Prepare for Change

http://crooksandliars.com/jon-perr/mitt-romneys-big-promises-and-bigger-lies When politicians just outright lie so they can get elected, no wonder citizens get turned off from political interest.  A noninterested citizenry does not work well with democracy.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-16348594 I would say these are a bit TOO tiny, but personally I could live in 400 square feet or so.  But it certainly does make sense to have just enough and be mortgage free, than have more room than you need and be weighed down by a big mortgage payment.

http://www.truth-out.org/goodbye-shop-til-you-drop-mentality-renegade-band-economists-call-degrowth-economy/1324836174 "'Overwhelmingly, growth is seen as the solution to all problems, but growth is failing,' says Herman Daly, a former World Bank economist who is also known as the father of 'ecological economics,' an offshoot of the same field that spawned Adam Smith three centuries ago but challenges many of the assumptions that classical economists hold dear.   While the term may seem like an oxymoron to some, ecological economics places the economy inside the larger 'ecosphere' that supports all life on Earth, rather than seeing the economy and job creation in direct opposition to environmental protection. That's an idea that has gained ground in recent years as businesses have become increasingly compromised by water and raw material scarcity, extreme weather, crop failures and other problems linked to global warming and environmental d...

http://www.npr.org/2011/12/20/143996530/immigration-effort-mistakenly-holds-u-s-citizens "A growing number of U.S. citizens have been mistakenly detained as part of the Secure Communities program. It's a federal effort to detect and deport illegal immigrants who've been arrested by local law enforcement. In Los Angeles recently, four native-born citizens — all Latino — have been held for days at a time." ICE - the Immigration and Customs Enforcement - uses their Secure Communities program to grab anybody they suspect is in the US illegally. In the process, they grab and hold legal US citizens as if they were criminals.  Why? http://www.rickety.us/2011/06/2010-defense-spending-by-country/ "The United States, with a budget of $698 billion, spends more on defense than the next seventeen nations combined . The United States military spending is almost six times that of the next biggest spender, China ($119 billion) and more than eleven times that of Rus...

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/12/18/ap-enterprise-russia-oil_n_1156030.html "Environmentalists estimate at least 1 percent of Russia's annual oil production, or 5 million tons, is spilled every year. That is equivalent to one Deepwater Horizon-scale leak about every two months. Crumbling infrastructure and a harsh climate combine to spell disaster in the world's largest oil producer, responsible for 13 percent of global output. Oil, stubbornly seeping through rusty pipelines and old wells, contaminates soil, kills all plants that grow on it and destroys habitats for mammals and birds. Half a million tons every year get into rivers that flow into the Arctic Ocean, the government says, upsetting the delicate environmental balance in those waters." There are natural oil leaks, such as off the California coast. But holy cow, 5 million tons per year, and a lot of that heading to sea?  I'm not happy about this.

http://www.reddit.com/r/reddit.com/comments/cktxy/reddit_lets_compile_a_list_of_the_best_online/ And then there's this from MIT: http://rapidcityjournal.com/news/not-quite-an-mit-degree-but-mitx-may-still-appeal/article_3d6f561c-2a0b-11e1-92d1-0019bb2963f4.html "Now MIT is looking to strike that balance — with an extra letter. University officials described "MITx" as a non-profit entity established inside the university that will offer an "MIT-sanctioned certificate" for completing various courses or, perhaps eventually, whole course sequences — though MIT emphasized full degrees will not be in the offing. How exactly will it work? On a conference call Friday, university officials were short on many details — how many courses would eventually be offered, how much it would cost, even the name of the first course for the experiment in spring. They did say they would focus, at least initially, on science and engineering, where assessment is fairly objec...

http://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2011/12/free-falling-in-milwaukee-a-close-up-on-one-citys-middle-class-decline/250100/ "First, the numbers. From 1970 to 2007, the percentage of families in the Milwaukee metropolitan area that were middle class declined from 37 to 24 percent, according to a new analysis by the Southeastern Wisconsin Regional Planning Commission . During the same period, the proportion of affluent families grew from 22 to 27 percent-while the percentage of poor households swelled from 23 to 31 percent. In short, Milwaukee's middle class families went from a plurality to its smallest minority... Late Wednesday afternoon, that was evident in the Jefferson Elementary school of West Allis, a once solidly middle class suburb bordering Milwaukee. In a crowded school gymnasium, principal Shelly Strasser said that fifty percent of students now qualify for free or reduced price school lunch programs. In other local schools, the number is ninety p...