SAR #15118

Send money, not stuff.

The Mysterious Yeast: A chunk of land 50 feet high, 10 feet wide and about a thousand feet long rose out of the sea next to the island of Hokkaido, Japan. A scramble for development rights is underway. Contact your broker.

Bland Date: The F-35's troubles just keep on coming. Or not. This time it's the plane's engine, which as been found to be unreliable. This is not as bad as it sounds, because the plane can't fire its guns and its bomb bay doors are too small for its weaponry. What it does have is a manufacturing or development contract in every state and in at least 75% of congressional districts. Try to whomp that gopher.

Business Plan: Rather than go through the trouble of identifying and developing new medicines, big pharma finds it easier to buy competing companies or rival drugs and then jack up the prices in a less competitive market.

Once Over: In FL a deputy sheriff stopped a black man on a bike and shoots him within 4 seconds. In NJ the police have admitted that an 18 year-old was shot in the back . Two SC cops may actually go to jail for repeatedly tasering a woman in handcuff who posed no threat to anyone. There probably has not been an increase in police brutality or stupidity – it's not a sign of the collapse of society or anything - but we're getting a lot better at reporting it.
 
Asked & Answered: Robert Reich asks why so many Americans feel so powerless. Because we are. It's by design – ask the man with the kill switch on our communications systems.

Third One's Not A Charm, Either: The ultra-secret Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) and the also secret Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP, thought to be even worse than the first), joined with the Trade in Services Agreement will complete the destruction of the experiment in self-rule that has been America and seal the fate of most Americans to ever lower wages and deteriorating living standards. They are not about “free trade”; they are not even about trade as we understand the term. They are aimed, the three of them, at increasing the power and control of international corporations over the the laws and regulations that we-the-people may have or may want to have enacted to protect our homes, our environment, our health and our safety. Freedom's been gone so long it no longer matters, but what little is left they want to take for “the certain and inevitable enrichment of the few and the further  reduction in worker's already low wages.” In secret, no matter what Obama says. 
 
One Slice Fits All: “If taxes didn't exist, Republicans would have to invent them so they could say that cutting them would solve  our problems.” All of them. “There are only two problems with this: it's not true in theory, and it's not true in practice.”

Overlap: Polls show that about half of Americans favor legalizing same-sex marriage and about 50% are in favor of legalizing marijuana. For extra credit, what percentage of the former are part of the latter?

Limits of Power: Reports say that Obama, the out of control dictator, wants to transfer control of drone operations from the CIA to the Pentagon. Why can't he just tell 'em to do it? They both work for him, or used to.

Arcade Fire: A federal court has ruled that standing in Texas and killing folks in Mexico is not a crime. Kids, earn your NRA Border Patrol badge!

Reality Check: The government is considering dropping its ban on letting private parties pay ransom for hostages held overseas, as long as they pay the government a 25% surcharge. Corporations have long been allowed to do whatever they want. 
 
No Exit: The Fed may lay to rest any fears you may have about the effect ending QE will have on the economy by never ending its large-scale purchases of assets. Wall Street said “Good doggie” and tossed them a bone.

Porn O'Graph: Bragging rights.