Ryan's news blog

The Pioneer Press, http://www.twincities.com/mld/twincities/news/16557265.htm, reported on a story concerning the discovery of a 15 plume of tainted underground water. The chemical which authorities have discovered is PFBA, or perfluorobutanoic acid. There have been discoveries of this acid before, once in Lake Elmo in 2002. 3M is known to manufacture the chemical, but officials are looking into where the problems may be. The article also wrote how the public is not reacting at all really. The Star Tribune did not report as in depth as the Pioneer Press article.

Posted by Ryan Callahan at 8:23 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

An AP story reported by the New York Times, http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/25/world/europe/25italy.html?ex=1171429200&en=66dba34e58fdc8f6&ei=5070, writes that 2,000 people have been accused of human trafficking in Italy. 784 are still being detained while the others have been let go pending legal proceedings.
The traficking was mainly from Eastern Europe and involved prostitution and sweatshop rings.
CNN.com, http://www.cnn.com/2007/WORLD/europe/01/25/italy.human.trafficking.ap/index.html, also covered this story through the AP, but included more quotes and personal stories from people who had been in the sweatshop rings.

Posted by Ryan Callahan at 8:16 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

In a Star Tribune article http://www.startribune.com/535/story/955670.html, writes about Minnesota's new focus of using wind as an alternative energy source. There are only three states which produce more wind energy than Minnesota, California, Texas, and Iowa. The article also mentions that president Bush did not really mention too much about the possibilities of wind energy in his energy plan.
The Pioneere Press also covered a story concerning the use of enegy, http://www.twincities.com/mld/twincities/business/16522110.htm, and this article writes about how many of the big energy companies are now agreeing to focus more on reducing emissions, mentioning that this is also correlating with the new congress.

Posted by Ryan Callahan at 8:04 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

In a Star Tribune article http://www.startribune.com/587/story/953355.html, it is reported that the state pensions may be short because a $4 billion deficit in a fund to pay retirees was not accounted for. The lack of money may affect former and future government employees who would be given money by the state pension. To account for this there might be a drop in services in certain areas.
The lead tells what the story is about pretty straight forward but I don't know if writing "The state has painted too rosy a picture of the condition of large government pension funds" works the best for me.

Posted by Ryan Callahan at 7:40 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

President Bush delivered the State of the Union on Wednesday.
The major points he talked about were to his Iraq strategy and trying to convince congress to give his strategy a chance, and also issues like global warming according to the Star Tribune article at http://www.startribune.com/587/story/955262.html. The Star Tribune article focused a lot on the issues that Bush talked about and how different members of congress reacted to the speech. Barack Obama went on the Morning Show the following day and voiced their opposition to Bush's plans.
The Washington Post reported a story on the State of the Union in a different way. This article http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/01/24/AR2007012401271.html writes about how Bush has lost his ability to be confident in office, and how he looks much more tired and older than in previous years. Friends and associates of Bush are quoted telling how tired he looks now.
The lead in the Star Tribune article was very informative telling the facts of what occured and how congress reacted to Bush's speech.

Posted by Ryan Callahan at 6:54 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)