Author: Serkadis

Acaba de ser filtrado un nuevo modelo de la marca gala antes de su presentación. No es otro que el nuevo Renault Mégane CC, un modelo que hemos podido ver en diversas ocasiones gracias a diferentes fotos espía. Aquí tenemos otro caso de filtración antes de su presentación.

Renault ha centrado los cambios en la parte trasera, mientras que el resto es igual que cualquier Mégane. Además, también conocemos todos los datos sobre la motorización.

La versión más básica hará uso de un motor de gasolina 1.6i 16V de 110 CV. Después podremos elegir un 2.0i de 16V y 140CV. En diésel tendremos disponibles tres dCi de 110CV, 130CV y 160CV respectivamente. A continuación os dejo con una galería de imágenes:

Related posts:

1. Renault Mégane CC, vídeo disponible
2. Renault Mégane RS ya esta a la venta
3. El Renault Megane III será fabricado en Argentina

Today, analyst Dennis Gartman weighs in with his take on yesterday’s commodity market weakness.

Commodity prices have all but collapsed as the dollar and the Yen have soared, and nowhere was that more evident than in the precious and base metals markets. Grains might zinc, aluminium, tin, et al… break trend lines in tandem one with the other and do so collectively and rather clearly only the un-wise or stubborn to not pay heed. The weakness of the base metals collectively is telling us in the very loudest of terms that there is at least doubt as to the efficacy of a global economic recovery, and there is growing concern that a re-entry into recession is likely… perhaps even certain. Attention then must be paid. Night flares have been sent up.

Turning then finally to gold itself… the “King” of all metals… we cannot help but think that as gold trades this morning “at the Battle of Hastings” price ($1066 earlier this morning) that this is the only metal we would wish to be long of. In a deflating environment we needn’t own platinum, nor palladium, nor silver, nor copper, nor zinc et al; but we may wish to own gold and gold only for when inflationary push come to deflationary shove only gold endures. The gold bulls were taken out behind the shed yesterday and tossed into the same trash heap of liquidation that the copper owners, zinc owners, rhodium owners and others were  tossed into. The margin clerks ran amuck yesterday, and they looked to gold for liquidity for it almost always can be found there. But now that the dust has settled, we own gold and we own government bonds as evidenced by our recommendations below. We’ll sit tight with both… for now.

For more information on Dennis Gartman’s “The Gartman Letter,” visit the official website at www.thegartmanletter.com.

Join the conversation about this story »

See Also:

• Gartman: Here’s How To Go Long Gold In Another Currency
• Gartman: The Russians Are Out To Control World Trade
• Citi: Gold Will Be Annihilated If Inflation Doesn’t Pick Up Soon

Bond for a Grayslake-area man accused of shooting a dog with one of the many weapons he illegally possessed was reduced to $250,000 Thursday in Lake County circuit court.

Elvin Dooley, 57, was arrested last week and charged with shooting a black chow mix dog that had apparently been dropped off at the Save-A-Pet No Kill Adoption Center near his home in the 24000 block of Townline Road.

A search of Dooley’s house turned up thousands of rounds of ammunition, and he later led police to 21 rifles and handguns he said he owned but had moved to a friend’s house.

Assistant State’s Attorney Michael Mermel said Dooley has at least one felony conviction, for a 1974 burglary in Alabama, but that earlier indications of a second burglary conviction from 1996 in West Virginia had not been verified.

He is charged with unlawful use of a weapon by a felon and aggravated cruelty to animals. His bond was originally set at $400,000.

Assistant Public Defender Sharmilla Manek asked Associate Judge Christopher Stride to release Dooley on a signature bond.

Manek said Dooley is a longtime resident of the area who does not pose a danger to the community, especially in light of the fact that police have taken all his weapons.

Mermel said he believed the bond should be increased for “someone so out of control as to be firing a weapon in a semi-residential area,” but did not cite a specific amount he was seeking.

Stride set the $250,000 figure and ordered Dooley to appear in court again Feb. 25.

He faces up to seven years in prison if convicted of the weapons charge and up to three years on the cruelty charge.

Read the original article on DailyHerald.com.

Filed under: Government/Legal, Safety, Toyota

The more we learn about Toyota’s rumored relationship with the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, the less we like it. Remember the claim that the government agency may have known about unintended acceleration issues as early as 2004? ABC News does, and the news network has been doing its best Sherlock Holmes work in an effort to learn more about the potentially damaging claims.

The ABC News investigation revealed that NHTSA wrote a memorandum limiting unintended acceleration claims to episodes lasting two seconds or less when the brake was never applied. The report states that the memorandum came down after agency representative Scott Yon met with two former colleagues (including Chris Santucci) who left the government to work for Toyota. Santucci testified back in December that the limited scope of investigations “worked out well for both the agency and Toyota.”

Also in question is whether federal safety investigators are included in a federal law that states that “an employee in the executive branch is barred for two years after leaving government service from representing any matter under the employee’s previous official responsibility.” Santucci left his job at NHTSA six months before he reportedly negotiated the terms of the investigation with his ex-colleagues.

According to ABC News, the limited scope of the investigations ruled out 26 of the original 37 claims of unintended acceleration. A reported 25 of those 26 incidents led to an accident or crash, and since those incidents were outside of the scope of the investigations, NHTSA never looked into the incidents. Sean Kane of Safety Research & Strategies told ABC News that the narrow scope of the investigation meant “NHTSA almost ensured they wouldn’t have enough complaint data to take action.”

The extremely limited and nonsensical scope of the investigations between 2004 and 2007 continually failed to show any failures, and Toyota routinely pointed that out when the subject was brought up even in the weeks that led to the original recall of 3.8 million floor mats in the fall of 2009. In fact, ABC News claims that a document provided by Toyota to NHTSA stated that the Japanese automaker would not even submit a report to the government “in which the customer alleged that they could not control a vehicle by applying the brake.”

Tired of Toyota recall news? Try out the recall-free version of Autoblog.

[Source: ABC News]

Report: After NHTSA investigator hired by Toyota, serious unintended acceleration cases ignored originally appeared on Autoblog on Fri, 05 Feb 2010 11:28:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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A scammy robocaller had spoofed Rodger’s phone number and angry recipients of the calls were calling him incessantly, but now it’s over. With AT&T’s help, he realized that the autodialer had spoofed his new work number, which was being forwarded to his cellphone. So he disabled the call forwarding, kept his cellphone number, and just had his new work number changed. Victory.

Unfortunately, due to deficiencies in the caller ID protocol, other victims might not be so lucky. The caller ID system is sent out directly from user device to user device and is easily manipulated. It might be time for phone companies to handle the caller ID so we can close this loophole and shut down auto-dialers more easily.

A new rainstorm that started to move into Los Angeles County Friday morning is expected to last through Saturday and could cause some problems for areas burned in last year’s wildfires, according to the National Weather Service.

“We are expecting periods of heavy rainfall, with rainfall rates which could pose a threat to the recently burned areas,” said Jamie Meier, a meteorologist at the National Weather Service in Oxnard.

The storm is expected to bring up to 1½ inches across the coastal and valley areas with as much as 3½ inches in the foothills and mountains, Meier said.

“We’re expecting rainfall today and a second wave to come in tomorrow, through the day Saturday,” Meier said. “The main cold front is expected to move through this morning.”

A flash flood watch is in effect for portions of Los Angeles, Ventura and Santa Barbara counties, and will remain in place through Saturday, Meier said.

Mountain resort areas can expect between a foot and 20 inches of snow at levels of 6,000 feet to 7,000 feet, dropping on Saturday to about 4,500 feet to 5,000 feet, just below the Grapevine on Interstate 5, Meier said.

It should also be quite windy, with mountain regions experiencing 20- to 30-mph winds and gusts up to 55 mph, Meier said.

Temperatures were not expected to rise above the low 60s, with overnight lows in the lower 50s through the weekend, she said.

— Ann M. Simmons

Photo: A man walks past a mural on the side of the Employment Development Department in Torrance during a rainstorm Friday morning. Credit: Rick Loomis / Los Angeles Times 

Photos: Raindrops are falling on … L.A.

More breaking news in L.A. Now:

Charges in Michael Jackson case remain in doubt amid squabbles

Surrender of Michael Jackson’s doctor now in doubt

L.A. sheriff’s deputies administer aid to stricken attorney

Police detonate explosives, sieze machine guns in Mar Vista

The latest issue of Asset Backed Alert says that Moody’s is currently in the process of preparing a report showing that holders of the most senior-securities of defaulted CDOs will get back, on average, 17 to 30 cents to the dollar.

I’ll repeat that. 17 to 30 cents on the dollar for these crappy CDOs in default.

Asset Backed Alert also reports that 2010 could see an uptick in the amount of CDO liquidations. What’s more, defaults aren’t likely to end anytime soon. Rather, they could actually increase this year. This could mean that banks and other financial institutions holding these mortgage related CDOs are in for another round of punishment.

Particularly, this quote is disturbing:

“Among the deals tracked by S&P, those that haven’t liquidated have either rearranged payments to accelerate principal installments to senior investors at the expense of junior holders, or done nothing.”

And this one too:

“There have been rumors of negative returns on some senior tranches saddled with out-of-the-money interest rate swaps.”

In the meantime, rather than worrying about total economic meltdown, we will simply wait for Moody’s to release their report and will then decide whether to breathe a sigh of relief or move to the North Pole.

Join the conversation about this story »

As far as practical renewable energy concepts go, these wind-powered highway lights are pretty elegant. And from my layman’s perspective, they seem to be practical and realistic. I like ’em! [Turbine Light via Inhabitat]

Burning garbage as an alternative to dumping it in landfills has been dropped as a possibility in Lake County for at least several years.

And, a special effort to find ways to dramatically boost recycling here by 2020 also will be made, following recommendations Wednesday.

The suggestions from the county’s public works and transportation committee were part of what has become a lengthy process to update the county’s solid waste management plan.

That’s normally an obscure exercise that occurs about every five years and requires approval by the full county board.

But the possibility of an incinerator as an alternative disposal method sparked a well-organized citizen effort to debate the merits.

“It just goes to show how a grass-roots effort such as ours can make a difference and very quickly,” said Grayslake resident Elizabeth Miller, spokeswoman for Incinerator Free Lake County.

Burning garbage and other alternatives to convert waste to energy for the first time were included in the waste plan update, although none were specifically recommended as answers to dwindling landfill space.

The two landfills in Lake County – Countryside in Grayslake and the Zion Landfill – have about 91/2 and 5 years of space remaining respectively, though a proposed expansion at Zion would add about 8 years of capacity.

The situation led the Solid Waste Agency of Lake County to conclude the county needs to “start seriously considering long-term options for managing its waste requiring disposal.”

Opponents objected to including incineration as an option, arguing it was an unproven and costly method that poses health risks.

Those concerns were taken to heart by the committee, which recommended incineration be removed from the plan as an alternative.

It also recommended limiting the amount of trash that could be disposed of in any alternative measure to 500 tons a day, and the technology in that instance be commercially available or proven.

About 2,500 tons of waste are dumped in Lake County landfills each day.

Decreasing that amount through recycling is another key aspect of the disposal plan, though the committee suggested upping the ante.

A provision added to the waste plan states a strategy should be determined to increase the county’s recycling rate from the current 38 percent to 60 percent by 2020.

A task force to include members of Incinerator Free Lake County and others will be created with the directive to weigh in on those possibilities by Nov. 1.

“What we’ll have to look at closely is the organic waste collection,” said Walter Willis, SWALCO executive director. Studies have shown food scraps account for about 13 percent of landfill waste, he added.

“It’s a huge component of our waste stream that we need to get out of there.”

The revisions in the solid waste plan will be made and considered a final time by the committee before being forwarded to the full county board for action.

Read the original article on DailyHerald.com.

Since the beginning of the crisis, the debate on financial regulation has focused on placing limits on financial services firms’ behavior, based on the idea that the government has to protect Main Street from Wall Street. Recent history suggests that bankers lack the incentive or will to avoid unsustainable, economically disastrous, and downright predatory behavior.

But just as a securities trader can focus on short-term profits and
ignore the incremental systemic risk
introduced with each transaction, the average American often
ignores the incremental risk he incurs with his own financial behavior — each credit card
opened, or each mortgage refinance. If we acknowledge that bankers lack the will-power to judge how much is too much*, then we must acknowledge the same failing in the common man, who lacks the banker’s financial background.

The average American deserves protection not only from Wall Street, but also from himself. What if, hypothetically, we imposed regulations on individuals similar to those imposed on banks? Here are three ideas for saving average Americans from our own worst impulses.

First, the government should require borrowers to make at least 20% to 30% down payments (twice what Congress is asking) on residential real estate, unless the potentially borrower has income and/or savings sufficient to cushion against significant home price depreciation. Interestingly, after I began this experiment, the FHA announced “more stringent” requirements for certain borrowers, as the WSJ points out:

The FHA will keep minimum down payments at the current 3.5%
level for most borrowers. But the agency will require riskier borrowers
with credit scores below 580 to make a minimum 10% down payment. While
the FHA doesn’t have a credit-score cutoff, most lenders require a
minimum 620 score.

Some housing analysts have pushed for higher down payments on
FHA-backed loans, and a bill in Congress would raise down payments to
5%, from the current 3.5%.

It looks like the Government is making steps in the right direction, but I don’t think its nearly enough.  First Fair Issaic
reports that ~13% of the general population has a FICO score below 600,
while Experian reports ~20% are below 619. I’m curious why the new FHA rules would require the riskiest 10% – 20%
of borrowers to put only 10% down when buying a home (whether credit
scoring is an accurate or appropriate measure to use is another
story). Most data suggests
low-“quality” borrowers are long-term risks for lenders, and this is especially pertinent since the subprime meltdown. Thus, the government should mandate that high-risk
borrowers must exhibit verifiable and stable high income and/or put
down 20% if not 30% equity at closing.

Critics of this approach may
argue that riskier borrowers compensate lenders by paying higher
interest rates. But the same critics often fail to acknowledge that
bringing more equity to the table generally helps the borrower — with a
larger cushion against declines in home prices and lower monthly
payments. A higher interest rate hurts
the borrower by imposing higher monthly payments, the bulk of which
will be allocated to interest for the first few years of the loan,
often the riskiest ones. Indeed, we’ve seen that ARM recast/resets
have accelerated delinquencies, and in some cases, defaults.

This approach would correct biases — like
borrower over-confidence — that are often discounted or ignored by lenders. If a potential borrower can’t afford the higher
down-payment, they should find an affordable rental in the short term. Chances are the amount they’d spend on rent
will actually be roughly the same (and perhaps, less than the) amount
of interest many low-quality borrowers would otherwise pay in interest
over the first few years of the mortgage, when only a tiny portion of
the monthly payment gets allocated to principal reduction.

Second, we should implement interim safety limits over the course of the loan. For example, if a borrower already has 6x debt/income and wants to
take-on more debt, he or she would have to either put up more
cash or exhibit increased earnings so that ratio wouldn’t increase with
a higher loan balance.  If the borrower doesn’t have the cash on-hand
or higher earnings, they can reduce their discretionary spending for a
few months (years) to repay their existing debt.  Such regulation would
not only protect existing lenders from increased default risk, but it’d
protect borrowers from predatory lending standards. It’s
fair to ask what would happen under these regulations in an
“emergency” situation?  Here, I’m not sure, but riddle me this: how
many such situations are caused, or at the very lease exacerbated by
years, if not decades of financial irresponsibility? 

The third and most crucial regulation is that
loan originators should be required to scan copies of official
client-provided income, indebtedness, and net-worth information to a
clients’ electronic file. The originating broker should be
responsible for personally inputting this information into the firm’s
loan application system and, verifying its accuracy.  Then,
based upon government-imposed maximum indebtedness, coverage, etc, the
originator could decide, based-upon their own scoring, how much debt
the borrower is capable of handling, any amount up-to, but not
exceeding the government-regulated number.  These firms should have
strict compliance and internal controls, empowered internal and
external audits, and random federal inspection to ensure they aren’t
abusing regulations, as well. 

In much of my prior work I’ve expressed significant skepticism of our government’s ability to not only create effective regulation, but to
enforce it with any success, especially during those times when its
needed the most.  While I’m no fan of creating more government
bureaucracy, I don’t see a reasonable alternative. As much as I’m loathe to admit
it, the laissez faire approach has failed. We return to the status quo at our peril. 

Would all this added red tape make it more difficult than in
2004-2006 to obtain credit?  For many people, absolutely. But look what happened when we let firms and
individuals obtain virtually as much debt as
they cared to take-on. We came precariously close to destroying the
entire global financial system! Surely, GDP growth may suffer as
expectations for consumer spending and home-price appreciation revert
back to non-bubble-period means, but we’d be making a marginal
sacrifice today in exchange for a much safer financial system down the
road, one that would be far less at-risk of credit-fueled boom/bust
cycles. 

The ideas expressed here are admittedly nowhere near perfect. But the financial regulation debate deserves honesty. We must accept the fact that the crisis
wasn’t caused just by bad actors on Wall Street, but by Main Street, as well.

_________________________________

*I’ll be the first to admit that one would be hard-pressed to make the case that Wall Street is even tangentially concerned with the “greater-good,” so long as its making money.  While he’s even more cynical than I, The Epicurean Dealmaker captured what many observers fail to realize:

Investment bankers have almost no interest in why things are the way they are. Rather, they spend all their considerable intellectual and psychological resources on understanding how they can take advantage of the way things are. 

This may be a bit of an over-simplification, seeing as TED, myself, and several others who work(ed) in Finance do exactly that which apparently we do not, but as the recent FCIC hearings illustrated, TED’s description certainly seems to apply to those at the very-top of the game.

CHICAGO  — A drunken driver was arrested after leading police on a chase that began in Indiana and ended outside a North Side police station after the car blew two tires and was only driving on rims Friday morning.

Indiana State Police started following a driver in Indiana whom they believed to be drunk, according to ISP District Chicago Master Sgt. Joe Stangl.

However, the motorist did not pull over and Indiana State Police pursued the driver until he reached Illinois, according to Stangl.

At 2:12 a.m., Illinois State Police took control of the pursuit as the driver traveled north on the Dan Ryan Expressway, Stangl said.

The driver entered northbound Lake Shore Drive and around 22nd Street, two tires on the 2007 Toyota car –  one of which was the front right tire — blew and it  continued traveling only on rims, Stangl said.

The driver exited Lake Shore Drive at West Belmont Avenue and at 2:30 a.m. — while still only driving on rims — finally stopped at West Addison Street and North Halsted Street where he was taken into custody without incident, Stangl said.

The Town Hall District police station is located at 3600 N. Halsted St.  — at the intersection of Addison and Halsted.

The driver, a man in his 20s or 30s, was expected to be charged to be driving while under the influence, but charges have not been officially filed as of 5:25 a.m., Stangl said.

Read the original article from WBBM News Radio.

With Valentine’s Day just around the corner, many of us are spending our days in bed, sifting through photos of boyfriend’s past with a tube of cookie dough in hand while The Fray plays in the background.

No? Just me?
Alrighty then….

Regardless if you’ve hit rock bottom, it’s not easy being single in February when it seems that everyone’s focus is on love: finding it, expressing it (with cheap chocolate), and (unknowingly…hopefully) rubbing it in everyone’s face who hasn’t quite found it yet. Who can judge you, then, for taking a trip down ex-boyfriend memory lane, thinking about all those wonderful little things you had together.

But maybe instead of drowning your sorrows in raw dough thinking of all the good in your past, it’s time to focus on the bad: all those jerks in your history of love who, thankfully, are long gone. Because as much as it sucked then, nothing lifts the spirits quite like realizing you’d rather be alone on V-day than with any one of these losers: (And hey, if you’ve got a man to snuggle up to on February 14th, you can still enjoy knowing he’s not like this.)

Kelly – University of Iowa: He was cute and “funny-a-hole-from-the-back-of-class” hot, but turns out he wasn’t so fond of anything that wasn’t white. When a hypnotist came to our high school and I was hypnotized, I was asked which celebrity I wanted to make-out with. I said Denzel Washington (OMG, duhhh, why not!?!) and he flipped out a month later because I thought a black man was hot. Racism is grosser than any halitosis problem. Yuck. Now, I’ve been dating a Mexican for over 2 years and there is no shame in that.

Samantha – UC Santa Barbara: Spent a long and amazing weekend with this guy that I had just started dating. Weekend included me dropping $220 on a hotel room for a spontaneous night at the beach and money on groceries all weekend, only to find out that he was going to another state to visit a girl for Valentine’s Day AND to see him tell another girl that he “found” all these cool places to hike in the hills (which I showed him). FML.

Christie – NC State: One of the biggest jerks I ever dated asked me if I was going to pick him up so we could go to the movies (on our first date). After I said I couldn’t, he made his friends drive him. When he arrived (late!), he immediately went up to the box office and bought himself a ticket, then turned and got out of the way for me to purchase my own. He wondered why I didn’t sit close to him during the movie (uh, get a clue). Oh, and he asked me out in a text message to be his girlfriend. Like an idiot I said yes, then he randomly could never hang out with me and about a week later I found out through Facebook he asked another girl out and began dating her.

Kelly – Simmons College: So many to choose from. It’s either the guy who broke up with me by not answering my calls for two weeks, or the guy who gave me a facial after I told him not too, then left me in his room while he went back downstairs to the party…

Carly – Grinnell: Wow. There have been a few doozies, for sure, but I think the dude who takes the cake is the one who broke up with me in high school over AIM on the night before finals, then started dating my best friend IN SECRET. That’s right. I didn’t even know they had ever been together until three years later when one of my other friends finally gathered the decency to tell me.

Brittany – University of Saint Thomas: Recently, a guy I had really liked and I were getting into the swing of things.  In fact, we had a steamy make-out sesh in his boat and literally 10 minutes later, I went upstairs and I caught him hooking up with his guy friend’s girlfriend. She was 17.

Meg – University of Delaware: Biggest jerk I’ve ever hooked up didn’t know how to take no for an answer (cut to me walking home by myself at 4am) and still tries every time I see him!

Sara C – Fordham: My first boyfriend broke up with me on my birthday. He said it was because his camp friends didn’t like me–but I’d never met them!

Lauren – University of Michigan: I dated a guy for two months and he ended things via mail. Addressed to Laura.

Alex – Lakehead: It would have to be Alex (yes, same name). He told me he broke up with his girlfriend for me and that he was falling in love with me after knowing each other for a week. Should have clued in, but obviously didn’t. One night at a bar, we kissed a lot and one of his girlfriend’s friends came up to us and tried to hit me because apparently they weren’t actually broken up. Luckily another friend saved the day and convinced the friend to back off.

Elizabeth – UC Berkeley: I think it would have to be the guy that made me pay for my own subway and bus ticket and then go inside and claim seats inside the venue while he smoked a joint.  Oh, and he also ended up giving me a piggyback ride that ended with me falling on my face on the sidewalk and chipping my front tooth in half.  What a winner.

Leah – Ryerson University: I was friends with this guy who I started getting feelings for, but he had a girlfriend so I placed them on the back burner.  Then he told me they broke up, we started hooking up and I started to really like him.  He then stopped talking to me, and I found out they hadn’t actually broken up.  Good times.

Melanie – Northeastern University: Two words: Adderall dick. Makes whiskey dick look like Ron Jeremy’s.

Kim – Stanford: I had been dating this guy for a while and Christmas was coming up. It was going to be our first Christmas as a couple and I spent hours thinking about what I was going to get him. I put together this great gift of all his favorite things and spent a good amount of time (and money) on him. Then we exchanged gifts. He legitimately gave me a candle for Christmas. A candle. And NOT even in my favorite scent. I faked that I liked it at the time and didn’t tell him till a year later how lame his gift was. He responded by saying he gave me the gift of light.

Jessica – FIT: So this guy called me to hang out at around 1:00 am, you know, the usual time to be hanging out.  I was already in bed but I was desperate and stupid so I got up, re-did my make-up and drove to his house.  When I got there, instead of inviting me in, he got in my car and told me his basement was already occupied by his brother so we’d have to “hang out” in my car.  After a few minutes he realized I did not want to make out with him in the back seat of my car, he got pissed off, told me I shouldn’t dress like a slut if I wasn’t going to act like one (I was wearing sweatpants and a t-shirt…) got out, and slammed the door.  Not to mention, I got my tonsils out the next day and he never called to see how I was.

Jessica – Delaware: My 9th grade boyfriend dumped me when I got sick with mono. He then proceeded to yell at me because he would miss soccer season if he caught it and blamed me for ruining his chances at a scholarship. He didn’t catch it. What a winner.

Emmy- Loyola University Chicago: I dated this one boy for three years. He got mad at me and asked my best friend to our senior prom without ever getting around to telling me that we were breaking up. The kicker is that she said yes. Yeah, he kind of sucked…

A home burglary in south suburban Country Club Hills started a police chase that ended with a four-vehicle crash in neighboring Hazel Crest early Thursday afternoon.

Country Club Hills police responded to a call of a burglary sometime after noon near 179th Street and Anthony Avenue, and began to chase a suspect vehicle, city spokeswoman Marge Seltzner said.

Neighbors reported the burglary, saying no one was home at the time, Seltzner said.

The vehicle — with at least three suspects riding in it — ran a red light at 175th Street and Kedzie Avenue in Hazel Crest, causing a crash involving a truck and two other cars, Seltzner said.

One person in the suspect vehicle had to be extricated and was airlifted to Advocate Christ Medical Center in Oak Lawn, Seltzner said. Another suspect was taken in police custody to Advocate Christ Medical Center in an unidentified condition.

A third suspect is thought to be at-large, sources said.

Multiple people from the other vehicles were reportedly injured and taken to area hospitals, but no further details were available, Seltzner said.

Hazel Crest Police are investigating the crash and the area continues to be barricaded, Seltzner said.

The Hazel Crest Police and Fire departments could not immediately provide details.

Country Club Hills Police are also investigating.

Read the original article from FOX Chicago News.

Jim and Susan’s mortgage is underwater by $160,000. They want to live up to their obligations, they want to keep their home, but they can’t do it with a $370,000 mortgage on a house that’s only worth $210,000. An attorney told them to send some “jingle mail,” just pop the house keys in an envelope, mail it to the bank, and move away. What they really want is a modification so they can stay in their house, but Bank of America has been jerking them around and they don’t have faith that this last hurdle will actually get them a mod. Isn’t there a decision-making human at BofA that can finalize this deal for them?

Susan writes: “My husband and I both lost our jobs in December of 2008. We were able to keep paying our mortgage with Bank of American, Countrywide, until April 2009. I immediately started working on a modification. In April, BOA said we were approved of a modification and we should receive the documents by FEDEX any day. We kept waiting and waiting and then, literally, in July, we called every week and they, out of the blue, told us we were denied. I can’t remember the reason why. They said we need to reapply. So we did and we again waited. In about August we were denied . We were both looking so hard for employment during this whole time and trying to keep everything afloat with just unemployment. We have gone through all of our savings and by October, only I had found employment and Jim was still looking.

The balance on our mortgage is about $370,000 and the value in 2009 dropped to about $210,000. We told this to a bankruptcy attorney and he said “dump the house, walk away. Its a bad investment, dump it”. This caused me to become very upset because, yes, it is a bad investment, but IT IS OUR HOME! We don’t want to lose it, we don’t want to have to move.

I called Bank of America and begged and pleaded for them to do something. They took all our financial information, again, and said we qualified for a modification and if we pay 3 modified payments, they would approve our modification. So we paid Oct. Nov and Dec payments, on time, exactly like they said. Beginning of January, we received a letter saying they were going to accelerate foreclosure! Jim called and we were told we were denied because we are behind more than $25,000 in payments. (Back in April, if we were approved of the modification, BOA would have made thousands in interest from our mortgage and we would not be in arrears by $25,000!) They said if we pay $2500 that would bring us under $25,000 in arrears and we need to REAPPLY and they will then do the modification.

So now, we are going to jump through this hoop, scrape together $2500, somehow, and reapply. BUT THIS IS WHERE WE ARE ASKING FOR YOUR HELP, PLEASE! Will this really be it? Will they really do the modification after we pay $2500? We are so desperate and scared about losing our house. We are both employed now – we can pay the modified mortgage payment but we are afraid they are going to string us along and we will lose our home. We need someone who can talk to someone at Bank of America who can make a decision and get something finalized. Representative Daley, can you do this? Please we really need help to save our home. We owe the debt, we know, and we are prepared to get back on track with our mortgage and start paying Bank of America back.

We all have heard that billions of dollars were given by the Obama administration to the banks for this exact purpose. What are they doing with this money?

Please help us, we will pay our debt, we just need someone in your position to get us to the right person to finanlize a modification. Thank you so much for reading this e-mail.

Jim and Susan”

If BofA won’t mod their mortgage, aren’t they really just daring Jim and Susan to strategically default?

NBC Universal management gets more and more ridiculous every time we come across anything they do. While they’ve left most of the more ridiculous statements to their chief lawyer, Rick Cotton (who is worried about the poor corn farmers harmed by movie file sharing), CEO Jeff Zucker has made his fair share of whoppers. While he got a lot of attention last month for his cowardly handling of the whole Leno/Conan mess, his latest move is to flat out lie to Congress. In a hearing in front of Congress as a part of NBC’s effort to merge with Comcast, Rep. Rick Boucher asked Zucker about Hulu being forced to block Boxee (a battle that’s gone back and forth a few times). When the whole thing started, Hulu management was very upfront about how they were pressured by their content partners like NBC to block Boxee, which is just another browser. It was quite clear that Hulu didn’t want to do the block, but had no choice due to pressure from the likes of partial owner NBC:

Our content providers requested that we turn off access to our content via the Boxee product, and we are respecting their wishes….

The maddening part of writing this blog entry is that we realize that there is no immediate win here for users. Please know that we take very seriously our role of representing users such that we are able to provide more and more content in more and more ways over time. We embrace this activity in ways that respect content owners’ — and even the entire industry’s — challenges to create great content that users love. Yes, it’s a complex matter. A tough mission, and a never-ending one, but one we are passionately committed to.

For those Boxee users reading this post, we understand and appreciate that you’re likely to tell us that we’re nuts. Please know that we do share the same interests and won’t stop innovating in support of the bigger mission.

So how did Zucker respond when asked about it by Congressman Rick Boucher? He blamed Hulu for making the decision, and falsely claimed that Boxee illegally access Hulu content:

Rep. Rick Boucher (D-VA): What about Boxee? Mr. Zucker you probably are in a better position to answer that. Did Hulu block the Boxee users from access to the Hulu programs?

Zucker (NBC): This was a decision made by the Hulu management to, uh, what Boxee was doing was illegally taking the content that was on Hulu without any business deal. And, you know, all, all the, we have several distributors, actually many distributors of the Hulu content that we have legal distribution deals with so we don’t preclude distribution deals. What we preclude are those who illegally take that content.

Of course, that’s a flat out wrong, as Boxee was not illegally “taking” the content at all. Boxee is a browser, like Firefox. If what Boxee does is illegal so is accessing Hulu with Firefox or IE. But it’s even worse than that, because last year, in a different situation, Zucker admitted that he had been a part of the decision makers to have Hulu block Boxee, telling Kara Swisher that “our vision” was to block Boxee in an effort to keep “Hulu being an online experience” rather than one you could access via a TV.

So why would Zucker flat out lie during a Congressional hearing, and throw Hulu under the bus while doing so? Does he not understand how Boxee works? Did he forget his own dealings with Hulu? Or is he just making stuff up in a Congressional hearing?

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Filed under: Convertible, Coupe, Performance, Cadillac, Chevrolet, Rumormill

The fifth-generation Chevrolet Camaro has been on the road for less than a year in production form, but, according to Motor Trend, General Motors is already considering a followup act. The current model is based on GM’s Zeta rear-wheel drive platform that was developed by Holden in Australia. While the Zeta cars, the Camaro and the late Pontiac G8, have generally been praised for their dynamics, they are not perfect. The platform is heavy and many of the originally anticipated additional applications have not materialized, raising the per vehicle cost in the process.

Last summer in the wake of bankruptcy, GM showed off many of its upcoming vehicles to members of the media, including a new smaller Cadillac dubbed ATS. The ATS rides on a new rear-wheel drive platform that has been referred to as Alpha. GM didn’t disclose exactly what they were calling the ATS platform, but they did tell us that it would be shared with the next-generation CTS which will likely grow a bit to better compete with the BMW 5 Series. Given the economics of building cars and the volumes expected for both the Cadillacs and the Camaro, it makes sense that the Camaro would move over to the Alpha architecture. One of the goals for all three models will be reduced mass, necessary to meet new fuel economy standards and improve performance.

[Source: Motor Trend]

Report: Next Chevy Camaro to use Cadillac ATS platform? originally appeared on Autoblog on Fri, 05 Feb 2010 10:57:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Remember this insane transparent OLED laptop we saw at CES? Well, Samsung is actually planning on selling this ludicrous contraption within a year. Prediction: it will be expensive and not worth it. But we’ll see! [PlusPlasticElectronics via OLED-Info]

Wikileaks, the whistle-blower site that has made the rounds since its launch thanks to revealing more than a few secretes and sensitive documents from governments or corporations, has announced that it managed to raise enough money to stay afloat for another year. The site had shut down temporarily last week, saying that it lacked funding to … (read more)

Today may be the last smooth commute for a lot of people.

Big CTA service cuts and changes will start this weekend.

Mayor Richard Daley said CTA leaders and their unions need to sit down at the bargaining table one more time before this weekend in hopes that employees will not lose their jobs.

Workers say the layoffs would be devastating.

CTA workers and passengers are bracing for big changes this weekend including layoffs and service cuts.

If the CTA and unions can not reach an agreement – service will be reduced on almost every bus and train line come Sunday.

That means crowded buses, trains and longer wait times.

Representatives from the unions say if a deal is not made by today, it probably will not happen over the weekend – and the cuts will take place.

Read the original article from FOX Chicago News.

By Stephen Leahy VICTORIA, Seychelles, Feb 5 (IPS) Swamps, marshes and other wetlands are beginning to be recognised as a country's 'green jewels', even in a tropical paradise like Mahé Island here in the Seychelles, with its stunning beaches and dramatic granite outcrops.

"Wetlands are one of the world's richest ecosystems on the planet," said Joel Morgan, minister for environment, natural resources and transport, Republic of Seychelles.

"We islanders live closer to nature than many others and we have long understood the importance of wetlands and environmental services and resources they provide us with," Morgan said at the first-ever World Wetlands Week.

Normally, World Wetlands Day is Feb. 2, but this year the Ramsar Convention, an intergovernmental treaty on conservation and wise use of wetlands and their resources, is celebrating wetlands around the world throughout the entire week.

The Seychelles were chosen for the global launch of World Wetlands Week because they exemplified the Ramsar principle of wise use successfully balancing tourism, development, food security and biodiversity, said Anada Tiega, secretary general of the Ramsar Convention.

"The Seychelles has done a good job implementing the Ramsar Convention," Tiega said in the opening ceremony.

The Seychelles Islands are a tropical archipelago 1,800 kilometres off the east coast of Africa with a population of just 85,000 people. They comprise 115 islands – the Inner Islands are tall and granitic and the outer low-lying comprise coralline cays, atolls and reef islands. Although generally small in size, wetlands of various kinds can be found on most islands.

Still, there are wetlands here that scientists have determined of are international significance. Praslin Island's Vallée de Mai, once believed to be the original site of the Garden of Eden, is both a Ramsar wetland site of international importance and a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

At a signing ceremony this week, two other sites were officially designated as a Ramsar wetlands – the Aldabra atoll, the world's largest raised coral atoll, and the Mare Aux Cochons high-altitude wetlands.

"We need to have a network of sites like this (Mare Aux Cochons) to support the unique life in the small islands of the Indian Ocean," Tiega said.

Wetlands include riparian areas, mangroves, mudflats, marshes and seagrass beds. In the Seychelles, they provide economic and conservation benefits through fisheries production, flood control, shoreline stabilisation, maintenance of coastal water quality for fisheries and coral reefs.

Wetlands also house extensive biodiversity, ranging from algae and lichens to plants, insects, amphibians, crustaceans, birds and fish.

Wetlands have often been treated as wastelands and drained for agriculture, or filled in to create building space. In the Seychelles, like many tropical areas, most of the mangroves have been destroyed – cut for wood, for coastal development or simply removed because they were once thought to harbour diseases.

Losing mangroves and wetlands means losing the valuable services they provide. Tourism, food security and coastal protection are often the most obvious losers when wetlands die. In small islands, the poorest people often live very near to and depend directly on wetland ecosystems for their livelihood.

The main challenge in small countries like the Seychelles, where tourism is the country's biggest source of income, is to balance development and conservation.

"For any nation, development is a must… On small islands, lack of land means some development will take place in environmentally sensitive areas," said Morgan.

Stringent development guidelines and planning are required to sustainably use and maintain wetlands for the benefit of humans and nature, as set out under the Ramsar principles. In resort developments in the past decade, wetlands have been integrated into building plans and become a real tourist asset to the economy with proper management and conservation plans, he said.

Climate change is the other major threat to wetlands, by decreasing precipitation in many places and increasing evaporation rates due to warming temperatures. The Amazon can't be preserved and store all the carbon in the forest without the 1,000-plus network of rivers and wetlands in the region that support the forest, said Tiega.

"Good management of wetlands can help mitigate climate change (by sequestering carbon)," he said.

And good management also means protecting peatlands from being turned into oil palm plantations because they store thousands of years of accumulated carbon. In fact, they contain more than twice the amount of carbon that can be found in existing forests today, he said.

"Climate change is threatening our very existence in the Seychelles. Tourism, fisheries, agriculture are already feeling the impact," said Morgan.

Wetlands play a very important part in the natural process of mitigation, he said. "We need to continue to value wetlands preserve them."