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Almost Half Of All Food Produced Is Thrown Away Between 30 and 50 percent of all food produced globally, equivalent to two billion tons, is thrown away each year according to a recent report written by the UK-based Institution of Mechanical Engineers (IME), titled ‘Global Food; Waste Not, Want Not’. The Guardian states that overly-cautious sell by dates, buy one get one free deals, and an obsession with only consuming fruit and vegetables that look perfect are some of the main reasons for this colossal waste of, not only food, but also the water, energy, and arable land used in...

Legislators will be dueling over guns this year at the Capitol, with gun-rights advocates set to oppose efforts to close Virginia’s gun-show loophole. Alexandria state Sen. Adam Ebbin (D-30) and Arlington Del. Patrick Hope (D-47) have introduced legislation that would require a background check for every gun purchase. That includes the 40 percent of current gun sales that take place in a private transaction, which do not require any kind of background check to be conducted on the individual purchasing the weapon. “The current laws are like Swiss cheese,” said Hope, who sits on the Militia, Police and Public Safety...

GARDENDALE, Ala. – Police say an Alabama pastor shot and killed his wife and wounded their 18-year-old daughter before stabbing himself in their home. Authorities say the Rev. Terry Greer is being charged with murder in the killing of 52-year-old Lisa Greer and attempted murder in the wounding of Suzanna Greer, a University of South Alabama student. Greer remains hospitalized with what police say are self-inflicted knife wounds. His wife died early Friday after being shot on Thursday. Police say the daughter took the gun from her father and escaped.

At least the teachers of Occupy Oakland are finally being honest about their political agenda. They’re openly calling for an all-out abolition of capitalism. The Occupy Oakland Education Committee – comprised of public school teachers from the Oakland, California school district – has renamed its publication “ClassRoom Struggle” and its platform TEACH, which stands for “Transform Education, Abolish Capitalism and Heal.” Finally the radical teachers have acknowledged what we’ve been saying all along: they want to end capitalism and replace it with a socialist economy, quite possibly enforced by a totalitarian form of government. And what, precisely, is their strategy?...

While at the same time comparing the Republicans to Opie! When I say that a comparison can be made between the Obama administration and Islamic extremists and terrorists let me be perfectly clear! In no way am I saying this relative to anything having to do with the Obama administration vis a vis the killing of innocent human beings! I do however say it in the context of the ability to listen to words, spoken or written, and then be faced with the prospect of having to successfully decipher the true meaning behind those words. Put another way, it's the...

The market begins the session with a whimper, and that's not such a bad thing. Last week stocks came out of the gate with gusto in a combination of excitement over the temporary resolution of one cliff issue and hope this could be the year when we go beyond green shoots. By the same token the set-up is positive. Expectations are low for corporate earnings and macro economic growth. The only places there might be too much enthusiasm are housing and automotive. Bonds are beginning to falter, and while predicting their demise has been the wrong prediction for thirty years...

Air France-KLM says the company will cancel its flights to Iran as of April, leaving Germany’s Lufthansa as the sole European carrier offering service to Tehran. … As part of a review of routes, the company is also halting service to Addis Ababa in Ethiopia and Khartoum, Sudan. …

The family’s ordeal began when they reached the hotel’s parking garage, which is shared with a Federal Emergency Management Agency building. A security guard at the parking garage entrance asked if Duncan had any weapons. Duncan said he carried two Smith and Wesson pistols under his seat.

Tiburcio Vasquez was one of California's most notorious 19th century bandits, but that did not stop education officials in one county from voting unanimously to name a new school in his honor. Come next August, children in Salinas will be heading to Tiburcio Vasquez Elementary School, unless the Alisal Union School District reconsiders its controversial naming choice. The decision to celebrate the Gold Rush-era outlaw who was hanged for multiple murders and a long string of other crimes in 1875 sparked a public outcry when it was announced last month. Law enforcement officials and even Salinas Mayor Joe Gunter insisted...

"No one, anywhere, is talking about doing away with the Second Amendment, and no one, anywhere is advocating stripping away gun ownership," MSNBC's Alex Wagner insisted on the January 11 edition of her eponymous noontime program. Nice try, Ms. Wagner, but exactly two years ago to the day, your colleague Richard Lui suggested it was time to "revisit the Second Amendment" following the shooting of Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D-Ariz.). In November of 2011, Wagner admitted to liberal comedian Bill Maher that she was "going to be pilloried for this" but that she would amend the U.S. Constitution to ditch the...

The Defense Department "Sequester" – a budget gimmick originally described as "ridiculous" by Harry Reid and the President's Chief of Staff – has become a Gordian Knot that the White House and Congress have so far failed to unravel.  Originally scheduled to be force implemented on January 1, 2013, it escaped solution during the New Year's Eve fiscal cliff fiasco.  Instead, the problem was just kicked down the road a few more weeks with a new drop-dead date of March 1.  Rather than providing relief, the legislative inaction accentuates uncertainty and compresses even further the time frame in which the...

Capping three days of meetings on ways to stem gun violence in light of the Connecticut shootings last month, Vice President Joe Biden said on Friday he was interested in technology that would keep a gun from being fired by anyone other than the person who bought it. And it became clear that President Barack Obama plans to push for a controversial ban on assault weapons and high-capacity magazines to stem gun violence in his State of the Union address next month. … Technology for so-called “smart guns” is being developed, although, so far there has been little demand for...

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and other Democratic leaders told President Barack Obama on Friday to consider side-stepping Congress if no agreement could be reached next month on raising the nation’s $16.4 trillion debt ceiling. And two Republican congressmen asked Obama in their own letter that the president to “be open and honest with the American people” on the nation’s finances in his State of the Union address next month. In their letter, Reid and other top Democrats said Obama should “take any lawful steps” to avoid defaulting on the debt—“without Congressional approval, if necessary,” The Washington Post reports. …

Two teenagers accused of killing a manafter he introduced them to a female prostitute will be charged with second-degree murder, a judge ruled Thursday morning... Llano told police he had Hypollite in a choke hold while Xolo stabbed him with a pen and hit him with a broken glassbottle. Xolo denied using the bottle but admitted to stabbing Hypollite with a pen. When officers arrived, they saw two teenagers hitting a man who was on the ground, said Hallandale Police Chief Dwayne Flournoy. The teenagers then ran away. Officers soon found Hypollite's body.

During the Obamacare debate, Paul Krugman told us we could ignore stories about what was happening across the ocean, writing that “In Britain, the government itself runs the hospitals and employs the doctors. We’ve all heard scare stories about how that works in practice; these stories are false.” Every so often, I wonder how Krugman would define a “scare story.” How about starving babies to death, as I wrote about last month? Would he say that’s “false,” or simply not a “scare story”?Let’s look at some new information from the U.K.’s government-run system and see whether we can expect our...

A Michigan civil servant is in hot water after being exposed as holding down two six-figure public posts at the same time - earning him more than the Vice President. Barnett Jones, has been paid $273,750 since May as Flint's administrator of public safety and head of security for the Detroit Water and Sewerage Department, despite the fact the posts are both full-time and based 70 miles apart, according to the Free Press. The lawman resigned his Flint role today after the newspaper began investigating his job-juggling. Flint City Administrator, Michael Brown, told the Press he wasn't aware of Jones'...

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(Phys.org)—As a young archaeologist, Peter Bogucki based his groundbreaking theory on the development of Western civilization on the most ancient of human technology, pottery. But it took some of the most modern developments in biochemistry—and 30 years —finally to confirm he was right. While working as director of studies at one of Princeton University's residential colleges in the 1980s, Bogucki theorized that the development of cheese-making in Europe—a critical indicator of an agricultural revolution—occurred thousands of years earlier than scientists generally believed. His insight, based on a study of perforated potsherds that Bogucki helped recover from dig sites in Poland,...

DEKALB COUNTY, GA (CBS ATLANTA) - A Decatur man fired his shotgun and hit a burglar who had broken into his home Thursday afternoon. It is the latest incident of homeowners protecting themselves from criminals. "I come into the gate. I come here and stop and he was coming out the window with a shotgun in his hand," said George McRae, who lives along Elgin Drive. The suspect found the shotgun that belonged to McRae inside the home after he had broken in. "I had my pistol in my pocket and I said, 'Put that gun down,'" McRae said. The...

A 13-year-old who police said was an innocent victim was shot in the stomach last night on a Roxbury street while walking to church for choir practice. The victim was taken to Boston Medical Center after the 7:10 p.m. shooting on Humboldt Avenue. Police said he is in critical condition and that his mother was by his side. Police said they are looking for a gray vehicle tied to the shooting at the corner of Homestead Street. Danielle Hunter, 29, said she stayed holed up in her home after she heard four shots. “The violence — it’s just terrible. It’s...