Potpourri: Sept. 24, 2012
Mitt Romney isn't the only rich American who hides money in Switzerland and the Cayman Islands. Last Thursday, a Senate investigating committee reported that Microsoft and Hewlett-Packard elude billions in U.S. taxes by funneling profits offshore. Microsoft moved $21 billion out of America and ducked $4.5 billion it owed the U.S. Treasury. Why can't these legal loopholes be stopped?
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At Los Angeles International Airport, not all flight paths are for jetliners. Tiny El Segundo Blue butterflies, the size of a thumbnail, flutter in buckwheat patches in dunes near runways. In their butterfly stage, they live only a week, and constantly face danger of extermination. The airport spends $250,000 a year to plant more buckwheat and save the lovely endangered creatures.
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America's worst war tragedy happened just outside West Virginia's Eastern Panhandle, at Antietam Creek in Western Maryland on Sept. 17, 1862, across the Potomac River from Shepherdstown. The goriest battle of the Civil War was a sickening slaughter. Records vary, but one source says Northern forces lost 2,108 dead and more than 10,000 wounded, while the South suffered 1,546 killed and nearly 9,000 wounded.
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Among West Virginia's top 10 employers, four are medical: WVU Hospitals, CAMC, Mylan Pharmaceuticals and St. Mary's Medical Center in Huntington. Health has become a colossal part of the economy.
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Maryland has America's highest median household income at $70,000, according to a new Census Bureau report last week. West Virginia ranks next-to-last, just above Mississippi, with $38,500. WVU defeated Maryland in Saturday's football clash - but Maryland is ahead in a different category.
Mitt Romney isn't the only rich American who hides money in Switzerland and the Cayman Islands. Last Thursday, a Senate investigating committee reported that Microsoft and Hewlett-Packard elude billions in U.S. taxes by funneling profits offshore. Microsoft moved $21 billion out of America and ducked $4.5 billion it owed the U.S. Treasury. Why can't these legal loopholes be stopped?
***
At Los Angeles International Airport, not all flight paths are for jetliners. Tiny El Segundo Blue butterflies, the size of a thumbnail, flutter in buckwheat patches in dunes near runways. In their butterfly stage, they live only a week, and constantly face danger of extermination. The airport spends $250,000 a year to plant more buckwheat and save the lovely endangered creatures.
***
America's worst war tragedy happened just outside West Virginia's Eastern Panhandle, at Antietam Creek in Western Maryland on Sept. 17, 1862, across the Potomac River from Shepherdstown. The goriest battle of the Civil War was a sickening slaughter. Records vary, but one source says Northern forces lost 2,108 dead and more than 10,000 wounded, while the South suffered 1,546 killed and nearly 9,000 wounded.
***
Among West Virginia's top 10 employers, four are medical: WVU Hospitals, CAMC, Mylan Pharmaceuticals and St. Mary's Medical Center in Huntington. Health has become a colossal part of the economy.
***
Maryland has America's highest median household income at $70,000, according to a new Census Bureau report last week. West Virginia ranks next-to-last, just above Mississippi, with $38,500. WVU defeated Maryland in Saturday's football clash - but Maryland is ahead in a different category.
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