Hot off the Press: Strike a pose edition

Blogger's note: Since the NYT implemented an online subscription policy, capping the number of articles non-subscriber's can access monthly at 20, the paper will have a much reduced presence on "Hot off the Press" posts from now on.

Reducing your exposure to Bisphenol A (BPA), which has been linked to breast and prostate cancer, infertility, early puberty in girls, obesity and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, is as easy as canning canned food from your diet: http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/greenspace/2011/03/bpa-canned-food.html.

Canadians will be heading to the polls in early-May, and current Prime Minister Stephen Harper is only taking five questions from the press each day: http://www.thestar.com/news/canada/politics/article/966583--how-many-harper-taking-only-five-questions-per-day-from-media?bn=1.

The Federal Reserve (which is the privately owned bank that prints and loans us money, making oodles off the interest in the process) has released a list of the institutions it loaned money to during the financial crisis: http://www.thestar.com/business/article/967057--fed-names-banks-that-drew-loans-during-crisis?bn=1.

Here is a DMR list of all the bills that survived or fell victim to last week's "funnel" in the Iowa legislature: http://www.desmoinesregister.com/article/20110401/NEWS10/104010356. Among the bills to die was this:

STAND-YOUR-GROUND: Iowans could use reasonable force, including killing someone, to prevent serious injury or death to themselves or someone else, when they’re anywhere they have a legal right to be. No duty to first try to flee. HF 573.

I'm just putting that out there — not saying it's good or bad. Still alive, shamefully, is:

ANIMAL FACILITIES: Iowa would ban undercover videotaping of animal facilities. HF 589.

Here is a NYT op-ed regarding a proposed bill aimed at allowing interstate trade regulations (OH MY GOD! — REGULATIONS!) on the direct sale of alcohol. Basically, you would be unable to directly buy wine or beer directly from an out-of-state producer, which would protect the nation's massive wholesale industry: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/04/04/opinion/04white.html.

Republicans in the Iowa House have proposed legislation that would slash the budget for the community advocacy division of the Iowa Department of Human Rights in half: http://blogs.desmoinesregister.com/dmr/index.php/2011/04/04/iowa-to-cut-human-rights-advocacy-budget-in-half/.

The number of aspiring teachers in California has plummeted: http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-teaching-20110404,0,3739990.story. No surprise, since California doesn't give a shit about its teachers. Why go into teaching when education funds are being slashed to the marrow and young teachers bear most of the burden of layoffs due to seniority based bumping?