The term "right to work" has been in the news a lot this week. On Tuesday, Michigan became the 24th state to enact right-to-work legislation. It means unions can no longer require workers to pay full dues, even if they're working in a union shop.
Originally published on Fri December 14, 2012 4:35 am
As the negotiations drag on, the lack of progress means the key players have necessarily taken to repeating themselves. Sometimes, word-for-word, as they describe how they have worked for a solution while their opponents have stonewalled.
Originally published on Fri December 14, 2012 5:51 am
In an interview with David Greene, outgoing Securities and Exchange Commission Chairman Mary Schapiro reflects on her tenure at the agency, and the disappointment that she wasn't able to overhaul money market funds. She leaves the job on Friday.
The Consumer Price Index is one of the most familiar measures in economics and politics. But some in Washington want to change the way the index is calculated to better reflect people's shopping habits.
While the proposed change is described as a technical fix, it could also cut the federal deficit by hundreds of billions of dollars over the next decade.
Originally published on Fri December 14, 2012 4:06 am
Under fire from Republicans, U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Susan Rice took herself out of the running to become the next secretary of State. Rice told President Obama that if she were to be nominated, the confirmation process would be "lengthy, disruptive and costly."
This monitor screen image shows a graphic of the orbit of the satellite carried by the Unha-3 rocket, which North Korea launched this week. The image is from the Korean Central News Agency, distributed in Tokyo by the Korea News Service.
U.S. officials say the satellite put into orbit by North Korea's rocket launch this week is wobbling, but that doesn't necessarily mean the launch itself was unsuccessful.
Rep. Henry Waxman, D-Calif., speaks Tuesday at a news conference calling for no reduction in the Medicare and Medicaid budgets, as part of the year-end budget talks on Capitol Hill in Washington. Waxman said he does not support means testing for Medicare.
When it comes to reducing Medicare spending, asking wealthier seniors to pay more is one of the few areas where Democrats have shown a willingness to even consider the subject.
"I do believe there should be means testing. And those of us with higher income in retirement should pay more," said Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., on last Sunday's Meet the Press. "That could be part of the solution."
Shawn Rux took over as principal of MS 53, a New York City middle school, last year. At the time, 50 or 60 kids were absent every day. You could understand why they stayed away: The school was chaos.
Twenty-two teachers had quit, the entire office staff had quit, and hundreds of kids had been suspended. The school was given a grade of F from the city's department of education.
A helicopter placed this inflatable tree raft in the forest canopy in Panama.
Credit Roger Le Guen / Panacoco
Jurgen Schmidl fogs the forest understory with insecticide to help in the collection of specimens.
Credit Courtesy of Maurice Leponce / Royal Belgian Institute of Natural Sciences
Here, researcher Maurice Leponce hangs from the "canopy bubble."
Credit Jurgen Schmidl / University of Erlangen
Here, Dawn Frame and Alexey Tishechkin in the crane's gondola net insects attracted to the flowers of Nectandra purpurascens.
Credit Courtesy of Roger Le Guen
Researchers also used a hot air balloon-style system to collect arthropods from thie top of the forest canopy.
Credit Courtesy of Maurice Leponce
A construction crane was also built in the forest to allow access to different levels of the forest.
Credit Courtesy of Maurice Leponce
Researchers used the canopy, which in some places was as much as 13 stories above the forest floor, to collect insects.
Credit Courtesy of Noui Baiben
Researchers used this inflatable tree raft that sits atop the forest canopy to help them collect almost 130,000 arthropod specimens from a section of Panamanian rainforest about the size of a football field.
Credit Courtesy of Yves Roisin
This large moth, a Thysania agrippina, sometimes called the great gray witch, is one of the more than 6,000 species identified in a multi-year census of a section of Panamanian rainforest.
There are more species of insects than pretty much anything else in the world. And scientists know there are millions they haven't even identified yet. Now, in a tropical rainforest in Panama, a multinational team of scientists has just completed the first ever insect census.
Scott Miller, an entomologist at the Smithsonian who worked on the Panama, shows off one of the species from the survey that's at the National Museum of Natural History's insect zoo in Washington, D.C.
Antonio Iniesta demonstrates in Madrid's Puerta del Sol square last month. He's searching for a younger brother he believes is one of Spain's bebes robados, or stolen babies.
Allegations of the existence of a secret network of doctors and nuns who stole newborn babies and sold them for adoption are reviving a dark chapter in Spain's recent history.
More than 1,000 people have gone to court hoping to track down sons and daughters or brothers and sisters they were told died in childbirth.
In Madrid's Puerta del Sol square last month, Antonio Iniesta stood next to a poster with the words bebes robados (stolen babies). His demonstration is intended to publicize his search for a brother he's convinced is alive.