The 3 ½ years from 2004 and mid-2007, reports NYTimes, was a period of “unprecedented wealth” on Wall Street…. Seven large banks and investment firms made a quarter of a trillion dollars… But as we know, profits took a hit in the mortgage mess.. those seven firms wrote down more than $100 billion recently…

….so, where to recoup? Why not water? From his ranch in the Texas Panhandle, legendary oilman and corporate raider T. Boone Pickens has set his sites on the New Oil: Blue Gold – creating Mesa Water in 1999 and buying up water rights throughout the region. Elsewhere companies, including Royal Dutch Shell, are scrambling to lock up water rights and see torrents of profit down the way… By 2030 nearly half of the world’s population will inhabit areas with severe water stress, says Business Week citing an OECD study.

Congressional Budget Office says that 50% of GDP will go to health care spending in 2082, up from 16% today…

“The Unions Are Coming!” was the mantra at a Dallas seminar last week, where warnings of the collective bargaining to come to the area’s hospitals were issued. For the first time in decades, a Texas hospital voted to unionize in Houston. Dallas is next. The California Nurses Association represents nurses in the process…

Damn Yankees… When, in addition to hundreds of millions of taxpayers subsidies, the richest team in baseball, the Yankees, took 20 acres of parkland to build a new stadium from the otherwise barren South Bronx – one of NYC’s poorest areas – the city promised (and federal and state law required) that replacement space be created… that space has not materialized. NYC is dragging its feet, but cites costs of doing that work have almost doubled... after all, how much exactly is it worth?? Note: the new Yankee Stadium seats fewer fans.