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Tuesday, March 15, 2011

The official death toll from the devastating Japanese earthquake that hit on Friday is now nearing 1,900, while police officials say that it is all but certain the final toll will be at least 10,000 people dead.

Bodies are still being recovered—2,000 thus far in the Miyagi Prefecture alone. The official count of those missing has now reached 2,300, though in one town alone, an estimated half of the 17,000 person population is still unaccounted for. Approximately 350,000 people have been left without homes; shelters are providing housing for the moment.

Due to infrastructure damage, survivors in the hard-hit northeast coast of Japan are coping with limited resources, including food, water and electricity. In the Iwate Prefecture, a government official stated that the incoming goods from relief efforts are only about ten percent of what is necessary.

At the Fukushima I Nuclear Power Plant, a second explosion occurred on Monday at the building housing Reactor 3, following an explosion Saturday at the Reactor 1 building. Reactor 2 was also reported to have difficulties with its cooling system.

Sunday, May 18, 2014

The governor of the Bank of England, Mark Carney, has warned that the state of the housing market in the United Kingdom is the current biggest domestic threat to the country’s economy, due to lack of house building, and regulatory issues.

In an interview to be aired on Sky News today, he said the housing market is the “biggest risk” to the economy and has “deep, deep structural problems”. Of house building he said: “There are not sufficient houses built in the UK. To go back to Canada, there are half as many people in Canada as in the UK, twice as many houses are built every year in Canada as in the UK and we can’t influence that.”

“We’re not going to build a single house at the Bank of England. We can’t influence that. What we can influence […] is whether the banks are strong enough. Do they have enough capital against risk in the housing market?”

Carney also said the Bank of England would look into the procedures used to issue loans and mortgages to see if they were being granted appropriately: “We’d be concerned if there was a rapid increase in high loan-to-value mortgages across the banks. We’ve seen that creeping up and it’s something we’re watching closely.”

Kris Hopkins responded to Carney on behalf of the government, saying the government “inherited a broken housing market, but our efforts to fix it are working”. “We’ve scrapped the failed top-down planning system, built over 170,000 affordable homes and released more surplus brownfield sites for new housing. We’ve also helped homebuyers get on the housing ladder, because if people can buy homes builders will build them. Housebuilding is now at its highest level since 2007 and climbing. Last year councils gave permission for almost 200,000 new homes under the locally-led planning system and more than 1,000 communities have swiftly taken up neighbourhood planning. It’s clear evidence the government’s long-term economic plan is working.”

Earlier this month, the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development called on the UK government to “tighten” access to the ‘Help to Buy’ scheme introduced by George Osborne and the coalition government in 2013. ‘Help to Buy’ has also recently been criticised by three former Chancellors of the Exchequer — the Conservatives Norman Lamont and Nigel Lawson, and former Labour Chancellor Alistair Darling. Darling said: “Unless supply can be increased substantially, we will exacerbate that situation with schemes like Help to Buy.”

Tuesday, May 9, 2006The Australian Budget (Appropriation Bill No. 1) for 2006-2007 was released by the Australian Liberal Party–Australian National Party coalition government treasurer, Peter Costello (Higgins, Liberal).

Costello noted the resilience of the economy against natural disasters and terrorism, and through “disciplined and prudent management” the Government was able to “repay Labor’s debt” of quoted 96 billion dollars of net debt and the Government was now “debt-free”.

Costello noted that the Government budget was in “surplus for the ninth time” with a forecast surplus of 10.8 billion.

Tuesday, August 16, 2005

CNN television news gave extensive coverage starting around 5:30 PM EST today to a new computer virus, a worm dubbed rbot.cbq. Its reporting suggested that it had the potential to become one of the most virulent and costly yet seen. This story was unique among cyber-attacks reports as the network apparently learned of the virus through becoming one of its early victims. Media organizations ABC and the New York Times were affected as well. Perhaps first-hand experience gave the studio more insight on the virus while providing an early notice. The coverage that followed, however, raises concerns that the network’s perspective was skewed, and that perhaps the damage even diminished its reporting ability.

CNN treated the story as a potential global crisis in its manner of coverage as well as in the advice given to viewers. For over 45 minutes, by one viewer’s tally, CNN devoted exclusive air-time to this topic. Home users were advised to turn off their computers for safety, while businesses were warned that if continued operations prevented this measure, they were at high risk. CNN.com sported a bold red headline above its usual content area, warning of the virus. CNN stated they were requesting reports from key sources across the nation, including California governor Arnold Schwarzenegger.

After some time, the network eventually obtained a Microsoft statement describing the virus as “low-impact” and only affecting computers running Windows 2000. CNN also learned from Microsoft that there was a patch available at Microsoft’s web site. CNN’s coverage contrasted with a lack of actual evidence of widespread infections, in this reporter’s view. Much of the discussion and advice came from experts probably not officially associated with CNN, so there is a question of who is at fault.

Chris Carboni of the Internet Storm Center speculated that “The fact that CNN, ABC and the NYTimes got it may be as simple as reporters from these organizations visiting the same event and connecting to an infected network. While a firewall may have protected their office network up to now, these infected laptops were able to take out the network from the inside once they connected back to it.”

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Due to the damage by Hurricane Katrina and subsequent flooding, a number of colleges and universities in the New Orleans metropolitan area will not be able to hold classes for the fall 2005 semester. It is estimated that 75,000 to 100,000 students have been displaced. [1]. In response, institutions across the United States and Canada are offering late registration for displaced students so that their academic progress is not unduly delayed. Some are offering free or reduced admission to displaced students. At some universities, especially state universities, this offer is limited to residents of the area.