The new tax was sold to the public with the idea that it would offset the public cost of medical care for shooting victims.
According to Board President Toni Preckwinkle's own numbers, that cost was just shy of $35 million.
Yet the estimated revenue for the new tax will be roughly $600,000.
The Tax Foundation ranks California behind only New York and New Jersey as the worst state in its 2013 Business Tax Climate Index. It is the fourth worst state in which to make a living, according to Money Rates; has the fourth highest income tax burden, says the Tax Foundation; and has the third highest jobless rate.
As if the tax millstone weren't already heavy enough, the voters decided in November to approve Proposition 30, which increases the state sales and income taxes.
Last month, 21% of small business owners said they expected to lower head count over the next six months — the highest percentage recorded by the Wells Fargo/Gallup Small Business Index since its launch in 2003. In July, the last time the data was compiled, just 10% of bosses said they planned to shrink employee ranks.
Moving back to the west, St. Louis is now reporting that local food pantries are being overrun thanks to the “new poor.” Emmanuel Seventh Day Adventist Food Pantry Director Liz Chambwa says demand is up significantly: “People are losing their jobs, there’s not enough food coming in anymore for donors as much as they used to, so we really have to get out and do a lot of food drives and we get more and more people every week.
This is the new normal. And it’s set to get worse, thanks to the business impact of Obamacare and tax increases pushed by President Obama.Read more from BREITBART BIG GOVERNMENT by Ben Shapiro.
For the chairman and chief executive of Murray Energy, an Ohio-based coal company, the reelection of President Obama was no cause for celebration. It was a time for prayer — and layoffs.
Robert E. Murray read a prayer to a group of company staff members on the day after the election, lamenting the direction of the country and asking: “Lord, please forgive me and anyone with me in Murray Energy Corp. for the decisions that we are now forced to make to preserve the very existence of any of the enterprises that you have helped us build.”
A group of Republican senators said Monday that thousands of voter ballots are unlikely to reach military service members until after Nov. 6.
One day ahead of the election, Sens. John Cornyn (R-Texas), Kelly Ayotte (R-N.H.), John McCain (R-Ariz.), Rob Portman (R-Ohio) and Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) sent a letter to Defense Secretary Leon Panetta to express their concern over delays in ballots reaching military voters
Paul has been outspoken about the Benghazi attacks before, even calling for an end to foreign aid to Libya until the perpetrators are brought to justice. But he has been critical of the Obama administration as well as Libyan authorities.
“Where the hell were the Marines?” Paul asked in October. “In Libya, where were the Marines? There were no uniformed Marines guarding our ambassador?”
“(The) basic principle is that you don’t deploy forces into harm’s way without knowing what’s going on; without having some real-time information about what’s taking place,” Panetta told Pentagon reporters. “And as a result of not having that kind of information, the commander who was on the ground in that area, Gen. Ham, Gen. Dempsey and I felt very strongly that we could not put forces at risk in that situation.”
But the quiet fortitude that has been on display could soon run out in the country on the frontline of the continent's worst crisis since the second world war. For on Thursday demonstrators were sure of one thing: if pushed too far they may be pushed over the edge.
"Personally, I'm amazed there hasn't been a revolution," said Panaghiotis Varotsos, a computer programmer.
Those two teenagers were the fourth and fifth persons killed since Friday night. The others were a 73-year-old man sitting on a stoop with a friend, a 34-year-old man getting ready to celebrate his brother's birthday, and a 20-year-old woman in a "domestic" incident.The race of the victims were not given, from the neighborhood, one can assume they were all blacks.
On Tuesday, the board passed a revised strategic plan that says that by 2018, it wants 90 percent of Asian students, 88 percent of white students, 81 percent of Hispanics and 74 percent of black students to be reading at or above grade level. For math, the goals are 92 percent of Asian kids to be proficient, whites at 86 percent, Hispanics at 80 percent and blacks at 74 percent. It also measures by other groupings, such as poverty and disabilities, reported the Palm Beach Post.
- An Excerpt detailing the Board's decision;
The officials also struggled to defend the security situation at the consulate. “We had the correct number of assets in Benghazi” at the time of the attack, Lamb told the committee. Kennedy seemed to dispute this later in the hearing, saying that State Department security is “never going to have enough guns” to prevent full-force military attacks like the one in Benghazi.It is very revealing in that a house cleaning from top to bottom will be needed in the Department of State when the adults take charge in January.
Meanwhile, Benghazi security official Lt. Col. Woods, a whistle-blower working with the Oversight Committee, said he “knew instantly” Benghazi was a terrorist attack. Woods added that he “almost expected the attack” because of the regular threats and security breaches in the area, and the fact that “we were the last flag flying” after the British ambassador had his convoy bombed and pulled out of Benghazi.
There were no protests, no benign crowds exploited by local militias, and nothing had anything to do with a video. Our Ambassador, another diplomat, and two Navy SEALs were murdered in a brutally efficient and coordinated terrorist attack.
“Electric car batteries do not perform much better than they did 100 years ago," he said. "Research has not conquered the battery storage issue, and therefore the electric transportation ‘stimulus’ did not boost the ‘technology of the future,’ but instead a century-old technology as far as performance and capability goes.”
The House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, chaired by Republican Rep. Darrell Issa, has been conducting its own investigation into the safety of the Benghazi consulate. Sources said to be familiar with the Libya operation told lawmakers that 13 threats were made in the six months leading up to the Benghazi incident, with repeated requests made for additional security that were denied.
