Ener1–a company that manufactures batteries for electric cars, and that received $118.5 million in federal stimulus money, and that Vice President Joe Biden visited last year the day after President Obama’s State of the Union Address—announced today that it has filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection.
via Electric-Car Firm That Got Biden Visit, $118M in Stimulus, Files for Bankruptcy | CNSnews.com.
How embarrassing this must be for President Obama, whose major speech theme so far this campaign season has been that every single American, no matter how rich, should pay their “fair share” of taxes.
Because how unfair — indeed, un-American — it is for an office worker like, say, Warren Buffet’s secretary to dutifully pay her taxes, while some well-to-do people with better educations and higher incomes end up paying a much smaller tax rate.
Or, worse, skipping their taxes altogether.
Warren Buffett’s Burlington Northern Santa Fe LLC is among U.S. and Canadian railroads that stand to benefit from the Obama administration’s decision to reject TransCanada Corp. (TRP)’s Keystone XL oil pipeline permit.
“Whatever people bring to us, we’re ready to haul,” Krista York-Wooley, a spokeswoman for Burlington Northern, a unit of Buffett’s Omaha, Nebraska-based Berkshire Hathaway Inc. (BRK/A), said in an interview. If Keystone XL “doesn’t happen, we’re here to haul.”
via Buffett’s Burlington Northern Among Winners From Keystone Denial – Bloomberg.
When burglar Kesler Dufrene became a twice-convicted felon in 2006, a Bradenton judge shipped him to prison for five years. And because of his convictions, an immigration judge ordered Dufrene deported to his native Haiti.
That never happened.
Instead, when Dufrene’s state prison term was up, Miami immigration authorities in October 2010 released him from custody. Two months later, North Miami police say, he slaughtered three people, including a 15-year-old girl in a murder case that remains as baffling today as it did the afternoon the bodies were discovered.
Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack announced Friday that his agency has approved a $25-million conditional loan guarantee to build a 55,000-square-foot biorefinery plant in Iowa.
The Fiberight facility will produce cellulosic ethanol by converting municipal solid waste and other industrial pulps into “advanced biofuels,” the news release said.
The project is expected to create 38 jobs and save 16 jobs. By contrast, expansion of the Canada-Texas Keystone XL pipeline would create thousands of jobs; some estimates say as many as 20,000.
via Obama Administration Says No to Oil, Yes to Biofuels | CNSnews.com.
Most healthcare plans will be required to cover birth control without charging co-pays or deductibles starting Aug. 1, the Obama administration announced Friday.
The final regulation retains the approach federal health officials proposed last summer, despite the deluge of complaints from religious groups and congressional Republicans that has poured in since then. Churches, synagogues and other houses of worship are exempt from the requirement, but religious-affiliated hospitals and universities only get a one-year delay and must comply by Aug. 1, 2013.
via Health plans ordered to cover birth control without co-pays – The Hill’s Healthwatch.
Indiana’s first specialty license plate that benefits gay causes is now available for purchase.
Bureau of Motor Vehicles spokesman Graig Lubsen said the Indiana Youth Group plate has been available since Dec. 28. The plate bears a logo with hands in rainbow colors reaching up.
via Indiana unveils its first license plate for gay youths | The Courier-Journal | courier-journal.com.
President Obama said that he will delay his vacation and keep Congress in session until the passage of his desired payroll tax cut and unemployment benefits extension — two proposals that Obama said would create more jobs than the Keystone XL pipeline that his administration recently delayed.
“I would not ask anyone to do something I’m not willing to do myself,” Obama said when asked if he would go on vacation while keeping Congress in Washington D.C. “We are going to stay here as long as it takes [to get unemployment extended and pass the payroll tax cut].”
via Obama: More jobs in jobless benefits than Keystone | Campaign 2012 | Washington Examiner.