Oregon Health Plan - we wont pay for your chemotherapy, but we will cover the costs of your assisted suicide!

Opponents of physician-assisted suicide are fired up this summer, and rightfully so, over an ethically questionable provision of the Oregon Health Plan. The conflict came to light in a recent report in The Register-Guard of Eugene. The newspaper described the sad plight of Barbara Wagner, a 64-year-old Springfield woman with lung cancer. After her oncologist prescribed a cancer drug that would cost $4,000 a month, the newspaper reported, “Wagner was notified that the Oregon Health Plan wouldn’t cover the treatment, but that it would cover palliative, or comfort, care, including, if she chose, doctor-assisted suicide.”

That presents an unacceptable conflict. The state health program should not be in the position of denying chemotherapy to terminally ill patients while offering to pay the cost of helping them die.

More from Dvorak.org

Study: Trade deficit with China cost 2.3M US jobs

China's soaring trade deficit with the U.S. cost Americans 2.3 million jobs and $19.4 billion in lost wages between 2001 and 2007, according to an Economic Policy Institute study released Wednesday.

The Alliance for American Manufacturing blamed unfair trade policies for encouraging U.S. companies to ship jobs to China, where labor is cheaper and its currency undervalued.

"Our flawed trade relationship with China is destroying good jobs," executive director Scott Paul said in a prepared statement.

Using data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, Census Bureau and United States International Trade Commission, the Washington-based think tank said high-tech workers were hit especially hard after China entered the World Trade Organization in 2001.

Imports of computers and electronic parts accounted for nearly half of the $178 billion increase in the trade deficit during that time period.

It also blamed the trade imbalance for pushing down wages an average of $8,146.

Overall, California suffered the most losses, with 325,800 fewer jobs. It was followed by Texas at 202,900, New York at 127,000, Illinois at 102,800 and Ohio at 102,700.

More from Buisness Week

Restaurant Chains Close as Diners Reduce Spending

Several national restaurant chains were shuttered on Tuesday, possibly offering an early taste of what’s in store this year for businesses that depend on free-spending consumers whose budgets are now being squeezed.

The parent company of Bennigan’s, an Irish-themed bar and grill with about 200 sites across the country, filed for bankruptcy, a move that will put hundreds of employees out of work and leave many landlords with empty retail space during a painful time in the real estate market.

A sister brand, Steak & Ale, will also close. Franchise units of Bennigan’s will remain open for now, a spokeswoman, Leah Templeton, wrote in an e-mail message.

The restaurants are the latest casualties in the so-called casual dining sector, considered a cut above fast food. Soaring food costs and a surfeit of locations have hurt the companies’ bottom lines just as Americans are choosing to take more meals at home.

The closings are “something we’re going to see more of over the next 6 to 12 months,” said Amy Greene, a director at Avondale Partners who tracks the restaurant industry.

More from The New York Times

S&P: Home prices drop by record 15.8 pct. in May

Home prices tumbled by the steepest rate ever in May, according to a closely watched housing index released Tuesday, as the housing slump deepened nationwide.

The Standard & Poor's/Case-Shiller 20-city index dropped by 15.8 percent in May compared with a year ago, a record decline since its inception in 2000. The 10-city index plunged 16.9 percent, its biggest decline in its 21-year history.

More from Yahoo News

Pickens: Oil at $300 a barrel? Maybe

Oil prices could hit $300 a barrel if the United States does not take drastic action to reduce its heavy dependence on foreign oil, but neither of the top presidential candidates is addressing the crisis, Texas oilman T. Boone Pickens said Monday.

To prevent economic bankruptcy as a result of sending $700 billion a year overseas to unstable oil producers in the Middle East and Africa, the nation needs to mobilize behind a plan to shift toward domestic energy sources such as natural gas, wind and solar power, he told reporters and editors of The Washington Times.

"We are getting in trouble fast" and the economy is "already in the tank" because the nation is importing 70 percent of the fuel it needs each day, he said.

"The price of oil will be $300 a barrel if you sit here and let it go" for another 10 years, said Mr. Pickens, chairman and chief executive officer of BP Capital. "We have no control over the price of gasoline and diesel. Whatever they're going to stick us with, we'll pay it." Oil closed Monday at $131.04 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange.

More from The Washington Post

Want to gain weight? Here's 8 great ways to do it.

First, I have a confession: I used to never care about what I ate. Not only that, I also loved take-out foods—mostly because of my crazy work schedule. And oh, I wasn’t the most athletic guy. In fact, I didn’t start exercising until I was in my thirties, when suddenly I realized that I had to do something to keep my body healthy.

Does this sound familiar? Honestly, it seems like we’ve all got some pounds we could shed—and we’re in big company (yes, pun intended). But seriously, this is no joking matter: the statistics about obesity in this country are far from funny. Can you believe that by 2010, three-quarters of the U.S. population will be overweight? And if that didn’t shock you, check this out: statistics show that 80% of our kids are suffering from weight-related afflictions, like arthritis? The consequences of extra weight are devastating. So here’s my question: how did we get here?

The Big 8 from Dr. Manny

Movie Warns of Pending Economic Crisis

A film that warns Americans of an impending economic crisis due to exponentially increasing national debt will be shown to delegates at both political conventions and debuts nationwide in August in selected theaters.

The film, entitled “I.O.U.S.A.,” is part of a grassroots campaign sponsored by the Peter G. Peterson Foundation to engage young people and the business sector and mobilize them to take action.

The foundation claims that America is currently burdened with $53 trillion in obligations -- $175,000 per American -- due to an addiction to debt, near-zero national and personal savings, and the rising costs for social programs like Social Security and Medicare.

The film, which was screened for members of Congress and others in D.C.’s policy establishment Wednesday night, focuses on what it calls America’s “four key deficits” – budget, savings, balance of payments/trade, and leadership.

“America is getting mired in more and more debt and unsustainable promises at both the national and personal levels,” Peterson said in a news release announcing the project. “This is a vicious cycle that must be broken, before it breaks us.”

More from cnsnews.com

At $100 for Tank of Gas, Some Choke on ‘Fill It’

With gasoline prices high and rising, a new financial milestone has arrived: the $100 tank of gas. Bryan Carisone, a heating and air-conditioning contractor in Raritan, N.J., “absolutely loves” his new GMC Denali XL, an extra-large sport utility vehicle with televisions built into the leather seats. But in June, one week after he bought it, he pulled into a station on a near-empty tank and watched the total climb higher and higher — to $109.

“It just about killed me,” Mr. Carisone said.

For decades, the $100 barrel stood as a hypothetical outlier in doom-and-gloom conversations about future oil prices. And nobody could even imagine an American family paying $100 to fill the tank.

From The New York Times

Group Asks for Divine Intervention to Ease Oil Prices

As the price of oil continues to rise, some are turning to God and prayer for an answer to their financial troubles.

The Pray at the Pump Movement, founded by Rocky Twyman, has been holding prayer vigils at gas stations across the country. On Monday, Twyman decided to take his movement from Exxon and Shell stations straight to the steps of the Embassy of Saudi Arabia in Washington, D.C., hoping to encourage the oil-rich country to raise the amount of barrels they release each day from 200,000 to 1.2 million.

Twyman, who is a member of the Seventh-day Adventist Church, spent the afternoon outside of the embassy praying and asking passersby to sign his petition for the release of more oil, which he hopes to deliver to the Saudi oil minister.

"Our people are really suffering through this crisis," Twyman told Cybercast News Service. "We need the Saudis to release at least 1.2 [million] barrels of oil per day for about the next six months until we can get everything settled in America ... (I)f they can just do that for us, than this will help us get through this crisis."

More from CNS

Change of plans for July 4 - gas too pricey

Many Americans will watch fireworks at home instead of hitting the road this July 4, according to a new poll released Wednesday, as record gasoline prices force people to make major changes in their daily lives.

According to a CNN/Opinion Research poll, 31% of Americans have canceled or shortened their planned holiday weekend vacation because of the recent increase in the price of gas.

"When consumers talk about their thinning wallets, high fuel expenses is the reason they would point to first," said Wachovia economist Tim Quinlan.

The average price of a gallon of gas rose to an all-time high above $4.09 a gallon Wednesday, according to a survey from motorist group AAA. Gas prices are now about 3% higher than last month and 38.5% higher than year-ago levels.

Of the more than 1,000 Americans surveyed from June 26 to 29, 72% said record gas prices have caused them to make changes in their daily lives, and 30% said those changes were major ones.

More from CNN

9 in 10 see rising gas prices causing family hardship

Like a plague that does not discriminate by economic class, race or age, soaring gas prices are inflicting pain throughout the U.S. Nine in 10 are expecting the ballooning costs to squeeze them financially over the next half year, an Associated Press-Yahoo! News poll said Monday.

Nearly half think that hardship will be serious. To cope, most are driving less, easing off the air conditioning and heating at home and cutting corners elsewhere. Half are curtailing vacation plans; nearly as many are considering buying cars that burn less gas.

As the price has spiraled upward so, too, has the public's ire.

Two-thirds consider gas prices an extremely important issue, edging the economy and outpacing health care and Iraq as the country's most distressing problem. In November, when gas cost about $1 a gallon less than today, just under half rated it extremely important.

More from Yahoo News

Auto sales plunge - Buyers flee SUVs and pickups but can't find the cars they want, resulting in steep declines at most automakers.

June auto sales plunged, according to reports from the nation's major automakers, as Americans shunned pickups and SUVs in the face of record gas prices.

General Motors (GM, Fortune 500) reported that its U.S. sales fell 18% in June versus a year ago. Sales of GM's light trucks, which includes pickups, SUVs and so-called crossovers, tumbled 16%. GM's car sales dropped 21% in the month.

Still, the results were better than forecasts of an overall 25% decline in sales. And it was good enough for GM to hang onto the title of the No. 1 automaker in terms of U.S. sales.

Toyota Motor (TM) reported a 21% drop in U.S. sales in June from a year ago, far worse than the forecast from Edmunds.com of only a 12% drop in sales. It was the biggest year-over-year decline in U.S. sales in 10 years for Toyota.

Ford Motor (F, Fortune 500), the No. 3 automaker in terms of U.S. sales, posted a 28% decline in sales -- steeper than Edmunds.com's forecasts of a 25% drop. Ford saw demand for its SUVs plunge by more than half and for pickups and other trucks fall more than a third.

More from CNN Money

Truckers to Washington: Drill for oil! - 'What we need is to develop what we have offshore, in Alaska, and from shale'

Truckers are telling Washington to do something about the high prices of fuel and quit blaming the oil companies and OPEC.

"The temporary solutions aren't any good," David Kilcoin, a truck owner-operator from Phoenix, Ariz., told WND at the Great West Truck Show going on now at the Las Vegas Convention Center.

"We don't need a quick fix; what we need is to develop what we have offshore, in Alaska and from oil shale," he said.

With fuel prices for gasoline for passenger vehicles hovering at $4 a gallon and diesel for the big rigs higher, he said those in Washington, including the president, the presidential candidates and Congress, have "spent far too much time focusing on getting rich quick themselves."

Truckers face fuel expenses as the largest single part of their operating expenses, often with bills that run 25 percent of their budget.

More from WorldNetDaily

Unable to Pay for Fill-Up, German Man Torches His BMW in Protest

A German man doused his BMW with gasoline and torched it on Friday in protest at skyrocketing fuel costs, police said. The unemployed 30-year-old man drove the black 1995 BMW 3-series sedan onto the lawn outside Frankfurt's convention center grounds at about 7:30 a.m., police spokesman Karlheinz Wagner said.

He then jumped out, emptied a canister of gas over the vehicle, and set fire to it, Wagner said.

By the time the fire department got to the scene, the car was entirely burned out.

The Bavarian man, whose name was being withheld because he has not been charged with a crime, told police that gas prices were so high he could no longer afford to drive the vehicle.

As in many countries, gasoline prices have risen steadily in Germany; a liter of regular gasoline now costs about $9.40 per gallon.

Police were investigating whether the man could be charged with violating German environmental laws with the stunt, Wagner said. Penalties range from fines to five years in prison.

From Fox News

10 Shocking Facts About Global Slavery in 2008

2008 witnesses the 200th anniversary of the abolition of the transatlantic slave trade in America. Amidst the celebrations, what many people fail to realize is that slavery persists today in the modern world on an enormous scale.

In spite of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights adopted by the UN in 1948 stating that “slavery and the slave trade shall be prohibited in all their forms,” the figures accompanying the modern slave trade seem inconceivable in a global society that prides itself upon its modern-day values and emphasis on human rights.

More from Matador.org

How Speculators Are Causing the Cost of Living to Skyrocket

After investing in high-tech stocks and real estate loans for years, legions of speculators have now discovered commodities like oil and gas, wheat and rice. Their billions are pushing prices up to astronomical levels -- with serious consequences for ordinary people's quality of life and the global economy.

From Spiegel

Soaring costs are squeezing gas station owners too

Andre van der Valk hasn't been paid in six months.

He has a job, though, as owner of four service stations in Southern California. He hasn't taken a salary this year so he can pour all his money into buying fuel for his stations.

Despite the jaw-dropping prices at the pump -- they jumped 19 cents a gallon in California to $4.43 in the last week and averaged more than $4 a gallon nationwide for the first time, the Energy Department said Monday -- service station owners aren't making the killing that motorists assume.

That's because credit card fees, the price of tanker-loads of fuel and other costs are rising so rapidly that station owners haven't been able to keep pace despite the record prices they're charging.

"People see $4 gas, and they think these retailers are making a fortune," said Ben Brockwell, a director at Oil Price Information Service, which tracks fuel prices. "The reality is these guys are being stressed to the limit."

More from the LA Times

Energy Dept. says oil, gas prices to stay high

Motorists can expect gasoline prices around $4 gallon through next year, the Energy Department said Wednesday, with oil prices staying well above $100 a barrel.

Crude oil prices are likely to average $126 a barrel in 2009, $4 higher than this year, as oil supplies and demand are expected to remain tight, Guy Caruso, head of the department's Energy Information Administration, told a House hearing.

Gasoline prices are likely to peak at $4.15 a gallon in August and won't go down much after that, the agency projected in a report. Gasoline was forecast to average $3.92 a gallon through 2009.

The agency said that the high price of gasoline has reduced expected demand for this summer, but not enough to dampen prices.

More from AP

Drivers Say U.S. Should Drill for Oil on Federal Lands

A recent Department of Interior report, requested by Congress, estimates there are 139 billion barrels of undiscovered oil in the United States, onshore and off-shore combined -- more than the known oil reserves of Iran, Iraq or Russia. But most of that oil cannot be tapped because of environmental regulations.

Cybercast News Service spoke to people at a gas station in Alexandria, Va., last Thursday, where unleaded gas was selling for $4.09 per gallon, and asked this question: Should the U.S. be allowed to tap into the billions of barrels of oil that are on federal lands, but which are off limits because they lie under national parks or are protected by environmental laws? (Watch video)

"Whatever it takes to get my gas prices lower, to tell you the truth," said "Al" from Waldorf, Md. "Obviously we've got to save some for the future and stuff like that. But at the same time, I'm paying an awful lot for gas and it's gone up so fast in such a short amount of time. [It] doesn't really make a lot of sense to a lot of people."

More at CSNN

Rural US Getting Slammed By $4 Gas

Suburban commuters may not enjoy paying an average of $4 a gallon for gas, but the rural US, where income levels are low and dependence on large vehicles is high, is getting hit the hardest says the New York Times.

The paper put together a gas impact heat map that shows the percentage of income that's being spent on gasoline. Some regions with "higher" gas prices still only spend 2% of their median income on gas, while the percentage is as high as 16% in Wilcox County, Alabama. It looks like in Eastern KY where I live, we are having a pretty tough time.

See the Map at The Consumerist

Also - Top analyst sees $200 oil, $5.75 gas at WorldNetDaily