1. The report from the U.S. Department of Education recently revealed two-thirds of students take out loans for college and have an average debt of $23,186 as of graduation. The report also revealed that the economic recession has pushed students to borrow 25 percent more money in loans during the academic year of 2008-09 than the previous year, marking the largest increase in the past 15 years. The additional loans totaled at $75.1 billion nationwide.
2. After analyzing tree rings, lake sediments and ice cores from 23 sites in the Arctic, researchers have discovered that temperatures in the Arctic have reached their highest levels in the past 2,000 years. This supports scientists’ claims that the region is especially sensitive to the warming effects of greenhouse gases and solar heat. After global temperatures slowly declined during the past two millennia, the past 100 years have seen an increase in temperature. Since the century-long rise in temperature began, the past decade has been the warmest.
3.The State Supreme Court of Montana is set to begin hearings on the appeal case of a lower court decision that ruled in favor of recognizing physician-assisted suicide as a state constitutional right. Robert Baxter, a 76-year-old retired truck driver diagnosed with lymphocytic leukemia, argued that his doctor’s refusal to give him a medically assisted suicide was a violation of his constitutional rights. After the court ruled in favor of Baxter on the day he died, the appeal case became a statewide issue, with both sides agreeing that the Montana Supreme Court will rule in favor of the right to a physician-assisted suicide.
4. Last Wednesday, gunmen killed 18 and wounded two in the El Aliviane drug rehabilitation center in Ciudad Juarez, Mexico, marking the city’s fourth drug rehab clinic shooting driven by drug cartel conflict in the past two years. Because Mexican President Felipe Calderón began a nationwide assault against drug cartels in December 2006, more than 11,000 people have died from gun violence and some 10,000 federal troops have been sent to Ciudad Juarez to replace corrupted local government forces and stunt drug trafficking into the U.S. With a record-breaking 326 deaths from gun violence, last month was the most violent month on record for Ciudad Juarez.
5. Last Monday, The World Trade Organization approved $295 million worth of sanctions on American goods that are to be paid throughout several years to punish the U.S. for failing to prohibit the payment of illegal subsidies on domestic cotton growers. This is the fifth ruling in an ongoing case initiated by Brazil that began in 2002, which aimed to penalize the U.S. for maintaining its place as the world’s second-largest cotton producer by paying some $3 billion to its own farmers on an annual basis. Washington officials argued that the U.S. should pay no more than $30 million in damages.
6. A taxpayer-funded film depicting pornography was released in Stockholm, Sweden last Thursday. Feminist documentary-maker Mia Engberg received 500,000 Swedish kronor, the equivalence of $69,000, in government funds to create the X-rated film titled “Dirty Diaries.” After receiving criticism by conservative politicians in the Swedish government, Engberg replied, “We are producing 70 minutes of high-quality film it’s just 500,000 kronor. They couldn’t spend the money any better.”
&-Compiled by State of Mind Contributor Tom Hammel
