Sunday, January 4, 2015

» how come puerto ricans are so short? | "...when it comes to humans, nothing is perfect." - WHY THERE CAN’T BE A PERFECT HUMAN FROM PUERTO RICO, OR ANYWHERE ELSE - BY TK OLEKSYK - 04/01/15 16:32 from Mike Nova's Shared Newslinks

Mike Nova's Shared NewsLinks Review

From The Major News Sources

04/01/15 16:32 from Mike Nova's Shared Newslinks
mikenova shared this story from PR Discussion Forum - Topix. 142 Comments, last updated on Sunday Jan 4 by Zen 

Yuiza_S.Lind
The nearest neighbor to the “perfect human” is HG00737, a female who is… Puerto Rican. One might imagine that such a person already existed, maybe Yuiza, the only female Taino Cacique (chief) in Puerto Rico’s history. 

"The perfect human is Puerto Rican": "maybe Yuiza, the only female Taino Cacique (chief) in Puerto Rico’s history." (This is just a quote, and not my opinion - I try to keep my reviews objective and comprehensive and try to include all the interesting articles. However, it looks that this one has to be checked out by a professional geneticist. - M.N.) - Tuesday, December 9, 2014


"...when it comes to humans, nothing is perfect."



WHY THERE CAN’T BE A PERFECT HUMAN FROM PUERTO RICO, OR ANYWHERE ELSE - BY TK OLEKSYK  

 "It gets lonely on the long rides in a foreign country, and I searched my memory for some comfort, and I recalled the face of my 10-month-old daughter Sophia. Here is the perfect woman, I thought, and the world around me smiled."


» The ‘Perfect Human’ Doesn't Live in Puerto Rico (or Any Other Country)
04/01/15 16:31 from Mike Nova's Shared Newslinks
mikenova shared this story from Global Voices » Puerto Rico (U.S.). Drum workshop on Calle Loiza, Santurce, Puerto Rico. Photo by Flickr user Angel Xavier Viera-Vargas. CC BY-ND 2.0 Is there such a thing as a “perfect human being”? Many ...
» Impresionante Meteoro visto en Puerto Rico 12/28/2014
04/01/15 16:28 from Mike Nova's Shared Newslinks
mikenova shared this story from Videos matching: puerto rico. Impresionante Meteoro visto en Puerto Rico 12/28/2014 (English translation below) La Sociedad de Astronomía del Caribe (SAC) captó imágenes de un impresionante y lento meteoro...
» Guns in Puerto Rico: Locked & Loaded in the Tropics (Trailer)
04/01/15 16:28 from Mike Nova's Shared Newslinks
mikenova shared this story from Videos matching: puerto rico. Guns in Puerto Rico: Locked & Loaded in the Tropics (Trailer) Puerto Rico has the world's highest overall percentage of homicides by firearm, with an estimated more than 9...
» POR LA PIEDRA: Momento crucial para Puerto Rico, Cuba y Estados Unidos
04/01/15 16:27 from Mike Nova's Shared Newslinks
mikenova shared this story from Uploads by Redacción Noti Uno. POR LA PIEDRA: Momento crucial para Puerto Rico, Cuba y Estados Unidos El comentarista de política de Noti Uno 630, Mario Porrata nos brinda unos puntos muy interesantes sobr...
» Mensaje de Año Nuevo 2015 del Gobernador Alejandro García Padilla
04/01/15 16:27 from Mike Nova's Shared Newslinks
mikenova shared this story from Uploads by La Fortaleza. Mensaje de Año Nuevo 2015 Fin de Año 2014 del Gobernador Alejandro García Padilla From: La Fortaleza Views: 2584 38 32 0 ratings Time: 01:11 More in People & Blogs
» Jan, 2-4 2015
04/01/15 16:26 from Mike Nova's Shared Newslinks
mikenova shared this story from The San Juan Daily Star. Jan, 2-4 2015 Wine MBA Programs Start to Follow Silicon Valley Into the Data Age Diabetes Prevention That Works In Haiti, Battling Disease With Open-Air Clinics Race to Build on Ri...
» Puerto Rico News Digest For December 29, 2014
04/01/15 16:26 from Mike Nova's Shared Newslinks
mikenova shared this story from The Puerto Rico Monitor. GOVERNMENT TO APPEAL DORAL RULING From The San Juan Daily Star : Puerto Rico Justice Secretary César Miranda said that on or before Jan. 2, the agency will appeal the recent ruling...
» Puerto Rico News Digest For December 31, 2014
04/01/15 16:25 from Mike Nova's Shared Newslinks
mikenova shared this story from The Puerto Rico Monitor. METEOR SIGHTING MAY HAVE BEEN ROCKET El Nuevo Dia is reporting today that the Astronomical Society of the Caribbean has advised that the "meteor" sighted over Puerto Rico early in ...
» Venezuela leader lashes out as White House says Obama will sign sanctions bill
04/01/15 16:25 from Mike Nova's Shared Newslinks
mikenova shared this story from The Americas News: News and Headlines from Canada, South America & More - The Washington Post. The White House says President Obama is ready to approve sanctions targeting senior high-level Venezuelan ...
» Obama's new Cuba policy could transform Washington’s ties with Latin America
04/01/15 16:24 from Mike Nova's Shared Newslinks
mikenova shared this story from The Americas News: News and Headlines from Canada, South America & More - The Washington Post. MEXICO CITY — With shouts of “Viva Fidel,” Cuban President Raul Castro said Saturday that the easing of te...
» Results 1 - 10 of 6420
04/01/15 16:23 from Mike Nova's Shared Newslinks
mikenova shared this story from Search Results. Results 1 - 10 of 6420 UPDATE 1- appeal in tax dispute is "baseless" ... (Adds shares, confirmation of appeal from ). The judge gave Puerto Rico 60 days to appeal, a deadline that expired o...
» Results 1 - 10 of 531
04/01/15 16:22 from Mike Nova's Shared Newslinks
mikenova shared this story from Search Results. Results 1 - 10 of 531 FBI searches Doral Bank offices in Puerto Rico - agent Doral in October in its tax dispute with the Treasury Department business has been affected by a slowing Puerto ...
» U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Orders Immediate Implementation of Pierluisi Provision to Accelerate Critical Projects in Puerto Rico
04/01/15 16:21 from Mike Nova's Shared Newslinks
mikenova shared this story from Res. Comm. Pedro Pierluisi - Representing the At Large District of PUERTO RICO. Washington, DC—Resident Commissioner Pedro Pierluisi announced today that the headquarters of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineer...
» Pierluisi Announces That New Law Requires Federal Government to Create Action Plan to Reduce Electricity Rates in Puerto Rico
04/01/15 16:21 from Mike Nova's Shared Newslinks
mikenova shared this story from Res. Comm. Pedro Pierluisi - Representing the At Large District of PUERTO RICO. San Juan, Puerto Rico—Resident Commissioner Pedro Pierluisi announced today that the comprehensive federal spending bill for ...
» As US-Cuba relations thaw, fight for the soul of Cuban rum could begin anew
04/01/15 16:20 from Mike Nova's Shared Newslinks
mikenova shared this story from Puerto Rico | The Guardian. A decades-long legal tussle left Havana Club with dual identities – one in the US market and one abroad. But after Wednesday’s historic announcement, the uneasy truce between it...
» The Farce of Puerto Rico's Status Debate | barriomulas.com
04/01/15 16:19 from Mike Nova's Shared Newslinks
mikenova shared this story from puerto rico statehood - Google Blog Search. The status question is Puerto Rico's daily bread and butter. Each morning on their way to work, Boricuas turn on their radios to hear pundits and politicians ran...
» Major Federal Spending Bill Provides Energy Expertise to Puerto Rico
04/01/15 16:18 from Mike Nova's Shared Newslinks
mikenova shared this story from Puerto Rico Report. A major proposal pending before Congress to provide $1.1 trillion in government funding is proceeding in conjunction with a smaller U.S. Senate initiative to require the U.S. Interior D...
» Gov’s Highways Relief Bill Passed But He Doesn’t Like Amendments
04/01/15 16:18 from Mike Nova's Shared Newslinks
mikenova shared this story from Puerto Rico Report. Governor Alejandro Garcia Padilla is deciding whether to sign his bill to prevent financial failures of the Puerto Rico’s Highways and Transportation Authority and Government Developmen...
» Balance of Payments Report Released
04/01/15 16:17 from Mike Nova's Shared Newslinks
mikenova shared this story from Puerto Rico Report. The Office of the Governor has published the “ Balance of Payments ” report for 2013, containing 25 pages of financial tables and seven pages of related graphs.  Among the k...
» Obama Likely to Release Puerto Rico Independence Crimes Prisoner
04/01/15 16:16 from Mike Nova's Shared Newslinks
mikenova shared this story from Puerto Rico Report. President Obama is likely to end the long prison term of a member of a U.S. terrorist group that tried to pressure the Federal government into granting independence to Puerto Rico. The ...
» The ‘Perfect Human’ Is a Puerto Rican Woman
04/01/15 16:15 from Mike Nova's Shared Newslinks
mikenova shared this story from Puerto Rico Report. A blog post entitled “ The Perfect Human is Puerto Rican” in the normally staid blog,  publication,  “Bits of DNA,” which provides “Reviews and Commentary on Computational Biology,” has...
» The Top 10 Articles Published by PUERTO RICO REPORT
04/01/15 16:13 from Mike Nova's Shared Newslinks
mikenova shared this story from Puerto Rico Report. We’ve shared the Top 10 Stories of 2014 at PUERTO RICO REPORT, but we were also interested to see the most widely read reports of our entire four years of bringing you the full st...
» Five Congress Members on Several Day Trip in Territory
04/01/15 16:13 from Mike Nova's Shared Newslinks
mikenova shared this story from Puerto Rico Report. Five members of Congress are on a low-key, several-day trip in Puerto Rico. All Democrats, they include Senators Kirstin Gillibrand of New York and Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut and...
» 369,0002:23Guns in Puerto Rico: Locked & Loaded in the Tropics (Trailer)
04/01/15 16:09 from Mike Nova's Shared Newslinks
mikenova shared this story from puerto rico news - YouTube. 369,000 2:23 Guns in Puerto Rico: Locked & Loaded in the Tropics (Trailer) - Duration: 2:23. Sabrina Hart 1 hour ago 9 hours ago 14 hours ago 14 hours ago No views New 3...
» The Money Is In Munis, But Not in Puerto Rico, Says Alexandra ...
04/01/15 16:08 from Mike Nova's Shared Newslinks
mikenova shared this story from puerto rico news - Google Blog Search. Municipal bonds have had a red hot year in 2014, but don't expect that to extend into 2015, particularly for Puerto Rican bonds, Alexandra Lebenthal, CEO of Lebenthal...
» Twelve former Puerto Rico police officers sentenced to prison ...
04/01/15 16:08 from Mike Nova's Shared Newslinks
mikenova shared this story from puerto rico news - Google Blog Search. Regional news archives from Caribbean News Now!: The source for the latest news throughout the Caribbean.
» The Puerto Rico Monitor: Puerto Rico News Digest For December ...
04/01/15 15:34 from Mike Nova's Shared Newslinks
mikenova shared this story from puerto rico news - Google Blog Search. El Vocero reports that many police officers across Puerto Rico have not reported to work, with absences per shift numbering about 500 across the island over this past...
» Puerto Rico's Day Of Economic Reckoning Has Arrived - Seeking Alpha
04/01/15 15:33 from Mike Nova's Shared Newslinks
mikenova shared this story from puerto rico economy - Google News. Puerto Rico's Day Of Economic Reckoning Has Arrived Seeking Alpha Reuters' conclusion was grim: " Puerto Rico's economy is floundering and it has over $70 billion in debt...
» Puerto Rico Utility Needs to Move to Natural Gas, Official Says - Bloomberg
04/01/15 15:32 from Mike Nova's Shared Newslinks
mikenova shared this story from puerto rico economy - Google News. Puerto Rico Utility Needs to Move to Natural Gas, Official Says Bloomberg ... is the cost of fuel, and so in order to significantly bring down rates so they're more in li...
» Puerto Rico Seen Losing Tourists as Cuba Lures U.S. Travelers - Bloomberg
04/01/15 15:32 from Mike Nova's Shared Newslinks
mikenova shared this story from puerto rico economy - Google News. Puerto Rico Seen Losing Tourists as Cuba Lures U.S. Travelers Bloomberg Puerto Rico 's economy will suffer when more U.S. travelers are allowed to visit Cuba as economic ...
» Puerto Rico's downward spiral - The Hill (blog)
04/01/15 15:32 from Mike Nova's Shared Newslinks
mikenova shared this story from puerto rico economy - Google News. Puerto Rico's downward spiral The Hill (blog) Alejandro Garcia Padilla took office and began his borrow-and-spend economic policies. Under Garcia Padilla, Puerto Ricans h...
» Migrant Flow Into US From Caribbean Spikes - New York Times
04/01/15 15:31 from Mike Nova's Shared Newslinks
mikenova shared this story from puerto rico economy - Google News. Migrant Flow Into US From Caribbean Spikes New York Times Smugglers also lure people, especially in relatively new routes that send Haitians into the neighboring Dominica...
» Puerto Rico campaign to stop New Year's gunfire sees success - Yahoo News
04/01/15 15:30 from Mike Nova's Shared Newslinks
mikenova shared this story from puerto rico - Google News. Latin American Herald Tribune Puerto Rico campaign to stop New Year's gunfire sees success Yahoo News SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico (AP) — Puerto Rico's police chief says a campaign agai...
» Are Puerto Rican Women The Perfect Specimen? A Berkeley ...
04/01/15 15:29 from Mike Nova's Shared Newslinks
mikenova shared this story from puerto rico - Google Blog Search. A Berkeley based biologist has determined that Puerto Rican woman possess the necessary requirements to deem them “the perfect human.” This can be attribut.
» The 'Perfect Human' Doesn't Live in Puerto Rico (or Any Other ...
04/01/15 15:27 from Mike Nova's Shared Newslinks
mikenova shared this story from puerto rico - Google Blog Search. Drum workshop on Calle Loiza, Santurce, Puerto Rico . Photo by Flickr user Angel Xavier Viera-Vargas. CC BY-ND 2.0. Is there such a thing as a “perfect human being”? Many ...
» Murder Fraud Conspiracy Haunt Doral Bank In Puerto Rico After FBI ...
04/01/15 15:26 from Mike Nova's Shared Newslinks
mikenova shared this story from puerto rico - Google Blog Search. On Tuesday, the FBI raided the IT offices of Doral Bank in Puerto Rico , citing an ongoing investigation. The officials didn't reveal much more, but given Doral's checkere...
» Puerto Rico police seize a record 110 weapons | WINK NEWS
04/01/15 15:26 from Mike Nova's Shared Newslinks
mikenova shared this story from puerto rico - Google Blog Search. SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico (AP) – Puerto Rico police say they have seized a record 110 weapons as part of a one-day crackdown on crime across the U.S. territory. Police Chief J...
» When Guns Are Outlawed, Only Outlaws Who Pay Off the Cops Will ...
04/01/15 15:24 from Mike Nova's Shared Newslinks
mikenova shared this story from puerto rican community in usa - Google Blog Search. From the United States District Attorney's Office for the District of Puerto Rico : SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico – On Thursday, December 11, 2014, a federal gra...
» Guns in Puerto Rico: Locked & Loaded in the Tropics (Trailer ...
04/01/15 15:24 from Mike Nova's Shared Newslinks
mikenova shared this story from puerto rican community in usa - Google Blog Search. This statistic hasn't stopped the NRA from setting up shop, establishing their 51st chapter in the tropical US territory. Puerto Rico's sky-high murder r...
» Juan Flores, a Scholar of Puerto Rican Culture in New York, Dies at 71
04/01/15 15:23 from Mike Nova's Shared Newslinks
mikenova shared this story from puerto rican community in new york - Google Blog Search. Professor Flores also studied Dominican and Salvadoran communities in New York . But his primary focus was on the experience of Puerto Ricans , refl...
» Latino Rebels | Scapegoating Puerto Rico's Poor: Moving Away ...
04/01/15 15:22 from Mike Nova's Shared Newslinks
mikenova shared this story from political status of puerto rico - Google Blog Search. I also write this response to not favor any specific political solution to Puerto Rico's colonial situation . I favor decolonizing the island in a proc...
» Senate passes bill expanding drug war with Transnational Drug
04/01/15 15:22 from Mike Nova's Shared Newslinks
mikenova shared this story from jeanvidal | Politic365. Senate passes bill expanding drug war with Transnational Drug Trafficking Act This post has been generated by Page2RSS
» Latino support for President Obama up, and majority of Americans
04/01/15 15:21 from Mike Nova's Shared Newslinks
mikenova shared this story from jeanvidal | Politic365. Latino support for President Obama up, and majority of Americans still support path to legalization This post has been generated by Page2RSS
» F.B.I. Searches Doral Financial's Offices in Puerto Rico
04/01/15 15:21 from Mike Nova's Shared Newslinks
mikenova shared this story from NYT > Puerto Rico. The offices of Doral Financial in San Juan, Puerto Rico, were raided searched as part of an ongoing investigation into the struggling bank.
» Unsolved Shooting Accentuates Problems at Doral, One of Puerto Rico's Biggest Mortgage Lenders
04/01/15 15:21 from Mike Nova's Shared Newslinks
mikenova shared this story from NYT > Puerto Rico. The mysterious killing murder of a top executive is one of many troubles that have shaken Doral Financial and unnerved investors.
» Puerto Rico Reports More Than 4,000 Chikungunya Cases
04/01/15 15:20 from Mike Nova's Shared Newslinks
mikenova shared this story from Latin American Herald Tribune. Puerto Rico has logged more than 4,000 confirmed cases of infection with the Chikungunya virus this year, the Health Department said Wednesday.
» 33 Break Out of Venezuelan Jail
04/01/15 15:20 from Mike Nova's Shared Newslinks
mikenova shared this story from Latin American Herald Tribune. Thirty-three suspects in custody at a police station in the capital municipality of Chacao escaped through a hole in the wall, Venezuelan authorities said Wednesday.
» Puerto Rico Expects a Record 1.5 Million Cruise Visitors
04/01/15 15:19 from Mike Nova's Shared Newslinks
mikenova shared this story from Latin American Herald Tribune. Puerto Rico expects to receive more than 1.5 million visitors from cruise ships docking during the fiscal year that ends on June 30, tourism director Ingrid Rivera said.
» U.S. Vice President Biden Speaks with Venezuela’s Maduro in Brazil
04/01/15 15:19 from Mike Nova's Shared Newslinks
mikenova shared this story from Latin American Herald Tribune. On the sidelines of the inauguration of Brazil’s President Dilma Rousseff at the Planalto Palace seat of Brazil’s Government, U.S. Vice President Joe Biden met briefly with V...
» Venezuelan Leader, U.S. Vice President Cross Paths in Brazil
04/01/15 15:18 from Mike Nova's Shared Newslinks
mikenova shared this story from Latin American Herald Tribune. Venezuela’s Nicolas Maduro said on Friday that he took the opportunity of an encounter with U.S. Vice President Joe Biden during Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff’s second i...
» Florida Keys to Use Drones for Mosquito Control
04/01/15 15:17 from Mike Nova's Shared Newslinks
mikenova shared this story from Latin American Herald Tribune. The Florida Keys, in the extreme southeast of the United States, will practice mosquito control with the aid of drones, which for the first time were approved for the task by...
» Obama made Bush's foreign policy errors worse - Florida Keys Keynoter
04/01/15 15:17 from Mike Nova's Shared Newslinks
mikenova shared this story from Geopolitical Aspects PR Political Status. Obama made Bush's foreign policy errors worse Florida Keys Keynoter Now we have not only Russian nuclear armed bombers and submarines playing war games from the Ar...
» 2015: ¿Año Nuevo?
04/01/15 15:15 from Mike Nova's Shared Newslinks
mikenova shared this story from CNE - Centro Para Una Nueva Economía - Center for a New Economy. Por: Sergio M. Marxuach Confieso que siempre he encontrado rara la celebración del “año nuevo”. Simplemente, la tierra habrá terminado otra ...
» Commentary: Cuba - challenges and chances for the Caribbean
04/01/15 15:14 from Mike Nova's Shared Newslinks
mikenova shared this story from Caribbean News Now!: News from Puerto Rico. Commentary: Cuba - challenges and chances for the Caribbean EU and ILO to support CARIFORUM labour, private sector and employers to fulfil EPA obligations Antigu...
» Cuba attracts three million tourists in 2014
04/01/15 15:14 from Mike Nova's Shared Newslinks
mikenova shared this story from Caribbean News Now!: News from Puerto Rico. Cuba attracts three million tourists in 2014 USVI governor-elect introduces 13 new cabinet members Netherlands and Curacao working to strengthen law enforcement ...
» 250 exotic animals seized in PR
04/01/15 15:13 from Mike Nova's Shared Newslinks
mikenova shared this story from Caribbean Business. 250 exotic animals seized in PR Authorities in Puerto Rico have seized some 250 exotic animals they say were bou ... Issued: December 19, 2014 Federal agents have raided nine stores and...
» Carrión wants Banco Popular in Cuba
04/01/15 15:13 from Mike Nova's Shared Newslinks
mikenova shared this story from Caribbean Business. Carrión wants Banco Popular in Cuba The chief of Puerto Rico’s biggest bank said Friday he’s interested in opening a ... PR unemployment rate holds at 14% Puerto Rico’s nonfarm payroll ...
» Doral selling off another $205M in assets
04/01/15 15:13 from Mike Nova's Shared Newslinks
mikenova shared this story from Caribbean Business. Doral selling off another $205M in assets Doral Bank, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Doral Financial Corp., is selling off a ... This post has been generated by Page2RSS
» Deep US policy shift on Cuba renews debate about potential impact
04/01/15 15:12 from Mike Nova's Shared Newslinks
mikenova shared this story from Caribbean Business. Deep US policy shift on Cuba renews debate about potential impact in PR Washington’s profound shift in is Cuba policy outlined Wednesday revived a long ... Issued: December 18, 2014 Reg...
» PR economy ‘bouncing along bottom’ into the new year, analysts say
04/01/15 15:12 from Mike Nova's Shared Newslinks
mikenova shared this story from Caribbean Business. PR economy ‘bouncing along bottom’ into the new year, analysts say Puerto Rico’s economy continued to “bounce along the bottom” in 2014 and conditi ... Issued: December 22, 2014 Washing...
» Big changes coming to Cuba tourism with US opening
04/01/15 15:12 from Mike Nova's Shared Newslinks
mikenova shared this story from Caribbean Business. Big changes coming to Cuba tourism with US opening HAVANA — U.S. tourists are roaming the streets of Old Havana, listening to lectu ... Issued: December 22, 2014 Puerto Rico’s nonfarm p...
» Tuesday, December 23rd, 2014
04/01/15 15:12 from Mike Nova's Shared Newslinks
mikenova shared this story from Caribbean Business. Tuesday, December 23rd, 2014 PR picks Roosy Roads developer; ups price tag for 30 year project to $3.2B And then there was one. Issued: December 22, 2014 Doral Bank, a wholly-owned subs...
» A View on Cuba's Opening From the De Facto U.S. Colony of Puerto Rico
04/01/15 15:01 from Mike Nova's Shared Newslinks
mikenova shared this story . This article is a joint-publication of NACLA and  edmorales.net .  Map of the Caribbean Islands (John Pinkerton, 1818 / Wikimedia Commons) Cuba y Puerto Rico son /  Cuba and Puerto Rico are De ...
» When Guns Are Outlawed, Only Outlaws Who Pay Off the Cops Will Have Guns (Puerto Rico Edition)
04/01/15 14:48 from Mike Nova's Shared Newslinks
mikenova shared this story from Hit & Run. WAPA TV Puerto Rico has restrictive firearms laws . Getting a concealed carry permit to legally tote a handgun is an arbitrary affair that largely comes down to a matter of knowing the right...
» Murders in Puerto Rico at 15-year low
04/01/15 14:46 from Mike Nova's Shared Newslinks
mikenova shared this story . Murders in Puerto Rico at the close of 2014 numbered 680, the lowest figure since 2000 and a drop of 23 percent compared with the year before, something that police attribute to better crime detection and cit...
» Puerto Rico police seize a record 110 weapons
04/01/15 14:45 from Mike Nova's Shared Newslinks
mikenova shared this story from WINK NEWS. MGN SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico (AP) – Puerto Rico police say they have seized a record 110 weapons as part of a one-day crackdown on crime across the U.S. territory. Police Chief Jose Caldero s...
» Puerto Rico police officer hits 2 US university professors with motorcycle; both survive - National
04/01/15 14:44 from Mike Nova's Shared Newslinks
mikenova shared this story . SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico - A Puerto Rico police officer assigned to protect the U.S. territory's governor accidentally ran over two American tourists, authorities said Friday. Police said agent Orlando Rodriguez...
» Unsolved Killing but One of Puerto...
04/01/15 14:26 from Mike Nova's Shared Newslinks
mikenova shared this story from puerto rico - Google News. Full coverage Unsolved Killing but One of Puerto Rico Bank's Woes New York Times  - ‎Dec 27, 2014‎ The bank's misfortune in Puerto Rico is the story of savvy fin...
» Puerto Rico picks developer for former naval site - U.S.
04/01/15 14:24 from Mike Nova's Shared Newslinks
mikenova shared this story from Stars and Stripes U.S.. Roosevelt Roads U.S. naval station Puerto Rico The Department of Economic Development and Commerce photo   The Associated Press Published: December 24, 2014 SAN JUAN, Puerto Ri...
» 17 accused in billion-dollar Puerto Rico drug ring
04/01/15 14:24 from Mike Nova's Shared Newslinks
mikenova shared this story . SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico (AP) — Federal authorities said Tuesday they have dismantled a ring that imported tons of drugs from South America and invested most of the billion-dollar proceeds in construction ...
» FBI Raids Puerto Rico’s Doral Bank Citing Unspecified Probes
04/01/15 14:19 from Mike Nova's Shared Newslinks
mikenova shared this story . The home office of Doral (DRL) Bank, the San Juan, Puerto Rico-based lender struggling to meet regulatory mandates, was raided by the FBI in a search for evidence related to “several ongoing investigati...
» Unsolved Killing but One of Puerto Rico Bank's Woes
04/01/15 13:11 from Mike Nova's Shared Newslinks
mikenova shared this story from DealBook. SAN JUAN, P.R. — It was near the evening rush hour when the bank executive drove his black Lexus along the four-lane highway here. Only a few minutes from the banker’s beachfront home...
» Migrant flow into US from Caribbean spikes
04/01/15 13:06 from Mike Nova's Shared Newslinks
mikenova shared this story from AP Top Headlines At 11:13 a.m. EST. MIAMI (AP) -- Just starting a five-year sentence for illegally re-entering the United States, George Lewis stared at the officers staring back at him at Miami's federal ...
» In search of a Boston jury to try marathon suspect
04/01/15 13:05 from Mike Nova's Shared Newslinks
mikenova shared this story from AP Top Headlines At 11:13 a.m. EST. BOSTON (AP) -- His accusers brandish a confession scribbled inside a boat during an intensive manhunt and a video they say shows him placing a backpack with a bomb a few...
» Pope Names 20 New Cardinals
04/01/15 12:47 from Mike Nova's Shared Newslinks
mikenova shared this story from Voice of America. Pope Francis has named 20 new cardinals, selecting them from 14 countries, including many from Latin America and Africa. The new cardinals include African church leaders from Ethiopia and...

Murder Fraud Conspiracy Haunt Doral Bank In Puerto | Puerto Rico police seize a record 110 weapons

Murder Fraud Conspiracy Haunt Doral Bank In Puerto Rico After FBI ... 

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On Tuesday, the FBI raided the IT offices of Doral Bank in Puerto Rico, citing an ongoing investigation. The officials didn't reveal much more, but given Doral's checkered past, which includes fraud and the fatal shooting of one ...

Puerto Rico police seize a record 110 weapons | WINK NEWS

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SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico (AP) – Puerto Rico police say they have seized a record 110 weapons as part of a one-day crackdown on crime across the U.S. territory. Police Chief Jose Caldero says officers also are serving arrest ...

When Guns Are Outlawed, Only Outlaws Who Pay Off the Cops Will ... 

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From the United States District Attorney's Office for the District of Puerto Rico: SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico – On Thursday, December 11, 2014, a federal grand jury returned a 17-count indictment against former Lieutenant and ...

Guns in Puerto Rico: Locked & Loaded in the Tropics (Trailer ...

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This statistic hasn't stopped the NRA from setting up shop, establishing their 51st chapter in the tropical US territory. Puerto Rico's sky-high murder rates prevail, despite its extremely strict gun laws, which have only ...

Juan Flores, a Scholar of Puerto Rican Culture in New York, Dies at 71 

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Professor Flores also studied Dominican and Salvadoran communities in New York. But his primary focus was on the experience of Puerto Ricans, reflecting his own heritage. Puerto Ricans, he said, are unique Americans on ...

Latino Rebels | Scapegoating Puerto Rico's Poor: Moving Away ... 

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I also write this response to not favor any specific political solution to Puerto Rico's colonial situation. I favor decolonizing the island in a process in which Puerto Ricans have the power to decide—a process in which ...
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Page 8

Senate passes bill expanding drug war with Transnational Drug

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This post has been generated by Page2RSS

Latino support for President Obama up, and majority of Americans

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This post has been generated by Page2RSS

F.B.I. Searches Doral Financial's Offices in Puerto Rico

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The offices of Doral Financial in San Juan, Puerto Rico, were raided as part of aninvestigation into the struggling bank.

Unsolved Shooting Accentuates Problems at Doral, One of Puerto Rico's Biggest Mortgage Lenders

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The mysterious killing of a top executive is one of many troubles that have shaken Doral Financial and unnerved investors.

Puerto Rico Reports More Than 4,000 Chikungunya Cases

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Puerto Rico has logged more than 4,000 confirmed cases of infection with the Chikungunya virus this year, the Health Department said Wednesday.

33 Break Out of Venezuelan Jail

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Thirty-three suspects in custody at a police station in the capital municipality of Chacao escaped through a hole in the wall, Venezuelan authorities said Wednesday.
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Page 9

Puerto Rico Expects a Record 1.5 Million Cruise Visitors

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Puerto Rico expects to receive more than 1.5 million visitors from cruise ships docking during the fiscal year that ends on June 30, tourism director Ingrid Rivera said.

U.S. Vice President Biden Speaks with Venezuela’s Maduro in Brazil

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On the sidelines of the inauguration of Brazil’s President Dilma Rousseff at the Planalto Palace seat of Brazil’s Government, U.S. Vice President Joe Biden met briefly with Venezuela President Nicolas Maduro in a hand-shake facilitated by Uruguay President Jose “Pepe” Mujica.

Venezuelan Leader, U.S. Vice President Cross Paths in Brazil

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Venezuela’s Nicolas Maduro said on Friday that he took the opportunity of an encounter with U.S. Vice President Joe Biden during Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff’s second inauguration to ask that Washington “respect” his country.

Florida Keys to Use Drones for Mosquito Control

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The Florida Keys, in the extreme southeast of the United States, will practice mosquito control with the aid of drones, which for the first time were approved for the task by the Federal Aviation Administration, or FAA, local media said.

Obama made Bush's foreign policy errors worse - Florida Keys Keynoter

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Obama made Bush's foreign policy errors worse
Florida Keys Keynoter
Now we have not only Russian nuclear armed bombers and submarines playing war games from the Arctic to the Gulf of Mexico and Caribbean, Chinese naval and airfield expansions in China seas in the middle of international shipping lanes challenging the ...

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2015: ¿Año Nuevo? 

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2015
Por: Sergio M. Marxuach
Confieso que siempre he encontrado rara la celebración del “año nuevo”. Simplemente, la tierra habrá terminado otra vuelta alrededor del sol en un periodo de 365.2425 días. Eso de acuerdo con el calendario Gregoriano, que reemplazó por razones litúrgicas al antiguo calendario Juliano por orden del Papa Gregorio XIII, y que fue adoptado por los países Católicos en 1582 cuando Felipe II de España ordenó que el jueves 4 de octubre de 1582 fuera seguido por el viernes 5 de octubre de 1582. Vale la pena señalar, según me lo recordó una amiga historiadora, que los países protestantes y otros cristianos del rito ortodoxo no adoptaron el nuevo calendario hasta mucho después. Por ejemplo, Inglaterra no lo hizo hasta 1752, Grecia hasta 1923 y la Unión Soviética hasta 1929. Además, aun algunos países que habían adoptado el calendario Gregoriano continuaron por años celebrando el comienzo del año nuevo en fechas diferentes.
Así que, después de todo, la diferencia entre el 31 de diciembre y el 1 de enero es básicamente ninguna. Más allá del cambio de un número en el calendario, todo sigue igual: los países en guerra siguen en guerra, los enfermos siguen enfermos, los ricos siguen acumulando riquezas, los pobres siguen siendo pobres y Puerto Rico sigue estancando y quebrado moral y financieramente. Igual que el año pasado y el anterior.
Sin embargo, los seres humanos hemos insistido en imbuir con un significado especial la conclusión de un año y el comienzo de otro. Muchas personas, familias, empresas y gobiernos utilizan esta época para concluir proyectos, terminar tareas pendientes, cambiar de trabajo, o poner en marcha nuevas iniciativas.
Puede ser que ese deseo de cambio sea algo natural, ya que tiene sentido, de manera intuitiva, aprovechar el cambio de calendario como excusa para llevar a cabo cambios en nuestra vida personal y en nuestra sociedad. Ahora bien, si ese deseo de cambio, ese propósito de enmienda, no está anclado firmemente en un análisis profundo de nuestra realidad, entonces no estaríamos haciendo otra cosa que entrando en el reino del pensamiento mágico, de la alucinación, de la enajenación de la realidad.
Por eso me preocupan las expresiones recientes de ciertos miembros de la clase gobernante y empresarial del país sobre como lo que hace falta en Puerto Rico es sencillamente “una dosis de optimismo” o “darle espacio a la esperanza”, entre otras simplezas, para que todo cambie mágicamente y volvamos a “ponerle el rico a Puerto Rico” en el 2015.
Me parece que sí de verdad queremos cambiar las cosas en Puerto Rico nos hacen falta tres cosas. Primero, capacidad para reflexionar. El diccionario de la Real Academia Española define “reflexionar” como “considerar nueva o detenidamente algo.” En el caso de Puerto Rico tenemos que reflexionar detenidamente sobre como llegamos aquí; ¿como surgió esta crisis?; ¿que lecciones podemos deducir de los triunfos y los fracasos del pasado?; ¿cuáles políticas fiscales, económicas y sociales funcionaron y cuáles no?
Segundo, necesitamos claridad de pensamiento. Santo Tomás de Aquino, antes de ponerse a escribir o dar una conferencia, rezaba una oración conocida como “Ante Studium”. En esa oración, Santo Tomás pedía la iluminación divina de los “rincones más oscuros” de su mente, además “de agudeza en el entendimiento, capacidad para recordar, facilidad en el aprendizaje, lucidez para la interpretación, y elocuencia al hablar”. Esa claridad de pensamiento es la que nos hace falta en Puerto Rico y no el discurso trillado, reducido a estribillos como “no hay otra alternativa”, “que paguen los ricos”, o “ni un impuesto más”, clichés que podrán sonar bien en una entrevista de radio o de televisión pero que no son más que un refugio cómodo para evitar el pesado trabajo intelectual que tenemos por delante.
Necesitamos pensar claramente sobre los cambios que tenemos que ejecutar. ¿Qué instituciones y organizaciones hay que reformar para diseñar una política económica racional en Puerto Rico? ¿Qué arreglos institucionales innovadores son posibles dadas las limitaciones políticas a las que nos enfrentamos? ¿Cuáles sectores económicos generan la mayor cantidad de conocimiento que podemos utilizar para movernos hacia la producción de bienes y servicios más complejos? ¿Qué política económica fomentaría esas actividades?
Finalmente, nos hace falta valentía moral para, como decía Vaclav Havel, dejar de vivir dentro de una mentira y vivir dentro de la verdad. Eso significa actuar cuando sea necesario actuar, hablar cuando haya que hablar y exigir cuando haya que exigir. No saben cuantas veces se nos acerca alguien al Centro para una Nueva Economía y nos dice ¿por qué ustedes no dicen esto o lo otro? Y mi respuesta usualmente es ¿y por qué usted no se atreve?
En Puerto Rico vivimos con una gran cobardía intelectual, con un profundo miedo existencial a hacer preguntas, a cuestionar lo que hacen nuestros gobernantes, y a dar la impresión de que estamos “creando problemas” a los poderes que son. Sí, en Puerto Rico hace falta más diálogo, pero no aquel que busca la reconciliación de diversos intereses económicos, políticos, sociales, o de clase basándose en el menor denominador común, sino ese diálogo, en palabras de Albert Camus, entre personas que se mantienen firmes en lo que son y que no tienen miedo de decir lo que de verdad piensan y tienen en la mente. Necesitamos el diálogo que derrota al silencio contundentemente, como la verdad a la mentira.
En suma, si de verdad queremos cambiar las cosas en el 2015, tenemos que reflexionar profundamente, pensar claramente, y actuar con valentía moral. Tenemos que ver las cosas como son, en su forma y color precisos y, parafraseando al escritor francés Roger Grenier, tenemos que descomponer nuestra realidad y recomponerla de otra manera que nos permita entenderla mejor y aprender algo sobre el mundo y la vida. De lo contrario nuestra caótica y pobre entendida existencia seguirá siendo incomprensible. Y el 2015 será igual que el 2014, que fue igual al 2013, que fue igual al…
El autor es Director de Política Pública del Centro para una Nueva Economía. Esta columna fue publicada originalmente en El Nuevo Día el 4 de enero de 2015.
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Page 10

Commentary: Cuba - challenges and chances for the Caribbean

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Cuba attracts three million tourists in 2014

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250 exotic animals seized in PR

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250 exotic animals seized in PR

Authorities in Puerto Rico have seized some 250 exotic animals they say were bou ...
Issued: December 19, 2014
Federal agents have raided nine stores and a warehouse owned by Farmacias C ...
The Puerto Rico Electric Power Authority’s chief restructuring officer has extended a required five-year business plan to a full decade, poi ...

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Carrión wants Banco Popular in Cuba

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Carrión wants Banco Popular in Cuba

The chief of Puerto Rico’s biggest bank said Friday he’s interested in opening a ...

PR unemployment rate holds at 14%

Puerto Rico’s nonfarm payroll jobs edged up in November on a year-over-year basi ...
Authorities in Puerto Rico have seized some 250 exotic animals they say wer ...
Issued: December 19, 2014
The Puerto Rico government is offering tax breaks of up to 40 percent on salaries and production costs for video game makers on projects wit ...
Issued: December 18, 2014
WASHINGTON — The U.S. and Cuba will begin taking steps to restore full diplomatic relations, marking the most significant shift in U.S. poli ...
Obama pledges proportional response to Sony hack
Issued: December 19, 2014
WASHINGTON — President Barack Obama says the U.S. will respond "proportionally" to North Korea's punishing hack of Sony Pictur ...
Obama: No quick end to embargo on Cuba
Issued: December 19, 2014
WASHINGTON — President Barack Obama praised the reopening of diplomatic relations with Cuba on Friday but said he doesn't expect it to b ...

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Doral selling off another $205M in assets

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Doral selling off another $205M in assets

Doral Bank, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Doral Financial Corp., is selling off a ...

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Deep US policy shift on Cuba renews debate about potential impact

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Deep US policy shift on Cuba renews debate about potential impact in PR

Washington’s profound shift in is Cuba policy outlined Wednesday revived a long ...
Issued: December 18, 2014
Regulatory approval for construction of a long-delayed liquefied natural gas terminal off Puerto Rico’s south coast has been pushed back dee ...

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Page 11

PR economy ‘bouncing along bottom’ into the new year, analysts say

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PR economy ‘bouncing along bottom’ into the new year, analysts say

Puerto Rico’s economy continued to “bounce along the bottom” in 2014 and conditi ...
Issued: December 22, 2014
Washington’s profound shift in is Cuba policy outlined Wednesday revived a ...
Issued: December 22, 2014
Regulatory approval for construction of a long-delayed liquefied natural ga ...
Life Wireless, a cellular provider offering free phone service to eligible customers through the federal Lifeline program, has opened its fi ...
Victoria’s Secret has been shooting its 2015 bathing suit edition at several locations in eastern and northeastern Puerto Rico.

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Big changes coming to Cuba tourism with US opening

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Big changes coming to Cuba tourism with US opening

HAVANA — U.S. tourists are roaming the streets of Old Havana, listening to lectu ...
Issued: December 22, 2014
Puerto Rico’s nonfarm payroll jobs edged up in November on a year-over-year ...
Federal agents have raided nine stores and a warehouse owned by Farmacias Caridad as part of an effort to round up hazardous toys imported f ...

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Tuesday, December 23rd, 2014

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Tuesday, December 23rd, 2014
Issued: December 22, 2014
Doral Bank, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Doral Financial Corp., is selling ...
Authorities in Puerto Rico have seized some 250 exotic animals they say were bound to be sold illegally on the island.
Battered NY mayor calls for temporary protest halt
Issued: December 22, 2014
NEW YORK — As the New York Police Department mourns two of its own, Mayor Bill de Blasio pleaded for a pause in protests and rancor amid a w ...
North Korea experiencing severe Internet outages
Issued: December 22, 2014
WASHINGTON — North Korea experienced sweeping and progressively worse Internet outages extending into Monday, with one computer expert sayin ...
Pope in blistering critique of Vatican bureaucrats
Issued: December 22, 2014
VATICAN CITY — To the Catholic Church's "seven deadly sins," Pope Francis has added the "15 ailments of the Curia." ...

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FBI agents raid Doral headquarters

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FBI agents raid Doral headquarters

Federal agents raided Doral Financial Corp.’s headquarters in San Juan on Tuesda ...
Issued: December 22, 2014
HAVANA — U.S. tourists are roaming the streets of Old Havana, listening to lectures on Art Deco architecture and meeting with jazz musicians ...

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Key PR economic index drops again; 2.1% fall is third deepest of 2014

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Key PR economic index drops again; 2.1% fall is third deepest of 2014

A key gauge of Puerto Rico’s economy posted another drop in November, marking ne ...
Sony broadly releases 'The Interview' in reversal of plans
Issued: December 24, 2014
LOS ANGELES — Amid a swell of controversy, backlash, confusion and threats, Sony Pictures broadly released "The Interview" online ...
Issued: December 24, 2014
HAVANA — Dairo Tio cruises the streets of Havana in a gleaming black 1954 Buick with polished chrome highlights and the diesel motor from an ...

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Year in review 2014

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Page 12

Report: US-Uruguay talk López release

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Report: US-Uruguay talk López release
Issued: December 25, 2014
The U.S. and Uruguayan governments are negotiating the release of imprisone ...
Doral Bank, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Doral Financial Corp., is selling off a portfolio of loans, mortgages and other assets for nearly $ ...
Detente spawns Cuban worry on US migration rights
Issued: December 25, 2014
HAVANA — Like tens of thousands of Cubans, Gerardo Luis wants to get to the United States and he's suddenly worried that time may be run ...

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Motorcycle officer hits 2 tourists

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Motorcycle officer hits 2 tourists
Issued: December 27, 2014
A Puerto Rico police officer assigned to protect the U.S. territory’s gover ...
Politically connected developer and attorney Juan Zalduondo Viera is among 17 people indicted by a federal grand jury in a crackdown on a dr ...
Poll: 5 things to know about the economy
Issued: December 27, 2014
WASHINGTON — Few issues in a presidential campaign come close to being as meaningful as the economy. The latest Associated Press-GfK poll of ...
N. Korea compares Obama to monkey in hacking row
Issued: December 27, 2014
SEOUL, South Korea — North Korea has compared President Barack Obama to a monkey and blamed the U.S. for shutting down its Internet amid the ...
US mission in Havana to become embassy amid thaw
Issued: December 27, 2014
HAVANA — A half-century after Washington severed relations with Cuba, the United States' seven-story mission looms over Havana's sea ...

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PR eyeing local sale of iguana meat

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PR eyeing local sale of iguana meat

The Puerto Rico government is analyzing the potential sale of iguana meat on the ...

HAVANA — Like tens of thousands of Cubans, Gerardo Luis wants to get to the Unit ...
Issued: December 29, 2014
FBI agents raid Doral headquarters
Issued: December 29, 2014
Federal agents raided Doral Financial Corp.’s headquarters in San Juan on T ...
Funtarctica ice skating opens in SJ
Issued: December 29, 2014
Ice skating is an option in sunny Puerto Rico as Funtarctica kicks in at th ...
The U.S. and Uruguayan governments are negotiating the release of imprisoned militant Puerto Rican nationalist Oscar López Rivera, according ...
The Puerto Rico government is putting together a multisectoral delegation for a planned trip to Cuba in the first quarter of 2015.
The chief of Puerto Rico’s biggest bank said Friday he’s interested in opening a branch in Havana in the wake of this week’s historic thaw i ...
In crowded skies, lost plane's request for new path denied
Issued: December 29, 2014
SURABAYA, Indonesia — The plane sought permission to climb above threatening clouds. Air traffic control couldn't say yes immediately — ...
AirAsia's brash CEO in spotlight after jet disappears
Issued: December 29, 2014
KUALA LUMPUR, Malaysia — His airline empire began, Tony Fernandes likes to say, with the purchase of a bankrupt company for less than a doll ...

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PR monkeys remain vital to research

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PR monkeys remain vital to research

CAYO SANTIAGO -- Scientists hope findings from a new research project involving ...

PR expects record 1.5M cruise visitors

Puerto Rico expects to receive more than 1.5 million visitors from cruise ships ...

San Se festival organizers slap City Hall with $1.5M lawsuit

The organizers of the annual Fiestas de la Calle San Sebastián festival in Old S ...
Campaign to stop stray bullets works
Issued: January 1, 2015
Puerto Rico’s police chief said a campaign against celebratory gunfire is s ...
Issued: January 1, 2015
The Puerto Rico government is analyzing the potential sale of iguana meat o ...
Issued: January 1, 2015
A key gauge of Puerto Rico’s economy posted another drop in November, marki ...
The Puerto Rico government will build a Puerto Rican Music Hall of Fame Museum to honor the island’s outstanding composers, singers and musi ...
Federal agents raided Doral Financial Corp.’s headquarters in San Juan on Tuesday as a part of ongoing investigations that may be tied to th ...
Issued: December 29, 2014
HAVANA — Like tens of thousands of Cubans, Gerardo Luis wants to get to the United States and he's suddenly worried that time may be run ...

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San Se festival on despite $1.5M suit

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San Se festival on despite $1.5M suit
Issued: January 3, 2015
San Juan Mayor Carmen Yulín Cruz pledged that the Fiestas de la Calle San S ...
Denison links with IMS to reach PR market
Issued: January 3, 2015
Florida-based Denison Yacht Sales has expanded into the Caribbean through a ...
Puerto Rico’s police chief said a campaign against celebratory gunfire is showing success.
The Puerto Rico government is analyzing the potential sale of iguana meat on the island as part of ongoing efforts to check the massive spre ...
Obama looks past GOP in promoting his 2015 agenda
Issued: January 3, 2015
HONOLULU — President Barack Obama plans new steps to help more Americans buy a home and attend college, part of a 2015 agenda he hopes can b ...
NASA explores inflatable spacecraft technology
Issued: January 3, 2015
NORFOLK, Va. — Devising a way to one day land astronauts on Mars is a complex problem and NASA scientists think something as simple as a chi ...
Cuban Santeria priests welcome closer ties with US
Issued: January 3, 2015
HAVANA — A group of Afro-Cuban Santeria priests say the path is clear for improved dialogue between the U.S. and Cuba following the governme ...

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Doral: PR govt appeal is ‘baseless’

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Doral: PR govt appeal is ‘baseless’
Issued: January 3, 2015
Doral Financial Corp. is dismissing as “baseless” a Puerto Rico government ...
Murders in Puerto Rico at the close of 2014 numbered 680, the lowest figure since 2000 and a drop of 23 percent compared with the year befor ...

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US-Cuba rapprochement exposes Venezuela's Maduro - Stabroek News

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Stabroek News

US-Cuba rapprochement exposes Venezuela's Maduro
Stabroek News
Also speaking at the Mercosur summit, Ricardo Patino, the foreign minister for Ecuador – another leftist member of the regional ALBA bloc – said he hoped the U.S-Cuba change would provoke a re-think over sanctions on Venezuela. “President Obama's ...

Venezuela's role in warming Cuba - US relations (+video) - Christian Science Monitor

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Jerusalem Post

Venezuela's role in warming Cuba - US relations (+video)
Christian Science Monitor
Bolivia's President Evo Morales (center l.), Cuba's President Raul Castro (center r.), and Venezuela's President Nicolas Maduro attend the closing ceremony of the 10th Bolivarian Alternative for the Americas (ALBA) alliance summit in Havana December 14.
Cuba shift is long overdue and marks the end of anachronistic policyDallas Morning News (blog)
Raul Castro welcomes renewal of relations with USNorthwest Georgia News

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As US-Cuba relations warm, fuming Venezuelan president left in the cold - The Guardian

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The Guardian

As US-Cuba relations warm, fuming Venezuelan president left in the cold
The Guardian
Also speaking at the Mercosur summit, Ricardo Patino, the foreign minister for Ecuador – another leftist member of the regional Alba bloc – said he hoped the US-Cuba change would provoke a re-think over sanctions on Venezuela. “President Obama's ...
Venezuela's role in warming Cuba - US relations (+video)Christian Science Monitor
Latin America cheers US-Cuba rapprochementDaily Mail

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A View on Cuba's Opening From the De Facto U.S. Colony of Puerto Rico

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This article is a joint-publication of NACLA and edmorales.net
Caribbean Islands (John Pinkerton Map, 1818 / Wikimedia Commons)
Map of the Caribbean Islands (John Pinkerton, 1818 / Wikimedia Commons)
Cuba y Puerto Rico son / Cuba and Puerto Rico are
De un pájaro dos alas / Two wings of the same bird
Reciben flores y balas / They receive flowers and bullets
Sobre el mismo corazón / With the same heart
—Lola Rodríguez de Tío
The “momentous” yet seemingly long-planned announcement that the United States and Cuba have agreed to re-establish diplomatic relations was an odd end to a chaotic year of crises and strife. From the summer of renewed violence in Gaza and the surge of unaccompanied children on the Mexican border to the anguish of Mike Brown/Ferguson and Eric Garner/Staten Island and the disappearance of 43 students in Ayotzinapa, there seemed to be no end to conflagrations of long-stirring conflicts that expose the myth of American exceptionalism. The cost of freedom in the first-est of First Worlds that we live in is the increasing precariousness of life outside our borders—a carnage that is often not connected to our comfort, yet is a result of the burgeoning inequality created by the gospel of globalization. Yet now, perhaps one of the sorest points of contention in the hemisphere, the 50-year U.S.-imposed embargo of Cuba, is finally being acknowledged as a mistake.
But what will come now, with the embargo still largely in place? Even as talking heads and pundits from MSNBC to Fox News, Breitbart to The Nation, are weighing in on the political and economic fallout of the rapprochement between Barack and Raúl–one that may yet culminate in the tearing down of the commercial wall between free-trade capitalism and the socialist experiment of the United States’s closer-than-close neighbor—there is uncertainty and confusion about what it all means. That’s why today, on holiday in my second home, the unincorporated island territory, de facto colony, and imaginary nation of Puerto Rico, I’m going to engage not in a North-South cloud of speculation, but a Caribbean sea of questions from one eastern wing of this archipelagic bird to its western other.
The advent of Obam-apertura, the great “opening” that the U.S. neoliberal narrative holds as a form of liberation for a suffering people, is also something its internal corporate banking cabal sees as a way to recapture a lost market. While there is much to celebrate as a victory for the Cuban people—the release of the remaining members of the Cuban Five, for example—the opening creates the possibility of a sudden windfall of previously unexploited consumers and a workforce accustomed to even lower wages that are foisted on places like Mexico, India, and Vietnam. For an American economy that has been largely stagnant—aside from a recent spurt sparked by falling gas prices and temporary holiday season hires—the opening up of Cuba has the look of a last-ditch opportunity to stave off looming worldwide economic disaster. And for a president reeling from bad press—even his accomplishments are neutered by right-wing media’s echo chamber—and a disastrous midterm election, it serves as an instant legacy-making machine, like Nixon’s engagement of China and Reagan’s hollow triumph over the Soviet Union. Much has also been said about how the move seeks to repair relations with the rest of Latin America, which had decided to invite Cuba to the next Summit of the Americas despite U.S. opposition.
The implications for U.S. politics are striking, of course. In one fell swoop, Obama has defused several attacks from a triumphant Republican Party gearing itself up to attempt to end Obamacare, impeach him for his executive action on immigration reform, and otherwise gum up the works with threats of closing down the federal government again. He has placed several of his most hysterical critics–notably the increasingly apoplectic Cuban-American senators Ted Cruz and Marco Rubio–on the wrong side of the issue, hurt Jeb Bush’s chances at a presidential run and possibly destroyed the Republican strategy of winning the presidency through Florida (remember the hanging chads of 2000?).  The home base of rabid anti-Communism that Republicans have been banking on since Reagan won in 1980 has begun to crumble on its own, as Democratic-leaning Puerto Ricans havebegun to populating the Orlando area and successive Cuban American generations have become more moderate. But this now may be the death blow. Obama’s Latino-friendly moves have already made him the “First Latino President” in Politico’s eyes, anyway, further damaging the Republican brand.
Yet as much as this has all the earmarks of a shrewd Obama move, this is clearly not just about politics. Despite their denials, The New York Times editorial board seems to have been in on this whole scheme, having published a series of editorials beginning in October calling for normalization of relations with Cuba. While on record with The Washington Post as denying any advance knowledge, the shocking speed of their carefully crafted narrative about the secret talks, the “18 months of furtive diplomacy,” had the feel of those notorious Times obituaries—prepared sometimes months in advance—when famous figures who have long suffered health problems finally pass away. Deriving their agenda from neoliberal economists who see Cuba’s ultimate goal as transitioning away from communism and into the global capitalist economy, the Council on Foreign Relations has had Latin America expert Julia Sweig speculating on “Cuba After Communism” for quite some time. Could it be that an institution that lists Nicaraguan Contra pal Elliot Abrams as an “expert” and Citibank/Goldman Sachs hedge fund king Robert Rubin on its board might be part of a broader neoliberal agenda to put Obam-apertura on the front burner?
All of this was presaged, of course by Raúl’s 2013 relaxation of Cuba’s migration laws, neoliberal-esque shrinking of government employment rolls, and allowing a limited expansion of small businesses. These policy changes were more bold than this December’s rapprochement, but received considerably less attention in the mainstream press. Yet as Castro tried to structurally change the Cuban economy, the United States is completely unwilling to change course from its orgy of deregulation of finance capital transactions, despite the fact that it continues to go down the road of freewheeling high-risk banking and investment activity as its main profit-making engine. On December 14, three days before Obama’s announcement, a Times Op-Ed, entitled “Cuba’s Economy at a Crossroads,” argued that “Cubans, who have been subjected for decades to a centrally planned economy that is among the world’s most dysfunctional.” But was it really more dysfunctional than an economy like that of the United States, stripped of governmental regulation and with a banking system turned into a high-stakes gambling casino? And how “functional” do Obama and the U.S. economy look when two days later, December 16, Obama signs a spending bill that rolls back banking regulations and allows a return to the corrosive banking practices that caused the 2008 recession in the first place?
Clearly, the Cuban revolution is far from perfect. A different kind of class system, based around party membership rather than material wealth is as ossified as ever, and a new “minority” class of those who have prospered through outsized remittances and involvement in licensed small business have intensified resentment from below as well as eroded the social contract of Cuba’s socialist egalitarianism. Black Cubans have not benefitted as much as lighter-skinned Cubans and there is persecution of dissidents and a raft of political prisoners. While freedom of expression is clearly limited in ways not typical of capitalist democracies, isn’t Cuba an example of how state control is just more overt, not carefully concealed by being funneled through market forces? In the “free” world we have plenty of political prisoners, and the captivity of pro-independence leader Oscar López Rivera—whom Telesur is claiming is the subject of negotiations for imminent release, in another Obama-the-Latino-president gambit—is a sore point for Puerto Ricans.
In Cuba, the Internet is largely unavailable and media is tightly controlled; in the United States we have censorship through market forces, which rarely promote art and culture with progressive political content, and media that elide many stories that conflict with the agenda of corporate ownership. We have a simultaneously sophisticated and crude way of policing ourselves—depending on what neighborhood we live in–and unlike Cuba, we don’t have a sustained commitment to public education, medicine, and the cultural expressions of non-elite communities. Perhaps most disappointing is the fact that in public discourse it is almost impossible to have serious discussions about economic systems that are alternatives to free-market capitalism.
If we did have those sort of discussions, we would be able to see that the future of Cuba is not just about how its tentative annexation into the free trade zones the United States seeks to establish across the hemisphere will affect foreign investment and local consumption patterns. That is, ask not how you can become a tourist in Varadero or sell tractors there—ask how Cubans themselves will balance their desire for more access to goods and material wealth with their desire to preserve the social safety net that free-market capitalists hope to make a distant memory by mid-century. Ask, how much further can Cubans seek to democratize their own workplace, create decision-making space and establish autonomy from party ideology as their aging, as Cuba’s sluggish state framework makes concessions to neoliberism?
These are questions that Puerto Ricans might want to ask about Cuba, since, as Lola Rodríguez de Tío, proto-feminist and fierce nationalist suggested in her 1893 poem, “A Cuba” (For Cuba) we are two wings of the same bird. While pouring through the various analyses of the Cuban economy over the last two weeks I noticed a few similarities between the two islands. Both—although Cuba seems to be far ahead in this project—are pushing major new seaports in the hopes of handling shipping commerce between the United States, Europe and Latin America; both feature an aging population whose needs will be a major consideration in future budget projections; and both, unlike state capitalist model China, have economies heavily centered on services rather than manufacturing.
Yet Puerto Rico and Cuba might also represent two widely divergent historical points on the free-trade timeline. Puerto Rico–whose agricultural economy was gutted to create a light-manufacturing model in the 1950s that featured a hefty dose of external investment capital–was a dry run for free-trade policies like NAFTA. U.S. corporations experimented with off-shore operations using a non-English-speaking, lower-wage work force in Puerto Rico long before Burger Kings and Walmarts invaded Mexico. It was the vastly lower wages that U.S. corporations found in Mexico after NAFTA that helped spin Puerto Rico into its current debilitating fiscal crisis, one immeasurably worsened by atoxic package of credit default swaps cleverly manipulated by, among others, Robert Rubin’s old shop, Goldman Sachs.
While in the short run, Cuban wages are so low that Cuba’s immediate entry into the global capitalist economy could even raise them. But in the long run, what would Cuba lose by submitting itself to the neoliberal plan? Puerto Rico, and other economies that have bought into the foreign investment, export-driven model ultimately see most of the wealth they create getting sucked into predatory banking structures, and their governments forced to go into debt to provide basic services. By 2012, the ratio of government debt to the island’s GNP rose to 100.6%. Now at around $73 billion, Puerto Rico’s debt has become the obscure object of desire for hedge funds, whose mom and pop investors are more concerned with the fate of their 401Ks than the island’s slowly declining and increasingly poor population.
If Cuba were to take a deep breath and look at what’s happened to an island it has shared such a deep history with—going back as far as the late nineteenth century when leaders of Cuban and Puerto Rican independence movements met in New York and designed flags that were each other’s inverse—and if Cuba were to see Puerto Rico as the beginning of the free-trade economic era we’re living in now, it would have to ask itself, are we the end game? I have faith they are already ahead of this game. No doubt the Cuban people, who are well versed in discussions of production and consumption, of capitalism, socialism, and workplace democracy, will know what’s at stake and find a way to make Obam-apertura work for them. 

Ed Morales is a freelance journalist and author of Living in Spanglish (St. Martin’s Press). He teaches at Columbia University’s Center for the Study of Ethnicity and Race, and is a NACLA contributing editor.
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When Guns Are Outlawed, Only Outlaws Who Pay Off the Cops Will Have Guns (Puerto Rico Edition)

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WAPA TVWAPA TVPuerto Rico has restrictive firearms laws. Getting a concealed carry permit to legally tote a handgun is an arbitrary affair that largely comes down to a matter of knowing the right people. As with all laws that give government officials the authority to dispense favors, this creates an opportunity for a market—and Lieutenant Sergio Calderón-Marrero, head of the Puerto Rico Police Department's Bayamón Criminal Investigations Corps, is just the sort of guy to introduce supply to demand. Unfortunately, federal officials don't care for those sort of shortcuts, and the former police lieutenant has been arrested and indicted.
SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico – On Thursday, December 11, 2014, a federal grand jury returned a 17-count indictment against former Lieutenant and head of Bayamón CIC, Puerto Rico Police Department Sergio Calderón-Marrero for conspiracy to commit identity fraud, unlawful production of identification documents, aggravated identity theft, attempted witness tampering and attempted obstruction of justice, announced Rosa Emilia Rodríguez-Vélez, United States Attorney for the District of Puerto Rico. The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and the Puerto Rico Police Department (PRPD) are in charge of the investigation.
Calderón-Marrero would obtain forged firearms handling course certificates, forge signatures of his clients, and use the notary seal of a deceased Attorney and Notary Public to circumvent the appropriate legal process and obtain Concealed Carry Weapons Permits illegally for his clients.
The feds say that over the course of two years, from 2012 to early 2014, Calderón-Marrero pulled in $105,000 from his extracurricular business activities. They, rather unkindly, want to deprive him of his proceeds.
Officials like Calderón-Marrero who lubricate the wheels of restrictive regimes and intrusive laws with the grease of corruption make life more livable for many people in a multitude of jurisdictions. Admittedly they're a second best to not having restrictive regimes and intrusive laws to begin with.
But officials like Calderón-Marrero are certainly preferable to honest and sincere enforcers of authoritarianism, as C.S. Lewis noted:
Of all tyrannies, a tyranny exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It may be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron's cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end, for they do so with the approval of their own conscience.
Spare us the tyranny, please, but if we can't be spared that, let it be enforced by the likes of Calderón-Marrero, from whom a little breathing room can at least be purchased.
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Murders in Puerto Rico at 15-year low

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Murders in Puerto Rico at the close of 2014 numbered 680, the lowest figure since 2000 and a drop of 23 percent compared with the year before, something that police attribute to better crime detection and citizens' cooperation.
The chief of the Puerto Rico Police Department, Jose Caldero, said Tuesday in a statement to Efe that the reasons for the significant decline in the number of murders are to be found in those two points plus the commitment of all the cops on the force.
"The crime rate continues to drop as we get better at arresting criminals, dismantling their organizations and taking them to court. These achievements are thanks to the commitment of our police officers together with the Department of Justice and its team of prosecutors," Caldero said.
The police chief said that "citizens' cooperation has also been fundamental," because "every day we get tips that help our investigations."
"Our plan of operations focuses on three main objectives: detection, prevention and citizen service," the top officer of the PRPD said.
Caldero noted that the creation of a high-profile investigative division has been key to driving the crime rate down, and an example of that is the percentage of cases solved of Type 1 crimes - including murder and rape - which has now risen to 78 percent, compared with 68 percent at the end of 2013.
The drop in the number of crimes this year was 30 percent compared with 2012 and 41 percent compared with 2011, the year when 1,164 violent deaths marked the highest number since such statistics began to be kept in Puerto Rico.
Murders on the Caribbean island went on an upward curve starting in 2000, though it was after 2008, with the effects of the economic crisis still suffered in the U.S. commonwealth, when the numbers went through the roof to make security Puerto Rico's biggest problem.
Caldero became police chief last April 29 after five other chiefs had "paraded" through that office in recent years, and who for different reason weren't on the job long enough to carry out long-term prevention policies.
The decline in murders has coincided with the internal conflict taking place within the island's security forces due to the discontent of policemen over their wages.
For several days during the past two weeks, cops made good on their threat to carry out a somewhat undercover walkout, with an absenteeism almost five times greater than usual.
The policemen's ill feelings originated with the Legislature's approval of a reform of public employee pensions, which in general were bad news for both their working conditions and their retirement. EFE
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Puerto Rico police seize a record 110 weapons

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SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico (AP) – Puerto Rico police say they have seized a record 110 weapons as part of a one-day crackdown on crime across the U.S. territory.
Police Chief Jose Caldero says officers also are serving arrest warrants for 87 suspects accused of drug trafficking and weapon violations. Puerto Rico police and U.S. federal agents have arrested 63 suspects so far.
He said authorities also seized 47 cars during the island-wide sweep that began early Tuesday.
A spokesman for the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives said about 90 percent of the guns seized came from Florida.
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Puerto Rico police officer hits 2 US university professors with motorcycle; both survive - National

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