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California Dreaming: New High-Speed Rail Project to Cost Roughly $100 Billion

SOURCE

The new business plan for California’s high-speed rail system shows the nation’s most ambitious state rail project could cost nearly $100 billion in inflation-adjusted funding over a 20-year construction period, far above the amount originally projected.The plan, which was shared late Monday with The Associated Press, also shows the system would be profitable even at the lowest ridership estimates and would not require public subsidies to operate.

The report estimates the actual cost at $98.5 billion if the route between San Francisco and Anaheim is completed in 2033. It assumes private investment will account for roughly 20 percent of the final cost.

The initial estimate to build the system when voters approved bond funding for it in 2008 was $43 billion in non-adjusted dollars.

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MGM STRIKES DEAL WITH ONLINE POKER SITE: iBankCoin Financial News Called It!

As noted many times in iBC Financial News, the recent federal raids on offshore online poker sites is likely to wind up being nothing more than a Godfather, Part II-esque ploy on the part of Steve Wynn and the Vegas tycoons to legalize and regulate it in America (with them running the show). 

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With billionaires and casino companies rushing to get ready for the potential of regulated online gambling in America, MGM Resorts on Monday announced an online poker alliance with Bwin.party digital entertainment, which owns PartyPoker, the second-biggest online poker service in the world, and the World Poker Tour.

“MGM is proud to have bwin.party as our partner as they have the assets and experience that, combined with our brands, can ensure a secure, fair and entertaining online poker experience,” Jim Murren, chief of MGM Resorts, said in a statement.

The MGM deal, which is contingent on a regulatory regime being established for online poker on either the federal or state level, helps define the competitive landscape as casino companies get ready to enter the online gambling business in the U.S. Boyd Gaming also announced on Monday that it has entered into an online poker alliance with Bwin.party.

According to Jim Ryan, co-chief executive of Bwin.party, the two announcements are related and have been in the works for nearly 18 months. Bwin.party will form a joint venture with MGM and Boyd to offer online poker in regulated U.S. jurisdictions. Bwin.party is slated to own 65% of the proposed joint venture, while MGM will own 25% and Boyd will own 10%. In addition, the deals call for Bwin.party to license its technology to both MGM and Boyd, which also plan to offer online poker under their brands.

“The intention of the joint venture is to take the PartyPoker brand and the World Poker Tour brand and our operating expertise and combine that with the regulatory expertise of MGM and Boyd,” Ryan said in an interview. “Effectively you will have four brands in the U.S. and all four brands will be acquiring players and putting them in one hub, one poker network.”

Bwin.party’s PartyPoker was the biggest online poker platform in the world until Congress passed the Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act in 2006, which caused the company to exit the U.S. market and lose its dominant market share. The deals with MGM and Boyd mark the formal return of Bwin.party to the U.S. Ryan, who is based in Gibraltar, has spent a lot of time recently in the U.S.preparing for Monday’s announcement.

Notably, the announced deals only cover online poker, even though Bwin.party has strong online casino offerings. “We see no evidence that a state or federal body is prepared to legislate anything other than poker,” says Ryan.

The U.S. online poker market has long been the world’s biggest, but for years it has operated in the shadows of the law and a disapproving Department of Justice. Prominent U.S. billionaires and casino companies stayed out of the business, leaving its riches for offshore companies like PokerStars and Full Tilt Poker. But now the casino industry is strongly pushing to get online poker regulation through Congress and lawmakers in states like Nevada and New Jersey are also trying to get something done. It is widely believed that first-mover advantage will be key in seizing the Internet if and when online gambling gets regulated, leading to a mad mobilization.

SOURCE 

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THE GREAT PEANUT BUTTER BULL MARKET

Trick-or-treaters might want to hold on to those Reese’s Cups this Halloween as sharp increases in peanut butter prices have begun going into effect following one of the worst peanut harvests in decades.

Kraft (KFTFortune 500) will raise prices for its Planters brand peanut butter by 40% starting Monday, while ConAgra (CAGFortune 500) has instituted increases of more than 20% for its Peter Pan brand that went into effect this month.

J.M. Smucker (SJMFortune 500), which makes Jif, will introduce price hikes of around 30% starting Tuesday.

Consumers, meanwhile, are already seeing these increases reflected at grocery stores.

Maria Brous, a spokeswoman for the Publix chain, said the store had already made slight increases in retail prices and expects them to go higher “as the cost of goods continue[s] to rise”.

Dick Roberts, a spokesman for Giant Eagle grocery stores, said that “like all retailers,” the store is “being affected by industry factors on peanut butter pricing”. Chris Brand, a spokesman for Giant food stores, said the “outlook does not look good until next year’s crop is harvested and produced”.

Peanuts usually get harvested in the fall, around September and October.

While spokespeople for several grocery chains declined to provide specific pricing figures, the peanut industry is clearly under pressure this year after one of the worst harvests in recent memory.

Prices for a ton of runner peanuts, commonly used to make peanut butter, hit nearly $1,200 this month, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture. That’s up from just $450 per ton a year ago. Overall, the USDA projects that American peanut production will hit 3.6 billion pounds this year, down 13% from last year.

Analysts attribute this drop to the intense heat and drought that hit the southern U.S. this year, as well as to high prices for other crops that led farmers to focus their efforts elsewhere.

Americans spend almost $800 million on peanut butter and consume an average of more than six pounds of peanut products each year, according to The National Peanut Board, a farmer-funded research group.

SOURCE 

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“Ironic” Consumer Spending Habits: Brooklyn Hipster Style

Brooklyn hipsters have found a new way of filling their bellies that would probably turn your stomach — rummaging for and then feasting on expensive food that grocery chains toss in the trash.

“Doing this saves me hundreds of dollars a month on groceries,” said Dumpster-diving college student Ashley Fields, 23, of Bushwick, who fills her fridge each week with produce, sandwiches, coffee and even sushi that she gathers from the garbage in Manhattan.

The food they find — including prepared sushi, prepared salads and fresh bread — isn’t thrown out because it’s gone bad but because stores such as Trader Joe’s and Whole Foods simply can’t sell it if it’s still left on the shelf at the end of the day, say Fields and her trash-chowing pals.

So while the average New Yorker might shell out $7 for a large salad at Starbucks during the day, just hours later, Fields and a growing population of educated and working hipsters are getting the same, although leftover, salads for free.

Fields, a theater major originally from St. Louis, Mo., didn’t even get her hands dirty when she took a Post reporter on a tour-de-Dumpster of four produce chains down Third Avenue last week.

Most of the fresh, still-packaged goods were separated from other, less appetizing garbage into their own trash bags, as if Mom herself had readied a personal care package for them.

“You never know what’s going to be in these bags on any given night,” said Fields, who makes $500 to $600 a week at a theater job while going to school and has been scrounging for food since the beginning of summer.

“Like tonight, I found a bunch of great, healthy breakfast sandwiches. They’re totally fine”

Upper West Side Trader Joe’s manager Mason Bly said a lot of his store’s leftover food is donated to charities such as City Harvest, which collects unused goodies from businesses.

But for items not meeting City Harvest’s standards, the grub ends up with people like Fields.

“They dig through everything,” Bly told The Post of the Dumpster divers. “They know what they’re doing. We’ve had to change our trash-disposal policies to prevent them from doing it, but they still manage to get into everything.”

And he means everything. On Wednesday, Fields single-handedly scrounged more than $160 worth of fresh groceries from stores such as Starbucks, Gristedes and D’Agostino. Her 42-item haul included plastic-wrapped sandwiches worth $10 a pop, cookies, fruit bowls, expensive salads and even a five-pack of Izze sparkling sodas, which sell for $3.50 a bottle.

Dumpster-diving is getting popular. Thousands of New Yorkers have formed trashy groups through social Web sites such as Meetup and regularly pounce on grocers’ refuse.

Fields and her pals aren’t part of the “freegan” movement, in which environmentalists live off throwaway food as a political statement against corporate waste and big agri-business.

These Dumpster divers are just in it for cheap food.

“I’m not a freegan. It’s just a really easy way to save money on groceries,” Fields said.

“All that money is going into my pocket, and I’m actually eating pretty well.

“This generation isn’t homeless, filthy or even impoverished — just thrifty with an iron stomach,” Fields said.

Read more: http://trade.cc/afj

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{SHOCK PHOTOS} Here’s the Most Talked About Article This Weekend

OP-ED COLUMNIST

What the Costumes Reveal

  
On Friday, the law firm of Steven J. Baum threw a Halloween party.The firm, which is located near Buffalo, is what is commonly referred to as a “foreclosure mill” firm, meaning it represents banks and mortgage servicers as they attempt to foreclose on homeowners and evict them from their homes. Steven J. Baum is, in fact, the largest such firm in New York; it represents virtually all the giant mortgage lenders, including Citigroup, JPMorgan Chase, Bank of America and Wells Fargo.

The party is the firm’s big annual bash. Employees wear Halloween costumes to the office, where they party until around noon, and then return to work, still in costume. I can’t tell you how people dressed for this year’s party, but I can tell you about last year’s.

That’s because a former employee of Steven J. Baum recently sent me snapshots of last year’s party. In an e-mail, she said that she wanted me to see them because they showed an appalling lack of compassion toward the homeowners — invariably poor and down on their luck — that the Baum firm had brought foreclosure proceedings against.

When we spoke later, she added that the snapshots are an accurate representation of the firm’s mind-set. “There is this really cavalier attitude,” she said. “It doesn’t matter that people are going to lose their homes.” Nor does the firm try to help people get mortgage modifications; the pressure, always, is to foreclose. I told her I wanted to post the photos on The Times’s Web site so that readers could see them. She agreed, but asked to remain anonymous because she said she fears retaliation.

Let me describe a few of the photos. In one, two Baum employees are dressed like homeless people. One is holding a bottle of liquor. The other has a sign around her neck that reads: “3rd party squatter. I lost my home and I was never served.” My source said that “I was never served” is meant to mock “the typical excuse” of the homeowner trying to evade a foreclosure proceeding.

A second picture shows a coffin with a picture of a woman whose eyes have been cut out. A sign on the coffin reads: “Rest in Peace. Crazy Susie.” The reference is to Susan Chana Lask, a lawyer who had filed a class-action suit against Steven J. Baum — and had posteda YouTube video denouncing the firm’s foreclosure practices. “She was a thorn in their side,” said my source.

A third photograph shows a corner of Baum’s office decorated to look like a row of foreclosed homes. Another shows a sign that reads, “Baum Estates” — needless to say, it’s also full of foreclosed houses. Most of the other pictures show either mock homeless camps or mock foreclosure signs — or both. My source told me that not every Baum department used the party to make fun of the troubled homeowners they made their living suing. But some clearly did. The adjective she’d used when she sent them to me — “appalling” — struck me as exactly right.

These pictures are hardly the first piece of evidence that the Baum firm treats homeowners shabbily — or that it uses dubious legal practices to do so. It is under investigation by the New York attorney general, Eric Schneiderman. It recently agreed to pay $2 million to resolve an investigation by the Department of Justice into whether the firm had “filed misleading pleadings, affidavits, and mortgage assignments in the state and federal courts in New York.” (In the press release announcing the settlement, Baum acknowledged only that “it occasionally made inadvertent errors.”)

MFY Legal Services, which defends homeowners, and Harwood Feffer, a large class-action firm, have filed a class-action suit claiming that Steven J. Baum has consistently failed to file certain papers that are necessary to allow for a state-mandated settlement conference that can lead to a modification. Judge Arthur Schack of the State Supreme Court in Brooklyn once described Baum’s foreclosure filings as “operating in a parallel mortgage universe, unrelated to the real universe.” (My source told me that one Baum employee dressed up as Judge Schack at a previous Halloween party.)

I saw the firm operate up close when I wrote several columns about Lilla Roberts, a 73-year-old homeowner who had spent three years in foreclosure hell. Although she had a steady income and was a good candidate for a modification, the Baum firm treated her mercilessly.

When I called a press spokesman for Steven J. Baum to ask about the photographs, he sent me a statement a few hours later. “It has been suggested that some employees dress in … attire that mocks or attempts to belittle the plight of those who have lost their homes,” the statement read. “Nothing could be further from the truth.” It described this column as “another attempt by The New York Times to attack our firm and our work.”

I encourage you to look at the photographs with this column on the Web. Then judge for yourself the veracity of Steven J. Baum’s denial.

SEE THE SLIDESHOW HERE 

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{Mugshot Photo} Woman Charged with Felony Pimping Teen at #Occupy New Hampshire

 

  • JUSTINA JENSEN
MANCHESTER – A city woman is accused of pimping a 16-year-old girl she met in Victory Park during the Occupy NH demonstrations.

Justina Jensen, 23, of 341 Hanover St., is charged with felony prostitution. Police allege Jensen met a teen at the local protest, which is an offshoot of Occupy Wall Street, and used the Internet to arrange a first liaison for the girl with a man who turned out to be an undercover police officer.

Police said the teen’s mother called them Thursday about noon to say her daughter was missing and that her photograph had been posted on a website advertising adult party entertainment.

Court documents show the mother told police she and a friend had used the website to negotiate a deal for the friend to pay for sex with the teen.

Investigators looked at the website and found the girl’s photo posted there, along with pictures of three other women, in an advertisement offering men to “come and have fun with four beautiful ladies” in Manchester.

Police said a woman who called herself “Remy” negotiated a telephone deal for “Mad Mike” to pay $150 to have sex with the teen called “Jewel.”

An undercover officer, identifying himself as “Mad Mike,” called “Remy” to find out where to go and she gave him her 341 Hanover St. address.

When he arrived at the address and Jensen confirmed she was “Remy,” the officer identified himself as a police officer and told Jensen she was under arrest. Police said Jensen attempted to reenter the building to escape, but the officer was able to stop her and, after some resistance, handcuff her.

The missing teen was found inside Jensen’s third-floor apartment. Court documents show the teenage girl told police that Jensen had taken her photo and posted it on the website and said Jensen was going to start training her to be a prostitute, with her first customer scheduled to be “Mad Mike.”

Police said Jensen was using her residence to facilitate prostitution involving an individual under the age of 18, so she is charged with felony prostitution. She was also charged with misdemeanor resisting arrest.

In Circuit Court-Manchester District Division Friday, Jensen repeatedly dozed off while waiting to be arraigned.

Jensen could enter no plea to the felony in Circuit Court, so a probable cause hearing was set for Nov. 10, when there will be a status hearing on the misdemeanor resisting arrest charge.

Police prosecutor Capt. Robert Cunha asked Judge Gregory Michael to set bail of $10,000 cash/surety for Jensen, with bail conditions that include no contact with the minor girl and a waiver of extradition.

Cunha said that in addition to concern for public safety, there is concern about two suicide attempts made by Jensen following her arrest.
He said she attempted to strangle herself with her shoelaces when she was left alone briefly in an interview room at the police department and, after she was taken to the Elliot Hospital, attempted to strangle herself with the ties of the hospital jonny. Cunha said Jensen struggled so violently at the hospital that she had to be sedated.

Cunha also said Jensen’s ties to the city are not strong. He said she was convicted of a similar charge earlier this year in New York.

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Obama vs. GOP on the Big Issue of Jobs

he partisan debate over jobs creation has descended into a blame game between President Obama and congressional Republicans.

President Barack Obama
Photo by: Pete Souza
President Barack Obama

“Over and over, they have refused to even debate the same kind of jobs proposals that Republicans have supported in the past – proposals that today are supported, not just by Democrats, but by Independents and Republicans all across America,” Obama complained in his radio address Saturday morning. “Meanwhile, they’re only scheduled to work three more weeks between now and the end of the year.

Republicans in the House respond that they’ve passed 15 job-creating bills only to have those measures bottled up in the Democrat-controlled Senate.

“We call these bills the ‘forgotten 15’,” Rep. Bobby Schilling of Illinois said in the Republican address Saturday.

“These are common-sense bills that address those excessive federal regulations that are hurting small business job creation,” said Rep. Schilling, a freshman lawmaker whose family owns a pizza business in Moline. “A number of them have bipartisan support. Yet the Senate won’t give these bills a vote, and the president hasn’t called for action.”

The essence of the divide remains: Increase federal investment to stimulate job creation versus easing environmental and other regulatory restrictions that critics say can hinder job creation.

As with much of the debate in Washington these days – including the effort by the bipartisan congressional “super committee” to cut the federal deficit by $1.2 trillion before draconian budget cuts kick in automatically – this one can’t avoid the subject of taxes.

READ THE REST HERE 

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Quantas Airlines Grounds Entire Fleet Over Labor Dispute

Australia’s Qantas Airways grounded its entire fleet on Saturday over a bitter labor dispute, prompting the government to ask a tribunal to stop the conflict out of concern it is putting both the airline and the economy at risk.

Tens of thousands of passengers were affected by the unprecedented decision, which came a day after the airline’s annual shareholders’ meeting and clearly took the government by surprise.

It came as an embarrassment for Prime Minister Julia Gillard who was hosting a Commonwealth leaders’ summit in the remote western city of Perth, 17 of them booked to fly out on Sunday with Qantas.

Unions, from pilots to caterers, have taken strike action since September over pay and to oppose Qantas plans to cut its soaring costs, as it looks at setting up two new airlines in Asia and cutting back financially draining long-haul flights.

It plans to cut 1,000 jobs and order $9 billion of new Airbus aircraft as part of a make over to salvage the loss making international business.

“They are trashing our strategy and our brand. They are deliberately destabilizing the company. Customers are now fleeing from us,” Qantas Chief Executive Alan Joyce said.

The unions “are sticking by impossible claims that are not just to do with pay, but also to do with unions trying to dictate how we run our business,” said Joyce, who estimated the latest move would cost the airline A$20 million a day.

The dispute is the worst Qantas has faced since 2008, when industrial action by engineers cost it A$130 million ($133 million), local media reported.

Qantas’ action sparked an angry response from Australia’s Transport Minister Anthony Albanese.

“I’m extremely disappointed. What’s more, I indicated very clearly to Mr Joyce that I was disturbed by the fact that we’ve had a number of discussions and at no stage has Mr Joyce indicated to me that this was an action under consideration,” he said.

The government asked for a special labor tribunal hearing to end the industrial action by both unions and Qantas. A late night hearing was adjourned until later on Sunday.

If it orders an end to the industrial action Qantas is expected to start flying again.

“The Qantas dispute escalated today and I am concerned about that for the national economy … it could have implications for our national economy,” Gillard told reporters.

Executives faced angry shareholders and workers at a shareholders’ meeting on Friday where the company said the labor dispute had caused a dive in forward bookings. The shareholders backed hefty pay rises to senior Qantas executives. [ID:nL3E7LR4B5]

Australian aviation analyst Tom Ballantyne told ABC Television Qantas’ decision to ground the fleet was partially designed to get the government involved.

“The airline will be irretrievably damaged if it goes on for more than a month,” he said.

Qantas said it would lock out all employees from Monday night in the dispute which has affected 70,000 passengers and 600 flights on one of the country’s biggest travel weekends. Qantas’ budget airline Jetstar is not affected.

STRANDED

Qantas is a member of the OneWorld airline alliance, which includes Cathay Pacific, American Airlines, British Airways Plc, Finnair, Iberia, Japan Airlines, LAN, Malev, Mexicana, Royal Jordanian and S7 Air.

Alliance members often use partners’ routes and flights to shore up their own networks. Cathay warned its own passengers of potential disruptions on Qantas connections, and said they were monitoring the situation and would provide updates.

The airline’s decision left many flyers venting their anger.

“To resolve this at the expense of paying customers on one of the biggest flying days in Australiais quite frankly… bizarre, unwarranted and unfair to the loyal customers that Australia has,” a businessman, who only gave his name as Barry, told Sky TV at Melbourne airport after he was stranded.

Qantas’ Facebook page was inundated with angry passengers. “Stranded in Sydney Airport…because QANTAS are useless idiots,” wrote Lyn Haddon.

Zoe Johnson, an Australian living in Switzerland, said: “I’m proudly Australian but it just leaves a really bad taste in your mouth. So many people say, ‘I’m never going to fly Qantas again,’ and from my point of view its just feels like a kind of bullying tactic really.”

At London’s Heathrow Airport, passengers stood in long queues looking up at departure boards showing canceled flights.

“(I’m) not very happy because it was the holiday of a lifetime for us and it cost us a lot of money,” British passenger Steve Johnson said.

Adding to travelers’ problems, Air France has canceled about one in five flights and warned of wider disruption as a five-day strike by flight attendants over employment terms began on Saturday.

Qantas’ decision to halt flights comes during one of Australia’s busiest travel weekends, with tens of thousands traveling to the hugely popular Melbourne Cup horse race on Tuesday, dubbed “the race that stops the nation.”

Many passengers were stranded on aircraft waiting to take off on Saturday when the grounding announcement was made.

“Alan Joyce is holding a knife to the nation’s throat,” said Captain Richard Woodward, vice-president of the Australian and International Pilots Association.

An extended grounding could benefit domestic rival Virgin Australia and others such as Singapore Airlines, British Airways and Chinese carriers on international routes.

Virgin Australia said it would accommodate Qantas passengers where possible and was looking at adding more services in response to Qantas grounding its fleet over labor dispute.

SOURCE 

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Google’s YouTube Adding Original Programming

Google Inc. (GOOG)’s YouTube, the most popular video-sharing service, is adding new channels of original programming, an effort to attract viewers with professionally produced content.

The new programming will include channels created by celebrities and producers from the fields of music, television, film, news and sports,YouTube said yesterday. The first of these channels will appear next month, with more coming over the next year. The project’s budget is about $100 million, a person familiar with the plan said earlier this year.

“The Web is bringing us entertainment from an even wider range of talented producers, and many of the defining channels of the next generation are being born, and watched, on YouTube,” the company said in a blog posting.

Google, which mostly relies on Internet-search advertising, is looking to YouTube to help boost revenue from video ads. U.S. Web surfers watched an average of 19.5 hours last month, up from 18 hours in August, according to ComScore Inc.

The new channels will feature content from actress Amy Poehler, actor Ashton Kutcher and basketball star Shaquille O’Neal, as well as news and how-to content.

Last year, YouTube unveiled a program that provides grants to promising video producers.

Google rose $1.47 to $600.14 at the close in New York yesterday. Shares of the Mountain View, California-based company have climbed 1 percent this year.

SOURCE 

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Flash: Now More than 1 Million Without Power on East Coast

A rare October snowstorm bore down on the heavily populated U.S. Northeast on Saturday, knocking out power to a million customers, delaying flights and threatening some areas with up to a foot of snow.

By 2 p.m. EDT, New York City had broken an October snow record with 1.3 inches in Central Park, making this the snowiest October there since records began being kept in 1869, NBC New York reported.

Snow was coming down hard from central Pennsylvania to southeastern New York and Connecticut after hitting parts of Virginia, West Virginia and Maryland earlier in the day.

More than 1.1 million customers lost power in Pennsylvania, Connecticut, New Jersey and Maryland, and utilities were bringing in crews from Ohio and Kentucky to help restore it. Officials had warned that the heavy, wet snow combined with fully leafed trees could lead to downed tree branches and power lines, resulting in power outages and blocked roads.

Delays were reported at Philadelphia International Airport and at New York area airports. At John F. Kennedy International Airport, some arrivals were delayed by more than four hours, and six hours at Newark Airport. One live flight tracking site, FlightAwaretweeted more than 1,000flights had been cancelled nationwide.

“It’s going to be wet, sticky and gloppy,” said NWS spokesman Chris Vaccaro. “It’s not going to be a dry, fluffy snow.”

Snow, snow and more
Communities inland are expected to get hit hardest by the storm. The heaviest snow was forecast for the Massachusetts Berkshires, the Litchfield Hills in northwestern Connecticut, southwestern New Hampshire and the southern Green Mountains.

Cherry Grove, W.Va., on the edge of the Monongahela National Forest, received at least 4 inches of snow, according to the National Weather Service.

Relatively warm water temperatures along the Atlantic seaboard could keep the snowfall totals much lower along the coast and in cities such as Boston, National Weather Service meteorologist Bill Simpson said, with 3 inches of snowfall forecast along the I-95 corridor.

While October snow is not unprecedented, this storm could be record-setting in terms of snow totals.

October snowfall records could be broken in parts of southern New England, especially at higher elevations, National Weather Service meteorologist Bill Simpson said. The October record for southern New England is 7.5 inches in Worcester in 1979.

READ THE REST HERE 

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Groupon Considering Raising IPO Price Range Due to High Demand

Groupon Inc. may increase the price range of its initial public offering amid higher-than-expected demand for the shares from investors, three people with knowledge of the matter said.

An updated filing with a higher range may be filed with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission early next week should Groupon decide to increase the price, said one of the people, who declined to be identified because the information is private.

Groupon is floating a record-low percentage of its total outstanding shares in the offering, helping to stoke demand for the stock. Only 4.7 percent of the unprofitable company’s shares will be sold to the public, less than in any U.S. Internet- company IPO of more $200 million since at least 2000, according to Bloomberg data. The company is pitching the IPO to investors and aims to complete the offering on Nov. 3, the data show.

“I’m sure that it’s going to be fully subscribed,” said Brett Harriss, an analyst at Gabelli & Co. in Rye, New York, who was one of about 400 people attending the Groupon investor conference in New York City yesterday. “It’s a thin stock to start and, despite the recent criticism, they tell a good story.”

Groupon is seeking to raise as much as $540 million selling 30 million shares for $16 to $18 apiece, according to an Oct. 21 regulatory filing. Julie Mossler, a spokeswoman for Chicago- based Groupon, declined to comment on the stock offering.

In a typical IPO, investors receive shares worth 20 percent to 25 percent of the company, according to Paul Deninger, a senior managing director at investment bank Evercore Partners Inc. in San Francisco who isn’t involved in the Groupon sale.

Amazon, Microsoft

A rising stock market can encourage companies to expand their offerings. The Standard & Poor’s 500 Index rallied 17 percent from Oct. 3 through Oct. 27, when volatility hit a two- month low.

By selling at a higher price, Groupon would become even more expensive than Amazon.com Inc. (AMZN) and Microsoft Corp. The current price range values the company at about five times projected 2012 sales, people familiar with the matter said last week. That compares with 2.9 for Microsoft and 1.5 for Amazon.com, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.

Groupon reported a net loss of $10.6 million attributable to the company in the three months through September, bringing losses in the first nine months of the year to $214.5 million, according to its filings.

LaShou Group Inc., the Chinese operator of a daily-deal website, filed yesterday to raise $100 million in a U.S. initial public offering. The Beijing-based company will offer American depositary receipts that will trade on the Nasdaq Stock Market under the symbol LASO.

SOURCE 

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SHOCK: U.S. State Dep’t Has it’s Own Foxconn Sweatshop Factory Program

For years, it has been touted as a form of vacation diplomacy: a U.S. government program that selects college students from across the globe to come work at beach resorts, amusement parks and other seasonal jobs. In the process, the visitors are expected to imbibe American culture, practice English and take home fond memories.

But in August, students complained that their work conditions were closer to a sweatshop than a summer break, sparking demands for government intervention and a firestorm of bad publicity that federal officials are trying to tamp down.

More than 300 young foreigners, packing candy in a warehouse in Pennsylvania, staged a high-profile walkout and protest against their employers and the State Department, which oversees the program. They alleged that they had been worked to exhaustion and had met few Americans except supervisors who pressed them to pack faster and threatened to have them deported.

“My parents agreed to send me because it would be a way to improve my English,” wrote Aysel Kiyaker, a student from Turkey who paid $3,000 for her airfare and work visa. “They told us the job would be easy and fun and they would have pizza parties for us.”

Instead, Kiyaker found herself lifting heavy boxes on long shifts in the rural factory, owned by the Hershey Co. “After work my whole body was numb,” she wrote in an affidavit for the National Guestworker Alliance. She said one friend was threatened after she complained, and another was fired for not working fast enough. “After that happened, people were more afraid.”

The nonprofit guest-worker group took up the students’ cause and filed a formal complaint against the State Department, as well as Hershey and the Council for Educational Travel USA (CETUSA), charging that they had exploited the students as cheap labor. The strike ignited a media frenzy and raised alarms in Congress, in part because of concerns that American workers were being displaced.

CETUSA, which manages the program for the State Department, denied the allegations. Company officials suggested that the striking students had been misled by union activists and said other students had been placed at Hershey for seven summers without any problems. Hershey officials said they owned the building but had no role in hiring or supervising the students, which were handled through subcontractors.

“If any of them were dissatisfied, we were not hearing it,” said Terry Watson, CETUSA’s president. “We sponsor thousands of students every summer. The great majority of them have a wonderful experience and go home spreading the good word of America.”

But the bad publicity stunned and embarrassed the State Department. Officials there promised to investigate the alleged abuses and review the program, which brings more than 100,000 foreign students to the United States every summer. Department officials said they are planning a major overhaul to prevent such problems from recurring and to reinforce the program’s diplomatic purpose.

“We want to make sure it meets our goals for worthwhile exchanges that promote better relations with other countries,” said Michael Hammer, an acting assistant secretary of state, adding that the summer jobs are supposed to be part of a “positive cultural experience.”

In July, before the Hershey case erupted, the department tightened program rules after reporting an increase in “fraudulent job offers, lax job vetting” and other problems. Yet Hammer said that more than 90 percent of students report being satisfied with their experiences — and that many reapply for a second summer.

Vlad Bicu, 26, a student from Romania, worked in Colonial Williamsburg for two summers and returned in June to work at an amusement park in Ohio. Each time he has saved his wages to travel around the United States before returning home. “I have seen all America now,” Bicu said this week while visiting New York. “Your Grand Canyon is the most beautiful thing I have ever seen.”

Yin Fung Tan, 23, a student from Malaysia, spent the summer at Morey’s Piers, an amusement complex on the New Jersey shore, earning an average of $300 a week as a cashier and ride operator. The most important thing she learned was “to look people in the eye and speak to them,” she said. “In our culture we never do that.”

Company officials at Morey’s Piers said they recruit more than 700 foreign students each summer, traveling to job fairs from Singapore to Dublin. All start at $7.25 an hour and work alongside American students. “They learn from each other, and it changes their lives,” said Denise Beckson, director of human resources.

But labor activists asserted that the alleged abuses were far more typical than officials acknowledge. They said even students in lighter hospitality jobs are often underpaid, poorly housed and threatened with losing their visas or right to return if they complain.

“While the State Department was asleep at the wheel, this entire program has turned into a captive labor source where students are exploited for profit,” said Saket Soni, executive director of the guest-worker group. He said the program left U.S. workers “locked out” of steady jobs and foreign students “locked in.”

The State Department already has rules in place to protect foreign student workers, who must be paid minimum wage and are banned from certain risky or sensitive jobs, such as patient care and adult entertainment. Department officials said they are planning to add further safeguards before the next students arrive.

In the Hershey case, however, officials said only that their investigation is “ongoing” and that they have taken no action against CETUSA, Hershey or its subcontractors. In detailed formal complaints, the guest-worker group described systematic efforts to intimidate students who complained and charged that government investigators had worked in tandem with factory managers.

CETUSA, in turn, has fought back with competing affidavits from former Hershey workers. It quoted Lenka Vavrova, a Polish student, as saying she was “ashamed” of her co-workers for causing a fuss. They all knew what to expect at the candy factory, she wrote. “If they did not like it, they should have chosen something else.”

SOURCE  

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#Occupy Madison Gets Rubbed Out for Rubbing One Out

City officials temporarily denied Occupy Madison a new street use permit Wednesday after protesters violated public health and safety conditions and failed to follow the correct processes to renew or amend a permit.

The permit, which expired Wednesday at noon, required Occupy Madison protesters to relocate from their current space at 30 West Mifflin Street, also called 30 on the Square.

A neighboring hotel’s staff alleged voiced concerns about having to recently escort hotel employees to and from bus stops late at night due to inappropriate behavior, such as public masturbation, from street protesters.

In addition, officials agreed further occupation should not be allowed to continue without restrooms on site to avoid further public health violations.

“You can’t be affecting the safety and health of other people around you,” Madison Fire Prevention Officer Jerry McMullen said. “With the public health violations and the complaints I’ve heard, I don’t believe it meets the spirit of the ordinance to a street use permit.”

Occupy Madison representative and street use permit holder Paul Streeter said he hopes to use the 30 on the Square space again as soon as possible after Freakfest.

“[The protest] is indeed a work in progress,” Streeter said. “We will continue to address issues as they come up.”

Madison’s Parks Division requested a written form stating the dates and location where members wish to occupy.

“You can tell us what your proposals are, but we have no idea what you are doing, how you are doing it or what your safety and security plan is,” McCullen said. “We have nothing in writing to back it up, and we usually require that all events have [written plans].”

Occupy Madison is relocating onto Olin Terrace until Monday when Freak Fest is over, and they can request a new permit for 30 on the Square.

SOURCE 

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MENACE II CYBERSPACE: U.S. Gangs Turn from Streets to White-Collar Crime Online

When is credit-card theft a good thing? When the culprits might otherwise be killing you.

The Federal Bureau of Investigation says national gangs like the Bloods and Crips are becoming more sophisticated, turning to white-collar financial crime and cyber attacks that threaten Corporate America and, well, everyone.

The evolving criminal schemes, which include mortgage fraud, counterfeiting, bank and credit card fraud and identity theft, are attractive because they are much less risky than traditional gang-related crimes such as murder, drug trafficking and robbery, and have the potential to yield much greater profits, according to a new national gang threat assessment from the FBI.

Read more: http://www.foxbusiness.com/technology/2011/10/28/from-streets-to-cyberspace-us-gangs-turn-to-white-collar-crime/#ixzz1cCp81SMb

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