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Ebola is threatening much of the world’s chocolate supply. Ivory Coast, the world’s largest producer of cacao, the raw ingredient in M&M’s, Butterfingers and Snickers Bars, has shut down its borders with Liberia and Guinea, putting a major crimp on the workforce needed to pick the beans that end up in chocolate bars and other treats just as the harvest season begins. The West African nation of about 20 million — also known as Côte D’Ivoire — has yet to experience a single case of Ebola, but the outbreak already could raise prices. The world’s chocolate makers have taken notice....

-Source claims Lewisham hospital response to case was farcical -Man was admitted despite plans to send Ebola patients to specialist centre -One ward reportedly refused to have him and medics "reluctant" to treat him -Came on same day as high-profile NHS drill in how to respond to outbreak -Insider says staff only have aprons, masks and gloves - not bio suits -Feverish patient later found not to have deadly Ebola virus A London hospital was totally unprepared when a suspected Ebola patient walked into A&E, it was claimed today. Health authorities have carried out high-profile drills in a bid to...

Worries over the worldwide spread of Ebola grew Thursday after three more health workers were quarantined in Spain and North America threw up border controls at main ports of arrival from the plagued African states. The United States and Canada announced new screening measures at major airport hubs to check travellers for symptoms of the deadly disease, and pressure grew for other nations to follow their lead. The Madrid hospital treating infected Spanish auxiliary nurse, Teresa Romero, also announced her condition had worsened on Thursday. Romero, the first person known to have been infected with Ebola outside of Africa, has...

I am starting this thread to get suggestions on what items would be useful to have at one's house and at the ready for the following scenario.Initial Conditions: 1. Ebola has started to ravage the United States and many people are already infected with it, many of whom don't even realize yet that they are infected. 2. The the emergency rooms and hospitals are already filled up to the brim with fresh Ebola cases making hospitals a dangerous place to be if you don't already have Ebola and useless in terms of actually helping you any way if you do....

America, the land of the free, the home of the brave, is in a social-media panic because Dr. Kent Brantly, the 33-year-old Indiana physician who contracted Ebola while battling it in Liberia, is coming home as he struggles to hang onto life. This fear-laden response to a true American hero is out of touch with the fundamental principles of this country. The Internet is afire with protest, and the misleading headlines stating that Ebola is being brought to the U.S. spread more fear but no understanding or empathy. Brantly himself makes me proud to be both an American and a...

... A report in the New York Post’s Page Six that Karl Rove told a conference last week that Hillary Clinton might be brain-damaged after a 30-day hospital stay during her illness at the end of 2012 caused a volcanic eruption of denunciation aimed at the Republican strategist. Rove was accused, among other things, of dealing the age card from the bottom of the deck. Rove denies saying “brain damage,” and the Page Six report didn’t put quote marks around that phrase.... The clot, according to The Washington Post, “can cause permanent brain damage, coma or death if not detected...

After the 9/11 terror attacks in 2001, members of the American left found one thing they could all agree on: America's Our First Amendment rights were in peril. The American Prospect insisted on Sept. 12, when the rubble was still burning and the dead had not yet been retrieved, that "a number of government agencies and their cheerleaders would be clearly tempted to lock the Bill of Rights away in some basement dustbin of the National Archives." Two weeks later, novelist Barbara Kingsolver warned, "Patriotism threatens free speech with death." She bravely attacked the claim that "free speech is un-American."...

Though officials at the World Health Organization are feverishly working to stop the spread of the Ebola virus in what is now seven African nations, their efforts may be for naught. In Guinea, a hot spot for the deadly contagion, government health officials have said that the outbreak is nearly under control. Yet, Reuters reports that the government “planned to stop publicly releasing the death toll to avoid causing unnecessary panic.” But panic may be in order. Despite the best efforts of emergency health workers it appears that virus may have crossed out of Africa into Europe.

Just had a very large violent quake here in So Cal. Scary.

Democratic strategists are quietly hitting the panic button. As political analyst Charlie Cook noted yesterday, “Democrats haven’t had a week this bad since 2010 and it’s only Wednesday.” Not only did Democrats lose a special election in Florida, but a new NBC News/Wall Street Journal national poll and surveys in four key Senate races (by a Democratic pollster) are painting an ugly picture for November. Analysts can disagree about the national meaning of the Florida special election, but the fact that the Democratic dream candidate — former Florida state financial officer Alex Sink — outspent and lost to David Jolly,...

Every time events fail to confirm the predictions of the global waming models, we see putative scientists thinking up excuses, like a "pause" that just interrupts the inevitable, absolutely beyond dispute, no discussion allowed predictions that...uhh...are just around the corner. While amusing it is also pathetic. And even worse are the journalists and non-specialist scientists who accept rationalization in place of rigor.

The most important thing about the policy move announced by President Obama on Thursday is not its practical significance — which is frankly very hard to predict — but rather what it tells us about the mindset of the president and his top lieutenants. In that respect, the past few days have marked a significant change, and signaled a new and unprecedented level of panic and chaos. **SNIP** If the Senate Democrats championing the Landrieu bill (which would impose a guaranteed ­renewability requirement on all 2013 plans, overriding ObamaCare’s qualified-coverage mandates) got their way, they would expose deep divisions in...

Rep. Jim McDermott (D., Wash.) said “I haven’t seen this much panic on the [House] floor since 9/11″ in response to the House Republican proposal allowing insurers to offer healthcare plans scheduled to be cancelled under Obamacare Friday morning: JIM MCDERMOTT: Mr. Speaker, my mother used to say, patience is a virtue. I haven’t seen so much panic on this floor since 9/11.

The firestorm over President Obama's "you can keep your plan" lie now threatens to singe vulnerable Democrats next year, so they're springing into action to try to force the administration to keep its word. Louisiana's Mary Landrieu -- an ardent Obamacare supporter -- is scrambling to undo one of the obvious consequences of a law she's voted to pass, fund, and retain: Sen. Mary Landrieu said Wednesday she would propose legislation to ensure all Americans could keep their existing insurance coverage under Obamacare, a fresh sign of the political problems the law’s rollout has created for congressional Democrats. Landrieu, a...

The State Department has evacuated non-emergency U.S. government personnel from the U.S. Consulate in Lahore, Pakistan, and has warned Americans to defer all non-essential travel to Pakistan due to 'specific threats' to that mission, a U.S. official said. In the travel warning issued Thursday night, the State Department advised Americans to defer all nonessential travel to Pakistan. “The presence of several foreign and indigenous terrorist groups poses a potential danger to U.S. citizens throughout Pakistan,” the statement read. “The Government of Pakistan maintains heightened security measures, particularly in the major cities. Threat reporting indicates terrorist groups continue to seek opportunities...

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NEW YORK – Stocks dropping across the globe. Six weeks of gains wiped out in the U.S. The biggest drop in the Dow Jones industrial average in 1 1/2 years. It’s easy to give into panic and sell along with everyone else. But there is a good case for staying calm. Three reasons you may want to hold on to your stocks: – STRONGER ECONOMY: Nothing kills a stock rally like a recession. Four of the five previous bull markets ended as investors sold during a recession, or anticipated one. Are we anywhere near a recession now? Quite the opposite....

Over-the-counter emergency contraception has just survived a fourteen-year slog through the federal bureaucracy, with the Justice Department announcing this week that it will finally allow people of all ages to purchase the pill without a prescription. Obama backed down when it looked like a lawsuit over the age restriction would make it all the way to the Supreme Court. Apparently, after years of citing paternal concerns as the reason his administration has ignored the recommendations of doctors and lawyers, he just doesn’t want to continue to have this fight in public. In April, when Obama became the first sitting president...

Ahead of December 21, which marks the conclusion of the 5,125-year "Long Count" Mayan calendar, panic buying of candles and essentials has been reported in China and Russia, along with an explosion in sales of survival shelters in America. In France believers were preparing to converge on a mountain where they believe aliens will rescue them. The precise manner of Armageddon remains vague, ranging from a catastrophic celestial collision between Earth and the mythical planet Nibiru, also known as Planet X, a disastrous crash with a comet, or the annihilation of civilisation by a giant solar storm. In America Ron...

In October, we published two articles suggesting that there might be a stock market panic in October.  We were early.  Whether the delay in the potential market panic was due to organic reasons, such as the excitement leading up to the November election, or some other factor is beyond the scope of this article. On Thursday, November 8,  the lower trendline of the Orthodox Broadening Top was breached.  In addition, The Dow, Wilshire 5000, Nasdaq, Russell 2000, and S&P 500 all closed beneath their respective 200-day moving averages.  You might say that the stock market panic button is about to...