FIPID: FIPID - 11/28/12

Fun Interesting Pertinent Information Dissemination

Top Picks
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Nova Science Now: Can I eat that?
Don't let the pic of the cockroach fool you. This is a great show on the science of taste. I highly recommend it.

This graph should scare you (slow recovery happening)

Another scary graph: Tuition vs. Earnings

Global Ranking of Education Systems (The US is ahead of Hungary, Slovakia and Russia.)

Wall Street Professionals Admit: Yes, Lots of Us Are Corrupt
Nearly one in four "believed that financial services professionals may need to engage in unethical or illegal conduct in order to be successful.

Mine Kafon (video)
A short documentary portrait on a designer who has created a low cost solution to landmine clearance.

How Costco Became the Anti-Wal-Mart

But not everyone is happy with Costco's business strategy. Some Wall Street analysts assert that Mr. Sinegal is overly generous not only to Costco's customers but to its workers as well.

Costco's average pay, for example, is $17 an hour, 42 percent higher than its fiercest rival, Sam's Club. And Costco's health plan makes those at many other retailers look Scroogish. One analyst, Bill Dreher of Deutsche Bank, complained last year that at Costco "it's better to be an employee or a customer than a shareholder."

Mr. Sinegal begs to differ. He rejects Wall Street's assumption that to succeed in discount retailing, companies must pay poorly and skimp on benefits, or must ratchet up prices to meet Wall Street's profit demands.

Plastic's fantastic for thieves in California
Authorities in Southern California say there's an epidemic of plastics theft in their region, but it's become a nationwide problem. Authorities estimate businesses lose up to $500 million a year to plastic pallet and crate thieves.

What Does Poverty Mean to Children?
Child poverty has reached record levels with over 16 million children affected.

Is this the end for the filibuster?
Filibusters used to be relatively rare. There were more filibusters between 2009 and 2010 than there were in the 1950s, 1960s and 1970s combined....Party polarization has turned the filibuster into a noxious obstacle. Filibusters are no longer used to allow minorities to be heard. They’re used to make the majority fail. In the process, they undermine democratic accountability, because voters are left to judge the rule of a majority party based on the undesirable outcomes created by a filibustering minority.

Buffett Says Wealthy Avoiding Taxes Among Romney’s 47%

Writing on the door: "Obedience to the law is Liberty"

Politics and Business
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President Barack Obama signed legislation Tuesday that affords greater protection to federal employees who expose fraud, waste and abuse in government operations.

Naughty or Nice? See which companies made our list this year and why

Six out of every seven doctors agree: Our health-care system doesn’t work

Shadow Banking Grows to $67 Trillion Industry, Regulators Say

World Bank Warns Climate Change Could Devastate Global Economy

US judge says tobacco firms must spend their own money on a public campaign admitting deception about the risks of smoking

Westland/Hallmark Meat Settlement Reached After Major Meat Recall
A California slaughterhouse where videotaped mistreatment of cows prompted the largest meat recall in U.S. history has reached a symbolic $500 million settlement with an animal welfare group and the federal government.

What happens when a woman is denied an abortion?
A new research project at the University of California at San Francisco is studying a group of 231 women who were turned away from 30 abortion clinics across the country. Dubbedthe Turnaway Project, its researchers recruited women who had shown up at an abortion clinic days after its limit on gestational period had passed. It compares those women, who carried their pregnancies to term, with others who had abortions.

State highway safety chief has long driving record, recent accident
Her driving record includes seven accidents, four speeding violations, two failures to stop for a police officer, one failure to stay in her lane, one driving without registration or license in possession, and one driving without wearing a seat belt.

How tech giants are like feudal lords and users are like serfs

The economics of wasted leftovers
Willson says she hates to waste. But with that much food, it’s inevitable. She estimates that 5-10 percent of the family feast goes in the garbage. But compared to the rest of us, they’re doing pretty well. The Natural Resources Defense Council estimates that Americans trash 40 percent of our entire food supply. For a family of four, that works out to more than $2,000 a year. Dana Gunders is a food project scientist at NRDC. She puts the numbers in perspective.
“Imagine going to the grocery store, buying three bags of groceries, dropping one in the parking lot, and not bothering to pick it up," she says. "That’s essentially what we’re doing in our food system today."

For Restaurants, Food Waste Is Seen As Low Priority
Some of the Dumpsters aren't properly sealed, so there are grease and putrid juices pooling beneath them. They may attract pigeons, rats, cockroaches, ants or flies...
But in spite of the fact that as much as 10 percent of the food a restaurant buys ends up in landfills, hardly anyone in the restaurant industry gives it a second thought.

Science and Technology
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What's The Big Idea? Pentagon Agency Backs Student Tinkerers To Find Out

Ban ‘Killer Robots’ Before It’s Too Late
"Fully Autonomous Weapons Would Increase Danger to Civilians"
Phone patents: An absurd battle
"You only have to look at some of the ridiculous numbers involved in the smartphone wars to see why they continue to rage."

Scientists develop 3D tissue printer that prints cartilage

$12.8 billion budget approved for European Space Agency

Fun, Interesting, Disturbing and Offbeat
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Why Thai women cut off their husbands' penises

The report explains, for readers in other countries: "The Thai saying, 'I better get home or the ducks will have something to eat,' is therefore a common joke and immediately understood at all levels of society".

A Massachusetts woman who posted a controversial photo on Facebook of herself at Arlington National Cemetery with her middle finger raised has lost her job due to controversy over the picture.

Chess was introduced to Persia from India and became a part of the princely or courtly education of Persian nobility. In Sassanid Persia around 600 the name became chatrang, which subsequently evolved to shatranj, and the rules were developed further. Players started calling "Shāh!" (Persian for "King!") when attacking the opponent's king, and "Shāh Māt!" (Persian for "the king is helpless" – see checkmate) when the king was attacked and could not escape from attack. These exclamations persisted in chess as it traveled to other lands.

Source

Women in the porn industry are healthy rather than exploited, claims new study