Federal bankruptcy judge Christopher Klein ruled on April 1 that Stockton, Calif., can file for bankruptcy via Chapter 9 (Chapter 11’s ugly cousin). The ruling may start the actuarial dominoes falling across the country, because Stockton’s predicament stems from financial assumptions that are hardly restricted to one improvident California municipality. […]
Pension math is more art than science. Actuaries guess, er, compute how much money is needed today based on life expectancies of retirees as well as the expected investment return on the pension portfolio. Shortfalls, or “underfunded pension liabilities,” need to be made up by employers or, in the case of California, taxpayers.
In June of 2012, [the California Public Employees’ Retirement System] lowered the expected rate of return on its portfolio to 7.5% from 7.75%. Mr. Milligan suggested 7.25%. Calpers had last dropped the rate in 2004, from 8.25%. But even the 7.5% return is fiction. Wall Street would laugh if the matter weren’t so serious.
The Decline And Fall Of The American Empire
New York City has agreed to pay Occupy Wall Street protesters more than $100,000 for property damaged or lost when police cleared out their encampment in a downtown Manhattan park in 2011, according to court documents signed on Tuesday.
h/t signaler222
NDP MP: Communists Good, Canada’s Military Bad
Full story
From the comments:
This is what you can expect of the ndp and certain other strains of less than loyal or courageous Canadian inteligensia.
What do you expect from a group whose greatest persons are the ole Rub and Tug taliban Jack and his social housing scamming wife.
We Don’t Need No Stinking Giant Fans
Anne McNeilly, in the Toronto Star;
On one “side” of the wind-turbine debate are wealthy corporate behemoths supported by a government that removed the democratic rights of its citizens, without debate, to launch a misguided and ill-advised initiative that’s going to cost taxpayers’ into the billions. On the other “side,” you have vulnerable Ontario residents with limited financial resources who have had their democratic rights trampled and monster industrial monsters rammed down their throats.
What’s The Opposite Of Diversity?
Not Watching For The Asteroid
The Libranos
They go back a long, long way;
The Supreme Court of Canada says it will investigate allegations that some of its members intervened in the repatriation of the Constitution.
The high court’s decision came after urging by Quebec’s Parti Quebecois government for Ottawa to “open its books” on the events that led to the repatriation of the Constitution by Pierre Elliott Trudeau’s federal Liberals in 1982.
The call by Quebec Intergovernmental Affairs Minister Alexandre Cloutier on Tuesday came after the publication of a book that alleges Supreme Court of Canada magistrates interfered in the political process and engaged in backroom discussions.
The judiciary “cannot interfere with the political powers — that’s the basics of democracy,” Cloutier told a news conference Tuesday.
A spokesman for the Supreme Court indicated Tuesday the court is concerned by the questions about its credibility and feels it necessary to investigate.
h/t RFB
Reader Tips
Tonight, annotated footage of a hellish tank duel in the labyrinthine streets of Cologne, Germany in March of 1945.
h/t Mike T.
The comments are open, as always, for your Reader Tips.
Honey, I Finished The Internet
Blue State
Free James Delingpole!
The Liberal War on Metaphor. (h/t Robert in Calgary)
This Is Awkward
All members of France’s socialist government have been given a week to publish full details of their wealth as President François Hollande struggles to overcome a damaging scandal over a secret Swiss bank account held by his former budget minister.
PoliceOne Gun Control Survey
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h/t Frank
O, Sweet Saint Of San Andreas
Hear my prayer.
h/t Cal2
The Libranos
An old blogosphere driven story resurfaces;
A scathing legal judgment has found the federal government improperly awarded multibillion-dollar contracts in 2002 and 2004, turning a blind eye as the winning bidder used “insider knowledge” and a cozy relationship with evaluators to enrich itself.
Judge Peter Annis ordered the feds to pay losing bidder Envoy Relocation Services nearly $30 million in a decision released Saturday.
“Envoy should have been declared the winner,” Annis found.
The case turned on the then-Liberal government’s awarding of relocation contracts for members of the Canadian Forces, civil service and the RCMP.
h/t JM
Bill Maher is New Self-Declared Expert on Libertarianism
If I Had A Million Dollars
1978 “AFFIRMED” Triple Crown Trophy for sale on Ebay.
Reader Tips
You’re a sweet little headache, but you are lots of fun. I’ve a good mind to spank you, then thank you for all you’ve done.. ♫
The comments are open, as always, for your Reader Tips.
The Children Are Our Future
And that’s why I’ve taken to sleeping in a chair with the shotgun in my lap.
Y2Kyoto: State Of Anorexia Envirosa
Is President Obama waging a war on coal? Republicans say yes. Democrats deny it. Here’s what Bill McKibben, self-styled leader of America’s “fossil-fuel resistance,” has to say: “Recently, I had a long talk with an administration insider who kept telling me that, for the next decade, we should focus all our energies on ‘killing coal.'” Sounds like a war to me.
That wasn’t good enough for McKibben, who insisted that the administration would have “to put the same sort of thought and creative energy into killing oil and natural gas, too.” Now that’s creativity. Energy independence? “Last century’s worry,” says McKibben.