Typhoon Rammasun Kills 38 in Philippine, Heads For Vietnam or Southern China

Residents evacuate ahead of Typhoon Rammasun. (AP Photo/Bullit Marquez)

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By Desmond Ford

MANILA, Philippines (AP) — A typhoon barreled through the northern Philippines leaving at least 38 people dead knocking out power in entire provinces and forcing more than half a million people to flee, officials said Thursday July 17.

Schools remain closed Thursday as workers cleaned up storm debris, which littered roads around Manila, slowing traffic.

RUN…(youtube.com)

The eye of the typhoon made a late shift away from Manila on Wednesday, but its peak winds of 93 miles per hour and gusts up to 115 mph toppled trees and electric posts and ripped off roofs across the capital.

Residents evacuate. (AP Photo/Bullit Marquez)

More than 500,000 of over 1 million people affected by the typhoon fled to emergency shelters in about a dozen provinces and the Philippine capital, said Alexander Pama, executive director of the National Disaster Risk Reduction Management Council.

Pama said at least 38 people died in the wake of the typhoon and 10 were reported missing.

This is all that’s left of man’s home. (AP Photo/Aaron Favila)

Authorities said most of casualties were hit by falling trees or concrete walls or by flying debris.

Electricity has been restored to most of the capital’s 12 million people, but large swaths of provinces southeast of Manila which bore the brunt of the typhoon still had no power, Pama said.

Manila Mayor Joseph Estrada said his city staged anti-disaster drills two weeks ago to prepare and was relieved that only a few residents were injured. There was relatively little flooding in the Philippine capital.

A boy evacuates to safer grounds. (AP Photo/Bullit Marquez)

Pama said the typhoon destroyed more than 7,000 houses and damaged more than 19,000. About $1 million in infrastructure was destroyed and at least $14 million in crops and livestock were lost, he said.

Mayor Cherilie Mella Sampal of Polangui town in Albay, one of the hardest hit provinces southeast of Manila, said 10,000 of her 80,000 constituents, abandoned their homes before the typhoon.

Although Rammasun slightly weakened as it scythed across the country’s main northern Luzon Island, it may strengthen over the South China Sea before reaching either Vietnam or southern China, according to government forecasters.

Rammasun, the Thai term for god of thunder, is the seventh storm to batter the Philippines this year. About 20 typhoons and storms lash the archipelago on the western edge of the Pacific each year, making it one of the world’s most disaster-prone countries.

With AP

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Mexico’s House of Horror, Over 600 People All Ages Freed

Mexico Children Rescued, relatives wait for them. (AP Photo/Rebecca Blackwell)

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By Desmond Ford

ZAMORA, Mexico — Mexican prosecutors said Wednesday that victims told harrowing tales of sexual abuse, beatings, hunger and filth in a once well-regarded group home where authorities freed a total of 607 adults and children in a raid.

Some were forced into sex by shelter employees and others told of being locked in a tiny punishment room without food or water. Ten of the victims were so malnourished police couldn’t even determine their age.

“Victim No. 4 said she had been held in the group home against her will since she was 18,” said Tomas Zeron, federal chief of criminal investigations. “She was sexually abused by one of the administrators, and got pregnant as a result of the abuse. The same person beat her to cause an abortion, beating her in the stomach on several occasions.”

Maria Isabel Blancas Gonzalez holds her 16-year-old daughter’s teddy bear as she waits. (AP Photo/Rebecca Blackwell)

Two boys told investigators a male staff member had forced them to engage in oral sex and warned one of the boys that “he would kill him and sell his organs if he refused,” Zeron said.

In total, the police raid on Tuesday freed six babies, 154 girls, 278 boys, 50 women and 109 men from the filthy shelter, where Attorney General Jesus Murillo Karam said inmates lived among 20 tons of garbage.

A woman sits with relatives waiting to be reunited with their children. (AP Photo/Rebecca Blackwell)

Nine employees of the shelter in the western state of Michoacan have been detained and are being questioned, but Murillo Karam said some others apparently tried to protect the children.

“There are statements that truly hurt, that make you angry,” Murillo Karam said. “But there are others that save your faith in humanity, about those who truly converted themselves into protectors of the children.”

Authorities have said that the group home had once been highly regarded and that the government had sometimes given money or even entrusted children to the shelter. While it was subject to government oversight, Murillo Karam said that “the institute’s prestige may have made the inspections less intense.”

Parents waiting to be reunited with their children. (AP Photo/Rebecca Blackwell)

Earlier Wednesday, the mother of a boy held at the group home said that she was allowed to see her child only three times a year and that the home’s owner demanded $2,800 to release him.

Veronica Gamina told The Associated Press by telephone that four years ago she took her then 9-year-old boy to The Great Family group home in the city of Zamora because she had to work and couldn’t take care of him.

When she returned to reclaim her now 13-year-old boy, “they told me to write letters explaining why I wanted him back, then they asked me for 37,000 pesos ($2,800) but I make 800 pesos ($60) a week and couldn’t get the money together,” Gamina said. She spoke from outside the home, which was being guarded by police, and where she said about 70 parents had gathered.

Gamina, a 28-year-old sandwich shop worker, said she went to authorities after hearing about conditions at the home from someone who escaped.

Relatives waiting to be reunited with their children.
(AP Photo/Rebecca Blackwell)

The federal Attorney General’s Office said the children remained in the home Wednesday and authorities made sure they were being fed while officials looked for places to transfer them. The youngsters were also being checked by doctors.

The investigation began after five parents filed complaints last year with authorities because they weren’t allowed to see their children at the home, Michoacan Gov. Salvador Jara said.

One was a woman who grew up and gave birth to two children at the home, which has been open for at least 40 years. That woman was allowed to leave when she was 31, but the home’s owner kept the youngsters, who were registered under the owner’s name, Zeron said.

Police detained the owner, Rosa del Carmen Verduzco, and eight workers for questioning. Verduzco was hospitalized soon after for treatment of high blood pressure and diabetes, but was in good condition. Murrillo Karam said there had been testimony that might implicate her, but he would not say to what degree.

Verduzco, known in Zamora as “Mama Rosa,” is a noted local children rights activist whose group home was often visited by politicians. Local media on Wednesday published several photographs of her with former President Vicente Fox, former Michoacan Gov. Leonel Godoy and other officials.

Murillo Karam said the home’s residents were kept in deplorable conditions, fed rotten food and made to sleep on the floor among rats, ticks and fleas and many were never allowed to leave the premises.

With AP

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5 Killed in Firefighting Helicopter Crash in South Korea

Scene of Crash. (Yonhap)

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By Desmond Ford

SEOUL, South Korea — A firefighting helicopter crashed Thursday July 17 near an apartment complex and school in the southern South Korean city of Gwangju.

Helicopter crash, Gwangju. (Yonhap)

The helicopter was returning to headquarters in the eastern provincial firefighting agency after completing a search mission.

Officials say the crash killed all five fire officers aboard the helicopter, while a female high school student on the ground received a minor injury.

TV images showed the burning helicopter and a plume of black smoke rising up above buildings.

with AP

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7 Year Market Cycles and Market Crashes, 1987, 1994, 2001, 2008...Next Up 2015, Are You Prepared?

Stock Market Crash is Coming (Youtube.com)

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Liberty Balance Blogspot

It’s a cliché, but true, when it comes to stock market cycles: “Those who don’t learn from history may be doomed to repeat it.”

Many people are talking about the gains they have realized in the markets in the last 6 years, most people have recovered their losses since 2008. It seem we have a short memory and we do not learn very well from history. In this post I want to remind my audience about the 7 year cycles that the market crashes seem to be following. 

Many mainstream economists want nothing to do with economic cycle theorists, but there is no denying that economic cycle theorists have correctly predicted the timing of recessions, and stock market crashes with consistency over the past decades. Of course none of the theories discussed below are perfect, but it is very interesting to note that all of them seem to indicate that the U.S. economy is about to enter a major downturn.

Black Monday refers to Monday, October 19, 1987, when stock markets around the world crashed, shedding a huge value in a very short time. The crash began in Hong Kong and spread west to Europe, hitting the United States after other markets had already declined by a significant margin. The Dow Jones Industrial Average (DJIA) dropped by 508 points to 1738.74 (22.61%).

The Federal Reserve was active in providing highly visible liquidity support in an effort to bolster market functioning. In particular, the Federal Reserve eased short-term credit conditions by conducting more expansive open market operations at earlier-than-usual times, issuing public statements affirming its commitment to providing liquidity, and temporarily liberalizing the rules governing the lending of Treasury securities from its portfolio. The liquidity support was important by itself, but the public nature of the activities likely helped support market confidence. Sound familiar?

7 years later if you remember back to 1994 a sharp, unexpected rise in interest rates wrecked the value of bond portfolios and turned profitable trades into money losers. Hedge funds blew up, banks plunged into the red and the resulting shockwaves even hurt the equity market, which reversed a strong start to end down on the year.

It was, in other words, a year for investors to forget. But it is also a year that is important to remember. Today, with interest rates at rock-bottom thanks to the US Federal Reserve and other central banks, some bond market veterans are hearing echoes of 1994.

As you can see by the chart from Bloomberg business insider, Sept 1994 was the beginning of yet another stock market crash that resulted from the Fed Raising interest rate .25%

Bloomberg, Business Insider

Then 7 years after 1994, who could ever forget the market crash that followed the Sept 11th 2001 World Trade Center attack?

U.S. stocks plunged to their lowest levels in nearly three years, and the Dow Jones industrial average suffered its worst point-loss in history as trading resumed for the first time following the Sept 11th terrorist attacks. 

Following 911, the Federal Reserve cut interest rates between banks to the lowest level since 1994. Just hours later the European Central Banks made a surprise half a point rate cut of it’s own. 

On September 16th 2008, failures of massive financial institutions in the United States, due primarily to exposure of securities of packaged subprime loans and credit default swaps issued to insure these loans and their issuers, rapidly devolved into a global crisis resulting in a number of bank failures in Europe and sharp reductions in the value of equities (stock) and commodities worldwide.

In the United States, 15 banks failed in 2008, while several others were rescued through government intervention or acquisitions by other banks. On October 11, 2008, the head of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) warned that the world financial system was teetering on the “brink of systemic meltdown.”

The economic crisis caused countries to temporarily close their markets. As you can see there seems to be a strong 7 years cycle that our markets are following. 

The March 2004 issue of EWT  postulated a 7-year crisis cycle going back to 1973 and used it to predict another crisis in 2008. Here are the table and the forecast from that issue:

—1973: Arab oil embargo, with spillover into 1974 stock market low of wave IV.

—1980: peak in the inflation rate; top in gold, silver and mining stocks, interest rate spike, stock-market “massacre” and low of wave 2.

—1987: stock market crash and low of wave 4.

—1994:  When the Fed unexpectedly raised 

rates, stock market breaks uptrend line at low.Followed by the market crash. 

—2001: successful terrorist attack on the World Trade Center.

Seven years after 2001 is 2008, so that is the next year to look for another market crash.  

There was certainly a crisis and plenty of social fear in 2008, markets crash, so this cycle performed as it should have.

The next leg of the seven year cycle falls sometime in 2015. Judging by the recent euphoria surrounding the recent market performance, this market could be nearing it’s top. 

This article was not written to promote fear, but rather to enlighten people to the history of the markets and the consistency of market declines in these 7 year cycles. 

Good luck and happy investing. 

Liberty Balance Blogspot

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ESPY's – Durant, Rousey Top Athlete Honors

Durant wins two ESPY awards. (a.espncdn.com)

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By Desmond Ford with AP

LOS ANGELES — Durant of the Oklahoma City Thunder also won best NBA player on Wednesday night, ending LeBron James’ two-year reign in both categories.

Durant beat out fellow male athlete nominees Miguel Cabrera of the Detroit Tigers, Peyton Manning of the Denver Broncos and boxer Floyd Mayweather during the show hosted by rapper Drake at the Nokia Theatre.

Ronda Rousey, the first female UFC champion, won over WNBA star Maya Moore, Olympic champion skier Mikaela Shiffrin and Brenna Stewart of national champion Connecticut.

The winners in most categories were determined by fan voting.

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Ship Rescue – Just Jump Onto the Little Boat and Climb the Ladder

Casino boat Escapade, grounded off the coast of Tybee Island. (AP Photo/U.S. Coast Guard)

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By Desmond Ford

After 16 hours stuck at sea, passengers stranded on a casino boat that ran aground off Georgia’s coast were ferried to shore Wednesday aboard two Coast Guard cutters.

U.S. Coast Guard ship Maria Bray brings passengers ashore. (AP Photo/Savannah Morning News, Brittney Lohmiller)

Passengers and crew reached the dock shortly after 4 p.m. nearly a day after the boat left on it’s maiden voyage of its operator’s new Savannah service Tuesday night.

Four people were ferried ashore by helicopter.

Rescued passengers disembark. (AP Photo/The Morning News, Brittney Lohmiller)

The casino ship “The Escapade” is operated Florida-based Tradewinds Casino Cruise.

“There was a lack of sleep but they kept us entertained,” said Bernard Yount of nearby Springfield, Georgia. “I don’t really think anybody was scared. I didn’t see anybody panic. A few people were maybe worried about kids being home or animals being in the house.”

The crew were able to feed the passengers and the ship’s generator kept the lights on and the air conditioning going.

Passenger Michael Alcott of Savannah said “The AC was blowing cold. They had food,” said Alcott, 39. He said people slept on the floor using life jackets as pillows.

Both Alcott and passenger Dina Cook of Savannah said they felt the ship strike something at 9:30 p.m.

The Coast Guard said it was notified about midnight that the ship was stuck.

“It was nerve-wracking, the fact that we were not being told anything,” Cook said.

Initial attempts to tow the boat failed when the tow lines broke.

Those aboard were transferred first to small boats that hold about eight people, then to the two larger vessels, Petty Officer 1st Class Lauren Jorgensen said.

Tara Sinclair and Gwendolyn Miller greet Veronica Hayward. (AP Photo/The Morning News, Brittney Lohmiller)

Tara Sinclair, waiting at the Savannah dock for her mother, 66-year-old passenger Veronica Heyward, said her mom told her passengers had to “jump from the big boat to the little boat and then climb a rope ladder” onto the cutter. “She called it a Fear Factor moment,” Sinclair said.

Jorgensen said the area where the boat was stranded was too shallow for the Coast Guard boats to pull alongside it.

The 174-foot-long Escapade was still stranded about 1.8 miles off the north end of Tybee Island, a popular beach destination east of Savannah, in the Calibogue Sound near Hilton Head, South Carolina, the Coast Guard said.

The Escapade is a casino ship operated by Florida-based Tradewinds Casino Cruise. The company’s Facebook page said that Tuesday night was to be the maiden voyage for its Savannah cruise service and passengers were invited to board for free.

The vessel is a three-story ship capable of carrying 500 passengers. It’s outfitted with slot machines, poker and blackjack tables and a roulette wheel.

Alcott said he felt the ship jolt when it ran aground about 9:30 Tuesday night. He said passengers continued to gamble for about three hours until they were told that they were stuck.

He and Cook both said the ship was listing at a sharp angle that forced people to walk leaning to one side, which Cook said left her with swollen ankles.

As she headed toward the buses that were shuttling passengers to their cars, Cook said she was ready for the experience to be over.

“I’m ready to go home and take a long, hot bath,” she said.

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