Even in the face of a resounding rejection of ACTA by the European Parliament last week, the European Commission seems determined to keep pushing for its eventual adoption. Techdirtnoted some ways in which it might try to do that, but an important article by Michael Geist lays out what seems to be an alternative approach that is already close to fruition:
According to recently leaked documents [pdf], the EU plans to use the Canada-EU Trade Agreement (CETA), which is nearing its final stages of negotiation, as a backdoor mechanism to implement the ACTA provisions.
Here's how that would work:
The European Commission strategy appears to be to use CETA as the new ACTA, burying its provisions in a broader Canadian trade agreement with the hope that the European Parliament accepts the same provisions it just rejected with the ACTA framework. If successful, it would likely then argue that ACTA poses no new concerns since the same rules were approved within the Canadian trade deal.
ACTA’s Back: European Commission Trying To Sneak In Worst Parts Using Canada-EU Trade Agreement As A Trojan Horse
Oakland City Council Seeks to Cut Goldman Sachs Ties After Bank Profits From Lowered Interest Rates
The Oakland City Council has voted unanimously to end a contract with Goldman Sachs that locked it into a financial deal called an high interest rate swap. The city signed on with the bank in 1998 on the premise it would reduce costs of its bonds amid rising interest rates. But after the 2008 financial meltdown, the Federal Reserve cut interest rates to near zero. As a result, Goldman’s rate dropped to 0.15 percent — even as it continued to require Oakland to pay a rate of almost 6 percent. The city council is calling on the city to refuse to do business with Goldman Sachs unless it ends the deal without requiring a $15 million payout. The vote comes after a long campaign by city workers, unions, the Occupy movement and local clergy members. "It’s really been through direct action and public pressure that we’ve been able to build for this," says Alysabeth Alexander, Political Action Chair for SEIU Local 1021, who helped organize the Oakland community and present testimony to the council members. "This is actually the second swap that SEIU 1021 has taken on and we’re going to continue to do this with our community partners and take on Wall Street. It’s not right that in this fiscal crisis that they’re profiting off of our local governments."
Oakland City Council Seeks to Cut Goldman Sachs Ties After Bank Profits From Lowered Interest Rates
America's poorly-educated spend less time-off with family or friends, study finds
Despite having more leisure time overall, stressed-out Americans report having less 'quality time' to enjoy themselves, particularly those with little or no education.
This is according to the findings of a new paper entitled Leisure Inequality in the US: 1965-2003, from Queen Mary, University of London, the University of Oxford and the University of Zaragoza.
The research offers insights on how leisure inequality across educational groups has evolved in the last four decades in the United States in contrast with the inequality in wages and expenditure over the same period.
Dr Almudena Sevilla, from the School of Business and Management at QM, conducted the study with Professor Jose I. Gimenez-Nadal, from Zaragoza and Professor Jonathan Gershuny, Oxford.
They used time-diary information from the American Heritage Time Use Study (AHTUS) collated between 1965 and 2003. AHTUS respondents recorded their activities over 24-hour periods, including leisure e.g. watching television, playing sport and socialising (activities that we cannot pay someone else to do or that are not necessary to live e.g. eating or sleeping).
America’s poorly-educated spend less time-off with family or friends, study finds
The Revelation of the Pyramids
The Revelation Of The Pyramids takes an in depth look into one of the seven wonders of the world, the Great Pyramids of Egypt. Mystery has surrounded these epic structures for centuries with theories varying from the scientific to the bizarre.
However with over thirty-seven years of in depth research taking in sites from China, Peru, Mexico and Egypt, one scientist has as at last managed first to understand and then to reveal what lies behind this greatest of archaeological mysteries: a message of paramount importance for all mankind, through time and space.
The Revelation of the Pyramids
Are we raising a bunch of idiots?
Second-graders who can't tie shoes or zip jackets. Four-year-olds in Pull-Ups diapers. Five-year-olds in strollers. Teens and preteens befuddled by can openers and ice-cube trays. College kids who've never done laundry, taken a bus alone or addressed an envelope.
FUTURE PRIMATE 