Category: News

In case you missed it, General Motors has a new commercial out bragging about the company paying back all of its government debt. Last week, the company paid back the last $4.7 billion of its $6.7 billion loan. Does that make its commercial accurate? Technically, but if you consider the bigger picture, then this repayment looks much less significant than GM wants Americans to believe.

Here’s the commercial:

The key quote comes from GM Chairman and CEO Ed Whitacre towards the beginning:

We have repaid our government loan in full, with interest, five years ahead of the original schedule.

Again, this is technically true. The entire $6.7 billion loan has been repaid. But as pointed out last week, that was a small fraction of its $50 billion bailout. The U.S. government still retains 60.8% ownership in the firm, even though the tiny bit of debt has been repaid. So to act like GM is in the clear in regard to its obligation to the government is misleading at best and disingenuous at worst.

In fact, it shouldn’t have been very hard for GM to repay this loan — even without any profit. That’s because it used the equity injection from its bailout to repay the loan, according to Special Inspector General for TARP, Neil Barofsky. So even implying that GM was able to repay the government loans due to its improved performance is misleading. In reality, it just took money from Uncle Sam’s right hand and put it into his left.

(Nav Image Credit: JustMcCollum (Read Profile!) flickr)

Fetching over $131,200 when it went on auction last week, this Hildebrand & Wolfmüller motorcycle from 1894 was the first two-wheelin’ motorcycle ever to be put into production. More »

Yesterday we pointed out the growing fixation with with the correlation between Chinese equities and US equities. The question on everyone’s mind is: Does the decline in the Shanghai Composite foretell a similar decline here?

Our conclusion is that you needed more data to answer the question.

We still do, but while we’re looking at the question, here’s another angle. Chinese stocks have also acted as a leading indicator for commodities as this David Rosenberg chart (via PragCap) shows nicely.

Join the conversation about this story »

See Also:

• The Stock Market’s New Obsession: Is Shanghai A Leading Indicator?
• China’s Much-Vaunted Rebalancing Is A Joke
• Here’s A Property Boom That Makes A Mockery Of America’s (And It’s Not China)

Yesterday Modaco promised to release the instructions to root your HTC Desire. Well, today is the big day. If you’re ready to root your Desire and unleash its full potential, follow the instructions after the break.

Read this whole topic – it contains a ton of useful information as well as the instructions and downloads!

Remember that if you use this guide, you do so entirely at your own risk!

Welcome to my guide on how to root the HTC Desire – this is a ‘first cut’ of the guide, and will be refined / improved as time progresses!

Compatibility

This guide will allow you to root your HTC Desire, provided it has a bootloader version of 0.75 or below. To check this, turn off your device, then turn it back on with the ‘back’ key held. On the second line in green text you will see HBOOT- and then a number. Provided this is 0.75 or below, this guide should work for you.

O2 Germany devices are currently shipping with a 0.80 bootloader, and as such cannot be rooted using this guide at this time.

Desire rooting protection

Back in the early days of Android, rooting was easy. You had several options – you could flash stuff via the bootloader, you could flash an engineering bootloader, you could use kernel exploits – there were many ways of getting the low level access to your device that – in fairness – I think we as paying customers are entitled to. As time has progressed however, the manufacturers have made things harder and harder. The Desire is not a straightforward phone to root, for many reasons, including…

* a ‘perfected bootloader’ that doesn’t allow flashing or booting of any images (even HTC signed ones)
* a RUU flash process that does not allow downgrading of the bootloader to earlier versions
* a kernel (that as yet does not have publicly available source) that as yet has no known exploits
* a new protection method previously seen on the HTC Tattoo that protects key partitions from having write access. Even with SU access, it is not possible to write to the boot, recovery
or system partitions.

In reality, the options for rooting a device this secure are limited. Even if a kernel exploit were found, the key partitions would still be unwritable, rendering su access useless. This was circumvented on the Tattoo very cleverly, using a specific memory address from a confidential Qualcomm datasheet, however this information is not yet available for the Snapdragon chipset used in the Desire (and indeed may never enter the public domain).

And so the root process becomes a process of methodically probing every possible point of exposure on the device, looking for the slightest chink in the armour. I found one and we’re putting it to good use! The downside is that it’s not as easy or as pretty as rooting a device that is actually DESIGNED to be accessible at the lowest level, such as the Nexus One.

Shame on you HTC for going to such unnecessary lengths (but that’s another story for another day).

What this root process provides and does not provide

The root process will…

* flash your device with a new, generic 1.15.405.4 based ROM that has Superuser access
* show you how to enter the recovery image in future, allowing you to flash update zips

The root process will NOT…

* enable you to flash your device with a custom recovery image that can be launched easily by just holding down the volume down button when powering on
* enable you to have write access to the /system partition in normal use of the device

Both of these limitations are being worked on of course.

Pre-requisites

In order to complete this guide, you need the following…

* a HTC Desire
* a Windows machine (sorry, I am trying to remove dependencies on specific OS’)
* a Linux (a liveCD should do) or OSX machine (sorry, I am trying to remove dependencies on specific OS’)
* a microUSB cable
* a microSD card (to be made into a ‘goldcard’)
* the downloads below
* balls of steel (actually, I just made that up)

Downloads

To be ready for the guide, download the following items…

* the ‘test ruu’ – DOWNLOAD / MIRROR – MD5: f1981b26b90b97aea395d2b30909a23f
* the ‘push files’ – DOWNLOAD / MIRROR– MD5: 9ee301b702078dd1842bd1c67e552f6e
* the ‘rooted update’ – DOWNLOAD / MIRROR – MD5: 44f2614452ddf777cab9115e2174a91a

Once you have those on your machine, you’re ready to start!

The guide

Follow through these steps, one by one and at the end of it you’ll have a rooted Desire with the latest ROM.

Note: This process will wipe your device and there is currently no option to backup your device ROM before you start.

* Make your microSD card into a goldcard by following these instructions (it’s a good idea to back up the contents of your card first!)
* Copy the ‘rooted update’ you downloaded above to the root of your SD card, before replacing it into your device.
* Turn off your HTC desire, then turn it back on with the ‘back’ button held down. You’ll see ‘FASTBOOT’ written on the screen in a red box.
* Connect the phone to your computer, then run the ‘test ruu’ that you downloaded above (it may take a short while to start). Let the update complete and turn your device off as soon as it reaches the configuration wizard. If you need USB drivers, you can find them as part of the HTC Sync install.
* Your device should now be off. Unplug the device from your computer. Turn it on again while holding down the ‘volume down’ button this time. The screen will look similar to before, but will say ‘HBOOT’ instead of ‘FASTBOOT’. Use the volume buttons and the power button to select the ‘RECOVERY’ option. You should then see a screen with a red triangle – at this point, plug it into your Linux or OSX computer.
* Now you need to unzip the ‘push files’ zip that you downloaded above. When you have done so, you’ll see a file called ‘recovery-linux.sh’ or ‘recovery-mac.sh’. Run the one appropriate to your operating system and the screen of your device should change to display the green recovery image menu.
* In the recovery image (moving around using the optical trackball), select ‘Wipe -> Wipe data /factory reset’ then ‘Flash zip from sdcard’ and choose the rooted update. Confirm with the trackball and the update process will begin. It’ll take a little while, so go make a nice cup of tea.
* When the flash has finished, reboot, and you are DONE!

[via Modaco]

Posted by Michelle Manchir at 12:29 p.m.



SPRINGFIELD — After watching his own running mate’s candidacy implode in February, Gov. Pat Quinn today indicated he favors legislation that would require the candidates for governor and lieutenant governor run as a team in the primary.



“That’s probably something that I would favor, but I want to look at the bill,” Quinn said. “Then the candidate for governor can tell the people who he or she wants as their running mate.”

The Senate sent Quinn the proposal Tuesday on a 56-0 vote in the wake of the Scott Lee Cohen debacle. The Chicago pawnbroker won the Feb. 2 Democratic lieutenant governor primary after spending more than $2 million of his own money, but quickly resigned after revelations of his tawdry past. Cohen was supposed to be Quinn’s running mate but now is exploring an independent run for governor.



If the legislation had been in place, Cohen would have had to find a governor candidate to team up with, which likely would have brought greater scrutiny of his background.



While Quinn said the team approach is “probably the healthiest way to go,” he might not be governor today if it had been law in 2002. Quinn won the Democratic lieutenant governor primary that year running a campaign against two lesser-known candidates. But there’s no guarantee any of the Democratic governor candidates would have picked the self-proclaimed maverick Quinn as a running mate if the team requirement was in place.



As it turned out, Quinn ended up as the running mate for Rod Blagojevich, who was impeached and removed by lawmakers in January 2010, paving the way for Lt. Gov. Quinn to become governor.

If you’ve been waiting for the Nexus One to hit Verizon, you can stop waiting. The HTC Droid will take the place of the Nexus One on the Verizon network, Google announced via a blog post Monday. It’s supposed to support better multi-touch sensors, so, win? Perhaps given the customer service issues that arose after the initial Nexus One launch – they didn’t even offer any phone support at first – Google decided it would be better to get out of the retail business. [Google via PhoneScoop]

What do you do when you have $40 billion in cash on hand? If you’re Apple, you go on a shopping spree. The latest acquisition in a string of corporate purchases is Intrinsity, another chip making company (Apple previously acquired PA Semi in 2008).

Although Apple has confirmed the purchase with the New York Times, there’s still no official word on its plans for the company or the price paid. At least one estimate places the value of the deal at $121 million. The purchase comes on the heels of a rumor that Apple had approached ARM with an offer to purchase the major chip design licensing company.

Intrinsity isn’t completely out of the ballpark, though it is less of an industry powerhouse by a wide, wide margin. Still, it confirms that Apple is increasingly interested in the chip design side of the computing business, something which the in-house designed iPad A4 is also further proof of.

It’s also possible that we have another situation like that surrounding the Quattro Wireless acquisition on our hands. In that case, Quattro Wireless was clearly second choice to mobile advertising company AdMob, which Apple had apparently bid on before it was acquired by Google. ARM could’ve similarly spurned Apple’s advances, at which point it would’ve turned its attention to more receptive targets, including Intrinsity.

But what about Intrinsity makes it so appealing to Apple specifically? Well, the Texas chip maker in question may be relatively small, but in this case, fast thing comes in small sizes. Intrinsity is known for making very fast versions of mobile device chips. Not only that, but it may actually be the company responsible for the speedy A4 chip found in the iPad, if rumors are true.

The same division of Samsung that developed the A4 for Apple apparently worked with Intrinsity to find a way to ratchet up the speed of chips that normally run at 650 megahertz to a much snappier 1000 megahertz. If it’s true, Apple just secured its speed advantage over the competition for at least a little while, and it did so without putting much of a dent in its massive cash reserves.

The move may also be intended as a means to jump-start Apple’s stalled plans to design its own brand new mobile chip from the ground up. Rumors circulating say that those efforts, which began with Apple’s acquisition of PA Semi, have since gone off the tracks since many former members of that company have left since the company’s purchase. A number of them ended up at Google last month.

Whatever the effect of the purchase, we probably won’t see any changes in the lineup until at least the next iteration of both the iPhone and the iPad. Let’s hope it means faster chips with lower power consumption for even bigger battery life gains.

Related GigaOM Pro Research: As Devices Converge, Chip Vendors Girding For a Fight

As previously revealed (qjnet/xbox-360/record-of-agarest-war-dated-hits-end-of-april.html), Record of Agarest War is scheduled to hit the PlayStation Store with tomorrow’s update. The game will be bundled into a single download along with all of its downloadable content, and checks

Baskin Robbins 31 Cent Scoop Night: Wednesday, April 28 from 5PM – 10PM….

Drop by your local Baskin Robbins this evening (Check The Store Locator For Participating Locations Near You….) for a yummy scoop of Butter Pecan or Rocky Road at a special price: just 31 cents per scoop. Cone included! No coupon required!

Baskin Robbins is offering the discounted treats in honor of America’s firefighters at participating locations around the country. The chain is honoring emergency service workers with a $100,000 donation to the National Volunteer Fire Council (NVFC) National Junior Firefighter Program.

Filed under: Aftermarket, Coupe, Budget, Performance, Chevrolet, Design/Style

On Christmas day, 2007, Constandina Tutten was informed that her husband, Army Sergeant Joseph Tutten had been killed in the line of duty in Iraq. Sgt. Tutten was a squad leader with the 82nd Airborne, and had fallen to an IED while helping to clear Tikrit of insurgents. After hearing Tutten’s story, Camaro5 member TheSpyMaster enlisted the help of a few others to help create a tribute 2010 Chevorlet Camaro in honor of anyone who has given their lives in service to this country.

What started as a simple customization with aftermarket wheels and smoked taillight lenses grew into an all-out show car. New scissor doors and a wild body kit helped nab the Camaro top honors at a few local car shows, but that wasn’t enough for TheSpyMaster. The guy topped the whole thing off with a complete American-themed vinyl wrap.

While the look won’t be for everyone, you have to respect TheSpyMaster’s dedication in his efforts to get America’s service men and women the respect and honor they deserve. Check out a smattering of images in our gallery below, but be sure to head on over to Camaro5 for the fully monty.

[Source: Camaro5]

Custom Chevrolet Camaro is ultimate tribute to fallen servicemen originally appeared on Autoblog on Wed, 28 Apr 2010 12:29:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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EA and DICE have announced a tie-on for Battlefield: Bad Company 2 and the upcoming Medal of Honor reboot.

[JURIST] The Moscow City Court ruled Tuesday that the Slavic Union (SS) violates Russia’s extremism laws, banning the organization. The SS, whose initials are the same as the Nazi paramilitary, was one of Russia’s largest neo-Nazi organizations. City prosecutors initiated the action, accusing the group of promoting nationalistic supremacy similar to the ideology of Nazi Germany. SS leader Dmitry Dyomushkin says he plans to appeal the ban. He warned that the ban will anger radical ultranationalists into retaliation.
Earlier this month, a Moscow City Court judge known for presiding over cases involving neo-Nazi groups was killed while leaving his apartment. Russia is currently struggling to limit hate crimes, which decreased in 2009 according to the SOVA Center. Last month, the Russian Prosecutor General’s Office banned Adolf Hitler’s book Mein Kampf, finding it in violation of laws against extremism. In December, the Russian Supreme Court upheld a lower court decision to shut down the Taganrog Jehovah’s Witness congregation and ban the distribution of 34 Jehovah’s Witness publications, finding both the Jehovah’s Witness congregation and the publications to be extremist. In 2007, the Russian parliament approved legislative amendments to change the prevailing definition of extremist crime in Russian law to include activities taken for “political or ideological hatred.”

After the failure of the third cloture vote to start formal debate on Sen. Chris Dodd’s (D-Conn.) financial regulatory reform proposal, Senate Democrats say that they might force Republicans to filibuster — the old-fashioned, all-night, stand-up-and-read-the-phone-book kind of filibuster — this evening.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) released a statement immediately after the blocked vote, saying, “If Republicans have ideas to bolster reform, we welcome those ideas and look forward to discussing them in full view of the public. None of this can happen unless Republicans stop standing in the way and agree to bring a bill to the floor so we can debate it. Their repeated efforts to block an open debate on Wall Street accountability legislation shows that they are trying to avoid a public dialogue so they can water down reform in secret.”

And the Democrats might force that public dialogue. Sen. Claire McCaskill (D-Mo.) tweets: “Plan is to stay all night asking consent of Republicans to let us debate Wall Street reform. I just don’t get why we can’t debate.”

by Agence France-Presse

Emergency crews battle flames at the Deep Horizon oil rig before it sank last week. Oil is now spewing into the Gulf of Mexico at 42,000 gallons a day.Photo: U.S. Coast GuardNEW ORLEANS, Louisiana—Emergency teams launched a
“controlled burn” operation on Wednesday to stop a giant oil slick in
the Gulf of Mexico from spreading off the ecologically fragile Louisiana coast.

A fleet of
skimming vessels deployed by the U.S. Coast Guard and British energy giant BP
swept the most dense concentrations of crude into a 500-foot-long
fire-resistant boom.

“This oil
will then be towed to a more remote area, where it will be ignited and burned
in a controlled manner,” said a joint statement released by BP and the
Coast Guard.

The drastic move
was deemed necessary because a huge slick with a 600-mile circumference has
moved within 23 miles of Louisiana’s wetlands—an important sanctuary for
waterfowl and other wildlife.

Mopping up the
oil if it reaches the wetlands would be next to impossible and officials fear
the slick could devastate the state’s $2.4 billion a year fisheries industry,
which produces a significant portion of U.S. seafood.

Coast Guard
spokesperson Lieutenant Commander Cheri Ben-Iesau said response units would
evaluate how well the initial burn-offs work before attempting any larger
operation to burn up the slick.

“Today they
are just seeing this as a kind of trial fire to see if it even can be
done,” Ben-Iesau told AFP, adding that extensive corralling of the oil
into denser concentrations was required before the actual burning would start.
“I believe that they use an actual accelerant to start it. You can’t just
throw a match in it and have it start.”

Oil is spewing
at the rate of 42,000 gallons a day from the riser pipe that connected the
Deepwater Horizon platform to the wellhead before the rig sank last week after
a deadly explosion that killed 11 workers.

BP has been
using four robotic submarines some 5,000 feet down on the seabed to activate a
giant 450-tonne valve, called a blowout preventer, and shut off the leaks.

As a back-up,
engineers are frantically constructing a giant dome that could be placed over the leaks to trap the oil, which would then be pumped
up to containers on the surface.

A rig is also on
standby to drill two relief wells that could divert the oil flow to new pipes
and storage vessels. But they would take up to three months to drill, and the
dome is seen as a better interim bet even though it could take up to four weeks
to construct.

Tuesday’s oil
burns could present their own environmental problems, sending huge plumes of
toxic black smoke into the sky and leaving mucky residue in the sea, although
Coast Guard officials dismissed the threat.

“The
closest shoreline is a very remote area,” said Ben-Iesau. “If any
mammals that are seen in the area, we will obviously have to hold off till that
threat is gone.”

“We don’t
want anyone downwind from the smoke,” she said, adding, “there are
obviously dangers inherent in these sort of operations working offshore with a
lot big vessels.”

The
Environmental Protection Agency was to continuously monitor air quality during
the operations, and officials gave assurances the burning would immediately be
halted should safety standards be breached.

Coast Guard Rear
Admiral Mary Landry, who is leading the government’s response to the disaster,
warned on Tuesday that if BP fails to secure the well, it could end up being
“one of the most significant oil spills in U.S. history.”

The U.S.
government has promised a “comprehensive and thorough investigation” into the explosion that sank the platform and pledged
“every resource” to help stave off an environmental disaster.

The rig, which
BP leases from Houston-based contractor Transocean, went down last Thursday 130
miles southeast of New Orleans, still burning off crude two days after the
blast that killed 11 workers.

The widow of one
of the dead has filed a lawsuit accusing the companies that operated the rig—BP, Transocean, and U.S. oil-services behemoth Halliburton—of negligence.

BP
chief executive Tony Hayward said he was confident an environmental disaster
would be averted, acknowledging that strong first-quarter results Tuesday had
been overshadowed by the “tragic accident.” Landry noted that the
deadly rig accident has not disrupted offshore gulf oil production, which
accounts for more than a quarter of the U.S. energy supply.

Related Links:

The politics of the Gulf oil spill

Cape Wind offshore project approved by Obama admin after nine-year battle

Automakers go ‘green’ in Beijing

Former U.S. Rep. Sam Gejdenson endorsed Greenwich entrepreneur Ned Lamont for governor Wednesday – four years after he supported New Haven Mayor John DeStefano for the same post.

Gejdenson was one of Connecticut’s best-known Democrats when served in the U.S. Congress for 20 years before losing in 2000 to Republican Rob Simmons, who is now running for the U.S. Senate.

“Ned has a proven record of not only creating jobs, but also standing up to the establishment and doing what it takes to deliver for the people of Connecticut,” Gejdenson said in a statement Wednesday. “I trust him to be the type of governor we need to put people back to work and get Connecticut back on offense competing for jobs and commerce worldwide.”

In 2006, Gejdenson became involved in a high-profile clash when he went public to say that he had received a push-poll from the campaign of gubernatorial candidate Dannel Malloy.

The whole thing started when Gejdenson said he picked up his telephone at his Branford home on Monday, July 24, 2006, to find a political pollster on the other end. The conversation started innocently as the caller asked whether the state was going in the right direction and how he felt about the races for governor and the U.S. Senate. But as soon as Gejdenson said he was voting for DeStefano instead of Malloy in the Democratic gubernatorial primary, he said the conversation abruptly turned to a series of anti-DeStefano questions.

What the pollster did not know was that the Branford man was Gejdenson, the former U.S. House member who had already publicly endorsed DeStefano.

“There was a lot of noise in the background, so it was a big phone-bank operation,” Gejdenson said at the time. “It was definitely just a push poll to beat up the other guy. They said [DeStefano’s hometown of] New Haven was dangerous. I’ve never felt endangered in New Haven.”

Malloy’s supporters, who were not on the telephone call between Gejdenson and the pollster, argued repeatedly and vociferously that it was not a push poll.

“If Sam Gejdenson thinks he got a push poll, it certainly wasn’t from the Malloy campaign or anyone we consider supporters,” campaign manager Chris Cooney said at the time.

Even though the Malloy campaign had been conducting research polling for two years, Cooney said, “We have never done push-polling, ever.”

After serving in Congress for 20 years, Gejdenson said that he clearly knew the difference between a push poll and a research poll.

Push-polling is a campaign practice in which candidates spread disinformation and sometimes outright lies about each other in the guise of an opinion survey. The line between that and the more accepted practice of research polling, in which candidates try to determine what messages might work best against their opponents, can be thin.

At the time, DeStefano’s spokesman, former television reporter Derek Slap, strongly defended Gejdenson and denied that the DeStefano campaign had made any anti-Malloy calls.

“We’d expect this from Karl Rove, but not from Dan Malloy,” Slap said at the time. “Are they calling Sam Gejdenson a liar?”

No this isn’t some torture entrapment for your pets. It’s actually a spa for them… well not exactly, but it still looks kind of menacing. The Canine Shower Stall  has 16 water-jet nozzles and a showerhead that will wash and rinse your doggy in this enclosed space. The powerful water jets will get through the thickest coats – perfect for those with Collies and Golden Retrievers.  The stall is made up of two integrated leashes and shower walls that reach 31″-high and a plastic roof to help keep water inside the shower. The shower stall connects to a faucet and has a 2′-long drainpipe which is used to get water out of the shower. The Canine Shower Stall can handle up to 200 lbs dogs and is adjustable to fit smaller dogs as well, and it retails for $1250.

A flight from Houston to Washington, D.C., was diverted to an airport in North Carolina earlier today after what is being described as a threatening message was discovered on the jet’s bathroom mirror.

According to the TSA, Continental ExpressJet flight 3006 was supposed to have landed at Washington Dulles International Airport but instead touched down at the Piedmont Triangle International Airport outside of Greensboro, NC, “out of an abundance of caution” following the discover of the message.

After landing in Greensboro, the Embraer 145 commuter jet, which seats about 50, taxied to a remote area of the airport where it was met by the authorities.

Continental flight diverted because of threat: TSA [Reuters]

Article Tags: Will Alexander

The plot thickens

It is difficult to keep abreast of the continuing tide of criticisms of the whole climate change issue. Unsuccessful attempts by the major Western nations and NGOs to prevent the World Bank from approving South Africa’s loan application introduced a new dimension to the issue. For the first time we have seen the change from words to action.

It is the Western nations that propagated this whole climate change charade. These nations have already started implementing costly emissions control measures. They erroneously assumed that other nations would follow their example. This has not happened. To make matters worse, this whole climate change issue is contributing to a widening rift between the affluent Western nations and the rest.

The gap is also widening between some of the former Commonwealth countries, India and South Africa for a start, and the UK. This is the first time that serious differences have arisen between Commonwealth countries and the UK. The governments of Australia, New Zealand and Canada have accepted climate change theory despite protests from some of their scientists. These counties will also face problems when the truth becomes known.

Read in full with comments »

File attachment: Global economic warfare.pdf
  

A Chinese manufacturer by the name of Aigo has two Android MID’s in the making. The new tablets will come in a 5 and 7 inch version. Both will be running Android 1.6, there is no word on when or if these devices will be upgraded to Android 2.1.  Price is rumored to be around 1500 Yuan which is roughly $220 and will be released in May.

Both of these devices will have a capacitive touch screen with multi-touch support. They will be powered by a Rockchip 2808 processor and have a dedicated video decoding chip capable of 720p HD video playback. They will also have onboard storage ranging from 4-16GB’s; also there will be a microSD card slot. Wi-Fi and Bluetooth makes their usual appearance as well. And for you people who love books, there will be a built-in e-book and e-magazine service, and these devices will be constructed in an all metal case.

[via pocketables]

It’s earnings time in the corporate world and guess what? Texas-based oil refiner Valero Energy yesterday reported a 27 percent increase in retail profit for the first quarter of 2010 and gave its CEO a 64 percent raise to $10.9 million a year. Valero’s announcement has special resonance for California fans of clean air, California jobs, and American energy independence. There’s a big clean energy showdown taking place here in California, and Valero is right in the dirty middle of it.

Valero—one of the worst polluters in the country-is the largest funder to date in a political campaign to reverse decades of California environmental leadership and keep our air dirty. It's paying to gather signatures for a November ballot proposition that would “suspend” California’s clean energy and climate policy (AB 32) until the state’s unemployment drops to levels seen just three times in 30 years – a good definition of “when the cows come home.”

Rather than directing its profits into cleaning up the pollution from its refineries, Valero is pumping them into this Dirty Energy Proposition.

Big Oil’s morally repugnant initiative comes at a crucial moment. Thanks to AB 32 and similar clean energy policy, California leads the nation in policies that link protecting our environment to growing our economy. Far from threatening jobs, as the oil companies charge, AB 32 promises to create a flood of new jobs in America’s largest and growing clean energy economy. A clean energy future scares the daylight out of polluters, which is whey they’re fighting it tooth and nail.

“Suspending” AB 32 until the cows come home would kill hundreds of thousands of jobs and chill billions of dollars of new green investment in California. According to the non-partisan, independent state Legislative Analyst’s Office, the suspension of AB 32 could: “delay…longer-run savings, dampen…investments in…green jobs by private firms, [and] result in less economic activity than would otherwise be the case.”

Big Texas oil companies are blowing cigar smoke in our faces – trying to buy votes in November to reverse the tide of history so they can keep polluting our air. If Big Oil can buy a win in California, it can bulldoze progress wherever it wants.

We can’t underestimate these special interests and the millions of dollars of profits they are funneling into California to roll back progress. Here in the Golden State, Job One is to prove not only that California is the national leader in growing its economy by protecting its environment, but also that Californians will stand up for their economic future in the voting booth. To do that, we must get the truth out to Californians. Please visit the campaign’s website, get the tools you need and get involved.