Some additional reading August 14th from 15:40 to 16:26:
- Appeals Court Rejects Plame’s Civil Suit Against White House Officials – "A federal appeals court upheld a lower court’s ruling Tuesday dismissing former CIA operative Valerie Plame Wilson’s civil suit against Vice President Dick Cheney and several other high-level White House officials who allegedly conspired to disclose her covert identity to the media five years ago.
The U.S. Court of Appeals said there was no constitutional precedent established to allow the case to move forward and declined to set one. Additionally, the appeals court said it was reluctant to get involved in litigation revolving around national security issues."
Surprise, surprise. - Dylan on the Economy: Some Insights – Freakonomics – Opinion – New York Times Blog – "Last week I asked blog readers to suggest the Bob Dylan lyrics they would use to describe the economy — a task requiring both deep knowledge of Dylan’s music and of current economic conditions.
The intersection of economics and Dylan is bigger than you might think, and yields some terrific suggestions.
And judging by the lyrics suggested, the Dylan-o-meter suggests that economic conditions are pretty bleak."
- Big Oil Earned $236 Per American Driver In The Last Year – "U.S. profits over the past year… $236 per American driver.
Oil and gasoline prices have broken all records this year. Oil reached $147 a barrel, and gasoline hit a new high of $4.11 a gallon earlier this month. And oil prices were 90 percent higher over the past three months than they were a year ago. These sky-high prices have created record profits for the largest oil companies in the world—but these profits have come at a time of high costs for American families."