Video: Recycling builds 'iconic' venue
Tom Foreman | BIO
AC360° Correspondent
Experts: No end to volcano ash in sight
CNN
Weather experts predicted Friday that a volcanic ash causing chaos to air traffic across Europe would affect the region well into the weekend and possibly beyond as the dust cloud continued to spread.
Scientists said it was too soon to predict when the Eyjafjallajökull volcano in Iceland would cease spewing ash, raising the prospect of thousands more grounded flights in coming days.
Prevailing westerly winds are expected to fan the massive plume of dust from an erupting volcano in Iceland further east and north, according to predictions from the London Ash Advisory Center.
By 07:00 GMT Saturday (7 p.m. ET) the cloud traveling at up to 9,000 meters (30,000 feet) is forecast to be covering parts of Russia, Poland, Finland and other East European countries while continuing to affect the UK, Sweden, Norway, Germany, Denmark and Netherlands.
Goldman Sachs: No apologies
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Aaron Smith
CNNMoney.com Staff Writer
Goldman Sachs defended its controversial employee bonuses and multi-billion dollar relationship with AIG in its annual report released Wednesday, while downplaying its short-selling in the mortgage market.
Much of the letter was devoted to describing Goldman's (GS, Fortune 500) role in the financial crisis and the recession, praising its own "strong performance" in 2009, which it referred to as a "year of resiliency."
The letter, co-signed by CEO Lloyd Blankfein and President Gary Cohn, also mentioned that Goldman repaid its $10 billion debt to the government in June 2009, as a U.S. Treasury recipient of the Troubled Asset Relief Program.
The letter came after Blankfein and other Wall Street chief executives were subjected to intense scrutiny in a hearing before the Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission in January, when they were blamed for contributing to the economic crisis.
SEC charges Goldman Sachs with fraud
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Colin Barr
Senior Writer, CNN Money
The Securities and Exchange Commission on Friday charged Wall Street's most gilded firm, Goldman Sachs, with defrauding investors in a sale of securities tied to subprime mortgages.
The SEC said it charged New York-based Goldman (GS, Fortune 500) and a vice president, Fabrice Tourre, for their failure to disclose conflicts in a 2007 sale of a so-called collateralized debt obligation. Investors in the CDO ultimately lost $1 billion, the SEC said.
Hedge fund manger John Paulson.
The SEC's civil fraud complaint alleges that Goldman allowed hedge fund Paulson & Co. - run by John Paulson, who made billions of dollars betting on the subprime collapse - to help select securities in the CDO.
Goldman didn't tell investors that Paulson was shorting the CDO, or betting its value would fall. When the CDO's value plunged within months of its issuance, Paulson walked off with $1 billion, the SEC said.
Too taxed, too furious
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Tom Foreman | BIO
AC360° Correspondent
I don’t want to brag, but I have an almost uncanny ability to sense trends. For example, I predicted that the Seinfeld show was going to be a hit several weeks before the final episode. After seeing Scarlett Johansson on about three dozen magazine covers in a month, I correctly predicted that she was going to catch on. And I long ago boldly proclaimed that American voters are reaching the point where they don’t much like taxes.
But even with my Nostradamus-like sense of things, I was startled by the results of our latest CNN/Opinion Research poll on the subject. We don’t merely dislike taxes now; we loathe them with the same upturned nose disgust that we usually display only when we run across our old Milli Vanilli records in the back of the closet. The relationship we have with the IRS makes Jon and Kate look like brunch on the beach in Cabo for crying out loud.
Look at the numbers. Half of us say the tax system is unfair. About four-in ten say they are angry about their taxes. Somewhat fewer say they are satisfied. But almost none are happy about running with their check books through the gauntlet every April 15th.
How volcanoes can change the world
Tourists gather to watch lava spurt out of the site of a volcanic eruption at the Fimmvorduhals volcano near the Eyjafjallajokull glacier on March 27.
Rosanne D'Arrigo
Special to CNN
The recent volcanic eruption in Iceland is stranding hundreds of thousands of air travelers at Heathrow Airport in the UK and other airports across northern Europe, due to its voluminous clouds of volcanic ash that can clog airplane engines and limit visibility.
However, this is by no means the first such volcanic eruption in Iceland to affect human activities. Long before the advent of air travel, the eruption of Iceland's Laki volcano in 1783-84 had profound effects on climate, not just in Iceland but around the globe.
Volcanologists Thorvaldur Thordarson and Stephen Self estimated that a comparable event in the modern era would release enough ash and other eruptive materials into the atmosphere that the resulting ash cloud and sulfuric haze would probably disrupt air travel over much of the Northern Hemisphere for about five months. But there were impacts well afield of Iceland and Europe at the time of Laki.
Americans more optimistic about the economy, says poll
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CNN
Americans appear slightly more optimistic about the economy than they did at the start of the year, according to a new national poll.
A CNN/Opinion Research Corporation survey released Friday morning indicates that 19 percent of the public now says that an economic recovery is underway.
"While that's not a great number, it's significantly higher than the 12 percent who felt that way in January," says CNN Polling Director Keating Holland.
Thirty-four percent of people questioned in the poll says the economy is still in a downturn, but that's dropped five points from the 39 percent who felt that way at the start of the year.
Video: Volcanic ash still causing travel chaos
CNN Wire Staff
Volcanic ash from Iceland severely disrupted air traffic across Europe for a second day on Friday, causing the cancellation of some 17,000 flights, according to the intergovernmental body that manages European air travel.
Eurocontrol said it expected around 11,000 flights to take place Friday, in contrast to the normal 28,000. The impact will last at least another 24 hours, Eurocontrol said Friday morning.
The ash has spread to large parts of northern Europe and has forced the closure of some of Europe's busiest airports, causing more disruption to worldwide air travel than 9/11.
Video: Weather is factor in how ash cloud acts, experts say
Craig Johnson
Special to CNN
As a volcanic ash cloud hung over parts of Europe on Thursday, weather experts said air travel in the region, and increasingly the world, will be affected by how the wind blows.
With no major storm system on the horizon, the weather –specifically the wind - in Europe could play a significant role in how the cloud acts, CNN meteorologist Brandon Miller said.
The ash cloud, swept in from a volcanic eruption in Iceland, has affected thousands of flights and closed some of Europe's busiest airports.
Keep reading...
http://www.cnn.com/2010/WORLD/weather/04/15/volcano.weather/index.html?hpt=T1
Tea Party leader: What we want
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Phillip Dennis
Special to CNN
The modern Tea Party movement began on February 27, 2009, when small groups in 22 American cities gathered to protest the signing of President Obama's stimulus bill.
The Tea Party groups viewed the stimulus bill as the crowning moment of decades of irresponsible government fiscal behavior. The federal government is addicted to spending, and the consequences are now staring us in the face.
Our national debt is at emergency levels and growing rapidly. Congressional Budget Office head Doug Elmendorf recently said the nation's fiscal path is simply "unsustainable." And yet this financial crisis seems obvious to virtually everyone except our elected officials in Washington.
Tea Party members are not averse to paying taxes. However, taxpayers are stretched thin, and piling more taxes on their backs is not the answer. We do not understand nor approve of Washington's insatiable appetite for spending, because that's not the way we as individuals live. We do not massively overspend today and borrow money tomorrow to cover the bills. As California and New York are learning, that ride eventually comes to an end.
