High-Net Worth Individuals on the Rise in U.S. - As unemployment numbers remain markedly high -

High-Net Worth Individuals on the Rise in U.S. - As unemployment numbers remain markedly high - 


As unemployment numbers remain markedly high, the number of high-net worth individuals in the U.S. continued to increase in 2010, according to Capgemini’s 2011 U.S. Metro Wealth Index.


The index, released on Tuesday, found that the number of high-net worth individuals (HNWI) in the top 10 U.S. metropolitan areas jumped by 7.3% in 2010, with New York, Los Angeles, and Chicago highest on the list and Houston recording the highest total growth rate of 9.6% taking over the No. 8 slot from Detroit.


Although the number of high-net worth individuals increased in 2010, the growth in HNWI was down compared to 2009 when growth the number shot up 17.5% after declining sharply in 2008. Nonetheless, the number of HNWI in the U.S. surpassed the 2007 pre-crisis levels.


“We saw many HNWIs – not just in these metropolitan statistical areas, but globally – taking on more calculated investment risks and shifting assets into what we consider more aggressive asset classes in a continued effort to recoup some of the losses they faced as a result of the financial crisis,” said William Sullivan, Head of Global Market Intelligence, Capgemini Financial Services, in a press release. “An important contributor to the increase in HNWI population we saw in these areas was the continued rise in U.S. equity and commodity markets, which led to many investors seeing the value of their investments grow.”


Read more - http://www.onwallstreet.com/news/rich-unemployment-capgemini-wealth-2674190-1.html

Mexican soldiers found the largest marijuana plantation ever detected in Mexico, huge field covering almost 300 acres -

Mexican soldiers found the largest marijuana plantation ever detected in Mexico, huge field covering almost 300 acres - 


Mexican soldiers found the largest marijuana plantation ever detected in Mexico, a huge field covering almost 300 acres, the Defense Department said Thursday.
The plantation is four times larger than the previous record discovery by authorities at a ranch in northern Chihuahua state in 1984.


The pot plants sheltered under black screen-cloth in a huge square on the floor of the Baja California desert, more than 150 miles south of Tijuana, across the border from San Diego.
Army Gen. Alfonso Duarte said the screening, which is often used by regular farmers to protect crops from too much sun or heat, made it difficult to detect from the air what was growing underneath.
It was only when soldiers on the ground reached the isolated area Tuesday that they found thousands of pot plants as high as 2.5 yards tall. The average height of the plants was about 1.5 yards. Duarte said they were not yet ready for harvest.
"We estimate that in this area, approximately 60 people were working. When they saw the military personnel, they fled," Duarte told reporters. A few were later reportedly detained at a nearby roadblock, but Duarte said no arrests were made at the scene.
He said traffickers could have harvested about 120 tons of marijuana from the plantation, worth about 1.8 billion pesos (about $160 million).




Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/world/2011/07/14/army-uncovers-mexicos-largest-marijuana-plantation/?test=latestnews

U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer left his gun inside a restroom at Bush Intercontinental Airport -

U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer left his gun inside a restroom at Bush Intercontinental Airport - 

Houston police and federal officials are looking into how a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer left his gun inside a restroom at Bush Intercontinental Airport.

An airport cleaning crew found the Sig Sauer pistol about 9:10 p.m. Wednesday inside the restroom, located in a secure area of Terminal E, and they notified security officers, Houston police spokesman Kese Smith said.

As Houston police were investigating the incident, the ICE officer approached and said he had left his gun in the restroom, Smith said. After he showed his identification, the Houston police officers returned the weapon to him.

The incident is under investigation by both the Houston Police Department and ICE Internal Affairs, Smith said.

Attempts to reach an ICE official for comment late Thursday were unsuccessful.

Read more - http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/metropolitan/7654280.html

Public schools in Calif will be required to teach students about contributions of gay Americans - INCLUDING KINDERGARTEN -

Public schools in Calif will be required to teach students about contributions of gay Americans - INCLUDING KINDERGARTEN - 


Public schools in California will be required to teach students about the contributions of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender Americans starting Jan. 1 after Gov. Jerry Brown on Thursday signed a controversial bill to add the topic to the social sciences curriculum.


Textbooks now must include information on the role of LGBT Americans, as well as Americans with disabilities, though California's budget crisis has delayed the purchasing of new books until at least 2015.


"History should be honest," Brown, a Democrat, said in a statement. "This bill revises existing laws that prohibit discrimination in education and ensures that the important contributions of Americans from all backgrounds and walks of life are included in our history books."


The governor called the legislation, SB48, introduced by Sen. Mark Leno, D-San Francisco, "historic."


The law - the first of its kind in the nation - adds the two groups to an existing list of minority and other groups that are required to be part of the social sciences curriculum.


Read more: - http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/2011/07/15/MNL61KAHVQ.DTL

Researchers at Cornell have designed, built and demonstrated the first "cloak" that hides events in time -

Researchers at Cornell have designed, built and demonstrated the first "cloak" that hides events in time - 




What a preposterous world we live in, where developments in invisibility cloak tech are common enough to elicit yawns. Fine, you unmovable automatons, how about a time cloak? Is that something you might be interested in?
Researchers at Cornell have designed, built and demonstrated the first "cloak" that hides events in time. The process relies on similar methods of distorting electromagnetic fields as invisibility cloaks, but it exploits a time-space duality in electromagnetic theory: diffraction and dispersion of light in space are mathematically equivalent. Scientists have used this theory to create a "time-lens [that] can, for example, magnify or compress in time."
The time cloak takes two of those lenses and arranges them so that one compresses a beam of light while the other decompresses it. That leaves the beam seemingly unchanged, but the diffraction and dispersion actually "cloak" small events in the beam's timeline. Right now, the cloak can only last for 120 nanoseconds, and the theoretical max for the current design measures just microseconds. But the prospect of being able to exist outside of time, even for just a few microseconds, should be enough to make even the most jaded tech nerd giggle at the possibilities. [Tech Review via Hacker News]


Read more - http://gizmodo.com/5821246/scientists-punch-a-hole-in-the-fabric-of-time-with-a-time-cloak?utm_medium=referral&utm_source=pulsenews