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GRAND RAPIDS, MI -- Family Christian Stores, the nation's largest Christian bookstore and gift chain, has filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in hopes of restructuring its debt in the face of declining sales. The Grand Rapids-based chain said it does not expect to close any of its 266 stores in 36 states or layoff any of its 3,100 full-time and part-time employees. "We strive to serve God in all that we do and trust his guidance in all our decisions, especially this very important one," said President and CEO Chuck Bengochea in a news release. "We have carefully and prayerfully...

[excerpt from Yahoo Finance]   NEW YORK (Reuters) - U.S. stocks are poised for more upward momentum even as uncertainty over oil prices and Greek debt negotiations keeps the market on tenterhooks, analysts say.Strong fourth-quarter U.S. company earnings and signs of an overall improving economy, alongside what appears to be the start of a bottoming in crude oil prices, have given equities support.After starting 2015 with its sharpest monthly drop in a year and a spike in volatility, the benchmark S&P 500 (.SPX) hit an intraday record on Friday while the Dow Jones Industrial Average (.DJI) reached its highest point...

A recent state poll asking Russians about their fears has laid bare a telling change in attitudes: more than double the number of respondents said they feared a nuclear war compared to two years ago. Russia's deteriorating relations with the West and the economic turmoil that followed sanctions imposed on Moscow for its meddling in Ukraine have had a significant impact on Russians' view on the likelihood of nuclear war or going hungry, the poll published Thursday by state-run VTsIOM pollster showed. The number of respondents who said they feared a nuclear war has doubled to 17 percent from only...

To mark Black History Month, TRNN's Eddie Conway speaks to Dr. Ray Winbush about why people of African descent have a strong case for reparations for the slavery in the United States.(VIDEO-AT-LINK) EDDIE CONWAY, TRNN PRODUCER: Welcome to The Real News. I'm Eddie Conway from Baltimore. In honor of Black History Month, I have with me today Dr. Ray Winbush from the Urban Institute of Research at Morgan University. Today we're going to try to talk about reparation, the history of reparation, and the future of reparation. So please join me in welcoming Dr. Ray Winbush. Thank you for coming....

Illinois poverty on rise since 2010; four counties at greatest risk, says report Caitlin Wilson The number of Illinoisans living in poverty has risen steadily since 2010, with nearly 15 percent of residents living at or below the poverty line, a new report says, the highest mark since 1960. The Social Impact Research Center (SIRC) released a report detailing the statistics surrounding poverty in Illinois, finding that Illinois “has plenty of room for improvement” in comparison to other states when it comes to residents living in poverty, and that 14 of the state’s counties have more than 20,000 residents in...

White House Warns Europe On Greek Showdown Washington blames Europe for the lack of global recovery and is losing its patience with EMU creditor states that fail to pull their weight By Ambrose Evans-Pritchard 13 Feb 2015 The Obama administration has leapt to the defence of Greece, warning Germany and Europe’s creditor powers that they must meet Athens half-way to avert a potentially dangerous rupture and a euro break-up. Caroline Atkinson, the US deputy-national security adviser, said the eurozone authorities had imposed the main burden of adjustment on the weaker deficit states and should do more to accept their share...

Regular readers know that I don’t approve of drug use, but that I also favor legalization because the Drug War has been a costly and ineffective failure.(And it’s led to horrible policies such as intrusive money-laundering laws and Orwellian asset-forfeiture laws).So I was happy when folks in Colorado voted to decriminalize marijuana use, even if part of me didn’t like the idea that politicians would gain a new source of tax revenue.If nothing else, what’s happening in Colorado (and Washington state) will be an interesting social experiment.And even though we only have a modest bit of data, I’m going to be...

At midnight, Greece turns into a pumpkin. The clock is clearly ticking but is this the 10th or 11th hour? Given the eurozone propensity to extend deadline after deadline, it's hard to say precisely what time this is. But we can say Greek Bailout Talks with Europe Break Down. Eurozone finance ministers’ first attempt to grapple with the bailout demands made by the new Greek government broke down in recriminations after the two sides failed even to agree a way to take negotiations forward after six hours of talks in Brussels. Jeroen Dijsselbloem, the Dutch finance minister who chairs the...

The political centre across southern Europe is disintegrating. Establishment parties of centre-left and centre-right - La Casta, as they say in Spain - have successively immolated themselves enforcing EMU debt-deflation. Spain's neo-Bolivarian Podemos party refuses to fade. It has endured crippling internal rifts. It has shrugged off hostile press coverage over financial ties to Venezuela. Nothing sticks. The insurrectionists who came from nowhere last year - with Trotskyist roots and more radical views than those of Syriza in Greece - are pulling further ahead in the polls. The latest Metroscopia survey gave Podemos 28pc. The ruling conservatives have dropped to...

With tax receipts tumbling and ELA funding hitting its limit, the Greeks are up against it. On the other side, the Greek strength in the face of EU's demands (and Eurogroup's realization of the uncertainty this could lead to) has apparently led to the start of compromise. As Bloomberg reports, •*GERMAN, GREEK OFFICIALS SIGNAL COMMON GROUND ON AID DEAL •*GERMANY SAID NOT TO INSIST ALL PARTS OF CURRENT BAILOUT STAY •*GREECE SAID TO BE OPEN TO SURPLUS, PRIVATIZATION DEBATE As Merkel noted earlier, "Europe is always about finding a compromise," and it appears they are getting closer - as long...

One of the big reasons for the slowdown at the 29 West Coast ports isn't on the tip of everyone's tongues, including elected officials, is because the public doesn't see it, he said. It's like cracks in the foundation of a house: virtually invisible but still very dangerous for the structural integrity of the house.

Diana Choyleva of Lombard Street Research, who produces an “unmassaged” calculation of China’s true economic growth, just reported that China’s fourth quarter GDP growth plummeted to 1.7 percent, versus the official 7.4 percent rate. According Choyleva, “Dire data out of China are competing head-on with the Greek political drama as the most destabilizing factor for the global economy and financial markets.” Lombard Street calculates that in 2014, real annual GDP growth averaged 4.4 percent, versus the official government rate of 7.3 percent. But what is more foreboding for the Middle Kingdom is that they see economic growth sequentially collapsing. Choyleva...

In less than a decade, the one-time feeble U.S. energy sector has accomplished a record-breaking 180-degree turnaround thanks to advancements in new technologies. In fact, at the current rate, the nation is likely to hit production marks not seen since the 1970s. As such, we now live in a more energy self-sufficient nation, one that is inching closer every day to energy independence. While we utilize roughly 25 percent of the world’s oil on a daily basis, about 40 percent of the petroleum we consume is imported, down from 60 percent not too long ago. Consumer Energy Alliance (CEA) has...

ISTANBUL--The world's top finance leaders on Tuesday in effect backed currency depreciation as a tool for promoting growth by signaling strong support for aggressive easy-money policies aimed at boosting the fragile global economy. The support by finance ministers and central bankers from the Group of 20 largest economies for mass monetary easing--policies that have weakened exchange rates from Europe to Japan--is at odds with the traditional view that currency depreciation could have damaging effects on other economies. It also reflects worry that economies in much of the world could get stuck in a low-growth rut without decisive cash injections from...

While Steve had a number of hard to hear quotes for the CNBC anchors - such as: "There is no acceleration in underlying economic activity," and "There's this wrong concept that I keep on hearing about in the financial press about the acceleration in economic growth... It's not happening!" A stunned Simon Hobbs rebuffs, "That's a long list of non-ideal situations we find ourselves in," to which Ricchiuto snaps back "and we can keep on going!" "After a string of dismal data on durable goods, retail spending, and inventories, we get a good jobs number and everyone saying the economy's...

The United Nation’s climate chief says that reordering the global economy to fight climate change is the “most difficult” task the international body has ever undertaken. “This is probably the most difficult task we have ever given ourselves, which is to intentionally transform the economic development model, for the first time in human history,” Christiana Figueres, who heads up the U.N.’s Framework Convention on Climate Change, told reporters. “This is the first time in the history of mankind that we are setting ourselves the task of intentionally, within a defined period of time, to change the economic development model that...

An odd marriage of convenience between liberal Democrats and Tea Party Republicans is squeezing President Obama on his ambitious trade agenda, forcing the White House and top Republicans to fight a two-front war on an international economic effort the president hopes to secure before he leaves office. An alliance between the likes of Representatives Louie Gohmert and Dana Rohrabacher — two of the House’s most conservative members — and Rosa DeLauro and Louise Slaughter — ardent liberals — is unlikely enough. But as the political fringes expand on each end, they are challenging another strange-bedfellows alliance between Mr. Obama and...

Just weeks after President Obama proclaimed that America had turned the corner and his "middle class economics" was working, the public is more pessimistic than they've been in months, and few think Obama's policies have significantly helped the middle class, the latest IBD/TIPP poll finds.

Myles Udland February 9, 2015 Millennials are storming back into the work force. Friday's monthly jobs report showed that in January nonfarm payrolls grew by 257,000 in the US. And with revisions to recent reports, the past three months were the strongest for job creation in the US in 17 years. The main driving force behind this trend? Millennials. Workers between the ages of 25 and 34 have been surging back into the workforce over the past several years, with this trend really taking off in 2014. (snip)

"This is probably the most difficult task we have ever given ourselves, which is to intentionally transform the economic development model, for the first time in human history. This is the first time in the history of mankind that we are setting ourselves the task of intentionally, within a defined period of time, to change the economic development model that has been reigning for the, at least, 150 years, since the industrial revolution." Those were the words spoken on Feb. 4 by Christiana Figueres, the executive secretary of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), under the auspices...