Say Anything North Dakota Senate Kills $352 Million Income Tax ...

Yesterday I wrote of the food fight going on between the North Dakota House and the Senate over HB1250, a package of income tax cuts. Well, yesterday evening the House (after much contentions debate) passed a $352 million package ($251 million in cuts for personal incomes, $101 million for corporate) with a strong, bi-partisan 76-vote majority.

Unfortunately, that package of tax cuts ran into a brick wall in the Senate where Finance and Tax Chairman Dwight Cook stood up to argue that $352 million was too much in tax relief for North Dakotans.

Here?s Senator Cook?s speech, watch the entire floor debate here.

?That $100 million can better be spent on property tax relief,? Senator Cook said. That?s a little ridiculous, given that the ?property tax relief? passed by the legislature isn?t money going back to taxpayers but is rather an enormous bailout to local governments with no guarantees that property taxes won?t continue to increase in the future.

The income tax relief is actual property tax relief. It cuts rates. It means more in our paychecks. It means more in our pockets, directly.

But I suspect Senator Cook might be motivated by politics. He invested a lot of political capital in his plan for oil tax restructuring that, while it passed in the Senate, fell flat in the House by a 6-87 vote.

Not coincidentally, I think, the carrier of Cook?s oil tax bill in the House who took his committee?s ?do not pass? recommendation to the floor was Rep. Craig Headland who was also the prime sponsor of HB1250.

Political payback? That seems likely, along with the fact that North Dakota?s Senate chamber just likes to spend rather than cut taxes.

Tags: craig headland, dwight cook, North Dakota News, Taxes

Source: http://sayanythingblog.com/entry/north-dakota-senate-kills-352-million-income-tax-package/

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Europe court: Tymoshenko jailing was rights abuse

KIEV, Ukraine (AP) ? Ukraine's jailing of former Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko was a politically motivated violation of her rights, Europe's human rights court ruled on Tuesday, dealing a harsh blow to President Viktor Yanukovych who has insisted that the case against his top opponent was not political.

The prosecution of Tymoshenko, the country's most vocal opposition leader, has strained the former Soviet state's ties with the European Union and the United States. Tuesday's ruling put fresh pressure of Yanukovych to ensure Tymoshenko's release if he wants to sign a key cooperation agreement with Brussels later this year.

There was no immediate comment from the government, other than a promise to closely analyze the ruling.

Tymoshenko, a heroine of Ukraine's 2004 pro-democracy Orange Revolution who was instantly recognizable her blond braid wrapped around her head like a crown, was sentenced to seven years in prison in October 2011 after being convicted of exceeding her powers as premier while negotiating a gas contract with Russia.

The West has condemned Tymoshenko's jailing and other legal cases against her as politically motivated and insisted on her release.

Tymoshenko has accused Yanukovych of masterminding the legal campaign against her to keep her out politics. She insists her rights were violated when she was first jailed in August 2011 during her trial on charges of contempt of court. The Strasbourg-based court agreed unanimously that her jailing was "for other reasons" than those permissible by law.

In Kiev, Tymoshenko's defense team called on Yanukovych to honor the ruling and free her from jail soon. Her daughter Eugenia said that the ruling will be like the "first ray of sunlight" for her mother who is undergoing treatment for a spinal condition in a hospital ward where windows are shut and draped.

"The European court has recognized my mom as a political prisoner and now the authorities in Ukraine will no longer be able to deny this and deny the fact that she must be freed in the coming days or weeks," a triumphant Eugenia Tymoshenko told reporters. "Today is the first step toward her complete political rehabilitation and she will be freed soon. Soon she will be completely cleared of all the false and absurd accusations."

The Ukrainian government's response to the ruling was muted. In Strasbourg, Ukraine's Permanent Representative to the Council of Europe, Mykola Tochytskyi, stormed out of the courthouse after the ruling was read out. In Kiev, the Foreign Ministry said it is not ready to comment until It scrutinizes the ruling, while a government representative with the Court told the Interfax news agency that the government may appeal. Both sides have three months to do so.

Yanukovych has left Kiev on a short vacation and his spokeswoman could not be reached for comment on the prospects of the president releasing Tymoshenko.

In the past Yanukovych has insisted that the Tymoshenko case is not political, that Ukrainian courts are independent and that he cannot interfere in the legal proceedings. He has also resisted calls to pardon Tymoshenko on humanitarian grounds. Yanukovych has said that he will consider pardoning her after all the other legal proceedings against her are over. Tymoshenko has been charged with embezzlement, tax evasion and organizing the murder of a politician and businessman 17 years ago ? charges she denies.

The European court ruling leaves Kieve to decide how to implement it. Last summer the European Court of Human Rights passed a similar ruling regarding a top Tymoshenko ally, former Interior Minister Yuri Lutsenko, whose jailing was also condemned as politically motivated by the West. The court ruled that the initial arrest of Lutsenko, who was then sentenced to four years in prison on charges of abuse of office and embezzlement, was also unlawful. While the Ukrainian government paid Lutsenko ?15,000 in compensation, as per the court ruling, he was released only in April after Yanukovych pardoned him on humanitarian grounds, not based on the Strasbourg ruling.

Kiev-based political analyst Volodymyr Fesenko said that Tuesday's ruling was not legally binding for Kiev, because it concerns the conditions of Tymoshenko's two-month-long arrest before her conviction and sentencing. Today, Tymoshenko is no longer under arrest and is serving out her seven-year-sentence, which she is also appealing with the European Court of Human Rights. It is unclear when a decision on that is expected.

"He will not free her now," Fesenko said of Yanukovych, adding that Ukraine may offer Tymoshenko monetary compensation but will contest the finding of political motives behind her arrest. "The legal marathon will continue."

Olga Shumylo-Tapiola, a Ukraine scholar at Carnegie Europe, also said that the decision, although unpleasant for the Ukrainian government, was not mandatory.

"The court confirmed that the way she was detained was politically motivated," Shumylo-Tapiola said, adding that it is now up to Kiev to ponder the next move. "They're not ready to release her."

Vadim Karasyov, a political expert with ties to the government, speculated that Tymoshenko will not be released now, but as a face-saving the government may allow for her to be transported to Germany for treatment before the landmark Ukraine-EU summit later this year. That way, Tymoshenko will still be out of the Ukrainian political scene, something Yanukovych wants, and Brussels may agree to sign the association deal with Kiev.

In Kiev, Tymoshenko's political allies and members of her party rushed to congratulate her and call on the government to ensure her release, but there was little jubilation on the streets of the Ukrainian capital with Ukrainians largely disillusioned with politics. In a tent camp set up in the center of the Ukrainian capital outside the courthouse where Tymoshenko was convicted, there were only a handful of her supporters, who reacted with joy, but said they did not believe the government would release her.

"He (Yanukovych) has always been afraid of her," said Oleksiy Karaulny, 63, a retired carpenter in Kiev, one of the activists at the tent camp. "Of course we are happy. And it's not only me who his happy, it's all the 12 million (people) who voted for her are also happy. They know that truth will come, that justice will prevail."

___

Hinnant reported from Strasbourg, France.

___

Lori Hinnant can be reached at https://twitter.com/lhinnant

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/europe-court-tymoshenko-jailing-rights-abuse-141813662.html

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Brazilian fighter gets eye glued shut during bout, wins anyway

Eye pokes are one of the problems facing MMA commissions as they try to evolve and keep up with the sport's explosive growth. Since eye pokes happen often, some rules are already in place, but more ideas need to be implemented to help the problem.

But a problem came up at a fight in Brazil that even the most prescient commission couldn't have expected. At WOCS 25 in Brazil, a staff member used glue to fix a hanging decal from a fight banner as staff worked on Carlo Alberto Lobo after the second round of his bout with Marcos Nene. The glue dripped onto Lobo's eye. Thinking it was the Vaseline that is applied to a fighter's face to discourage cuts, he rubbed it and ending up gluing his eye shut.

Fight staff worked like crazy to open Lobo's eye back up, but it didn't work. The fight was stopped. The crazy part? They had to go the scorecards and Lobo still won.

Thanks, Middle Easy.

Source: http://sports.yahoo.com/blogs/mma-cagewriter/brazilian-fighter-gets-eye-glued-shut-during-bout-215234756.html

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Many in Muslim world want sharia as law of land: survey

By Religion Editor Tom Heneghan

(Reuters) - Large majorities in the Muslim world want the Islamic legal and moral code of sharia as the official law in their countries, but they disagree on what it includes and who should be subject to it, an extensive new survey says.

Suicide bombing was mostly rejected In the study by the Washington-based Pew Forum, but it won 40 percent support in the Palestinian territories, 39 percent in Afghanistan, 29 percent in Eygpt and 26 percent in Bangladesh.

Three-quarters of respondents said abortion is morally wrong and 80 percent or more rejected homosexuality and sex outside of marriage.

Over three-quarters of Muslims in the Middle East and North Africa, South Asia and Southeast Asia want sharia courts to decide family law issues such as divorce and property disputes, the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life said on Tuesday.

Views on punishments such as chopping off thieves' hands or decreeing death for apostates is more evenly divided in much of the Islamic world, although more than three-quarters of Muslims in South Asia say they are justified.

Those punishments have helped make sharia controversial in some non-Islamic countries, where some critics say radical Muslims want to impose it on Western societies, but the survey shows views in Muslim countries are far from monolithic.

"Muslims are not equally comfortable with all aspects of sharia," the study said. "Most do not believe it should be applied to non-Muslims."

Unlike codified Western law, sharia is a loosely defined set of moral and legal guidelines based on the Koran, the sayings of Prophet Mohammad (hadith) and Muslim traditions. Its rules and advice cover everything from prayers to personal hygiene.

Amaney Jamal, a Princeton University political scientist who was special adviser for the project, said Muslims in poor and repressive societies tended to identify sharia with basic Islamic values such as equality and social justice.

"In those societies, you tend to see significant support for sharia," she told journalists on a conference call. By contrast, Muslims who have lived under "narrow if not rigid" Islamic systems were less supportive of sharia as the official law.

POLITICS AND VIOLENCE

More than four-fifths of the 38,000 Muslims interviewed in 39 countries said non-Muslims in their countries could practice their faith freely and that this was good.

This view was strongest in South Asia, where 97 percent of Bangladeshis and 96 percent of Pakistanis agreed, while the lowest Middle Eastern result was 77 percent in Egypt.

The survey polled only Muslims and not minorities. In several Muslim countries, embattled Christian minorities say they cannot practice their faith freely and are subject to discrimination and physical attacks.

The survey produced mixed results on questions relating to the relationship between politics and Islam.

Democracy wins slight majorities in key Middle Eastern states - 54 percent in Iraq, 55 percent in Egypt - and falls to 29 percent in Pakistan. By contrast, it stands at 81 percent in Lebanon, 75 percent in Tunisia and 70 percent in Bangladesh.

In most countries surveyed, Muslims were more worried about Islamist militancy than any other form of religious violence.

SEX AND VEILS

Views on whether women should decide themselves if they should wear a headscarf vary greatly, from 89 percent in Tunisia and 79 percent in Indonesia saying yes and 45 percent in Iraq and 30 percent in Afghanistan saying no.

Majorities from 74 percent in Lebanon to 96 percent in Malaysia said wives should always obey their husbands.

Only a minority saw Sunni-Shi'ite tensions as a very big problem, ranging from 38 percent in Lebanon and 34 percent in Pakistan to 23 percent in Iraq and 14 percent in Turkey.

Conflict with other religions loomed larger, with 68 percent in Lebanon saying it was a big problem, 65 percent in Tunisia, 60 percent in Nigeria and 57 percent in Pakistan.

A section of the survey on U.S. Muslims noted they "sometimes more closely resemble other Americans than they do Muslims around the world". Only about half say their closest friends are Muslim, compared to 95 percent of Muslims globally.

(Reporting By Tom Heneghan; Editing by Mike Collett-White and Michael Roddy)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/many-muslim-world-want-sharia-law-land-survey-160939872.html

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Newtown victim's daughter challenges Ayotte on gun vote (cbsnews)

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Leap2 Raises $1.6M For A More Social And Image-Centric Approach To Mobile Search

Search startup Leap2 is announcing that it has raised $1.6 million in new funding. It's also releasing new versions of its iOS and Android apps. Building a better search experience than the existing players is a pretty tall order. In Leap2's case, it sounds like the focus really is on the experience, incorporating more images and social updates into a unified search result. Mixing different media into one list of links may not sound particularly new, but founder and CEO Mike Farmer told me via email that Leap2's goal is to give you "the whole answer," so there's one result with all the content you're looking for, and you don't have to visit a number of different sites to piece things together.

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Techcrunch/~3/xpr5Gn8YaBE/

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Benchmark's Bill Gurley: ?Uber Is Growing Faster Than eBay Did?

Today at Disrupt NY 2013, Benchmark partner Bill Gurley shared an interesting fact about Uber. “Uber is growing faster than eBay did,” Gurley said. In 1997, Benchmark invested $6.7 million in eBay. It was worth more than $5 billion less than two years later. Benchmark is also an investor in Uber. “Uber is probably the fastest growing company that we?ve ever had,” Gurley said. He insisted a lot on the quality of the product. If a company builds a good product, it will grow organically. Benchmark took part in Uber’s Series A and Series B rounds of respectively $11 million and $37 million. Gurley seemed very satisfied with this investment and only had good things to say about the car company. “The product is so good, there is no one spending hundreds of thousands of dollars on marketing,” Gurley said. eBay and Uber are both consumer companies that have reached a lot of customers in a very short time. It contrasts a lot with his comments about the past failures of the tech industry. “On the consumer side, the risk is what there was in the late 1990s, with too much money spent on marketing,” Gurley said. A few days ago, New York finally decided that e-hail services would be able to operate in the city. Last year Uber launched UberX in New York, its e-hailing service on top of regular taxis. But the company had to kill its service because of legislation issues. Uber will now be able to enter the market again, with competition from Hailo, TaxiMagic and others. On Twitter, Uber investor Sherwin Pishevar added: I'd been hesitant to publicly say this re: @Uber but since @bgurley said it, I can confirm @Uber is fastest growing company I've ever seen.— Shervin Pishevar (@shervin) April 29, 2013 And check out the video of Gurley on stage below:

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Techcrunch/~3/59pVnzll9bg/

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