Defendant in Rutgers suicide trail pleads not guilty

Dharun Ravi, a nineteen-year old former student at Rutgers University, appeared in the courtroom today in New Brunswick N.J. There he pleaded not guilty to 15 charges. Ravi is accused of using a webcam to spy on his roomie, Tyler Clementi, an 18-year-old violinist, in a same sex encounter. The incident allegedly led to Clementi’s suicide and sparked the nationwide awareness of gay bullying.

Chance of 10 years

When it comes to Tyler Clementi’s suicide, Dharun Ravi is being charged with 15 different related charges. While appearing in the courtroom, he didn’t say anything. Steve Altman is Ravi’s lawyer. He gave the pleas for all of the charges. Bias intimidation is the charge that is considered probably the most severe. Ravi acted out of Clementi’s sexual orientation, according to that charge. If convicted of just that charge, Ravi might end up in prison for 10 years. Other charges include invasion of privacy and evidence tampering.

How Clementi was ‘outed’ by his roommate

Authorities say that shortly after Ravi and Clementi became roommates, Ravi “outed” Clementi by posting the message “Found out my roommate is gay” on his Twitter account. The comment was connected to a gay chat room Clementi was supposedly in.

Webcam used to spy

Ravi tweeted over it on Sept. 19, 2010. He said, “Roommate asked for the room ill midnight. I went into Molly’s room and turned on my webcam. I saw him making out with a dude. Yay.”

Clementi committed suicide on Sept. 22 by jumping off of the George Washington Bridge.

Covering up what occurred

Prosecutors in the case say that Ravi then erased Twitter and text messages in an attempt to cover up his alleged crimes.

Status conference to be held

On July 25, Judge Glenn Berman will have a status conference on the case. Ravi’s lawyers and the Middlesex County Prosecutors are expected to share evidence before that time.

Witness signed up for intervention program

Wei was also in the case and charged with invasion of privacy. She was a key witness. Earlier this month she was entered into a pretrial intervention program. She can have all charges dropped in three years as long as she meets all of the court’s requirements.

What his father wants

A statement was released right after the hearing from Clementi’s father. He said, “Our family is grateful for the active work of the prosecutor’s office in this case. We’re eager to see the criminal justice process move forward.”

Articles cited

MSNBC

msnbc.msn.com/id/43135427/ns/us_news-crime_and_courts/

Newser

newser.com/article/d9nd5i1g0/not-guilty-plea-entered-for-defendant-in-rutgers-webcam-case-linked-to-suicide.html

WABC

abclocal.go.com/wabc/story?section=news/local/new_jersey&id=8146113

Finding ways to go to Cuba

Travel to Cuba was mostly limited for the past half century. The people who long to don a Panama cap and enjoy Montecristo cigars and daiquiris in Hemingway’s favored bars have had to go without doing so. Loopholes and exceptions are there, and restrictions are starting to slowly get lifted. There are increasingly more Americans traveling to Cuba every year, but it is definitely not a good country to book for Spring Break or for a family vacation.

Cultural exchange makes Cuba travel possible

Relations between the U.S. and Cuba have not been the warmest for the past half century. A small number of people were allowed to go to Cuba in 1999 when Clinton signed a bill to allow it, states MSNBC. The Kennedy administration’s Cuban embargo is still in effect though. As long as an individual is going to Cuba for “people to people contacts,” it is acceptable. This means that individuals have to go to Cuba with the intention of learning about the Cuban culture. It is not enough to hope to see the individuals and places. People must have itineraries to be able to be allowed to go.

Not as stringent

To get into Cuba on a trip, a person has to go with a group. These groups are pre-authorized to schedule tours and the trip. A key rule change will make it easier to get into a tour of Cuba, as travel itineraries no longer have to be approved ahead of time by the State Department. However, Cuba it’s not a great place to take the children. Though the “person to person” travel exemption has been reinstated and more individuals are going there, most travel to Cuba is for academic, journalistic, governmental and religious purposes or for a limited range of commercial purposes, according to the State Department site. If you have relatives in Cuba, you can go there to see them. This is only okay if your relatives are Cuban nationals. In the Swiss Embassy in Havana, there is a U.S. Special Interests Section that functions as an embassy. Otherwise, there is no U.S. Embassy there.

Get documents in order first

The citizens in Cuba are kept under control with physical and other means. It is “a totalitarian police state,” the State Department explained. Do not worry about being safe while in Cuba. However, make sure you are respectful and have your paperwork in order if you’re going to visit. Most Cubans cannot travel at all. The exit visa, “white card,” required for Cubans to leave Cuba costs the equivalent of $150. Most Cubans live on $20 a month and barely get enough to eat, according to the Christian Science Monitor. Obama, according to Reuters, is open to normalizing relations and lifting some restrictions on trade and travel if the Raul Castro regime makes meaningful changes to the notoriously tight-fisted Cuban regime. Trade in Cuba is beginning to happen more often. Castro will not bid farewell to communism though.

Articles cited

MSNBC

msnbc.msn.com/id/43126754/ns/travel-news/

U.S. Department of State on traveling to Cuba

travel.state.gov/travel/cis_pa_tw/cis/cis_1097.html

Christian Science Monitor

csmonitor.com/World/Americas/2011/0513/Cubans-may-no-longer-be-stuck-on-Caribbean-isle

Reuters

reuters.com/article/2011/05/13/us-usa-cuba-obama-idUSTRE74C3P820110513

In Mexico, a semi-truck with five hundred and thirteen people was found

Two semi-trucks were stopped by Mexican cops and were found to be full of illegal immigrants, as the two tractor-trailers were attempting to smuggle 513 individuals into The United States. Law enforcement in Chiapas, Mexico, detected the illicit cargo with x-ray scanning equipment and discovered hundreds of people in dilapidated conditions were inside the trucks.

Human smuggling operation busted near Guatemalan edge

Mexican authorities busted a small human smuggling operation near the edge of Mexico and Guatemala, in the state of Chiapas. There were checkpoints near Tuxtla Gutierrez that two semi-trucks were driving through. With x-ray equipment, states MSNBC, they found hundreds of people in the trucks. The 513 individuals stumbled across in the two trucks were dehydrated and hungry. They had cargo ropes hanging for the people to hang onto to keep themselves upright during the drive.

More than five different countries work of immigrants stumbled across

There was certainly a variety of individuals in the truck. There were several individuals from different countries involved. The majority of the people were from Guatemala; however, some were not. There were 6 from Nepal, one from japan, 1 from china, 12 from India, 47 from El Salvador and 32 that had come from Ecuador. There were 32 females and 4 kids and the rest were male. Four smugglers were apprehended when they tried to flee, and their human cargo is in the care of Mexican authorities, according to CNN. The smugglers wanted $7,000 per person, according to the Chiapas general, and only had air holes drilled into the top of the trailer. The individuals would be put in different trucks so they could go to the United States after being re-routed in Puebla. In January, a truck containing 219 migrants was discovered in the same region.

Mexico main conduit for immigration to the United States

In order to the get the United States, many illegal immigrants will go to Mexico. Mexican authorities connected with the case, according to the BBC, said that this was the biggest find in recent memory. Coyotes, or coyotaje, are what the human smugglers are known as. They get illegal immigrants across the border for a payment. It is a hard way in for migrants. They could be abused or hurt without any way to look after it. There were 10,000 migrants kidnapped between April and September last year, reports the Christian Science Monitor. There were also 72 migrants killed by the Zetas drug cartel in just August of last year.

Articles cited

MSNBC

msnbc.msn.com/id/43073023/ns/world_news-americas/?GT1=43001

CNN

edition.cnn.com/2011/WORLD/americas/05/17/mexico.migrants/index.html

BBC

bbc.co.uk/news/world-latin-america-13434589

Christian Science Monitor

csmonitor.com/World/Americas/Latin-America-Monitor/2011/0518/More-than-500-migrants-found-crammed-in-trailers-in-Mexico

Beer becoming increasingly costly

No product is immune from inflation. And though the slow economy has made most of us tighten our belts, it seems costs continue to rise. As the barbecue season rapidly approaches beer prices is still rising at a rate we haven’t seen for three years.

Higher and higher prices of beer

In January and February beer prices went up 2.6 percent, showing a steady increase in 2011. In just a year, there was a rise from 5 percent to 8 percent on domestic, specialty and non-alcoholic beer prices. Craft beers have been hit especially hard. Prices are up 42 cents a case since last year, according to Paul Gatza, who is director of the Brewers Association.

Still working to get enough hops

The essential ingredient in beer is hops. Most of these come from Germany. It is where about 35 percent come from of the world’s supply. Just three years back, there was a huge hops crop problem in Bavaria. This is Germany’s largest state. Brewers worldwide felt the crunch, prices rose and, though the crunch has lessened somewhat since then, they are still scrambling to make up for it.

Growing grain has been hard

If you do not count water, another significant ingredient is grains. Most use malted barley. It is very common. Grain production is down this season due to a drought in China and a devastating heat wave in the Ukraine region of Russia. Without these crops, the price of beer continues to go up. It has been hard on corporations. According to the International Monetary Fund, the price of barley has risen to $196.37 per metric ton from $137.30 last year.

Increase in fuel

It is also essential to consider transportation. It plays an essential role. Raw materials have to be delivered to the brewer before they’re also shipped from the manufacturer to the customer. Every bottle of beer rises with the cost of bio-fuels.

Pub closures in the U.K.

The pressure is everywhere in the world. England is suffering a small company crisis as pub after pub, which is a mainstay of their local economy, is closing down. While the smoking ban and recent tax hikes have also been blamed for this trend, the largest reason appears to be the main difference in cost of drinking out and drinking at home.

“I would drink in pubs if the prices were not so high,” said Pete Jayes of Corby, England. “You can buy it for half the price in the supermarket.”

Citations

Daily Finance

dailyfinance.com/2011/05/19/whys-my-beer-so-expensive-the-forces-behind-a-sudsy-economic-i/

Evening Telegraph

northantset.co.uk/news/local/corby/jobs_fear_over_the_rising_cost_of_beer_1_2503350

Fox Business

foxbusiness.com/personal-finance/2011/03/17/raise-glass-higher-beer-prices-st-patricks-day/

Utah anti-prostitution law bans acting sexy

This summary is not available. Please click here to view the post.

Possibility that human beings can get super abilities

What would it be like to have a “Spidey sense”? Or radar senses like that of the superhero Daredevil, who could acrobatically get through a small space full of traps ready to kill, regardless of the belief that he’s entirely blind? Dr. Bradley Voytek, U.C. Berkeley neuroscientists, believes it wouldn’t be far outside the bounds of normalcy, as human beings have potential super senses that they rarely spend time developing.

The super abilities we aren’t using

Dr. Bradley Voytek is a U.C. Berkeley neuroscientist who explained that human beings have not developed mega abilities they have always had access to. The power of the human mind is extraordinary, Voytek reminds us. We’re able to hear and see with membranes in our brain. The basic biology and cellular processes involved work apart from and in concert with our conscious awareness, yet the degree of sensitivity involved in perception is far from basic.

Abilities according to Voytek

Quite arguably, states Voytek, the upper and lower threshold of our abilities lie far beyond conventional wisdom. As few as two photons in the retina could be seen by humans. A human should be able to see miles away something as simple as a candle flame. The right weather and landscape would make a difference to this.

It could also theoretically be possible that the range of human hearing – commonly from 20 Hz to 20,000 kHz – could focus down intensely enough to detect the vibrations brought on by Brownian motion, or the movement of atoms in particle theory.

Referencing yet another sense, it is known that humans can smell as few as 30 molecules of certain substances.

The ’super senses’ aren’t being used regularly

Too much attention is needed to use super sense which is why human beings don’t use them, according to Voytek. That much focus is too much for most people. People don’t want to have to focus like that. Human beings are required to focus intensely on one sense, ignoring the others, when testing the physical limits. You’ve to tune out senses consciously. This is how you get a hold of super-human senses. Our brains are able to create 3-D images even better the more we focus on perception.

You are a Daredevil

The senses can become much better when you lose one or two abilities. Ben Underwood and Terry Garrett are examples. They are both blind. Teenage Underwood is able to perfectly navigate his surroundings – even on a skateboard or roller blades – via echolocation. Underwood makes clicking sounds like a bat or dolphin. This allows a sonar sense to be created while his ears and brain work together. It is also possible for Underwood and Garrett to play video games. All they need is the sound of the game.

Dr. Voytek and other scientists will not give up until they have developed the understanding they need of the brain and the brain’s senses. We will continue to move forward until we know exactly how to acquire these super human senses.

Articles cited

CBS News

cbsnews.com/stories/2006/07/19/earlyshow/main1817689.shtml

Oscillatory Thoughts

blog.ketyov.com/2011/05/we-are-all-inattentive-superheroes.html

Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brownian_motion

Wired

wired.com/gamelife/2011/04/blind-gamer-plays-zelda-by-ear/

Ben Underwood has overcome his blindness without surgery

youtube.com/watch?v=G1QaCeosUmw

Senate does not want 401(k) funds used as personal loan

The Senate is trying to keep people from using their 401(k) money as a source of personal loans. Currently, retirement accounts can be borrowed from an unlimited number of times, which the Senate is looking to cap, and for good reason.

How retirement accounts work

Business Week states that a permanent limit on the number of times an individual can take money out of an IRA fund such as a 401(k) might become reality with a bill the Senate is looking at. Senators Herb Kohl (D-WI) and Mike Enzi (R-WY) are proposing the bill to limit withdrawals from 401(k) and other retirement funds in order to keep people from draining retirement accounts and jeopardizing their futures because of a temporary shortfall. Senator Kohl was quoted as saying that a retirement account isn’t meant for use as “a piggy bank.” The bill is called the “SEAL 401(k) Savings Act.”

Nearly a third of account holders borrow

The average loan taken from a 401(k) or similar account by the end of 2010 was $7,860. Almost 28 percent of people borrowed from it, an Aon Corp study reported. There were at least two large loans taken out before some of the people took money out of their retirement, Aon Corp explained. This was 58 percent of the individuals. According to the Aon study, about 70 percent who really take money from retirement default also. About 22.5 percent of those with 401(k) accounts at Fidelity have an outstanding loan balance when 2010 was over, USA Today reports. With these statistics we learn that people needed to take out money for emergency reasons. This was why individuals with 401(k) accounts would dip into retirement.

Problem with retirement

Several individuals are having difficulty figuring out how to one day retire. Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid are typically pillars of security for retirees because portions of their paychecks have been going toward these programs for decades. The programs are not a guarantee anymore. They have been changed quite a bit. If the Social Security Administration wants to be solvent, it would need $6.5 trillion. CNN states that this is why Social Security is beginning to become such a problem. In the next 25 years, the Social Security Trust Fund will probably be depleted, and it can’t be fixed with the current Social Security payroll taxes.

Information from

Business Week

businessweek.com/news/2011-05-18/senate-bill-would-limit-use-of-401-k-s-as-rainy-day-funds.html

USA Today

usatoday.com/money/perfi/retirement/2011-05-11-401k-retiement-accounts-up_n.htm

CNN

money.cnn.com/2011/05/18/pf/expert/expert-social-security.moneymag/?section=money_latest

Smaller businesses get a helping hand with credit ratings

Getting investment in a large idea or large business could be tough, but is possible. Then there are the smaller businesses that all of us use that aren’t the “big idea.” A new startup called OnDeck is intending to help these 5 million companies qualify for loans more effortlessly.

Loans for small businesses harder to come by

For many smaller businesses, qualifying for loans can be a challenge. Businesses without a credit history or business history sometimes have a hard time getting loans from financial institutions. Loans for amounts less than $100,000 are often considered not worth the work it takes to vet a full business with the standard 14-item business loan package. Faced with these two realities, several owners of companies with fewer than 25 employees end up using their personal credit to secure financing. This could be dangerous since all the risk is there for the business owner and is tied to personal accounts.

Answer with OnDeck

Cloud-based and interlinked, OnDeck aims to streamline the creation of financial reports and information for lenders. Companies input their business profile, link the profile to their online banking, accounting and credit-card processing accounts. The full financial profile, business credit report and prospectus is created with the information as well as industry data, regional information and tax data. It took five years to get the system put together. Now it creates reports that big businesses want to see. The reports also provide more real-time information than banks currently use, hoping to streamline the process for loans between $5,000 and $150,000.

Businesses can have even more

OnDeck provides new financing resources for small businesses, but it isn’t the only new resource for getting small business credit. Small company owners are able to start up a business with some help from StartUp America also, which is a new government partnership. The SBA also provides loan guarantees, counseling and information for small business owners. Business owners wanting to use other resources may have them accessible. Just try to find them.

Citations

Tech Crunch

techcrunch.com/2011/05/19/smart-lending-on-deck-gives-your-startup-a-credit-score-so-you-can-secure-a-loan/

Startup America Partnership

startupamericapartnership.org/

Marketing by charge card businesses still aims at college students

Part of the provisions of the CARD Act, the law aimed at taming ethically suspect practices of charge card businesses, was restrictions on how credit cards could possibly be marketed to college students. Card corporations are now finding ways around that.

Still seeing too several credit cards

The Credit card Accountability, Responsibility and Disclosure Act was a concentrated effort by legislators to restrict credit card company practices that many people felt weren’t ethical. One of the provisions of the CARD Act was to prohibit charge card companies and card issuing institutions from marketing heavily to college students, however they’re finding ways back onto campus, according to a recent article in the Wall Street Journal. It is now illegal for any promotional gifts to be offered to students. Still, they can give out signing bonuses such as the Citibank $50 bonus being offered. Students are still being marketed to on Facebook. By joining the Chase Facebook group, “karma” reward points are also offered.

Doing nothing wrong

Banks, not credit card corporations, offer most of the charge cards. For signing up for a checking or savings account, banks can give out promotional tings. This doesn’t make everybody happy. They see it as a canard. That same level is where marketing is from financial service businesses. The University of Houston Law Center did a survey of college students to find out that marketing to students is not typically on campus. About 73 percent is off of campus for advertising. Students are willing to skip the rules to get charge cards as well. That survey found that 29 percent of students used loan disbursements as proof of income in applying for credit cards.

Education costs

The increasing cost of attending a four-year university is an easy inducement for students to get charge cards to experience some comforts, like a meal consisting of more than macaroni and cheese. The debt from college is going up. Students are taking out more. The Sallie Mae foundation found that 92 percent of college students in 2009 charged an educational expense such as tuition or books and 20 percent of college seniors carried at least $7,000 in charge card debt, according to U.S. News and World Report. The highest average college debt seen ever has been carried with the class of 2011, the Time reports. A $22,900 average debt is carried by the class of 2011. From 2001, that’s a 47 percent increase while increasing even 8 percent from 2010.

Articles cited

Wall Street Journal

online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704322804576303652621312770.html?mod=WSJ_PersonalFinance_FamilyFinance#articleTabs%3Darticle

Time

newsfeed.time.com/2011/05/11/congratulations-class-of-2011-youre-the-most-indebted-graduates-ever/

U.S. News

usnews.com/education/blogs/student-loan-ranger/2011/05/11/student-credit-card-use-could-cause-problems-later