These 11 universities are awful and should be demolished down right now

The Great Recession has put a lot of people out of work and has taken a huge bite out of the value of pretty much everybody’s real property values. It bankrupted some historic companies, too, including Lehman Brothers and General Motors.

Education is a sector of the economy — a pretty large sector — that has managed to survive the malaise mostly unscathed. American colleges have been able to hang on, virtually en masse, with the tenacity of cockroaches — thanks in no small part to federal largesse in the form of Pell Grants and subsidized student loans.

That’s sad, really, because many public and private colleges and universities are delivering a sloppy, unfinished product. The 2011 “Pathway to Prosperity” study conducted by Harvard University found that only 56 percent of students complete four-year programs in fewer than six years.

Graduation rates don’t always accurately reflect the dropout rate. Some students don’t graduate because they leave at the first opportunity for better schools, for example. Also, students who obtain two-year degrees get missed in any four-year graduation count.

Still, way too many public and private nonprofit schools produce deplorable results — leaving dropouts on the hook for student loans and with little else, and leaving the government out billions in wasted grant money.

The slideshow below presents some of the worst offenders. Hopefully, your alma mater isn’t on the list. It’s probably not, though, because graduation rates are so low.

Via: The Daily Caller

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Is The United States Going To Go To War With Syria Over A Natural Gas Pipeline?

Is The United States Going To Go To War With Syria Over A Natural Gas Pipeline?

 

Why has the little nation of Qatar spent 3 billion dollars to support the rebels in Syria?  Could it be because Qatar is the largest exporter of liquid natural gas in the world and Assad won't let them build a natural gas pipeline through Syria?  Of course.  Qatar wants to install a puppet regime in Syria that will allow them to build a pipeline which will enable them to sell lots and lots of natural gas to Europe.  Why is Saudi Arabia spending huge amounts of money to help the rebels and why has Saudi Prince Bandar bin Sultan been "jetting from covert command centers near the Syrian front lines to the Élysée Palace in Paris and the Kremlin in Moscow, seeking to undermine the Assad regime"?  Well, it turns out that Saudi Arabia intends to install their own puppet government in Syria which will allow the Saudis to control the flow of energy through the region.  On the other side, Russia very much prefers the Assad regime for a whole bunch of reasons.  One of those reasons is that Assad is helping to block the flow of natural gas out of the Persian Gulf into Europe, thus ensuring higher profits for Gazprom.  Now the United States is getting directly involved in the conflict.  If the U.S. is successful in getting rid of the Assad regime, it will be good for either the Saudis or Qatar (and possibly for both), and it will be really bad for Russia.  This is a strategic geopolitical conflict about natural resources, religion and money, and it really has nothing to do with chemical weapons at all.

 

It has been common knowledge that Qatar has desperately wanted to construct a natural gas pipeline that will enable it to get natural gas to Europe for a very long time...

Via: The Economic Collapse

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WEAK: JUST 169,000 NEW JOBS CREATED IN AUGUST, BAD DOWNWARD REVISIONS, LABOR FORCE PARTICIPATION RATE FALLS

There were just 169K new jobs created in August.

Private payrolls came in at 152,000 new jobs vs. expectations of 180,000.

What's worse. Last month was revised SHARPLY down from 162 to 104K. That is quite ominous.

June was also revised down, from 172K to 188.

The unemployment rate did, however, drop to 7.3%, but that's basically just due to continued exodus from the workforce.

The participation rate fell to 63.2% from 63.4%.

Snap reaction: this could delay the Fed's drive to reduce the pace of bond buying. The consensus had been that starting in September, the Fed would begin the so-called "taper" but right now the market is calling that bluff. Gold is surging, the dollar is tumbling, the US 10-year is seeing yields go down. And stocks are actually rising.

You can read the full report from the BLS here.

Via: Business Insider

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WATCH: Arizona Voters Savage John McCain’s Syria Support at Town Hall

Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) came face-to-face with his constituents Thursday during a tense town hall event in Phoenix, Arizona. The senator, who has perhaps been the loudest Republican voice supporting military action in Syria met voters who were vehemently opposed to intervention and let their voices be heard.

According to a report by CNN’s Kevin Liptak, one man told McCain, “We didn’t send you to make war for us. We sent you to stop the war,” drawing applause from the crowd. Another man held up a bag on marshmallows, telling him, “This is what I think of Congress. They are a bunch of marshmallows. That’s what they are. That’s what they’ve become. Why are you not listening to the people and staying out of Syria? It’s not our fight.”

Videos captured at the event show McCain contending with the often angry crowd. At one point, a man repeatedly attempted to interrupt McCain mid-speech, causing the senator to stop and address him. “What you’re doing is not just disrespectful to me, but disrespectful to others who want their opinions and views heard.”

Later, a woman who said she had a young cousin living in Syria delivered an emotional plea to McCain. “For me, to listen to you say there is no good option in Syria-–I refuse to believe that,” she told him. “The good option right now is to take Saudi Arabia and Iran and force them to stop supporting the two sides in Syria. And you could do it. You can do it by diplomacy, not bombs, Sen. McCain. We cannot afford to shed more Syrian blood.”

McCain thanked the woman, who got loud support from the crowd, for her “emotional plea,” but disputed what he saw as her support for the Assad regime. “To say that Bashar Assad is anything but a merciless butcher, then we have a strong disagreement.”

Watch the two exchanges in the video below:

Via: Mediaite.com

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[CARTOON] BoehnerCare

Via: California Political Review

Creative Destruction

Obamacare versus artists, writers, musicians, actors, et al.

Nancy Pelosi waxed rhapsodic in 2010 as she imagined the benefits of Obamacare: “Think of an economy where people could be an artist or a photographer or a writer without worrying about keeping their day job in order to have health insurance.”

GARY LOCKE

Well, that was the economy we used to have. But as Obamacare begins to kick in, artists, photographers, writers, and other members of the “creative class” who have access to health insurance programs through numerous professional organizations will lose that coverage.

Up until now professional organizations have worked with insurance providers to craft reduced-rate plans for their members. But thanks to the fine print in the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA), on January 1, 2014, many of these plans will fail to pass legal muster.

The College Art Association website posted a notice this month: “The New York Life Insurance Company recently informed CAA that it will no longer offer catastrophic healthcare coverage previously available to CAA members.” Why? Because it “is no longer an option” for “associations whose members reside in different states” to provide such coverage. These members will have to seek help from their home states’ newly formed Obamacare exchanges. Plans offered to Modern Language Association (MLA) members will suffer a similar fate.

Other insurance providers are reporting cancellations. The Entertainment Industry Group Insurance Trust (TEIGIT) website posts the following notice: “All individual and/or Sole Proprietor Health Insurance will terminate January 1, 2014. This includes plans acquired as Members of our Affiliated Associations & their groups.” Those affiliated associations include the American Federation of Television and Radio Artists, the Dramatists Guild, the Graphic Arts Guild, NY Women in Film and Television, and many others.

Via: Weekly Standard

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Obama struggling to win support on Hill, world stage for Syria strike

The specter of defeat is starting to hang over President Obama’s drive to win congressional backing for a Syria strike, as his team struggles to win rank-and-file support in the House – with even top ally Nancy Pelosi saying she’s not sure she can round up a majority of her caucus.

The president is not doing much better 5,000 miles away, seemingly running into a wall -- and Vladimir Putin -- during his brief visit to St. Petersburg, Russia, for the G-20 summit as he tries to sway allies to back his plan.

Speculation is swirling that the president may address the nation in the near future, as Congress takes up legislation authorizing the use of force. But for now, lawmakers say their constituents are overwhelmingly against military action in Syria – a fact they weigh heavily as they consider how to vote.

Rep. Peter King, R-N.Y., one of the biggest advocates for military action on the Hill, acknowledged in an interview with Fox News that he’s not at all certain there are 218 votes in the House for the resolution to pass. Informal tallies show only a few dozen members of the House have come out for military action.

"It is up to the president to be much more forceful and not seem like he is trying to pass the buck on to someone else," King said.

Via: Fox News

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CBS and Time Warner win; viewers lose in cable dispute

So here's the final score: Time Warner Cable got some but not all of what it wanted. CBS got pretty much everything that it wanted.

And after a month of being denied access to CBS, Showtime and other popular channels, Time Warner subscribers got the certainty of even costlier monthly bills and the assurance that money-grubbing squabbles among multibillion-dollar media giants will continue.

Excuse me if I'm not exactly thrilled about this week's conclusion to the latest in a series of go-ahead-make-my-day confrontations between greedy corporations.

Moreover, why aren't our elected officials hopping mad about these ongoing industry food fights and racing to pass legislation aimed at finally giving consumers a break from the endless cycle of rising pay-TV bills?

"We need regulators who are willing to stop powerful special interests, whether broadcasters or cable firms, that use consumers as pawns in their spats," said Ed Mierzwinski, consumer program director for the U.S. Public Interest Research Group.

"In the long run, we need better rules, including a la carte pricing, to help change the video marketplace," he said.

I've been pushing for years for a la carte pricing — paying only for the channels you want. More on that in a moment.

First, let's sample the bury-the-hatchet statements released by Time Warner Cable and CBS after they made the peace.

Glenn Britt, Time Warner's chief exec, said the company's hard-nosed bargaining stance was guided by wanting "to hold down costs and retain our ability to deliver a great video experience for our customers."

"While we certainly didn't get everything we wanted, ultimately we ended up in a much better place than when we started," he said.

Via: LA Times

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Stunning Food Stamp Facts Uncovered ...

U.S. Report Makes Case for Food Stamp Increase

JUDICIAL WATCH: The Obama administration blew an astounding $80 billion on food stamps last year but it wasn’t enough to put a dent in the national epidemic of "food insecure" households, according to a new government study that aims to justify pouring larger sums of taxpayer dollars into the bulging welfare program.

It’s like there’s no end to the madness! In 2012 a record 47 million people got food stamps, according to the government’s own figures. Uncle Sam spent an unprecedented $80 billion on the program, marking an unbelievable $2.7 billion increase from the previous year.  To help illustrate the drastic growth, let’s consider the 2007 figures; 26 million people got food stamps that year at a cost to American taxpayers of $35 billion.

As breathtaking as these figures are, the Obama administration insists on expanding the rolls even offering the benefit to illegal immigrants. Earlier this year Judicial Watch obtained documents from the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA), the agency that distributes food stamps, detailing its work with the Mexican government to promote participation by illegal aliens. The effort includes a Spanish-language flyer provided to the Mexican Embassy by the USDA ensuring that Mexicans in the U.S. don’t need to declare their immigration status to get financial assistance from Uncle Sam.

Via: Judicial Watch

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[OPINION] Obama’s cruel fight against school choice

While President Obama publicly celebrated the anniversary of Martin Luther King Jr.’s “I have a dream” speech last week, his administration took action behind the scenes in Louisiana that was a complete rejection of King’s dream.

The Justice Department has challenged my state in court for having the temerity to start a scholarship program that frees low-income minority children from failing schools. In other words, Obama and Attorney General Eric Holder would rip children out of their schools and handcuff them to the failing schools they previously attended. And, in the ultimate irony, they are using desegregation orders set up to prevent discrimination against minority children to try to do it.

Never mind that 90 percent of the children receiving scholarships in Louisiana are minorities or that 100 percent of their parents choose to apply for these scholarships.

By his own words, the president is fighting for the right of these children to live the American dream, but his actions would destroy their dreams.

We as a country have made significant progress toward King’s dream. We have more work to do, but this blatant political maneuver by the Obama administration will set the fight for civil rights back decades.

We all know the harsh cycle of poverty that exists in the United States and that a disproportionate share of those in poverty are minorities. Studies of health-care outcomes, incarceration levels and economic opportunity all show that education is key to improving quality of life.

Millions of single parents in this country work two jobs to make ends meet, hoping that their children won’t have the same struggles. Hope is their only option because they live in neighborhoods with chronically failing public schools and lack the means to move to better school districts or to send their children to private schools.

Via: Washington Post

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Obamacare exchanges aren't the only game in town

Americans who buy their own health insurance next year won't have to get coverage through their state-based exchange.

Many insurers will offer individual policies outside the Obamacare exchanges in 2014. Consumers can avoid the exchanges by buying plans directly from insurers or through brokers.

But should they?

First, anyone earning less than 400% of the poverty line will be eligible for federal subsidies toward exchange-based plans, so going off the exchange would likely not make sense.

But those who make too much to qualify for subsidies should look both on and off the exchanges for a plan that best fits their needs, experts say.

The off-exchange policies are required to have many of the same Obamacare protections as plans sold on the exchanges, like maternity and mental health benefits, plus insurers can't exclude enrollees because of pre-existing conditions. Only a handful of current individual policies that meet strict guidelines will be grandfathered in.

So why might one want to go off the exchange?

#1: Possible better coverage: Some insurers may opt to offer richer policies or continue grandfathered plans off the exchange to hold onto long-time customers. These policies may have more comprehensive doctors' networks or lower drug co-pays ... with a higher premium to boot, said Dan Mendelson, chief executive of Avalere Health, an advisory company for insurers. But they could be more attractive to current customers than the exchange policies, which may be more restrictive in order to keep premiums under control.

Via: CNN Money

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Becerra Pushes Immigration Overhaul as Deficit Reducer Again

Rep. Xavier Becerra has a plan for dealing with two thorny political problems at once this fall: bring down the national deficit by passing an immigration overhaul.

It’s an idea the House Democratic Caucus chairman has been pushing for years with little success, first during the Simpson-Bowles fiscal commission and then in his capacity as a member of the doomed supercommittee on deficit reduction.

“At that point, I think people were still just focused on the budget, the regular tools for fashioning a budget,” Becerra said in a recent interview with CQ Roll Call. “The idea didn’t go very far. I raised it again, and again it didn’t go very far, probably because we weren’t having a very expanded discussion about immigration reform and a lot of people didn’t know what it would mean to have an immigration bill and how it would fit in terms of the economy.”

But things are different now, Becerra continued. There is increasing urgency to avert a government shutdown or debt limit showdown with an aim to also curb spending, and the momentum for an immigration rewrite has grown following the 2012 elections.

“Each issue is looking for some locomotion, and I certainly think any time you can add a trillion dollars of deficit reduction to fiscal negotiations, that’s pretty big,” Becerra said. “And any time you can also give a jump-start to the reluctance of some on the Republican side to move on fixing the economy at the same time, I think that’s gotta help.”

Via: Roll Call

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E! NEWS SAYS JACK NICHOLSON RETIREMENT HEADLINES UNTRUE

LOS ANGELES, Sept. 5 (UPI)--Hollywood screen icon Jack Nicholson is not retiring from acting, contrary to a media report claiming he is, E! News said.

A story making the rounds Wednesday alleged the 76-year-old triple-Oscar-winning actor is retiring from show business due to memory loss or dementia.

But E! News said the report is completely false and Nicholson is actively reading scripts for future possible projects.

Via: Breitbart

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‘YOU MORON!!!’: ELEMENTARY SCHOOL TEACHER IN TROUBLE AFTER FACEBOOK RANT THAT RIPS A ‘CRACK HEAD’ PARENT, DUMB STUDENTS

The teacher works at Alicante Elementary in Lamont, a southeastern suburb of Bakersfield, Calif., and posted the following, according to KERO-TV.

Here he rants about a mom who complains he’s too harsh with students, adding that the woman’s third-grader can read only “7 freaking words a minute” and still counts on her fingers while criticizing the mom for possessing only a fourth-grade education and not speaking any English:

(Credit: Facebook via KERO)

Here’s the promised image, implying a family is on welfare:

Via: The Blaze

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