days will see warmer temperatures for December, which could push up the average for the month slightly.

However the Met Office predicts the weather will get colder towards the weekend with sleet and snow over high ground.

Motivation?? How about Antony Robbins on the economy!!!

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D.C. expanding public surveillance camera net

Big Brother may already be watching you in the District, and he will soon have a lot more eyes trained in your direction.

The city's homeland security agency is planning to add thousands of security cameras from private businesses around the nation's capital and the Metro system to the thousands of electronic eyes that authorities are already monitoring 24/7.

D.C.'s Homeland Security and Emergency Management Agency has already centralized the feeds from more than 4,500 cameras operated by the District's department of transportation and school system. Those feeds are watched around the clock by officials from those departments who sit together in homeland security's Joint All-Hazards Operation Center.

By bringing feeds from thousands more cameras to the central watching room through links to cameras at businesses such as banks, corner stores and gas stations, the District is joining other big cities like London, New York and Baltimore that in recent years have turned to cameras to fight crime and terrorism. But critics worry the District's government might be going too far.

"The D.C. effort to link public and private watching capabilities might be viewed as excessive," said Jeffrey Rosen, a law professor at George Washington University who studies the balance between security and civil liberties. "It would make it hard to find a place in the city where people aren't being watched by cameras."

"It sounds like Big Brother to me," Maryland resident James Dewitt said Wednesday on the streets of downtown Washington, referencing George Orwell's novel foreseeing a society oppressed by a government that tracks everyone. "We're heading to '1984.' It's 2011, but we're heading to 1984."

Robyn Johnson, a spokeswoman from HSEMA, told

The Washington Examiner that "the program has not expanded to include private businesses." But, "We continue to explore this in a deliberative way."

A plan for 2011 submitted to the city administrator by HSEMA says the agency plans to centralize cameras at private businesses and those run by Metro and the D.C. Housing Authority. The plan doesn't have a timeline, and Johnson said there isn't one.

Homeland security says the centralized camera system is designed to be used to raise "situational awareness" during "developing significant events" like the shooting at the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum in 2009 or the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001.

When it was started in spring 2008, the program immediately met resistance from the D.C. Council. Some council members worried that the closed-circuit television system was put together too quickly and without consideration of how effective it would be in reducing crime or preventing terrorism.

At-large Councilman Phil Mendelson, who oversees the homeland security agency, still has those concerns.

"My concern about these cameras has always been that there's no evidence they reduce crime," Mendelson said. "If HSEMA intends to put more staff on to monitor these cameras, it would not be a good use of resources."

Mendelson added that "although one doesn't have much of a right of privacy on a Metro platform ... it could change when you're inside a bank, and if HSEMA were looking at a bank statement."

Johnson said the agency is developing regulations to protect civil liberties.

Homeland security currently operates under the same series of regulations the D.C. Council adopted for the cameras used by the police department, which are run separately from HSEMA's cameras.

Those regulations make it illegal for a camera to be focused on literature being carried by someone in a protest. They also prevent footage from being stored for more than 10 days, unless it captured a crime being committed or questionable police action.

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