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Editor’s note.  If you cannot fight poverty, redefine it.  That seems to be exactly what the Obama Administration is trying to accomplish.

This article originally appeared at NPR.org, with a different title.

The federal government has officially measured poverty for 50 years by looking at an individual’s or family’s cash income strictly.

But it’s been known for years that measuring poverty that way has its limitations. For instance, it doesn’t capture the impact of taxes on the poor who frequently don’t pay income taxes but pay disproportionately more of their incomes on employment and sales taxes.

So the Census Bureau is moving to expand the way it measures poverty. Granted, it’s not exactly moving at a breakneck pace; it’s taken 15 years to get to this point. But this is the government we’re talking about, remember.

On NPR’s Talk of The Nation Tuesday, Rebecca Blank…(read more)

Originally entitled “Whose Body Is It?”  By John Stossel.  Source: Creators Syndicate.

People suffer and die because the government “protects” us. It should protect us less and respect our liberty more.

The most basic questions are: Who owns you, and who should control what you put into your body? In what sense are you free if you can’t decide what medicines you will take?

This will be the subject of my Fox Business program tomorrow night.

We’ll hear from people like Bruce Tower. Tower has prostate cancer. He wanted to take a drug that showed promise against his cancer, but the Food and Drug Administration would not allow it. One bureaucrat told him the government was protecting him from dangerous side effects. Tower’s outraged response was: “Side effects — who cares? Every treatment I’ve had I’ve suffered from side effects. If I’m terminal, it should be my option to endure any side effects.”

Of course it should be his option. Why, in our “free” country, do Americans meekly stand aside and let the state limit our choices, even when we are dying?

Dr. Alan Chow invented a retinal implant that helps some blind people see (optobionics.com). Demonstrating that took seven years and cost $50 million dollars of FDA-approved tests. But now the FDA wants still more tests. That third stage will take another three years and cost $100 million. But Chow doesn’t have $100 million. He can’t raise the money from investors because the implant only helps some blind people. Potential investors fear there are too few customers to justify their $100 million risk.

So Stephen Lonegan, who has a degenerative eye disease that might be helped by the implant, can’t have it. Instead, he will go blind. The bureaucrats say their restrictions are for his own safety. “There’s nothing safe about going blind,” he says. “I don’t want to be made safe by the FDA. I want it to be up to me to go to Dr. Chow to make the decision myself.”

But it’s not up to Lonegan and his doctor. It’s up to the autocrats of the Nanny State. Tomorrow, I will show my confrontation with Terry Toigo of the FDA about that. She calmly and quietly explained that such restrictions are necessary to protect the integrity of the government’s safety review process until I shouted: “Why are you even involved? Let people try things!”

She replied, “We don’t think that’s the best system for patients, to enable people to just take whatever they want with little information available about a drug.”

So people suffer and die when they might have lived longer, more comfortable lives…(read more)

 Learn more about radio host and syndicated columnist, Kevin Price at www.PriceofBusiness.com.

FOX Business Network senior correspondent Charlie Gasparino reports that former Lehman Brothers CFO Erin Callan has resigned from her post at Credit Suisse and has left the financial industry.

“What we hear is, as you know, she’s one of the central figures in the financial crisis, was at Lehman when it was imploding, left for Credit Suisse… she is now out of the securities business as of December 31^st she has resigned.  The speculation is wide, and from what we understand, it’s these investigations.  She’s one of the central figures in a federal investigation into the collapse of Lehman.”

“She went to Credit Suisse and then she went on a lengthy leave of absence.  It was pretty bizarre—she was gone from the scene, until, from what I understand—I checked yesterday—December 31^st she’s officially out of there.”

We were shocked to see the number of people who watched the recent Tiger Woods press conference.  We guess many enjoy watching entertainment in the “two trains crashing” tradition.

Originally found at Forbes.com:

Here’s a way the rich are really different: They know how to use capital gains to protect their wealth from Uncle Sam.

That’s one conclusion from the Internal Revenue Service’s latest look at the 400 Americans with the highest incomes. Crunching numbers back to 1992, the report found–not surprisingly–that the rich got a lot richer. But the way it happened is intriguing.

In 1992 realized capital gains (triggered by selling an asset, such as a business or stock) accounted for 33% of the adjusted gross income of the average magnate. Back then, gains were taxed at a 28% rate. But by 2007, the latest year examined, the capital gains slice of the 400’s (by then much bigger) income pie had doubled to 66%. In 2007 the top federal tax rate on capital gains was just 15%, compared with 35% for ordinary income such as salaries.

A whopping $91 billion in capital gains reported by the “IRS 400″ in 2007 accounted for 9.2% of all favorably taxed gains among the 143 million tax returns filed. That compares with the IRS 400’s 1.59% share of total income of all Americans (a share that has tripled since 1992.)

The suggestion here is that the rich take advantage of a simple axiom of tax law: Taxes are not paid on unrealized gains (an increase in value), but only when an asset is sold and the gain realized. So the wealthy are able to develop businesses or make investments and watch them grow tax-free over many years before cashing out–at the most opportune time.

The 2003 tax cuts championed by President Bush dropped the top capital gains rate to 15%, its lowest level since 1933, providing a good window for taking gains. When the Bush tax cuts expire at the end of 2010, if Congress doesn’t act, the rate will revert to 20%–its level at the end of the Clinton presidency. President Obama favors allowing the top gains rate to go back to 20% and the top rate on ordinary income to go back to 39.6%…(read more)

CNN, Fox News, and every other network are jockying to be “number one” when it comes to news and information.  A new poll done by Broadcastingcable.com provided surprising results:

From Broadcastingcable.com:

A new poll finds PBS among the most trusted institutions in America and the most trusted name in news. According to an annual poll conducted by GfK Roper Public Affairs & Media, 40% of Americans trust PBS’ news and public affairs programs a “great deal.” Fox News was second at 29% and CNN was third at 27%.

Additionally, when asked to chose whether news coverage, investigations and discussions of major issues on PBS programs was “liberal,” “mostly fair” or “conservative,” 40% chose “mostly fair.” NBC and ABC were second with 33% each followed by…(read more)

From Forbes Magazine:

The city of Cleveland has had a colorful history. The Cuyahoga River, which runs through the city, famously caught fire in 1969 thanks to rampant pollution, and it wasn’t the first time. In 1978 it became the first U.S. city to default on its debts since the Great Depression. Cleveland sports fans have had to endure more anguish than those in any other city. The city has been dubbed with a less than endearing nickname: the Mistake by the Lake.

This year Cleveland takes the top spot in our third annual ranking of America’s Most Miserable Cities. Cleveland secured the position thanks to its high unemployment, high taxes, lousy weather, corruption by public officials and crummy sports teams (Cavaliers of the NBA excepted).

Slide Show: America’s 20 Most Miserable Cities

Video: Stockton’s Makeover

Misery was on the rise around the country last year. Sure the stock market was up big, but so were unemployment, foreclosures and bankruptcy filings. Meanwhile housing prices, the U.S. dollar and approval ratings for Congress continued their downward spiral.

The widely tracked Misery Index initiated by economist Arthur Okun, which combines unemployment and inflation rates started 2009 at 7.3 and rose to 12.7 by the end of the year thanks to soaring joblessness. That is the highest level since 1983.

Our Misery Measure takes into account unemployment, as well as eight other issues that cause people anguish. The metrics include taxes (both sales and income), commute times, violent crime and how its pro sports teams have fared over the past two years. We also factored in two indexes put together by Portland, Ore., researcher Bert Sperling that gauge weather and Superfund pollution sites. Lastly we considered corruption based on convictions of public officials in each area as tracked by the Public Integrity Section of the U.S. Department of Justice.

Read more at Forbes…

From the Fox Business Network:

FOX Business Network (FBN) has signed a multi-year deal with CNBC’s Charlie Gasparino, announced Kevin Magee, Executive Vice President for the network. Gasparino will serve as a senior correspondent, appearing across all programming to provide market updates and breaking news reports. He will make his debut on the network on Monday, February 22nd..
 
In making the announcement Magee said, “We are tremendously excited to have Charlie join the FOX Business family. His breaking news reports during the most recent economic crisis have proved invaluable and we look forward to adding his in-depth reporting to the network.”
 
While at CNBC, Gasparino served as the on-air editor was responsible for breaking some of the biggest stories affecting the financial markets during the recent recession. Before joining CNBC, he was a senior writer at Newsweek magazine where he broke major stories involving Wall Street and corporate America.
 
Prior to Newsweek, Gasparino served as a writer for the Wall Street Journal where he was nominated for the Pulitzer Prize in beat reporting in 2002 and won the New York Press Club award for best continuing coverage of the Wall Street research scandal. In 2003, he was nominated as part of a team of reporters for the paper’s coverage of the New York Stock Exchange and the resignation of its former chairman Richard Grasso.
 
A recipient of numerous business journalism awards, Gasparino is also the author of the bestselling financial books including, “The Sellout: How Three Decades of Wall Street Greed and Government Mismanagement Destroyed the Global Financial System” and “Blood on the Street,” as well as critically acclaimed “King of the Club: Richard Grasso and the Survival of the New York Stock Exchange.” He has also served as a contributor to the Daily Beast, New York magazine, Forbes among other publications.
 
FOX Business Network (FBN) is a financial news channel delivering real-time information across all platforms that impact both Main Street and Wall Street. Headquartered in New York—the business capital of the world—FBN launched in October 2007 under the leadership of FOX News Chairman & CEO Roger Ailes and is now available in more than 50 million homes in major markets across the United States. Owned by News Corp, the network has bureaus in Chicago, Los Angeles, Washington, DC and London. On the web at www.foxbusiness.com
 

This from the US Senate:

U.S. Senate Roll Call Votes 111^th Congress - 2^nd Session

as compiled through Senate LIS by the Senate Bill Clerk under the direction of the Secretary of the Senate

See how your Senator voted here.

Vote Summary