CTRSVP
Connecticut, Post Kelo New London, Fort Trumbull & Eminent Domain
 FiddleHeads - A Natural Food Cooperative
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A Defense of Neighborhood Businesses
Corporate industries invading American neighborhoods, from coffee chains to bookstore chains, music chains and movie theatre chains, pose a threat to the authenticity of our unique neighborhoods. Although there is room on the map for shared territories - both the homogenous corporate enterprise and the independent ventures across the nation, our independent, community-operated businesses deserve your dime. | Many independent store owners talk about knowing the community, creating a friendly and supportive atmosphere, and chatting with clients about their kids, school games, and local news. Support the underdog and promote a future that includes the culture of small businesses! Independent bookstores are facing a grave challenge. Cody's Books in Berkeley, California was a bona fide cultural institution on Telegraph Avenue. In his recent announcement (May 10, 2006), owner Andy Ross says, "It is with a heavy heart that I must announce that Cody's will be closing our doors at the Telegraph Avenue store for the last time on July 10." | In the past fifteen years, Cody's sales have declined by 66%. Cody's is certainly not the only independent bookstore to close its doors. The American Booksellers Association has seen a decline in membership from 5200 bookstores in 1991 to 1702 stores in 2005. With chains on the rise, supporting local institutions (and many independent bookstores are truly thought of as cultural institutions) promotes a future that includes our neighborhood bookstores, movie theaters and coffee shops and denies the type of news that Andy Ross so sadly delivers. Become active on Delocator.net or Delocator.Mapyourcity.Net and help promote independent businesses across the country! Delocator.net was launched with the intention of becoming a web-meme, sprouting many future delocated corporate stores. |
Flickr Photo Cloud
Excerpts from the New Education Funding Law
Increasing Pell Grants: The biggest aid increase would raise the maximum annual Pell grant, the nation's main aid program for low-income students, from $4,300 to $5,400 a year by 2012. Making It Easier to Repay Loans: * Ensuring you don't retire in student debt. The program cancels most remaining balances (if there any left) after 25 years. This applies to anyone, who took out federal loans as an undergraduate or graduate student, whether they took them out years ago or recently. (The time period for the 10-year public service cancellation begins October 1, 2007. Project on Student Debt has more details on that.) *Slashing interest rates on Stafford subsidized loans. The bill would reduce the interest rate on subsidized Stafford loans by half over four years. Subsidized loans go to students who demonstrate financial need. The rate cut would be phased in starting July 1. It would go from 6.8 percent today to 3.4 percent by 2011. | (The bad news is that this rate cut only applies only to new subsidized Stafford loans, not the ones that students have already taken out. It does not apply to unsubsidized Stafford loans either, which students can take out regardless of financial need.) * Capping loan payment. Starting July 1, 2009, borrowers would not have to devote more than 15 percent of their income to repaying Stafford (federal) student loans. This applies to both subsidized and unsubsidized federal loans, regardless of when the loans were taken out. It's a sliding scale. For more use this helpful calculator by FinAid.org for determining how this would affect you. Project on Student Debt has more helpful information on key provisions of the bill, such as percentage limits on payments depending on your income, or Public Service Loan Forgiveness program. |
The Real Truth in Candidate's Claims
PolitiFact is a project of the St. Petersburg Times and Congressional Quarterly to help you find the truth in the presidential campaign. Every day, reporters and researchers from the Times and CQ will analyze the candidates' speeches, TV ads and interviews and determine whether the claims are accurate. FactCheck is another good source to check the truth of condidate claims and many other facts.
Challenge to Global Warming Theory
WASHINGTON, Sept. 12 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- A new analysis of
peer-reviewed literature reveals that more than 500 scientists have
published evidence refuting at least one element of current man-made
global warming scares. More than 300 of the scientists found evidence
that 1) a natural moderate 1,500-year climate cycle has produced more
than a dozen global warmings similar to ours since the last Ice Age
and/or that 2) our Modern Warming is linked strongly to variations
in the sun's irradiance. "This data and the list of scientists make
a mockery of recent claims that a scientific consensus blames humans
as the primary cause of global temperature increases since 1850,"
said Hudson Institute Senior Fellow Dennis Avery...CLICK HERE
Purging Voter Rolls
The Department of Justice's Voting Section is pressuring 10 states to purge voter rolls before the 2008 election based on statistics that former Voting Section attorneys and other experts say are flawed and do not confirm that those states have more voter registrations than eligible voters, as the department alleges.
| Voting Section Chief John Tanner called for the purges in letters sent this spring under an arcane provision in the National Voter Registration Act, better known as the Motor Voter law, whose purpose is to expand voter registration. The identical letters notify states that 10 percent or more of their election jurisdictions have problematic voter rolls. It tells states to report "the subsequent removal from rolls of persons no longer eligible to vote."... |
