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Cash-for-gold rip-offs

Cash-for-gold rip-offs prevalent 

Ann Hardie

The AJC

 Metro Atlanta / State News

5:23 p.m. Saturday, June 5, 2010

In recent years, the cash-for-gold mail-order industry has taken off as the price of the precious metal skyrocketed and Americans’ wealth plummeted. 

The price of the gold has skyrocketed as Americans’ wealth has plummeted. At the same time, an increasing number of consumers shipping off their Rolexes or class rings say they are getting pennies on the dollar or nothing at all. 

At the same time, an increasing number of consumers shipping off their Rolexes or class rings say they are getting pennies on the dollar or nothing at all from companies that claim they never received the goods.

The complaints have prompted lawsuits and investigations. Proposed federal legislation would regulate the industry, making it illegal for companies to melt down jewelry without customer authorization and require companies to give consumers ample time to request a refund.

Typically, the cash-for-gold mail-order business is supposed to work like this: A customer drops unwanted gold jewelry in a postage-paid envelope and a few days later receives a check in the mail. The amount is based on gold content (karats) and the daily price of gold, currently about $1,200 an ounce. If a customer thinks the amount is too low, he or she can send the check back and the jewelry is returned at no charge.

The question is: How could anyone blindly mail their valuables to some business they’ve never dealt with and expect a good result? 

“People make foolish decisions when they are under the pressure of hard economic times,” said Michael Galvin with the Better Business Bureau in southeast Florida, where several big cash-for-gold mail-order companies are headquartered.

He recommends that consumers who want to sell their gold approach jewelers in their communities.

“I surely would recommend going to them instead of putting your valuables in an envelope without any insurance and sending it to someone you don’t know,” he said. “I can’t overemphasize the importance of an individual looking in their own community for this service.”

Parkway Gold, with offices in Alpharetta and Cumming, advertises that it pays top dollar for gold. But Bob Weinberg, an owner of the family business, said consumers should not take his word for it.

“Comparison shop, just like you would for tires and shoes,” said Weinberg, who says he’s been dealing with precious metals for 50 years. He happily will provide customers with the names and numbers of his competitors.

If a company won’t quote you a price over the telephone, hang up, he said.

“There are people who will take advantage of those who are not informed,” Weinberg said. “There are a lot of good, legitimate people in Atlanta. We are not the only ones.”

But many people with money problems might be embarrassed to be seen in a local pawnshop or jeweler, said Evan Nierman, a representative of Cash4Gold, one of the largest players in the industry. Many consumers like the convenience that his company offers, he said.

“It is discreet. It is easy and fast. You can do the whole transaction without leaving the couch,” Nierman said.

Cash4Gold, headquartered in Pompano Beach, Fla., aggressively advertises on TV and online. The business took off after a popular 2009 Super Bowl commercial featuring rapper MC Hammer and former “Tonight Show” sidekick, the late Ed McMahon.

The company has done nearly one million transactions since its startup in 2007, Nierman says.

Cash4Gold also has taken a lot of heat. Florida’s attorney general has opened a civil investigation of the company in response to complaints from consumers. The attorney general’s Web site cites complaints from consumers who allege they were paid far too little for their gold, with checks as small as 7 cents; others allege Cash4Gold said it never received the valuables or that when consumers asked for the return of their gold, they were told it had been melted already.

The company said it is cooperating with the Florida attorney general’s office and is “confident that all outstanding issues will be resolved amicably.”

In January, the company upgraded its system so customers can more easily track receipt of their shipments, Nierman says.

“People have a lot of misconceptions about what their items are worth,” he says. “We make an offer. No one has to accept it.”

Cash4Gold sometimes gets mistaken for unscrupulous players with similar sounding names, Nierman says.

The company supports federal legislation to regulate the industry to increase transparency and openness, Nierman said. “We think it is a good idea.”

As gold continues to be so lucrative, financially strapped consumers will continue to look for fast and easy ways to cash in on it

The BBB’s Galvin emphasizes that consumers need to take time to research the companies they might deal with, paying special attention to a company’s terms and conditions. Some don’t give consumers the opportunity to reject the offered payment.

“People go to these Web sites and they see how great they look, but they forget to go to the bottom of the page and click on the terms and conditions,” Galvin said. “The key is the terms and conditions.”

Tips for Selling Gold

• Calculate an item's worth yourself. Note any stamped karat mark and weigh the piece on a good kitchen scale. Use this online calculator, enter karats and weight to learn the value based on the current gold price: www.dendritics.com/scales/metal-calc.asp

• Have valuables appraised by a reputable jeweler who will factor in workmanship and stones, not just gold. 

• Verify the current price of gold: check with a local jeweler or online source such as Goldprice or Kitco Metals. Remember, any purchaser will likely offer less than full value to accommodate a profit.

• Consider dealing with local jewelers and pawnshops. When Consumer Reports shopped identical 18-karat jewelry, mail-in companies offered 11 percent to 29 percent of market value while jewelers and pawnshops offered 35 percent to 70 percent.

• Be wary of Internet gold buying deals. Some consumers have lost jewelry and money on fraudulent offers.

• If you use a cash-for-gold mail-in company, insure your valuables for appraised value. Use certified mail or a shipping method that provides proof of receipt.

• Research any company you deal with. Read the terms and conditions. Some companies don't give consumers the option of rejecting an offer. Check the reimbursement policy for lost items – many limit their liability.

 

Sources: Better Business Bureau, Consumer Reports

Entry #2,439

Councilwoman seeks to boycott bikini wearing baristas

Councilwoman seeks boycott of bikini baristas, nearby biz

 

SARA CASTELLANOS
The Aurora Sentinel

Saturday, June 5, 2010 1:24 PM MDT

 

 
BIKINI BOYCOTT Bikini-clad women walking the streets advertising Perky Cups coffee shop have provoked Aurora City Councilwoman Molly Markert to spearhead an incendiary effort to boycott the shop and all businesses surrounding it. (File photo by Heather A. Longway/The Aurora Sentinel)
AURORA | Bikini-clad women walking the streets advertising Perky Cups coffee shop have provoked Aurora City Councilwoman Molly Markert to spearhead an incendiary effort to boycott the shop and all businesses surrounding it.

Markert and at least 30 other people have signed a petition to impose an economic boycott on the stores surrounding Perky Cups coffee shop at 12101 E. Iliff Ave. because of store owner Jason Bernal’s racy business tactics.

Markert, who did not return a call for comment, sent the petition along with a letter to the shop’s property manager on May 20, saying the store’s scantily clad employees are at risk of “rape and murder.”

A copy of the letter was included in Markert’s monthly newsletter sent to The Aurora Sentinel.

“There is nothing per se illegal about the antics he insists on forcing on the neighborhood,” Markert wrote in the letter addressed to Jamie Mitchell, a broker at Shames-Makovsky Realty Co., the property manager of Perky Cups. “When one of his employees is raped and murdered we will all mourn the loss. In the meantime, we pledged together to not shop or frequent any of the shops in that (shopping center) until the outside parades cease permanently.”

Bernal said the bikinis that are donned by his 10 employees pose no risk of sexual harassment, and Markert’s remarks went “overboard”.
“That’s out of line,” Bernal said. “We’re just a coffee shop, we do nothing illegal here.”

The store is in compliance with all city ordinances and is certified with the Tri County Health department, he said.

Perky Cups has been at the center of controversy since March when a 10-foot-by-20-foot sign featuring a woman in a bikini sprung up in front of the shop and resulted in a heated First Amendment debate.

City officials determined that the sign was protected by the First Amendment and it was in compliance with city code, although discussions about reducing the maximum-allowable size of standalone banners are currently ongoing.

The store also began receiving criticisms in April from people who were irked and unimpressed when the store’s employees began their Wednesday ritual of selling hot dogs in their bikinis outside of the shop.

Some business owners adjacent to Perky Cups are worried that the economic boycott will grow and become detrimental to their financial gains.

“It’s okay if they stay within their confines over there,” said Jim Pasquariello, owner of Daniel’s of Paris bakery. “But when they start parading around the shopping center, they look like prostitutes soliciting other things. The economy is sorry right now, and there’s a lot of vacancies in here, so if it were to escalate, it would be a big hurt to the businesses.”

Other storeowners say they think an economic ban on the entire shopping center is rash and unwarranted.

“Every business owner tries,” said Leo Kosolap, owner of the Ukraine Market. “I don’t think they are doing anything wrong.”
Entry #2,438

Fewer teens at work — blame adults

Fewer teens at work — blame adults

Parents emphasize education, older workers take scarce jobs

 

Ted Gregory

Tribune reporter

June 6, 2010

The drama of teen employment unfolds in front of Sue Paustenbach almost daily at Maciano's Pizzeria and Pastaria on Eola Road in Aurora.

In addition to managing the place, Paustenbach is the mother of a 16-year-old. But while Paustenbach started working at age 14, clearing tables at a golf course restaurant, she does not expect — nor necessarily want — her own son to hold down a steady job during his high school years.

"The one thing that's different," Paustenbach said when comparing today's teens with herself as a teen 30 years ago, "is that I think they have a lot more going on. It seems like they have a lot more responsibility than I had when I was a teenager."

Fewer teenagers have jobs or are looking for jobs this year than at any time since researchers started gathering statistics on such things in 1948. Figures from the Bureau of Labor Statistics show that about 33 percent of 16- to 19-year-olds are in the labor force, meaning they are employed or looking for jobs. Thirty years ago, when teen employment was at its peak, almost 60 percent of them were in the labor force.

Conventional cynicism might suggest the trend shows that today's teens are a lazy bunch, distracted, maybe even hypnotized by — or addicted to — video games, Facebook and texting.

The truth is a little more nuanced. Sure, kids might shoulder some responsibility for the historic low. But so do their parents.

The bureau's research indicates that parental emphasis on education and related extracurricular activities and community service are significant factors in the declining percentage of teens employed or looking for work. In other words, kids aren't working because, at least in part, their parents don't want them to be.

The evidence suggests that parents are "more willing to have their kids participate in school instead of in a job," said Teresa Morisi, an economist in the Office of Employment and Unemployment Statistics with the bureau. "Also it suggests that they would substitute volunteer work for paid employment."

School enrollment for teens last year had grown to 83 percent, from 73 percent in 1985, bureau figures show. And the number of high school students completing advanced courses and taking Advanced Placement exams also is rising. Figures from the College Board, the nonprofit education association that administers the Advanced Placement Program, show that 1.7 million students in the U.S. took 2.9 million AP exams last year. A decade earlier, 686,000 students took 1.1 million AP exams, the College Board reported.

The recession clearly is playing a part, and Morisi noted that she is unable to distinguish what portion of teen unemployment is due to the economic downturn. But the overall trend of teen employment has been dropping, except for a couple of hiccups, since about 1981 — in recessions and periods of robust economic health alike.

At Maciano's, Paustenbach said many of the 15 or so teen employees she manages are involved in sports or other extracurricular activities that cut down on the time they have available for work.

Her son, Aaron, was enrolled in a couple of honors courses and playing football at Oswego East High School this year. Aaron participates in a summer baseball league, and a summer workout program for the football team occupies chunks of four days each week, she said.

When he can squeeze it in, he passes out fliers for Maciano's and helps clean the restaurant, Paustenbach said, and that's exactly the way she wants it. She doesn't want to weigh down his dreams of a career in sports journalism with a menial job.

"I believe in school first, over everything," Paustenbach said. "I just want to be sure that he has every opportunity to follow his dreams, and I'll do whatever I can to help, because I didn't do it."

Kelsey Marks runs into similar sentiment at times from her parents. Marks, 17, who graduated from Neuqua Valley High School in Naperville on May 23, was captain of the lacrosse team and is a leader of her Young Life Christian group. She participates in another youth group at Good Shepherd Lutheran Church in Naperville and is a high-achieving student who took college-level classes in calculus, speech, anatomy and physiology.

She worked for a while, too, at Players Indoor Sports Center. But when lacrosse tryouts started in March, something in her schedule had to give and her parents pointed to the job. She quit but began work as a lifeguard once school ended for the year.

"They've always been supportive," Marks said. "But there have been times when they've said that I need to slow down a little bit and take a break."

Her mother, Cindy Marks, said her daughter is a "very driven and assertive individual. Our philosophy is family first, then school work, then your athletics and then work. She tries to balance all that and it gets overwhelming sometimes, even if you take work off the plate."

Beyond increasingly nudging their teenage sons and daughters from employment, adults are stunting the teen job market in another way.

"The data shows that more older people are competing for the jobs that teens would normally get," Morisi said. In a review of the retail and restaurant industries, two sectors that employ more teens than any other, Morisi found that those businesses added workers between 2000 and 2007.

But the percentage of teens working in those industries declined during that time.

Jocelin Fuller, 17, who graduated on May 27 from Eisenhower High School in Blue Island, said she has applied to five restaurants and about 10 stores in a job search that started in September.

"I think so many people are out there looking for jobs," she said, "and so many of those people are older than me."

Apart from the basic life skills of managing money and time, a job for a teenager can nurture other important traits, said David Gottlieb, a Homewood-based child and adolescent psychologist who has been in practice since 1985.

"It can be a big confidence booster," he added. "They usually do pretty well and earn some praise and make some money. They see that they can do things in this world."

Having a job also gives a teen "experience in what the real world is like, particularly if they have a menial job," Gottlieb said. "It can motivate them to do better in school and make them think about the direction they want to take."

Teens without jobs can too easily fall into hours of TV watching or video game play, Gottlieb said. That pattern can lead to anxiety, anger, even trouble with the law, he said.

Howard Madison of Naperville said he supported the choice of his daughter, Ashley, 15, to work for some of those other-than-financial reasons.

"It's just good for her to get used to being employed," he said. "It gives her a chance to see what it's like to be in the work force and to be dealing with different people."

Ashley said her father's attitude is uncommon among her friends. Many of the teens she knows want jobs, she said, "to make money and to have something to do over the summer. But their parents aren't letting them. They say that their parents say they're too young."

Ashley herself was an unusual success story. She went to the KidsMatter Student Job Fair in March at North Central College and applied for one job at one place: lifeguard with the Bolingbrook Park District. She got a call about two weeks later, took training and passed the lifeguard test.

Over the Memorial Day weekend, she started working as a lifeguard at Pelican Harbor Aquatic Park, earning $7.75 an hour, a wage she said "is pretty good for a first job."

But Ashley had been preparing for the position for a decade.

"We've had her in swimming classes since she was 5 or 6 years old," Howard Madison said. "This is the only job she's really qualified for."

Graphic: Teenager emoployment and school enrollment

Tribune, Tribune / June 5, 2010

 

 
Entry #2,436

Father gives away kids to settle debt

Mexico dad charged with giving away kids for debt

Sunday, June 6, 2010

17:17 PDT

MEXICO CITY, Mexico (AP)

Prosecutors in the capital charged Sunday that a man who reported his two children kidnapped last week really gave them to a woman to settle a debt of 25,000 pesos, or about $1,925.

 

 

The kidnapping report from Javier Covarrubias, 20, set off riots and street blockades in the poor Tepito neighborhood in central Mexico City as dozens of residents demanded that authorities provide more security.

The city prosecutor's office said in a statement that Covarrubias admitted he lied about his children's disappearance to keep his wife from finding out about his debt.

However, when the suspect was displayed to journalists Sunday as prosecutors announced his arrest, he denied the prosecutor's account, according to the websites of the Mexico City newspapers Reforma and El Universal.

Prosecutors said police were still looking for the two children. The office did not give the age of the youngsters, but media reports have said they are 1 and 2.

 

Read more: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/n/a/2010/06/06/international/i171759D78.DTL&tsp=1#ixzz0q7oScs3I

Entry #2,435

Rush Limbaugh marries Kathryn Rogers in Palm Beach

Rush Limbaugh marries gal pal Kathryn Rogers in lavish Palm Beach ceremony

Lauren Johnston
DAILY NEWS STAFF WRITER

 

Originally Published:Saturday, June 5th 2010, 12:05 PM
Updated: Saturday, June 5th 2010, 11:11 PM

 

Kathryn Rogers and Rush Limbaugh are set to wed Saturday in Palm Beach.
Capehart/Getty

Kathryn Rogers and Rush Limbaugh are set to wed Saturday in Palm Beach.

 

It's wedding bells for Rush Limbaugh – for the fourth time.

The conservative firebrand, 59, exchanged vows with Kathryn Rogers – a blond bombshell half his age – in a lavish Hawaiian-themed wedding bash headlined by none-other-than Sir Elton John Saturday in Florida.

It's an odd pairing considering El Rushbo's history of anti-gay commentary on his conservative radio show and the openly gay "Tiny Dancer" singer's longtime commitment to gay rights.

The Palm Beach Post reported the British superstar will pocket $1 million for playing the wedding reception at the posh Breakers Hotel.

The hotel has reportedly staffed about 50 additional security guards for the event.

Limbaugh and Rogers, 33, hosted a rehearsal dinner luau for 400 close friends and family at the hotel Friday night and the wedding will take place at Limbaugh's beachfront mansion at an undisclosed time.

Rogers told the Post in 2008 that the couple's age gap is part of what makes the romance work.

"I grew up so differently, traveling around the world, that I'm sometimes not able to relate to the average person my age," Rogers said. "Rush has such amazing experience."

The always outspoken radio talk show host has been uncharacteristically tight-lipped about his wedding plans – posting only a vague note on his website that he would be "out until Tuesday, June 15."

He made a plea for privacy in an e-mail statement to the Post.

"We try to live our lives as normal people. We do not seek media attention.We do not want it, especially for this," he wrote.

Limbaugh met Rogers in 2004 at a celebrity golf tournament.

He was divorcing his third wife at the time and the pair has dated for three years. 

Read more: http://www.nydailynews.com/gossip/2010/06/05/2010-06-05_rush_limbaugh_to_wed_gal_pal_kathryn_rogers_today_in_lavish_palm_beach_ceremony_.html#ixzz0q7AfQnp4

Entry #2,434

Burglar caught after license plate falls off

Not only did Jacksonville police get thief's license number, but license itself

June 3, 2010 - 11:13am

Dan Scanlan

 

Be careful what you leave behind — that’s the advice Jacksonville police are probably glad wasn’t followed in the case of two recent burglaries that ended Wednesday with arrests.

In one case, a license plate that fell off a car let police track down its owner. In the other, it was a drop of blood.

Police said security camera video from a March 14 break-in at a San Juan Avenue Hess station shows a dark four-door sedan pulling up to the store about 1:45 a.m. and a man getting out with a garbage can smashing the window.

The video shows the man filling the garbage can with cigarettes from the store and loading it into his trunk. That’s when the video shows the car’s license plate falling off before the perp drives away.

Officers found the license plate and ran it though the computer, tracing it to a Tennessee vehicle registered to 49-year-old Gary Browder at a Foxboro Road address in Jacksonville, according to the arrest report.

Browder was already in the Duval County jail, having been arrested Monday on two unrelated charges, and the latest burglary charge was added.

The other case started with a Jan. 21 burglary to International Bio Resources on North Julia Street. Police evidence technicians found some blood at the downtown crime scene and submitted it to the Florida Department of Law Enforcement laboratory for DNA testing.

The results of the tests recently came back matching 40-year-old Reginald Lawrence Everette of West 41st Street, an arrest report said. Everette was found already in jail following a May 21 arrest on unrelated charges, the latest charge added, police said.

 

The Florida Times-Union

Entry #2,433

Bill Clinton bank robber tries to escape from New York

'Bill Clinton' bank robber tries to escape from New York hospital

Joe Tacopino
Daily News Writer

 

Sunday, June 6th 2010, 1:00 PM

 

John Ryan robbed a bank last year wearing a Bill Clinton Halloween mask. BuyCostumes.com

John Ryan robbed a bank last year wearing a Bill Clinton Halloween mask.

The "Bill Clinton" bank robber made a run for office – the doctor’s office.
 
Convicted bank robber John Ryan of Cos Cob, Connecticut attempted to escape from corrections officers Friday as they transported the inmate from the Sullivan County Jail to Westchester Medical Center for a biopsy.
 
The repeat offender was in the process of negotiating a plea bargain when he made his ill-fated attempt.
 
The Connecticut bandit, who is known for wearing a rubber President Bill Clinton mask during heists, was undergoing tests for throat cancer when he made a dash for the exit.
 
“He made an attempt to bolt through the door,” Sullivan County Patrol Chief Art Hawker told the Times Herald-Record. “It all happened in the examination room.”
 
Two corrections officers suffered minor injuries while detaining the thief.
 
The “career bank robber,” along with an accomplice, entered a Bank of America last October wearing a Bill Clinton Halloween mask. The men claimed they had a bomb and hit the vault, making off with nearly $80,000 stuffed in a bag.
 
The bomb was a flimsy hoax, like the rubber Clinton mask.

Ryan has been charged with burglary, robbery, grand larceny and unlawful imprisonment.
 
The “Clinton” robber and his attorney, Stephan Schick, have been trying to negotiate a plea deal in an effort to get him released before sentencing to get treatment for his throat cancer.
 
The judge had previously deemed him a flight risk. The most recent incident will likely bolster his claim. 

Read more: http://www.nydailynews.com/ny_local/2010/06/06/2010-06-06_bill_clinton_bank_robber_tries_to_escape_from_new_york_hospital_.html#ixzz0q709EG2k

Entry #2,431

Whites in state 'below the replacement' level

Whites in state 'below the replacement' level

Justin Berton

Chronicle Staff Writer

 

Saturday, June 5, 2010

California's white population has declined since 2000 at an unprecedented rate, hastening the day when Hispanics will be the state's largest population group, according to newly released state figures.

There were half a million fewer whites in California in 2008 than in 2000, a period when the state's overall population grew by 4 million to 38.1 million, according to a study released Thursday by the state Department of Finance.

By 2008, whites made up 40 percent of Californians, down from 47 percent at the turn of the century. In 2000, Hispanics comprised 32 percent of the population; that number grew to 37 percent in 2008.

Analysts said the decline can be attributed to two main causes - a natural population decrease as Baby Boomers enter their later years and die at a faster rate than younger whites have children, and a migration from California since 2001 among whites who sought affordable housing as real estate costs soared.

"This is the first decade to see a year-over-year consistent population decrease due to natural causes," said Mary Heim, chief of the Finance Department's demographic research unit.

The study also confirmed projections that a steadily growing Hispanic population will surpass whites as the state's largest racial demographic in 2016. Hispanics are expected to become a majority of all Californians in 2042, Heim said.

Most Bay Area counties reflected the state's shifting numbers - Alameda County, for example, dropped from 41 percent white to 36 percent - while showing spikes in Hispanic, Asian and multirace categories. 

Yet, San Francisco's racial mix remained consistent. Forty-four percent of the city was white in 2008, 30 percent was Asian and 14 percent was Hispanic, just as it was in 2000. Only the city's African American population showed a slight decline, from 7 percent to 6 percent.

Below replacement level

Hans Johnson, a demographer at the Public Policy Institute of California, said white women in recent decades have tended to pursue higher-education degrees and stay in the workplace, leading them to have fewer children. The white population is now "below the replacement" level, Johnson said. "They're simply not replacing themselves."

The median age among California's whites is 44, while the median age for the Hispanic population is 28, according to the study.

Stephen Levy, director of the Center for Continuing Study of the California Economy, said the study also reflected how skyrocketing real estate prices pushed workers from California during the housing bubble from 2005 through 2007.

"This is a good look at what happens when your housing prices get way out of line with the rest of the nation," Levy said. "It will be interesting to see what happens when the market corrects itself."

Reverse of a trend

Johnson said migration into California was a national trend until the 1990s, when the number of out-of-state transplants began to decline.

Lower-paid California workers headed to cities like Phoenix, Las Vegas and Seattle, where they could make similar wages but pay less for housing.

"California is no longer attracting large numbers of people from other states," Johnson said. "And a lot of those who did come to California from other states were white, reflecting the ethnic composition of the country as a whole. 

"Now," he said, "that flow has dried up."

The decline among whites and increase in other groups in California is a long-standing trend, Johnson said.

"It's just faster now"

Read more: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2010/06/05/MNSG1DQ1BL.DTL#ixzz0q4IvsDVz

Entry #2,430

Primaries from Calif. to SC measure voter anger

Primaries from Calif. to SC measure voter anger

AP 

 

Meg Whitman
AP – Meg Whitman, Republican gubernatorial candidate hopeful, spoke to a crowd of mostly senior citizens during …
 

MICHAEL R. BLOOD

AP Political Writer 10:38 pm

LOS ANGELES – How angry are Americans? People primed for change vote in 12 states Tuesday in contests that will decide the fate of two endangered Washington incumbents — a two-term senator in Arkansas and a six-term congressman in South Carolina — while setting the stage for some of the races that could determine the balance of power on Capitol Hill in the fall.

In an Arkansas runoff, Sen. Blanche Lincoln could fall to a fellow Democrat, Lt. Gov. Bill Halter, who says "the only way to change Washington is to change who we send there." South Carolina Republican Rep. Bob Inglis is trying to fend off primary challengers who have made the race a referendum on his 2008 vote to bail out up the nation's banking industry.

The political strength of the tea party movement faces tests in several states, particularly in Nevada, where three Republicans are in a bruising fight for the chance to take on Democrat Harry Reid, the Senate majority leader, in November.

Republicans in California could send two political neophytes, wealthy former business executives Meg Whitman and Carly Fiorina, into races to succeed Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and challenge Democratic Sen. Barbara Boxer.

In an election season overshadowed by the ailing economy and unhappiness with Washington, three longtime incumbents already have lost: Sens. Bob Bennett, R-Utah, and Arlen Specter, D-Pa., and Rep. Alan Mollohan, D-W.Va. A party switcher new on the scene, Democrat-turned-Republican Rep. Parker Griffith of Alabama, stumbled this past week as voters demanded ideological purity.

A Pew Research Center poll in April found that public confidence in government was at one of the lowest points in a half century. Bennett calls the political atmosphere toxic. Races on Tuesday will provide fresh evidence of how far people want to go to shake up statehouses and Washington.

"I've become frightened over what our government is doing," says Roxanne Blum, 57, a Republican from Pahrump, Nev. She's alarmed by the soaring debt and has seen firsthand, through her work in the mortgage industry, the damage caused by Nevada's highest-in-the country foreclosure rate.

Once excited by Reid's ascendancy in Washington leadership, she now sees him as out of touch with his economically troubled home state. "When he comes here, he does lip service," she says.

Earlier congressional contests have shown that incumbency can be a yoke and that voter discontent is running through both parties, even though the Democrats who control Congress have the most at risk in November. With President Barack Obama's popularity slipping, issues from the health care overhaul law to taxes are defining races.

Tea party-backed Mike Lee, one of two Republicans who advanced to a June 22 primary for Bennett's Utah seat, says there's "a widespread feeling the federal government is growing, taxing, spending and borrowing way too much."

In the Arkansas runoff, Lincoln is suffering blowback from the right and left for her health care votes. Unions backing her rival have spent more than $5 million to defeat her. In one ad, she acknowledges the frustration among voters: "I know you're angry at Washington."

The Republican race to succeed Schwarzenegger has been a display of extraordinary spending as well as a test of how far right the party wants to venture on issues such as illegal immigration in a traditionally Democratic-tilting state.

Republican billionaire Whitman, a former eBay chief executive, has invested more than $70 million of her own fortune in the race against state insurance commissioner Steve Poizner, a wealthy former businessman who has put $24 million into his campaign. The all-but-certain Democratic nominee is Attorney General Jerry Brown, who was governor in the 1970s and 1980s.

Whitman and Poizner have challenged each other's conservative credentials in a torrent of negative ads. Poizner supports Arizona's tough illegal immigration law; Whitman does not. Poizner wants to cut off most state services to illegal immigrants and their children; Whitman would not end services for children.

In a year of tea party insurgency, "all of the Republican candidates in California have been pulled to the right," says political scientist Bruce Cain of the University of California, Berkeley. The question in November will be whether independents who cast decisive votes follow.

Fiorina, a former Hewlett Packard Co. chief executive who has Sarah Palin's endorsement, has a lead in polls over former U.S. Rep. Tom Campbell and state Assemblyman Chuck DeVore, a tea party favorite. Boxer's campaign has depicted the Republicans as out of step with mainstream Californians.

Nevada Republicans appear ready to punish Gov. Jim Gibbons for his messy divorce, potentially making him the first sitting governor to lose a nominating contest in the state in 100 years. Gibbons was trailing former federal judge Brian Sandoval by more than 10 points in a Las Vegas Review-Journal poll released Saturday.

Reid knows he's in trouble. But big-name Republicans skipped the race and he has seen his chances lifted after a caustic Republican primary that could leave him facing tea party favorite Sharron Angle. She wants to abolish the federal income tax code, phase out Social Security for younger workers and eliminate the Education Department.

Angle says she's in the mainstream; Reid supporters depict her as out of step with most Nevadans.

In addition to the Inglis race, South Carolina Republicans chose from a field of four candidates hoping to succeed term-limited Republican Gov. Mark Sanford, who was politically and personally damaged by an affair with an Argentine woman.

State Rep. Nikki Haley has the backing of the tea party and Palin in her bid to become the state's first female governor. In the past two weeks, two men have come forward to say they had trysts with her, which she denies, and the primary will tell whom voters believe.

In north Georgia, Tom Graves hopes his involvement with the Atlanta Tea Party Patriots will help him defeat Lee Hawkins, another conservative, in a runoff to fill a vacant House seat in a heavily Republican district.

Maine voters will choose nominees for governor in a wide-open race to replace Democratic Gov. John Baldacci, who's completing his second four-year term. A seven-way Republican primary includes tea party favorite Paul LePage. Candidates have been talking about jobs and cutting government regulation.

Iowa has a three-way Republican primary for the right to oppose Democrat Chet Culver, considered one of the nation's most vulnerable governors.

Montana, New Jersey, North Dakota, South Dakota and Virginia also hold primaries.

Entry #2,428

Inmate overpacked for jail stay

Cheeky inmate overpacked for jail stay, astonished cops say

 

Dee Riggs
World staff writer

 

Thursday, June 3, 2010

WENATCHEE — A full load of contraband came into the Chelan County Regional Justice Center on Wednesday night, leaving law enforcement officers amazed.

Coming in rectally — via one person — were a green cigarette lighter, cigarette rolling papers, a golf-ball size baggie of tobacco, a bottle of tattoo ink, eight tattoo needles, a one-inch-long smoking pipe and a small baggie of suspected marijuana, said Sgt. John Kruse, a Wenatchee Police Department spokesman.

“We were all wondering, ‘How do you put all that up there?’ ” Kruse said. “The tobacco was pretty impressive; it was a good ounce.”

Gavin Stanger, 24, of East Wenatchee, was booked into jail about 10 p.m. on a misdemeanor charge of disorderly conduct, said Phil Stanley, jail administrator. The inmate had arranged to serve three days in jail on the charge.

He said no contraband was found on a pat-down search or on a later strip search. About 90 minutes later, with Stanger in a single holding jail, a jailer found a plastic bag and duct tape floating in the cell’s toilet. After being questioned by jailers, the man surrendered the contraband.

The man will be charged with another misdemeanor: introduction of contraband into the jail, Kruse said.

Entry #2,427

New beer makes boobs grow bigger

 

03. 06. 10. - 13:00

Austrian Times

Pint of bitty please

 

It's a whole new reason to nip out for a pint.

Inventors of this lager tipple in Bulgaria claim their Bohza beer has been brewed specifically to make boobs grow bigger.

The beer - brewed from fermented wheat flour and yeast - was originally developed as a health drink to help new mums having trouble breast feeding.

Now women are flocking to brewers Yavor-M in Ruse after drinkers started to record some eye-popping results.

Spokesman Kristian Gyoshev explained: "We make no special claims but we get hundreds of testimonials from women who say their boobs have gone up one or two cup sizes.

"It's natural, healthy, fun to drink and cheaper than any surgery."

 

Entry #2,426
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